And Baby Makes Two

Chapter Four (part two) - When in Rome

Tasha had leant me her cats for the week while we flatshared with the rat pack: Colour-point Persians who didn’t DO outside. My chocolate brown fake-fur throw has already turned a lighter shade of pale from their long flyaway fur that gets in my eyes and up my nose.

I had managed to feed Josh, bath him and put him to bed, do some washing and dissolve the weeks dishes. I never eat before 8pm these days and invariably the pasta tortellini with cheese and pesto wins hands down in the war of convenience.

Bushed, I sit down to a welcome bowl of pasta and much needed glass of wine when the doorbell goes.
“Who the bloody hell is that?” I bitch to myself while making my way toward the door. Peeking through the side window I see a man outside carrying two massive bags of…...... white? And then I remember, Nancy’s delivery!

I unlock and open the door and am handed one of the bags stuffed full of polystyrene.
“Oh, thanks” I say, working the loaded bag around the corner and into my front room. The man follows me in with the second. “Oh, thanks” I say again, more nervously this time, as I inch the door closed behind him.
“No, there is more!” he says, in a thick Eastern European accent, ever so slightly angry.
“More?” I whimper back, beginning to feel a bit uncomfortable about letting a very strange man into my front room whilst wondering how I am going to fit any more of his bags into my tiny overcrowded live/work/feed space.

The delivery man disappears back up the steps and returns with what looks like a Roman arch, also made out of polystyrene. I signal toward my office space for him to place his load.
“’is more!” he barks once again.

Three more descents and my front room is filled with a polystyrene statue of The Thinker, an obelisk and a large throne. The delivery man hands me a delivery note to sign, then leaves without a word.

Thanking the Greek Gods that I am still intact I return to my, now cold, pasta whilst scoffing under my breath that Rome wasn't built in a day but in half an hour, just long enough to ruin my bloody dinner. Finishing up my bowl of pasta I reach for my gauntlet of Chianti and sup at the bludgeoned grape juice.... well, when in Rome....
The phone rings,
“Hello, Ceaser's Palace, how can I help you?” I giggle whilst surveying my room.

“Oh, sorry must have the wrong number”.

I freeze as a globule of wine rolls off a desert-dry tongue and squeezes down my throat before sinking into the pit of my stomach. A thin layer of sweat settles on my skin as I hear the line go dead. Perhaps this wine has gone to my head a bit, but I feel sure that it is an Australian twang that reverberates around my sorry skull.

In slow motion I rest the receiver back on its perch forgetting to breathe.
The phone squawks again and in shock I snatch it back up and hold it to me ear.

“Err, hello is Zoe there please?”

Gathering myself together I manage to muster a bit of a voice to respond. Like a dehydrated mouse I squeak back, in a rather formal manner,
“Erm yes this is Zoe Plummer”.
“Zo’ it’s Rodge – howareya little mate? Long time no speak!” His voice sounds so close, like he is just around the corner and yet he is almost certainly 20,000 miles away with a late winter sun breaking over the horizon in its early morning salutation.
“Erm, Roger, what a surprise! Yes, it’s...er.... been about ... erm... well... a year…....”

***

We need to talk about Roger. A long story – about a chapter to be honest (although it kills me to give him one all to himself). So, in Rome we must end this chapter and, roughly speaking about 15 months ago, start the next in a bedsit in South London.

Labels: Australian, Eastern European, Rome

posted by Rebecca Valentine at 11:11 am