Becoming a posh or a snob in England was so easy. In Italia, it was different: he was rich and known to be rich. Nobody was astonished to see him wearing designer clothes or horseback-riding. Here, he had to be more careful. Nobody knew that he was from a rich family, nobody had seen his face in magazines, and so everybody could be very judgmental towards him whenever he let a clue about how rich he really was slip out of his mouth. He did not want to be classified as a posh, so he stopped playing polo, dropped fencing, and rented a small apartment in town. He actually really enjoyed his new lifestyle, but he definitely needed to find equivalents in the “sport” department, ergo the running thing. He never used to run, back in Milano. He thought for a few weeks to keep playing tennis, but that wasn’t the sport he liked the most; beginning a whole new thing was definitely better.

So Gabriele was running. He wore a grey t-shirt, Adidas shorts and Nike shoes. He had his iPhone wrapped around his right arm, his earplugs in, and he ran at a steady pace. For twenty minutes, it was easy … and then, well, he just came back from Italia! You know, it’s this country where the food is so delicious that you always have to come back for more. And when you have spent almost a year in another country where the food is disgusting … you just can’t say no, can you?

He was all sweaty, his grey shirt had become black in various areas, and more importantly, he was out of breath. His jogging app said he was running for a little bit more than forty minutes, and he decided that it was enough, and that he could stop.  But then, he saw a girl running just in front of him, and it gave him a little bit more strength. What? One can use any motivation he wants when it concerns his health, right? Well, not everything, but looking at a girl’s hips can do no wrong, Gabriele was sure of that. So he kept running behind this girl, admiring her back until she stopped. She seemed out of breath, just like him, but he didn’t want to look like a creep and just stop beside her, so he kept running for a bit. He still managed to take a look at her face while stepping next to her. For a second, he looked a bit puzzled watching her, before realizing that he actually knew her: she was the new girl from the activity coordinators' team! He decided to stop near her – he could be a creep for a few seconds, it didn’t matter – wait for her to stand up – because she was catching her breath while looking at the floor – and when she did, he said : “Hey, you’re the new girl in the activity coordinators’ team, right ?!”

So apparently she wasn’t the only masochist in the neighbourhood that had woken up earlier than the majority for a bit of running, she realised as she spotted a pair of sneakers and looked up to find out who was standing in front of her. His face was familiar; she couldn’t really place him, nor could she distinctly remember what colour his hair was supposed to be, darkened by sweat as it was now, but his eyes twinkled and a friendly smile played on his nice lips as he stopped in front of her to catch his own breath. She could tell this guy clearly had more practice than her when it came to running lapses, and his damp T-shirt indicated he’d run a lot longer than she had, too.

She remembered him from school, she noticed. He was the other activity coordinator and she’d met him very briefly on her first day, when she’d been introduced to her new colleague. It’d been a fleeting conversation, barely a conversation at all, to be honest, as she’d quickly had to proceed to the rest of the visit of the premises with the headmistress.
She seemed to remember he was from Italy, or maybe Spain – the accents were similar and sort of threw her off, although she was fairly certain he was in fact Italian. She couldn’t remember his name, however – they had been loads of names and loads of faces on her first day. So much information was too much for her brain to process at once and she realised now that it had started to blend into a huge mess.

- Hi, she answered, her face lighting up with a smile. Yeah, I’m Lena.

She would have extended a hand to shake his, but she was holding a bottle of water and was struggling with the cap, her hands slipping on it. Her nails finally did the trick, and some water splashed from how much she’d actually squeezed it. She jumped backwards to avoid spraying him. The water was actually quite refreshing, although when she’d taken it, she’d pictured actually drinking it after her run, and not spilling half of it all over herself.

- For Christ’s sake, she moaned, scrunching her nose. Sorry, are you alright?

It was only water, and they were already so sweaty from the running that some water wouldn’t actually be gross or even make a difference, but still.

- Sorry, she repeated, a giggle in her voice this time. I should probably have introduced myself more properly before showering you in water. So, yeah, Marlene, but you can call me Lena. You’re the other activity coordinator, right? Hopefully, you won’t judge me too harshly based on this poor performance, she joked.

