The M Word

by Eileen Wharton

  ‘There wasn’t even a solid seven with them all added together.’

  ‘Let’s get out of here,’ she says. ‘We can go to the Fighting Cocks in Durham and have a dance and a laugh.’

  It turns out to be more a pint and a fight night, so we give up and get a taxi home.

  ‘Just to confirm, Tammy, we are never going speed dating again.’

  ‘I think it was the venue,’ she says. ‘Next time, we should go to a more upmarket one.’

  ‘No, no, no,’ I say. ‘There is not going to be a next time. ‘Tinder is bad enough, but that was excruciating.’

  ‘It was a little rough,’ she admits. ‘Where the hell did they find those guys? One of them told me he fell off a boat onto a dead seal while fishing for mackerel in Northumberland. The seal was so decomposed, he was covered in rotting flesh, and the fisherman had to fish him out. Then, he told me he invented the story to impress me.’

  ‘Dear God, we’ve had a lucky escape.’

  11

  #ex-rated

  I didn’t take a selfie today, but I found a photobooth photo of me and an ex-boyfriend in the 80s. I Snapchat it to Tammy, and she turns us into dogs. When I get home, there’s an answerphone message from Shoni saying she’ll forgive me if I apologise. Sod that. There’s also a Facebook message from my first serious boyfriend, Harry McGarrigle, asking if I’m that Roberta Gallbreath. If by that Roberta Gallbreath, he means the one he tried to grope in the bus stop outside the chippy and then cheated on with her friend when she was on holiday in Oban, then, yes, she is indeed that Roberta Gallbreath. He’s sent a Facebook friend request, and I hum and ha about accepting. I press accept. I can always block him if he becomes a nuisance. He was quite good-looking in his day. He’s probably as bald as a coot now and as round as the Coliseum.

  His profile pic shows a distinguished-looking gentleman in a grey suit. His occupation is listed as CEO. Ooh, he’s gone up in the world. He used to be a brickie’s labourer. I message him:

  ‘Yes, it is that Roberta Gallbreath. How are you?’

  ‘Mustn’t grumble. Lovely to be back in touch after all these years. We did have some fun, didn’t we?’

  If fun constitutes sperm in your hair and a quickie in a Cortina, then maybe, I think.

  ‘We did,’ I write, remembering my promise to myself to be nice.

  ‘Would be lovely to meet up again,’ he writes. No, it bloody wouldn’t, I think. Be nice.

  ‘It would be.’

  ‘How about Thursday?’

  ‘Great.’ I can always make an excuse… I have toenails to pick or a toilet bowl to bleach.

  ‘Café Rouge?’

  ‘Sounds good.’

  ‘Gotta dash. Fax to send before close of play.’

  “Play” brings back memories of his teenage bedroom. Porn mags, potato wedges and out of date prophylactics.

  Bugger, why did I have to add him? It would have been kinder to ignore him. Bloody Karma.

  #hotflush

  I have another answerphone message from Shoni accusing me of being immature and heartless, plus one from Carolyn condemning me for upsetting her sister. I don’t know why she had to get involved; they can’t bloody stand each other. They always seem to become great allies when they can gang up on me. Drew calls to ask if I can lend him five thousand.

  ‘Five grand? For what?’ Skunk is the first thing that comes to mind.

  ‘I want to buy a burger van,’ he says. ‘It’s a little gold mine. I could really make a go of a business with it.’

  ‘I don’t have five thousand to waste,’ I say.

  ‘It wouldn’t be a waste, it’ll be an investment.’

  ‘I’ll stick with premium bonds, thanks.’

  ‘Thanks for the vote of confidence, Mother.’

  He’d probably sell it the first time he was skint and couldn’t be bothered to go to work. Then, he’d buy drugs and drink with the proceeds. I bite my tongue. Again. It makes me feel like I’m going to explode. Being nice is overrated.

  Hot flushes have me wafting bits of paper in a meeting and getting daggers from Oldham. If he was the one melting, he’d have turned up the air con until we had icicles hanging from our extremities. Selfish, insensitive creep.

  ‘Turn that heating up,’ he says when the clients have gone. ‘It’s bloody Baltic in here.’

  ‘With respect, sir.’

