A kind of Haiku

My unrequited love poems are now on Kindle

My own photo of St John's College

5 October 2019
I fear one day
Our ways
Will part
I cry
Feeling phantom loss
If only you knew
How important I am to you
If only
I love you, but I can never tell you

AND the first one
11 February 2019

In the gallery the poet reads with emotion

Champagne's bubbles tickle my lips

My heart swells
While I imagine our first kiss
I cycle back through
Dark Cambridge streets
Tears running down my cheeks
My heart shrinks
I love you, but I can never tell you.

The whole Cambridge series is now on Kindle.

Hello, new series announcement + #nanowrimo!

Good morning, long time no see... I am planning a new series based on Cambridge Colleges, 31 stories, in the same vein of Circle Lives. I am not sure when I can publish them as one is in a competition, when it's over, I will publish it here. I can't share it now. I will develop the other 30 during #nanowrimo.

One of Cambridge's colleges... 

A creative writing workshop on the bear straw festival in Whittlesey

Pic: Kev747 at Wikipedia, 14/1/2008

Here is something I posted on my main blog... poems and short prose about a straw bear... Cheers!

Moorgate: lunchbreak

Pic: Andrew Bowden

The sky was dark. The waves were swollen, crested by strokes of black and purple. Accents of white foam edged the dusky sand.  A woman, dressed in a smart pinstripe suit, was facing the storm. She was standing still and supple, as if the day’s weariness had been swallowed by the violent waves.

Sky and waves, meeting in the distance - where did the sky end and the sea start? Dark clouds were gathering and soon silver flashes fragmented the sky.  A moon ray filtered out of a cloud: a translucent beam in the midnight blue.

She was waiting, her bare feet washed by the sea, her eyes on the far horizon. High sprays bathed her face, making her eye make-up run down in dark rivulets. In those roaring waves, in that soaked sand, in that sky split by lightning, there was a force. A powerful one she had not encountered before.

Invisible arms were enveloping her. A supreme being breathed in the sea, sky and sand. The storm was his powerful lullaby. Tired, she lay on the sand and closed her eyes.

At last all was calm. The sea was an indigo brush stroke, the sky a jewelled midnight blue, the woman a shapeless body on the burnt sienna sand. A suffused light illuminated the unframed canvas, a pair of black high-heeled shoes neatly placed underneath. 

Barbican: Curiosity killed the Cath

Cath looked out of the bus window. The street lamps were diffusing an orange glow to the street, while the brightly lit shop windows murmured, ‘Come in, come in.... we are open late tonight...’ She yawned, then felt her stomach rumble. Time to go home, have a bath, eat dinner, watch TV and then off to bed.

The bus slowed down as the rush-hour traffic built up. The doors opened and closed, people got on until all the seats were taken and a line of people were standing from the back up to the driver's seat. Cath saw angry faces when the driver refused to take any passengers at the next stop.

She peered out of the window and saw people approaching the old church that had been shrouded like a giant mommy by scaffolding and plastic sheets for months. A banner screamed ‘Grand Opening’ in big letters, lit by a row of industrial-strength spotlights. She saw people entering freely, no sign of a bouncer or anybody collecting invitations.

She rang the bell. The bus stopped and the doors opened. She negotiated her way through the standing passengers and got off. She reached the church and joined the visitors’ flow.

By the door a tall desk displayed exhibition programmes, a price list and leaflets of future events. Cath picked up one of the programmes and walked into the main room. Three metal towers reached the ceiling of what once was the main nave. People holding wine glasses were milling around, talking to each other and glancing at the smaller exhibits hanging from the whitewashed stone walls.

Cath liked the towers best. The first one had a plaque at the base with the words ‘Name your fears’. The second’s plaque read ‘Challenge your fears, while the third said ‘Overcome your fears’. She opened the programme and read: "Xandra Behr's totemic installations deal with the interior knots of pain, alarm or apprehension we call fears. Unlike animals, human beings can identify their fears, so naming your fears is the first step to rationalisation, a truly liberating experience, the first step to harnessing the dark instincts we bury inside us."

"Clever rubbish, isn't it," remarked a female voice.

Cath looked up. A tall woman dressed head to foot in black and wearing dark sunglasses was smiling down at her.

"It sounds interesting."

The woman removed her sunglasses. Two icy blue eyes bored down on Cath. "Nice, interesting, pah, it's non-committal crap. Do you like the artwork or not?" She waved her arm around the room to include every single piece.

