I know how this ends, p.1
I Know How This Ends, page 1
Dedication
For my grandad—
who always saw me
Epigraph
“If you can look into the seeds of time, and say which grain will grow and which will not, speak then to me.”
—William Shakespeare, Macbeth
Contents
Cover
Title Page
Dedication
Epigraph
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
36
Fifteen Years Later
Acknowledgments
About the Author
Also by Holly Smale
Copyright
About the Publisher
1
It’s not hard to see the future.
We do it all the time without thinking: search the skies above us for what’s coming. A red sky at night is a shepherd’s delight, but in the morning it’s a sailor’s warning, so a sunny day is either behind or ahead of us. When dew is on the grass, rain will never come to pass (high pressure), but when clouds appear like rocks and towers, the Earth’s refreshed with showers. For thousands of years, humans have looked upward to catch a glimpse of what the future holds and thus plan accordingly.
Then rhymed about it to ensure that it sticks.
But when it’s literally your job to keep an eye on what lies ahead, it’s not just the heavens that hold the clues: they’re scattered everywhere, like raindrops. Data that’s easy to miss if you’re looking in the wrong direction.
The signs are always there, as long as you’re paying attention.
“So, basically you’re a Weather Girl.”
I lean back in my chair and study the face of Date Number Fifteen. According to his online profile, the key to John’s heart is “Cuddles and Coffee,” and he doesn’t like “people who don’t message back—we r hear to talk!” (But not to spell, apparently.) John enjoys “long walks on the beach,” “honesty LOL” and randomly adding LOL to basic statements. He claims to be forty-two years old, a Gemini (“whatever that means haha”) and a “six-foot-stop-asking” accountant who drinks “socially” but “never smokes” and is looking for his “next big adventure—is it you?”
At no point did John say he enjoys smugly demeaning his dates, yet here we are.
“Sure.” I take another sip of red wine. “Why not.”
“But not on telly.” There’s a manic, slightly feverish glint in his eyes, like a light bulb about to pop. “So not a real Weather Girl. Bet you would look very nice in one of those perky little suits, though. Just saying.”
John winks and takes a huge swig of his pint: fingertips stained yellow.
“I wouldn’t know,” I say brightly. “As you say, I’m not On Telly.”
“You could be, though.” He leans forward and I catch a strong whiff of the cigarettes he never smokes. “You’re hot enough, Margaret. Like, an eight. Maybe. Not quite. Seven and a half, but with the right lighting . . .”
I grin at the waiter as he arrives with two plates of pasta.
“Thank you so much.” Picking up my fork, I attack my tagliatelle. “Could we also please get a side of garlic bread—make that two—a burrata with pesto and tiny tomatoes, a Caprese salad, stuffed artichokes, garlic mushrooms and . . . ooh, a bottle of your most expensive red wine? And a tiramisu, please.”
John chokes slightly on his free bread roll and I smile sweetly at him.
“How rude of me,” I add. “Was there anything extra you wanted? Coffee, obviously. It is the key to your heart, after all.”
Date Number Fifteen glances at the menu, boggles slightly at the prices, then forces a smile at the patient waiter.
“No, I’m good.”
John looks me up and down, presumably to work out what my body will look like after £65 worth of Italian side dishes and whether it’ll be worth the financial investment. He says he’s an accountant; I’d imagine he’s calculating it to the penny.
“I like a girl who isn’t afraid to eat,” he says uncertainly as I pile pasta into my mouth and wipe carbonara sauce off my chin. “It’s very . . . sexy.”
“What a relief, John.” I finish my wine. “You’re a true gentleman.”
This pleases him: he is a gentleman. Here, finally, is a woman who sees him.
“You’re a breath of fresh air, Margaret.” He shakes his head, ruefully picking at his ravioli. “Online dating is the worst. You would not believe the amount of crazies I’ve met. Absolutely bonkers out there.”
“Oh no.” I tilt my head at him. “How awful for you.”
“At least you look mostly like your profile photos,” Date Fifteen grins at me with an errant piece of crab stuck between his teeth, “although obviously they’re flattering—but we all tweak now and then, don’t we?”
“We do.” I feel my nostrils flare slightly. “Which beach do you favor for your long walks, in this non-coastal city of Bristol?”
“Oh.” He blinks. “I went to Weston-super-Mare last year.”
“True commitment! And what’s an average weekend like in the life of Gemini John?”
He’s starting to look irritated now, and I think I can guess why.
“You know, just . . . normal stuff.” John rubs his finger yet again, and I make a mental note of it: number seven.
“Wonderful.” I beam at him. “And last weekend, specifically?”
“What is this?” John tries to laugh, which is unfortunate because the crab is still protruding, as if making a final doomed bid for freedom—possibly encouraged by all the talk of beaches. “A first date or an interview?”
I glance at my watch. “Are they not the same thing?”
Just in time, the waiter arrives with my order. I grin at him and he grins back.
