Magical Merlot

The lift doors part, the bar bright and bustling. The busier the better.

“Table for Cleo,” I say.

The pony-tailed receptionist, no jacket, no tie, no standards post-Corona, taps his tablet and instructs me to follow him. Past the bar and a family of five, two kids colouring, the teen scrolling on her phone, a few years since the parents were on their first date. Longer still for the old couple two tables along, more interested in their menus than each other.

Is this what my future holds?

Our table’s by the glass-front.

Great, the world can see us.

She insisted on picking this place. Out of my league. It and her. Expensive. Portuguese. We’ll go Dutch, I hope.

What am I doing? Living alone in a pandemic does peculiar things to people, it had been a lean time in that respect. A friend recommended I do it. Said what have I got to lose? You’re not having much joy with women your own age. So I signed up to the site. I’d fail the age rule, I said. What was it? He rolled it off alarmingly quickly: half their age plus seven. I just about made the grade when it came to Cleo, but I was a long way from 48. It’d be weird. Look odd. Everyone there will stare. This is going to be a nightmare. Screw them, he’d said. And her! I am not doing that, I protested. Not on a first date. Not with a school teacher. He said he wouldn’t mind her teaching him a thing or two. Mate, I said, you do know we can’t talk about women like that anymore.

“Charley?”

Wow! Petite and pretty.

In a figure-hugging pink dress, dreadlocks hanging over one shoulder.

“Cleo, right!”

I stand.

What is the Covid convention for greeting these days?

She sits.

“Expecting someone else?”

“Eh?”

“I know what you young guns are like, a date every night of the week.”

If only.

“You’d best drink some of that water,” she says, “help cool down those cheeks of yours.”

They’re only getting hotter.

The small talk is, well, small, looking through the menu. The prices aren’t.

“Shall we have a starter?” she says.

“Think I’ll go straight to the main course.”

“You a steak or burger kinda guy?”

At these prices…

“Burger.”

Half of one.

The waiter arrives and he asks what we’d like to drink.

“I’d say a glass of Merlot would be appropriate.” She smiles. “Don’t you think?”

I snort.

“Californian or French?” the waiter asks.

“You choose. Charley?”

Crap! She was speaking to me.

“Ladies’ choice.”

Slick.

She opts for French.

“Thank you, Sommelier,” I say confidently.

He sneers at me the way Mum does when I say something stupid, and walks off.

“You do know that’s not his name, don’t you?”

“It’s on his badge.”

“It means wine waiter. Sommelier. Sommelier is a wine waiter.”

“What are you going to have?” I say, raising the menu in front of me, my cheeks on fire tonight.

She taps her toe into my shin.

“Don’t be shy.”

“I feel stupid.”

“Don’t.”

“I’m a bit of a wine virgin.”

The waiter pours a mouthful of wine into Cleo’s glass.

“Charley…”

Her eyes invite me to take the glass; a modicum of masculinity returns.

I take a sip. It’s lovely. Though I’ve no idea why. Then I remember the price may have something to do with it. Whatever I say will be daft, so I nod approval.

The food was like nothing I’ve tasted before, nor likely to do again at the price. Is this what’s meant by how the other half live? I’ve drunk too much: three glasses to Cleo’s one. She sure wants to know a lot, enough not to notice the leggy blonde, hair to her hips, eyeing us from a stool by the bar, with what’s definitely meant by legs to die for.

“Oi!”

Cleo snaps her fingers.

“I said I’m going to the restroom.”

She walks past the bar and the blonde, who follows her. Crap! Had Cleo noticed and wanted confirmation of my wandering eye? I dare not look; confirm my guilt, reaching instead into my pocket for my mobile. I dare to open the app to check her profile. Merlot, 48. Safety reasons, she’d said, once I summoned the courage to ask her real name. Was she really who she claimed to be? Scrolling up, she’d given little away, asking me a stack of questions, until yesterday: Carpe diem, let’s meet, she texted. I had to Google it. A day later, tonight’s message was as clear as the water I down to clear my hazy head: Merlot or Cleo, I hadn’t a chance. I swipe through others while I wait. There it is, the recurring ad: Tired of swiping? Take your love life to another dimension.

“Let’s go,” Cleo says, the only level I’m heading for, the ground floor.

I hastily hide my crime, slipping my phone beneath the table napkin.

“The bill,” I say.

“I’ve paid.”

“Oh. I was–”

“You know it’s 2021, right?”

Older women rock. I should have had the steak.

I stand. And wobble…the edge of the chair saves me. But not my blushes.

“Looks like you could do with going to bed. Your own!”

The lift doors open as soon as Cleo presses ‘Call’ and we reach the bottom faster than it took me to go up, the foyer din welcome amidst our awkward silence, her Uber thankfully by the kerbside.

“How you getting home?”

“Think I might walk. Clear my head.”

I go to kiss her. On the cheek. But she pulls away.

“Best play it safe, eh. Corona ’n all. Message me if you like.”

Cause for optimism.

“I’d like to know you get home okay," she says.

Ah.

Feeling flush in more ways than one, I go to call a cab.

Shit, my phone! Where could it be? Think! The napkin. That’ll teach me.

