First Impressions by Charlie Lovett

Author:Charlie Lovett
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Penguin Group US
Published: 2014-09-28T16:00:00+00:00

Affectionately (that’s how Jane Austen signed her letters),

Eric

Sophie read the letter over three times, feeling more and more guilty about the thrill it gave her. Just reading it felt like cheating on Winston; enjoying reading it was even worse. But she couldn’t help herself. She still wasn’t sure how she felt about Eric, but the thought that he was coming back to England to see her left her a little breathless. She had just stowed the letter in her handbag and was turning to the catalogs when her phone rang.

“Where are you?” asked Winston. “I stopped by the shop and Gusty said you were sick and when I rang the flat there was no answer.”

“I’m fine,” said Sophie. “I’m on the train. I’m going up to Oxford to get my things.”

“I could meet you there,” said Winston. “We could spend the night. Take a room at the Randolph; I could show you all my old haunts.”

“Can you afford a room at the Randolph?” asked Sophie, who slumped a little deeper into her seat as she imagined a night with Winston in the freshly laundered sheets of Oxford’s finest hotel.

“Not exactly,” he said, “but don’t you have a room?”

“I have a room with a very narrow single bed.”

“I’m sure we could come to some sort of arrangement.”

“You never told me you were at Oxford,” said Sophie, changing the subject before she weakened further and agreed to let him come meet her.

“I read economics at St. John’s,” he said. “Longer ago than I care to think.”

“Yes, you’re so old,” she teased. “Much too old for me, I imagine.”

“So shall I meet you at the Eagle and Child around eight?”

“I’m actually going home for the night,” said Sophie. “To my parents’, that is.”

“I could come up tomorrow,” said Winston. “We could take a punt out, maybe have a picnic in the meadow.”

It was a glorious vision, but Sophie would not be distracted from her quest. “Not this time,” she said. “I have too much work to do cleaning out my room. I’ll call you, though. And maybe when I get back to town we could . . .” She left her sentence unfinished, but they both knew what she meant.

“We certainly could,” said Winston.

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