Silver Linings

Getting back out there was a huge challenge – but could Brian and Mandy be two of a kind?

It was a chilly winter’s day and Ciao Café was packed. The crowd of post school run mums downing lattes was merging into business types in suits checking out the lunchtime specials.

Glancing at her watch, Mandy gasped. ‘I can’t believe we’ve been here all morning and I still haven’t asked your news,’ she said to Carly.

‘Oh, don’t worry,’ Carly said. ‘You’re the number one priority right now.’

But if she was honest, she did feel drained after an entire morning listening to Mandy’s tales of woe.

Two years earlier, Jack, Mandy’s husband of 22 years, had left her for a blonde dentist he’d fallen in love with on his train to work.

Carly had supported her friend throughout. It hadn’t been easy, soaking up so many tears and angry tirades, but she couldn’t help thinking those days were preferable to the non-stop moaning Mandy indulged in now.

After all, Jack had been generous in the divorce settlement, their grown-up kids had adjusted and Mandy was free to reinvent her future in a thousand ways. Yet she seemed determined to hold on to the past, obsessing over ‘the other woman’.

‘Little Miss Colgate has changed her Facebook profile picture to her and Jack grinning on some beach,’ she was saying now. ‘She can’t be that great a dentist when her own teeth aren’t even straight!’

Carly took a deep breath, knowing what she was about to say wouldn’t go down well.

‘Do you think it might be time to move on?’ she suggested tentatively. ‘Meet someone new?’ Mandy glared at her as if she’d suggested running naked through the frosty streets outside. ‘That’s never going to happen,’ she snorted. ‘I’d never pick up a stranger on a train. Unlike some...’

‘What about online dating?’ Carly continued bravely. ‘Everyone does it these days.’

Mandy poo-pooed the suggestion but later, alone in a house so silent she could hear the clocks ticking, she flipped open her laptop and dived into a matchmaking website.

‘I have been very badly hurt,’ she wrote in her profile. ‘I’m not sure I can trust another man, but I’m willing to try.’

When Mandy called wanting feedback on her words, Carly cringed hearing so much negativity but told her, ‘Great! You’re sure to speak to someone out there.’

Sure enough, a few days later, Mandy got a message from Brian Brooks, 56, a driving instructor.

‘I like what you say,’ he wrote. ‘My wife dumped me too.’

They began chatting and even though Brian’s repartee wasn’t exactly sparkling, Mandy got the feeling he was steady and safe.

A fortnight later, they agreed to meet in Ciao Café.

‘I’ll be wearing a brown jumper and brown trousers,’ Brian said.

That didn’t sound very appealing. If Mandy had a pang for Jack, who’d always been a natty dresser, she slapped it down.

She arrived first so she could watch Brian arrive. He was punctual, though he spent ages perfectly parking his drivingschool car.

He was smaller than Mandy had imagined, but there was no mistaking his head-to-toe mud-brown outfit.

He seemed shy, so she ordered scones and a pot of tea and tried to put him at ease.

‘You said you liked local politics in your profile,’ she said. ‘That sounds interesting.’

He shrugged. ‘My ex didn’t think so,’ he said. ‘She banned me from even mentioning the council’s doings at home. She wasn’t keen on my roundabout collection either.’

Mandy had a sudden vision of The

‘Do you think it might be time to move on?’

Magic Roundabout on children’s TV with Brian the Snail until he clarified that he had an extensive library of books on the motorway roundabouts of Europe.

‘Cynthia said she’d rather read the gas bill,’ he went on. ‘Once she started going to Spanish evening classes, I knew I’d lost her.’

It turned out Cynthia had left Brian for an accountant with a villa in Marbella.

‘I didn’t have much in common with my ex-husband either,’ Mandy sighed. ‘I liked staying in watching old movies, but he preferred cocktails and salsa dancing. Apparently, his new partner does a mean jive. I guess it makes a change from all those fillings.’

The ex-bashing perked up Brian no end and two hours later, he and Mandy were still swapping stories of how hard done by they were.

