Turning Forty (21 page)

28

As I break away from the kiss my head is full of wonder as I think of how little I understand women despite having reached the age of thirty-nine. Every time I think I’ve got them sussed one does something so off the wall, so unexpected that all I can do is scratch my head in a gormless fashion. I know I’ve been off the market for a while but is this really how young women act these days? Do they all just come up to blokes they met once buying elephant-dung stationery sets and start kissing them?

‘Hi,’ I say, holding out my hand in a deliberately formal fashion. ‘I’m Matt and up until a few minutes ago in my head at least you were Elephant-Dung Paper Girl.’

Overcome with embarrassment she ignores my hand and covers her face with those slender fingers of hers. ‘I can’t believe I just did that.’

‘So that was a first? I’m impressed.’

‘They dared me.’ She glances over to a small group of young women on the opposite side of the room pretending not to look at us.

I look over at them. ‘Do you always do everything they dare you to do?’

‘Never,’ she replies. ‘It must be the cocktails we were drinking earlier . . . or maybe the shots, I don’t know . . . it’s not even my birthday.’ She hangs her head in mock shame. ‘I’m so drunk it’s not even funny. What are you doing here anyway? Who do you know in the house?’

‘I came with that lot over there,’ I say, gesturing to Kara and her friends.

‘She’s not your girlfriend is she? You know, the pretty one. She keeps looking this way.’

I think she’s referring to Kara. ‘Nope, not my girlfriend, but a mate’s. He should be round here somewhere.’ I scan the room for Gerry but he’s nowhere to be seen. ‘His name’s Gerry. You probably know him. He’s the kind of guy everyone knows.’

‘Never heard of him,’ she says and she looks over at Kara again. ‘You’re definitely sure that’s not your girlfriend?’

‘Positive. I couldn’t be more single now if I tried. And anyway, she’s not my type.’

‘And what would your type be exactly?’

‘I used to belong to a pretty broad church but recently I’ve decided to focus purely on women who buy elephant-dung stationery. They’re a select bunch but they really get my motor revving.’

She laughs. ‘What was your name again?’

‘Matt.’

She holds out her hand. ‘Well Matt, I’m Rosa, and I’d really like to get you a drink. Will a beer do? I think there are some in the kitchen.’

‘Beer sounds great. But let me get it. It’s the least I can do after you’ve made me so welcome.’

‘Too late,’ she says, peeling away from me. She stops and points a finger at me in mock menace. ‘Don’t you dare move!’

Rosa doesn’t head to the kitchen. Instead she makes a beeline to her friends on the other side of the room, who erupt in cheers as they throw their arms round her. Through the hugs she sneaks a look in my direction. Her face is the very picture of embarrassment and I begin to wonder if she’ll ever return. But then she breaks away from them and heads towards the kitchen and as she does so I feel a rush of excitement go through me. I have no idea how this night will end but it feels good to be this free.

All feelings of liberation are curtailed however when my phone vibrates. It’s a text from Abi:
There’s nothing on telly, entertain me Beckford! Really looking forward to coffee tomorrow, Abi xxx

Abi. Somehow in the time that it’s taken me to arrive at a party and kiss a virtual stranger I have forgotten that I am supposed to be seeing her tomorrow. This is typical of the kind of luck that always comes my way. I go weeks without so much as a sniff of interest and then the one weekend in which I have a date with a funny, pretty and charming woman I have to walk into a party in Balsall Heath of all places and get jumped on by a girl like Rosa.

The best I can do in the circumstances is to make the courageous decision not to make any decisions and so I tap out the following message:
Can’t entertain you right now, am getting seriously hard stares from the people I’m out with who think it’s rude to text gorgeous and funny women when I should actually be soaking up the riveting anecdotes about their trekking holiday in the Himalayas.
As I press send I look up in time to see Rosa returning holding a plastic beaker of wine and a bottled lager.

‘Texting your other lady friends are you?’ she teases, handing me the lager.

‘Hardly,’ I reply.

