Alice Brown's Lessons in the Curious Art of Dating (16 page)

‘Can I speak to Audrey Cracknell, please?’ a male caller asked.

‘I’m afraid she’s out,’ Alice answered. Everyone had sighed with relief when Audrey declared that she was going out and wouldn’t be back. She’d been in a terrible mood all day. Alice wondered if it was something to do with yesterday’s DIPS meeting; she’d seen Audrey leave early, her neck flushed and her face tight.

‘Can I help? I’m Alice.’

‘Oh, um. I’m not sure. Ah. Well, maybe. Er. Actually, yes. My name’s Max, Max Higgert. It’s, ah, it’s about the dates
I’ve been on. Um, well, the dates I’ve been sent on by Audrey.’

Alice listened.

Twenty minutes later she put down the receiver. She wanted to help but it would be tricky.

What Max had eventually told her was that he wasn’t being matched with the kind of woman he wanted. He wanted a kind, caring woman; someone homely and unaffected to share cosy nights in front of the TV. But Audrey kept fixing him up with rich, socially aspiring, designer-clad women; the kind of women who made trophy wives and ruthlessly hunted for solvent husbands; the kind of women who made Max run a mile.

Alice couldn’t help herself. She knew it was office suicide to meddle with Audrey’s matchmaking. It was fair enough for the staff to dip into each other’s client lists, but Audrey’s own list was sacrosanct. But Alice knew she wouldn’t be able to sleep at night if she just stood by and watched the path to true love being bulldozed. Wasn’t the whole point of her job to make perfect matches? Cupid wouldn’t stow away his arrows just because his target wasn’t on the right list, and neither should she. She looked out of the window and started building the restaurant again.

A few minutes later Alice clicked back into the present with an energetic snap. It was 5.27. She rushed over to where Bianca was shutting down her computer.

‘Bianca – please – can I ask you a favour?’ Her words tumbled out hastily. Bianca was already buttoning her coat.
‘It’s about one of Audrey’s clients; Max, the architect. I’ve found his perfect match and I need you to suggest her to Audrey.’

Bianca turned her big blue eyes on Alice and blinked blankly.

‘Why don’t you suggest her yourself?’

‘Because she won’t listen if it comes from me! She’d dismiss it out of hand, even though I think they’re made for each other.
Especially
because I think they’re made for each other!’

‘Audrey’s not like that!’ Bianca said with a little gasp. ‘If it’s a good idea she’ll listen.’

Alice almost laughed out loud.

‘I’m sure you’re right. But I can’t risk it. Max
has
to meet this woman. She’s his happy-ever-after!’

The two women smiled at each other; matchmakers couldn’t help but go mushy at the thought of a happy-ever-after. Alice let Bianca’s romantic nature take hold for a moment, and then pushed home her advantage.

‘Audrey listens to you. She’ll take it seriously if she thinks it’s your idea.’

‘But I don’t want to take your credit—’

‘Take it! Please – have it!’

‘Well, if it’s what you really want . . . And if it’s going to make Max happy . . . I’ll do it. I’ll suggest the match to Audrey.’

Alice encircled Bianca in a huge hug. ‘Thank you! You won’t regret it, I promise!’

Alice could only hope she wouldn’t regret it either.

Audrey carried her dinner tray into the kitchen and poured herself an extra-large sherry. Pickles the cat twisted around her ankles, rubbing his marmalade hairs into her tights and purring contentedly. Audrey carefully carried her glass back into the living room and settled into her favourite armchair. Her armchair was the only seat in the room that was ever sat on. Her three-person sofa was as plumped and pristine as the day it had been delivered to the house, eleven years ago. Audrey hadn’t even taken its plastic cover off for the first few years, and even now she couldn’t remember the last time she’d sat on it. And she never had house guests. There was never anyone to invite.

Audrey’s armchair, on the other hand, had seen sustained action. Its arms were slippery and balding and several springs under the cushion had gone, but it was as comfortable as a pair of slippers and as welcoming as a hot bath. Audrey spent a lot of time sitting on it; seven evenings a week if she wasn’t giving one of her ‘The Secret To Finding Your Mr/Miss Right’ talks. Once upon a time the armchair had been dusky pink, but over the years it had muted into
the colour of butterscotch Angel Delight and had moulded exactly to the contours of Audrey’s bottom. In front of her chair was a small pouffe, decorated with a dusting of Pickles’s hair and scarred with two deep ruts where Audrey’s feet rested.

