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‘Should I put that in my ad?’
‘Your guy seems romantic! Or at least minimally above average. He’s the one in fifty who are worth the effort, because he is making the effort. I think that’s the ratio. For every fifty men, one is worth the hassle.’
‘Okay, okay, I’m writing something back. What about:
I’m shy, and I’m often late, but I make great coffee and I think it’s me you wrote to, to call cute? I can’t figure out who you are on my train, but come talk to me! I won’t bite. At least not at first.’
Emma laughed. ‘That’s … kinda fun!’ she said.
‘I am not actually serious.’
‘You could be though! Or, what about:
Wine me, dine me, sixty-nine-me, train man: just let me know who you are by saying hello, first? Love, the devastatingly cute blonde with the amazing hair (you forgot to say about my amazing hair in your advert, but that’s okay. Just remember it next time.)’
‘You make me sound self-obsessed! OMG!’
Emma shrugged. ‘I mean, you are, a bit. At least with your hair.’
‘This hair costs me two hundred and ten pounds every twelve weeks. I think it would be a crime against hair if I wasn’t proud of it, don’t you?’
‘Very true.’
‘This is hard,’ complained Nadia. ‘What if I reply, and it’s shit, and he loses interest?’
‘Woah, woah, woah, friend – stop that before it starts! It is NOT your job to seduce him. It is his job to impress you. Whoever the next guy is, he has to break the cycle, okay? No more simpering, pliable Nadia. Date like the Nadia we know! And love! Literally your state of mind cannot be to impress him. He’d be lucky to have you. Okay?’
‘Okay.’
‘And if he is the one in fifty who is worth being bothered about, you’ll be lucky to have him too. And together, it will be lovely.’
‘Okay.’
‘Literally, one in fifty, okay? He has to prove he is one in fifty.’
‘It’s hilarious to think he’s probably looking for his one in million.’
‘It is. Nobody will ever win those odds. We’re all only human, after all.’
Within the hour, a third bottle of wine had been ordered.
‘Wassabout being flirt-y. FLIRT-Y,’ slurred Emma, just enough to let Nadia know that she was as pissed as she was. ‘I’m-the-best-flirt-y. I really am.’
Nadia nodded, sagely. ‘You are. You really, really, really are.’ She sank back in her chair, and smiled at her friend without showing her teeth – the smile of the drunk.
‘I gotta go home,’ she said. Picking up her phone from the table and hitting a button to make the time glow, she said, ‘It’s almost midnight! I-gotta-be-up in like …’ She went quiet and used her fingers to help count from midnight to 6 a.m. ‘Six hours!’
‘I like your new routine thing,’ said Emma. ‘I couldn’t do it, but I like you for doing it. Is proactive.’
Nadia nodded, her eyelids drooping. ‘Me too,’ she said. ‘I’m-no-very good every day but I try,’ she said.
Emma paid, getting a receipt so she could expense it, and they feigned a more sober demeanour as they walked the flight of stairs to the reception area, not speaking except to say a strident ‘Goodnight!’ to the two stern-faced women in short black dresses and sleek ponytails on the desk.
‘Uber,’ said Nadia outside. ‘I need an Uber.’ She figured she could justify the expense of it since she’d not spent anything all night, even though The New Routine to Change My Life limited silly mid-week expenses like taxis. She paid her mum a good chunk of money every month, almost like rent, so that eventually the flat would be in her name. But the chunks of money needed to be bigger if she was going to own the deeds before she was 75. She poked around on her phone and ordered a cab.
‘Three minutes, it says.’ She glanced up in time to see Emma looking further down the street at something, and instinctively followed her best friend’s gaze to see Gaby – work BFF Gaby – waving. Nadia looked back over from her to Emma, who looked slightly panicked, and then shouted, ‘Gaby! Is that you?’
Gaby walked towards them, looking fabulous in what Nadia knew, even with her wine goggles on, was a date outfit. Hadn’t she said she wasn’t dating?
‘Hey, guys!’ she said, brightly. ‘What are you two doing here?’
‘We just sent an advert to the paper … for Train Guy,’ said Emma, smiling brightly.
Nadia corrected her, ‘Well. Didn’t send it. Wrote it.’
Emma shifted her eyes from side to side, mischievously. ‘Yeah. What she said.’
Nadia suddenly felt nauseous, as well as a lot more sober. ‘Emma!’ she said, as if addressing a naughty puppy who had peed on the carpet.
