Wake Up Happy Every Day by Stephen May

Author:Stephen May
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
Published: 2014-10-08T16:00:00+00:00

I’m deep in the financial district now. The place where San Francisco has been most Manhattanised. Though the truth is the whole world has been Manhattanised. Every city now has iconic statement buildings. Bank-statement buildings you might say. They all have their towers, their shards, their needles, their pins, their fins, their gherkins, their fuck-you middle fingers. Their rigid digits. And after those sky-taunting gestures come all the steel and glass cubes. The galleries housing the same butterfly colours and shapes of the same conceptual art, replicated on the same postcards in the same gift shops. I’m sure Timbuktu will have a museum of modern art by now. I bet Kinshasa has a sculpture park. Cities like to wear what all the other kids have. They all want the fashionable gear.

The sting is already fading and I force myself to pick up the pace even more. The further I get from this Catherine and her shy, crooked smile, the more ridiculous I feel. The more disloyal. ‘Just coffee,’ I say out loud. ‘Just coffee.’

I think about the other time I was asked out. By Sarah. It was she who made the first move on me a lifetime ago in the council and that was just for lunch, and look where that led. And sprinting to overtake that thought is the next one. Yes, I must marry her. As soon as is decent – which will be a while yet after all. We’ll find a way to make it work. And I won’t even wear the marital condom of a pre-nup.

And, as soon I’ve finished this run, I’ll call this Catherine and tell her even a quick espresso is out. I’ll tell her I was dazzled by her. I’ll tell her that in the bright smiling light of her I wasn’t thinking properly. I’ll find a way to let her down that also makes her feel good about herself.

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