Kismetology (14 page)

"Did she take you up on it?"

"She just smiled and thanked me. I’m not sure she
speaks the language very well. I think she was Spanish."

Ah, so he got blown off the night before.

"So, where do you work?" He asks, changing the
subject for me.

"I’m a nail technician," I say. "I work at a
salon about twenty minutes away."

"The woman at the party had beautiful nails. They were
painted red with white bits on them. I think the white bits were meant to be
flowers."

"Do you know her name?" I ask, realising that he
obviously isn’t done with this topic yet.

"No." He shakes his head sadly. "I never
found out."

I nod in a way that I hope is sympathetic.

"How about you?" I ask, trying to get the topic of
conversation away from the red-nailed Spanish Seductress. "What do you do
for a living?"

"I’m an investment banker. It’s pretty boring though.
Everything in my life was boring until last night."

I wonder if this is quite possibly the strangest
conversation to ever take place on a date.

I try for a change of topic again. "So, your profile
says that you’re a dog lover. Do you have any of your own?"

He shakes his head.

"My mother has one," I say in an attempt to remind
him that he is actually on a date here. "A little Yorkshire terrier.
Friendly little thing."
It will not bite your ankles, honest
.

"I wonder if the lady at the party has a dog. She
seemed like she might be a dog person. You know that vibe you get from people
who love dogs?"

I nod my head, even though I know it wasn't really a
question. He’s not concentrating on me anyway. I think he’s kind of forgotten
that I’m here.

"Yeah, she seemed like a little dog person," Russ
is saying. "She was so beautiful. I can just picture her with a little dog
in her handbag.

"Eleanor carries her dog in a handbag."

"Who’s Eleanor?"

I sigh. "My mother. You know, the woman we’re trying to
figure out if you’re compatible with."

"Oh yes, right. Sorry."

"Look," I say. "You’re obviously hung up on
this Spanish lady."

"Yes." He nods. "It was just like that boom,
you know? The thunderbolt. Ka-boom." He smacks his hands together and
makes me jump.

"Do you want my advice?" I ask.

"Yes, please."

"Did you get her number?"

He shakes his head.

"You said she moved in across the road from your friend.
Why don’t you go there, get your friend to show you which house, go and knock
and invite her out for dinner right now?"

"Really? Do you think she’ll go with me?"

"If you don’t ask, you’ll never know."

"What about you? I must be giving you such a bad
impression of myself. I really thought your mother sounded great, but I don’t
know what’s gotten in to me since I met this woman last night."

"It’s called love at first sight," I say.
"But go on, go and find her. Forget about my mother. I hope you’ll be happy."

"You’re good at this. You should charge people for
this. I bet you set all your friends up."

"No," I say. "And so far I’m hugely
unsuccessful at setting my own mother up."

"I’m sorry," he says. "I really am. I’ve
wasted your time tonight."

"Not at all," I say. "Good luck with the
Spanish lady, I’m sure you’ll be very happy together."

"Thank you." He kisses my hand as he leaves the
table, and I sit there for a while, staring after him. For some reason I can’t
be angry with him. I should be. I should be offended by the fact he’d come on a
date with me while desperately wishing he was out with someone else, but
really, isn’t finding love more important? I know what he means about the
thunderbolt but I can't say I've ever felt it, not even with Dan. I’m not about
to try to deny anybody else the opportunity to have that love. There’s nothing
more rewarding that seeing a couple happy together, and if Russ was hung up on
some other woman, there’s no way he’s meeting my mother anyway. I just hope the
Spanish Seductress likes him.

Date number two courtesy of Cupid-Waits.com is Evan, or
"
Worldly male, sixty-three, seeks an outgoing fifty to sixty-year-old
for companionship and company on many trips abroad
." One that sounds
promising solely for the "
many trips abroad
". He’s pretty much
earned himself a date before we’ve even started, just on the "I plan to
take your mother out of the country on numerous occasions" thing.

When I get to Belisana, I’m surprised by how old Evan looks.
The photo posted online is either taken a very long time ago, or is of someone
else entirely. I mean, I know he is sixty-three, which is kind of above the age
range I’ve been targeting, but the "trips abroad" were just too much
to resist. It’s swings and roundabouts as always though.