When he popped to the loo, she checked her phone and found a text from Carly. ‘How’s Brian?’ ‘Brown,’ Mandy replied. ‘But nice.’ She and Brian began to meet every week for tea and a good whinge. Mandy told herself it was good to have found a kindred spirit, a fellow wronged party, but as time went on, she would come away from their dates feeling more deflated than ever.

‘We need to shake things up a bit, have some fun,’ she thought. ‘I wonder if Brian knows how…’

Jack had always taken the initiative in their relationship, but now Mandy realised it was down to her.

Next time they met for the usual in Ciao Café, Mandy declared, ‘Brian, I think we should try something new.’

He looked alarmed. ‘Like a choc-chip muffin?’

‘Nope,’ she replied. ‘A fondue in the Swiss place down the road.’

It took a while to convince Brian, but in the end, he agreed and they booked a table for the following weekend.

There was snow on the ground, but the restaurant was toasty-warm and welcoming, with red checked tablecloths and a delicious smell of mulled wine and melting cheese.

Mandy ordered, enjoying her new assertiveness, and soon, she and Brian were glugging back gluhwein and cooking chunks of steak on forks in a pot of sizzling oil.

Brian’s cheeks turned pink as he relaxed. ‘I feel as if I’m on a wonderful skiing holiday in the Alps,’ he smiled. ‘Shall we finish off with a Schnapps?’

‘Brian!’ Mandy exclaimed. ‘You do surprise me!’

She realised they hadn’t whined about their exes all night and she’d actually had a genuinely wonderful time.

He looked really quite handsome in the flickering candlelight and, walking back on the slippery pavements, Mandy gripped onto his arm a little tighter than strictly necessary.

When they reached her door, she was almost tempted to ask him in, but decided she’d gone quite far enough for one night.

‘Next time, it’s your turn to think of a date with a difference,’ she said, giving him a peck on the cheek.

In the morning, Brian called. He sounded younger, lighter, almost flirty. ‘I loved every minute of last night,’ he said. ‘To carry on the mountain theme, I’m taking you walking in the Peak District. I’ve even taken the liberty of booking us a modest B&B.’

Mandy felt her heart give a little lurch of… what? She needed Carly to explain.

‘Sounds like it could be excitement,’ Carly chuckled down the phone. ‘Possibly even a little bit of lust?’

Mandy let out a strange, giggly little squeak because, for the first time in years, she felt exhilarated by life.

She’d not been in Brian’s car before and as they drove to the Peaks, she noted how careful he was, precisely observing every speed limit. It wasn’t very rock and roll, unlike Jack, who would speed around corners and brake too hard, but Mandy had to admit it was very relaxing.

They arrived in cold rain, pulled on their brand new hiking boots and waterproof all-in-ones and set off up the hill.

It was hard going and soon Mandy was groaning, ‘I’ve got a blister.’

‘The label on my coat’s rubbing my neck,’ Brian winced. ‘And my back’s hurting.’

‘My hands have gone numb,’ Mandy added. ‘I’m sure the rain’s getting worse.’

Suddenly, they looked at each other and fell about laughing.

‘Hark at us,’ Brian said. ‘Whinge, whinge, whinge.’

‘Right pair of miseries,’ Mandy agreed. ‘From now on, we get fined one jelly baby for every negative thing we say.’

Old habits die hard, but now when they slipped up and complained about the mud or freezing wind, they just chuckled.

By the time they got to the summit, the score was three-two in Brian’s favour. They sat and shared a bar of chocolate.

The rain stopped and before long, to their amazement, the sun began to peep through. They chattered away happily all the way down and seemed to be back at the car in no time.

That evening, by a log fire in the pub, they ate chicken pie washed it down with cool white wine.

‘Honeymooners?’ the barman asked as he cleared their plates. ‘You look so romantic sitting there.’

‘Not yet,’ Brian said archly, making Mandy blush.

Their eyes kept meeting, full of anticipation at the thought of their first night together.

‘It’s been a perfect day,’ she said dreamily. ‘Funny how as soon as we stopped grumbling, the weather changed.’

‘It’s called blue-sky thinking,’ Brian quipped.

‘Very witty,’ Mandy smiled. ‘And you know what they say – every cloud has a silver lining.’

‘for the first time in years, she felt exhilarated by life’