  ‘Gallbreath, you wouldn’t know what respect was if it jumped up and bit you on the–’

  ‘Sir, I don’t think–’

  ‘That’s exactly right, you don’t think. Making all that noise in front of the Carters.’

  ‘That’s not really fair…’

  ‘Neither’s the bloody weather. Now get back to work. We need this contract. Or do you fancy the TUPE over to Madarins? The managers there are bastards.’ I can’t imagine such a transfer rendering our employment terms any worse. These buggers want sinew from stones, never mind blood.

  ‘And you’re so liberal, so kind and considerate, such an all-encompassing joy to work for,’ I say.

  ‘Don’t be funny, it doesn’t suit you.’ I catch sight of Mick smirking as I leave the office. Moron.

  When I get home, there’s a message from Harry reminding me about ‘Our date lol.’

  I message him to say, ‘It isn’t a date lol.’

  He lols me again and then says he’s G2G as he’s chairing a meeting of the board.

  Meeting of the bored, maybe.

  I might just invite him to the company dinner dance. That would show Mick. After all, he’s the CEO of a company. Tammy says that could mean anything. Trust her to pee on my parade. She says he’s probably a plumber with two Polish skivvies working for him for fifty pence an hour. At least he’s not a milk monitor (I’m showing my age. I know they don’t have milk monitors anymore. Another of Margaret Thatcher’s legacies. Why shouldn’t people buy their own milk? If their kids have rickets, they’ve only themselves to blame).

  Drew texts to say his dole has been stopped and could he borrow a fifty for essentials. I know essentials to be tobacco and beer, so I text I’ll drop him some groceries round later and put some credit on his electric card.

  ‘Don’t bother,’ is his reply, so I take it the essentials aren’t. Get on your bike, I think.

  That night I’m lying in bed and Dave number two messages on Tinder to say, ‘YOU’RE STILL A HOTTIE, ROBERTA.’

  ‘Thanks,’ I send.

  ‘WANNA GO OUT?’

  The last thing I want to do is reapply my make-up, get dressed again and stagger about in heels for three hours, but the alternative is a party-political broadcast by the snowflake party or Hetty Wainthropp Investigates.

  ‘Where to?’ I ask.

  ‘SOMEWHERE FOR A BITE?’

  I hope he means we’ll go for something to eat, and it isn’t a kinky vampire fetish he’s suggesting. You never know with internet dating.

  ‘TGI Fridays in The Gate?’ I type.

  ‘PERFECT’ he says. It isn’t followed up with WEAR SOMETHING SLUTTY or I COULD USE A BJ, so things are definitely looking up.

  It takes me half an hour to do my make-up, tease my hair into something that doesn’t resemble bad bed head and throw on a black top and jeans with a denim jacket. I choose heels over flats and feel that familiar anticipatory feeling one gets before a date. That feeling that something wonderful could happen. That you might meet your soulmate. That this could be the first day of your happy ever after.

  When I arrive at the Gate, he is already sitting in a booth in TGI Friday’s. I hope he’ll stand up to greet me. Then, I realise he is standing up. The six-two he’d detailed on his profile must’ve alluded to inches not feet. I could put him in my pocket. The profile picture must be at least ten years out of date too. Be polite, I tell myself. Do not call him a hobbit. Worse still, as I tower over him I notice he’s beginning to go bald and has coloured in his bald patch with what looks like eyebrow pencil.

  ‘Do you like birds?’ he asks. />
  ‘Birds?’ He isn’t angling for a threesome already, surely?

  ‘The feathered kind. I have budgies and canaries.’ So, he isn’t leading into a joke about a cockatoo. ‘They make a bit of mess, and they can be noisy at breakfast time. Just thought I’d better warn you.’ Easy there, tiger, let’s get dinner over before we think about breakfast.

  ‘I love your shoes,’ he says. ‘I love high heels.’ Please tell me he doesn’t mean wearing them.

  ‘They kill your ankles, though,’ I say. ‘Not to mention your back.’

  ‘I wouldn’t know,’ he says. Relief floods through me. ‘They look gorgeous, though.’ Phew, he’s not a weirdo.

  We order the food, and he asks to see my shoes again. ‘May I?’ he asks, touching the heel. ‘Beautiful.’

  ‘Are you in the fashion industry?’ I ask him – he seems unusually preoccupied with my footwear.

