Dan Taylor Is Giving Up On Women

Chapter Five

Alex is such a bastard. I’m so stupid. :-(

In case the message itself weren’t enough, the emoticon let me know that Delphine was not happy this Sunday morning. But what other significance did the message have? I’d spent the walk home pondering what it might have meant, and how I would reply. It was terrible when someone you knew and liked was so obviously unhappy, and going through a difficult emotional time. But hey, the upside was she was telling me about it.

My stomach got a jitter of excitement at the thought I might be the person she turned to at these times. It crossed my mind that I should let Rob and Hannah know what was going on — this fell into their responsibilities under our wager after all. But they had their own stuff to deal with, and I thought it’d be cool if, as they slaved away trying to find the right person for me, I could turn around and say, actually, I’ve got myself sorted, thanks. So let me buy you that dinner and let’s crack open the champagne and toast my gorgeous, interestingly angst-ridden, extraordinarily bendy, French girlfriend.

But just maybe I’m getting ahead of myself, I thought. It was eleven o’clock by the time I got home, meaning the message had come in thirty-five minutes ago. I had to reply quickly now to be sure the window of opportunity didn’t close.

You’re not stupid! Are you OK?

I hadn’t exactly managed to hone the one hundred and forty characters that’d solve all her problems and make her fall into my arms in one text, but I figured this would be just the start. An opening move in text chess, and I’m a grandmaster. I poured a big bowl of chocolate Shreddies®, made an oversized mug of tea, and switched on the Cheers marathon on the comedy channel as I settled down and waited for the next move. I felt the buzz through the arm of the sofa as my mobile vibrated and beeped to say I had a new message.

I am not OK and he’s a bastard. And I AM Stupid

Yes! I thought to myself, we have a live situation here. Now I can make her feel better, and wow her with what a sympathetic young man I am. I muted the TV so I could concentrate on my replies without the benefit of the laughter of a live studio audience.

Right. All the thickoes I know are bilingual…

Within seconds of my reply going out, another message came right back in.

If I’m so smart how come I let him make me feel so unhappy? Why is it me always bending over on my back for him?

I think this was one of those times when an idiom hadn’t quite been mastered. But what if it was intentional? My fingers flew over a response.

Now there’s an image. ;-)

I hesitated slightly as I entered the characters for a winking emoticon, and my hand hovered over the send button. Was this what had become of me? Was I really a person who used little smiley faces in saucy texts? But what else could I do with a remark like that? An exclamation mark would have seemed too excitable, and just dots might have left it ambiguous on whether I thought it was a nice image. Did the text itself make me look like a seedy pervert? Maybe so, but the smiley bracket meant I was at least a friendly one.

I held my breath and sent the message — and that was why I loved the invention of the mobile phone. I couldn’t say something like that to someone in real life. Being mildly flirtatious never seemed to work so well if you had to repeat yourself because you were mumbling slightly, and were blushing uncontrollably because you’d paid someone a compliment. God forbid, they might actually think that you ‘like’ them.

Minutes passed, and I watched the silent TV as I fretted. Sam Malone, the bar owner, was chatting up twin college students while the posh barmaid looked on despairingly at his behaviour. Had I gone too far? Been too tacky? Perhaps I should send another message, explaining that, despite the impression given by my comments, I wasn’t objectifying her by thinking about her in heels and lingerie leaning seductively over a giant bed like an FHM cover girl.

Although now, of course, I was.

On the TV, Sam returned to the bar to collect drinks for the two young women and was being looked upon with awe by Norm and Cliff the postman from their usual barstools. A wink and a wisecrack and he was back to the table with the early eighties’ hotties, while I was left waiting with a mildly suggestive text message hanging in the air. I checked my outbox to be sure that it actually went. It did, six minutes ago.

Oh, God, I thought, she’s been looking for words of consolation from a friend when she’s genuinely upset about the conduct of a man she might actually love, and I’ve been acting like a leering chimp. While Sam was taking a phone call, Cliff had approached the two young students and was making a clumsy play, trying to look cool in his postie uniform with the trousers slightly too short for him. All he got for his troubles was a derisory laugh from the girls and a clip around the head from barmaid Carla. It was no less than us half-witted buffoons deserved.

Then my phone beeped.

Oi! Cheeky!! :-p. He’s just come in to collect his shoes, he’s spending the whole day watching football at the pub with his stupid mates :-(

I thought I’d got away with it.

Choosing to leave you to go out to watch 22 sweaty men spit and scratch themselves in high definition? Madness!

Sam cruised back to the girls, who finished their drinks and they all left the bar together. As I waited to hear what Delphine had to say next, I pondered what my own next message should be — in text chess you’ve got to be thinking several moves ahead. I was thinking that now I’d highlighted some of Alex’s faults as a putative boyfriend, I should probably lay off him to not look bitter. I did think about mentioning the fact he was wearing the same stinky socks two days in a row, and was probably using her toothbrush, but that looked a bit petty.

No, I decided my next move should be to raise the prospect that she could be doing something more fun with her Sunday afternoons than hanging around at home while the bloke she’d been expecting to see got pissed.

Then, next week in the office I could casually mention the cinema listings in the Metro during a coffee break, and get an idea if there was something she’d like to see. That day I could go by myself to see the latest nihilistic psychodrama with subtitles the French seemed to watch for fun, and maybe send a text on my way home saying whether it was any good or not.

After that, I’d just need to keep a track of the film listings in Time Out to monitor whenever there was a Gallic Despair season on at the Everyman. Then, the next time she was looking for textual sympathy because she’d been let down by a spotty oik, I’d be able to leap in and suggest we forget about him and cheer ourselves up with Canal Plus’s latest romantic comedy about the suicidal paraplegic and the bi-polar single mother.

From there it was just a matter of casually suggesting we grab a bite at a hot new tapas bar afterwards and getting sufficiently drunk on San Miguel to suggest we do it again some time on a proper date. Our superficial office-based friendship would then be out there in the real world.

Checkmate in a few simple moves.

I jumped as my mobile beeped at me again:

Конец ознакомительного фрагмента.

Текст предоставлен ООО «ЛитРес».

Прочитайте эту книгу целиком, купив полную легальную версию на ЛитРес.

Безопасно оплатить книгу можно банковской картой Visa, MasterCard, Maestro, со счета мобильного телефона, с платежного терминала, в салоне МТС или Связной, через PayPal, WebMoney, Яндекс.Деньги, QIWI Кошелек, бонусными картами или другим удобным Вам способом.