Cath noticed that people were staring at them. She thought, "Bloody woman, why couldn’t she harass somebody else?" and moved aside, clutching the programme like a lifesaver. She walked to the bar at the other end of the room and picked up a glass of white wine. She sipped it slowly, admiring a black statuette of a woman holding a child by hand. Milk spurted from her left breasts and dripped, white on black, on her side to form a pool at her feet. The child's head was bent down, his small features screwed up in pain. Under the statuette, placed on the floor an open suitcase had been filled with spiders. On its stiff leather handle sat a stuffed rat with a long, slim tail.

"This work has a disturbing quality to it, don't you think?" asked a male voice behind her. He looked like he was in his sixties and was dressed head to toe in bottle green, a paisley scarf knotted around his neck. Cath ignored him and moved towards the second tower. A small queue was standing by the staircase that led to the door at its top. A gallery attendant was directing people to climb one by one.

The queue moved slowly, so Cath opened the programme. "Challenge Your Fears stands for courage, the prerogative of facing what limit or terrifies us as human beings. The triptych completes the journey through the human psyche with Overcome Your Fears. How can you control your fears? Is it through psychoanalysis, extreme fortitude or necessity? There isn’t only one answer, the solution is different for everyone of us. You're invited to complete the journey and find out what you're made of."

"Intriguing isn't it?" said the woman in front of her. Cath looked up and noticed with relief that she was speaking to the man beside her. She was getting paranoid about being approached by weird strangers. "Yes, very, but do you think it's dangerous?" asked the man. "Not for the initiated," she replied looking smug.

"What a snob," thought Cath and leafed through the programme. On the last page there was a short biography of the artist. Xandra Behr had been at St Martin’s Art School, had then exhibited all over the UK and abroad and been an artist in residence for a mental health charity. Cath had read about art therapy and wondered if the exhibition had been influenced by her latest experiences. Fears became phobias, phobias could lead to mental disorders.

The woman in front of her started to ascend the steps that reached the tower’s summit. She let the door go abruptly, so that it clanked loudly. At a sign of the attendant, Cath started to ascend the steps. She noticed that they had holes so she could see through them, the holes getting bigger as she ascended. When she was nearly at the top she looked down and she could see the far-away floor, a rather unpleasant experience. She felt dizzy. She had never been afraid of heights, but her left foot was frozen on the lower step and she couldn't move the right one. “Don't be stupid,” she thought. Only the thought of the people watching her down below, made her grab the handrail and force her legs to reach the top.

She opened the metal door and closed it gently. Inside the tower was hollow. A spiral staircase descended in a dark pit. Small lights lit up as Cath descended each step. On the wall a small glass framed a photograph. One displayed the roof of a skyscraper, in another a big spider was standing on a woman's arm. Other photos illustrated claustrophobia, agoraphobia and even social phobias.

She descended the steps without feeling any anxiety. The staircase had solid sides and the steps didn't have holes through them. She wasn't frightened, but the darkness below each step was unnerving. At the bottom of the tower she saw with relief that a neon sign indicated the exit. She was expecting to be in the gallery again but entered a narrow booth. A chair stood against the wall and an old-fashioned diver helmet was waiting for her to try it on. She put the helmet on, intrigued. At first it was darkness, then multicoloured lights flashed in front of her eyes. A spiral started twisting round and round until she felt dizzy and had to close her eyes. She jerked herself awake and took the helmet off, got up, found a half-hidden doorway and came out in the gallery. She emerged at the back of the tower and noticed that only a few people were still milling around. Waiters were busy collecting glasses while a woman was plugging in a hoover. She looked at her watch. Eight o'clock. It couldn't be, she couldn't possible have spent half an hour in the tower.

She saw the man in bottle green talk to the woman dressed in black. They turned and looked at her. She crossed the room and quickly exited the gallery. Outside a couple was lingering, perhaps waiting for a taxi. She crossed the road towards the bus stop and sat on the plastic bench at the opposite end of an old woman who was muttering to herself. She was facing the gallery. The couple who were standing outside were now boarding a taxi. A man flung open the heavy gallery door and ran into the road. A car swerved to avoid him, the driver angrily tooting his horn. When the man was past the middle white line, he stopped, opened his arms and was knocked off by a courier van speeding down. Cath sat transfixed. The old woman whimpered, a hand on her mouth. The traffic stopped, men and women got out of their vehicles to look at the accident. The van’s driver was talking in a mobile phone.

