I Followed the Rules

by Joanna Bolouri

  I go inside, put on my happy face and prepare to listen to how thrilled and excited Grace is about the wedding, despite the fact I’m still raging inside.

  Sunday night is always bath night. Even though Grace would happily play in the bath for hours at a time, getting her in there in the first place is always a chore.

  ‘Bath or shower, Grace?’ I take towels from the cupboard and place them over the radiator.

  ‘Neither.’

  ‘Neither isn’t an option. I’m running a bath now.’

  ‘What do I get?’

  ‘Two bedtime stories.’

  ‘I’d get that anyway . . .’

  ‘GET IN THE BATH!!!’

  She giggles and hops through from the living room. I pour bubble bath under the running water.

  ‘Do you think I’ll get to wear a big white dress, Mum? And a tiara?’ Grace hops in and starts playing with the little plastic sea creatures she got from Deep Sea World three years ago, which are now beginning to look like they deserve a decent sea burial.

  ‘Hmm, usually it’s the bride who wears the big white dress, honey,’ I reply, thinking that Emma will probably wear black and float down the aisle on a broomstick. ‘I’m sure Dad will let you pick a lovely dress though.’

  After the bath, we make it through two chapters of Coraline before Grace starts to yawn. I fold down the page and kiss her goodnight, and she snuggles down under the covers. The cat is sleeping on top of her drawing table – he’s so sweet when he’s not being a furry dickhead.

  After I’ve prepared Grace’s packed lunch for the morning, I text Helen to remind her that she’s taking Grace to school and then I head to bed too, taking Cora­line with me. It’s not that I’m tired; I just don’t feel like spending yet another bloody evening sitting on the sofa in my own company. I’m starting to bore myself. I’d like to put Grace to bed and snuggle up with someone who gives a shit about my day, which, as it happens, was both tedious and swift and was filled with routine household drudgery. Everything in my life is planned. There’s no excitement any more, no surprises. How I long to be surprised.

  I lay out my clothes for the morning on my chair, flop into bed and begin reading where we finished up.

  I hope tomorrow is a better day.

  Chapter Five

  I catch the 8.21 from Queens Park and manage to grab a seat beside a stubble-faced man-beast who’s clutching a bottle of Irn-Bru like his life depends on it. His dark grey designer suit screams, ‘I AM A MAN WHO MEANS BUSINESS!’ but his crumpled face sobs, ‘I AM A MAN WHO DIDN’T MEAN TO STAY UP UNTIL 3 A.M. DRINKING WHISKY.’

  The journey is short, only two stops. I clamber off the train at Central station and am instantly lost in a sea of familiar, miserable faces, all of whom would rather be anywhere else than heading to work. Technically I don’t need to work at the office; I can write from home and email my copy, but I know that if I don’t make the effort to go in once a week, I’ll become the kind of freelancer who lives in her whiffy dressing gown, only getting dressed for the school run or to answer the door to the pizza guy. Appealing as that sounds, I choose to remain a functioning member of society for as long as possible.

  Just like everything else in my life, my routine rarely changes, the exception being where I choose to buy my coffee in the mornings. This depends entirely on length of queue, and today I spy only three people in line at Delice de France. This is almost unheard of, so I casually head towards it, trying not to alert other coffee drinkers to this miracle by rushing. I spot a well-dressed, haughty woman in a faux fur coat approaching the queue. Dammit, she looks as if she’s about to order something they’ll have to import in especially for her. I refuse to be stuck behind anyone who wants to sample every option before spending three pounds fifty, so my footsteps quicken to an ‘Oh no you fucking don’t’ pace. I slip into the queue seconds before her, and although my face remains emotionless, inside I’ve just crowned myself CHAMPION OF THE FUCKING WORLD and I’m wearing her fur coat like a royal robe!

  I order my skinny caramel latte and eye up the pastries, deciding on the last chocolate croissant while the barista cleans the coffee machine with a vice-like grip some men would pay handsomely for. I’m completely bewitched by this until someone taps me on the shoulder, breaking my concentration.

  ‘Morning, Cat!’

  It’s my colleague Leanne.

