Page 21 of A Copenhagen Snowmance

Chapter Fourteen

Kindly taking control of the conversation, Jamie tells her about the first time he walked through the cemetery during the summer and was surprised to see people of all ages on picnic blankets, using the area as a park, drinks and all.

She’d not quite considered that that might look strange to others, but she’d spent many a summer evening chilling with friends or a weekend afternoon reading a book amid the graves.

Totally accepted and normal. She suggests he heads up to Bispebjerg Cemetery in May, for their cherry-blossom festival.

“It’s beautiful,” she says, “almost Japan,” which makes him chuckle. It’s the first chuckle she’s had from him, and it raises her spirits.

“Lunch!” Jamie states, pointing in the direction of N?rrebro. She’s not saying no to that. Her stomach is rumbling under the down of her big coat.

It’s still a good fifty-minute walk to where he has planned, but the route is pretty, especially with the snow.

Walking side by side, close but not quite touching, they meander through ?stre Anlaeg, the park created from the city’s old fortifications, complete with a flooded moat, the lake now frozen over and glistening in the early afternoon sun.

They pass the State Museum of Art and the Botanical Garden with its iconic Palm House, Jamie finally steering them to Torvehallerne, two glass food halls blending stalls and eateries.

There are cheesemongers, French paté stalls, a butcher, amid porridge vendors, poke-bowl cafés and many others.

Jamie and Anna um and ah whether to go for open sandwiches at one shop, but a Spanish tapas eatery wins out, as Jamie is, it turns out, a sucker for a deep-fried croquette.

Minutes later they’re installed on two yellow metal barstools by a window, with a plate each of three baguette slices topped with different toppings, a glass of Spanish wine each and a side plate of molten croquettes.

The smoked-salmon-and-mayonnaise-salad-topped slice doesn’t stay on the plate long, with a tuna one following quickly after. The meatballs in tomato sauce actually make her moan aloud.

“OK,” says Jamie, “that’s clearly your fav—” And then he stops.

Anna sips from her wine, waiting, realising just how hungry she was and how the wine is hitting the spot, but his attention is firmly caught by something on the other side of the pane.

Anna turns, but whoever it is has walked in through the glass doors just behind her and Jamie is still entranced.

Anna turns to the other side to get a proper look.

It’s a tall, Nordic blonde woman and a small child.

Both are warmly dressed, the little girl in a floral snowsuit and a purple balaclava that rounds her face and rosy cheeks.

The woman takes a moment to pull back the head part of the balaclava to become a neck warmer, releasing a wealth of light brown hair.

It’s as she rights herself that she sees she’s being watched, and her focus moves from Anna to Jamie.

Her expression then changes from relaxed to very tense.

Whatever Anna’s sitting in the middle of, it doesn’t feel comfortable and she doesn’t know what to do.

At a loss, she moves her eyes down to the little girl and gives her a smile, which is enthusiastically returned.

“Hej, Lajla,” Jamie says. His voice sounds careful and tense. Not the Jamie voice Anna’s used to.

“Um… Hej,” Lajla responds and Anna looks back up to see her looking about, perhaps for escape.

“How are you?” he asks in English, although Anna is sure he normally ventures the initial pleasantries in his best Danish when he meets friends.

“Fine.” Her tone is tight. Anna looks at Jamie for direction, but his attention is now on the little girl.

“Hej,” he says to her, a big smile on his face, and again the little girl smiles back. Is it Anna’s imagination or is Lajla moving between them?

Jamie snaps his attention back to Lajla.

“This is my girlfriend,” he introduces Anna.

It comes out oddly, not natural, but then she supposes that as a fake couple, it would.

The way he drops his hand on top of hers across the table is clumsy, too.

Jamie is clearly out of sorts here. He was much smoother with his colleagues, but she knows a “we’re on” sign when she’s being given it.

Knowing her role, she holds out her other hand to Lajla.

“Anna,” she says, in the way Danes do.

Seeing scant option, Lajla shakes her hand and gives her name, too. There’s no smile coming back at Anna, but there’s less of an edge to her expression.

“I have to go,” she says quickly. “I’m meeting friends.” Anna suspects this isn’t true, and she notes Lajla only refers to herself, as if her daughter isn’t there.

“Good to see you both,” Jamie says, but Lajla just nods and draws the girl away by her hand.

Jamie looks back out of the window and takes a long swig of his wine. Anna simply observes him, waiting for an explanation as to what that was, but as she does so, sees Lajla and her daughter leave again from one of the side doors behind Jamie’s back. Weird.

The little girl looks back at the food hall as they go and Anna can’t help thinking there is something about her that’s familiar.

Jamie takes another of the croquettes, and then another.

“You really like those,” she says, for want of something to say.

