The Dating Detox (18 page)

In the cab, driving up Sloane Street, I try to collect myself.

You know, I really wasn’t built for confrontation. I can’t help crying when I’m angry. I think it’s just because there’s an overflow of emotion and it backs up into the ‘weep’ area of my head. And though I managed to keep it all in when I was saying those things to Rick, the tears are now escaping from the corners of my eyes.

I try to control my breath, which is coming out in lopsided gasps.

Calm. Caaaaaalm.

Oh God, that was awful. I feel dirty just from seeing Rick. What the fuck is my problem? The Dating Sabbatical was meant to protect me from shit like that, and instead, it practically led me straight into the arms of the King O’ Shits.

Ew. I can’t believe I was ever actually really and truly in his arms.

My breathing regulation attempts are failing. As we cross over Knightsbridge and start driving alongside Hyde Park, I start to feel like I’m hyperventilating. I put my head between my legs and try to inhale and exhale as slowly as possible. The cab stops quickly at some red lights, and I, predictably, am jerked forward sharply, bang my head against the opposite seat and land in a heap on the floor of the car.

‘Ow,’ I say. It’s surprisingly comfortable down here.

‘You alright, love?’ calls the driver.

‘Fine!’ I call back. ‘Totally fine.’ At least the fall stopped the tears.

I clamber back up and lie down across the seats. My head needs a rest. Never mind that a million people have sat here with farty bottoms. Right now the back seat of this cab is a place of rest and respite. I rest my head on my lucky yellow clutch and close my eyes. My mind is whirring, and I think the wine just hit my nervous system.

Next thing I know, we’ve lurched to a halt and I’ve almost fallen off the seat again.

‘Chepstow Villas, my love!’ exclaims the driver. I sit up in a rush. I must have fallen asleep slash passed out.

‘Sorry! Gosh! That was quick!’ I say in a high-pitched voice, and pay the fare. Bloomie’s house is just across the road, so I walk over—slightly unsteadily, I notice, damn heels—and ring on the doorbell. It seems to take Bloomie ages to answer the door, so I lean against it and rest my eyes for a minute.

‘Oh holy fuck, darling, what happened to you?’ She must have opened the door. I didn’t hear her do that.

‘Had a drink. With fuckwit. Rick.’ Suddenly, full sentences seem terribly hard. The wine, vodka and gin are having a meet-and-mingle party in my body. And not getting on.

‘You fucking WHAT?’ she exclaims. ‘What the fuck were you thinking?’

‘Don’t tell me off,’ I say, leaning into the door. I can hear myself slurring. I think the gin and the wine are having a fistfight. ‘I learned my lesson. Was very bad. I threw a drink on him.’

‘You threw a drink on Rick?’

‘At his face.’ Somehow, I’m now up the stairs and in the living room, and can see Kate, Eugene and Eddie all sitting at the dining room table with cards in front of them. They’re all staring at me. I hate being this person. I’m never this person. Well, not since the weeks after I left Rick. Then I was this person a lot.

‘Hello everyone…Shit…I got drunk by mistake. I’m…
God, guys, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean this to happen…’ I lean against the couch for support. I can’t focus on anything.

‘You’re a mess,’ Bloomie says. ‘I can’t believe you’re doing this again.’

‘It was so awful. No more. He’s not a good person.’ I try to smack myself on my forehead but miss and nearly fall over.

‘I’m putting you to bed. And we’re talking about this in the morning. Enough is enough.’

‘I’m so sorry…’ I whisper. Somehow we are now in the bathroom and Kate is cleaning my face. I feel seasick. I want to get all this alcohol out of my body. Now.

‘Oh, Katie…I think I’m…I don’t feel well…’

In what feels like one swift manoeuvre, though really, who can say, my head is over the toilet. In between my—almost entirely liquid—vomit, I keep gasping out my apologies.

‘Amsosorry…’

‘That’s OK, honey…’ she says, rubbing my back. ‘Better out than in.’

‘Amsosorry…’

I hear Bloomie’s voice in the doorway. ‘Oh, fucking hell.’

And now we’re in Kate’s bedroom and she and Bloomie are putting me in PJs and into bed.

‘Sass, stay on THIS SIDE,’ Kate orders me. ‘Do not even TRY to cuddle me later.’

‘You won’t even know I’m here!’ I exclaim, one eye closed so I can see her face without it bending into double. ‘I’m so quiet…I’m quiet as a mouse. As a mouse!’ I close both eyes. Relief immediately overwhelms me.

‘She better have a good fucking explanation for seeing him again,’ I hear Bloomie say as they walk out of the room.

‘Oh, leave her alone,’ says Kate. ‘You know how much he messed with her head.’

‘After the week I have had, I just don’t need her turning up here like some idiot in fresher’s week.’

‘Bloomie, come on. For God’s sake. Give her a break.’