Hurtling through the lobby, it’s empty. A lot of people vanished in a little over a minute.

The lift, no matter how many times I jab the button, doesn’t share their pace. I lack Cleo’s touch to summon it speedily.

The lift trundles up, noisier than I remember. And…the metal shutter as I arrive, wasn’t there before. The old-fashioned type, I unlock the catch and pull the guard sideways.

The bar’s darker and starker than before, the glass-front gone, a solitary window in its place, a single light fitting where there were spotlights.

The maître d’ has what looks like a silk handkerchief around his neck, his jacket made from the same material as Nan’s curtains, soft and shiny looking. He eyes me up and down with as much bewilderment as I do him.

One fixture’s remained: blondie by the bar, though even she’s spent the time it’s taken me to go up and down to change. Into a costume? Short skirt and high heels replaced with a dress down to her ankles…velvet in vogue all of a sudden.

“Can I help?” the maître d’ asks.

“My phone. I left it behind.”

“Your phone?”

“I was sat…”

I go to point…at booths not tables. Either the joint’s had the fastest refurb in history or, tipsily, I’ve walked into an adjacent building.

“You are welcome to use our phone, Sir.”

Or I’ve walked into a time warp…the retro wall phone is like the ones in war films.

I wander towards it out of curiosity but blondie summons me with a flick of her head.

“Sit down and say nothing.”

She puts her finger to her lips to stop me speaking.

“Welcome to 1946. We picked this year so you could see that despite the war ending a year ago, life has yet to return to normal. Covid recovery may have happened quicker seventy-five years later, but it will take longer for this generation to enjoy anything approaching prosperity. And in that I want you to gain great understanding, Charles, for it will explain a lot. What if we knew in 1939 what lay in wait? What if we knew in 1929 about the great stock market crash about to happen? How rude of me, let me get you a drink. Watch. She leans over the counter, gestures to the barman, but fails to attract attention.

That wouldn’t happen in 2021.

“You try. You’ll need this.”

She hands me a small silver coin, a…shilling.

I make eye contact with him, a tub full or grease in his slicked-back hair. He approaches and asks, “What can I get you?”

“Bourbon,” I say.

Well it is 1946.

“And for the lady?”

“Gin,” she says.

“Gin,” I say when he doesn’t acknowledge her. And to her, “Now would be a good time to tell me how I got here.”

“By the magic of Merlot. A delightful drink that transforms time. And hopefully history.”

I hand the barman the shilling and, astonishingly, he hands me more coins back, which I pocket.

“Do you remember 2008, Charles? The great financial crisis of your lifetime? The austerity it caused? For your family?”

I swig my whiskey, stinging my throat. It doesn’t take me back to the future.

“Maybe you can recall how much your glass of Merlot cost in the future? Wouldn’t it be great to know the price of things in advance? Years ahead of everyone else. Just think what you could do if you knew. Afford any number of burgers or steaks. Own entire restaurant chains if you knew which to invest in. Beats unblocking sinks for a living, wouldn’t you say?”

“How–?”

“I know everything about you. And you know lots of profitable things about the future.”

“I really ought to be getting back there.”

“Carpe diem. Isn’t that what Cleo told you to do?”

“You know Cl–?”

“I know everything you get up to. The cash-in-hand jobs. I’m sure the taxman would–”

“Am I being blackmailed? Is that what this is? Holy crap, you’re cybercriminals!”

“Relax, Charles. I am offering you an opportunity; not swindling you out of what little money you have. You know you really should start saving more. And what better way to start than by returning to the past, knowing what to invest in for your future?”

“Why me?”

“You picked us.”

“No I didn’t.”

“No more than twenty minutes ago. You swiped right on our advert.”

That damn napkin.

“It was an accident.”

“This is no accident. You want to know why you? Look at you. I know you do. Frequently. You, handsome, have a face and a smile that opens doors. Into the past. And back to the future. Armed with information that will make you rich. Richer than any Merlot you’ll taste.”

“What’s stopping you?”

“The future may be ready for women to be equal to men; the past isn’t. Or wasn’t.”

“So let me get this right. You want me to travel through time and invest in the things that are going to make us rich?”

“Not us. You. Whatever money you make you keep.”

She leans in.

“We only want to make a difference. But by virtue of our gender, historically we couldn’t. You could. You could make gender equality happen faster. With your face and guidance from us, you can go back and ensure women are at the table and have a say in history’s biggest decisions. You’ve always wanted to travel.”

She smiles a smile I imagine assassins do before they…

“Don’t imagine you’d simply play the lottery, then vanish. We’d hunt you down. Now, are you taking the lift back to 2021, or taking the chance of a lifetime?”

“I’m not taking anything until I’ve taken a pee.”

In the toilet I pass the latrine, a hand basin, and step inside a cubicle with an old-style chain for a flush. Is someone pulling my chain? Step outside and there’ll be wall urinals, a sink… hand sanitiser! No blonde. No bar.

The latrine’s still there, a bar of soap on the sink. Invest in hand sanitation and I’d clean up in more ways than one.

Reaching the lift I stop, on my left the call button within easy reach. To my right, time-travelling lady. Left or right? I could monetise that one day…