"Hello Mackenzie." He smiles at me when I arrive,
but doesn’t get up. I realise that maybe I expect too much of a man. Does any
man get up when a woman comes to the table these days? But at sixty-three,
maybe he can’t get up. Maybe he has really bad arthritis or something. I decide
not to knock points off before we’ve even started.

"Your hair is very sexy," Evan says as I sit down.

"Thank you," I say, a bit taken aback. No one in
their right mind would call my hair sexy. It is very unsexy hair. It is frizzy
hair, occasionally curly, if I don’t shake my head too hard or turn around too
fast.

He is already reading a menu, and I always order the same
thing anyway. Holly comes up to take our orders but Evan asks if she can give
us a few minutes.

"So," he says, when she’s left.
"Mackenzie." He leans forward over the table and beckons for me to
come closer. I lean forward too. Maybe he is a little deaf and has forgotten
his hearing aid or something.

"Okay?" I ask.

"Will you give me a blowjob?"

Ack! I sit up straight and push my chair back to get away
from him. "No! Are you out of you mind?"

"If you don’t want to go outside, we can do it in the
bathroom."

Ugh. Who does this guy think he is? I’m actually at a loss
for what to say. Here is a guy old enough to be my father. Older even. A guy
old enough to be my grandfather has just asked me for a blowjob in the middle
of a crowded restaurant. I’m horrified. I’m beyond horrified. Seeing as there
is no suitable response for this situation, I get up out of my chair and walk
away as fast as I can without sprinting.

"I’ll graciously accept a threesome." Evan calls
after me, apparently not bothered by the fact that every person currently
eating their meals can hear him.

Ugh. Yuck, yuck, yuck. What is it about these old guys?
These ageing Lotharios with evidently more money than common decency.

I go round and into the kitchen, still shuddering at the
mere thought.

"You okay, babe?" Dan asks. He’s used to me being
here now. Just lately I seem to be spending a lot of time in his restaurant.

"No," I say. "That guy just propositioned
me."

"Are you serious?"

I nod.

"He’s like your grandfather."

"I know."

Dan laughs.

I smack him on the shoulder. "Dan, it’s not
funny."

"You’re right," he says, trying but failing to stop
giggling.

"That’s disgusting," Holly says coming in.
"He just put his hand on my knee when I went to get his menu. Ugh."

"Well, that’s not on," Dan says, suddenly standing
up straight.

"It isn’t?"

"Oh no. Nobody touches my staff."

And with that he’s storming out into the dining area,
kitchen door slamming behind him. Holly and I stand in the doorway and watch as
Dan gives Evan a mouthful, points angrily towards the front door and yells at
him to never come back. Evan leaves, and I watch Dan seething as he stands
watch over him as he collects his coat, pays the bill for the food he never got
to eat and leaves.

"Damn," Holly says. "I could’ve found some
real nice rat poison to slip into his water tonight."

I smile at her, but something is making me feel uneasy. I
can’t help thinking about what has just happened. I tell Dan that the old guy
asked me for a blowjob and he laughs. Holly tells Dan that the old guy put a
hand on her knee, and Dan storms out ready for a fight. What is that about? Why
did Dan laugh at my encounter with him, but ban the guy and barely refrain from
hitting him when it was one of the waitresses he’d bothered?

I try to justify it by the fact there was touching involved.
I mean, he may have been incredibly rude and inappropriate with me, but he
didn’t put a hand (or anything else) anywhere near me, thank god. Plus the fact
that I’m not staff. I guess I can see it from Dan’s point of view. But it
would’ve been nice if my boyfriend had stuck up for me in the same way he stuck
up for one of his waitresses.

CHAPTER 26

Predictably, I have no hope
whatsoever for the Tuesday night date. I’m tempted to cancel, but no matter how
horrible a sixty-three-year-old asking for a blowjob is, I have to carry on.
I’ve come too far to turn back now just because of one jerk. Well, many, many
jerks, but only one in particular this week. Besides, this is
The Farmer
Wants a Wife
guy, and my mum has always had a soft spot for pot-bellied
pigs, so maybe this guy has a good shot.