  ‘Ready for a brilliant day? I’ve been up since six – already been for a jog.’

  Leanne’s a morning person.

  ‘I’m starving. I was going to . . . Look at that man over there. Is he wearing tweed? It’s too hot for tweed.’

  Leanne is easily distracted.

  ‘Oh, you’ve bought the last chocolate croissant. Bugger. Split it with me? I really don’t have time to wait in line somewhere else.’

  Leanne can go and fuck herself.

  ‘Oh, go on. I’ll give you one of those hot-chocolate sachets I keep hidden in my drawer.’

  I’m tempted to tell her that I’m already aware of her hot-chocolate stash and have been raiding it for the past year – and can she stop buying the hazelnut ones as they taste like shit – but instead I nod and reluctantly hand her a torn-off corner of the pastry as we walk towards the station exit.

  I walk. She bounces. It was one of the first things I noticed about her when she joined the company last year. Everything about Leanne is bouncy, from her personality to her curly black hair. She’s not so much a glass-half-full kind of girl; more of a girl who’s simply excited to have a glass in the first place.

  We stop at the traffic lights on Union Street, crushed between the other Monday-morning losers.

  ‘Good weekend then?’ she continues, stuffing the pastry in her mouth and brushing the crumbs off her navy suit jacket. ‘Charlie and I went to Ikea. He bought a new computer table; hideous red thing, but it’s for his office. I got—’

  ‘Meatballs?’ I interrupt.

  ‘Ha! Of course. You can’t go to Ikea without having meatballs. But I also got a new rug for the bedroom. It’s so fluffy.’

  ‘Does Charlie like a fluffy rug?’ I enquire, wondering why I feel the need to turn everything into a euphemism when I’m bored.

  She giggles and shakes her head. ‘No, he hates them. He likes a clean area to work with. Bare floors, if you know what I mean.’

  ‘I do, and now I’m sorry I asked.’

  She giggles again before her brain takes off in another direction. ‘I wonder if they’ve restocked the vending machine.’

  The green man appears and we head down Gordon Street towards our office near George Square. I know the words ‘LEANNE’S BARE FLOORS!’ will now appear in my mind’s eye every so often, flashing in neon seedy strip-club signage. It’s going to be a long day.

  The Scottish Tribune’s new, swanky offices are located near the squinty bridge on the picturesque banks of the River Clyde. They are expensive, clean, modern and unfortunately still being built, which means staff who write for the Lowdown continue to work from the third floor of the elevator-free ‘Trade House’ office block, while the main-paper journalists, sales and production staff are still at their comfy but crowded headquarters in Finneston. The powers that be are building the new block because they think it will be more cost-effective and productive if we are all based in the same building, but the schedule is delayed and, to be honest, I’m not there often enough to care.

  The trudge up three flights of stairs never gets easier, but we’ve learned to cope. I plod along slowly while Leanne takes the steps two at a time because she’s a fucking show-off. Her legs are in great shape though – if I put as much time and effort into fitness as I put into being a smartarse, I’d probably be leaping up the stairs too.

  I swing open the office doors and I’m greeted by the usual sight of messy desks, strewn newspapers, PR freebies and the wall display of our magazine cover
s, which could use a good polish. Five of us work for the magazine, but it appears that only three have made it in so far today. I smile over at Gordon, our music editor. He’s already on Twitter and downing a Red Bull.

  ‘Morning, Gordon. Good weekend?’

  ‘Nope.’ He continues typing. His red hair looks as if it has been lovingly ruffled by a shark.

  ‘Anything you’d like to share with the group?’ I ask. The room smells musty. I get up and open a window.

  He stops tapping for a minute. ‘My fucking in-laws came to stay. How the hell my wife turned into the well-adjusted woman she is, I’ll never know. Her mum and dad are in-sufferable. Thank Christ they live three hours away. Here, did you see that cabinet minister got caught in a brothel on Saturday? Clown.’

  At my desk it looks like nothing has been touched since last week, including the coffee cup I forgot to put in the sink. Even the cleaners here are shite. I turn on my computer. Nothing happens. Oh for God’s sake.