‘I saw Jake,’ I whisper as they’re closing the door. But they don’t respond. God, I’m so very, very tired. I open one eye again. The room is spinning. I think that tumble in the taxi may have given me a concussion as surely, the room should not be spinning this much just from half a bottle of vodka, two gins and two glasses of wine. I close my eyes again and surrender to drunken sleep. My last conscious thought as I close my eyes is that this is why the Dating Sabbatical exists. When I try to live my life without it, I crash and burn.

I wake up the next morning to the beepbeep of a text message. I open one eye and look over at the pink-curtained windows in Kate’s room, and with a jolt remember everything that happened last night. Oholyfuck.

I close my eyes again and go through the events in my head. Accidentally took Dutch courage one step too far. Accidentally met up with Rick for longer than the two minutes it should have taken for me to wave a drink in front of my face and leave. Accidentally lost my temper and threw a drink at him. Accidentally turned up on Bloomie’s doorstep, absolutely hammered, threw up and was put straight to bed.

As my science teacher Mr Campbell would have said, what do we learn from this? We learn that the Dating Sabbatical is back the fuck on, that’s what.

I try to talk myself into doing my happy stretchy thing, but it won’t come. I feel paralysed by an extremely parched throat and the sick feeling that I messed up. Again. I don’t want to deal with it. I take a deep sigh and roll over to face Kate.

She’s crying silently. Eyes closed, perfectly still, tears just running down the sides of her face and into the pillow. One hand is clasping her phone on her tummy.

‘Katie…oh, darling, are you OK? Did something happen?’

She looks over at me and nods, and clears her throat to talk.
‘Just a text…from Tray. He’s so sad…and it’s all my fault…I want him to be happy. I really, really do.’

Oh God, poor darling Kate. I sit up in bed, reach over to the box of tissues she has on her bedside table and hand her one.

‘I know, I know I did the right thing, I know it.’

I nod.

‘But sometimes I feel so…sad…’ Her voice goes all wavery and high on ‘sad’ and she starts crying silently again.

I take one of her hands and start stroking it, and after a few minutes say (aiming my words downwards, as my breath must smell like a dead homeless person): ‘Darling…you won’t feel sad forever. I know it.’

‘But it hurts so much…And I would have been…fine…with him. But I just didn’t want that life. I didn’t want him.’

She starts crying again, and I reach over her for another tissue and hand it to her.

‘Does breaking up with someone always feel this bad?’

‘I don’t know,’ I say honestly. ‘I’ve never done it.’

Kate looks at me for a second and, seeing I’m grinning, starts laughing through her tears. Spit and snot fly everywhere.

‘Dude!’ I say, grabbing more tissues and mopping her face. ‘Gross.’

‘You know what?’ she continues, in a more normal, non-teary voice. ‘I don’t even feel single. I can’t imagine going on a date with someone, even though all I’ve done for months is fancied every half-decent man I see.’

‘That sounds…healthy?’ I say. ‘It’s a sign that you’re moving on, when you find other men attractive.’

‘You should see me on the tube. I look up at every stop in case someone hot gets on.’

I start laughing. ‘And what do you do then, start licking the pole?’

We both giggle for a few seconds and then take a deep, deep sigh in tandem, which makes us giggle even more.

‘You broke up what, seven weeks ago now? It’s probably time for you to get back in the saddle again.’

‘Maybe,’ she says. ‘Are you OK?’

I nod. ‘I’m sorry I turned up here like that.’

‘That’s OK. I can’t believe you saw Rick, what happened?…No, wait. Let’s wait till Bloomie is here for the gory details.’

‘Can’t wait,’ I sigh. I vaguely remember Bloomie was pretty angry last night. I usually try to avoid any angry Bloomie situations, but I don’t know how I’ll get out of this one.

‘She’s just worried about you,’ says Kate, reading my mind. ‘Oooh. How about pancakes?’

We head out to their little kitchen. We’re trying to be quiet, as Bloomie and Eugene are still in bed, but after a few dropped saucepans, and stifled giggling fits, as well as the gurgling burps of the Nespresso machine, Bloomie pads into the room in her flannel PJs and Big Bird slippers.

‘Morning, angel,’ I say. ‘Before you say anything, I’m sorry I was such a social hand grenade last night. I’ve learned my lesson.’

She leans against the doorway, rubbing her eyes and frowning at me. ‘Seriously, darling. I cannot handle you getting smashed every time you go out, and turning up on my doorstep crying.’

‘I won’t!’ I say defensively. ‘I haven’t done that in months and months!’ Since the post-Rick period.

‘What were you even thinking, seeing that fuckwit? I mean…for fuck’s sake, that was wrong and you know it.’

‘I keep TRYING to do the right thing, Bloomie,’ I say, raising my voice slightly. ‘My entire fucking life is built around that, actually.’ It’s not her job to tell me off. It’s her job to be my friend.

‘How can seeing Rick again be the right thing? God, never mind…it’s so pathetic, that’s all…Sort yourself out.’ Wow. Harsh.

‘Pathetic?’ I say, raising my voice. ‘I don’t have to ask your permission before I do things, you know. And you’re not perfect.
Your boyfriend had to contact Kate and I to find out if you were even alive yesterday. And by the way, when I rang you, you were fucking rude.’

