Dan’s View

The night I met Faythe, I was working in a bar in London. It was near Christmas, and we were winding down from what had been a hectic festive period. Through all the busyness and distractions of that night, I saw a young girl smiling. Her smile was one of the most refreshing things I had seen in my time living in London. Almost every interaction I had before that night was disingenuous. Unless you were already acquainted, no one was authentically themselves. There was something about Faythe's smile; seeing someone portraying genuine emotions and being comfortable expressing how they feel set her apart from the rest of the crowd. 

Faythe came up to the bar with her friend Jocelyn. I saw her waiting to be served. So I moved a bartender aside, smiled at her, and waved her over. I do wish my first words had been more prolific than “What can I get for you?” 

But those were the words that started our relationship. 

I wasn’t supposed to be serving that night, but I made the exception for her. I made Faythe a pineapple juice with cranberry, the only free drink I’ve given out of that entire month. Throughout the evening, I kept catching Faythe smiling at me, giggling, then looking away.

At one point in the night, whilst I was standing by my DJ, I saw Faythe dancing only a couple of metres away. She signaled me to come over to her while she held a pair of novelty reindeer glasses. I reluctantly obliged. Our first act of physical contact was Faythe jamming one of the arms of those glasses into my eye socket. At least I was the smooth one that night.

Throughout the remainder of the night, staff members and I played a game counting how many times Faythe looked at me; it was a lot. I was hot. As the night was ending, instead of doing work in the office, which is what I was paid to do, I decided instead to hand out water bottles to spend a couple more minutes looking at her. I was waiting for her to leave the venue so that I could go outside and ask for her number, in order to remain professional. One of my regular prostitutes came and hugged me, wishing me a Merry Christmas. This upset Faythe as she thought I was in a relationship with the prostitute. I was not. Nor had I ever been. (I would also like to mention I’d never received any services from this prostitute or any other.) As she was getting ready to leave, Faythe came over and said, “I’ve enjoyed staring at you tonight.” I had enjoyed staring at her, too. Faythe asked if I wanted her number, and I did. She started with plus one and told me she lived in America. I didn’t care.

Following on from that night, we spent a lot of her remaining time in London together. I even left my family Christmas celebrations early to take Faythe out for our first proper date. I knew there was something special about her, so I told my whole family about her. We spent New Year’s Eve together, staying up until nine in the morning, just sitting and talking. Even though we had only known each other for a couple of days, I promised her that I would come to America to see her. I dropped her off at the airport and said goodbye. I allowed myself the train journey back to work to be sad. I told myself that as soon as I got off that train, I needed to focus on working until I could afford to be out there with her. I was working 18-hour shifts, and on some days, I slept at my venue just to get those extra hours in to see her. And when I finally could afford my ticket, I knew we were able to conquer the distance.