She didn’t want to ask him for his name directly – would it be kind of rude of her to admit that she couldn’t have remembered what his name was even if her life had depended on it? Probably not.

She was Greek, of that he was certain. He remembered seeing her last name written on the employees’ list of the activity coordinator’s bureau. Gabriele even remembered that it wasn’t so difficult to read or to pronounce, which was sort of rare considering the ton of Greek last names that were completely unreadable. Anyways, he remembered that she was Greek, but apart from that …   Well; let’s say it was fortunate that she gave him her name a second time. Lena, she w as. Pretty name, he had to say.

So Lena was trying to open her bottle of water, and Gabriele felt like it was going to end up badly. She was squeezing the bottle too hard, and her fingers slipped around the cap because she was a bit sweaty (but less than he was, he realized). Obviously, what was going to happen happened, and when she finally managed to open the bottle, it sort of exploded, and his already sweaty t-shirt got even wetter. His eyes, by reflex, closed for a half a second, and then he started laughing while opening them again. She seemed truthfully sorry, and that discouraged Gabriele from making fun of her.  She then asked him if he was alright, and obviously, he was, certainly because that quantity of water probably never killed anybody; he smiled gently, still a bit out of breath. He ran his hand through his hair to pull it back, which was kind of gross, but it was falling in front of his eyes – he really needed a haircut – and he couldn’t watch her properly, which he liked to do. She told him that she hoped he wouldn’t judge her based on her poor performance at opening a bottle, and he smiled back at her for a few seconds, looking at her straight in the eyes, before answering, softly : “No worries Lena, I’d even say that you have a good breaking-the-ice technique! You’ll be good with the kids!”

She looked like a kid herself, truthfully. If he hadn’t known she was on his team, he might have thought she was just a student. How old was she, anyways? Younger than he was, definitely. But maybe the cause of that was that she had no make-up on, or maybe that she was sort of small – but not like too small, but still small compared to him. He added, finally dropping his gaze to watch where exactly they had stopped: “Come on, there’s a Starbucks like two streets from here, I’m buying you coffee, or whatever you’d prefer!” He then realized that he hadn’t managed to let his name slip into the conversation, just in case she didn’t remember. Well, it would be kind of awkward to drop it now, so he decided to wait for her to ask – or maybe, the bartender at Starbucks would do it for her. They started walking towards it, Gabriele leading the way: “So, tell me everything, how did you end up here ?”

Spoiler:

He laughed and his eyes crinkled as droplets of water splash his T-shirt, as Lena stared longingly at what had been a full bottle a few seconds earlier. The guy had a good sense of humour, she had to say, and her smile got wider as he reassured her regarding her social skills.

- Well, that only worked because you work with kids and probably are used to clumsy people making fools of themselves, she said lightly, no seriousness in her voice whatsoever.

Granted, she didn’t know too many people that would have thrown a fit over some water, but who knew? Some people were downright unpleasant, but he seemed to be the Southern type, just like her. (Because, you know, it’s a fact that people from Southern Europe are usually way more relaxed than people from Northern Europe. That’s what she’d deduced from her own experience, anyway. Maybe people from Ireland were a bit warmer than the Brits, though, she couldn’t tell.)

Carefully, she lifted her bottle to her lips. She was thirsty, and although she downed the rest of the water in one gulp – while trying not to choke –, her throat was still dry when she stopped drinking and capped her bottle once more.
She couldn’t tell if her colleague had picked up on her disappointment at wasting her precious water, but he invited her to join him at Starbucks, and she smiled again, pulling her hair back into a tight ponytail.

- That’d be great, thanks!, she replied, grateful. Although it should really be my treat, what with the unexpected shower and everything.

