The Waitress Read online

  The Waitress

  MELISSA NATHAN

  To

  Samuel Mark

  Contents

  Chapter 1

  IT WAS ONE OF THOSE PARTIES THAT WOULD LIVE ON…

  Chapter 2

  BY THE NEXT MORNING, THE WARM GLOW WHERE IT MATTERED…

  Chapter 3

  EVEN THOUGH KATIE NOW KNEW SHE WANTED TO BE AN…

  Chapter 4

  SO FAR IT HAD TAKEN KATIE FOUR HOURS. WEEKEND TRAFFIC…

  Chapter 5

  KATIE ALWAYS FOUND IT SO MUCH EASIER GETTING BACK TO…

  Chapter 6

  IN THE CORNER OF THE SIXTH FORM COLLEGE COMMON ROOM…

  Chapter 7

  THAT NIGHT, KATIE SAT AT THE BAR WHERE JON WORKED…

  Chapter 8

  THERE WERE NOW EIGHT WHOLE SHOPPING DAYS TO GO BEFORE…

  Chapter 9

  AS SOON AS SHE REACHED HER PARENTS’ VILLAGE, KATIE FOUND…

  Chapter 10

  THREE MONTHS LATER, THE NOVELTY OF THE NEW YEAR HAD…

  Chapter 11

  THE NIGHTCLUB’S LOW CEILINGS, UNEVEN WALLS AND INTERMINABLE BASS MADE…

  Chapter 12

  THE NEXT MORNING KATIE’S HANGOVER WAS BIGGER THAN HER BODY.

  Chapter 13

  RICHARD MILLER, HOTSHOT LITERARY AGENT, SAT BACK AND LOOKED ACROSS…

  Chapter 14

  TWO HOURS AND TWO BOTTLES OF WINE LATER, SUKIE AND…

  Chapter 15

  AT THE END OF A FORTNIGHT, THE BUILDERS, POLYTHENE DOORS…

  Chapter 16

  THE NEXT FORTNIGHT SAW EVERYONE ADAPT, IN THEIR OWN TIME…

  Chapter 17

  THAT DAY, BETWEEN THE TWO OF THEM, DAN AND KATIE…

  Chapter 18

  THE NEXT MORNING WAS DECEPTIVE IN ITS LAZILY BEAUTIFUL START.

  Chapter 19

  DAN HAD NOT NOTICED HIS WIFE-TO-BE DISAPPEAR TO THE LADIES…

  Chapter 20

  DAN SAT AS NEAR TO THE BACK AS HE COULD.

  Chapter 21

  “WHAT ARE YOU DOING?”

  Chapter 22

  IT WASN’T UNTIL KATIE HAD SPENT A FRUSTRATING FIVE MINUTES…

  Chapter 23

  TWENTY MINUTES LATER AT 7.30, MATT STOOD OUTSIDE THE GNAT…

  Chapter 24

  DAN STARED AT HIS REFLECTION IN THE JEWELER’S WINDOW, IMAGINING…

  Chapter 25

  KATIE HAD ABSOLUTELY NO QUALMS ABOUT PHONING IN SICK ON…

  Chapter 26

  TUESDAY WAS MID-JUNE PERFECTION AND KATIE WAS WOKEN BY THE…

  Chapter 27

  DAN SAT ON HIS APARTMENT FLOOR, CLICKED HIS PHONE OFF…

  Chapter 28

  BY THE TIME SHE GOT TO WORK ON THURSDAY MORNING,…

  Chapter 29

  THE BIGGEST DAY OF CRICHTON BROWN’S CALENDAR HAD FINALLY ARRIVED.

  Chapter 30

  THE CAFÉ WAS CLOSING AT SIX SO THAT THE PARTY…

  Epilogue

  KATIE SAT IN THE CORNER OF THE CAFÉ, AN ESPRESSO…

  Acknowledgments

  About the Author

  Others Books by Melissa Nathan

  Copyright

  About the publisher

  Chapter 1

  IT WAS ONE OF THOSE PARTIES THAT WOULD LIVE ON IN THE COLLECTIVE memory, ripening over the years with significance and irony; a party that would launch a hundred favorite anecdotes and change lives. But to actually experience it was hell. It was full of tomorrow’s celebs and high-fliers, yesterday’s love affairs and embarrassments. The laughter was loud and the talk thunderous, the noise almost drowning out the din from the music deck but not making a dent in the clash of egos.