“Actually.” I put my fork down and pat my stomach. “Can we get all this to go? I want to make sure we have enough energy for later, if you know what I mean.”
I wink at John and his surliness evaporates like water droplets on a hot car bonnet.
“Ooooh, bad girl. Straight to the point. I like it.”
“I’m thirty-six years old,” I say calmly, wiping my mouth and watching as John rubs his finger for the eighth time. “I haven’t been a girl for two decades. But thank you so much for repeatedly overlooking that chronological flaw. Much in the same way you have overlooked your own age, which I’m guessing is what—forty-seven?”
Date Number Fifteen winces. “Like I said—we all tweak. Right?”
“Absolutely!” I grin at him. “It makes sense to strategically alter the data to make sure you hit a younger female demographic. What an interesting way to reject the burden of time we all carry.”
The waiter saves him from responding by arriving with the bill and, with a twitching mouth, placing it in the middle of the table. I keep my hands flat and dimple at John for a few seconds—playing a game of bill chicken—until he sighs slightly and reaches for it. The muscles under his eyes twitch, and I watch his internal struggle. Am I worth extra garlic mushrooms? He glances at my breasts and decides: just. With a gallant flourish, Date Fifteen pays the whole bill, leaving no tip.
“So.” With my most seductive eyes, I push back my chair. “Shall we go?”
Poor John’s face lights up with such ferocity, I almost feel guilty. Almost but not quite. “Absolutely. My place or yours?”
I grin. “Both.”
“Um, how does that work?”
“Well, John.” I put a twenty-pound note on the table, stand up and grab my raincoat, handbag and giant umbrella. “I am going to go to my house, and you are going to yours. So that’s how it will work.”
“But—”
“You’ve failed this date, John. Sorry.”
“I don’t—” He stands up too and stares at me for a few seconds with his mouth open (crab still present), then looks at my tip lying on the table. “Why?”
“I’m so glad you asked.” I smile at the waiter, who is holding a paper bag. “Because you haven’t asked me a single non-rhetorical question all evening. You have stared at my breasts for the entire, uncomfortable hour. And not a single thing on your profile is true, including your height.”
All five foot ten of him bridles. “I am six foot. It’s not my fault you’re wearing bloody heels.”
“Oh, and you’re married.”
At this, his face completely changes, which immediately erases the one percent uncertainty still remaining. “What the—”
“With children.”
John pales. “You’re—”
“Crazy?” I laugh properly for the first time this evening. “I doubt it, John. You’ve rubbed the indent on your ring finger eight times. You also have one piece of dried alphabet cereal stuck to the back of your jacket, along with baby spit-up on your collar. Having assessed this data, I surmise that you have two children. One is less than six months, the other learning to read, so I’m guessing three or f
John—or whatever his actual name is, I’m assuming I’ll never know now—starts to froth like an overloaded washing machine. “What the hell kind of business is it of yours if my wife and I are—”
“Except your phone has pinged six times this evening and you checked it as soon as I went to the bathroom. So I’m guessing you are currently ‘stuck at work,’ sad-face emoji. Don’t feel too bad. Statistically, thirty percent of people using online dating apps are secretly married, so it’s not just you. You’re just shockingly bad at covering it up.”
Suffice to say, John isn’t LOL-ing anymore. It’s a good thing this little Italian restaurant in Clifton is so quiet on a Monday, because I think now he’s really “hear to talk.”
“So, you knew you weren’t interested and just let me pay for dinner anyway?”
“Yes.” I pick up my takeout bag. “Thank you. Much appreciated.” I hold up the bottle of wine to the waiter, along with the previous glass I’d already poured. “I’ll bring this back next Monday, OK? Washed, obviously.”
The waiter laughs. “Gotcha.”
I glance out of the window—yup, just as expected—and sling my raincoat on. John told me when we met that my raincoat and umbrella were “overkill in August,” but I’ve been watching the cumulonimbus clouds gather all afternoon. The sky doesn’t lie, unlike the majority of my online dates. As I walk toward the front door, I can feel John crackling behind me, the way you feel electricity in the air just before a thunderstorm.
“By the way,” I say, holding up the bottle of wine, before he can start yelling. “My name is Margot. And I’m not a ‘Weather Girl.’ I’m a bloody meteorologist.”
Then I open my umbrella just as the first few drops begin to fall.
And walk straight into the rain.
I probably shouldn’t have enjoyed that as much as I did.
In fairness to him, Gemini John was unlikely to be a perfect match for me; I’m not sure I want any man with a heart that can be “unlocked” at the local Starbucks. But I didn’t have time to line up another option, and Monday is Date Night. And no—I don’t normally make them pay for the entire meal. I’ve decided to save that as a special treat for the men who merrily tick the “single” box on a dating app and then ask their wife why they’re “being so neurotic” when they get home.
Irritated, I unlock my front door and attempt to get into my house.