  ‘No, I work at Hartlepool docks. We make undersea cables for the offshore industry. Wind farms and the like. It’s all a bit boring, really. May I?’ he asks again, nodding towards my heels.

  ‘You don’t want to try them on, do you?’ I ask.

  ‘Hahaha, no,’ he says. ‘I’m not a transvestite.’

  ‘Can’t say I’m not relieved. Not that I’d judge.’ He strokes the leather of my eBay purchased Louboutins (from the USA, eighty pounds, and they were still in the box), a look of bliss crossing his face.

  ‘I’m so pleased you’re not the judgemental type,’ he says. ‘Those soles are to die for.’

  ‘Yes, they’re my favourite shoes,’ I say.

  ‘Do you have photos of any others?’ Ok, things are beginning to enter the realms of the creepy. He starts to shake. He closes his eyes and breathes heavily.

  ‘Are you ok?’ I ask.

  ‘Yes. It’s just…’

  ‘What?’

  ‘I wanted to ask you something.’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Please may I lick them?’

  ‘Eh?’

  ‘Your shoes. I just want to lick them.’

  ‘No, you bloody cannot.’ I stand to leave. He “accidentally” drops his fork on the floor and crawls under the table to pick it up. As I try to barge past him, he licks the heels and soles of my shoes. I run all the way home and stay in a steaming shower for forty-five minutes. What is wrong with these people? I’ll watch Hetty Wainthropp on Catch Up. It’ll remind me of all the other evil in the world. Like appalling TV.

  #French

  I sweat so much through the night, I wake up with a hangover, and I didn’t even have much to drink. Maybe it was the thought of my new “sole” mate. Next time, I’m going to get rat-arsed, then at least I’ll have a reason to feel this rough. The whole pleasure/pain thing is becoming just pain. I’m late, too, so I don’t have time to do my make-up. Obviously, Mick’s going to have something to say about that.

  ‘Ooh, Bob, you look like a bulldog licking piss off a thistle.’

  ‘How original,’ I say.

  ‘Seriously, though, rough.’

  ‘You’re no George Clooney yourself.’ I throw him the most disdainful look I can manage.

  ‘That was a dirty one. Hacky black, as my old nan used to say. If looks could kill, I’d be decomposing as we speak.’

  ‘Smells like you are,’ I say.

  ‘Now, now, Bob. You know you love me, really.’

  ‘Yeah, like I love toothache.’

  ‘Don’t say you wouldn’t,’ Mick says, clearly alluding to the fact that he thinks I’d sleep with him.

  ‘I really wouldn’t.’

  ‘You so would.’

  ‘I so would not.’

  ‘Who is this date for the dinner dance?’

  ‘Never mind, you’ll find out soon enough.’

  ‘If he exists.’

  ‘Oh, yeah, cos I’m such a munter, I have to go around inventing boyfriends.’ I try not to choke while saying that. ‘I’m meeting him tonight, actually. In Café Rouge.’ Why? Why did I say that?

  ‘Café Rouge, eh? Jonathon,’ he shouts to the Foetus. ‘You fancy French tonight?’

  ‘French what?’ Johnathon asks. ‘If it’s kiss, I’m good, thanks.’

  ‘French food. Café Rouge.’

  ‘Yeah, sounds like a plan.’

  ‘What did you go and do that for?’ I ask.

  ‘Thought your boyfriend could do with a little moral support.’

  ‘And how are you going to support his morals when you have none of your own?’

  ‘So bitter. You really need to work on your people skills.’

  ‘Get lost.’

  ‘People skills, Roberta.’ I turn away before I jump on him and gouge out his eyes. At least he’s dropped “Bob”.

  ‘See you tonight,’ he says sweetly, blowing me a kiss. I mime catching it, throwing it to the floor and stamping on it.

  #datingdisaster

  I took a selfie alone in the restaurant waiting for the ex-boyfriend to show. I uploaded it to Twitter, Facebook and Instagram and got no likes.

  Of course, the evening was a disaster. That goes without saying. Harry arrived late, so I sat on my own for half an hour while Mick and co whispered and laughed. I imagined them saying, ‘See, I told you she’d made him up.’

  When he did arrive, he wasn’t bad looking, but his craic was as boring as watching wallpaper dry. I had to sit through a chronology of his movements since the day we split up thirty years ago. He hadn’t led an interesting life. The highlight was a trip to Malaga – ‘You might have seen it in the papers’ – where he’d been arrested for trying to hump a dolphin. Of course, he was innocent. I bet.

