by Jane Green
“Mmm?”
“Haven’t you forgotten something?”
“What?”
“His personality?”
Well, what can you say about a personality, for heaven’s sake? I mean, let’s face it, we all want pretty much the same thing when it comes to personality. We want someone who’s intelligent. We’d quite like him to be creative, although that’s not a prerequisite if you’re not into that kind of stuff. We’d like someone kind. Sensitive. Oh, and how could we forget, a good sense of humor, although that’s a bit of a difficult one, because, as Carrie Fisher once said in a film, everyone thinks they have good taste and a sense of humor.
We’d like someone who likes going out for dinner and going to the movies. We’d like someone who’s also very happy going on a long walk in the country, then curling up by a fire, and even though I’d never dream of actually going for a long walk in the country, it’s a nice thought, and I’d definitely want someone who would, at the very least, appreciate that thought.
And before you think I’m completely superficial, I have to say in my defense that I honestly never gave the personality a second thought, because it’s kind of an unspoken thing. Of course you assume he’s going to have a personality you like, otherwise you wouldn’t bother in the first place.
So, finally, we end up with a list that’s two pages long. A page and a half of what he looks like, where he lives, how he lives, and a few hastily scribbled lines of the personality stuff, and when we’ve finished Jules tucks it into my bag and says, “I think you may have to compromise somewhat on the material side, but it always helps to write down what you think you’re looking for. Now the next step is wardrobe.”
Jules goes into the kitchen, opens the fridge, and pulls a black bin liner off a roll that’s nestling there, and only Jules knows me well enough to know that due to the lack of space in my kitchen the vegetable drawer in the fridge is also home to various cleaning items that I rarely get around to using.
“What’s that for?” I look at her suspiciously.
“This is for Nick memorabilia.”
“But I don’t have any memorabilia.” Why do I still feel a pang of sadness when his name is mentioned unexpectedly?
“What, nothing? No photos? No letters? No sweatshirts that you borrowed and accidentally on purpose forgot to give back?”
I shake my head, and then I remember. “Wait!” I run into the bedroom and pull a T-shirt out of the dirty linen basket, and I can’t help it. I’m completely ashamed to admit that I bury my nose in it to smell Nick, since he was the last person wearing it, but try as I might I can’t smell him. All I can smell is the musty odor of dirty linen.
I go back into the living room, holding the T-shirt, and gingerly hand it to Jules, who, it has to be said, accepts it even more gingerly before stuffing it in the bag.
“Are you sure that’s it?” I know she doesn’t believe me, but I nod.
“So this is the last reminder?”
I nod again.
She ties the bin bag tightly and takes it out the front door, putting it with the rubbish.
“I thought you liked him,” I moan, because I can’t believe she’s being so ruthless.
“I did like him,” she says. “But the only way you’re going to get over him properly is to remove all the evidence, and by going out with other men. Speaking of which, has that guy called?”
“Which guy?”
“Ed.”
He has called. He called the day after I met him and left a rather nervous-sounding message on my machine, which was a bit peculiar because he was so self-assured when we met. “Hello, Libby,” he said. “Er, it’s, er, Ed here. We met last night at Mezzo. I was just wondering whether perhaps you’d, er, like to come out for dinner with me. It was lovely to meet you, and I wondered whether you might give me a call back.”
Maybe he’s just one of those blokes who hate answering machines. Anyway, he left his home number, his work number and his mobile number, and he said he’d be in all day and at home that evening.
I didn’t call back.
I mean, I know I said I’d have dinner with him, but I’m really not that bothered, and what would be the point? I don’t fancy him, there’s no stomach-churning lovely lustful feeling like I had with Nick when we first got together, like I still have when I think about Nick, and I’m sure he’s a nice guy but I really can’t see me getting involved with anyone right now, even if he does drive a Porsche. I just feel weary. Exhausted. That whole Nick thing has done me in, and right at this moment if I can’t have him I don’t want anyone.