She raises an eyebrow. Clearly I’m a much worse liar than I thought. ‘Are you sure you haven’t got a girlfriend?’

‘Hand on heart, guv, there is no lady in my life. But in the interests of transparency and because I’m a lot more drunk than I intended I have to tell you that I do have a sort of ex-wife.’

‘Sort of?’

‘We’re separated.’

‘I’m sorry to hear that. How long were you together?’

‘Long enough.’

‘But you don’t live together?’

‘She’s in London selling our house and I’m up here licking my wounds.’

‘I knew you were damaged goods the moment I saw you in the shop,’ says Rosa and she touches my hand briefly. It’s an unconscious act of pure tenderness that makes me want to kiss her all over again. ‘You just had that look about you.’

She leads me to the hallway to get away from the music and we sit and talk in earnest. She tells me that her academic parents named her Rosa after the America civil rights icon Rosa Parks and I tell her that my parents named me Matthew because it was the only name they could both agree on. I also learn that Rosa’s a visual arts relationship manager at the West Midlands office of Arts Council England and when I ask what that is she explains that she OKs funding for visual arts projects and then checks in on them from time to time. She loves her job and I tell her that it’s good to love your job because otherwise it can really rain on your parade. Inevitably she asks me a few questions about the shop and what I’m doing in Birmingham. In the light of my date with Abi I try my best to keep it all vague and she seems to get the message. Before long we’ve left all the autobiographical stuff by the wayside and are getting stuck into films, music, places we’ve visited and places we’re desperate to see. Suddenly she stands up, and asks me if I want to dance.

I’ve only ever been passable at dancing, just enough sway to look like I’m enjoying myself but nowhere near enough to be eye-catchingly cool. The last time I really danced was the night of my thirty-ninth birthday when after an evening in various bars with Lauren and our friends we ended the night in a club in the West End. Although my recollection is impaired I’m sure that I’d danced pretty well that night, all things considered, but given that nearly a year has elapsed who knows what might have happened to my dancing skills? And more to the point, now that I am nearly forty there’s every chance that I might inadvertently start dancing ‘from the knees’, and now is certainly not the time to debut my ‘dad’ dancing to the world.

I briefly think about searching out Gerry but if I do this there is a danger that I will break the spell between Rosa and me. I need this girl to like me. I need for her to want to take me home. I need for her to believe that I’m not completely damaged goods and if dancing is what I’ve got to do to make that happen then dancing is what I’m going to do.

‘OK, you’re on,’ I say, and I allow her to lead me back into the living room. I have no idea what the song is. To me it sounds like twelve different songs being played simultaneously. I look over at Rosa and she flashes me a heartfelt grin as though my fulfilment of her request has satisfied something deep in her soul. Moving to the music I try to channel the spirit of my eighteen-year-old self who used to be a lot less self-conscious about this sort of thing and I think it works. Because while I’m not in receipt of a standing ovation when the song comes to an end on the plus side no one’s pointing and laughing. More importantly, Rosa’s fingers are now firmly entwined with my own and she looks blissfully happy. It feels like for ever since I’ve been able to make someone happy just by holding their hand and I find myself wishing that I might always be able to make her feel this good.

29

Rosa tells me that her head is feeling a bit light and that she could really do with some air. I suggest that we go outside and she tells me to wait by the front door while she gets her coat. I’m about to leave the room when Gerry intercepts me. His grinning face says it all. ‘All right, stud? What’s going on here then?’

‘The truth? I have no idea.’

‘I couldn’t believe it when she just pounced on you like that. I had to be in a band to get that kind of attention! Who is she? Do you know her?’

‘About as well as you do. She’s Elephant-Dung Paper Girl.’

Gerry raises a knowing eyebrow. ‘And she was on you like that just because you sold her novelty paper? I’ll have to man the tills more often!’

‘You, wish! I’ll have you know that Rosa and I have really good chemistry. Plus, she’s drunk a bucketload so I’m guessing her judgement’s not up to much.’

