My Fake Wedding(93)
Apparently, on a normal Saturday, the eating of the takeaway is followed by the implementation of a cunning device that, Jake assures me, is typical of ‘all blokes’. He lets Fishpants choose the video, then sits down to watch it. And then he waits. And waits. Until she demands the remote control to herself for a change. Or talks over an important bit of the film. And then he storms out and comes round to mine. Where we watch shit TV together and eat takeaways. And then have sex.
It’s as easy-peasy as that.
The sly fox.
Still, Fishpants made her bed (nasty frilly sheets and a horrid valance, no doubt), when the pair of them played hide the salami behind my back, so she can sodding well lie in it as far as I’m concerned. After all, it’s hardly my fault if Jake seems to be labouring under the impression that monogamy is a low-fat spread, is it?
Nick, of course, is a different kettle of fish altogether. And the more I see him, the more I realise we really do have nothing in common at all. He was born in the eighties, for God’s sake. To him, a Snickers has always been a Snickers. A Texan is someone who comes from a particular part of America. ‘Watch Out, There’s a Humphrey About’ means nothing to him at all. He was about four when Culture Club belted out ‘Karma Chameleon’. He never spent his holidays giggling as Irish children made ‘fillums’ on Why Don’t Yew? And he’s never eaten Pacers, Spangles or Star Bars in his life.
Still, with no common reference points, I don’t really have to bother talking to him at all. We can get straight down to the sex. Which, I might add, can get pretty exciting. Sex with Nick is very much of the sordid, shag-me-up-a-back-alley variety. He loves doing it outside, which means we spend little time in bed and lots behind skips, on park benches and in other people’s back gardens. Still, it keeps things interesting, or so I tell myself with a sigh one evening, as the back door of a pebbledashed semi opens and a fat woman in a peach candlewick dressing gown screams abuse in our general direction, before hurling a bucket of cold water over us.
Now though, as George tells me bluntly that even Janice, Mrs Muff Before Mates herself, feels I have no time for her any more, I feel suddenly depressed. I remember that I haven’t even bothered to make up with Sam after the row we had about my moving into George’s. And it suddenly becomes clear to me that, whatever might or might not have been said in the heat of the moment, Sam and Janice are my best friends. And I can’t afford to lose them. Besides, in the back of my mind I’ve known all along that I’ve got something very, very important I need to ask Sam. So, feeling ridiculously nervous, I call him to apologise. And then I ask him if I can take him out for dinner tonight to make up.
‘Course you can, Simpson.’ I can hear Sam’s grin down the phone and I love him for it. ‘Always happy to take your money.’
‘I’ll be round at eight,’ I tell him, feeling relieved.
It’s one of those beautiful, balmy June evenings. The pavements around every pub I walk past on my way to Angel tube are thronging with girls in short, flippy dresses drinking vodka and clean-cut city blokes oozing the scent of lemony aftershave and freshly laundered shirt. The air is thick with the smell of sexual promise and, as I emerge from the tube and wander up to Sam’s house, newly painted and with every windowsill over-spilling with glorious purple and orange pansies, I realise I’m really, really nervous and I don’t know why. Surely it can’t be because I fancy Sam, of all people. Besides, even if I did, I’ve got quite enough on my plate with Jake and Nick. I really haven’t got the time to rack up a third.
Nevertheless, when Pussy answers the door, flicking around a lot of glossy blonde hair and shrugging a delicate lilac cardie over her sticky-outty collarbones, I can’t help feeling more than a tad annoyed.
‘Oh,’ I say involuntarily as she narrows her eyes at me.
‘We’re almost ready,’ she says, with lots of emphasis on the ‘we’. She’s definitely hostile. But the minute she hears Sam’s footsteps behind her, she flips expertly from arch mother cat to fluffy Persian kitten. In fact, she reminds me so much of a cat, I keep expecting her to bend over and start licking her bum.
Sam bounces up behind her, pulling his favourite scruffy tan suede jacket over his shoulders. ‘Simpson, you ol’ slapper.’ He grins, looking really pleased to see me after all this time. ‘It’s great to see you.’
‘You too.’ I smile back, enjoying the sour look on Pussy’s face as he gives me a huge smacker on either cheek.
‘I’ve got vodka,’ he says. ‘We can make cosmopolitans before we go.’