Instantly, my florist fantasy dissipates, replaced by another, less appealing one. Wally and me in a crowded restaurant, shouting to be heard over the music. Pungent dishes and intoxicated diners. I open my mouth to explain to Wally that I can’t possibly go out for dinner, that restaurants are among the worst places for overstimulation, but he holds up a hand, silencing me.
‘Hear me out! A guy that I know runs a Greek restaurant in Windsor. They are hosting a private function tonight in their upstairs room, so the main dining room is closed. He’s agreed to open it, just for us.’
I frown. ‘What do you mean?’
‘We will be the only ones in the restaurant. We can choose the lighting, the music, the food – everything.’
Slowly, it starts to sink in, what Wally has done. Not just the flowers, but all of it. An entire evening – all coordinated to be perfect for me. It is an entirely unprecedented level of thoughtful.
‘Why are you crying?’ he asks.
I reach up and touch my face, which is indeed wet. ‘I . . . I’m just a little overwhelmed, I think. This is so lovely. A restaurant. I didn’t think I’d ever be able to go to a restaurant.’
In my peripheral vision, I see Wally smile softly.
‘What does one even wear to a restaurant?’ I ask. I gesture to my denim overalls. ‘Can I go like this?’
‘You could,’ he says. ‘But I brought you something that I thought you might like to wear instead . . .’ He reaches into the back seat and brings back a white plastic bag.
‘There’s more?’
I reach into the bag and retrieve a long halter-neck dress with diagonal stripes. Each stripe is a unique colour – not one is doubled up. It must include every single colour and shade on earth.
‘I saw this in a shop and it . . . it made me think of you,’ Wally says.
‘It is the most beautiful dress I have ever seen.’
I change in the back of the van. The dress fits, though the fabric is a little scratchy. It matches perfectly with the rainbows on my sneakers.
‘Beautiful,’ Wally says when I appear in the front seat. On a whim, I swish the skirt a little bit to show off, but I immediately feel silly and stop.
Wally drives to the restaurant, carefully adhering to the road signs and speed limits, which I appreciate. As we drive, I take a minute to reflect on the fact that I’m going on a proper date! To a restaurant! It is like a dream, except I’ve never had dreams like this. It’s like the books I’ve read, the happy ones, where things work out.
We pull up in front of the restaurant but before I can open the car door, Wally places a hand on my arm. ‘There’s one more thing.’ He leans over and opens the glove compartment. ‘These are noise cancelling and Bluetooth connected, so we can hear each other,’ he says, handing me a pair of giant headphones that look like earmuffs. ‘And these . . .’ He hands me a pair of swimming goggles in pink and purple and aqua and pulls out another pair of bright green goggles for himself. ‘I think are fairly self-explanatory.’ He pulls the green ones over his face. ‘What do you think?’
‘You look like an aviator frog,’ I say. I pull on my own goggles. ‘What about me?’
‘A rainbow aviator frog.’
I smile.
As promised, the restaurant is quiet and the lighting is low. We are greeted by a waitress with a nose ring, purple hair and a tattoo of a dragon creeping out of the chest area of her white button-down shirt . . . and yet she stares at us when we arrive.
‘Reservation for Wally,’ Wally says.
I snort.
The waitress leads us to a table set with a white tablecloth and bright blue chairs. As we sit down, the waitress hands each of us a laminated menu and fills our water glasses from a porcelain jug. The restaurant smells of garlic and meat.
‘Are you okay?’ Wally says.
I nod. ‘It’s lovely.’
Wally looks so funny in his goggles, I let out another snort.
‘What?’ Wally says.
‘Nothing.’
The waitress brings over pita bread and tzatziki and tells us she’ll be back in a minute to take our order. I dive into the bread before it’s even hit the table. This pregnancy hunger is no joke. I feel like I could eat every carbohydrate in the place.
‘Did you miss lunch?’ Wally asks, as I dip my second piece of pita.
I am grateful to have a mouthful, so I can just smile and shrug. I can’t tell him, of course, that I missed neither lunch nor afternoon tea. I can’t tell him, because then he might ask more questions and find out that I’m pregnant.
As I swallow my next mouthful, I become aware of sounds drifting down the stairs – soft music, chairs scraping, intermittent laughter. It’s not overwhelming, but I can hear it even with my earphones on. I’m about to ask Wally if he knows what is happening up there when the waitress appears to take our order.
Wally and I remove our headphones long enough to order a lamb souvlaki (for Wally) and baked Greek fries with meatballs (for me). We also order bread and hummus, olives and water. Music starts up above, slightly louder than before. I replace my headphones.
‘So . . .’ I say to Wally. ‘Was there a particular purpose to this evening or was it just . . .’ I stumble on the juvenile-sounding word, ‘. . . a date?’
‘As a matter of fact, there was a purpose. A celebration. I’ve created an ad hoc version of FollowUp.’
Ad hoc version. I fear I ought to understand this reference. Over the past few weeks, Wally has explained the process of creating and launching an app, but each time, despite the clarity and simplicity of his explanations, I invariably found myself tuning out after