I look over my friend’s shoulder and spot Rosa. She’s wearing a bright red coat and carrying two bottled beers. Even drunk she looks amazing. I look back at Gerry. ‘I’ll see you later, mate.’

Gerry gives me a wink laden with innuendo. ‘I doubt it.’

We walk down the front path past a group of smokers talking, laughing and joking with each other. One of them, a cool-looking young guy wearing a trilby, nods in Rosa’s direction as we pass calling out: ‘All right, Ms Logan?’ but she barely acknowledges him. He reminds me of a mannequin I’d seen in Top Man when I’d tried to update my wardrobe. It too looked as though it had dressed in the dark.

‘Who’s your friend?’ I ask as we sit down on the wall across the front garden.

She hands me one of the beers. ‘You don’t miss a trick, do you?’

‘I’m oblivious to most things but this was impossible to ignore given the daggers being thrown in my direction. When did you split up?’

‘A while ago. This is his party and this is the house he and his friends rent.’

‘What did he do wrong?’

She studies me carefully. ‘What makes you so sure he did anything wrong? It could’ve been me.’

‘Again, I refer you to the daggers. Guys don’t throw looks like that when they’re in the right. He wants you back because he did something for which you won’t forgive him. The daggers are for your benefit as much as mine. Yes, he’d like to punch my lights out but he’s actually more interested in letting you know that he knows you’re trying to make him jealous and it’s working.’

‘You’re pretty good at this, aren’t you?’ she says.

‘Not really, I’ve just been around the block a few times.’

Rosa smiles mischievously. ‘And how many times would that be?’

‘For the sake of argument, let’s say forty. After all, what’s a month or two between friends?’

It feels good to have got the age thing off my chest. I’d been wondering when it would come up. I had thought it might raise its head when I mentioned I was separated but it almost felt like she was deliberately avoiding the question, perhaps because she feared the answer. Anyway, it’s out now, and there’s nothing I can do to put the genie back in the bottle.

She looks at me disbelievingly. ‘You’re really forty?’

‘Just about.’

‘You don’t look it.’

‘I’d say thank you but the truth is it’s less about how you look than how you feel. And I feel old.’ I take a swig of beer. ‘How old are you, if you don’t mind me asking?’

‘What if I do?’

‘Then I suppose I’ll have to guess.’

She puts the beer bottle up to her lips and for a moment I think about following my current line of questioning with a kiss but having studied her youthful skin these past few minutes under the unflattering xenon glow of a Balsall Heath street lamp I have a horrible feeling that she’s much younger than I’d like her to be.

She takes another swig of her beer and then sets it down on the wall: ‘Be my guest,’ she says.

‘I want you to be older.’

She arches one of her carefully maintained eyebrows. ‘Why?’

‘Because then it wouldn’t feel so weird. I was hoping you might have a really youthful face but be in your late twenties but you’re not, are you?’

‘How old would you like me to be?’

‘In an ideal world, you’d be over thirty-five and I’d fall in love with you right now . . . but in the real world I’d settle for anything over twenty-five. Please tell me I’m right.’

She rests her head on my shoulder. Her hair smells unapologetically feminine. I inhale and hold my breath even though I know her answer is going to break my heart. ‘Looks like you’re out of luck. I’m twenty-three.’

Twenty-three. Between her birth and my own there’s a whole seventeen-year-old who’s halfway through their A levels. No matter how much I like her it’s way too much of a gap for me to contemplate this going any further. After all I’m not Gerry. Or Jason Cleveland. Or for that matter Hugh Hefner.

She kisses my cheek. ‘The age thing, it’s freaking you out, isn’t it? ‘

‘Just a bit.’

‘You shouldn’t let it.’

‘Why not?’

‘Age is just a number.’

‘And that right there is why this right here would never work. No one but the seriously deluded believes age is just a number. It’s not a number, it’s an incontrovertible fact. Like, I don’t know, being tall . . . having red hair . . . or being allergic to oysters.’