Bridget Jones: Mad About the Boy(90)

I stared at him. I did really heart Roxster, I hearted that he was so beautiful and young and sexy, but more than that hearted who he was and what he stood for. He was funny, and together, and light, and kind, and practical, and emotional but contained. But he was also born when I was twenty-one. And if we’d both been born at the same time – how could we know what would have happened? What I did know as I looked at him, was that I didn’t want to ruin Roxster’s life. And my kids were absolutely without a shadow of a doubt the best thing that I had in my life. I didn’t want to deprive him of doing all that for himself.

Crucially, though, I suspected that, even though he wanted to, Roxster just couldn’t do it. He would try, but then sometime in a week, or six weeks, or six months, he would go all uncertain again and keep shorting out. And the thing about reaching the advanced age of, er, thirty-five was that I just didn’t want all that uncertainty and emotional roller coaster and pain any more. I just couldn’t bear it.

Moreover, I did NOT want to be like Judi Dench with Daniel Craig at the end of Skyfall, the age difference between whom must be about the same as between me and Roxster. But then, in Skyfall, when you think about it, Judi Dench was actually the Bond Girl, not the frizzy-haired one with no character who decided (in a weird anti-feminist twist, surely?) she wanted to be Miss Moneypenny. Judi Dench was the one Daniel Craig really loved, and ended up carrying through the bullets. But then would Daniel Craig actually have had sex with Judi Dench? I mean, if she wasn’t dead? How great if they’d done a beautifully lit sex scene with Judi Dench looking gorgeous in a black La Perla slip. Now there would be a rebranding feminist . . .

‘Jonesey. Are you pretending not to have an orgasm again?’

I looked back, startled, at Roxster who was now down on one knee. How could I have been so rude as to stare into space for so long when . . . God, he was so, so, so gorgeous, but . . .

‘Roxster,’ I blurted, ‘you don’t really mean all this, do you? You’re not actually going to be able to do it.’

Roxby McDuff looked thoughtful for a moment, then laughed ruefully, got to his feet, and shook his head.

‘No, Jonesey, you’re right. I’m actually not.’

Then we hugged each other, with lust and happiness and sadness and tenderness. But I knew that, this time, the game was up. It really was over.

As we let go, I opened my eyes and over Roxster’s shoulder saw Mr Wallaker, standing stock-still and staring at us.

Mr Wallaker caught my eye, impassive, said nothing, and, in his usual fashion, simply strode away.

On the way home, in the midst of confusion, and sadness, and seller’s remorse, and overheating, and shock at Mr Wallaker seeing what looked like an engagement but was actually a break-up, I felt that overwhelming thing that people feel when . . . that I . . . that once again, at a moment of parting, I hadn’t . . . that you absolutely have to tell people that . . . and simultaneously, spookily, the text pinged.

<Jonesey?>

<Yes, Roxster?>

Roxster: <Just wanted to tell you that I will always . . . H>

Me: <E?>

Roxster: <A>

Me: <R>

Roxster: <T U>

Me: <M>

Roxster: <E?>

Me: <2 U>

Roxster: <G>

Me: <B>

Roxster: <H>

Me: <X>

I will always heart you. Me too you. Great Big Hug. (Or possibly Hamburger.)

I waited. Was he going to leave me as the final one in the final thread? There was a ping.

<I meant fart, not heart, you understand.>

Then another ping.

<I didn’t. And I will. Always. Now don’t reply. XX>

Roxby McDuff: a gentleman to the last.





GIVING IN


Saturday 13 July 2013 (continued)

When I got home, there was an hour before Mum was due back with the kids. I sat down, finally, in an armchair, with a cup of tea. And I just gave in and accepted it all. It was really over with sweet, lovely Roxster. And I was sad, but so it was. And I couldn’t hold all these balls in the air. I couldn’t rewrite a film about an updated Hedda Gabler on a yacht in Hawaii, moved to Stockholm by six different people. I couldn’t do Internet dating with weird strangers. I couldn’t keep this mad matrix of schedules and Zombie Apocalypses and Build-a-Bear parties in my head, and deal with nearly-confusingly-snogging married teachers at the school, and wear Grazia-style clothes and try to have a boyfriend and do a job, and be a mother. I tried to stop myself thinking I should do anything. Check my emails. Go to Zumba. Get on OkCupid. Read the latest insane rewrite of The Leaves on His Yacht.

I just sat there and thought, ‘This will just have to do. Me. The kids. Just let the days flow by.’ I didn’t feel sad, really. I couldn’t remember the feeling of not having to do the next thing. Not having to squeeze the last second out of the day. Or find out why the fridge was making that noise.

And I’d love to say something marvellous came out of it. But it didn’t, really. My bum probably got fatter or something. But I sensed a sort of mental clarity emerging. A sense that what I needed to do now was find some peace.

‘I need to be gentle now,’ I thought, blinking rapidly. ‘It’s a gentle time. Never mind anyone else, we’ll just be us – me, Billy and Mabel. Just feel the wind in our hair, and the rain on our faces. Just enjoy them growing up. Don’t miss it. They’ll be gone soon.’