‘No,’ said Emma, giving nothing away. ‘I mean yes. No. Maybe!’
A white Prius pulled up alongside the three women.
‘Nadia?’ said a guy through the driver’s window, and Nadia looked down at him, waiting for him to say something else before realizing he was telling her that he was her ride.
‘Oh, I – this is me,’ she said, offering her cheek to Gaby to kiss it, and then to Emma. ‘Tell me everything tomorrow?’ she said to Gaby, alluding to her date dress. ‘I knew you were seeing somebody!’
And then to Emma she said, ‘You had better be joking about that advert! I swear to god, Emma.’
Emma smiled as if butter wouldn’t melt, helping her into the car and closing the door behind her. ‘Of course I am,’ she said, as Nadia wound down her window to hear her. ‘I wouldn’t send it without permission.’
‘We love you!’ Gaby shouted through the open window, holding onto Emma’s waist as the pair waved her off.
‘I love you both too,’ Nadia slurred, before telling the driver, ‘Hey – can you put something nice on? Some music? Something romantic. Something about love.’
The cab driver switched on to a station that seemed to play love songs on repeat, and Nadia left Emma and Gaby in the middle of Soho, her head filled with thoughts of the man on the train lusting after her, arriving home just as the last chorus of ‘Endless Love’ finished. She went to bed without taking her make-up off, dreaming of trains and duets and newspapers. And, of course, totally forgot to set an alarm.
7
Daniel
Daniel had had Percy block out the last hour of his Tuesday as a meeting in the diary, and slinked off from work early. He was headed to his mother’s for tea, and was in the perfect state of mind to get fussed over. He’d never be too old for his mum. He’d not told her about the advert – the only person who knew was Lorenzo, what with it being his idea. It was literally yesterday’s news, anyway. He wanted to forget about it. What a stupid, dumb, pointless thing to have pinned his hopes on. He felt like a right twat.
Daniel passed by security on the way out, and a man with a shaved head and a walkie-talkie called, romantically, Romeo, held up his palm for Daniel to high five.
‘My brother, my man,’ Romeo said, turning the high five into a sort of fist grab, pulling Daniel’s right shoulder into his right shoulder so that they bumped in a way Daniel had seen American sports players and some rappers do. Romeo wasn’t American. Romeo had been born in Westgate-on-Sea.
‘How’s it going today? You’re looking shaaaarp.’ Romeo spoke as if he was the comic relief cousin in a Will Smith movie about a comedy bank heist done in the name of love, but was white with blue eyes and blond hair scraped up into a man-bun, and had a degree in Landscape Architecture. (‘Turns out I don’t like being outdoors much,’ he’d explained, with a regretful shrug.)
Daniel tugged on his own collar, jutting it upwards like John Travolta. He’d worn a jacket with his suit trousers today, which wasn’t expected in the office and which the weather was about ten degrees too warm for, but he’d wanted to look nice because it lifted his mood. He liked to take care of himself, liked to spend money on clothes. He liked feeling as though he was putting his best foot forward – it bolstered him. And after yesterday, he wanted to feel bolstered.
‘I try,’ Daniel said, attempting to make Romeo laugh. ‘I try.’
The suit was navy, a colour he had always bought his formal wear in, ever since his first suit at twelve, which his mother had insisted be navy: ‘Because that’s what Lady Di likes Charles in.’
Romeo frowned instead of laughing. ‘Okay, cut the bullshit, man. What’s up?’
On Daniel’s second day back after his dad’s funeral, Romeo had found Daniel around the side of the building. He’d been crying, spinning around in small circles, pinching the bridge of his nose, trying to stem the flow of tears so he could get back to his desk without anyone questioning if he was back too soon. Daniel had never been rude to Romeo, but he had never gone out of his way to be friendly to security, either. He’d never ignored anyone on the door, but hadn’t extended courtesy beyond a mumbled ‘Hello’ each morning. After Romeo gave him a hug – two men, hugging, around the side of one of London’s most prestigious buildings in the middle of the day – and told him to let it all out, whatever it was – well. Daniel started to stop and chat to his new buddy in the evenings, when he was on shift, asking after his day or dissecting the Arsenal game the night before, and on one more memorable occasion listening to the merits of a dream-interpretation workshop Romeo was undertaking, until now it was one of Daniel’s most treasured moments of the day. It felt like normalcy. It felt like he’d found a friend.
