Me-Before-You-by-Jojo-Moyes

I took a deep breath. ‘Okay. Are there any other restaurants?’
‘I’m afraid the Weighing Room, our relaxed dining area, is being refurbished
right now, but there are stalls along the stands where you can get something to
eat.’ She saw my face fall, and added, ‘The Pig In A Poke is pretty good. You get
a hog roast in a bun. They do apple sauce too.’
‘A stall.’
‘Yes.’
I leant in towards her. ‘Please,’ I said. ‘We’ve come a long way, and my friend
there isn’t good in the cold. Is there any way at all that we could get a table in
here? We just really need to get him into the warm. It’s really important that he
has a good day.’
She wrinkled her nose. ‘I’m really sorry,’ she said. ‘It’s more than my job’s
worth to override the rules. But there is a disabled seating area downstairs that
you can shut the doors on. You can’t see the course from there, but it’s quite
snug. It’s got heaters and everything. You could eat in there.’
I stared at her. I could feel the tension creeping upwards from my shins. I
thought I might have gone completely rigid.
I studied her name badge. ‘Sharon,’ I said. ‘You haven’t even begun to fill
your tables. Surely it would be better to have more people eating than leaving
half these tables empty? Just because of some arcane class-based regulation in a
rule book?’
Her smile glinted under the recessed lighting. ‘Madam, I have explained the
situation to you. If we relaxed the rules for you, we’d have to do it for everyone.’
‘But it makes no sense,’ I said. ‘It’s a wet Monday lunchtime. You have empty
tables. We want to buy a meal. A properly expensive meal, with napkins and
everything. We don’t want to eat pork rolls and sit in a cloakroom with no view,
no matter how snug.’
Other diners had begun to turn in their seats, curious about the altercation by
the door. I could see Will looking embarrassed now. He and Nathan had worked
out something was going wrong.
‘Then I’m afraid you should have bought a Premier Area badge.’
‘Okay.’ I reached for my handbag, and began to rifle through, searching for
my purse. ‘How much is a Premier Area badge?’ Tissues, old bus tickets and one
of Thomas’s Hot Wheels toy cars flew out. I no longer cared. I was going to get