A love story

Marjorie was content around dinosaurs. They were as much a mystery as men, she had to admit that to herself, yet Sammy the stegosaurus, the colossus that stood proudly in front of her now, wasn’t going to let her down the way men usually did. Sammy was Marjorie’s name for the beast. She guessed that he had a much more fancy Latin name that the caretakers of London’s Natural History museum used, but what did they know? Sammy he would stay.

Sammy and Marjorie had been seeing each other every weekday for three years now. With an hour to kill between finishing work and getting the tube at South Kensington, she took to coming here and offloading the woes of the world onto the poor beast.

Having been killed by an asteroid sixty five million years ago, Marjorie guessed Sammy had a few gripes of his own to tell, and she was ready to listen, any time he chose, but for now, the traffic was all one way.

Actually, he hadn’t been her first choice of confidante. She’d tried Terry the Tyrannosaurus, but after only a minute chatting to him, she realised he was a bit of a dick. So, Sammy was the one.

“He still hasn’t called, Sammy.” Marje shook her head. “It was a lovely meal. We chatted for hours, it all seemed to go really well. But nothing. Not a squeak from the inconsiderate pratt, and that  is two weeks now.” Marge put the last bite of her cheese sandwich in her mouth and looked round to check for the Museum’s Gestapo guards who delighted in imposing the draconian, no eating rule. “It’s no wonder you are just bones” she said, and giggled. Her smile darkened again. “I’m finished with men… current company excluded of course.” She held up a hand in apology.

Marjorie looked at the artist’s representation of the Stegosaur and puzzled how the men and lady beasts ‘got it on,’ with those big plates on their back. “I bet you had your own lady troubles. Sorry to keep burdening you with mine.”

Marge folded up the shrinkwrap that had contained her lunch, and surreptitiously swept the crumbs from her jacket. It was time to brave the darkening Winter streets and head home. She so wanted to pat Sam’s head in acknowledgement of the counselling, but the no touching rule was also imposed rather strictly, and she really didn’t want to risk another ban.

Steven watched as the dinosaur woman made her way to the exit. His heart beat  in time to the clack of her heel on the polished wooden floor. As she passed under one of the ceiling lights, her stunning tousled blonde hair exploded into a thousand colours, and Steven did all he could to continue breathing.

She stood about a head short of his six-foot frame and he imagined her curvatious figure must have just stepped out of a Rubens masterpiece from the National Gallery. Her long and impossibly curly locks wended over her shoulders and down her back like a Gordian river of gold. When she exited the building, Steven would have sworn the lights dimmed, and the disappointed dinosaurs exhaled, before sinking down onto their haunches. The show was over for another day. Another day that he hadn’t figured a way to talk to the love of his life. A nameless love, assuming that ‘dinosaur woman’ wasn’t an inspired guess. How long had it been?

“Two years passed Christmas,” he said to himself accusingly. It’d been Christmas Day, that was right. With nothing better to do, he trained it in from Croydon for the opening of the new Dino exhibition. Terrified that he may be the only saddo that turned up, he’d stood outside and checked to see if anyone entered. There’d been a few families trailing unruly children and a couple of winos that figured they’d be able to get a heat, but that was about it. Disappointed, Steven headed back down the path, intending to go home to his M&S turkey micro meal. Halfway to the gate, she’d appeared. A wonderful vision. Powder blue wellies matched the Christmas jumper and umbrella. The second she came into sight, a confetti of snowflakes fell all around, and Steven noticed she left welly tracks in the thin powder that now covered the pavement. A covering he would have sworn was not there a second ago. She brought Christmas with her.

Casually pivoting, he headed into the museum. She entered and lowered the brolly, securing it against the wall. First right, then left wellington was scraped along the coconut hair matting before she raised each, and looked over her shoulder to check they were snow free. Happy that her feet were dry, she pulled off her pom-pom hat, and right there, right then, he was in love. The figure, the beautiful face, her poise, yes, they had led him to the precipice, but as the golden mane spread out in the pale winter sun, a whirlwind sprang and drew his heart forever into the void.

Yet here he was. Two, coming on for three years later, he now stood in exactly the same spot and watched her walk down the path and off to her train.

Okay, he had to admit it. He knew she headed for the Tube as he’d followed once. Once only though. He wasn’t a stalker. Although, changing his work hours to be in this museum at four each day, maybe belied that idea a bit. He felt pathetic. Two years and ten thousand ideas of how to start a conversation, yet not one word had passed between them. Maybe she was married, maybe an axe murderer, these things could well be true, but it still didn’t mean that he couldn’t at least say “Hello.” Damn! He was going to do it tomorrow…. For sure.

Marjorie took her usual place on the granite bench, near Sam’s head. She looked around and made sure they couldn’t be overheard.