  Katie sipped at her paper cup of sweet punch again because she’d forgotten how disgusting it was. Ex-boyfriend number three, Hugh, was bellowing at her over the thumping bass. She hadn’t seen him for four years, and was frowning so hard to hear him that she looked as if she was straining. Hugh did not have a naturally loud voice, but what he lacked in ability he made up for in motivation.

  “…but the annual bonus,” he trumpeted, “you see, is a golden handcuff.”

  “A golden what?”

  “Handcuff. Uncouth to go into details, but they really know what they’re doing.”

  “Excellent. So, how is—”

  “I mean put it this way, we’re talking more than—”

  And then he did an impression of a person whose trousers had been set on fire. Katie was impressed. He’d rarely been so interesting. As he re-landed, the grinning face of their hostess, Sandy, appeared beside him. It was Sandy’s engagement party and she was very, very drunk.

  “Hello everybody!” she greeted them. “Hello Hugh-Poo. If I wasn’t a taken woman, you’d be in trouble.”

  Hugh gave a tight smile. “Anyway, if you’ll excuse me.” His voice was slightly pained.

  “Oh dear,” said Sandy. “You’re not leaving on my account, are you?”

  “No, no,” said Hugh. “I must just…” As he limped off, Sandy turned to Katie.

  “It’s so hard not to do it to him,” she whispered into Katie’s left eye.

  “I know.”

  “It’s his face.”

  “I know.”

  “How am I going to be mature enough to get married?”

  “Show me the ring again!”

  Sandy extended her hand in glee and Katie ooh-ed at the beautiful diamond in its platinum setting. As she did so, Geraldine, Sandy’s flatmate, appeared as if from nowhere.

  “Oh my God,” she muttered. “You’re not still showing that thing off are you?”

  They looked up at her.

  “Hello Gerry,” greeted Katie. “Sprinkling happy fairy-dust all around, as usual?”

  Ignoring Katie, Geraldine looked down at her flatmate. “People will think you’re getting married for all the wrong reasons, you know.”

  Sandy gave a regretful look at her ring. “I just think it’s beautiful.” She gave a little sigh.

  “It is!” squealed Katie. “Let me see it again.”

  Sandy, never one to stay unhappy for long, extended her hand again, as Geraldine tutted. “Have you been remembering to take pictures?” she asked.

  Sandy gasped, “Oh no!” She rushed off on heels that seemed to have turned her ankles to sponge.

  “I knew it,” Geraldine said to Katie. “All that money on the newest digital camera and she hasn’t taken one shot. Money to burn.”

  “You know, you should be careful,” warned Katie. “People will think you’re jealous.”

  It was Geraldine’s turn to gasp. “Me? Jealous? Are you mad? I wouldn’t marry that man unless he…I don’t know…”

  Katie raised her eyebrows. “Proposed?”

  Geraldine sighed. “Piss off.” She took a gulp of punch and then grimaced. “I told her she put too much sugar in this. It’s like medicine,” she said before finishing it in one. “I just assumed I’d get married before her.”

  “Do you want to talk about it?” asked Katie.

  Then Geraldine was off. “All the way through college—three goddam years—I had to listen to her pathetic relationship problems—that girl has the emotional maturity of a boohbah. I could become a relationship counselor just off the back of being her flatmate. The hours I wasted listening to her waffle. And all the time,” she took a deep breath, “I thought I was on to a sure-fire thing with that wanker. A man whose idea of commitment is to buy a newspaper. Mr. Emotional-Retard.”

  “Well,” sighed Katie, “you should have guessed from his name.”

  “And can you believe,” squeaked Geraldine, “two years together and he chucks me during a Pizza Express meal—a Pizza Express meal—and then comes to the party tonight?”

  “You
r ex?”

  “Yes. You know what he is, don’t you?”

  “An emotional retard?”

  “He’s a fucking emotional retard.”

  “So, where is he?” Katie looked round the expanse of oak-floored room.

  “In the corner,” said Geraldine. “Don’t look!” She yanked the back of Katie’s halter-neck dress. “Jesus, Katie, I don’t want him to think we’re talking about him. He’s arrogant enough already.”