Huge cardboard boxes have migrated slowly down the hallway over the last couple of months, and now one of them has fallen off the top of a teetering stack, barring my entry. With a few huffs, I ram the door open and stare at the broken plates lying in an accusatory heap on the floor. The box says “MARGOT WAYWARD’S KITCHEN SHIT” on it, which now seems slightly pouty.
“Fuck’s sake,” I sigh, pushing it to the side with my foot.
Then I step over the crockery pieces and carry my food to the small kitchen I’m still not used to. I put most of my free Italian fodder in the fridge, take my bra off with a sigh and grab a fork so I can peacefully make my way through the remaining tagliatelle without my date silently calculating how much each bite costs.
Still chewing, I pick up a pen and my little purple notepad.
Then I quickly scan the contents.
Date One: fifty minutes late.
Date Two: said the woman on neighboring table was “too old to dress like that.”
Date Three: sent me eleven unanswered texts in a row, followed by an unsolicited photo of his genitals.
Date Four: ate with mouth open, then helped himself to my mushrooms.
Date Five: asked for a “Body Count” ten minutes in.
Date Six: rude to waiter.
Date Seven: told me, while wearing a shirt with three buttons missing, I could have “made more effort.”
Date Eight: casually claimed “all my exes are crazy.”
Date Nine: used phone to work out his share of olives.
Date Ten: immediately told me “not to get too attached,” then winked.
Date Eleven: homophobic, racist, anti-women, anti-deodorant.
Date Twelve: doesn’t normally date his own age but will “make an exception” for me.
Date Thirteen: monologued for two hours about his exercise routine.
Date Fourteen: gave me marks out of ten as if scoring an ice-skating competition.
“Get back out there,” they all said. “Plenty more fish in the sea.”
Except nobody pointed out exactly what is swimming around in the depths of the online dating ocean in your thirties and forties: it’s all jelly and teeth and transparent organs and protruding eyes jubilantly announcing that “they want to find that special connection” as long as she’s a “nine or above.”
At least now when they ask for my “Body Count,” I tell them it’s currently zero, but I’m looking to change that and have dug a large hole in my garden.
With flared nostrils, I write:
Date Fifteen: married with kids.
Then I flip to the back of the notepad and scribble under my rapidly escalating List of Dating Criteria:
25. Doesn’t already have a secret family.
Flopping onto my sofa, I switch my burner phone back on. Suffice to say, after a few months of waking up to unasked-for images of body parts, I bought a second phone I could throw at a wall as hard as I wanted.
With a sensation of faintly impending doom, I start scrolling through images of men as if I’m looking for a vacuum cleaner in an Argos catalog: occasionally handy but not exactly enjoyable. The more faces you look at, the more identical they start to seem, until they’re reduced to a simple slide show of human features in a variety of positions: eyes, noses, teeth, beards that cover rapidly disintegrating jawlines, though they still “prefer women without make-up” and “will buy the first drink if you actually look like your photos.”
Nope, nope, nope, nope. Rather switch my toaster on and stick a fork in it.
Then I abruptly sit forward: Henry, 39.
This fish has a kind, open face, blond hair, a wide, dimpled smile. Henry is a fireman, six foot two, and has made no passive-aggressive statements about saying “something more interesting than ‘hi’ if you want to impress me,” as if he’s the eighth of his name and holding court. Henry is on top of a mountain, laughing in a pub garden, wearing a suit at a wedding that hopefully (but not definitively) isn’t his own. Henry is—quite possibly—a dolphin in an ocean of sludge-sliders and bottom-crawlers who try to stick their tongues down my throat without asking for permission first.
Surprised, I swipe right and hold my breath to see if we match.
Jackpot.
Then I send my normal message:
Hi Henry! Shall we save getting to know each other for a meeting in person?
Do you fancy dinner next week? Monday any good?
Margot
Straight to the point, as everyone should be.
The reply is almost immediate.
Hello Margot! Good idea. Sounds great! Henry
Frankly, I don’t have time to pen-pal for the next week while we sporadically discuss our favorite holiday destinations. Romance can wait until we know if the other person clicks their fingers at waiters or not.
Date Sixteen set, I put my phone down and stare around my tiny new flat.
Two months here and it still doesn’t feel like home yet.
Leaving aside the scattered boxes—which I very much have—it’s still a home for a person I no longer am: half of a pair. The bathroom even has His and Hers basins, which feels slightly aggressive. This is a flat for more than one person, those basins say. A couple’s flat. Don’t you dare come in, with your one face to wash, and store make-up and skincare in the second one.
After a few seconds, I reach forward and stare at my burner phone again.
I shouldn’t. I won’t.
Except I already know I will, so let’s save the internal struggle for when there’s actually someone to pretend in front of. Holding my breath, I open the social media account of an imaginary person I made up called @Lucy_Jones7. Lucy has a jaunty squirrel as her profile photo, works vaguely in “The Arts” and has uploaded a few pictures of flowers and pancakes to her profile so she looks like a real human, not a completely unhinged stalker faking an entire identity and then getting angry at men for doing exactly the same thing.
