Page 1 of Going Overboard

1

‘Cheer up, love, you might have marked the days wrong in your calendar.’

Ugh. Gross. And way to make an already misogynistic phrase just that little bit worse. You’ve got to hand it to some people, going above and beyond like that.

I suppose (some might say) it’s my own fault, for sitting on the side of the pub garden next to the pavement, like I was just asking to be talked to by one of the drunk men pub-crawling past.

I am smiling now, to be fair, but not because he told me to, because the man who said this to me was dressed like a T-Rex. Peak dinosaur behaviour, as expected.

I swirl my drink around in my glass, watching the ice melt under the afternoon sun. I’m trapped somewhere between heaven and hell. Well, you can’t beat a Saturday afternoon in a pub garden in sunny Headingly… it’s just a shame that some of the people doing the Otley Run are so worse for wear at this point that they’re in that annoying stage of drunkenness where being a bit of a dick seems like the funniest thing.

I know, I sound grumpy for a thirty-two-year-old, and I was nostranger to an Otley Run – the infamous fancy-dress pub crawl – when I was a student in Leeds. It’s just that today I’m trying to vibe in the sunshine, now that it feels like summer might finally be well and truly here after a few false starts, and that vibe is being killed by things like handing back a rogue inflatable banana to a twenty-something Minion with a beer stain down the front of his dungarees.

Don’t get me wrong, I love that Headingly is a social Petri dish, but I’m feeling kind of stressed today, and coming here was supposed to relax me and cheer me up, and yet I find myself sitting on my own watching the world go by – literally, I just saw someone dressed up as a globe.

I smile to myself as a gaggle of girlies dressed as bowling pins trot by in their heels. I have a lot of time for that – that respect for style, even when it feels impossible. I don’t envy them navigating the pavement flags though, which I always seem to trip on, even when I’m in my trainers.

It’s been a long time since I went on a pub crawl with Kelsey, my bestie. Isn’t it weird how you sort of reach an age when you decide you’re too grown-up for such things… but then one day your perspective shifts and you start feeling like you might be old? Maybe I’ll ask her if she’s up for it, one of these days – perhaps we’ll even dress up for old times’ sake.

At least it’s sunny. The entire street is bathed in a warm glow – and my legs are getting their first official outing of the season. Shorts seemed like a great idea, for keeping cool, but it has to be said that my legs are looking alarmingly reflective. Maybe I should have stuck some fake tan on, just to not be such an obstacle to traffic should the light bounce off my ghostly-white legs and blind a driver, but to be honest with you I was so eager to get out of the flat and feel the sun on my skin that it’s a miracle I even bothered shaving them.

I’m scrolling aimlessly through Instagram, busying myself with something, when a shadow falls across the table. It’s not a cloud – it’s a man.

‘All right, princess,’ he says, his voice a mixture of swagger and slur.

And there he is. Super Mario himself. Super-drunkSuper Mario.

His hat is kind of flat and sad and his stick-on moustache is clinging on for dear life, but he’s got the full outfit on – even the white gloves. Well, I assume they were white when he put them on.

‘Erm… hi,’ I say, polite but cool, already turning back to my phone, pretending like I’m doing something very serious, very urgent, very… none of his business.

He doesn’t take the hint.

Mario plonks himself onto the bench opposite me, causing it to creak under his weight – almost like it’s protesting his intrusion on my behalf.

‘What’s a lovely lass like you doing sitting on your bill?’ he asks, leaning across the table with the kind of smile that makes me think either this has worked for him before, or he has an overwhelming level of self-confidence. I’m certain it’s the latter.

‘I’m with someone,’ I tell him. ‘My b?—’

‘You dressed up too, yeah?’ he asks, squinting at me as he talks over me. ‘What are you meant to be?’

I blink at him. I’m wearing denim shorts, a white vest and a pair of sandals. My long blonde hair is in loose waves – nothing fancy. Who or what on earth could I possibly be? Other than a millennial thirty-something starter pack.

‘I’m not dressed up,’ I say flatly.

He grins.

‘Not dressed, eh? Even better. You can be my Peach. I wouldn’t mind takin’ a bite out of that.’

I feel a wrinkle form on my forehead at his choice of words. Well, one word in particular –that. I don’t know whether to cry at the sheer bleakness of it or burst into flames.

‘Charming,’ I say under my breath.

‘Come on, princess, what do you say?’

Ugh, and then he winks. Honestly, like that was going to help.

‘Don’t you have a drain to jump down?’ I ask, briefly confusing him with my smile.

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