Eventually the bus reached the stop. Cath and the old woman boarded it. Cath glanced at the man lying on the tarmac, surrounded by paramedics. On the bus, passengers were looking out of the windows to find out what was going on. Cath stared ahead. She had witness street accidents before, but never a suicide. She closed her eyes. She could still see the man standing in the road, his arms opened as if welcoming death.

When she saw the bright lights of the bingo hall, she pressed the request button. The bus stopped and the door opened. Cath got off with a man leading a dog on a leash. She walked up the alleyway towards her flat. The man with the dog caught up with her by the pub.

"Do you want to hear a funny story, mate? " he asked.

"No, not now, please."

"I'm not mad or anything." He bent to caress his dog's back and added: "Today my dog was supposed to be put down. The sweetest dog in the world."

"I'm sorry, I need to get home," said Cath and walked away.
"Sorry, yeah, sorry," she heard him muttered behind her.

When she got home, Cath walked straight into the kitchen. She put her coat and bag on the table and bent down to look at the trap. She could hear the sound of tiny claws scratching, while the box shook. Of course, being a humane trap with holes dotted along the box surface, the mouse was still alive and trying to find an exit or make one. She reluctantly picked the box up. It wasn't very heavy. A baby mouse, probably. She had a horror of mice, filthy, furry creatures, their faeces small black pellets that have been dotting her kitchen’s surfaces for weeks. She decided to free the mouse by the canal. She dropped the trap in a plastic bag and walked out again. She was tired but it could not wait.

Down the steps, the pathway was deserted. She walked a far as she could, to disorientate the mouse, hoping it would not find its way back. She bent down, opened the trap, but because she was nervous she twisted the box and the mouse fell on her shoes. It was a black small mouse, it squirmed and started to climb her left leg. Horrified, she tried to shake him off, but it gripped her leg through the lace tights. It would not let go. Cath jumped in the canal. 

High Street Kensington

Pic: Wikipedia

English for beginners

Giulia worked as a waitress in a teashop in High Street Kensington from half past eight in the morning to three o'clock in the afternoon. She lived in Bloomsbury, where she shared a room with Margaret in a women's hostel opposite the British Museum.

The teashop occupied three floors in a Victorian building squeezed between modern office blocks in a narrow street off Kensington High Street. The narrow ground floor only had room for the patisserie counter with an old-fashioned till and a couple of bistro tables; the kitchen was located on the first floor, next door to the toilets, while the tearoom was on the second floor.

In the tearoom, the tables were covered by pink cloths with small ceramic vases of fresh flowers and a matching sugar bowl. The chairs and wall seats were upholstered in black leather, well worn and cracked in places. There was a small gap between the tables and when it was busy, Giulia moved around with difficulty, trying to avoid bumping into chairs and upsetting her tray.

The staff consisted of two waitresses, the pastry chef, a kitchen porter and the owner, a young French woman who like to talk to her customers when she wasn’t otherwise engaged. Christine was a resting actress. She had bought the teashop from a couple of compatriots, after having worked on and off as a waitress for many years.

The teashop was frequented by artists and businessmen. Christine knew all her customers and particularly cultivated the friendship of a theatre director who had promised her a small part in his new play.

At four o'clock, Giulia would take the uniform off and let her hair loose from the tight ponytail she had to wear while serving. She then combed her hair and applied a little make-up. Every evening during the week she attended classes at a language school in Oxford Street. The class started at five thirty and Giulia spent her free time before in Covent Garden, walking around the shops and watching the street performers.

If the weather was good, she would walk from her workplace to Marble Arch by crossing Kensington Gardens and Hyde Park. It was a long walk, but it was very pleasant on sunny days.

Her day off was Wednesday, but she worked every Sunday. On weekends Giulia was on her own because Margaret went to see her parents in Manchester. Margaret had invited her to join her, but because Giulia worked on Sundays, it wasn’t practical for her to get away. On Sunday afternoons, she would take the tube to Camden Town to walk around the market or strolled by the canal towards Regents Park.

Margaret was thinking of moving out of the hostel and had asked Giulia if she would share a flat with her. Their accommodation was cheap and central, but they had to share the kitchen and no visitors were allowed past the reception desk.

On a Wednesday afternoon, Giulia accompanied Margaret to view a flat near Russell Square. The flat was in a quaint, pedestrianised alley, on the top floor of a brick building that was over 150 years old. On the ground floor was a pottery shop, its glazed door squeezed to the wooden front door of the flat, which was painted in an eye-catching postbox red.

