My Fake Wedding(59)

‘What for?’

Flipping wonderful. I’m such a loser I can’t even have a simple one-night stand without it all going tits up.

God, why is he gazing at me like that? There’s obviously something very wrong with him.

‘What?’ I panic.

‘Nothing, it’s just…’

‘What?’ I ask a second time, a weird, uneasy feeling bubbling away like hot porridge in the pit of my stomach.

‘You’re just so…’

‘Go on.’

‘I think you’re fantastic,’ he bursts out.

‘Oh.’

‘I mean it.’ He nods. ‘You’re funny, you’re gorgeous. You’re just… I can’t believe…’

‘Can’t believe what?’ I demand. Good God. Surely he isn’t about to declare undying love for me, is he? That’s not the idea at all.

I knew I should never have gone for that second shag. I’ve led him on. Allowed him to form an attachment. He seems to be expecting me to say something lovey-dovey back to him.

And ‘love’ is something I’m afraid I’m just not willing to get into right now. As far as I’m concerned, the L word means only one thing.

And that’s ‘Lack Of Vaginal Exercise’.

‘I just can’t believe you changed your mind.’

‘About what?’

‘About me.’

‘I don’t follow.’

‘Well, after everything you said at your party. When we first met. About not wanting a boyfriend. I mean, I’m really not a bastard and I’m definitely not gay. So why did you change your mind? I just can’t believe I’m your type.’

‘You’re not,’ I tell him. ‘I’m desperate.’

Of course it doesn’t even occur to Max that I might actually be serious. He assumes I’m joking. God. Men can be so damn arrogant at times.

He stares at me adoringly for another ten minutes, gazing at me in bewildered awe and shaking his head in wonderment, as though I’m the star of ruddy Bethlehem, instead of plain old Katie Simpson, ginger spinster of Balham parish. And by the time I’m drifting in and out of uneasy slumber, I’ve decided that he’s not even that good-looking. If he likes me that much, he clearly has big problems. Nope, I decide, staring at the silver mirrorball hanging by my window as I listen to the steady rhythm of his breathing. He’s definitely not my type. The colour of his eyes is more mud than Mars bar. And, unless I’m very much mistaken, his head would probably look an awful lot better on the end of a stick.

Typical, isn’t it? The minute I decide to live a single, blameless life, I’ve got blokes following me around like sick puppy dogs. I lie in the Sunday evening gloom feeling cheated. The only reason I was attracted to him in the first place was that I felt sure he had to be a complete and utter bastard. That cheeky grin. Those twinkly eyes. He had it written all over him. But I obviously misread the signs completely. Max has been masquerading as a bastard when he’s really Mr Mills & Boon. He’s the flipping Milk Tray Man in disguise. And I blooming well fell for it. Oh, he’s pulled the wool over my eyes all right. Hoodwinked me good and proper. Now if I lived in America, I could sue him for reeling me in under false pretences.

He isn’t what I ordered and I want my money back.

Finding out what Max is really like feels a lot like going into a restaurant and ordering what I believe to be lobster thermidor, only to discover when it arrives on my plate that I’ve actually asked for a grey lump of boil-in-the-bag cod and parsley sauce.

Bugger it.

I have to pretend I’m going to visit my granny in order to get rid of him. And when he’s finally gone, grinning and loping off down the street like a loon, I flop onto the sofa to think and plan. And then I see it…

A spider the size of a saucer is making its way spikily across the sitting-room rug.

Flipping wonderful.

I haven’t a hope in hell of getting a wink of sleep now. And I can’t even escape round the corner to Janice’s, because I know full well she’s staying at Jasper’s this evening. She told me so this morning. She might even have to bonk him, she said. She’s been telling porkies for weeks now. According to her, the reds have been playing at home for a month and a half and Jasper’s starting to think she’s on an everlasting period.

In desperation, I call Sam.

‘What are you doing?’

‘Watching TV.’

‘In bed?’

‘Yep.’

‘Oh.’

‘Why?’

‘Feel like coming over?’ I try to keep the edge of panic from creeping into my voice. I can still see the spider. It’s crouching disgustingly in the middle of the carpet. Sodding thing has the gall to enter my flat and plonk itself in front of Channel 5. I have to keep it in sight, no matter how traumatic, because if it hides before I can get rid of it, I’ll never be able to set foot in the flat again.