Audrey took a long sip of sherry. Her favourite detective show wasn’t holding her attention tonight. Her mind kept wandering, and the plot had become incomprehensible. Audrey firmly believed that the careful watching of detective shows was far better than any of those expensive brain-training things they sold on the television. A detective TV-show viewer needed to stay on her toes. A diet of
Morse
,
Cracker
and
Prime Suspect
reruns kept her mentally fit and sharp as a button. Apart from tonight, that was. Tonight she was fuzzy and diverted.

She lifted her sherry to her lips. Pickles suddenly jumped onto her lap, causing Audrey’s sherry to slop against her lip, leaving a sticky alcohol moustache. She felt a flash of irritation, but as soon as she felt it, it passed. She couldn’t be angry with Pickles. He was her constant companion, her one true friend. No matter how trying her day at work, he was always waiting for her at home, purring happily merely to be in her presence. Pickles made Audrey feel loved, and in return, she extended him a rare tolerance. They were in it together, she and Pickles.

As Pickles kneaded her lap, Audrey stroked his fur absent-mindedly. Her fingers took their familiar path down his back, from just under his ears, along the sides of his spine to the tip of his tail, before starting again at his ears. Within
three or four strokes everything was forgotten. All Audrey could see was John.

Whenever Audrey daydreamed about John, she always pictured him in her life, not his. That she imagined him relaxing with a whisky in her living room, or crashing pans in her kitchen as he cooked them a romantic meal, was only natural. She’d never seen John’s house. She didn’t even know where he lived. Whenever she tried to bring it up he’d say something vague like ‘not far away’, before smoothly bringing the conversation back to her.

Audrey’s evenings with John took place entirely within neutral domain. They’d meet on the safe territory of her doorstep. In her excitement she’d get dressed early and then wear down the carpet between the kitchen and the front door, nipping fortifying sips of sherry in the former and peeking through the mottled glass of the latter. She was always ready and waiting for their dates, and never had any reason to invite him over the threshold and onto the fertile ground of her hallway.

Once John arrived he’d kiss her hand in greeting, drive to the ball venue, and then, once the evening was over, drive her home again. He’d never come in when she offered a nightcap. He’d decline graciously, saying, ‘Something I’ve learnt over the years is when to call it a night on a great evening. And that’s what this has been . . . a great evening.’

So Audrey had very little geography to go on when placing John within her dreams.

But the one place she did know – and know very well – was the inside of his car. The fluttery nerves she got before
their evenings together would soften as soon as John opened the Audi’s passenger door and she slid inside. The car advertisements on TV were right to be seductive, she thought. John’s car was a perfect, purring machine. From the understated layout of the dashboard to the cream leather seats, everything about the car made Audrey feel protected. She’d smooth her hand along the inside of the door, savouring its solidity, as John walked around to the driver’s side. She’d breathe in the car’s smell and quietly thrill at the muted power of the engine as John pulled away from her street and towards their evening ahead.

This was the ground zero of her fantasies. Not the racy dreams of the younger woman; Audrey dreamt of domesticity and partnership. She pictured John picking her up from work on a rainy afternoon; of him driving them to the Lake District for a romantic weekend; of the contented routine of a Saturday-morning trip to Waitrose.

Too shy in the early stages of the evening to look directly at John, Audrey would sneak glances at his hands, so manly as he turned the wheel, transporting them through the dark streets of the city. Sometimes – if it was summer – he’d wear a short-sleeved shirt, his jacket waiting neatly on the back seat. Then Audrey would see his forearms, surprisingly muscular; his skin so even and vital-looking that she ached to lean across and touch it.

These were her favourite moments. Audrey prided herself on being in the driving seat of life, but the excitement of a man driving her around the dark city made her feel so feminine. What surrender! She’d catch a glimpse of her
reflection in the passenger window and be taken aback. The wrinkles were gone, the years of disappointment wiped out; she looked innocent and girlish, like a teenager on her first date.

Audrey stirred herself. The detective show had finished and the ten o’clock news was drawing to a close. On her lap Pickles lay still, his eyes closed. She looked at her half-drunk sherry. It was too late to finish it now; it was time for bed. Gently she lifted Pickles to the floor and brushed down her skirt. Cat hair floated in the air around her.

Alice blew across the surface of her cappuccino and did her best to avoid looking at Sheryl’s breasts, straining to escape from their leopard-print blouse. If Alice raised her eyes to look above them she knew she’d see Sheryl smiling wolfishly over the top of her skinny latte, her lips sticky with scarlet lipgloss. Alice wondered whether Sheryl ever wore a polo neck, or any item of clothing that didn’t display a large ‘V’ of cleavage. Didn’t her breasts ever get cold? Alice was huddled in two layers of jumper. Surely Sheryl’s breasts must cry out for a day off; a little time out from being displayed to the elements? They must dream of being wrapped in a nice, soft turtleneck.