‘I don’t know why you can never finish a dessert,’ Jamie said, laughing.
‘I could finish it. I just know how much Anna likes dessert.’
‘So it’s a pity half cheesecake, is it?’ Anna asked, managing to smile.
‘Look, if he doesn’t come, nothing’s lost,’ Jamie said. ‘I can just head home, it’s no big deal.’
And Anna was about to answer, but then the door opened and he was there, scanning the restaurant for them. Anna put up a hand, waved him over. She knew she should be annoyed withhim but she couldn’t really be bothered with it. She was just so relieved that he’d come.
‘I’m so sorry,’ Marco said, leaning across the table to kiss Anna, then pulling a chair over from a vacant table nearby.
Anna waited a beat for him to offer an explanation before realising he wasn’t going to, that he didn’t have one.
‘Why were you late?’ Cara asked.
Anna loved this little girl for her ability to just say what everyone else was thinking, but she could see that Nia was poised to tell her off.
Marco looked flustered. ‘Trouble with the Tube,’ he said, clearly unused to having to explain himself to a six-year-old girl.
Nia disappeared to pay the bill and they got ready to leave. In the confusion of picking up bags and jackets, Marco took Anna’s hand in his and whispered in her ear. ‘I really am sorry. I’ll make it up to you later.’
Anna felt her insides turn to liquid. Marco did things to her, without even touching her, that no other man had. Just his voice, that hint of an Italian accent, turned her on. She went up on tiptoes and kissed his full lips. It was little more than a peck, pretty chaste, but there was a part of her that was ready to give up on the whole afternoon and take him back to her flat. She closed her eyes for a moment, imagined pushing him inside the door to her room and up against the wall, how he would press himself into her body and then very slowly start to remove her clothes. She snapped back to the present, chastised herself for letting her sex thoughts in on this family day out.
‘Anna,’ Cara said as they bustled out of the door and into the street, ‘you’ve gone red.’
Anna laughed and made eye contact with Marco, whose expression told her he knew exactly what she’d been thinking about.
‘So Marco,’ Jamie said, clapping him on the back. ‘Are you a football guy?’
‘Of course. I mean, you know I’m Italian, right?’
Anna watched as they got into an animated conversation about football. She’d worried that they might have nothing in common, but she needn’t have done. Nia had predicted that sport would be their common ground. Nia was holding Cara’s hand and Anna noticed that Cara was holding out her other hand for Anna to take. The street was crowded but she took it anyway, letting the men go on ahead, dodging the crowds.
‘Is there a real lion in the play?’ Cara asked.
‘No, just people dressed up as lions and other animals,’ Nia said.
Cara looked disappointed.
‘And is there singing?’ she asked.
‘Yes, lots of singing.’
‘Have you seen it before?’
Nia nodded. ‘Twice, I think.’
‘Have you, Anna?’
‘No. It’s my first time.’
‘If you are scared of the animals, you can hold my hand. But remember that they’re only people,’ she said, a very serious expression on her face.
At the theatre door, they parted ways.
‘Do you know where you’re going to be?’ Nia asked. ‘We can come and find you, after.’
‘Not sure yet,’ Jamie said. ‘We’ll message you. Have fun, girls!’
