My Fake Wedding(16)

‘Sorry to disappoint you.’ David laughs. ‘But I live on my own.’

‘How very unpatriotic of you.’ I lurch over to the chalkboard and choose another flavour. ‘We’ll have two, no, four raspberry vodkas and a couple of butterscotch ones please.’

By eight o’clock, we’re both off our tits. And we have so much in common that I decide I can really see us as a couple. I mean, obviously I don’t want to rush things. I haven’t got us moving in together, or purchasing joint electrical items yet. And I am supposed to be off monogamy this year. But you never know, do you? Perhaps the right man just hasn’t come along before. Either that, or he did come along and he was George, and therefore unavailable to someone like me.

Perhaps David is the right one. Who knows?

Who cares, I think drunkenly, pouring more booze down my neck. This is funnnnn.

At half eight, my mobile rings. It’s Janice.

‘Where the fuck are you, you witless bee-atch?’

‘In a bar,’ I say gleefully. ‘With vodka. Lotsha vodka. Why? Wanna come?’

‘You were supposed to be meeting me,’ she yells, clearly pissed off. ‘I stood at the sodding tube station freezing my flaps off for an hour. You were supposed to come to the Evergreen Club with me.’

‘The what?’ I shout. ‘Well, where is it? We’ll come now.’

Drunkenly I decide that the thought of David and me dancing beneath an enormous glitterball in some tacky South London nightclub is the thing I’d most like to do in the whole world right now. And because I’m drunk, I can do exactly what I want. I’m cleverer, richer and more beautiful than anyone else in the bar. And I’ll have anyone who dares to say otherwise.

I’m also probably a lot more shitfaced than anyone else here. But they…

‘Don’t be stupid,’ Janice snaps. ‘It’s too late now. It’s not a nightclub it’s a social club.’

‘Oh. Nemmind. Might be fun, doan’tcha think? Doesshit have a late lishensh? Isshit dead posh? You a member?’

‘It’s for the over-sixties, you dappy cow. I’ve been out sharking for Filthy Rich.’

‘Well, be careful.’ I laugh, the effect of the vodka causing circuit failure in my brain and a subsequent lack of any contrition whatsoever. ‘You’ve heard of the dangers of getting pubes in yer teeth.’

‘What?’

‘Imagine what it’s like to get teeth caught in your pubes.’ I giggle as David brings something purple and noxious-looking to the table. ‘Beware.’

I find that last ‘beware’ so hilarious that I start giggling. And then I can’t stop. Janice flips her mobile off in disgust and I giggle some more. I’m having so much fun I don’t care that she’s pissed off with me.

‘Shalright when iss her.’ I grin at David, taking my purple drink and downing it in one. ‘Ss muff before matesh every time when she’s with a bloke she’shh shafting. Not that we are, you know, shagging.’

‘No.’ He looks grave. Probably a bit nervous. I give his leg a squeeze to put him at his ease.

‘But we are having fun, aren’t we?’ I hiccup.

‘We are.’

By the time the bar closes, I’m so pissed that David, bless him, worries that I won’t be able to get home on my own. Perhaps, he says, looking concerned, I should stay at his.

‘Aye aye,’ I joke. ‘I know your game.’

He laughs. It’s nearer, he says. It’ll save me rattling all the way home on the Northern Line. And it’s easier to get into work in the morning from his. He walks it. Besides, he wants to prove to me that he doesn’t have to share a bed with a hundred other antipodeans.

It’s midnight by the time we arrive back at his. And before I slump into the elegant banana-coloured couch in his kitchen, I have time to notice that his pad is distinctly un-bloke-like. Lots of Alessi kitchen equipment. A shiny chrome Dualit toaster. A gleaming Waring blender…

‘Nice shutff,’ I slur as he hands me a cup of Lapsang.

‘Thanks.’

We loll on the banana sofa for a while, then David, suddenly serious, looks at his watch.

‘We’ve got an editorial meeting tomorrow,’ he says. ‘I think we should go to bed.’

Just as I thought. He’s gagging for it.

I’m tingling with anticipation as he leads me up the stairs. He seems to spend an inordinate amount of time in the bathroom, brushing and flossing his teeth, but I tell myself it’s nice to meet a man who takes care of his appearance, and concentrate on checking my own teeth for spinachy bits.

By the time he comes out, a tiny white towel wrapped round his delectable, nipped-in waist, I’m already in bed, my clothes in their usual crumply heap on the floor. Cursing myself for not wearing matching undies, I’ve taken my dirty grey bra off and hidden it under my shirt. I contemplated just leaving my purple bikini knicks on but then decided to be bold and let it all hang out. Under the sheets I’m starkers.