Plus, this Ed character might not drive a Porsche anyway. He might be one of those wanky types who has a Porsche key ring to impress women he’s trying to pick up in Mezzo.
“No,” I lie, shaking my head. “He hasn’t called.”
“Really?” Jules looks surprised. “I can’t believe he hasn’t called, he seemed so smitten. Well, he will.”
“I really don’t care.”
“I know,” she says. “But it would do you good. He’ll probably take you somewhere incredibly swanky and treat you like a princess and you’ll have a good time. No one says you have to sleep with him, or even see him again for that matter, but you never know what his friends are like. You might meet the man of your dreams by being friends with him.”
“Oh, shut up, Jules, you sound just like my mother.”
And I know I will be fine, it’s not like the other times I’ve broken up with boyfriends, when I’ve been so heartbroken I’ve cried solidly for about three weeks and not wanted to go anywhere or do anything. Okay, I had that one night from hell, but since then I’ve been really okay, and at least I know there’s no point living on false hope. At least I know it really is over so I can move on. But I have to say that this time I feel a bit numb, still in a state of shock, really, although I don’t feel that my world has ended, not completely. I suppose that the light at the end of the tunnel, though not very bright, is at least there.
They say that it never hurts as much after the first time, and I suppose there’s an element of truth in that, but they also say that every time you get hurt the barriers go up a little bit higher, and you end up being hard and cynical, and not giving anything to anyone.
God, that that were true.
I wish that I could be hard and cynical. That I could take things slowly, not give too much of myself, because I’d be so frightened of getting hurt that there wouldn’t be any other way. But no. Every time I meet someone I dive in headfirst, showering them with love and attention, and hoping that this time they’re going to turn out to be different.
Chance would be a fine bloody thing.
I don’t see the point in pretending to be something other than what you are, because if you do, at some point, you’re going to have to reveal your true self, and if it’s completely different, they’re going to run off screaming.
But perhaps I’m learning to hold back a little bit, perhaps that’s why this isn’t hurting so much, or perhaps it’s because Nick wasn’t, isn’t, The One, and although I was starting to like him more and more, I suppose deep down I knew I couldn’t live his life, and that’s why I’m really feeling okay.
But okay isn’t great, and so what if I go through my CD collection once Jules has gone and pull out all the songs that I know are guaranteed to make me cry. So what if I start with R.E.M. and “Everybody Hurts,” and sob like a baby. So what if I continue with Janis Ian’s “At Seventeen,” and start feeling like the biggest reject in the world. And yeah, so I stick on Everything but the Girl singing “I Don’t Want to Talk About It,” but Jesus, everyone’s allowed to feel a bit sorry for themselves sometimes, aren’t they?
So I sit, and keep putting on CDs, and cry and cry and cry, until I’m hiccuping madly and I’ve got a pounding headache, and the phone rings but I don’t answer it because I’m not sure whether I can disguise the fact I’ve been crying this time, and I really don’t want to have to explain myself to anyo
ne right now.
The machine clicks on, I hear my message, and then I hear a voice. “Oh hello, er, Libby. It’s Ed, we met the other night at Mezzo. I left you a message the other day but I thought perhaps you didn’t get it, so I’m leaving you another one because I’d really love to see you.”
Once again he leaves all his numbers, and I know this sounds bizarre, but it cheers me up a bit, the fact that someone likes me enough to leave two messages, and even though it doesn’t cheer me up enough to actually pick up the phone, soon after he’s finished speaking I decide that I might just call him back after all.
Today is the day I’m going to phone Ed. Definitely. I thought about it last night, and Jules is absolutely right, I should be going out with other men, and I know he’s not really my type, but what the hell. I am, as my mother reminded me, twenty-seven years old and I suppose what it’s all about is a numbers game: go out with enough men and one of them’s bound to be Mr. Right.
