Bookish London

Chapter 11 - Liz

We stop our run, laughing in a church like two idiotic kids we thought were long gone under the weight and pressure of our years and our responsibilities, and look at each other, eyes gleaming with pure joy.
We leave the church, walking up the outside stairway on a run, sometimes almost slipping on its worn steps. We take the sidewalk on the right and every now and then I sprint a few meters, just to see how far it will follow me.
He reaches me every time, sternly glaring at me for making a scene.
“What, Carter? Is it so irritating to lose those appearances society demands of us once in a while? Come on, give up that furrowed-brow kind of look, it doesn’t suit you much, you know?” I half ask, half announce.
“Yeah? And how do you know what suits me, huh Cuthbert?” he asks, smirking.
“Well… obviously not that face, that’s for certain.” I spurt out, finding myself embarrassed for having said anything about it…and for the reaction I have whenever we talk.
“Hey Cuthbert, did I leave YOU speechless?! Wow” he says.
“Oh, shut it, Carter. Take your fleeting win and let’s close this topic. All right?” I say, ending our argument.
“Fine. Just because it’s you who’s asking.” He whispers and mumbles, especially the second part…but I hear him. I hear him declaring something so very at odds with his self, and with everything he has ever said and done towards and concerning ME.
I shove off those useless thoughts and lead us across the stripes over Borough High Street, and I gather my step faster, walking on the left side now, along the street.
The silence between us is almost covered by the sounds of the street, so loud on a Saturday, especially around noon, the right time for lunch.
But the beeps of the traffic light’s timer for pedestrians and the bustling of people going about their life do not effectively hide the secret glances I see him take towards me, awkwardly, almost shily glances, which I also take in turn, looking at him only seconds before glancing at any shop or car or bus I could lay my eyes on rather than cross his look.
We walk for a good five minutes, then I abruptly turn left, leaving him stunned.
“Cuthbert, where are you going?”
He demands, almost afraid I’m secretly an axe murderer and that the church tour was just an early show of his last resting place. So scared for nothing.
He hasn’t seen me on my period, na-hah.
“You’ll see.” And at that, I run off towards the George Inn, our next stop for our Shakespearean tour of London. We reach the inn and I turn around, waiting for Kyle on the entrance steps, a mischievous grin painted on my face.
“What is this place?” he asks me, frowning deeply.
“It’s an inn.” I say, turning my mischievous grin into an innocent smile in a three-second span.
“Yes, I can see that, Cuthbert. But why are we here? I thought we were doing a tour about Shakespeare in London?” he says, looking at me first and then at the building, quizzically.
“Exactly. We are.” I answer.
“But how-?!” I stop his question mid-air by rushing through the entrance of the inn, leaving him to choose between staying out on the street like an idiot or fight his fear and follow me inside.
As I find out soon enough, he chooses the latter and walks though the dark entrance not long after myself.
“There you are! Thought you’d run back home to Monument and your expensive furnished flat.” I shoot, hoping he’d sense the ironic tone in my voice.
He does, fortunately.
“Do you think so low of me, Elizabeth?” he asks me, nodding in the meantime to a table for us to sit at.
“Did I just hear Kyle Carter ask someone their opinion?” I say, laughing. I look to his eyes, thinking I’d find him laughing even louder than me, but instead he looks hurt, and his eyes are as cold as ever before.
Just as he’d opened up to me, I slammed that door in front of him. Darn it.
But why do I care? He’s Kyle Carter, for Pete’s sake, he could and can have anyone and everything he wants.
Meanwhile I’m simply Elizabeth Cuthbert, and I work my ass off to reach my goals.
Nonetheless, I’m hurt too by his reaction, and by the fact that I caused it.
“I’m sorry, I was just kidding, Carter. Come on, you cannot say I haven’t got the foundations and the history to back my comment up, right?” I say, putting up a make-do smile, hoping to cheer me up.
“That’s exactly the problem, Elizabeth. Everyone knows me by what I represent, not who I am. Everyone calls me by my surname. Even you, Liz. Even you.”
He says, mumbling the last part as if he were talking to himself rather than to me, like before.
That awkward silence covered us once again, but this time I was faster to break it.
“Well, as I know you already guessed, this is an inn. But why did I bring us here, you wonder? Well, first of all, it’s noon on a Saturday morning. And I for one am always hungry. I don’t know about you, but I am, truly. And second of all, this place goes back to the 17th century, year 1676 to be precise, and raised on the site of an inn built around 1542. Can you believe it? Shakespeare might have known this place! And you know why?! Well, because the building once surrounded three sides of the courtyard, which was used by the members of certain acting troupes, who would perform on a stage set up in the middle of the courtyard.”
I say, moving my hands frantically without sense, like I always do when something hypes my enthusiasm and curiosity.
“And you know what else? The audience could either stand around the actors or pay more, like the noble or the merchants I suppose would, and sit in the galleries, with the chance of making the most of the upper-level view. Isn’t that cool?!”
I ask him, smiling, cheeks red by the heat of the inn.
We talk a lot and have lunch together there, peacefully.