  ‘Yeah, I heard it on the news yesterday,’ I reply, thumping the side of my PC. ‘Do me a favour, Gordon, and stick a journo request on Twitter for me? I need to speak to women who’ve had facelifts before fifty, and I can’t get this bloody machine to switch on again.’

  I hear him laughing. ‘Is this for the magazine or for you?’

  ‘It’s for your mum.’

  ‘Leanne’s signed in – use hers. I can’t have that nonsense clogging up my notifications when everyone inevitably takes the piss.’

  Leanne smiles and pulls up a webpage for me. I post my request from the column’s Twitter account, then log out. Last time I left myself logged in as Glasgow Girl, Gordon announced my forthcoming and completely fictional haemorrhoid surgery to my seventeen thousand followers. I’m wise to these people now.

  My editor Natasha arrives ten minutes later, carrying three espressos and a green tea, which she carefully lines up on Leanne’s desk.

  ‘Morning, troops. Don’t say I’m not good to you.’ She opens her coffee and blows on it, looking over at the empty desk in front of Gordon. ‘Patrick not in yet?’

  Gordon shakes his head. ‘He’s out on a job. I think he’s interviewing Val McDermid.’

  ‘Nice one.’ She smiles. ‘Catriona, I need some new column suggestions from you this week – I think something slightly more engaging than that piece about how your cat hates men. Not sure I’m convinced that misandry exists in the feline world. Anyway, have a think and we’ll talk after lunch.’

  I nod and continue trying to turn on my PC, but already a slight twinge of panic has set in. I’m aware from recent online comments that my column isn’t as funny or clever as it used to be, and I’m mindful that Natasha has noticed this too. I liked that cat piece! It was funny: how a white cat turned up, knocked on our front door and decided to stay so I called him Heisenberg and because . . . oh fuck it, she’s right – it was shit. And he doesn’t just hate men, he hates everyone but Grace.

  Finally my PC decides to work and I check my emails. It’s mostly PR rubbish, one from a crazy woman asking what David Tennant is like in real life and can she have his autograph and several addressed to Glasgow Girl demanding I either shut my face or keep up the good work. I delete them all and neck my espresso, hoping it’ll magically trigger some good ideas. It doesn’t work. I sigh, and suggest a brainstorm with my colleagues. Leanne is first in line to contribute:

  ‘You know how you said in Saturday’s column that you didn’t want to do the online dating thing, but maybe you should? Plenty of material there! Lots of people meet online.’

  ‘Yes, yes, everyone knows someone who met their other half online, but that someone is usually a socially awkward musician who has run out of people willing to listen to his latest song about Karl Marx on SoundCloud. No, it’s all too weird and clinical. AND DANGEROUS. I don’t like the thought of searching through hundreds of photos, trying to pick the one who looks the least likely to pick me up in the car that will drive me away from MY LIFE. That shit is real. I watch the news.’

  Gordon laughs. ‘You’re so dramatic. I think you’re canny enough to weed out the bad ones.’

  ‘I’m not so sure . . . I could write about speed dating?’

  He shakes his head. ‘You did that last year.’

  ‘Bugger, so I did. How about I date someone young and then someone old and—’

  ‘Do you really want to date someone old?’ Leanne interjects, squinting at me. ‘He’ll just bore you with tales about the war and you’ll be forced to change his incontinence pads.’

  ‘Which war?’

  ‘All of them.’

  I place my head in my hands. ‘Ugh, I have nothing. My dating life is a big, dull pile of crap! It’s not even noteworthy enough to write about once, let alone week after week. The last man I asked out on Twitter didn’t even bother replying.’

  ‘You ask men out? Well, there’s your first mistake.’ Leanne’s looking at me with the face of a 1950s housewife.

  ‘What do you mean? It’s 2014. Women do that. I ask men out all the time.’

  ‘And how’s that been working out for you so far?’

  ‘Sometimes they say yes . . .’

  ‘But it never lasts, right? Oh, don’t look at me like that. I had the same problem! You have to read the book.’

  ‘There’s a book? What book?’

  ‘The Rules of Engagement. I swear it changed my effing life. I’m engaged to Charlie because of it.’