Crap, she still didn’t know his name. She wracked her brain, trying to remember what the headmistress had said when she’d introduced her to him, but not to avail, and she felt sheepish for a moment, before remembering that Starbucks employees always asked for their customer’s name to write it on their cups. If only she could get a peek… She could’ve just said she simply couldn’t put her finger on it, but she didn’t mean to be rude and followed him. She didn’t know the city very well, and made a point of filing away all the details of Bournemouth that she noticed on the way – if only to make sure she’d find her way again if she ever needed coffee and didn’t want to take out her phone’s GPS.

- I’ve only been here a couple weeks, she explained to the young man, I lived in Southampton before that. I mean, I’m from Crete, originally, but I moved to England to study ancient civilisations, part of being Greek, I guess. But, well, I kind of sucked at that, so I dropped off, got a certification in sailing instead and here I am! Not much to say, really, I mean, I grew up by the sea and I could swim almost before I could walk, so… What about you?

She was sincerely interested; since she hadn’t gotten to really talk to any of her colleagues until then, she wanted to make up for it and get to know them a little better. This seemed like a perfect occasion to get acquainted with her closest co-worker!

Spoiler:

They really did worked with kids, the activity coordinators. To any of those who pretended doing this job was easy, Gabriele responded that it was as simple as being in charge of a nursery. You've got a bunch of people that are only interested in eating, drinking and having fun, and a bunch of other people (or superiors, as you are supposed to call them) that are always mad for any reason possible. That's the exact same thing as a nursery, right? It would take a few week for Lena to fully understand it, but he would be here to help. She was in the same position as he was about a year ago now, so it sort of was his duty now to teach her how much he knew about this job. But she would do great, he had a feeling about it, she would. They were a team, now, so they had to get know eachother. A Starbucks was a great opportunity to do so. They would chat around a coffee, it wouldn't be too long so that if they had to go through that awkward phase where no one knew what to say next, they would just have to throw a “bye, see you tomorrow at the office” and it would be over.

She agreed for the coffee, and Gabriele began leading the way. He listened carefully to what she was saying, still catching his breath a bit. He opened his eyes wider when she said she could swim before she could walk ; what it really possible, or was it just a metaphor, her way of saying that she really loved water? He prefered not asking, and chose to believe in the magic: she learned to swim before she learned to walk. How cool was that?
She asked him back how he ended up in Help Yourself, and he answered, as they were getting closer to their coffee: “A bit like you, actually... Well, I didn't pass any cool degree in sailing, but I went to college, had a double-degree in Art History and Law. It satisfied my mother, but … I felt kind of empty, and I needed a fresh start. So I went here, first as a student, and then, I applied for this job.”. Now that he was saying it out loud, it didn't really sound like they had shared the same experience. But he did sort of felt some connection when she first told him her story, so … “Anyways, super-cool, the sailing certification. I used to sail a bit, when I was a kid, with my parents. I loved it! I guess if you like the sea that much, you'll be able to work on activities in that department. You'll see, everyone ends up doing something he fits in. That's the main perk: you get to work on something related to what you love doing.”.Gabriele loved his job, really, he did. Yes, it looked a lot like being in charge of a nursery, but still, he loved it. He knew it wouldn't be eternal, that one day, he would have to return to his first path, law and art history, which he liked, too. But for now, he tried to enjoy as much as he could his time in Bournemouth.

Eventually, they arrived at the Starbucks. He pushed the door and held it for Lena, naturally. There were not a lot of people in, which meant that the best chairs would certainly still be free. He looked at the bar station, looking for one bartender in particular: a pretty blond girl that was already working there when he first arrived in town. He wasn't sure she would be working that day, but she was, as he saw her behind the cash-register. The two activity coordinators began lining, and a few seconds later, the girl made eye-contact with him, and she smiled: “Heyyy Gab! Back from Italy already? A Venti Cappucino, as always I guess?”. He smiled back, nodded, and answered: “You know me! I've been back for a little bit more than a week, actually, but I haven't been able to come before, those few days have been kind of hectic. But then I ran into my new co-worker here, and I decided it was about time I came! So Louise, this is Lena, and Lena, this is Louise. She makes the best capuccinos...” Really, she did, and above that, she was a very nice girl. Gabriele watched her ask Lena with a smile: “So, honey, what am I making for you?”

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