Do You Want to Know a Secret?

by Claudia Carroll

  ‘I’m not exactly attracting anyone, now am I? Can I just point out that it’s Saturday night and here I am, at home, dateless, living in a building site and sitting on patio furniture borrowed from my mother.’

  ‘At least you’re working and earning and you know that you’ll have the cash coming in to transform this place,’ Laura butts in. ‘Look at my life and feel free to gloat if you’d care to. Do you realize there’s a very good chance I’ll end up rotting in a debtor’s prison?’

  ‘As project manager, can I just say we’re dealing with one issue at a time,’ Barbara says to her, mouth still stuffed. ‘You’ll get your turn, don’t worry, so just sit there quietly and drink your dinner.’

  Then she turns her full attention back to me. ‘Now, Vicky, I just want you to really listen to yourself: “I don’t want this, I don’t want that, he can’t be like this, I’m so sick of guys who are like that . . .” Come on, what do you expect? You’re putting out nothing but negativity, so of course that’s what the universe is delivering right back at you. It’s very obedient like that. At least that’s what that American woman told us at the mind, body, spirit whaddya call it. Remember?’

  OK, this actually shuts me up. She did say that and, what’s more, so does The Law of Attraction. There’s a quote in it from some Victorian philosopher saying that just like the law of gravity, the law of attraction never takes a day off. Or words to that effect. Suddenly I’m aware of how negative I do sound, and it’s quite a sobering thought. Well, that and the fact that our Barbara, our wonderful, flaky, dippy, slightly off-the-wall Barbara has turned into a cross between Sir Alan Sugar and Donald Trump. You should see her, she’s being scarily assertive.

  ‘Oh, I’m sorry,’ she says, clocking the bewildered look on my face. ‘Am I being a bit hard on you?’

  ‘No, but you just said all that with such authority, I bought it.’

  Now Laura, who’s genetically incapable of sitting quietly and letting other people get on with it, gets her two cents’ worth in. ‘Ladies, as you’re no doubt aware, I have a tendency to tune out whenever you pair start talking about the universe; however, I do actually find myself in agreement here. What I mean is, I see it with the kids all the time,’ she adds, taking in the blank expression on both our faces. ‘Our brains just aren’t programmed to understand negativity. If I say to the kids, “Don’t go outside, it’s raining,” all they hear are the words “outside” and “raining”. Therefore all I get is: “But Mum, we really want to go out outside, that’s all we want, you’re ruining our lives, we hate you, all of our friends are allowed do what they want . . . etc., etc., etc.”, repeat ad nauseam. However, if I rephrase and say, “It’s horrible out, let’s stay in and read,” then they’re all up for it.’

  She takes in our vacant, non-parent, ‘what-the-hell’s-she-on-about’ stares again. ‘Sorry, but I’m only trying to keep this within my own particular frame of reference.’

  ‘OK, OK, so maybe I do have a slight attitude problem when it comes to men,’ I say, a bit grudgingly.

  ‘So are you going to sit there whingeing, or are you going to listen to what I have to say?’ says Barbara, in the all-new, businesslike, assertive voice.

  God, I’m thinking, looking at her and drifting off for just a sec, she’d be so fabulous in a soap opera, cast as the Joan Collins type, you know, looking stunning, with the long red hair tied up, wearing professional make-up and a tight little designer suit and a hat with a veil and saying lines like: ‘Too bad, Dexter, I just bought ninety-nine per cent of your company, so actually you’re the one who’s fired. HA!’

  Well, OK, so maybe with better dialogue than that, but you see what I mean. How come I never spotted this before?

  ‘The way I see it, it doesn’t matter how you got here,’ she goes on. ‘The big question is, what are you prepared to do about it? Which is what I’m here to tell you. And first up is: you’re going to write out your dating cheat sheet.’

  ‘Excuse me, my what?’

  ‘Like a list. I want you to scribble down the absolute basic, minimum qualities that your future life-partner absolutely must have. Come on, you’d do it if you were buying a house, so why not a husband?’

  ‘Well, maybe not this house,’ says Laura, blithely.

  ‘And I want you to be really specific, like, say, if you want him to have a hot body and do meals on wheels in his spare time, or . . . I dunno, be in Amnesty, whatever.’

