Read Online Running in Heels by Anna Maxted - Free Book Online Page A

to spray you with diet Coke, you were a fast runner, and now, and now…you’re a different person. You seem so muted .”
    So I reminded him that I’d just been involved in a multiple relationship pile-up and he had the gall to come out with the line about “high-risk stock”!
    I look at his tanned face side-on and marvel at his short memory. So, St. Andrew, I want to say. You don’t remember. Babs’s fifteenth birthday party, kissing me numb in your parents’ linen cupboard (I’ve not looked at linen cupboards in the same way since), mumbling a stream of testosterone-fueled rubbish about me visiting you at college, you’d write, you’d phone, we’d go out, I’d stay over, I was so shy, but god I was gorgeous—I was fifteen, I believed you!—and so I waited and dreamed and planned my dress, and silence. I couldn’t tell Babs and I couldn’t tell Tony. Thanks, Andy, you lying git. That snog-and-go reverberated in my head for years. High-risk stock. I reply, “I think that’s so wise.”
    Andy looks at me and laughs. “No you don’t,” he says—all green eyes and perfect skin. “What’s wrong, Natalie? You’ve been giving me the evil eye since the wedding.”

6
    I WAS SUCH AN EASY CHILD, AS MY MOTHER NEVER tires of boasting to the dentist, the lady in the bank, Mrs. Parekh in the corner shop, the man in the post office, her fellowreceptionists at the doctor’s office, and a great many other people who couldn’t give a toss. Tony—surprise!—was the difficult one, the baby who screamed so long and loud that my mother would often shut him in the front room and run to the end of the garden to stop herself from hitting him. Naturally we don’t talk about that, but I was told it once by an indiscreet relative. I suspect that my mother harks back so persistently because my failure to marry and spawn and shin up the career ladder without chipping my nails makes me less of an easy adult.
    If she could see me right now she’d be more disappointed than ever. A perfectly good son-in-law has been wasted and instead of hurling myself on a burning pyre, here I am scuttling to the studio to watch Melissandra rehearse with a full-beam smile on my face because the man who displaced my prospective husband, the man who my great friend assured me was more likely to donate his penis to a sausage shop than call me, the man who constitutes a blatant misuse of my horizontal resources has just called me (better three days late than never) and we are meeting tonight. So there. Altogether, today is turning out to be an excellent day. The Italian State Tourist Board press office responded to my fax, and while the essence of their response was “pay for your own bloody jollies,” they were kind enough to pass on the number of L’azienda turistica di Verona. I am researching flight details and hotels and liaising with the Telegraph picture desk. Matt is delighted and I am teacher’s pet again. His pleasing verdict on the Saul and Chris saga was, “A person who dislikes animals is one step away from a serial killer.” (Saul was frightened of Paws.) Then he advised me not to call Chris until my scab cleared. But Chris called me and we are meeting at Poncho at 10:30.
    Normally I wouldn’t be seen in a body bag at Poncho—it makes Taco Bell look like the Met Bar—but I didn’t want Chris to think I had nowhere to go on a Friday night. The party is a welcome back party, organized for Andy by his pal Robbie. Andy invited me—a sympathy invite—when I was captive in the Astra. I didn’t have the nerve to refuse. (I didn’t have the nerve to refreshhis memory either.) I’m going because Babs is going. Presumably Simon will be there too, so at least Chris will know someone. I didn’t tell Chris it was karaoke, but I did say that my brother Tony—vice president of