The landlord was a middle-aged man who owned a local b&b. He arrived 20 minutes late and excused himself several times. He led them up a steep carpeted staircase and showed them round briskly. ‘The first floor is taken by a dental surgery. Every Friday you can leave an envelope with the rent money with the receptionist. This door, here, leads to the flat,’ he explained patting a solid-looking white door. ‘It’s a fire door and provides some security for you girls as the front door is kept open during surgery hours.’

They walked up concreted uncarpeted stairs.

‘The ceilings are bit low, but it’s pretty good flat for the price,’ he said unlocking the flat’s door.

They followed him in the living room, a square room with a small table and four chairs, a gas fireplace, an old-fashioned chintz armchair and a melamine shelving unit with a small portable TV on top of it.

The kitchen was tiny but clean. The bedroom had two twin beds with matching cabinets, a wardrobe and a chest of drawers.

‘Where is the bathroom?’ asked Margaret.

‘The bathroom is upstairs, and it’s shared with one room.’

‘Ah, that explains the price,’ said Margaret bluntly. Giulia admired her nerve; she had been thinking the same thing.

The landlord eyed her warily and said: ‘You won’t find anything at this price in this area. I could have rented this many times over, but I wanted the right tenant, like yourselves, two young girls who work and are no trouble. The room upstairs is rented to a young professional, a very quiet person. I want no trouble here and the rent paid on time.’

Opposite the flat, a matching white door led to more concrete steps, the top landing covered by green patterned lino. A coin-operated public telephone was mounted to the wall between two doors. Somebody had fixed a pen with a piece of blue tack and there was some paper for messages on a metal stool under the phone. The landlord showed them the bathroom, which was outdated but looked clean.

They followed the landlord downstairs and into the waiting room of the surgery. ‘So, girls, what is going to be?’ he asked eagerly.

‘I like it,’ said Giulia.

Margaret gave her a look and said: ‘We will take it if you knock off 50 pounds on the weekly rent. We can pay three weeks in advance as a deposit.’

The landlord didn’t look pleased but smiled at Giulia and asked: ‘I spotted an accent, there, are you Italian?’

Giulia nodded.

‘All right girls, since my wife is Italian too, I will give you the discount, but four weeks in advance, please.’

‘OK,’ said Giulia.

They shook hands and left. In the street Margaret nudged Giulia and said. ‘We got a flat, hurray! We can have parties and invite people now! It’s not a bad deal, but he would have taken three if you’d have let me work on him.’

‘It’s a nice area. I wonder whom we are sharing our bathroom with?’

‘An old man, no doubt. He’ll bang with a broom stick whenever we have visitors.’

The day of the move, Giulia stood on the pavement outside the hostel surrounded by cases and bulging black bin bags, while Margaret tried to hail a taxi. It was a short journey so the taxi driver had to be persuaded to take them. Giulia had only a case and a rucksack, but Margaret had been living in London for two years and had accumulated a lot of things.

The taxi had to stop on the main road as their new street didn’t allow access to vehicles. It took a while to unload their luggage from the taxi and carry it by the door of their new flat. The driver was such in a hurry to pick up his next fare that he helped them with the cases.

Margaret went upstairs to pay the deposit and the rent for the first week, while Giulia minded their possessions, which had blocked the door to the shop. Luckily it was closed.

The surgery receptionist gave Margaret a receipt and the keys of the flat. After several trips, they managed to take up everything. With their possessions in, the living room had shrunk in size.

In the bedroom Giulia and Margaret started to put away their clothes. The empty cases were pushed under the beds. They moved to the living room and soon the flat look more homely with their books, photos and small objects. Giulia looked at her watch. It was three o'clock and they had had nothing to eat since breakfast. She opened the kitchen cupboards and was pleased to find pans, plates and crockery. ‘We have everything we need here, but nothing to eat.’

‘I can go downstairs and ask the receptionist where the nearest supermarket is. Like you I left my food leftovers with the girls at the hostel, I couldn’t risk them making a mess in my bags.’

The surgery’s receptionist told them there was a shopping centre in front of Russell Square station. They found a Safeway supermarket, a laundrette, a cinema, a cobbler, a florist and a burger bar.

‘Let’s have a burger and French fries here and then we can go to the supermarket,’ suggested Margaret.