But in the meantime I’ve got my hands completely full at work. I’m trying to organize the launch for this TV series, and I’ve just finished the press release inviting all the journalists and photographers, when who should call up but Amanda Baker.
Not what I need right now at all.
“Hi, darling,” she says, which throws me ever so slightly, because she’s not the sort of person I’d ever darling, and she’s never done this to me before, but I suppose since her recent radio appearances she’s forgiven me my apparent lack of work on her behalf, and now she’s treating me as if we’re best friends.
“I thought we could go out for lunch,” she says. “You know, a girls’ lunch. You and me.”
I’m so flummoxed I don’t know what to say, so I stammer for a while, wondering what on earth is going on.
“Are you free today?” she says. “It’s just that I’m so busy at the moment, but I’d love to see you and I thought we might go to Quo Vadis.”
Now that’s done it for me, because needless to say I haven’t been to Quo Vadis yet, and it’s one of those restaurants that you really ought to go to at least once, if only to say that you’ve been there.
“I’d love to,” I say. “Shall I meet you there?”
“Perfect,” she says. “Book the table for one-fifteen. All right, darling, see you later.” And she’s gone, leaving me sitting there looking at the receiver in my hand and wondering why on earth I’m supposed to book the table when she invited me.
So I’m walking round the office in a bemused fashion, asking if anyone’s got the number for Quo Vadis, when Joe Cooper walks out of his office and says, “That’s very posh. How come you’re going to Quo Vadis?”
“This is really odd, Joe,” I say. “Amanda Baker just phoned and invited me out for lunch, which is completely peculiar in itself because up until pretty damn recently I was her worst enemy, and I suddenly seem to have become her best friend, and then she asked me to book the table. All a bit weird.”
Joe throws back his head with laughter. “Libby,” he says. “This is Amanda’s trick, she’s done this with every PR she’s ever worked with. She starts off mistrusting you and the minute you actually get her some coverage she decides you’re her best friend. Don’t worry about it, look at it this way, at least it will make your life easier.”
I shrug. “S’pose so.” And I scribble down the number on a yellow Post-it note and go to call the restaurant.
It’s half past one, and I’m sitting at a window table trying to see out the stained glass and wondering what they do when it gets really hot in here, because there aren’t any window latches so they can’t open the windows. I’m trying to look very cool, as if I’m someone famous, because it seems that almost everybody else in here is. I’ve already spotted three television presenters, two pop stars, and the people at the table next to me are talking about their latest film, and since I don’t recognize them I presume they’re behind the camera, as it were. And no, I’m not trying to earwig, it’s just that it’s bloody difficult when you’re sitting on your own not to hear what the table next door is talking about when they’re so close to you they’re practically sitting in your lap, and where the hell is Amanda anyway?
I ask for another Kir and puff away on my fourth cigarette, when I suddenly hear a familiar “Darling!” and look up and see Amanda kiss her way through the restaurant, greeting all the minor celebrities as if she’s known them forever, and to my immense surprise they do all know her, and I suddenly feel quite pleased that she’s meeting me, and I’m even more pleased when she sweeps up to the table and gives me two air-kisses before sitting down.
“Darling,” she says, evidently in a much more ebullient mood than when we last met. “You look fab.”
“So do you,” I say. “It’s lovely to see you.”
“I thought that we really ought to get to know each other a bit better,” she says, glancing round the room as she speaks, presumably just in case she’s missing anything.
She orders a sparkling mineral water from the waiter, and we sit and make small talk for a while, and then, once we’ve ordered—me from the set lunch menu at £15.95 and Amanda from the à la carte menu—the conversation turns, as it so often does with single women, to men.
“Well, you know”—she leans forward conspiratorially—“my last affair was with . . .” She leans even closer and whispers the name of a well-known TV anchorman in my ear, then sits back to note my admiration, because the anchorman in question is indeed gorgeous, and I would normally tell you, but somehow I don’t think Amanda would want you to know, because as well as being gorgeous he’s also very married, and it wouldn’t do his image any good at all.
