The day I ask to Jess is like
World War III
in my chest.
I am too much shitting my bricks.
‘Tell me you’re having a laugh, Nicu?’ Jess say.
‘I not laughing, Jess. I dead serious.’
‘What, like a real date?’ she say.
‘It will be nicest of days,’ I say.
‘With me?’ Jess say, looking with her demanding eyes.
‘We will have good fun times.’
‘Suppose so.’
‘Proper dating. In night-time,’ I say.
I swear Jess eyes
fill with the
tears.
She kick stones,
small,
big,
bigger,
away into the distance.
‘And I like your gorgeous physical,’ I say,
because all the girls need knowing this.
‘That’s sweet.’
‘So we go on night date then?’ I say.
‘We can go out at night,’ she say. ‘But it is not a date.’
WE CAN GO OUT!
I want to
jump,
cheer,
whoop.
Sit on nine clouds.
Jess
say
YES.
‘I thinking Burger King
or
greasy spoon,’ I say,
because these are
English date places.
‘No,’ Jess say. ‘Let’s do something better.’
I swallow grenade.
Does Jess meaning that we do …?
That we should to …?
That we …?
‘Let’s go up Ally Pally,’ she say.
‘Ally Pally?’
‘Alexandra Palace.
They’ve got a massive ice rink there.
Can you skate?’
‘Yes.’
I tell white
little lie.