Plus, Daniel particularly respected how Romeo hadn’t brought the crying up since, and didn’t pry as to why he’d been in such a state that day. He just carried on minding the door and greeting everyone who walked by, and that was a classy move, to Daniel. A real classy move.
‘You know what …?’ Daniel started, and he trusted Romeo to tell him the whole sorry thing. That he’d seen this woman and thought it would be cute to do a Missed Connection, and that he felt pretty stupid that it hadn’t worked. He thought he’d wanted to forget, but he didn’t: he wanted to talk about it, to be sad out loud.
‘What! Well, that’s damned cool of you!’ Romeo exclaimed. ‘It’s here, in this newspaper?’ He reached behind the reception desk and rifled through a stack of papers – it looked like a collection of the past week’s. He flipped through them, looking for yesterday’s. ‘Ah – got it!’
‘Oh god …’ said Daniel, but Romeo was already flicking through the pages with lightning speed.
‘Well, I’ll be damned!’ Romeo said. ‘To the devastatingly cute—’
‘Don’t read it out loud!’ Daniel said. ‘Jesus!’ Daniel held up his palms, in surrender. He knew the thing off by heart: he’d laboured over it for three days before he finally hit ‘send’ on the submission email. He didn’t need the agony of having Romeo read the whole monologue out to him.
Romeo gave a hoot of laughter and read the rest under his breath, only muttering the odd word.
‘Smooth,’ he said in conclusion, closing the paper and putting it back where he’d found it. ‘Really smooth, bro.’
‘Well,’ said Daniel. ‘Not really, though. She was in my carriage and didn’t look up once. She’d not read it. She was texting!’
‘Coulda been texting about the ad,’ Romeo said.
‘No,’ Daniel replied. ‘I could just tell. She hadn’t seen it. She’d have at least looked around the carriage if she had.’ It then occurred to him: ‘Unless she did read it, but didn’t realize it was for her. Maybe I wasn’t specific enough?’ He threw up his hands, exasperated by himself. ‘I’ve been like this all week,’ he told Romeo. ‘Self-obsessed and neurotic. I hate it.’
Romeo stroked his chin, leaning back against the reception desk.
‘You know, I met a woman called Juliet on my first day of training for this job, and thought we were destined to be.’ Daniel watched his friend talk. Romeo met a Juliet? He wasn’t sure if this was true, or if Romeo was about to hit a punchline.
‘She’d give me the eyes across the table, hot as shit even under that fluoro lighting they have, you know. Every day for a week she’d catch my eye, and on the last day I thought, damn, I gotta make my move.’ Romeo was wistful as he spoke, and Daniel understood what he was saying was, as implausible as it sounded, genuine. ‘But on the last day, she didn’t come. I never saw her again. I think about her, you know? Because I think we could’ve been something.’
Daniel didn’t know what to say. ‘I’m … sorry?’ he settled on, making it a question. A near-miss in love was a special kind of disappointment.
‘I just mean,’ Romeo said, snapping out of his reverie, ‘at least you went for it. You don’t have to regret it, you know? Good for you, man. You said something.’
‘Yeah,’ said Daniel. ‘But to reiterate: she didn’t see it. Or doesn’t care. So.’
Romeo nodded. ‘She beautiful? Your woman?’
Daniel smiled. ‘Yeah.’
‘She kind?’
Daniel nodded. ‘I think so.’
‘She work around here?’
Daniel narrowed his eyes, wondering if there was some sort of security-person network that meant Romeo could track her down.
‘Yeah,’ he said. ‘No idea where, though. Something to do with artificial intelligence maybe? I heard her talking about it the day I first saw her.’
Romeo offered his hand to Daniel so that they could shake goodbye.
‘If she works around here, maybe she’ll surprise you yet. Not to sound woo-woo or whatever, but I think it’s not enough to love – you’ve got to have faith.’
‘Faith,’ Daniel repeated, appreciating that Romeo was taking his plight seriously. ‘Okay.’
‘I’ll keep everything crossed for you, bro. I think you did a cool-ass thing.’
Two mornings later, faith wavering but still intact, Daniel had read almost the whole paper by the time the train whizzed through Angel, and Moorgate, and then Bank. When he got to the Missed Connections section, right at the end, he wasn’t going to read it, because what would be the point? But two words jumped out at him: devastatingly cute. That’s what he’d called her – Nadia. He looked up and around the carriage, suddenly sheepish and exposed. His body knew what he was about to read before his mind did. The hairs on his arms prickled in excitement and he felt the back of his neck flush and redden.
