Novel Project 2010 - Chapter Fourteen

A couple of weeks passed, and I hadn't heard anything from Anne since the party. Nor did I try to get in touch. Although we probably didn't really need to talk about it, it was fairly clear that another date was definitely off the table. At least there was no need for the "its not you, its me" type platitudes. Flaunting intimacy with someone else is actually a pretty good way to send a message. Although, as I discovered, it doesn't do much for the other person's confidence. And despite my best efforts to be pragmatic, it took me a good while to get over it. After all, its no fun to be cheated on. And I wasn't even sure if it was actually cheating. This wasn't even behind my back. Assuming we'd been dating long enough for there to be any kind of obligation not to sleep with anyone else.
    I kept telling myself that it really wasn't anything to do with me: her ex was there, they got back together, it would've happened no matter what guy she was with at the time. They'd been together for three years, which somewhat trumped our four dates. I repeated this in my head over and over to try and cushion my ego. I repeated it so often that I forgot to do anything else, spending much of the next two weeks padding around the flat in my dressing gown, watching TV and sampling as many different snack foods as the local supermarket would provide in lieu of a proper meal.  Andy had tried to get me to come along on many outings with his friends, but I'd politely declined, my desire to be sociable outweighed by the thought that a mutual friend might bring up the subject of Anne and Sid. I'd even stopped playing video games with Nick.
    After a few weekends had passed without incident, and the last few hidden caches of party drinks had been discovered in the toilet cistern, I resolved not to let this get me down. If I sat about lamenting for my whole life I'd never get anywhere. I needed to get back on the horse, take control of my own destiny, be the change I wanted to see, and use cliches like a man.
    This occurred to me at about 3pm on a Sunday afternoon, as I finished a second bowl of cereal, pulling double duty as breakfast and lunch. I put down the bowl and leapt purposefully to my feet. I imagined a cool training montage set to some classic inspirational track from the 1980s: running laps, lifting weights and punching meat hanging in a giant freezer. All while a coach figure shouted silently at me through a megaphone a mere three inches from my face. This manifested in reality as a fresh cup of coffee and turning on my computer to check for new e-mail. Zero messages. Not exactly inspiring. I signed into the dating site and started a new search, thinking it a shame that there wasn't an option to order profiles by their sense of decency.

    I engaged in a brief, but pleasant email exchange with a girl named     Susan, who worked in advertising. We discussed our work, what we did in our spare time and where we grew up. The typical sort of introduction. She was fairly new to London, having moved down from the North in the past year. I offered to show her around, re-writing the sentence a good three or four times to avoid it seeming too sleazy. Susan suggested meeting for dinner first. I guess I was jumping the gun a little with a guided tour.
    We arranged to one evening after work, and, as was becoming typical, slightly too early to pop home to freshen up first. I left slightly later than I'd hoped, and had just enough time to look over myself in the mirrored walls of the lift on the brief trip down. My hair seemed to be keeping roughly in place, but my shaving seemed to leave a little to be desired. I'd missed a small tuft of hair on my upper lip, just below my nose. I'd managed not to notice it all day, but now I'd made a close inspection it seemed clear as day. This tiny homage to Hitler would not be at the forefront of my mind, burning brightly when I went to greet Susan. No better way to start a date than a minute advertisement for National Socialism, or possibly for a better razor.
    I'd played the local knowledge card and recommended a restaurant a few minutes' walk from work. I arrived outside to find Susan waiting for me, and greeted her with my head slightly turned to keep the unshaven patch on my left in shadow.
    "Susan?" I asked, as always accounting for the possibility I had the wrong person. I almost held my hand out to shake hers, but I'd never really worked out if this was appropriate date etiquette. I decided against it, adopting an informal approach, although one that currently involved absolutely no physical contact.
    "Ben. Hi, nice to meet you."
    "And you. Shall we?" I said, leading us inside.
    We were shown to a table near the window, a short enough walk as to preclude the possibility of any conversation until we sat down. I paused briefly as Susan was placing her bag under the table, and wondered if I should have held her chair out for her. Some might have appreciated the gesture, some might have taken offence. Equal rights are all well and good, but when it comes to confusing men with questions of proper behaviour, feminism has a lot to answer for.
    "Did you find the place ok?"
    "Yeah, no problem, wasn't far from the tube."
    "Well, score one for convenience."
    "Is the food as good as the location?"
    "It's pretty good, come here with work a lot." I wasn't 100% sure of this claim, as most of the time I came here with work, it was after a rather heavy drinking session.
    "You work near here?"
    "About ten minutes away."
    "So slightly more convenient for you then?" Susan said with a raised eyebrow.
    "Ok, guilty." I held up my hands in surrender. "I chose the place purely for my own convenience."
    "I'll forgive you just this once." Susan winked.
    "So how was your day?"
    "Not bad, things are kinda quiet at work right now, so had plenty of time to worry about tonight."
