Greg Bruce: My first meal with the love of my life and what happened 11 years later

Mondial in 2009, the year before Greg Bruce went there. He may have sat in one of the seats pictured, but can't remember. Photo / Babiche Martens.

Greg Bruce partially remembers a very important moment in his life

I picked her up from the mouldy Ponsonby sleepout she shared with another film studies student. As I stood on the steps in the cold, her flatmate asked me some questions, none of which were, "Do you want to come inside?"

I had never been to Mondial before and I never went again. Why Mondial? I don't know. I thought it looked nice, or had heard good things about it. We had met for the first time a week or so before, for a drink at a bar near my place, but only briefly. Mondial was where I really found out who she was.

I can't remember who I thought she was. I don't know what we talked about and I don't know what we ate. I have only two recollections.
1) Late in the meal, on my way to the toilet, I walked past my immediate past girlfriend, who didn't look at me.
2 The table next to us sent us a dessert we didn't really want.

The fact I remember these events suggests I've attached meaning to them but I have no idea what that might be.

That was 2010, and the first meal I shared with the love of my life and best friend. My most recent meal with her was last night, with our three children (7, 5 and 4). She wasn't eating because she was about to go out with some parents from school but she joined us at the table because the children whined at her to do so.

For the kids, I prepared a platter featuring pasta, grapes, three reheated green pancakes, scrambled eggs, toast, cheese, feijoa and ham. For myself, I prepared reheated nacho mince and toast. I arrived at the table to find one of the children sitting on a chair, another sitting under the table and one nowhere to be seen. When I called that one, it entered the kitchen making fart noises to the tune of Macarena and doing an unrelated dance.

One of the children asked when Zanna was coming to join us.
"When she's finished getting ready to go out," I said.
"If she doesn't get ready in time," the child said, "She'll just have to stay here."
"No," I said, "she'll have to go."
"But she won't have pants on," it said.

Zanna came out to find the first child still doing the Fart Macarena.
"That's some funky dancing," Zanna said, doing a dance of her own, which was very good, because of the years she spent training as a dancer. The child laughed hard at that, which made me feel good, because that laugh is one of the most beautiful sounds in the world.

The child said: "I saved a special spot for you Mummy."
Zanna said, "I don't really want to sit on scrambled eggs and animal pasta," and sat elsewhere. The child didn't seem affected by that.

As we finished eating, Zanna stood up to go. One of the children didn't want her to go. None of them wanted her to go, but one of them really didn't want her to go.
"You're going to have to bring your children, Mummy," one of them said
"No, it's no children," Zanna said. "Parents only."
The child said, "They're going to have to change the rules."

The children chased the car out on to the road, one of them in full meltdown, wailing and grabbing Zanna's arm through the window. When I tried to hug that child, that child punched me in the balls.

When they were finally in bed, one of the children said, "Can you ask Mummy to hug me when she gets home?"
Yes, I said.
Another one said, "Can you ask Mummy to kiss me when she gets home?"
Yes, I said.
The third one asked, "Can you ask Mummy to take a photo of me sleeping when she gets home?"
Yes, I said.

In the end, I didn't do any of those things.

At the end of our meal at Mondial in 2010, presumably flushed with good food and the joy of prematurely blossoming love, we kissed in the car outside her mouldy Ponsonby sleepout, knowing not where that might lead.

At the end of her meal last night with the parents from school, she came home to find me asleep in a bedroom that, I assume, smelled of my farts. She might have kissed me, but I can't imagine why. The first I knew of her presence was when I felt her violently shaking me and telling me to get out of bed. "There's no room for me in here!" she hissed in the darkness.

Sitting up to see her sandwiched tightly between two of our children, I rose and walked to their room, where I got into one of the empty beds and there I slept most of the rest of the night until the one remaining child woke up and got in with me. That child kicked me till morning.