  I was going to make my excuses and leave – ‘the house is on fire’, ‘the cactus needs water’ – but Mick and co came over. ‘So, you’re Roberta’s boyfriend,’ Mick said. ‘How lovely to meet you.’

  ‘I am?’ Harry said, looking at me quizzically. I smiled or grimaced; it’s probably hard to tell the difference with me. ‘I am,’ he said with confidence, holding out his hand to shake Mick’s.

  ‘I wouldn’t shake that,’ I said. ‘You don’t know where it’s been.’

  ‘Ha-ha, you do, though, Bob. You can vouch for me,’ Mick said. I wanted to punch a hole where his nose was. ‘I imagine you’ll be taking Bob to the company ball?’ he asked Harry.

  ‘Oh, er…well,’ Harry stuttered. I did that smile/grimace again. Embarrassment strangled me. ‘Yes, yes, of course.’

  Aw, bloody hell. How am I going to get out of this?

  12

  #wetwetwet

  I’m reading Mother’s letters. Even they will be less tragic than my life right now.

  Letter number eight:

  6th January, 1941

  Dear Michael,

  Today, I am celebrating. Joy of all joys. You are coming on Monday. I can’t wait to see you there at the station. We will have the best fun here together in the countryside. I will teach you how to ride the bull. He’s called Angus, and he’ll throw you off if you’re not too careful. The Mister says I’m the best at riding him. The Missus says it’s because I can cling like a leech. I’m a bloodsucker, she says. I wouldn’t suck her blood, it’ll taste bitter.

  Yours,

  Alice

  Letter number nine:

  10th January, 1941

  Dear Michael,

  The Missus tells me you’ve taken a turn for the worse, and that Mother says you’ll have to stay another week or so. It was such a disappointment to me when they told me you wouldn’t be on the train after all. I ran down to the station and waited just in case and then suffered a thick ear from the Missus on my return. She said the butter was spoiled, and it was all my fault.

  Yours,

  Alice

  Dear Alice,

  The bombing is intensifying. Every night, the siren sounds, and we have to go to the shelter. Some families have had enough. The Thompsons and the Fosters have packed up their belongings, and they’re moving out of their flats. The two misters have
hired a van. They’ve piled everything in: bedding, blankets, clothes, saucepans, kettles, chairs, the kids and the missus. The babby sits in the middle, clutching a teddy bear with one eye. They’ve even taken the canary in a cage. Mrs Linton says it reminds her of the song, and she starts to sing it in the shelter. It’s all about following her old man in a van. Then, they’re singing about Tipperary. Then, we’re packing up our troubles in our old kit bag and smiling. They’re cheerful songs, though, and it lightens the mood as we’re sitting in the dank shelter waiting for the bombing to subside.

  Mr Cant starts a song about there always being an England. I’m not so sure. The noise tonight suggests it’ll be flattened by the time we emerge bleary eyed into the daylight. I imagine you running through fields and meadows, surrounded by hedgerows and blossoms. Collecting caterpillars and frolicking in woods, picking bluebells and making daisy chains. I’m both sad and happy you’re not here.

  Your loving brother,

  Michael

  Letter number ten:

  15th January, 1941

  Dear Michael,

  I found out that one of the kids with no shoes is called Bertie. His family is so poor that none of the children have shoes, and the reason his head is shaved is because his hair was crawling with lice. Nits, they call them around here. There’s a nurse comes to school to check our heads. Nitty Nora the Head Explorer we call her. The reason he wears his jumper back to front is so that no one can see that he has no vest or shirt on. The wool itches him terribly, and his torso is covered in sores. The other kids mock him and make a big song and dance if they have to sit near him. Me, I’d rather sit with him than any of them. He says he’s going to be somebody one day, and I believe him.

  Yours,

  Alice

  Letter number eleven:

  5th February, 1941

  Dear Michael,

  Bertie is a crack shot. We go rabbiting together, and he sells the catch to the Missus, so his family can eat eggs and bread and milk. We go fishing in the river. It belongs to the lord (not the one we pray to, but a posh fella with a great big house), but as long as we don’t get caught, he won’t mind.