The Case of the Missing Boyfriend (33 page)

As I lick my lips, now tingling from the curry, I almost regret refusing that kiss. Almost.

‘So do you have a lot of gay friends, or just that one?’ Norman asks, clearly casting around for a fresh subject of conversation. ‘They usually come in groups.’

‘You’re right,’ I say. ‘They do.’

‘What do you call a group of gay men? A troop?’

I laugh. ‘A gander, maybe. A huddle?’

‘A haggle perhaps. I must ask my brother.’

‘But yes, I know a few,’ I say. ‘From work mainly. There’s a lot of it about in advertising.’

‘My brother’s a film editor,’ Norman says. ‘He’s really into cinema as well.’

‘Well, there are lots of gay guys in media in general.’

‘And hairdressing,’ Norman laughs.

‘Yes. That too.’

‘Air stewards.’

‘Yes. Actually the guy I was talking about – the one I went to the exhibition with – he’s got the hump with me at the moment. He hasn’t spoken to me all week. Well, not except for ‘yes’ and ‘no.’ It’s quite difficult really because I have to work with him.’

‘Really,’ Norman says, in the tone of someone struggling to sound interested. ‘What’s that about then?’

‘Oh, nothing really. It’s silly.’

‘He presumably wouldn’t agree with you on that one though . . .’

‘No. No, he wouldn’t. I just made a joke at work . . . about him being tied up. And he got all holier than thou about it.’

‘Right.’

‘He says that just because
he
jokes about his sex life doesn’t mean that I can.’

‘Oh. I see.’

I shrug.

‘I suppose it’s like your parents,’ Norman says.

‘My parents?’

‘Everyone’s parents. Or country.’

‘Country?’

‘Yeah. You can joke about your country all you like, but then if some foreigner joins in you get really offended. It’s the same with family.’

I nod thoughtfully. ‘Yes, I suppose it is,’ I say, thinking, ‘
How perceptive. Two extra points.
’

‘Still, all the same,’ I say. ‘If you’re going to do weird shit like that,
and
tell everyone about it . . . Well, it’s a bit hypocritical to then start pretending to be offended. I mean, I never thought he would be. And of course I apologised immediately.’

Brown Eyes shrugs. ‘Well, people are into all kinds of weird shit really, aren’t they? As long as no one gets hurt, I don’t really give a damn what people get up to in their own bedrooms.’

‘Or hallways,’ I laugh. Wondering if I’m coming across as a prude I add, ‘Well nor do I, I wasn’t criticising him or anything.’

‘Good,’ Norman says. ‘Broad minded is the way to be.’

I restrain a smile and squint at him. ‘You’re not into anything weird are you? Because I’ve had my share of nasty surprises . . . fetish wise.’

‘Tell me more!’ Norman says.

‘Erm, I’d rather not.’

‘No, I’m not into anything weird,’ he laughs. ‘Though I would have to admit, for a moment there I
was
imagining you tied to the bottom of the stairs.’

I open my mouth to speak, but then close it again. His eyes are twinkling and I can’t for the life of me decide if he’s genuinely aroused by the idea or just winding me up.

‘Well don’t,’ I finally say, trying to walk the fine line between sounding like a prig and stating clearly what isn’t on the menu here. ‘Don’t imagine it, that is. Because it’s not going to happen. Just because I don’t disapprove of what Darren gets up to doesn’t mean that I’m going to do the same things myself.’

‘Sure,’ he says, raising the palms of his hands at me in a surrender sign.

‘Sorry, if you are into that, I wouldn’t hold it against you either.’

‘No?’

‘No. But I’d rather you said straight out.’

He laughs. ‘Honestly . . .’ he says. ‘No, honestly I’m not . . . But I am open minded.’

‘Well as my friend Mark says: don’t be so open minded that your brain falls out.’

He laughs. ‘I like that. Yes. Very good. No, I just mean that I am into new things. I like the idea of spicing things up a bit anyway. But then I think anyone who has spent fifteen years with a frigid cow like Cathy would say the same thing.’

‘Your ex?’

He shakes his head. ‘My wife,’ he says. ‘Unfortunately.’

My mouth fills with saliva. I swallow. ‘You’re still
married
?’

He nods. ‘Sadly, yes.’

‘But separated presumably?’

‘Not yet, no.’

I put down my glass and straighten my posture. ‘I don’t really understand,’ I say. But I think that I probably
do
understand. I just daren’t let it show. Not yet.

