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Alex almost froze. She was there one minute, gone the next. All Alex new was he’d seen Fenella in the crowd.
Fenella.
The ex-girlfriend Alex had never quite been able to let go of. There’s always one, and for Alex, that was Fenella Boddington. With her dark hair and pale skin, hazel eyes and rosy cheeks, her Elizabeth Taylor eyebrows and soft lips, she was Alex’s idea of heaven. After Fenella, Alex had gone for buxom blondes with no personality to try and shag away the memory of his beloved Fenella. It didn’t work. We wouldn’t be telling this story if it did.
As soon as the gig was over, Alex ran to the ticket office, to try and get any scrap of information as to whether it really had been Fenella.
“Fenella Boddington - I don’t know if that’s still her name but I need to know if anyone called Fenella booked a ticket” Alex said quickly, desperate for something. The woman in the ticket office smiled before typing the name ‘Fenella Boddington’ into the system.
“A Miss Fenella Boddington, of 6 Clarendon Street, Pimlico, London, did indeed book a ticket, and she did come” the woman in the ticket office said. Alex broke into a huge grin.
“Thank you” Alex almost shouted as he ran back to the dressing room. As he arrived back, the rest of the band looked at him in confusion.
“What the fu-” Dave started.
“Fenella was here” Alex said, grinning from ear to ear.
“Fenella was here?” Damon asked, amazed that Alex had been able to recognise anyone, let alone a woman he hadn’t seen for 25 years, in the crowd.
“Fenella was here” Alex confirmed. Damon just raised his eyebrows and walked away from his slightly manic looking bandmate.
The next morning Alex found himself sat outside 6 Clarendon Street in his car, plucking up the courage to go and knock on the door. What would he say? How would he explain remembering her address after a quarter of a century? What if she had a boyfriend? All these thoughts played on Alex’s mind until a knock on the window pulled him from his imagination. He looked up and saw the same hazel eyes he’d fallen in love with all those years ago.
“Fen” he breathed, looking up at her whilst rolling down the window.
“Cuppa?” Fenella asked, grinning as Alex fumbled opening the car door. The pair walked up the steps to Fenella’s front door, Alex placing a gentle hand on her lower back.
Sitting at Fenella’s kitchen table, memories of their glorious 8 months together came flooding back to Alex. The house had hardly changed in the 25 years since he’d last sat at that table, hands wrapped around a mug of tea whilst Fenella perched on the work surface in a silk dressing gown, a habit she had clearly kept up, batting her eyelids and looking like a classic hollywood beauty.
“You still look like Liz Taylor” Alex mused, leaning back and surveying the scene.
“You’ve still got that boyish thing going on” Fenella replied, gesturing to Alex’s general person.
“How’ve you been?” Alex asked, curious to find out how she’d spent the 25 years he’d spent being a pop star and making cheese.
“Oh, y’know, this and that” Fenella replied casually. She knew that Alex knew her family background, and he knew that she didn’t really need to work.
“Did you ever buy our records?” Alex asked. Fenella nodded, sipping her tea.
“Really?!?” Alex almost screamed.
“Of course! I had to see what you ragtag bunch were up to” Fenella said, smiling at Alex’s disbelief. As soon as she’d seen him on stage the night before, Fenella knew her feelings for Alex had never disappeared. She was still as in love with him as she’d been in 1990.
“Fenella?”
“Alex?”
“Would it sound strange to say I never quite let you go?”
“No. I never really let you go either” Fenella replied. Alex’s eyes widened as she said this, surprised.
“R-really?” Alex mumbled.
“I never stopped thinking about you. Why do you think I live in this big house all by myself?”
“I...I-”
“Because despite however many people I dated, none of them were you!” Fenella shouted, the emotions she was feeling spilling over. Fenella looked down into her tea as the tears began to pour. She couldn’t bear to look at Alex. She heard him stand up and walk over to her. His hands gently rested on her cheeks, bringing her head up so she was looking at him. He had tears in his eyes too.
“I never stopped loving you, Alex. Never” Fenella whispered, looking desperately at him. He didn’t say a word, he simply pressed his lips to hers and held her as she melted into him. It was Alex who first broke the kiss.
“I love you Fenella. Always have. Always will” he said quickly before reconnecting their lips and carrying Fenella up the stairs.
Around lunchtime, Alex found himself waking up in Fenella’s bed, with said woman’s head resting on his chest. He leant down and gently kissed her forehead, enjoying the peace and the serenity of the moment. They were almost immediately disturbed by Alex’s mobile phone ringing.
“I bet you a fiver it’s Damon” Fenella mumbled as she began to wake up. Alex picked up the phone, looked at the caller ID, grabbed his wallet, and passed a five pound note over to Fenella. He then answered the phone.
“What do you want Damon?”
“I just wondered how you got on”
“Am I on speakerphone?”
“Might be”
“Are there any children in the room?”
“No”
“I’ve just had possibly the best shag of my life”
“With Fenella?”
“Yes. With Fenella”
“Crikey. Well done fella”
“Yes. Well, that’s how I got on. Now fuck off, Fen’s waking up” Alex said, hanging up the phone before Damon could reply and throwing the offending device across the room. It landed with a thud on the floor, next to the pile of Alex and Fenella’s clothes. Alex looked over at Fenella and broke into a wide smile.
“Cuppa?” He asked. Fenella grinned back in reply and quickly kissed him before almost pushing him out of the bed and towards the door.
Alex wandered back in a couple of minutes later, carrying two cups of tea, to find Fenella sat propped up against the headboard of the huge bed, silk dressing gown wrapped around her shoulders. Alex couldn’t remember a time when he’d seen a human look more perfect. He silently handed her a mug of tea and got in next to her, arm instinctively wrapping around her shoulder. Her head rested on his shoulder as they sat there, the only sound the cars driving past outside, completely serene and completely happy for the first time since they’d last been together, 25 years before.