The Dish by Stella Newman

D. stand for?’
    ‘No idea, Jack Daniels? John Doe? Same as whatever it stands for in JD Sports?’
    ‘Shame, I was going to invite you to join my pub quiz team . . .’ he says, crossing his arms and leaning back in his chair with a look of contentment. ‘I do like this place. They make some of the best bread in London.’
    ‘The waiter said you’re a regular.’
    ‘Ialways thought their bacon sandwich was my little secret.’
    ‘I thought it was mine .’ I look over my shoulder at the chefs at work. ‘I love it here. The kitchen always looks so relaxed – none of that testosterone bullshit.’
    ‘What testosterone bullshit?’
    ‘You know, kitchens where you’ve got a bunch of heavily tattooed macho-men shouting and screaming at each other. Chefs are the new rock stars?Don’t make me laugh! You’ve just flipped the perfect omelette? Come back to me when you’ve actually done something useful like saved a life. Half of those reprobates would be in jail if they weren’t in a kitchen.’
    ‘Would you like to see the tattoo I had done when they let me out of jail and I became an omelette chef?’ He moves to pull up the sleeve of his jumper.
    ‘Go on then.’ I guarantee ifhe’s got a tattoo of anything it’ll be a Merrill Lynch logo.
    ‘I’ll spare you – I don’t think I know you quite well enough yet.’ He smiles the most outrageously contagious smile, which I can’t help but mirror.
    ‘We’ll save that for next time,’ I say as I blush. I think I’ve been blushing ever since I sat at his table.
    We have been sitting and talking for two and a half hours over a bottle ofwhite wine when his phone rings. He looks at the name on the screen and his smile suddenly falters. ‘Two minutes,’ he says, as he takes the call outside. Don’t go outside! What if you change your mind and never come back?
    I take my mirror from my handbag, put on some more lip balm and check that none of the seed cake is stuck in my teeth. Adam is outside, deep in conversation. I hope it’s notwith a girlfriend. I’m sure he’s been flirting with me – though since the tattoo conversation, all we’ve talked about are random subjects – the smell of bookshops, the evolving nature of facial hair in East London, favourite pop video from the eighties: me – ‘Sledgehammer’; him – ‘Addicted To Love’.
    His laptop’s on the table and I sorely want to open it, to see what the document he was workingon so intently was – it looked like a spreadsheet. I still haven’t asked what he does for a living but I’d bet a tenner he’s a banker. His navy jumper and jeans are classic, but they look expensive. His thick brown hair is slightly messy, but not in a poncey I work in digital media kind of way. Until he actually says ‘I am a banker’ I can live in a little bubble of fantasy where he’s a doctoror a human rights lawyer or some other heroic profession.
    He walks back in looking weary.
    ‘Is everything OK?’
    ‘It will be.’
    ‘Was that your angry wife on the phone?’– Might as well put it out there.
    He laughs. ‘No wife, angry or otherwise.’
    ‘Do you have to be somewhere?’
    He looks at me, thinks about it, and shakes his head. ‘How about another bottle of wine?’
    I check my watch – it’s justgone 2 p.m. ‘This might sound weird . . . but . . . no, it doesn’t matter, actually, it’s a silly idea . . .’
    ‘Go on.’
    ‘Well, I have two cinema tickets that are going to waste, three fifteen, at the Barbican . . . dumb idea, you’ve probably got plans . . .’
    ‘I haven’t been to the cinema in years.’
    ‘You don’t like films?’
    ‘I love films! I just never have time, with work. How come you’ve gottwo tickets? Do you just hang around nice restaurants, waiting to pounce on people’s doughnuts, then kidnap them with the promise of a movie?’
    ‘The minute I’ve got you in the darkened cinema, my crack team of organ thieves will have your liver in an ice