Falling Fast - L.S

12

I waited three agonising days for him to phone. I stopped eating. I stopped sleeping. I kept my mobile charged and never more than a metre away from me.

He didn't call and he didn't call and he didn't call.

Taylor - who had of course seen me give him my number - asked what was going on. At first I tried to pretend we were just going to meet up to talk about the play. But Taylor saw through that straight away. So I fessed up.

I desperately needed to tell someone. And Taylor - despite her cynical attitude to boys and dating - was the best person.

She might not understand Harry. But she had more experience than anyone else I knew. And I knew I could trust her advice.

"Be cool," she said. "If he's interested, he'll ring."

I didn't think it was that simple. I knew he was interested. He'd shown me that several times. But to Harry there was more at stake. It had something to do with his anger. His pride. I didn't understand it, but I knew it was there.

He called, finally, after the Thursday evening rehearsal, which - as he'd explained - he'd had to miss.

"Hi," he said.

My stomach flipped over at the sound of his voice. "Hi," i said, trying to sound casual. "Finished delivering vegetables?"

"Yeah." He sounded exhausted. "Frigging ridiculous people - d'you know how much these organic things cost?"

As a matter of fact, I did know. Dad's commune was one of the places that supplied the local organic veg wholesalers with their produce. He often commented on how he hated it being so expensive, saying in the next breath how the additional cost was justified by the extra work put into growing the food.

"Still, it's worth paying more for healthier food," I said hopefully.

Harry snorted down the phone. "If you can afford to pay more," he said.

There was a short silence.

"So d'you wanna meet up at the weekend?" he said.

"Sure." My mouth went dry.

"Maybe we could go for coffee again?" he said. "On Sunday?"

"Okay," I said. "The same place?"

"I was thinking the park," Harry said.
"Princess Park. That little café'll still be open. It said when i looked last week. Open through half-term. D'you wanna meet there? Say at three?"

"Sure."

We didn't talk much after that. It was too awkward. But I didn't care. I had what I wanted. I had A Date. A First Date.

I spent ages deciding what to wear. I hadn't intended to ask Tay and Gigi for advice but, in the end, I had to tell them I was seeing Harry - Taylor was asking me every hour if he'd called. Anyway, from there it was a short step to the inevitable discussion about clothes and make-up.

Gigi was all for looking outdoorsy and healthy. "Jeans, trainers and just a smudge of lipgloss," she said. "The natural look."

I didn't think so. Gigi got away with that kind of look far better than me. She had pretty, regular features and an innocent air about her. I'd look like an elephant in normal jeans and trainers.

"Something sexy," Taylor advised. As she would. "But not tarty. He's going to be all over you like a rash as it is."

She told me to wear my black, lace top again. There was no way. Not to meet someone during the day.