“You’re not going to believe it. He called last night.” She clapped her hands and imagined Sam skipping in anticipation of juicy gossip. “It turned out that he really enjoyed our last date, but he misplaced my phone number, that’s all.” She peeled back the plastic on her three bean wrap and took a bite. “We are going out again tomorrow. He’s picking me up from work and we are off to see a show. Sorry but it means that I won’t be in. Will you be okay?” Marge was fairly sure Sam nodded. “That’s good. I suggested that we came here, but he doesn’t really like museums, apparently. I will have to get to work on that, I’m sure he just needs to see the magic of this place to be convinced, but we’ll give him time, eh?” She was about to take another bite of her lunch when she noticed a tall guy, leaning against the wall and looking over. He stood upright and started heading her way.

“Oh, I think someone has seen the sandwich.” As he drew near, she put her bag over the offending item, and smiled at the approaching interloper. Just then, he seemed to swerve away and start reading the plaque with Stegosaurus information, down by Sam’s tail. “Whew, that was close. I thought we were busted there,” Marjorie said to Sam as she checked out the man. “He’s not all that bad either,” she said. “And he seems to be into dinosaurs, that’s good. It’s the way of the world. You wait sixty-five million years for a decent man, and two come along together.” She chuckled and really wanted to dig her elbow into Sam’s gigantic ribs. ,

The man’s face was beetroot red. “I think he is about to have a heart attack though. I probably better stick with my original date.”

“I almost did it.” Steven gave himself an imaginary pat on the back. “We were so close there.” Of course, the other half of his brain was laughing hysterically, and shouting rude insults. If it had control of his hands, he would currently be giving himself a wedgie. You absolute chickenpoop, lilly livered waste of space. Get over there and talk to the woman. What’s the worst that could happen?
The Captain Brave side of the head was right except for one small thing. She could burst out crying, or, worse still, laughing. His testicles shot back up inside his abdomen at the thought. No, this had been a good first step.

From where he stood, he could smell her perfume. It was a rich intoxicating aroma of citrus and exotic fruits. Tomorrow, he would walk over,and casually say, “My, that is a lovely perfume.” Now, come on, that was surely inoffensive and non-committal. If she shunned him, he could just walk away, if she spoke, bang! They were off and running.

He’d already picked out a house for them to spend the rest of their lives together. Only a mile away, they could come here every day and reminisce about how they met. Boy, they’d laugh at the length of time it took them to pluck up the courage to talk to each other. They’d bring little Steven and little Sam, (short for Samantha, they’d have one of each,) and together, they’d teach them all about the wonderful things in this building. Steven had overheard Dino woman call the dinosaur in front of him, Sam, and voila! the conundrum of what their little girl would be named was solved. It was all falling into place now. Tomorrow was going to be the big day.

It was Friday at last. That was about the only good thing in Marjorie’s world today. She took out a paper hanky and dabbed the tear in the corner of her eye. Sam looked on with concern. “Sorry, Sam. I’m not great company today, I know. Do dinosaurs cry? It’s a pointless past time, but I seem to do it more and more.” She returned the Kleenex to her pocket.

She sighed deeply. “He picked me up at work and we headed for the theatre. We hadn’t been in the car ten minutes when his phone rang. He went to answer but put it on speaker, by mistake I assume,” she leant her head forward and sobbed. “You have probably guessed the rest, but it was his wife calling. He tried the usual excuses, but he’s just another cheating pig. Why do I keep attracting these fu…..”

She sniffed and waved a hand to the dinosaur. “Sorry. There is no need to be crude. I know how much you hate bad language.” Marjorie stood and picked up her bag. “I’d probably better just go. I can see that I am depressing you.” But she didn’t move. It was Friday night in London, one of the biggest and most vibrant cities in the world. Marjorie was 34 years old, she’d been told she was attractive, okay, predominantly by bloody married men. Still, she had a good job and was solvent. All this being said, she had absolutely nowhere to be. She slumped back down on the bench.

This was it. Steven inhaled and ran his fingers through his hair. Girls like the bad boy look, he’d been told. Unkempt hair was about as far as he would go with that. Something was wrong though.

Checking his fly, he noticed the granny standing by the rail, watching him. “I wasn’t fondling myself; I thought my zip was down,” he said, but she took her grandchild and sped away. It wasn’t the zip that was errant though. Suddenly, he realised what it was. He’d stopped breathing. “Jesus, how stupid can you be?” he said, regulating his heart rate to five hundred beats a minute.

“Okay, just remember your line. That is a lovely perfume…  that is a lovely perfume.”

