Bridget Jones: Mad About the Boy(100)
‘Are,’ he said. ‘And it was my pleasure.’
He walked down the steps then turned, added softly ‘. . . Superheroine’, and strode off towards the main road, the taxis, and a girl who looks like she’s out of a magazine. I watched him go, sadly, thinking, ‘Superheroine? I’d still like someone to shag.’
’TIS THE SEASON
Monday 2 December 2013
Everything is all right. Took Billy to the child psychologist who said he seemed to have ‘healthily assimilated it as a learning experience’. When I tried to take him for a second time, Billy said, ‘Mummee! It’s you who needs to go.’
Billy, Bikram and Jeremiah are enjoying a period of what can only be described as celebrity at the school and have been signing autographs. Their school celebrity, however, is as nothing beside that of Mr Wallaker.
And Mr Wallaker is friendly to me now, and I to him. But that’s as far as it seems to go.
Tuesday 3 December 2013
3.30 p.m. Mabel just came out of school singing:
‘Deck de halls wid boughs of holly,
Falalalala la la la la.
’Tis de season to be jolly . . .’
It is the season to be jolly. Am going to be jolly this year. And grateful.
Wednesday 4 December 2013
4.30 p.m. Oh. Mabel has now changed the words to:
‘’Tis de season to hate Billy.’
Thursday 5 December 2013
10 a.m. Thelonius’s mother stopped me at the Infants Branch drop-off this morning.
‘Bridget,’ she said, ‘could you ask your daughter to stop upsetting Thelonius?’
‘Why? What?’ I said, confused.
It turns out Mabel is going round the playground singing:
‘Deck de halls wid boughs of begonias,
Falalalala la la la la.
’Tis de season to hate Thelonius . . .’
2 p.m. ‘That’ll teach you to plant such an unimaginative flower,’ said Rebecca. ‘How’s Scott? I mean, Mr Wallaker.’
‘He’s nice,’ I said. ‘He’s friendly, but, you know, just friendly . . .’
‘Well, are you “just friendly” to him? Does he KNOW?’
‘He’s with Miranda.’
‘A man like that has his needs. It doesn’t mean he’s going to be with her for ever.’
I shook my head. ‘He’s not interested. I think he likes me as a person, now. But that’s as far as it goes.’
It is sad. But mostly I am happy. It only takes a really bad thing to nearly happen to make you appreciate what you have.
2.05 p.m. Bloody Miranda.
2.10 p.m. Hate Miranda. ‘Oh, oh, look at me, I’m all young and tall and thin and perfect.’ She’s probably also going out with Roxster. Humph.
THE CAROL CONCERT
Wednesday 11 December 2013
The carol concert was upon us again, and Billy and Mabel both had sleepovers so there was wild excitement combined with the utter hysteria of trying to pack two overnight backpacks, get Mabel and me looking human and festive enough to go to a school carol concert, and get there before it had actually ended.
Was trying to put on my best front, as no doubt Miranda would be in the church cheering on her man. Mabel was wearing a furry jacket and a sticky-out red skirt which I’d got in the ILoveGorgeous sale, and I was wearing a new white coat (inspired by Nicolette, who is currently in the Maldives, where her sexually incontinent husband is begging her forgiveness while she tortures him in a luxury hut on the end of a long wooden walkway, suspended over the sea on stilts, sharks circling below). In the absence of any possibility of blowjobs, I had gone for a blow-dry – though the Disney Princess and Mario backpacks didn’t exactly add to the look. Plus Miranda would undoubtedly be wearing an effortlessly sexy yet understated outfit so edgily on-trend that even Mabel would not understand it.
As we came out of the tube station, the ‘village’ looked utterly magical, delicate lights casting shadows in the trees. The shops were all lit up, and a brass band was playing ‘Good King Wenceslas’. And the old-fashioned butcher had turkeys hanging up in the window. And we were early.
Out of a moment’s believing I actually was Good King Wenceslas, I rushed into the butcher and bought four Cumberland sausages – in case a poor man suddenly came in sight – adding a sausage bag to the two lurid backpacks. Then Mabel wanted to get a hot chocolate, which seemed like the perfect idea, but then suddenly it was 5.45, which was the time we were meant to be seated by, so we had to run towards the church, and Mabel tripped and her hot chocolate went all over my coat. She burst into tears. ‘Your coat, Mummy, your new coat.’
‘It doesn’t matter, sweetheart,’ I said. ‘It doesn’t matter. It’s just a coat. Here, have my hot chocolate,’ meanwhile thinking, ‘Oh, f*ck, the one time I manage to get it together, I f*ck it up again.’
But the church square was so beautiful, lined with Georgian houses with Christmas trees in the windows and Christmas wreaths on the doors. The church windows were glowing orange, organ music was playing and the fir tree outside was decorated with Christmas lights.
And there were some seats left inside, quite near the front. There was no sign of Miranda. Heart gave a great leap as Mr Wallaker appeared, looking cheerful yet masterful in a blue shirt and dark jacket.