Bridget Jones: Mad About the Boy(28)

‘Um, well, I think it might be a bit—’

‘I mean, most people from St Oswald’s will be with their grandchildren. It is a special time of year, when people do spend it with the grandchildren. Julie Enderbury and Michael are taking the whole family to Cape Verde.’

‘Well, what about Una’s grandchildren?’ I counterpointed.

‘It’s the in-laws’ turn.’

‘Right, right.’

In-laws. Admiral Darcy and Elaine are actually incredibly sweet with Billy and Mabel and manage to play it right by inviting them one at a time, to rather well-thought-out and short treat-like occasions. But I don’t think they could handle having us for Christmas. Even when Mark was alive he used to invite them to our big house in Holland Park, but he always got a cook to do the Christmas dinner, which he said was nothing to do with my cooking, but so that everyone could relax and enjoy being together. Oh, though. Why would they not ‘relax’, if I was cooking? Maybe it was to do with my cooking.

‘Bridget? Are you still there? I just don’t want you to be on your own,’ Mum said. ‘I mean, there’s still time to decide.’

‘Great! Then we can sort it out,’ I said. ‘Christmas is ages away.’

Now she’s gone off to her Aqua-Zumba. Wish Dad was here, to mitigate Mum and giggle with me about everything and hug me. Wish could get blind drunk on entire bottle of wine.

9.15 p.m. Ooh, just heard Chloe come in from her night out in Camden. She’s staying on the sofa bed so she can get to t’ai chi early tomorrow.

9.30 p.m. Think will have small glass of wine, now she is here, just to get spirits up.

ALERT! ALERT! DO NOT EVEN OPEN WINE WITHOUT WRAPPING PHONE UP IN NOTE SAYING ‘NO TEXTING’ AND PUTTING ON HIGH SHELF

9.45 p.m. Much better now. Will put music on. Maybe Queen’s ‘Play the Game’. Gay perspective is always good, esp. in musical form. Mmmm. Leatherjacketman. Wish he would text me then we could see each other and have sensual . . .

10 p.m. Maybe tiny nother glass of wine.

ALERT! ALERT!

10.05 p.m. Love Queen.

10.20 p.m. Mmm. Dancing . . .

‘This is your life!. . . Don’t play hard to get . . .’

10.20 p.m. You see, s true. ‘Love runs . . . pumping through my veeeeiiiiins!’ Love Letherjackiema. You an’t go ound getting bogged in defensiveness. Love is loike a stream.

DO NOT USE WORDS OF POP SONGS TO GUIDE BEHAVIOUR, ESPECIALLY WHEN DRUNK

10.21 p.m. Youse? Dfon’t polay hard to get. So why shunni text him . . .?

GAAAH! You see, this is the trouble with the modern world. If it was the days of letter-writing, I would never have even started to find a pen, a piece of paper, an envelope, a stamp, and Leatherjacketman’s home address and gone outside at 11.30 p.m. with two children asleep in the house to find a postbox. A text is gone at the brush of a fingertip, like a nuclear bomb or Exocet missile.

10.35 p.m. Just pressssd d SEND. Issfineisn’ tit.

DO NOT TEXT WHEN DRUNK





CONTINUING DATING INCOMPETENCE


Sunday 16 September 2012

133lb (stuffing feelings).

‘No!’ said Talitha, sitting in my living room with Tom, me and Jude. ‘It is not “fine”.’

‘Why?’ I said, staring eerily at my text.

<So great to see you Wednesdyy. Let’s get togethr again soon! > Tom read it out then snorted.

‘Well, number one, you’re clearly drunk,’ said Jude, looking up briefly from OkCupid.

‘Number two, it’s eleven thirty at night,’ said Tom. ‘Number three, you’ve already told him you’d like to see him again, so you’re sounding desperate.’

‘Number four, you used an exclamation mark,’ said Jude crisply.

‘And it’s emotionally inauthentic,’ said Tom. ‘It has the gushing, fraudulently breezy tone of a schoolgirl who’s persuaded the netball captain to sit next to her at lunch, and is trying to force her to be friends, whilst attempting to sound casual about it.’

‘And he didn’t reply,’ added Jude.

‘Have I ruined everything?’

‘Just leave it as the naivety of a newborn bunny amidst a pack of ravenous coyotes,’ said Tom.

Almost immediately the text pinged.

<How’s your babysitting schedule? More organized than your spelling? What about next Saturday night?>

I looked at them with the expression of an anti-Iraq War demonstrator hearing that there were no weapons of mass destruction. Then I floated up onto a cloud – non-biochemical – of excitement.

‘“How’s your babysitting schedule?”’ I said, dancing around. ‘He’s so CONSIDERATE.’

‘He’s trying to get into your knickers,’ said Jude.

‘Don’t just stand there,’ said Tom excitedly. ‘Answer the text!’

I thought a bit, then texted:

<Saturday night perfect, just need to obtain a sturdy rope to tether the children.>

<I prefer duct tape.> came straight back.

‘He’s funny,’ said Tom. ‘And there’s just a hint of S&M. Which is nice.’

We all looked at each other happily. A triumph for one was a triumph for all.

‘Let’s open another bottle,’ said Jude, padding over to the fridge in her baggy onesie and big fluffy socks. She stopped to kiss me on the head on the way. ‘Well done, everyone, well done.’