  “Did you invite him?” choked Katie, rearranging herself.

  “Of course I did. We’re good friends. I’m completely over him.”

  “As long as no one looks at him.”

  “All right then, Miss Smarty-pants. I’ll introduce you—and then you can tell me what an emotional retard you think he is.”

  “Ooh, I can’t wait. Lead on McMadwoman.”

  Just as they turned round, Hugh blocked their path. He gave them both a big grin and Geraldine abandoned Katie to his monologue.

  “Right,” he said. “Goolies all straightened. Now, where was I?”

  Despite herself, after talking to Hugh for a while Katie remembered why she’d been able to stay with him for so long. Ten months and three weeks to be precise. There was a comfy solidity about him, a warm reassurance that seemed to emanate from his M&S cardi. And then he started to dance. As the drum and bass shifted to a new rhythm, he did things with his hips that reminded her of her Great-Aunt Edna trying to walk on a damp day. His pupils were now so dilated they looked as if they were in the last stages of labor.

  “So where’s Maxine?” she asked.

  “Away on business,” said Hugh, almost losing his balance and giving up on the hip movement. “She does a lot of travelling with her work. She’s doing very well. They’re talking promotion within the year. How’s your work?”

  “Brilliant!”

  “Really?”

  “Yep,” nodded Katie firmly. “Decided what I’m going to do.”

  She looked briefly round the room, so as to avoid Hugh’s reaction. When she heard him say “Good for you,” enthusiastically, she felt as if she’d just told him that today she’d learned how to count to ten and spell “fish.”

  “I’m going to be an educational psychologist,” she informed him.

  There was a pause.

  “Oh by the way, we’re moving into your area,” said Hugh.

  “Really?”

  “Yeah. Time to move out of the flat and into a house. You can get so much more for your money out your way. How’s your little flat?”

  “Fine.”

  “And the waiting?”

  Katie frowned. “Waiting?”

  “I mean, being a waitress. The waiting at table.”

  Katie shrugged. “It pays the bills. Until I get trained up as an educational psych—”

  “Oh yes, that’s right,” interrupted Hugh. “So what happened to your dreams of running your own restaurant?”

  Katie pushed the memory of confiding this to Hugh in bed one Sunday afternoon to the back of her mind. “Ah, those innocent dreams,” she smiled. “After a few years of work you realize why it was so easy being idealistic as a student. Because you hadn’t worked yet.”

  “Tell me about it,” said Hugh. “Mind you, I’m not doing too badly. Bonuses are amazing. Guess how much—”

  “Oh my God!” whispered Katie, staring beyond Hugh’s shoulder. “Look!”

  Hugh looked and turned back, unimpressed. Standing behind him was Dave Davies, champion oarsman, part-time model and lead role in all the best plays during their years at Oxford.

  “He’s come out, you know,” said Hugh. “Completely and utterly gay. His boyfriend’s called Kevin.”

  Katie gasped. “You’re kidding!”

  Hugh sighed. “Yes. But a man can dream.”

  Then, before she knew it, Katie was enjoying herself with this man who had threatened to do something silly all those years ago when she’d told him It Was Over. Of course, she hadn’t taken Hugh’s threat seriously, but sure enough he did go and do something silly, almost immediately. He went and found solace in the form of Maxine White—and four years on, he was still with her. Maxine White, she of the pointless questions in lectures, she of the stick-thin legs, no bottom, and shoulder-blades like pistons, she of the shiny lipstick and no lips. She of the figure a pencil would be proud of.

  Maxine White had been one of Katie and Hugh’s favorite in-jokes for their entire ten months and three weeks together—Katie had been especially proud of the nickname she’d given her: Karen D’Ache—so it was only natural that, almost instantly after their abrupt break-up, when Hugh started taking Maxine seriously, Katie had taken such disloyalty personally.

  However, after he had stayed with Pencil for the first year—longer than he’d been with Katie—Katie began to entertain the thought that he might not be doing it to make her jealous. It took until she spotted them introducing their parents to each other at graduation to finally acknowledge that their relationship was probably not a sub-plot in the oeuvre that was Katie’s Life. It took her another six months to regain confidence in the powers of the petite, hourglass figure over the long tall stick look.

