‘What the hell are you on about?’ he asked, confused, as Ma and I began to laugh.
‘Nothing,’ I giggled, finally picking my fork up again. Maybe all this marriage malarkey wouldn’t be entirely awful if my brother was forced into participating as well.
After dinner, instead of joining my parents in watching the latest cooking competition show they were addicted to, I headed back up to my room. Now that I had checked off task one on the list – applying for a course – I was ready to tackle what was next.
Sitting down at my little desk – the same one I had during my undergrad, where I spent hours and hours poring over massive Law textbooks and past papers – I carefully took out the leatherbound book from my tote and opened it. I had started to carry the book around with me – in case I ever saw Noah again and had to return it, of course. Not because I had started to form an unhealthy attachment to it or anything. I turned to the second page:
2. READ ULYSSES 
Challenging but epic read – glad I got there in the end.
His handwriting wasn’t the neatest, but I noticed there was an artistic flair to the way he crossed his Ts and curled his Ys. I wondered if that meant that he was creative and my heart lifted at the thought. I was neither sporty nor arty, but I liked that there seemed to be so many layers to him.
Reading a classic would be a doddle, I decided as I closed the notebook. Noah had already done it and he was the active, Marvel-watching type. I had done English Lit for A-levels, so it would be easier for me. The fact that he had persevered demonstrated that he was a hard worker and didn’t give up easily, making him all the more attractive in my eyes.
It had been a while since I had finished a book, I was ashamed to admit. As a teenager, I would devour them and throughout university I always made sure to have a bestseller in my bag. These days I ended up listening to podcasts on my way into the office. Sometimes. Mostly it was music.
The next day, instead of going to Pret, grabbing a sandwich and coming back to the office to eat it during my lunch hour, I found the nearest bookshop to our office in Hammersmith so I could buy Ulysses for myself. I couldn’t remember the last time I went to a bookshop, or the library and the familiar scent of books took me straight back to my childhood, when Baba would take me to our local library in Wood Green and spend the afternoon reading newspapers while I browsed the books. When and why did I let life become so dull? Why had I stopped enjoying simple pleasures like reading a good book? Was it laziness or an inability to see beyond my Groundhog Day routine?
Well, whatever it was, that streak was over. My life was now unpredictable and I had no idea where the next task would take me.
Browsing through the latest paperback releases, I picked up a romcom that looked like fun and last year’s Booker Prize winner before I ambled over to the classics and found Ulysses. It was MASSIVE. I knew it was big but I hadn’t expected it to be quite so huge. Did I have to read the whole thing?
Chapter Seven
After struggling through hundreds of pages of bloody Ulysses I was definitely immersed. Immersed in a stream of consciousness that was supposed to be revolutionary but made me go cross-eyed. And the worst part was, I still had a thousand pages to go.
Bloody Noah and his bloody list! Why couldn’t he have chosen something like ‘read a Russian novel’ instead? I could have managed a bit of Dostoyevsky or Tolstoy. But this . . . this was torture.
‘You can’t give up,’ Lucy admonished me at work the following week, as I sat during lunch with the brick of a book opened up in front of me. I could have sworn that my biceps were more toned after holding it so much. Even the muscles in my palms ached from trying to hold it open for hours at a time.
‘But I gave it a go,’ I moaned, rubbing my eyes. ‘I’ve read five hundred pages, Luce!’
‘More than a third. Imagine how accomplished you’ll feel when it’s done!’
‘It’s going to take ages. I should be getting on with other stuff on the list.’
‘Why don’t you? You can carry on reading while you complete other tasks.’
‘Fine,’ I huffed. I couldn’t remember what came next in the list so I took out the notebook and flicked through the pages. ‘Let’s have a look, Stalin.’
‘If you’re going to compare me to a dictator, at least choose a more fashionable one,’ Lucy retorted.
‘Like whom?’
‘Sheila. Sheila’s a fashionable dictator,’ Arjun whispered, throwing himself onto the free chair in our little chill-out corner. ‘She’s had a word with me about my timings. Apparently, I’m always coming in late and leaving early.’ He stared at us, waiting for our outraged denial.
‘Ummm,’ Lucy began. ‘Well . . .’
‘Oh, piss off,’ he grumbled, pulling a sandwich out of a paper bag and taking a delicate bite. ‘This place has become a bloody matriarchy and I’m sick of it!’
3. PARTICIPATE IN A TRIATHLON
Choose between:
• Dorney – Windsor, 21 May
• Dorney Lake – Eton College, 31 July
• All Nations Supersprint – 7 May
‘Oh, it’s that triathlon thing we saw the other day.’ I groaned. ‘I can’t do it. Don’t try to make me.’
‘Can you swim?’