    "Why should you have been worried?"
    "Well, you know, meeting someone new. Anything could happen. Worried I might say something stupid or offend him or something. Gotta make a good impression."
    "You shouldn't let that bother you. If you're right for each other, it'll work, seems pointless making a huge effort to force it." I was slightly shocked as the words left my mouth. I guess I'd actually learned something over the past few months.
    "Maybe. But don't you ever get nervous before a date?"
    There were many things I could have said here: "I'm too excited to be nervous.", "Yes, but a good kind of nervous.", "No, I've been undergoing hypnotherapy.", but I didn't really give my reply much thought. "Terrified." I responded.
    "At least I'm not the only one."
    Being close to the entrance, it was hard not to notice when someone walked in. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw a familiar face and I couldn't help but look up over Susan's head and locked into eye contact.
    "Vanessa, hi!" I waved, raising my voice to some point between loud enough to carry and not loud so loud as to be obnoxious.
    "Ben!" Vanessa replied, walking the short distance to our table, dragging two men behind her on an invisible rope of which she herself was unaware.
    "How are you? I haven't seen you in ages." Vanessa asked as she arrived at the side of our table.
    "I've not been out in a while. This is Susan, by the way." I said, indicating my date, who seemed slightly uneasy at the interruption.
    "Nice to meet you."
    "Likewise."
    "Oh, and this is Steve." Vanessa said, almost as an afterthought, bringing her own date forward into the circle. More handshakes and greetings followed.
    "Would you like me to put you all together?" A waiter offered, breaking into the group.
    We all looked at each other, then back at the waiter. Susan looked even more uneasy. Steve looked almost smug, I guessed he saw himself as the better catch. I mulled over it, unsure about the idea of an impromptu double date. Eventually, several of us, and I can't quite remember exactly who, nodded at the waiter simultaneously. We were quickly re-seated at a table for four, that was handily vacant immediately next to the table Susan and myself were originally occupying.
    "Sorry to barge in like this." Steve said, profoundly embarrassed.
    "Oh, don't be silly, its fine." Susan replied, temporarily relieving me of the lingering doubt.
    "Have you folks ordered anything yet?" Vanessa cut in, taking charge of the situation. Susan and I shook our heads. "Right, anyone for wine?"
    We picked a red and ordered a bottle between the four of us, Steve grabbing the attention of a passing waiter with little more than a raising of the eyebrows. I had trouble getting a waiter's attention with a megaphone. He was definitely staking his position as the alpha male.
    "So how do you two know each other?" Steve asked, indicating Vanessa and me.
    "We went to the same uni."
    "Met in halls."
    "You see each other often?" Susan asked?
    "We hadn't seen each other since graduation until a coupla months ago. Bumped into each other outside a pub."
    "Seem to be a lot of coincidences like that lately."
    "Indeed." Steve said, with a tone I might have described as suspicion.
    "We had a lot of fun back when we were student though." Vanessa said wistfully.
    "Only because you knew all the good places to go." I turned to Steve. "She had a real knack for finding the most random events."
    "Oh god, you mean like that variety show?"
    "Yes, that's exactly what I was thinking."
    "Variety show?" Susan asked.
    "It was terrible. There was this one guy, a ventriloquist. His dummy was dressed as a monk."
    "And he'd taken a vow of silence!" Vanessa and I said in perfect unison.
    We laughed briefly at one another, sharing something of an in-joke, then turned and realised the others were staring at us blankly.
    "So, Susan, what do you do?" Vanessa asked.
    "I'm in advertising."
    "A creative? Sounds interesting."
    "Not really, I mostly sort out placing ads in magazines and things."
    "Enjoy it?"
    "Well, its work. The people I work with are great, have some fun nights out. What about you?"
    "I work with a charity."
    "Oh, that's great."
    "I like it."
    "How about you, Steve. What line of work are you in?" I asked.
    "I'm an accountant." He didn't sound like he enjoyed it. Luckily, our waiter arrived with a bottle of wine, saving me from having to come up with a follow up question.
    We engaged in a four-way introductory conversation, discussing our work, social lives and various other qualities that my e-mail conversation with Susan had already revealed. I became increasingly aware that Vanessa and I were monopolising the conversation somewhat, despite our best efforts to include Susan and Steve. Its far easier to talk to someone you know than it is to get to know a stranger, even if you're trying your hardest to favour the latter.
    A single bottle of wine doesn't go very far between four. We were onto our third bottle once we reached the main course.
    "Ever feel like you can't drink as much as you used to?" Vanessa asked, blanching slightly at her half full glass.
    "I have a theory there." Steve said, "I think its more that you don't want to get as wasted as you used to."
    "What do you mean?" Susan asked, intrigued.
    "Well, we're all working now. Getting up in the morning and all that. When we were students it wasn't that big a deal to sleep in and skip a lecture."
    "But what about the weekends?"