‘Well, I’m looking,’ he says. ‘I’m waiting to meet the right person.’

‘I see.’

He nods. ‘Is that a problem?’

‘Well . . .’ I say. I think,
A problem? A problem?!

He shrugs.

I cough. ‘The thing is, Brian,’ I say.

He frowns at me. ‘Brian?’

‘Sorry,
Norman
,’ I correct myself, feeling suddenly sick. ‘The thing is, that people usually do it the other way around.’

‘Sorry, but who is Brian?’ he asks.

None of your business
, I think. ‘Oh, nobody,’ I say. ‘An ex.’ Norman smiles. ‘Should I take that as a good sign then?’

I screw my eyes up and tilt my head to one side. ‘Erm . . . no. No, you probably shouldn’t,’ I say with exaggerated seriousness.

‘OK. Anyway, don’t get the wrong end of the stick, there. God, me and my big mouth! I will
leave
Cathy . . . just as soon as I meet the right person . . . when I, you know, have somewhere to go to.’

How lovely!
I think. ‘Right,’ I say, flatly.

‘Because obviously, we live together. So there are material issues too. I nearly left her at Christmas. I was seeing this girl . . . I thought it was going to work out. But then she dumped me.’

I nod and swallow hard again. ‘So you were living with your wife and seeing someone else?’

‘Well yeah,’ he says. ‘For a bit. Temporarily.’

I think,
What a slimeball.
I sigh deeply. ‘And presumably your wife didn’t know about this?’

He frowns. ‘Well no. She’d make my life hell if she knew. I may like a bit of kink, but I’m not a masochist.’

‘Right,’ I say. ‘So you had an affair. I mean . . . Well, really,
that’s
what you’re saying, isn’t it?’

He frowns. ‘Well no. I mean, not really. Because I would have left her. I was going to do it on Boxing Day. I didn’t want to spoil Christmas, that’s all.’

I nod. ‘Right,’ I say. I think,
Worm.

‘But women aren’t cars,’ I continue, starting to feel truly angry now. ‘You can’t just go around test driving them until you find a model that suits you better and then trade up.’

‘No,’ Norman says, thoughtfully. ‘Well you sort of
can
actually,’ he adds. ‘I mean, don’t get me wrong, of course women aren’t cars, but as a bloke, well, you can’t let them boss you . . .’

Mary, mother of Jesus!

‘I need to pop to the loo,’ I interrupt, pushing away from the table and grabbing my bag. I’m scared that if I let him finish that phrase I shall have to slap him.

‘Me too,’ Norman says, standing too. ‘Too much tea at work.’

We head to the back of the restaurant side by side. I want to push him away from me. I have a little fantasy of him falling into the hot-pot at the big group table, sit-com style.

The ladies’, as always, is occupied, so I wait and watch Norman disappear into the men’s. As he vanishes behind the door, he winks at me again.

Cocky little shit
, I think, as I fake a smile and give him a little wave.

And then I have an idea. I scoot back across the room and grab my coat from the seat-back, and not even taking the time to put it on, I stride to – and then out of – the door of the restaurant.

When I get outside it is drizzling lightly but there is nowhere really to hide. And so I literally jog – well, as close to jogging as heels will allow – to the first side street.

Once I have rounded the corner, I slow to a brisk walk until I manage to flag down a passing cab. The street is one way, so the taxi driver has no choice but to drive me back to the main road, and back past the restaurant.

I slump as low in the seat as I can; my heart is pounding. I feel like I have done something naughty and am about to be caught out. I feel the way I did when I went through my brief stint of shoplifting at thirteen. Adrenalin. Fight or flight.

I shake my head at my inability to ever pick a sane, normal, single, heterosexual male. Does such a person even exist any more?

I feel a wave of dismay at the fact that I have spent so very many months fantasising about this, entirely
pointless
, worm of a man.

And then I think of one of Darren’s fabulous one-liners –
do I look like a side-dish for bored couples?
– and wish that I had used it.

For a moment I think about texting the line to Norman, but then I decide that picturing him waiting for me to return from the ladies’ is going to be far more satisfying.

A Ghostly Presence

Because I have a car booked for nine, I have to set my alarm for seven. What with thinking about Norman, men, and my life in general, plus worrying about meeting Saddam, it’s four a.m. before I finally drift off into the lightest of slumbers. What’s more, I’m awakened a full fifteen minutes before the alarm by the dulcet tones of Guinness retching. I switch the light on just in time to see him vomit a prodigious quantity of semi-digested cat food over the pile of (until that moment, clean) washing I left on the armchair.

