Page 9 of The Riviera House Swap
And now she had to go to work. Because she’d booked yesterday off for her birthday topamperherself. She’d imagined getting up this morning, after a lovely but sedate night out, newly coiffed and tweaked and strutting into work as a brand-new version of herself.
Well, she thought, looking in the mirror. She would at least look different from usual. Only, having a slight green tinge to her complexion wasn’t the difference she’d been hoping for. Still, there was nothing for it, she thought, turning the shower down a few degrees in the hope of waking herself up.
Ten minutes later, she was sitting at the kitchen table eating a stale croissant and drinking instant coffee – a kind of low-budget version of yesterday’s extravagance – and scrollingthrough her mobile phone at the latest headlines. All of which were thoroughly depressing. Worse, too, some sort of algorithm spying technique had flagged to someone in cyber land that she was now forty and therefore her feed ought to be peppered with references to anti-ageing treatments, pension plans and lists of things she should achieve in the next decade. Thanks Google.
She thought back to last night – the bits that she could remember – and tried to smile. It had been nice putting the world to rights with Sal and Bess. Nice to vent a little bit. But she hadn’t meant to make it into a pity-fest. She blushed thinking about the cake destruction and the noisy proclamation she’d made in the bar. Hopefully, the loud music and the fact that most of the other punters were several drinks down meant that her spectacle hadn’t made an impression on anyone other than her friends.
She thought back to the things she’d lamented. It was true that she’d chosen safe options more often than not over the years. There was that time she’d signed up for adult dance classes but chickened out at the last minute, the job she’d been offered in TV that she’d turned down due to its unpredictability; she’d shunned a gap year back in the day because she’d wanted to save for uni – and worked in a bank instead. And of course there was Pierre. The one who got away. Or, to be more precise, the one she could have gone to but had decided not to, instead, settling for Rory a few years later as a ‘safe bet.’
It had been over twenty years since she’d met Pierre, and at least a decade since she’d thought about him. The seventeen-year-old student she’d met on French exchange who’d proclaimed his love to her and suggested they elope. She’d agreed, until the school coach had arrived back on British soil and the idea of trekking back with her life savings and backpack, leaving a note for her parents, as she’d planned, had started to seem faintly ridiculous.
Instead, she’d married steadfast Rory, whom she’d met in her first year at uni. And she’d had a nice life. A good enough marriage. Until it wasn’t.
Just… looking back, she wondered where she might have been if her choices had been just a little more adventurous. Perhaps she’d be wandering the Champs-Élysées right now, or tap dancing her way around theatres of the world. Maybe she’d have found the perfect location on her travels and settled there, basking in the sunshine. Or perhaps Pierre would have given everything she’d lacked with Rory: passion, adventure and possibly even children.
‘Stop it,’ she said to herself as she realised tears had formed in her eyes. She couldn’t go to work tear-stained as well as hungover. It was the nostalgia talking. Yes, maybe she should have had more adventures, but she couldn’t change the past, couldn’t chastise some younger version of herself for being cautious. You live, you learn. She’d be more adventurous going forward. If the opportunity arose.
She couldn’t exactly book a trip away right now though, and although she kind of liked the idea of kids, she wasn’t about to jump on the next virile-looking bloke who passed by her front door. As for dancing, she was barely fit enough to do the chicken dance, let alone a pirouette. And Pierre would have well and truly got away by now. He was no doubt happily married to some impossibly glamorous, French supermodel. She needed new goals. Forty-friendly goals. Softer. Realistic. With elasticated waist-bands and forgiving, longer sleeves.
Whatever fate had had in store for her down those roads untravelled, each one was now firmly closed. She ought to be sensible and get to work and try to think about her future and what kind of life she wanted to build going forward.
She pulled on her work clothes – black trousers and a sensible blouse – quickly blow dried her short bob and snatched up her keys and handbag.
‘Right,’ she said to herself, walking into the hallway and grabbing her coat from the hook. This was the first day of the rest of her life. And she was going to make it count – hangover or no hangover. She was going to see what fate had in store for her.
Seconds later, as if in answer to her thoughts, a leaflet dropped through the door. A small, photocopied, low-resolution rectangle advertisingMandy’s Movers. She picked it up. ‘A dance class for over 30s, guaranteed to de-stress and get things moving!’, Nina read aloud. The first session was tonight, at 6.30p.m., in the local church hall.
She shook her head. Yes, she was thinking about dance classes, but this didn’t sound quite right. She’d been thinking of going into the local dance school or somewhere a bit more upmarket. She already did a local yoga class once a week, so her desire for dance wasn’t purely about exercise. She wanted to get some serious training, see if she could harness some of her old flexibility.
She popped the leaflet on the hall table and was about to unlock the door when she stopped. Wasn’t this exactly what she was complaining about last night? The opportunities she’d wasted? The experiences she’d turned her back on over the years? Surely if fate did exist, the leaflet dropping in her hallway just now when she was thinking about it all was exactly the sort of thing she ought to force herself to try?
What harm could it do, after all?
Before she had time to think, she copied the mobile number into her phone and sent a quick message.
Just got your leaflet! Is there space for me to try tonight?
There promptly came an enthusiastic reply.
Of course! Wear something with plenty of give.
She fired back a quick OK, feeling slightly less certain. Plenty of ‘give’ sounded ominous. Why not ‘something comfortable’ or ‘sportswear?’ ‘Give’ sounded… mildly dangerous.
Still, it was done. She ran quickly up the stairs and shoved a pair of leggings, some trainers and a T-shirt into a carrier bag – she could go to the class on the way home.
She opened the door and walked out into the autumn morning. It was still warm, despite the fact it was October, and the air smelled fresh. She walked quickly to her car and climbed in, turning the key in the ignition and pulling out carefully into the road. The familiar journey to work passed in a flash and she was soon pulling up in the usual car park and making sure her pass was displayed in the window.
She sighed as she exited the car. Her stomach still felt uneasy, but her headache was lifting. It wasn’t the hangover causing her low mood, nor the prospect of a dance class this evening involving untested levels of flexibility. It was the sameness of it all. Fifteen years in the same job – a job she liked well enough but didn’t love, wasn’t passionate about. Would she be still locking up her car and making her way to the office in fifteen more years’ time, aged fifty-five? Then, ten years on from that, retiring to some beige bungalow down an unnamed road and fading into the background of everyone’s lives?
‘Come on,’ she said to herself aloud, causing a woman walking her dog near the car park entrance to look up, confused.Pull yourself together, Nina, she added, keeping her voice inside her head this time.
The woman walked on, her pace quickening. The little dog tugged on the lead, pleased at the increase in pace, and the woman half-tripped. ‘Pierre!’ she admonished the small chihuahua. ‘Steady!’
Pierre. That name again. Could it be another sign from the universe? Nina mused. Some small signal from some vague entity out there that Pierre could still be part of her life? But then, surely the universe, if it had time to send signs to forty-something admin workers on a Tuesday morning, would choose something more impressive than a chihuahua with a significant name.
Get a grip. Pushing back her shoulders, straightening her stance and trying out a half-hearted smile, Nina stepped into work mode and started to make her way towards the familiar building with its familiar desk in the familiar office that had been her daily destination for far too many years. And in doing so, stepped in a tiny present that dog-Pierre had left on the pavement, its soft form yielding against her court shoe.
‘Pierre!’ shouted the dog’s owner, noticing what had happened. ‘I am so sorry, love,’ she said, looking at the brown garnish on Nina’s black leather.