    "Well, I'd like to think we're a bit more mature than we used to be. Perhaps a bit more embarrassed to be acting like a drunken moron. So you've given yourself a new limit and stop sooner."
    "Can't say I really drank a lot in uni." Susan said, making no attempt to disguise her boredom.
    "There's an exception to every rule." I offered.
    "God, when I think how much we used to drink when we were students." Susan said. "I can't imagine how we could afford it."
    "Two words. Cheap booze." I said.
    "You mean like those ready-mixed cocktails from Sainsbury's?"
    "Exactly. Those things were like drinking paint." The memory made me slightly nauseous. "You seemed to like it though."
    "I don't remember a whole lot from that night. That was the night before we moved out of halls, wasn't it?"
    "Think so. Turned out the drink we had left over from the year wasn't enough for the party, so we went out for more." I explained. " Our judgement was a little impaired by that point. We still thought drinking more would be a good idea, for some reason."
    "That's exactly my point." Steve said. "You wouldn't be seen dead getting that drunk now."
    "I seem to remember you swearing you'd never drink again after that night." I teased Vanessa.
    "Well, it didn't last too long." She replied, raising her glass in a miniature toast.
    "Good thing we didn't have to move out until the afternoon."
    "Steve's right though. I have no intention of getting that drunk again."
    "Glad to hear it. I'm not holding your hair back while you puke again."
    Everyone fell silent.
    "That was telling too much, wasn't it?"
    I adopted my best sheepish look, Vanessa's brow furrowed like a child's approximation of a bird in flight. Steve burst out laughing, followed by Vanessa and myself, my own laughter out of sheer embarrassment. As the laughter reached a crescendo, Vanessa leaned forward almost unintentionally and slapped my thigh, squeezing it slightly before suddenly sitting bolt upright, her laughter ceasing. I looked at her, mildly shocked, then turned away quickly. I didn't notice it at the time, but Susan wasn't laughing.
    We finished the meal without much more in the way of conversation, sharing our plans for the weekend in the driest terms. Upon paying the bill, we decided to head to the pub next door for a couple more drinks. We headed towards the bar and Steve offered to buy a round. For some reason, I politely declined. Part of me didn't like accepting drinks from people I'd only just met, and another part wanted to separate the two dates a little more. Vanessa and Steve got their drinks and headed to sit down. I turned to Susan to ask what she'd like, but she beat me to it and spoke first, words that seemed to have been brewing for a while.
    "Is there something going on with you two?"
    "What? Between me and Vanessa? No, of course not."
    "But you want there to be, don't you?"
    "What? No."
    "Oh come on, you were totally flirting with each other."
    "We weren't." I half-lied. "We're just friends."
    "You totally were flirting. And I saw the way she was looking at you." At least she hadn't noticed anything else. "And when she grabbed your leg." Guess I was wrong.
    "We're just good friends. We don't get to see each other very often and we have a lot to talk about."
    "But did you have to talk about it all on a date?"
    "Ok, I'm sorry about that. I thought a double date might have been a bit different, something fun."
    "Wasn't what you expected?"
    "Not at all."
    "Well, me either."
    "Can I make it up to you sometime?" This was more from guilt than any particular feelings. I hadn't really got to know her well enough to know if we'd like to meet again.
    "Tell you what. If you can tell me where I studied, I'll give you another shot."
    I stared blankly for a moment. It had come up at some point I knew, but looking back, I think I was just about to start a side conversation with Vanessa about recent happenings with a mutual friend who'd studied the same subject. Susan knew it.
    "Thought so. Maybe there is something to be said for making that special effort." And with that, she left.
    I stood there in shock for a moment, before wondering whether to go over to Vanessa and Steve alone, or leave, my tail tucked firmly between my legs. I ordered a pint so I could mull it over, and while I was paying, my dilemma resolved itself. Vanessa appeared at the bar beside me.
    "You ok?" She asked.
    "That was a little odd. Susan just left."
    "Oh, I'm sorry. Not your month is it?"
    "Guess you heard about Anne as well."
    "If not, I might have assumed it didn't work out."
    "Good point. Kinda knocked me for six that one."
    "That why you've not been about the last few weeks?"
    "Yeah, this was pretty much my first night out since."
    "Seems like a great one to come back on." She said, sarcastically.
    "A brilliant one. Where's Steve?"
    "He's gone too."
    "Why was I afraid you were going to say that?"
    "Did Susan think we were flirting too?"
    "How did you guess?"
    "Maybe guess we were a bit too familiar."
    "You think so? Isn't that ok behaviour for good friends?"
    "I'd think so. Maybe it seems like we're more than that."
    We stared at each other for a moment, various cogs turning in our minds. We both moved to say something, then we got embarrassed and turned away.
    "Nope, we're definitely just friends."
    "Totally, maybe even just acquaintances."
    "Colleagues, even."
    "Colleagues who can't hold a date together."
    "I'll drink to that."
    We raised our glasses. "To failure!"