It’s creepy that you’re watching me when you could be saying hello, but maybe you’re trying to be romantic. I just want you to know that I won’t bite until at least the third date, so don’t be shy. If you think I’m devastatingly cute then be brave with it: kind, romantic and bold? That’s my love language. From the girl you wrote to with coffee on her dress, on the 7.30 at Angel x
Daniel smiled, and looked up and around the train again. Was she there? Was she watching him, like he had watched her? He couldn’t see her from where he always stood, by the doors. He was grinning like an idiot and couldn’t stop. He opened the paper again and reread what she had written. He liked that she’d called him out for being a bit creepy, because intellectually he knew it was borderline bizarre that he was being so dramatic, and making a joke out of it felt … intimate. Like, that was cool, that she could poke fun at him. You had to be comfortable with yourself to poke fun. And to say the thing about the biting and the third date – that was flirty, and cheeky. She’d complimented him, too, which was kind of key. He’d put himself out there, and she was telling him it was okay. It was good – it was an encouraging and funny and kind response. Just the right level of provocative. If he could see her, he’d march right up to her and tell her: drinks, tonight, 6.30.
But she wasn’t around. The train pulled into London Bridge and Daniel stuffed the paper into his bag. He searched the crowds for her face. He kept his eyes and mind alert as he walked through the station, all the way to his own office.
‘Daniel! My man! How’s it going today, brother?’
Daniel fished the paper out from his bag, and said to Romeo, ‘Dude. Check this out! Check it out!’ He opened the paper on the Missed Connections page and pointed at the response. ‘She wrote back, man! Can you believe it?!’
Romeo took the paper from Daniel and read the small section meant for him in silence, his eyes growing bigger and bigger in admiration.
‘Well, she’s a feisty one. Congratulations!’
Romeo held out a hand for Daniel to shake, and Daniel beamed at both the advert and his mate in front of him who knew this was a massive thing for him. He felt a funny sense of accomplishment. Accomplishment, and also slight dread because: what now?
‘You gotta figure out a way to get this newspaper connection off the page and into real life,’ Romeo said. ‘She’s asking you to!’
‘Yes, I do,’ said Daniel, nodding. ‘I mean. Surely I wait for her to be on the train and then just … go up to her and say hello, right?’
‘Sure,’ said Romeo. ‘Sure.’
‘Sure?’
‘Well. Or, you could amp it up a little, you know. Sounds like she’s a gutsy one. Maybe you could build the tension a little bit.’
‘Uh huh. Yeah. Totally.’ Daniel nodded. And then he shook his head because he actually didn’t know what Romeo meant. ‘I mean – like how?’
Romeo folded the paper and handed it back to him. ‘Write her back, man. Make this a thing. If you build up the anticipation, the climax will feel all the better – for both of you. Girls love that shit!’
Daniel nodded. ‘I’m not a girl, and I love that shit too! Romance is nice, right? The thrill of the chase and all that?’
‘You got this, man,’ said Romeo.
Daniel nodded, understanding. ‘So if I write back, it needs to be flirty, like she has been, but also – well, you know on the dating apps when people say “I don’t want a pen pal”? I don’t want it to seem like I’m playing a game where it’s more about the letters than actually getting to meet.’
‘That’s smart thinking, man,’ Romeo said. ‘You’re absolutely right. So maybe what you want is some kind of like, riddle, yeah? A clue that she has to solve. You said she’s clever, so I bet she’ll love that.’
‘A clue she has to solve, but nothing that makes her think she has to impress me.’ Daniel’s face darkened with a memory. ‘My mate Joel always did this thing at uni that he’d read about – do they call it negging? Where you like, make a woman want to impress you by making out that she hasn’t already?’
‘Negging, yeah,’ said Romeo, disapprovingly.
‘That’s some weird psychological crap,’ Daniel said. ‘I like her, and now I know she likes me …’ Then it occurred to him. ‘Oh. Well. Actually that’s not quite true. She likes the idea of me – we don’t know that she’s identified who I am. She hasn’t even been on the train since Monday, so …’
Romeo held up his hands. ‘Do NOT tell me that you’re doubting if she’ll fancy you,’ he said. ‘She will, man. I like girls and all, but I’m confident enough in my sexuality to tell you that you’re a handsome bastard.’