  ‘So you’re saying it’s not enough for a guy to be Mr Right any more, he has to be Bono as well,’ I say.

  ‘Just hear me out, will you?’ says Barbara, referring back to the notes on the back of her gas bill. ‘Now one of the more unpleasant sides to being project manager is that I have to get you to face up to the ugly truth. Namely, that for as long as I can remember, Vicky, it’s like you’ve basically been dating any guy that’ll ask you. I can’t put my finger on it, but it’s almost as if you’re so bloody grateful that they’ve invited you out in the first place that you just say yes, regardless of whether you actually like them or not. Once they have a proper job and they don’t have two heads you just slap your DSM label on them and away you go.’

  Ouch.

  There’s a tiny, stunned silence from my corner while I’m thinking, could she actually be right?

  ‘I’m afraid I have to agree,’ says Laura, nodding like a Buddha. ‘You are in fact suffering from indiscriminate affirmative syndrome.’

  ‘Excuse me, I’m suffering from what?’

  ‘You always say yes. To men, at least.’

  ‘How very dare you,’ I say, in a Catherine Tate voice, hands on hips, as though I’m messing, but I’m actually not.

  That stung. And, as ever, when cornered, I get a bit defensive. That plus the fact that I’m beginning to feel a bit ganged-up-on by the two of them. God, this is starting to remind me a bit of school, when Laura was the one with all the brains and the great future ahead of her, and Barbara was the one who was never without a fella, and me . . .

  Well, I just wisecracked my way through things, really. I’d launch into a comedy routine to cover up my shortcomings/complete and utter failure with the male race.

  And here I am, all these years later, STILL doing it.

  ‘OK, so maybe I don’t exactly run a screening programme on guys,’ I say. ‘But come on, I mean, all the dating manuals out there say you have to give every single potential boyfriend a decent chance. Besides, at my age, shouldn’t I just gratefully take what I can get? The law of attraction book even says it: attitude is gratitude. So as long as he has a pulse, a job, can use a knife and fork and doesn’t steal from my handbag, then I’m prepared to give any guy a whirl.’

  Times like this, I wish I came with a canned laughter soundtrack, like they have on sitcoms, but the two of them are just looking at me in stony silence.

  ‘And now we’re over to the opposition,’ says Laura, as if she’s hosting a debate on Prime Time, using a celery stick as a microphone, which she’s now thrusting under Barbara’s nose. ‘I put it to you that Victoria feels her quest to find a life-partner is merely about having no standards at all, to which you reply . . .?’

  ‘Right then,’ says Barbara, topping up our glasses from what’s left in the cocktail shaker. ‘Sorry to be the one to dole out tough love, Vic, but you’ve no choice. The longest relationship you’ve had so far this year was with . . .’

  I sigh deeply. Christ alive, she already knows the answer to this one, but if she wants me to illustrate her point, then I may as well just get it over with.

  She is, after all, only trying to help me, I keep having to remind myself.

  ‘Lee Harrington. Architect. Met when he came to have a look at this place for me. Thanks so much for opening that particular box, Pandora.’

  Although, in hindsight, the only thing I’m grateful for here is that I never actually gave Lee the job. His ideas were just way too ‘out-there’ for me. Put it like this, he wanted to rip out all the period featur
es and turn my pretty little doll’s cottage into a boy-toy heaven, all black granite walls, windows in the ceiling and a giant plasma screen TV built into the living-room wall.

  Grand, if you happen to be a Formula One racing driver, but not for me.

  ‘And, remind me again: why did you break up?’

  ‘Barbara, you know perfectly well . . .’

  ‘Say it aloud, dearest,’ says Laura, doing her chairwoman thing. ‘I think she’s trying to establish a pattern here.’

  ‘If you’re asking me who dumped who, I can’t give you a straight answer because I don’t know. It was one of those weird awkward ones, where he went from calling me all the time to big fat nothing. Zero. Like turning off a tap. And of course, all my calls and very concerned texts went ignored. Absolute killer, cos if you both only knew the amount of time and energy that I wasted wondering whether it was something I said or did . . .’

