Chocolate special toffee

[raven]

Things are going so so much better. The morning was odd, as it was raining very very heavily and I had only just washed my hair, so I went out with it damp and half hidden under my red hoodie. By the time I reached the station, I looked about eleven. Which was a good thing, as it meant I had no trouble getting my child ticket and getting on the train and drying off slightly. It was a long and sublimely uneventful journey, and I was on time, but for some reason I was the last to arrive at Central. Everyone else - Becca, Hannah, Clare, Emily, Colleen, Lorna - was already there, and they were standing just beyond the ticket barriers in a sort of three-quarter circle. When I arrived, I stepped forwards and completed it, which I don't think was intentional, but it made a nice moment.

So, yes. Before anything else happened, I was handed the book version of the Shawshank Redemption by Clare, who's lending it to me, and Clare had also given her copy of Good Omens to Hannah to read. After all the happy slashy rambling on my part about that book, I hope she likes it. Next, I was introduced to Lorna, made the pleasant discovery that out of six of us, four had umbrellas, and we went out to Music Zone. It took a while to explain where exactly it is -
"The square?"
"What square?"
"The theatre place..."
"Stones in his pockets!"
"Where the Lambana used to be..."
"Oh, that place!"
- but we got there in the end. Becca wanted to buy a CD. She couldn't find U2 1980-1990, so she bought the best of Queen and then started talking about what her dad would say when he saw what she'd brought home. Admittedly, Pedar would be just as delighted if I came home with the Best of Queen, but I didn't. I had exactly two things to buy. Placebo's Sleeping with Ghosts wasn't too difficult to get hold of, but as the DVDs weren't arranged in anything like alphabetical order, the other thing wasn't so easy. Finally, with Emily's and Clare's help, I found Velvet Goldmine. Strangely, on Amazon, it was rated 18, but it was only a 15, so I could buy it legally. In any case, I took Clare with me to look intimidating, which she did with her usual aplomb.

Next, we went to Sayers, where I discovered Colleen likes chicken 'n' mushroom slices as much as I do, and also the fact Lorna is a vegetarian too, putting we meat-eaters in a minority. We bought pasties and doughnuts, and went into Clayton Square to eat them, because at least that way we'd be dry. Perching ourselves on the edge of the Body Shop was less than successful, as we all plummeted to the floor after a few moments, but once we'd eaten them, we were right by Millie's Cookies, which is always a good thing. I got my usual cup of rainbow cookies - sweet and decadent, as always. After that, we went to Virgin, where Lorna bought a CD by a band I'd never heard of, and following that, we went to Quiggins. Only in Britain can you buy scarves in the middle of July, and Lorna did it. I didn't buy anything, not even in the Bead Shop, which is very uncharacteristic, I know, but I was distracted by the conversation.

It appears Em and Collen's new mission in life is to persuade me to come to SG6. I'd like to, and Coll says if I do, I can get a lift with her and swap my ticket for ticket number 18, and get to meet the guests, particularly Colin Cunningham - yes, I laughed at that. He plays Major Davis. Colleen's ambition is to go up to him and start asking him questions about guacamole. I know (I know!) that they only want me to come so they can nominate me as resident slasher and make me ask him all the ruder questions. But I'm severely tempted. But, on the other hand, I won't go, because it would be a terrible thing to do to Hannah and well, no, you don't do that. So no.

We couldn't go to Chavasse today because of the heinous weather, so we wandered up to Home and Bargain (avoiding Colleen's Chemistry teacher!) and then back down into the city. We were aware of the fact we didn't know where we were going, but we employed the time in conversation and enjoyed ourselves. I learned some more about Lorna - her A-level choices are staggering. English language, English literature, French and German! She says she might become an interpreter when she's older - I told her about my mother, who could certainly help her out with that ambition. We'd started talking about random things (peasants, the Berlin Wall) when Em realised she had to go. She had to be home by four, so off she went to the bus stop, with us all waving and acting like the peanut gallery.

After that, we gave up the pretence of shopping and just sat down on that big round plinth where they put the Christmas tree, and talked. At least, I talked to Clare and Colleen, and we had a squealing fangirlie conversation which really was very nice. We managed to work our way through all the fandoms we share, squealing our way about the good bits in Stargate fandom, the good bits in Lord of the Rings fandom, and we had a nice time talking about Good Omens and the Anti-Christ in Lower Tadfield, and also how every tape left in the car long enough becomes the Best of Queen, and that of course led to discussion of a wonderful fic both Colleen and I read, a Harry Potter fic which features a guest appearance by Freddie Mercury. It's brilliant - Sirius summons him, Remus gets rid of him again and writes on the doormat:
"Welcome.
Unless you are -
a) buying something;
b) selling something;
c) Freddie Mercury."
Once we'd squealed about that, and gone through some of our favourite quotes from Order of the Phoenix (my favourite one is now on my userinfo) we started talking about Red Dwarf for some reason, and that always brings everyone into the conversation. Becca was pretending not to know us when we started to sing the theme. It's Clare's ringtone, which probably sparked off the discussion, now I come to think about it.

We must have sat there on the plinth, talking, for almost two hours, and it seemed strangely cold, strangely September-ish in weather, but with the freedom of its being July and (nominally) summer. We made a move eventually, wandered towards Thorntons because Becca wanted to go, and everyone seemed to be buying toffee. I didn't get any, but Lorna, having bought four packets, was very generous with hers, and let me have a big, sticky piece of chocolate special toffee. I chewed on that as we ran into the station, said our goodbyes and got on the train just before it was about to leave the station (Becca and me, that is).

I got home about an hour ago, realised my mother and Dadi have gone to arrange that dish-party. It's just Pedar and me, and yes, it's been a good day. It was made even better by an email in my inbox from louiselux. She wrote the fic that inspired me to almost-plagiarism, and it turns out she's really lovely, has read my fic and authorised it. So once I've cleaned up the spelling and grammar, it's going on contrelamontre.

There, that's everything.

Comments

[loneraven.livejournal.com]

Oh, wow! That's so cool!