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Here’s Looking At You
Mhairi McFarlane
A laugh-out-loud romantic (mis)adventure from the internationally bestselling author Mhairi McFarlane.Anna Alessi – history expert, possessor of a lot of hair and an occasionally filthy mouth – seeks nice man for intelligent conversation and Harlequin romance moments.Despite the oddballs that keep turning up on her dates, Anna couldn’t be happier. As a 30-something with a job she loves, life has turned out better than she dared dream. However, things weren’t always this way, and her years spent as the butt of schoolyard jokes are ones she’d rather forget.So when James Fraser – the architect of Anna’s final humiliation at school – walks back into her life, her world is turned upside down. But James seems a changed man. Polite. Mature. Funny, even. People can change, right? So why does Anna feel like she’s a fool to trust him?Hilarious and poignant, ‘Here’s Looking At You’ will have you laughing one minute and crying the next.
HERE’S LOOKING AT YOU
MHAIRI MCFARLANE
For Helen
A school friend who’s more like a sister
Table of Contents
Cover (#ub3e3be16-6e9d-57df-b55f-4f31fd68f4b5)
Title Page (#u7da789de-96e7-5bf2-b825-d29f4d90d193)
Dedication (#ucb84b240-dfb0-5275-9ddc-3221646be703)
Prologue (#u02eabe2a-c36a-5df3-b140-d7f704abc329)
Chapter 1 (#ue522fec6-17be-5559-a5db-9e6fffcea5be)
Chapter 2 (#u0fbba019-ac82-58e6-bffa-7f976d8a7ad0)
Chapter 3 (#uf9f8f9dc-5809-54b8-bf7d-887f5ed94f9c)
Chapter 4 (#u2f099bda-a70e-59ee-9fc4-1864992652fe)
Chapter 5 (#ua33b93a8-0bef-5484-80e5-b845ad8aac94)
Chapter 6 (#u5bdcad16-3b67-5390-b076-91c8ab17cc33)
Chapter 7 (#u95c25fda-99c0-5e4d-b1ae-1f8d077a4cee)
Chapter 8 (#ubfa1a120-63f4-5099-a962-4cc6cffd9d31)
Chapter 9 (#u7a48b657-682e-5b88-8185-9a17c2493385)
Chapter 10 (#u14925cc3-db4c-55cb-946d-4ba63ac1a14b)
Chapter 11 (#u0bbc05dc-02a2-57f6-a0a5-d8d46b61cbed)
Chapter 12 (#u27b48890-62eb-5225-ab50-bf0f4bc8f201)
Chapter 13 (#ue7a04c21-0711-527f-a2f2-71a08757675d)
Chapter 14 (#u254bffbc-b383-535b-aec5-9fa0137df818)
Chapter 15 (#u94801281-34b2-5fde-a20e-7c7437cd5bee)
Chapter 16 (#u119ee598-4b51-5cc8-a480-3966f205d790)
Chapter 17 (#ud1bc8f9e-6837-5677-8bb1-f57df495394f)
Chapter 18 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 19 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 20 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 21 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 22 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 23 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 24 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 25 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 26 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 27 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 28 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 29 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 30 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 31 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 32 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 33 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 34 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 35 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 36 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 37 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 38 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 39 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 40 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 41 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 42 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 43 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 44 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 45 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 46 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 47 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 48 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 49 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 50 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 51 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 52 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 53 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 54 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 55 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 56 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 57 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 58 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 59 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 60 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 61 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 62 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 63 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 64 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 65 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 66 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 67 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 68 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 69 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 70 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 71 (#litres_trial_promo)
Acknowledgements (#litres_trial_promo)
About the Author (#litres_trial_promo)
Copyright (#litres_trial_promo)
About the Publisher (#litres_trial_promo)
PROLOGUE (#ulink_bdc592a4-a4f0-5fac-83c5-3ec1eae8054c)
Rise Park Comprehensive, East London, 1997
The last day of term
‘Ladies and gentlemen. Mr Elton John!’
Gavin Jukes, in huge pipe-cleaner spectacles and a duck costume, strode out to deafening cheers. Well, strode out as well you can in canary yellow foam feet: a jaunty waddle. He sat down at the keyboard – with some difficulty due to the padded tail – and started bashing noiselessly at a keyboard, carolling along with ‘Are You Ready For Love’.
Standing in the stage wings, Aureliana adjusted the sash on her 1970s peach polyester maternity gown with knife-pleat skirt, and touched a hand to her hair-sprayed bouffant.
She took a deep, shaky breath, inhaling that school sports hall odour of tennis shoe rubber, Impulse body spray and ripe adolescent hormones.
The leavers’ Mock Rock was a simple but wildly successful formula: dress up as a pop star, the sillier the outfit the better, and mime along to an old hit.
And thank God, the crowd loved Gavin.
According to all witless graffiti that tackled the topic of Gavin Jukes, he was ‘a massive gayer’. And yet he’d fearlessly chosen to impersonate a flamboyant homosexual singer, to this rapturous reception?
Perhaps Aureliana Alessi, the weirdo who ate whiffy lasagne in Tupperware for lunch instead of Mighty White sandwiches, might also finally be laughed with, rather than at.
It was as if school had been a pantomime, with everyone merely playing roles, and villains and heroes alike came on to take their bows together at the end.
Even Lindsay and Cara, Aureliana’s most committed antagonists, dressed in minis and platform boots as Agnetha and Anni-Frid from ABBA, had studiously left her alone today.
Their coven members were swigging contraband ‘Minkoff’ brand vodka from bottles of Happy Shopper cola and watching her with their heavily Rimmelled eyes, but keeping their distance. Aureliana wouldn’t have minded a nip of something herself.