  ‘Now, I may not have been out there at the dating coalface for a very long time,’ Laura interrupts, ‘but is that the twenty-first century way of breaking up? A guy just stops calling, and somehow you’re psychically expected to deduce that you’ve been dumped? No conversation, not even of the tired old “it’s not you, it’s me” variety?’

  ‘Pretty much, yup.’

  ‘How cowardly.’

  ‘Cowardice is the least of my worries, the stupid bastard’s office keep sending me bills for consultation fees.’

  ‘The point I was actually trying to make,’ says Barbara, mouth stuffed full with crisps, ‘is that, at the time, you referred to him as, and I quote, “Mr Ah Sure He’ll Do”.’

  ‘Well, in my defence, I’ve dated a lot worse.’

  ‘Vicky, just listen to yourself. What I’m trying to get across to you is, if you set the bar low enough, only a louse can crawl underneath.’

  ‘You’re the one who just had a fling with a guy whose name you couldn’t even remember.’

  Told you, I have a very defensive streak. Particularly when I think the other person could actually be on to something.

  ‘Yeah, but, unlike you, I’m not trying to get married. I don’t particularly care if I never marry. Completely different set of life priorities going on here, babe. I just wanna be a star. Which is where you come in.’

  ‘Oh yeah, now I had this great idea . . .’

  ‘Stop changing the subject. We’re not finished with you. So your homework is, do out your dating cheat sheet and then we need to discuss the way you act around men.’

  ‘My behaviour around men? What, are you telling me now that I come over like some desperado cheap tart that’s anyone’s for a tin of beans?’

  ‘Shhh, easy there,’ says Laura. ‘Remember we’re here to nurture, not to torture.’

  ‘Very well put, thank you,’ says Barbara, wiping a dribbly bit of blue-cheese dip off her face.

  ‘You’re most welcome. I’ll say this for you, dearest, when it comes to dating: you are something of a gold standard.’

  They’re 100 per cent right, of course they are. I should just shut up and listen and be grateful to have friends who are prepared to put themselves out and help me to this extent. And Barbara’s not criticizing, I remind myself: all tonight’s about is window-shopping each other’s lives, then gratefully receiving the benefit from everyone else’s particular field of expertise. And, to be fair to the girls, my love life could probably do with an industrial-strength, super duper power-hosing down, let’s be honest.

  ‘Sorry,’ I say meekly, although I’m quite sure my face has gone the colour of gazpacho.

  ‘Go on about the dating-behaviour bit.’

  ‘OK, it’s like this,’ says Barbara. ‘You know how sometimes you see stand-up comics, and it’s almost like they have the begging bowl out, looking for laughs, and they’re never, ever funny?’

  ‘Ehh, yeah, I think so.’

  ‘Same with fellas. If you try too hard, believe me, they’ll know. It’s like they come with a sixth sense, and if there’s even the slightest whiff of a wedding seating-plan from you, they’re out of there. I’m telling you, Vicky, it’s a relationship weapon of mass destruction.’

  ‘So what’s the answer? Watch a lot of Grace Kelly movies and do my best to come across all cool and ice maideny?’

  The two of them snort just at the thought of me trying to act like an ice maiden, and in fairness I can’t really blame them.

  ‘I think she’s trying to say the solution is just to be yourself,’ says Laura. ‘Although, ladies, did we really need a book about the law of attraction to tell us that?’

  ‘No, there’s more to it than that,’ Barbara answers. ‘You’ve got to stop going into each and every relationship thinking: oh my God, this is him, this is the one. All you’re doing is putting all your eggs into one basket, then when things don’t work out, you’re totally devo.’

  ‘Devo?’ says Laura.

  ‘Devastated.’

  Oh yeah, I forgot to mention that Barbara sometimes talks in kind of Bebo-style teenagery slang. Half the time, I don’t really get it, but it makes me feel hip and young on the very rare occasions when I do.

  ‘Right then,’ I say. ‘So my homework is: I’ve to do out my, whatever you call it, dating cheat sheet and then . . . oh yes, have a complete personality change.’

  ‘Be as touchy as you like, but if you want a fella, then hear me out. Before the three of us meet up again, I’m putting you on a two-date minimum. You’ve got to go out with at least two fellas . . .’