They ate their burgers perched on stools by the window. They were so hungry that everything tasted so good. They went back to the flat loaded with bags. Margaret filled the fridge and the cupboards, while Giulia investigated a small door near the fireplace, which had been papered to blend in. It was a tiny cupboard containing an ironing board, an iron, a hoover, a broom and a metal bucket with a mop.

‘We really have got everything we need,’ said Giulia feeling pleased.

Giulia and Margaret moved the furniture to suit them and hanged a James Dean poster above the fireplace. The shelves of the melamine unit were soon crammed with books.

As they both worked during the day, they only met late the evening when Giulia came back from her classes. On her day off, Giulia used to spend most of the day in the flat studying. They loved the independence and did not mind having to share the bathroom as it was always free when they needed it.

Giulia bumped into their neighbour on a Saturday evening. Margaret had gone to Manchester to a friend’s wedding. She was carrying a shopping bag up the steep stairs and was so absorbed in her thoughts that she collided against a tall, young man, who was running down in haste.

She managed to keep her balance, but the shopping bag flew off her hands. He helped her to pick up her purchases then introduced himself. ‘Hi, sorry about the accident, I’m Robert.’

‘I'm Giulia. Don’t worry; I wasn’t looking where I was going.’

‘You must be my new neighbour. Are you Italian?’

‘Yes, from Milan.’

‘I have great admiration for Italian art; I have been in your country many times. I'm an architect. What do you do here in London?’

‘I study English and work in a teashop.’

‘I'd like to speak Italian. I did a course but I lack practice.’

‘I've had some problems with English. It's so different from Italian.’

‘I could help you, if you could help me in exchange,’ Robert offered. ‘Does it matter that I’m American?’

‘No, it’s OK,’ said Giulia. Robert sounded like an interesting person and was very good looking. ‘When are we going to start?’ she blurted, and then bit her tongue hoping she did not sound desperate.

‘First we must get acquainted. What about going out for a walk tomorrow afternoon? I'm a respectable man, with respectable intentions,’ he joked.

‘We could meet after three, where I work, if it’s OK,’ suggested Giulia.

‘OK, leave the address by the phone, I'm going now. I’m meeting a friend and I am late.’

Giulia prepared her dinner and ate with appetite. She then sat on the chintz armchair to watch TV. At ten o'clock she switched it off and took a book from the shelf. It was a simplified version of Pride and Prejudice. She read it with a dictionary on her lap so she could look up the words she didn't understand.

The next day she woke up early. She arrived at the teashop well before the opening time and had breakfast in the kitchen. The cook did not come on a Sunday and his assistant was in a good mood. He had prepared crepes, which they ate drizzled with honey.

That morning there were only a few customers. It had started to rain as soon as Giulia had opened so not many people were about. Giulia hoped the weather would change in the afternoon or her walk with Robert would be ruined.

It stopped raining and the tearoom was crowded at lunchtime. There quite a few elderly men and women as they still served tea in the old-fashioned way, with a hot water jug by the teapot.

Giulia’s replacement arrived early, so ten minutes before three she went into the staff toilet to get changed. She looked at herself in the mirror with critical air and put a bit more makeup on her eyes.

Robert was waiting outside and smiled when he saw her.

‘What are we going to do today?’ She asked.

‘What about a tour of the canals? You can leave from little Venice and reach the zoo and Camden Town by water.’

‘Where is little Venice?’

‘It's by Paddington. It's not quite like Venice, but it’s pretty and the barges are very pretty.’

They took the underground to Paddington. During the journey, Robert told Giulia about his big family and his plans to open an architect studio in Houston. He wanted to build houses in the traditional European style.

Giulia was impressed. She didn’t have much to say about herself, she was an only child and her parents owned a small wine company. She had come to London to study English so she could help her father export wine.

Little Venice was a narrow canal crossed by two brick bridges. Colourful narrowboats and barges were moored along it.

A barge hosted an art gallery. The artist, an older man wearing a kaftan on cropped jeans, showed them round and gave Giulia a postcard with an ink drawing of the canal and his barge.

They waited in line to board the tour boat. The boat moved slowly because of the shallow waters. For a while there was nothing much to see. The embankments had been reinforced by block of concrete, which were covered in ugly graffiti. The view improved when they passed near Regent’s Park and when the boat reached the zoo, Giulia spotted wild animals peering at them through the fence.

They got off at Camden Town and walked towards the Lock market. Robert seemed to know the area as well as Giulia. He bought a wooden incense dish for himself and a small papier mache’ box for Giulia with two Siamese cats painted on its lacquered lid. Later, they shared a cream tea at a teashop overlooking the canal.

