Cocktails and Records

Last night I started my new Tai Chi class - new form, new night, new people.

I got there a bit early and was lingering in the corridor chatting to the other people in the class; they all knew each other but were friendly and welcoming towards the newbie. Throughout the chatter about tai chi, a guy in the corner is eyeing me off. Finally he edges his way over.

‘Good party on New Year’s Eve then?’ he says.
I am a bit taken back. I have never seen this man before in my life and this is not your usual conversation opener from a stranger.

‘I had a good New Year thanks, but sadly, I didn’t go to any parties’ I reply smiling.
‘Yes, you did.’ he says confidently ‘You were at a New Year’s Eve party in Cambridge’.
‘Er, no I wasn’t. You must have met my doppelganger that night!’

He is completely unconvinced and insists ‘No, you were back in Cambridge.’
‘No.’ I say firmly ‘I was definitely home in London. I haven’t been to Cambridge for a long time.’
‘Are you sure?’ he challenges.
‘Yes!’

He changes tact. ‘Have you got a boyfriend?’
‘Yes…’ I reply, wondering where this is going.
‘I know!’ he says triumphantly ‘He’s from Cambridge!’
Again, I have to let him down. ‘Well, actually he’s from Aberdeen - unless he’s been performing an elaborate ruse for the past seven years’.
 
He is undeterred. ‘But you’re from Cambridge aren’t you? When did you last go back home?’
I wonder if my Australian accent has suddenly disappeared for the evening. ‘I’m not from Cambridge’ I say, completely bemused by now.

‘But I know you’. He is absolutely perplexed.

To put him out of his misery, we eventually decide that we may have met on a tai chi course several years ago, and we head into the evening’s class.

Throughout the session though, out the corner of my eye, I keep seeing him glance at me. He looks suspicious, as though I am purposely misleading him about not being from Cambridge.