He looked over at Dino Woman and saw she hung her head. She looked sad. “Maybe I should leave this until next week. I wouldn’t want to catch her in a bad mood.” She was sad, true, but oh god, was she beautiful. “Get over there right now,” Brave brain shouted. “But she’s clearly in distress,” lilly liver replied. “Well, there is no better deed than assisting a damsel,” conscientious brain piped in, but what did he know?

“Look,” said brave brain in a voice that sounded a lot like Mel Gibson, “Just get over there and use the perfume line we rehearsed. It’s not as if you are asking for her phone number or anything.” For once, Lilly Liver didn’t seem to have a cogent rebuttal.

“Okay, here goes nothing.”

“I better be going, Sam. Yes, yes, don’t worry about me. I will be fine. I’ll pick up a Chinese and some ice cream on the way home. I might even crack open that bottle of wine that has been in the cupboard these last three years.” The thought spawned another tear. The wine had been purchased as a previous beau was due to come round for dinner. They’d been seeing each other for a month, and all seemed to be going swimmingly, until he got arrested for dealing drugs on the way to her flat. Marjorie had spent the rest of that night in a police cell as an assumed conspirator. Of course, she’d missed that little story off the Christmas letters that year.

As she got up from the bench, she noticed heart attack man stood about ten feet away and stared. And stared, And stared.

“Are you going to murder me?” she asked. “because if you are, please know, it wouldn’t be the worst thing that has happened today. Not even in the top three. Can you make it quick though?” The sweat beaded down his face and his hands shook. “Are you okay?” she asked, now genuinely concerned for his health.

“Er….     Er… Yes… Okay…   You smell.” His chin fell to his chest.

“I smell?” Marjorie stuck her nose under her jacket lapel. “I had a shower this morning, you cheeky sod.”

“No…  No.. perfume.” He’d managed to look up but wouldn’t make eye contact.

“You don’t like my perfume? What’s wrong with it?” She began to think that maybe Mr Sweaty here was a sandwich short of a picnic. Luckily there was still a lot of people around, in case he got nasty. Looking at him though, he seemed to have a kind face.

“I love you….” He stammered.

“Wow, I’ve gone from offending your nostrils to being the love of your life in under a minute. This day couldn’t get any crazier.” Marjorie laughed but mostly to cover her discomfort.

The man dipped down to a crouch and as far as she could tell, seemed to be arguing with himself. She was a little impressed when he stood, wiped his brow and held up a hand. His eyes met hers.

“I’m really not retarded. I have a flipping degree in engineering. What I was trying to say was that I love your perfume, but I’ve been trying to tell you for three years and the bloody words just wouldn’t come out. There, I’ve done it. Now, you can tell me to go bugger off and we can both get on with our miserable lives. Okay?”

She looked at Mr sweaty a long time. All around, people had stopped gawping at dinosaurs and were circling around the two of them. This was a much better show. From the murmurs, the betting was 50-50 she would tell him to take a run and jump. Some were hoping they’d fall into each other’s arms. She turned to Sam.

“What do you think, Sammy boy? Do we take Mr Sweaty here…”

“Steven,” he interjected. “My name is Steven.” She nodded at him and looked back at the skeleton.

“Do we buy Steven a coffee or just feed him to the T-Rex?”

“Buy him a coffee,” someone shouted from the back of the crowd in what they meant to sound like dinosaur, but was more like Norwegian.

“There we have it,” said Marjorie. “Far be it for me to argue with a Scandanavian dinosaur. Come on sweaty Steven, let’s go have a coffee.”

All around, the crowd cheered, and a couple of guys raised Steven up on their shoulders. A woman held out a hand to shake with Marjorie and when she took it back, she now held a pack of condoms. “Bloody hell, . I only said coffee. What type of tramp do you think I am.” She couldn’t stop laughing though.

Two years later, a very pregnant Marjorie, and a doting Steve, sat together on the granite bench and discussed the world with Sam. The dinosaur had been given a say in the colour scheme of their Kensington apartment, the date of last year’s wedding, and whether the imminent baby Sam, should be a hospital or natural birth. He seemed to be taking his time over this last conundrum.

“Can I tell you a secret that has been burning inside of me as long as my love for you, Marje?”

“You can tell me anything, love,” she replied but her forehead lined. Surely it was way too late for him to admit he had a second family, up in Watford.

“Are you sure? This may rock your world to its core?” he said.

She kissed his cheek and whispered. “Won’t be the first time you’ve rocked my world, stud.”

He beamed with pride. “Okay, here goes. See your ever reliable boyfriend, Sam here?”

“Yes. What about him?” she asked, anxiously.

“Do you want to know why he hasn’t let you down like other men did?”

“I most certainly do.” Marjorie raised an eyebrow.

“He’s not a he. You can tell by the shape of the plates on HER back. Sam here’s a girl.”