Halfway to Love | A Joanne Fanfiction

Twelve

It was five minutes to four and Dianne was already waiting for Joe to arrive. She'd wanted to be a bit early anyway, in order to get a feel for the area and to find any escape roots if it all got too much. What she hadn't anticipated however, was the extent at which the tube lines had been quiet, and that Hyde Park was a lot closer to her flat than she had initially expected. Consequently, despite all the rides, stalls and sights she was bored already. Sighing quietly, she flopped onto the nearest bench as her aching calves from the morning's pro rehearsal finally began to stop singing. Missing home, she scrolled quietly through the rather limited Instagram page that she'd helped her mum set up when she was last home, and smiled at the now dated picture of her niece and nephew who stood with matching Easter bonnets and their rewards from her family's annual Easter egg hunt.

Her mind wandered.

Through the countless videos that she had managed to watch in the past months, she'd become accustomed to the YouTuber's humour and had nothing better to do to kill the next hour so she set to work with a plan.

With a newfound purpose, she walked up to the carousel and smiled as politely and as sweetly as she could, knowing that she was asking for a big favour. The round, cheerful gentleman smiled back at her. "It's three pounds per turn miss-"

"Oh umm sorry I don't want to go on I'd get far too dizzy but I've got a favour to ask when you're not too busy."

"Oh right." He said, attempting to sound like he knew what she was about to question, but the bemusement written clearly all over his face said otherwise. "Just uh- wait there and I'll get to you once I've got these," he said, gesturing to the queue behind her "sorted."

She smiled gratefully, the nervous energy that had been swirling around her stomach during the exchange beginning to quieten.

A few moments later he was back in his cabin. "Right love, what can I do for you?"

"I'm supposed to be meeting someone here in around an hour, but I want to organise a surprise for them. Do you think you could look out for him and tell him to follow the blue arrows to find me? He should come and ride on your carousel first, and I can pay you for any trouble but I'd really appreciate it."

The man smiled, nodding immediately in understandingly at the pure hope in the woman's childlike wide eyes. "Of course I can. What do they look like?"

Her face broke out into what could only be described as a picture of absolute joy. "Thank you," she breathed as she shakily pulled out her phone, immediately opening a photo. The man looked at the screen intently for a few moments, concentrating hard.

"Yep, got it. Can I take your name so I can tell him?"

She smiled once again. "Of course, it's Dianne."

With a quick wave goodbye, she walked westwards from the ride, her red curls bouncing slightly in the rapidly fading light. Quite quickly, she found her first blue arrow- she had noticed that the park had colour coded paths towards the attractions and this particular one led to the perfect location- the boating lake. As she looked around her surroundings, she couldn't help but smile at the ornate displays of festivity that surrounded every corner.

A glance to the left showed an entrance to an ice-sculpture workshop, and one to the right showed the entrance to an ice-rink. She paused for a while, watching the families wobble shakily on the slippery surface, and shared the laughter of couples clinging onto each other for dear life, only to fall straight to the floor. The wistful smile on her face quickly turned to one of panic as she realised that due to her dawdling, she only had twenty minutes left.

She dashed across the park, only stopping when the smell of roasted chestnuts became too much to ignore. Before giving into the temptation, she noted that the lake was finally in sight. Thankfully the queue was small as this area of the park was away from most of the main attractions. As she queued, her mind continued to wander so she absentmindedly turned around, watching the lake for a potential place to wait for Joe.