‘Yes. You need to do something bold and brazen to get your confidence back.’
‘I don’t think I’m ready to sit in a restaurant that posh by myself.’ Item six had started out as a meal in one of Nottingham’s stuffiest restaurants, but when that closed down a year earlier I’d updated it to Hatherstone Hall. Originally opening up as a wedding venue, its boutique restaurant had swiftly garnered a reputation as the most exclusive eatery in the county. When a well-known Nottingham actor had proposed to his girlfriend there a few weeks earlier, it had been unofficially crowned the ultimate romantic place to dine.
I squinted at her. ‘Eating in a restaurant on your own by choice, knowing you have friends to eat with if you wanted, is one thing. Eating alone because you have no one else to ask is a whole different matter.’
‘Ollie, you have friends – and family – who would love to eat out with you. Not that long ago Boring Mark specifically asked you to eat in a restaurant with him. That’s not the point of this.’
‘I know.’ I wriggled awkwardly on her breakfast bench. ‘Maybe I’ll do some of the other out-and-about things on the list first, and have a couple of incidental meals with other people, then I’ll feel okay about getting pitiful looks from the waiter when I blow a day’s wages going to an expensive restaurant on my own.’
Steph tried arguing with me, but it turned out that the next possible booking was a month away, so that decided it. For the next few weeks I balanced work, hanging out with Joan, trying to teach my puppy who was boss, and ticking off the things on the list that would help build up my courage to complete item six.
I went to the Nottingham Contemporary Art Gallery one Saturday, soon feeling quite comfortable wandering about and forming my own opinions about the artwork, and even having a perfectly pleasant conversation with a forty-something man who then invited me to join him for a coffee. I of course turned him down, on the one hand because he was a man, and this was the No-Man Mandate, and on the other because I was meeting Karina at an Italian restaurant for a late lunch that ended up lasting until an early dinner, thanks to cocktail hour and lunch being taken up with talking about how Mum was doing. In summary: not great, but better than before. She missed me, but still couldn’t comprehend how I felt, or that what I needed also mattered. Karina and Aunty Linda were trying to persuade her to see a counsellor. Karina had also signed her up for a silver singles night out. I wasn’t sure which of these was more improbable.
One Thursday evening I watched Romeo and Juliet at Newstead Abbey’s outdoor theatre, surrounded by groups of middle-aged friends and younger couples with picnic hampers while I sipped my single glass of wine, a plastic plate of cheese and crackers balanced on my lap. At the half-time interval, Sam’s mum, Pia, spotted me. She invited me to join her group, while somehow not making me feel at all strange for being at the theatre alone. When I politely declined, she discreetly pulled down the neckline of her tunic to show me her bottle-green bra strap – ‘This is the one I was telling you about. So comfortable!’ – before patting my arm with a wink and leaving me to it.
I had tea and cake with Aunty Linda, and met Steph and a couple of her work colleagues at a gin bar. Not on the Dream List, but equally vital in helping my confidence grow as I wobbled my way through my newfound freedom.
The only outing that I found a real challenge was item five – a dance class. Going to Ballroom for Beginners with a dance partner is one thing. Going alone, it turned out, is a different experience altogether. There were half a dozen or so couples at the class, held in Bigley village hall one Wednesday evening. There were also six women, including me, and one man. The man, and most of the women, were regulars, and he had seemingly cultivated some bizarre hierarchy that determined which women got to dance with him, and who had to partner up with the other women. He instantly started sniffing around the new girl like a tomcat, which did not go down well with the others. One woman tried to trip me up during the warm-up, and another commented on how I looked like a ‘right trollop’, and how dare I think I could ‘waltz in here and bag Liam for the tango’.
Believe me, I did not want to bag Liam for the tango. His idea of being ‘sensual’, as he patiently explained in response to my objection about his creeping fingers, was my idea of borderline sexual assault. And if that meant I had no artistic expression, then fine by me.
Still, it was another tick on the list. Seven down, only five to go.
13
‘Table for… two, madam?’ the ma?tre d’ asked, with a polite smile, once I’d given him my name.
‘Just one, thank you,’ I replied, lifting my chin and pretending I did this sort of thing all the time.
‘Certainly, madam,’ he replied as though showing nervous women to their solo table was the sort of thing he did all the time, too. ‘A view of the garden?’
I tugged my pashmina a little tighter around my shoulders and followed him through the clinking of crystal and fine china in the dining room to the conservatory beyond. It was simply stunning. The fanciest place I’d eaten in before this was a flashy, ultra-modern hotel in London when Jonathan had sneaked me away to the West End to see The Lion King. We’d eaten to a backdrop of pounding dance music and raucous banter, and I’d been too tense to eat more than a couple of mouthfuls.
Hatherstone Hall was the epitome of serenity. The faint notes of a sonata from a grand piano mingled with the evening birdsong and gentle murmur of conversation. It was mid-July, and the air drifting through the conservatory doors was fresh and sweet, the gardens a mix of lush lawns and pretty flower beds. Everything from the paintings on the walls to the linen tablecloth and single peach rose in a vase spoke of class and elegance. I would have felt utterly out of place and horribly uncomfortable, except that each small gathering was getting on with enjoying their own meal.
I had a feeling that had someone famous walked in, no one would have stirred or even noticed. They certainly weren’t going to notice me.