  ‘Oh, is it one of those generic self-help brain-fucks, Leanne? I hate those.’

  Leanne’s phone starts to ring. ‘It’s a remarkable book. Look, just go out at lunchtime and buy it. You won’t be sorry – Hello? Yes, this is Leanne.’

  I swivel back round on my chair, laughing. A dating book? I don’t fucking think so.

  *

  Lunchtime arrives and everyone heads off to do their own thing. I could just have the packet soup I’ve had in my desk since Christmas, but instead I decide to dine alfresco by buying a sandwich and sitting in George Square watching all the suits and the students go about their lunch hour. Since I’m usually stuck at home writing, this helps to remind me that I still live in a world where other human beings exist. I hope that a good hard dose of people-watching will inspire me, because I’m struggling to come up with new ideas. I’m not sure when or why I lost my spark, but I’d better get it back pronto before Natasha sees fit to fire me.

  Four bites into my Mexican chicken sandwich and I start to attract the attention of several overfed pigeons, which boldly waddle over to see what I’m eating. I feel like I’m in some low-budget Hitchcock remake and I smile, until one of them does a weird flappy thing near me and I leave my bench abruptly, throwing them the rest of my sandwich as I go. I wander into Queen Street station and grab a tea before heading back to the office. Leanne’s already there.

  ‘You didn’t get the book, did you?’ She frowns at me and my lack of carrier bag. ‘I knew you wouldn’t, so—’

  I interrupt her before she mistakenly thinks I care about what she’s saying. ‘Look, Leanne, I just don’t think it’s my kind of thing—’ but before I can say anything else, she reaches into her own bag and hands me a small black book.

  ‘Surprise! I bought one for you.’

  This woman is unstoppable.

  Resistance is futile. I take the book from her with a sigh and drop it on my desk. I glance at the cover: ‘The Rules of Engagement: Single to Spoken-for in Ten Easy Steps by Guy Wright’ in gold lettering. Ugh. I want to frisbee it out of the window, but instead I smile, playing along, and open it at a random page.

  Stop throwing yourself at men. We know you’re keen, but restrain yourself. If a guy likes you, he’ll ask you out.

  I flip through to another page:

  We want to sleep with you, but if you offer it up straight away, on some level we’re going to judge you
for it.

  I look over at Leanne, who’s grinning. ‘This isn’t serious, right? It’s like a parody?’

  She shakes her head. ‘No, Cat, totally serious! I’m telling you, if you want to find someone, pay attention to every word in this book.’

  ‘But . . . but it’s ridiculous! When the hell was this written? 1892? Women being judged for wanting sex?’

  ‘Look, men and women are wired differently. It’s about getting an insight into men’s minds and being able to act accordingly. It even covers women with children. Like you.’

  ‘Oh, I feel honoured.’

  ‘You’re being very negative about this.’ Leanne smiles, almost singing the words. She bites into an apple and hums. It’s like working beside Snow White.

  Natasha comes back from lunch, followed by Gordon, just as I’m in mid-rant about women dating on their own terms and waving the book around in the air.

  ‘Ooh, what’s this?’ She grabs it out of my hand.

  ‘It’s some sexist tripe advising women on how to date,’ I reply. ‘Leanne thinks it’s the Holy Grail of self-help.’

  ‘I’ve heard about this.’ She nods, reading the blurb. ‘Glasgow-­based author, isn’t he? If I’m not mistaken, Debbie from the Star met her husband using this book.’

  How the hell am I the only one who’s never heard of this?

  ‘Told you!’ Leanne cries. ‘It works!’

  ‘Interesting. Can I see you in my office, Cat?’ Natasha hands me back the book and doesn’t wait for an answer. I grab my notepad and walk behind her, watching her pencil-skirted bottom wiggle towards her office. I have the feeling that I’m about to get my arse kicked for my recent substandard columns and I start to panic. She sits down and spends a minute checking her emails while I wait.

  ‘So, your column. You know I love it and it’s a valuable addition to the magazine, but lately you seem to have lost your edge and, well, your edge is what keeps your work fresh and attention-grabbing. Have you given some thought to what we could run this week? Any good ideas?’