I groan, roll from the bed, scrape the worst of the brown gunge from a sweatshirt into the loo, and carry the entire pile of folded washing straight back to the washing machine.

I’m lacking so much sleep that I feel like I have been at an all- night party (when was the last time I did
that
?). So I dig out my trusted college-year remedy (vitamin C tabs) and make myself two double espressos and head for the shower. Vaguely aware that I’m trying to look younger but determined not to think about why, I dress in my trendiest pair of G-Star jeans and a French Connection sweatshirt, dump another pile of cat-food (a different brand this time) in Guinness’ bowl, and head from the door.

It’s a cold but sunny day, and I’m hugely grateful for this. Motorways in the rain have always given me the willies. For some reason I have always felt that I will probably die in a slithering pile-up on the M11.

At easyCar Euston, I learn that somebody has pranged my Ford Ka, so I’m ‘upgraded’ to a diesel Mondeo, which, due mainly to tiredness, makes me disproportionately furious. I don’t like big cars anyway but the Mondeo makes me feel like a long distance sales rep.

But once I get out of London and onto the M11 I forget about it and get entirely lost in my own thoughts which flip back and forth between yesterday evening’s long-anticipated reunion with Norman (who this morning, I feel, probably should have received at least a slap) and nervous, sickly anticipation of meeting Saddam.

Thinking about Darren, Saddam, Charles, Brian and Norman, I decide that in fact men in general could do with a slap. In a vague fantasy world, I toy with the idea of becoming a lesbian. I imagine living with a woman instead of a man. I picture having her butch animal-rights friends around for a Sunday nut-roast. It actually all feels quite appealing until the movie in my mind reaches the obligatory sex-scene, upon which I pull a face and blank that entire thought process by thinking about Mum and Saddam again.

I wonder what he will be like. Mainly, when I try to picture him, my mind produces images of Saddam Hussein. Old and bearded, the day he was captured.
God! I hope he doesn’t have a beard!
Not that I’m intending to kiss my mother’s boyfriend of course, but all the same . . . You don’t want your stepfather –
stepfather!
now there’s a thought! – being called Saddam,
and
looking like him. I remind myself that he’s too young to look like Saddam Hussein, and force myself to imagine someone younger, but the image my mind’s eye conjures up looks more like a twelve-year-old than a young man of twenty-three. And then I remind myself that I have already glimpsed him in Mum’s photos so I try to recover that image. Interestingly enough that part of my data-bank is entirely blank.

As I hit the M25, thick grey cloud fills the sky, but the roads remain dry and the traffic is light, so I make good time. The radio in the Mondeo only seems to pick up soppy love songs which are
sooo
not where my brain is at this morning, so I end up switching it off and humming The Strokes instead. I pull onto Mum’s drive at eleven o’clock precisely.

She appears from the side of the house, trotting across the gravel.

‘I thought it might rain,’ she says as I climb from the car. ‘I’m so glad it didn’t. I know how you hate driving in the wet.’

‘Dry all the way,’ I say, slamming the car door and hugging her perfunctorily as is our way.

‘That’s a big car for you,’ she says.

‘I know,’ I say. ‘They ran out of little ones. I wanted a Ka.’

Mum nods. ‘Well . . . yes . . .’ she says. ‘Oh, a “
Ka
”
.
That little blobby Ford thingy.’

‘Yeah,’ I say.

‘Well come in,’ she says, ‘before it
does
rain.’

‘Do you think it’s going to?’ I ask as I follow her to the house. I think,
Suspend judgement. Maybe he’s nice.

‘Adam’s out,’ Mum throws over her shoulder, as if she’s reading my thoughts. ‘He’s having a driving lesson.’

I smile and grimace at the same time. ‘A driving lesson! Wow.’

I step into the hallway and Mum pushes the door closed behind me. ‘Now don’t be like that . . .’

‘I’m not being like anything.’

‘He can already drive. It’s just he has to take his test again. They only give you twelve months on a Moroccan licence.’

‘Right,’ I say. ‘Did you say
Adam
, or did I mishear you?’

‘No, that’s right. We’ve decided to re . . . what is it you advertising people say?’

‘I don’t know. Re-brand him?’

‘Yes. That’s it. We’ve decided to “
re-brand
” him.’ I restrain a smirk as she makes speech-marks with both hands. ‘The Saddam thing is turning out to be a bit . . . challenging . . . so . . .’