From that afternoon, Giulia and Robert would meet once or twice in the evening during the week and spent the weekends together. Sometimes they spoke Italian, sometimes they spoke English.

Margaret was introduced to Robert and often invited him to dinner. Occasionally they all went to see a movie at the cinema opposite Russell Square tube.

As Giulia and Robert became good friends, Margaret started teasing her. Giulia was unsure of how she felt. Robert always behaved correctly and made her feel at ease. She was going back to Italy at the end of the summer and she didn’t believe in long-distance relationship.

Margaret was of a different opinion. ‘Life is short, why don’t you let things take their course and worry later? You think too much, just let yourself go.’

‘I’m not a flirt like you,’ retorted Giulia which made Margaret laugh as she had met a university student in Manchester she really liked and did not know what to do about it.

One evening, Robert came back from work with exciting news. ‘The project is complete so I’m finished here. I called one of my university pals and he’s willing to be my partner in the studio. Things are proceeding faster than I expected.’

‘When are you leaving?’ asked Giulia. She was shocked at how much she was distressed by Robert’s departure. She had known from the start that they would have to part. Had she hidden her real feelings to protect herself?

‘When I'm settled, you can pay me a visit. In my home, there will be always a place for good friends.’

Friends, that’s what they were and what they will ever be. Giulia’s father might not wish to finance another foreign trip and it would take her a long time to save enough money for it.

Giulia returned to Italy two months after Robert’s departure. She had passed her exam and obtained the proficiency certificate. Her father was delighted and soon Giulia started working with the sales manager.

She left home early in the morning, worked and came back home late in the evening. At weekends she went to eat a pizza or watch a movie with her school girlfriends. At Christmas she received a card from Robert. He had finally opened his studio and was inviting her to visit him in the spring or summer.

Giulia thought it was best to leave it at that, Christmas cards and the occasional postcard from Liguria where her family owned a holiday flat. Although she missed London, she had fitted back in her old life and was enjoying her job. Next year she would start travelling to the European wine fairs and she was looking forward to that. She mentioned the invitation to Margaret when she called her to wish her a Happy New Year.

‘Are you mad? You have to go! Think of the great time you’d have.’

‘But isn’t it best this way? Besides it’s quite expensive to fly to the US.’

‘If you go in the low season it won’t cost as much.’

‘What about you, what are you up to?’

‘I got a promotion! I’m now the PA of the managing director. I can afford to rent our flat on my own. Emma is a pain, she has to go. Soon it will be just me, unless you fancy coming back.’

‘Are you going to ask her to leave? Poor Emma.’

‘Don’t worry. She’s is moving in with her boyfriend. I wish him all the luck in the world as he will need it.’

Giulia called the travel agent to book plane tickets to Paris and hotel accommodation for the Spring Wine Fair. It was going to be her first international fair. She couldn’t resist asking for the cheapest fare to Houston. She was told that direct flights were expensive, but if she didn’t mind changing in New York, there was a really good deal for early February. Giulia thanked the woman and hung up. If she added her Christmas money to her savings she could afford to go.

She rang Robert and asked him if it was OK to visit him for a week in February. ‘I know it’s a bit sudden, but I was quoted a good fare and I can just about afford it now.’

‘I’d love to show you around,’ said Robert. ‘I can take some time off as it is not too busy now.’

Giulia managed her connection to Houston without a hitch. She had never spent so many hours on planes and when she got off, her legs felt numb. She collected her case and walked towards the exit, eager to stretch her legs.

Robert was waiting in the arrival area with a pretty blonde. They were laughing and looked very happy together. They soon spotted her and Robert waved.

‘Hi, I'm Susan, Robert told me all about you.’

 ‘Hello, Susan, nice to meet you.’

‘You must be tired,’ said Robert and took her case. They walked to the underground parking and Robert put Giulia’s case in the boot of an expensive looking convertible.

From her back seat, Giulia struggled to follow Robert and Susan’s conversation, saying very little. When they reached Robert’s apartment and Susan made her feel at home with a coffee and slice of cake, Giulia couldn’t contain her curiosity any longer. ‘Where did you meet?’ she asked trying to sound casual.

‘I've know Rob since he was a little,’ said Susan, ruffling Robert’s hair. ‘I’ve loved him from the first sight. Isn't my little brother awesome?’