  Ever since then, whenever she’d seen Hugh at college get-togethers he was with Maxine. In fact, now Katie thought about it, this was the first time she’d seen him on his own, without Maxine in gobbing distance, since that fateful night when he’d dreamily told her that their first son would have to be named after his great grandfather who’d died in the First World War. Until then, as far as she could remember, they’d been happy enough, but his casual reference to the assumption that one day she would be the proud mother of one Obadiah Oswald caused such a strong reaction in Katie that she had yet to fully recover.

  The thought of that night still gave her shivers. There they’d been, cosily entwined under his Thunderbirds duvet, when he’d started talking about The Future. She hadn’t known blank terror quite like it since seeing the child-snatcher in Chitty Chitty Bang Bang. She’d completely panicked and, there and then, chucked her longest-surviving boyfriend faster than she would have chucked a pinless grenade that had plopped into her lap, and with about as much finesse.

  And that was it. They were never alone again.

  Since then they’d both discovered all they needed to know about each other through the grapevine. She’d discovered that he blamed her for being a heartless bitch and he’d discovered that she was too busy enjoying herself to blame him for anything. The next thing he was dating Maxine White.

  In recent years, the grapevine had withered and died and she’d forgotten about him. She’d also forgotten that if you gave him time, he became a very sympathetic listener.

  He concentrated as she listed the merits of becoming an educational psychologist. He nodded earnestly when she told him This Was It, the career she’d been looking for, the reason she’d been “waiting”—yes, in both senses of the word—before choosing the right path. Only last month she’d thought she wanted to be a teacher, but an educational psychologist was the natural progression—and of course, she already had the right psychology degree. It seemed this was meant for her. Most importantly, he laughed at her jokes and even made some good ones of his own. It was nice. Not nice enough to lose all reason and agree to name your first son Obadiah Oswald, but nice none the less.

  They both blinked as a flash went off in their faces.

  “Gotcha!” cried Sandy, waving a digital camera the size of a compact in the air. “I’ll print it out later and e-mail it to you.”

  “Don’t you dare,” said Hugh. “Maxine’ll kill me.” He turned suddenly to Katie. “Not that—she’s just…you know.”

  “Of course,” she said. “Anyway, I really should find my friend, she doesn’t know anyone else here.”

  “Right. Fine.”

  “She was a bit nervous.”

  “Absolutely. Right. I have to…you know…”

  “OK.”

  They turned away from each other
in one swift, concluding move only to land facing each other again. Hugh then did the decent thing—gave Katie a firm, nodding grin and turned back into the living room, oozing decisiveness.

  Katie almost dived to the safe sanctuary of her best mate, Sukie and her flatmate, Jon. They always stayed in the kitchen at parties. If Jon had had the choice, he’d have climbed into the oven, but they were using it to heat pizzas. If Sukie had had the choice, she’d have climbed on the table and sung Waterloo, but they were using it to serve drinks.

  Katie pushed her way through the crowd, stopped occasionally by the obligatory catch-up chat (Are you still a waitress? You’re not going to believe it, but I’m engaged/married/divorced…) and joined them by the sink. Sukie was sitting on the sideboard, cocktail in hand and Jon was leaning against it mixing a new one. They greeted her with obvious delight.

  “Katie!” greeted Sukie. “Jon’s just created the best cocktail in the world! We have to think of a name.”

  “No, we have to go,” replied Katie. “This is the worst party I’ve ever been to.”

  “But everyone here’s so successful,” said Jon. “They’re all frightfully clever.”

  Katie and Sukie turned to him.

  “So are you,” reminded Katie. “Mr. First.”

  “Classics doesn’t count,” he mumbled, swaying alarmingly.

  “Oh no.” Katie turned to Sukie. “You’ve let him get drunk, haven’t you?”

  “I’m a talentless git,” moaned Jon, his chin dropping to his chest.

  Katie slumped. “I have to go home with this, you know,” she grumbled to Sukie.

  “He’s only just turned,” said Sukie. “I promise.”

  “And nobody cares,” Jon told the floor.

  “I care,” Katie told him, rather sternly. “I’m the one who’ll have to listen to you all bloody night.”