Daniel smiled, chuffed, already standing taller for Romeo’s compassionate words. ‘Cheers.’ His dad’s face flashed into his mind. His dad had always made him stand taller, always believed in him before he believed in himself.
Romeo held out a hand, and as Daniel met it he pulled him in for one of his half-hugs, half-shoulder-bump things.
‘You’re inspiring me to get a bit romantic myself, truth be told,’ he said. ‘I’ve had two dates with a woman I like, you know? Maybe I’ll text her and wish her a good morning, just because she’s on my mind. Nothing wrong with that, is there? If you feel it, say it, and all that.’
Daniel nodded. ‘That’s a nice thing to do for people we like,’ he agreed.
Romeo held out his fist so that Daniel could knock against it with his own, as a goodbye gesture.
‘We’re a right sort, aren’t we?’ Romeo said, and Daniel couldn’t help but agree. Love was in the air, and he was thrilled about it.
8
Nadia
‘I am going to fucking kill you,’ Nadia said in a voice note to her best friend. ‘I can’t believe you sent that! You total …’ Words failed her. She could not believe that Emma had sent in an email to Missed Connections on her behalf. ‘This hangover cannot process this. You’ve made me sound … cheap! And like I’m some sort of sexy temptress! What the fuck is the thing about the biting? Nobody has made that joke since the nineties, and even then it was always someone’s pervy uncle. I said it ironically, but you’ve not bloody used it ironically. Oh god. If I get approached by some weirdo seventy-year-old who looks like Piers Morgan and has his hands down his pants, I will actually kill you. I just threatened to kill you, but I need you to know I will actually slaughter you.’
Nadia was an hour late for work, and in a foul mood. She’d been on time for work once this week, on Monday, but had forgotten to set her alarm twice after that. Last night she’d had a cocktail after work with her team, and then met her old colleague Naomi for dinner and they had talked so late that she was basically asleep by the time she fell into bed at midnight – again forgetting to set an alarm. That meant she’d woken up this Thursday morning with a start, had to rush to shower, and hadn’t had time to fully assess if her outfit actually looked like an outfit or was mismatched in a way she couldn’t pass off as cool. She’d have to start The New Routine to Change My Life again tomorrow. Or maybe on Monday.
‘Don’t act like you’re mad!’ said Emma, when she eventually called back in response to the scathing voice note. ‘It’s a cute advert. I did you a favour! And I promise I didn’t do it when we were drunk. I saved it in drafts and only sent it yesterday, when I was sure it was a good one.’
‘It’s not a good one! It’s awful!’ said Nadia, determined to give her a hard time for doing it without her permission. I don’t bite?! What was Emma thinking?
‘No! It is a good one! I 200 per cent know in my bones he will approach you. You’d be talking to him right now if you’d been on time for work! That’s how good it is!’
Nadia had a weird twinge in her tummy at the thought of it – that if she had gone into the office on time, on her regular train, she could be talking to her future right now. But her future could wait twenty-four hours. Couldn’t it? She could use today to build her courage. Suddenly she was less angry and more excited.
After talking to Emma, Nadia picked up the paper again, open on the page with Missed Connections on. She took a breath and reread it, carefully unpicking it sentence by sentence.
It’s creepy that you’re watching me when you could be saying hello, but maybe you’re trying to be romantic.
Okay, well. That bit was actually okay, if she was totally honest. It was a sort of warning that he had better not be an actual creep, stalking her or something. She could deal with that. The line between big romantic gesture from a stranger and weird stalking was, actually, pretty fine, and probably rested on how handsome and well-adjusted the author of the letters was. Nadia had once read a Twitter thread about a girl whose date had known to come to the back door of her house, not the front, and brought a bouquet of lilies for her, because he knew she liked lilies. The woman said she’d never told him to use the back door, and that her favourite flowers had never come up in conversation; and to some it might have seemed like she was overreacting, but this woman said she knew in her stomach something wasn’t right. Two weeks later, the guy was arrested for masturbating onto her car bonnet at three o’clock in the morning.
I just want you to know that I won’t bite until at least the third date, so don’t be shy. Bloody hell. That bit really was awful. Horrid, horrid, horrid. I won’t bite until at least the third date? Emma was insane for including that. It was provocative in all the wrong ways. If Nadia had written it, she would have said something like … well. She wasn’t actually sure, off the top of her head. That’s why she’d delayed writing her own response – it was tough to get the tone right! But just because she hadn’t got around to it herself didn’t mean she wouldn’t have done it in the end. Probably. Maybe.