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@abbeytownsend
“Maybe you should go and turn it into a saying, then.” Juliet shrugged, looking at her. “And the worst fact is that there aren’t only people you work with that do it, it’s people in general trying to simply….fire you from life.”
“I’ll try. I’ll slip it into every relevant conversation until I hear someone else say it.” Abbey half joked, glancing quickly over at the other blonde when the tone went less jokey between them. “Yeah, I don’t know why people do that.”
“Impractical or not, if it helps, I think it might just end up being worth it,” the brunette said with a shake of her head, sipping from her drink before the other one’s question got her attention once more. “Well, right now I’m drinking myself into what I want to think will be oblivion and avoiding thinking about stuff. Not to mention I’m dishing on humanity and other people’s capacity of actually being great.”
“Maybe, I’ll see if I can spare the crockery.” Abbey joked, though thought of the idea seriously. It might be cathartic. She chuckled at the brunette, it was exactly the response she didn’t want to hear. Abbey didn’t want to drink things away, because it was never away. It came back in the morning with a hangover, like revenge. “Dishing on humanity, now, that sounds good.”
“I’ve had reunions.” he said with a nod. “A lot of those, if I’m honest.” Cameron said with a shrug of his shoulders. He was actually known for the yo-yo relationship he had had with Nina after all, so, saying that the two of them hadn’t crossed paths at a party or anything of the sorts would have been a gross lie. Sure that sometimes their reps tried to keep something like that from happening, but, sometimes it was unavoidable. “As for high school ones… I can’t say I’ve made it to the ten year reunion; no.” he shook his head. “Though I remember getting a lot of messages around facebook of former colleagues who wanted me to show up.” he mentioned.
“Yeah?” Abbey sipped at her wine, reminded of her own reunions. There weren’t many, and she was grateful for it. They were awkward and painful, and she didn’t have much to tell anyone she would run in to, whereas they would brag for certain. “Same, I got a few emails but I didn’t go. I told people I had to work for an event that night, but ended up spending the night in myself.”
“More or less,” he said with a slight shrug. “I think my main issue is that I’m too inpatient. That, or that I turn to do something else and forget what I did in the first place.”
Henry had never felt the need to learn how to cook, and that was his main reason not to. But facing the fact that he was an adult man with a house and a functional kitchen he had realised that it had to be done. “Oh I don’t have to do it well,” he smirked, “I just gotta do it.”
“You have to be semi-patient, depending what you’re cooking. If you’re making a stir fry, only a few minutes. If you’re that bad though, then maybe invest in a slow cooker? That way it wont burn if you forget, and when you get back from work you could have a bowl of chilli or a stew.” Abbey told him, taking another sip of wine.
Abbey laughed, raising her brows at him. “I beg to differ, it needs to be done well because I have to eat it.” She peered over at the recipe to see what he was intending to make, “And I don’t want to be sick tomorrow.”
“Bless you, Abbey.” He laughed. “And I won’t, since you’ll be there when I do it you can make sure I do it well.”
“I will, I’ll make a chef out of you yet!” Abbey laughed, “It’s not that hard, it’s just following instructions.”
“I wasn’t addressing you specifically, I was talking about the collective hypothetical ‘you’. I was just taught that it’s the polite thing to do, that’s all, so I do. It’s not really any more serious or complicated than that.”
“It is the polite thing to do, for sure, and I’m sure a fair few people do it to whoever catches their eye, but I bet it helps that you’re well known. And as you said, when you have the kids around.”
“I think you could say I passed the phase in which I felt like smashing things and waved it goodbye a long way back,” she stated with a snort. “But, what the hell, if you feel like smashing things, you should go for it. Who knows, maybe it’ll be good for you to have that sort of escape valve. Besides, if it’s something that will make you feel better on the long run, why should you hold back from it?” the brunette said while shrugging her shoulders.
“It’s impractical, a waste of plates and glasses. I’ll find another way, maybe write an angry letter and then throw it away.” Abbey looked at the brunette’s drink, she was very good at avoiding actual answers. “What are you doing then?” She asked, she wouldn’t push again but was eager to know what coping mechanisms were useful, hoping it wasn’t just drinking.
“Isn’t it? I always tried to be what my parents wanted me to be, and it made me incredibly unhappy. So I want her to have a different life. If she wants to be a baker and an astronaut, she damn well should be.”
“My parents were never too bothered, trusted my choices you know? I think I turned out okay as well. Exactly, well, it might be impractical baking in space until we get some proper movie style space ships, but it could happen.”
“I had this friend who used to say that when exes call you there are only two things they might be after: one is that they want you to lend them money. Two is that they might want to rub their success on your nose.” Cameron listed those to her. “So, I suppose you can say no one would really be looking forward to meet anyone else under those circumstances, isn’t that so?” he inquired. Running a hand through the back of his head he thought about it. “I never said it was something impossible. I just… I just think that maybe that’s how it’ll end up going.”
