Bridget Jones: Mad About the Boy(26)

‘Say goodnight to Talitha.’

‘Mummy. I just did.’

Mabel was asleep on the bottom bunk, head on back to front, clutching Saliva.

‘Will you cuddle me?’ said Billy, climbing into the top bunk. I thought about Talitha getting increasingly impatient downstairs then climbed in with him, Puffle One, Mario and Horsio.

‘Mummy?’

‘Yes,’ I said, heart wavering, fearing he was going to ask about Daddy or death.

‘What is the population of China?’ Oh God, he looks so like Mark when he is worrying about these questions. What was I doing messing about texting some unshaven leather-jacketed stranger who probably—

‘Mummy?’

‘Four hundred million,’ I lied smoothly.

‘Oh. Why is the earth shrinking by one centimetre a year?’

‘Um . . .’ I thought about this. Is the world shrinking by one centimetre a year? Like, the whole planet or just the land bits? Is it to do with global warming? Or the awesome power of waves and . . . Then I felt the slight relaxing sigh of Billy falling asleep.

Rushed back downstairs, panting. Talitha looked up with a self-satisfied expression: ‘OK. I hope you appreciate this. This was a really tough one.’

She handed me the phone.

<I’ve finally recovered from my embarrassment at fleeing from Prince Charming and his Stronghold. It was all so outrageously sensual, I feared I would spontaneously combust or turn into a pumpkin. What are you up to?>

‘You haven’t sent it?’

‘Not yet. But it’s good. You have to take care of their ego. What do you think the poor guy felt like, with you running off like that and not explaining yourself?’

‘Doesn’t that sound—’

‘It’s a question, and carrying on the thread. Don’t overthink it, just—’

She took hold of my finger, and pressed ‘Send’.

‘Nooo! You said you wouldn’t—’

‘I didn’t. You sent it. Could I possibly have another teensy teensy little vodka?’

Mind reeling I headed for the fridge, but just as I opened the door there was a text ping. Talitha grabbed it. A self-satisfied smirk spread across her immaculately made-up features.

<Hi. Is that Cinderella?>

‘Now, Bridget,’ she said sternly, watching the confusion of feelings on my face, ‘you have to be brave and get back in the saddle, for everyone’s sake, including . . .’ She nodded in the direction of upstairs.

Ultimately, Talitha was right. But it couldn’t have gone more disastrously wrong with Leatherjacketman. As she herself said, as we sat on my sofa in the bloody aftermath:

‘It’s all my fault. I forgot to warn you. When you come out of a long relationship, the first one is always the worst. There’s too much hanging on it. You think you’re going to be rescued. Which you’re not. And you think they’re the barometers of whether you’re still viable. Which you are, but they’re not going to prove that to you.’

I broke every single one of the Key Dating Rules with Leatherjacketman. But, in my defence, at that point, I didn’t know that the Dating Rules even existed.





HOW NOT TO DO DATING


Wednesday 12 September 2012

133lb (lost 2lb through texting thumb-action), minutes spent fantasizing about Leatherjacketman 347, number of times checked for texts from Leatherjacketman 37, texts from Leatherjacketman 0, number of times checked Unexploded Email Inbox from Leatherjacketman even though Leatherjacketman does not have email address 12 (insane), total cumulative minutes late for school runs 27.

2.30 p.m. Mmm. Just back from lunch with Leatherjacketman in Primrose Hill. He was looking even more like a car-advert man, in a brown leather jacket this time, and aviator shades. It was an unseasonably warm, bright autumn day, the sky blue, the sun shining, so we could sit outside at a pavement cafe.

FINE

I love him. I love him.

NOT FINE

He’s about my age and divorced with two kids. And he’s called Andy – such a cool name.

ANDY??

As I sat down at the table, he took off his shades. His eyes were like pools. Pools of pale, pale water like a tropical sea . . .

DO NOT GET CARRIED AWAY

. . . only brown. I love him. The Dating Gods have smiled down on me.

TRY TO RETAIN SOME VESTIGE OF OBJECTIVITY

He REALLY understands the problems of single parenting. He said things like ‘How old are your kids?’

All through lunch felt like some dangerously aroused puppy who was going to start shagging his leg.

DO NOT JUMP TO CONCLUSIONS OR FANTASIZE

It’ll be so great having sex together on Sunday mornings, I was thinking, then breakfast together with all the kids – laughing, moving in together, selling both our places and getting a house they can all walk to school from. Just as I was thinking, ‘. . . then we could just have one car and not have an issue with the parking permits,’ he interrupted: ‘Do you want a coffee?’

I blinked at him, disorientated, teetering on the brink of saying, ‘Do you think we could manage with just the one car?’

ON THE FIRST DATE: LET HIM PAY

When the bill came, I made a terrible fuss about getting my credit card out and saying, ‘No, let me,’ and ‘Shall we split it?’