The first thing I notice when I enter Belisana on Tuesday
night is the Wellington boots. It may well seem like a cliché, but my farmer is
wearing welly boots. At the dinner table. I blink a few times, in the vague
hope that maybe I am either dreaming or have entered some sort of parallel
universe arranged by Cupid-Waits.com as some sort of big practical joke. I spot
Dan on his way into the kitchen and I wave at him. He winks at me, and the look
on his face reads "
Wow. He’s a keeper
", clear as day.

Above the knees, he’s actually dressed quite nicely. The
trousers are plain black, and he has on a blue shirt and a tie. And then there
are the wellies. These are not just any wellies. These are light green wellies
with pink swirls on them. I wonder what on earth has possessed a relatively
well turned out guy to wear Wellington boots to dinner in a nice restaurant.
And there is only one way to find out.

"Hello," I say, walking up to him. "You must
be Ed."

"Oh hello, Mackenzie, right?"

I nod. "Thank you for meeting me here."

"You’re welcome. It’s a little out of my way, but I
like to come into the city now and again."

"Is it far for you?"

"It’s about an hour drive. Not too bad."

"And you wouldn’t mind dating someone from here?"

"Not at all. Besides, if it worked out, she could always
come and live with me. I have a very big house and lots of land."

"And lots of animals too, I would imagine?"

"Yes, yes. Plenty."

"Eleanor likes animals," I tell him. Okay, so I’m
not impressed by his choice of footwear, but if it works out between him and my
mother, she can go and
live
with him. An hour away. And she can’t drive.
And it’s not like he could just leave his farm, so she would have to move down
there eventually. Did I mention that she’d be going to
live
with him?

And really, who even looks at feet? He could be wearing pink
stilettos and he’d still get a date with her. Any guy who is offering for her
to live an hour or more away is going to get a date.

"This is quite an unusual situation," he says.
"Meeting my date’s daughter before I can even meet my date."

I want to add, "
if you get that far
," but
he lives an hour away, and if they get on together, so will Mum. Result!

"Yes," I say instead. "But it seemed like the
right thing to do. My mum doesn’t want to be dating every Tom, Dick, and Harry
who comes along, so I just thought I’d try to find her someone compatible, and
not waste her time with men who aren’t." And believe me, there have been a
few Tom’s, a few Harry’s, and more than a few dicks.

"What do you think of me so far?"

Well, I think it’s not polite to ask that question so
directly, or maybe it is. Maybe I need a guy who will be direct and honest,
rather than beating around the bush or offering to graciously accept a
threesome in the restaurant bathroom. "I think you’d get on like a house
on fire," I tell him instead. Heroically resisting the urge to add, "
if
you didn’t stamp the fire out with your big rubber boots.
"

"I like your footwear, by the way," I say
politely. I’m not trying to be sarcastic. I do like his footwear. I think
they’d look lovely ten inches deep in a puddle of mud. I am merely trying to
determine where in his upbringing it was considered protocol to wear such boots
to a fancy eatery.

"Oh, thank you," he says. "I hope you don’t
think it inappropriate of me to wear them, but I just drove up this afternoon,
and I thought it might rain. I didn’t think to bring anything else with
me."

Is it wrong of me to think that maybe when trying to impress
someone, he could’ve walked in to any of the twenty shoe shops in nearby streets
and purchased a pair of, well, anything that wasn’t green and pink? They didn’t
have to be expensive. Frankly even the most basic budget trainers would have
impressed me more. But if he gets on with my mum, she’ll be living an hour
away. So I say, "No, it’s not inappropriate at all. I’m impressed."
I’m
impressed that you have the courage to wear those things out in public
.

"What do you recommend to eat in this joint? I’m a
vegetarian, that is okay, isn’t it?"

I nod. Now I am impressed. At least he isn’t a cannibalistic
veterinarian. "So am I," I say.

"And Eleanor?"

"Yes," I conveniently don't tell him about the ham
she always keeps in the fridge for ‘emergencies’.

"That’s good. I don’t think I could date a meat
eater."