“Huh.” Abbey smiled, “That sounds pretty correct. I don’t think I’ve spoken to someone for a while without those coming up, and those are dreadful calls to receive.” She laughed to herself a moment, “Have you ever made one of those calls? Or gone to a reunion? I’m not looking forward to the next reunion letter. Does anyone like those? People only go to see if you’ve failed in life.” She nodded slowly, sad he thought that way. She hoped desperately that she’d meet the right person soon, and she hoped the same for him.
“You don’t know my life. I might be absolutely horrible and just deceived you. And I just kept her out of the kitchen…”
“I don’t believe that for a second, sweet good cop Henry. You’re not dirty. Besides, you can’t fool me now.”
“Well, not hundreds of people, obviously, but that’s not what I’m talking about. I mean when someone is just looking around them and catches your eye – you can’t spare a moment to smile politely at them when your eyes meet? If people find that strange, that’s a sad commentary, I think. Because to me, that’s just a simple, small act of kindness, not anything creepy or strange.”
“Well, I can, but a lot of people wouldn’t. I’ve lived here my entire life and I know that there are people that do smile at strangers, but it’s in the minority for sure. Unless there’s a crowd for a concert or something, and then you know you’re sort of with that person, so people do it more often.”
“Madison.” She introduced herself before following the blonde down the street. “So are you originally from here?” She asked after a moment, not sure what else there was to talk about in a place like this one.
“Nice to meet you.” She said politely as they walked, slowly coming to doubt her decision. A meal with a stranger could be a very awkward and stilted thing. “Yep, I love it here. I can tell you’re not from here though, with the accent.”
“Oh, I’m not really stopping her from it when it comes to costumes either. I want her to know that she can be anything she wants to be, not any less. But yeah, it’s incredibly cute. It warms up my heart.”
“That’s a very good lesson to teach! Maybe one day she’ll be an astronaut and a baker. I think I just described my own personal job heaven there.”
The peaceful atmosphere that cafes with outdoor patios produced was one of the main reasons that Joey was so drawn towards them. He often lost track of the time in situations like this one and today was no exception, he didn’t know how long it had been since his friend had left but he was in no hurry to do the same.
The sound of buzzing noise, accompanied by said friend’s contact name flashing up on his phone caused him to snap out of his daydream. Had he forgotten something?
[Text received from <<loser™>>]: omg have u seen this?? [Text received from <<loser™ >>]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dQw4w9WgXcQ
“Ugh-” He sighed after he clicked on the link, at this point all he could do was bury his face in his hands, he only had himself to blame for falling for that one again. “Why do bad things happen to good people?” He groaned, unsure if he was asking himself this, or if the question was directed towards the person nearby him.
Abbey sipped her coffee reading the previous day’s newspaper. When she looked around everybody was on something electric. Was she the only one that didn’t want to live their life through pixels? She rolled her eyes like a teenager and went back to reading about a school charity event that was being put on nearby. She didn’t have time to stop by herself, which was a shame. Abbey glanced over at the man speaking, was he talking to her? She sort of recognised him, but couldn’t place him from his profile. “You alright?” She asked, imagining the worst had happened.
“Thank you, I think so, too.” Lucas gave a little shrug. “But in a city those sizes, isn’t most everyone around you a stranger? It seems like a waste of time and energy not to ‘care for strangers’ in that case. And it isn’t as though a polite smile is particularly draining.”
“No, not draining at all but it becomes a mentality to just go about your own life because you can’t smile at the hundreds of people you meet on the tube or in the streets. And then people find it strange when you do.”
“You know kids these days, they want everything at once. Hayley is no exception. I think she would go crazy with excitement if she got to do both at once.”
“It’s sort of how the world is, can’t expect them not to want everything at once. It’s cute though, it’s not like being spoiled, just too excited to hold back. That’s always endearing.”
“I thing psychopath might be a bit much,” he trailed off. “But, there’s no way the person wouldn’t think that was a weird call somehow. Can you imagine that? Like… You haven’t seen someone in a decade and the person suddenly hits you up and goes like: we should do something. I think part of me would worry that the person would be dying or something along those lines. The chances of me having happy thoughts that could be associated with it would be dim.” Cameron shrugged. “I think if I’m not married until I’m around fifty, then, I might not do so at all.”
“Is it?” She joked, sipping from her glass of wine as he spoke. “If someone did that to me, my first thought would be..” She dragged the word out as she thought about it. “They want to see if I failed.” She decided, and that made perfect sense. Abbey wasn’t even sure if they’d be right, professionally she was succeeding but her personal life was in tatters. “It would definitely go somewhere bad. Really? But what if you found the love of your life at sixty?”