But trust me. It’s great gossip.
“So what happened?”
“He came out with all the usual shit about loving his wife but not being in love with her, and how they slept in separate beds, and he was only with her because it was good for his profile, and that he was going to leave her, he’d had enough. But of course he didn’t.”
“Amazing, isn’t it?” I say. “Whenever our friends get involved with married men we hear about what they say and it’s always the same and we always tell our friends that he’s never going to leave her, but the minute it happens to us, the minute we meet a married man and he says he loves his wife but he’s not in love with her, we believe him.”
“I know,” she laughs, but there’s a tinge of bitterness in her laugh. “I really thought I was more clever than that. I really thought that he was different, that he was going to leave.”
“So what made you realize he wasn’t?”
“When I opened the pages of Hello! and read how excited they both were that she was pregnant again, with their sixth child.”
“Jesus.” I exhale loudly and sit back. “That must have hurt.”
“It was a killer,” she says. “So now I’m back on the dating scene, which is hell, really, because even though I’m famous . . .”
I suppress a snort.
“. . . I just don’t seem to meet any decent men. To be honest I think they’re all a bit intimidated by me.”
“I can understand that,” I say.
“Really?” she says. “Why do you think it is?”
“Oh, er. Well, because you’re famous, and you’re very bright, and very attractive.” I see her face fall. “I mean, you’re beautiful, and that scares a lot of men off.”
“I know.” She nods. “You’re absolutely right.”
“It’s the same for me,” I say, and wait for her to ask me about my own love life, but she doesn’t, and then I think how stupid I am to think a celebrity, even one as minor as Amanda, would be interested in anyone other than themselves. But fuck it. I want to talk about this. I need to talk about this. And somehow, sitting right here with this woman who’s more than a stranger but not quite a friend, I find myself telling her all about it, which I suspect throws her a bit, because she’s far more used to talking about herself than to listening to other people, but I can’t help it. It a
ll comes out.
“So,” I end, having spoken nonstop for the last twenty minutes, “now there’s this guy Ed pursuing me and I really don’t know whether to call him, because even though he’s nice enough I just can’t see a future in it and I guess I’m still hung up on Nick, even though I know there’s no future in that either.”
“Ed who?” Amanda asks, a flicker of interest in her eyes.
“I don’t know,” I say, and I laugh, because I’m so uninterested I haven’t even bothered to look at his business card. “Hang on,” I say, fishing around in my bag. “His card’s here somewhere.”
I find my diary and pull out the card, glancing at it briefly. “Ed McMann.”
“You’re joking!” Amanda’s gasping across the table at me. “No.” She shakes her head. “It can’t be.” She grabs the card and starts laughing as she reads it. “Oh my God, Libby! Ed McMann! Don’t you know who he is?”
I shake my head.
“He’s only one of the most eligible bachelors in Britain. I can’t believe you pulled Ed McMann and you didn’t even realize who he was!”
“Who is he, then?”
“He’s a financial whiz kid who everyone’s talking about, because he seemed to appear out of nowhere. He’s single, hugely rich and supposedly unbelievably intelligent. I’ve never met him, but my friend Robert knows him really well. I’ve been begging him to fix me up with him, but Robert keeps saying we wouldn’t get on.”
“But Amanda,” I say slowly, “have you seen him? He’s not exactly an oil painting.” I laugh, although suddenly I’m slightly more interested in Ed. Not a lot, just slightly.
“So?” she says. “With his kind of money, who cares?”
“How come, if he’s so rich and so eligible, he hasn’t got a girlfriend?”
“That’s the odd thing,” she says. “He doesn’t seem to have much luck with women. Robert says it’s because he’s a bit eccentric, but I don’t really know.”
“Well,” I say, “maybe I will call him, then.”
“Call him?” Amanda snorts. “Marry him, more like.”