“Comfort food,” he mumbles. Clearly something about the exchange has made him need it. And something about that gives Anna a clue.

She hazards a guess. “Was that who we’re fake dating for?”

He looks down at the table. “Aye. It took me by surprise. It was a bit—”

“Clunky?”

He gives her a wry smile.

“Can we talk about it? I’d like to understand.”

Jamie’s face says there’s a million other things he’d far prefer to talk about, but she knows she has some credit here, having told him more about Carl last night.

“Come on,” she coaxes. “You might feel better, and I can definitely fake-girlfriend better if I know what I’m dealing with.” Lajla and Jamie would make a striking couple. Anna needs all the ammo she can get.

He still doesn’t look convinced.

“I can see why she caught your eye, Jamie. She’s gorgeous.

” Anna doesn’t know why she feels the need to say this, although it’s true, Lajla had something almost regal about her, the way she held herself and just her put-togetherness.

Anna can’t remember when she last felt she looked put together, her life seems far more like random things thrown at each other in the hope something will stick.

He nods his head from side to side, “Aye, she’s something.” He pauses, then makes a decision.

“I met her in Edinburgh; she was over for a week-long conference, and we hit it off. At least, I thought we did. We spent the entire time together,” he goes on after another sip of wine, “obviously hiding that there was anything going on. I guess the subterfuge was fun, but I think I got wrapped up in her attention. I mean, she was totally out of my league; she was a super-confident professional during the day and in the evenings, she simply took control and … I dunno, when I look back at it now, I was like a puppy. She took the lead, and I happily went along.”

Considering the aloofness Anna’s experienced, she cannot imagine Puppy-Jamie.

But then, what she’s been through with Carl has totally changed her, too; she’s wiser now, more guarded and uninterested in another relationship.

There’s no way she’d take that risk again or trust like that again.

And she didn’t know there were leagues above the one Jamie’s in…

“After the conference she ghosted me. Which, if you haven’t experienced it before, is truly shite.

” Anna thinks for a moment that he could be making a point about her blocking Carl, but decides not.

He’s too lost in the memory of what was clearly a painful experience.

“But coincidentally, I was headhunted off the back of the conference by a company in Copenhagen. I … I sort of took it as a sign. I was ready for a change, too, and so I accepted.”

He shifts his eyes back to Anna. “I see, with hindsight, it could look dodgy. Stalkerish,” he mutters the word, ashamed.

“I do get that, but I thought she and I clicked. So, when I’d settled in, I thought I’d see if it was worth a shot.

Fortune favours the brave and all that. I waited outside her work, to surprise her.

” The more he tells, the more Anna can see he’s cringing at his own actions.

And rightly so. If Lajla had cut ties with him then he should have taken it as the No it was.

But Anna gets why being ghosted screwed with his head.

“And I succeeded,” he goes on, after another sip of wine.

“I properly surprised her. And she was really pissed off with me. Told me she didn’t want me, she didn’t want to speak to me or see me and I should leave.

She said we were just a conference fling and that I’d read far too much into it.

Which obviously I had, and I won’t make that mistake again. ”

The expression on his face leaves no doubt of whether that had hurt.

“Why didn’t she want more? I mean, you’re a catch, Jamie. You’re smart, solvent, kind and … you know,” Anna waves a hand in the direction of his face and physique because it bears saying, “you. So, I don’t get it.”

His face reddens even more. If he didn’t look so pained, she would have been loving being able to do this to him.

“Oh, come on,” she says with a smile. “You know you’re fit. Don’t get bashful on me now.”

Jamie drinks from his glass and once he’s swallowed, the bob of his Adam’s apple slightly mesmerising Anna, he says, “It’s not that.

It’s embarrassment. About the coming here.

I just got things wrong. I misread things, which is completely on me.

But like I said, I love it here and my job, so don’t want to leave, even though she’d prefer me to. ”

“And you didn’t know she had a kid?” Anna asks. “Oh my God, is she married?” If that’s the case, then Anna has even more understanding of where he’s at.

It takes Jamie a moment to answer before he says, “I didn’t know.

To be fair, I never asked. Anyways,” he says, sitting up straight from his gradual slouch, “I couldn’t leave the job I’d just started, or rather I didn’t want to, nor should I have to.

I’d like to speak to her, have things out for my own peace of mind, but she won’t.

So, I’m hoping meeting you might make her feel more open to the idea.

See? You might not need closure with Carl, but I would prefer some with Lajla. ”

At that he drains the rest of his glass.

“Let’s finish up here and head into town,” he says, drawing a line under the conversation. “Let’s see the lights. Maybe we’ll see some more of my friends-slash-probably-your-relatives.”

He’s clearly in need of distraction, and having just had his support in the cemetery, who is Anna to say no to that?