  ‘TWO? Are you kidding me? This isn’t Manhattan, you know. Where am I supposed to meet them?’

  ‘Under bar stools if we have to. Hell on the liver, but quicker than speed dating.’

  ‘Did you just say “we”?’

  ‘Oh yeah, that’s the other thing. I’m coming with you. I don’t trust you not to end up with a complete eejit, if past experience is anything to go by. Plus, if anyone could do with a dating wing-woman, you could.’

  ‘Thanks so much. Why don’t you just drop a safe on my head while you’re at it?’

  ‘You’re the one who wants to turn this year into an annus mirabilis, aren’t you? So this is what’s happening. Suck it up.’

  ‘I agree with you,’ says Laura. ‘We should all have another margarita.’

  ‘That’s not what I said.’

  ‘Well, it was implied. Any excuse to top up our drinks.’

  I’m almost relieved when it’s my go to have a crack at being project manager, special subject: transforming Miss Barbara Fox into a household name within twelve months. This isn’t only relief that the heat’s temporarily off me, you understand, it’s that I really, really REALLY went to an awful lot of trouble on this particular task. Colouredy folders, the works. I was all day at it.

  Anyway, while Laura’s telling us the latest about her eldest son George Junior, who she calls ASBO boy (her nickname, not mine), I root around for my briefcase then remember that I left it perched on top of a bag of cement filler beside what WILL be my state-of-the-art utility room, oh, sometime in the next millennium probably.

  ‘This is a child,’ Laura’s saying, ‘who has no problem eating the dog’s diarrhoea tablets, but who won’t share a slice of pepperoni from the top of his pizza with his brother. He’ll kiss the dog on the lips, but runs a mile when his granny asks for a hug, even though she pays him money for the privilege.’

  Laura’s always at her funniest, though without ever meaning to be, when she’s giving out about her kids, and Barbara’s still falling around the place with her big-man, meat and spuds laugh when eventually I find what I’m looking for.

  ‘Da, da!’ I sing, handing them each two identical, very official-looking presentation packs, neatly labelled ‘project Barbara’. They both wolf-whistle and look dead impressed, and if I say so myself, it does really look fab, like a business plan, except I went a bit mad with the coloured stickers. Oh yeah, and the folders are shiny, see-through fluorescent pink plastic.

  ‘You spent all this t
ime and effort on little ol’ me?’ says Barbara, delighted. ‘Way to go, Vicky, you’ll be doing power-point presentations next.’

  ‘If you’d both be good enough to turn to page one,’ I say in the special voice I use for pitching meetings, when I want to come across as organized, efficient, you know, on top of things. Oh yeah, and available, just in case there’s a single man present. And while we’re on this subject, you should just see me in action. Not tooting my own trumpet or anything, but I am actually able to shake hands with a guy and, in a mere fraction of a millisecond, by the tiniest, barely discernible flicker of an eyelid, ascertain whether or not there’s a wedding band there or not. God almighty, I should do it as a party piece. Just in case you think I’ve absolutely nothing at all to show for my decades of chronic singledom.

  Anyway, back to our meeting.

  ‘Point A,’ I begin, ‘is that you, Barbara, are a fabulous actress whose talents are at present criminally under-used. Agreed?’

  ‘I second that,’ says Laura.

  ‘Now ladies, if you’ll please turn to point B, this is possibly, in no small way, due to having the worst, most useless agent in the business . . .’

  ‘I certainly won’t challenge you on that,’ Barbara interrupts. ‘He’s an out and out ’mare.’

  ‘Mare?’

  ‘Nightmare. Gobshite told me the other day that if he didn’t get a job for one of his clients soon, he’d have to go full-time behind the checkouts in Tesco. Do you know he has a list of all his clients on his office wall, in descending order of how much commission he’s made out of them? Then he’s nice to you on the phone in direct proportion to how much cash he’s earned out of you. And I’m fifty-third on the list. Out of fifty-four, and the last one is Daisy the pony who does all the pantos. Bastard.’

  ‘So, to be brutally honest, you’ve attracted an agent into your life who doesn’t exactly believe in you, to which I reply . . . let your useless agent just see my proposal and weep. Ladies, if you’ll please turn to page one in your folder, clearly labelled “Shakespeare in the park”.’