‘I have a real job. I can’t always chat,’ says Bloomie.

‘I have a real job too, Susan. What the hell is that supposed to mean?’ I’m angry now, and my usual anger-tears are nowhere to be seen. How odd.

‘Nothing,’ cries Bloomie. ‘I didn’t mean…’

‘Like fuck you didn’t. Christ, that’s a horrible thing to say.’

There’s a pause as we stare at each other furiously. Kate is stirring the pancake batter silently, peering into it like it’s the most interesting thing in the world.

‘I’m sorry,’ says Bloomie, dropping her voice and her eyes. ‘I’m sorry, I didn’t mean that. I get upset when you’re like that…I hate you being miserable.’

I sigh. ‘Everything has changed over the last few months, Bloomie. OK, I fucked up last night, but like…I’m trying. And you can’t get pissed off at me for living the way I want to. It’s my life, not yours.’

‘I know. But…can’t you remember after Rick last time, the utter disaster area you were afterwards?’

I pause. I don’t remember that period very well, actually. I try not to think about it.

‘Blooms, thank you for looking after me after…after Rick. I mean it, thank you. And last night…Look, I know it was a stupid move, and I knew it even as I was doing it, but I couldn’t stop myself. He rang on Thursday and said he had something to say in person, and I was intrigued and I wanted him to say sorry for the Pink Lady and that he made the biggest mistake of his life, or something…And I know what that sounds like, but I really couldn’t stop myself.’

‘I can understand that,’ says Kate supportively.

‘I am sorry I turned up here last night. I didn’t mean to get that drunk,’ I say. ‘I was feeling odd and introspective and I drank
half a bottle of vodka, and then gin, and then wine, and then Rick was just so ah-paw-leng…and then I threw a drink on him.’

‘WHAT!’ says Bloomie, shaken out of her disapproving stance. ‘You mumbled something about that last night but I thought it was wishful-drinking talk. Tell us everything.’

‘Alright,’ I sigh. For the next ten minutes, as we fry the pancakes, discarding the first one as a sacrifice to the pancake gods (it never turns out right), and pile them up on three plates with, according to individual tastes, lemon and sugar, Nutella, or English mustard and ham (guess who that is), and flop down together on the couch, I relate everything that happened last night.

As I tell the story, they interrupt at various points—‘You bought him a gin and tonic even though he was already late? AND HE was the one who asked YOU out for a drink…No wonder he thinks you’re a chump,’ (Bloomie, of course) and ‘I wish I had seen his face when you threw the wine at him!’ (a gleeful Kate) and finally ‘Are you sure it was Jake?’ (both at once).

‘Yes,’ I say. ‘Definitely Jake. It’s the last thing I can clearly remember, actually. God, that guy has some kind of homing beacon for me or something.’

‘Is that what you kids are calling it these days?’ says Bloomie.

‘Are you admitting that you like him?’ asks Kate excitedly.

I frown and shake my head. I don’t know what to say, so I just take a big bite of my lemony pancake instead.

‘Well done, anyway, Sassafras darling. I wish you’d decked him,’ says Bloomie. There’s still a slight froideur between us, but it’ll be OK soon. ‘Though I still don’t see why you accepted a date—OK, OK, a drink—with him in the first place.’

I shrug. ‘Well, that’s because you’re you and I’m me…you don’t have to understand. You just have to, you know, adore me anyway.’

‘Oh, darling, I do!’ says Bloomie, reaching out for a hug. Ahh.
Now there’s the Bloomie I know and love. That tough ol’ alpha is marshmallow inside. ‘I’m sorry I was a bitch on the phone yesterday. And I’m sorry I said that about your job,’ she mumbles into my hair. ‘Please forgive me. I’ve had a horrible, horrible week, but I know it’s no excuse.’

‘Do you want to talk about it?’ I ask.

‘Nah,’ she says, pulling back. ‘No point, it’s over now. You smell ever so slightly of vom, by the way.’

‘Actually, that’s my new shampoo. Hint Of Bile. Anyway, guys, the last thing I’ll say about it is that, clearly, I genuinely do have instinctively kamikaze dating instincts, and the only way to survive is to romantically quarantine myself, which is why the Dating Sabbatical is being extended-o-fuck-me!’ I interrupt myself. ‘I saw Posh Mark last night! I completely forgot!’ I quickly tell them all about Posh Mark and Annabel Pashmina Face kissing on the street.

‘How do you know she always liked him?’ asks Bloomie.

‘She used to practically frot his leg whenever she saw him,’ I say.

‘What does frotting mean?’ says Kate.

‘Dry humping, darling,’ I reply.

Kate snorts with laughter. Bloomie hands me over the last of her Nutella pancake. I know it’s a peace offering, so I grin at her as I take it.

‘Since I’m—thank you—telling all, you should know I kind of broke Dating Sabbatical Rule 8 with a client,’ I say. ‘The kissing one,’ I add, as I see them both looking confused.

‘WHAT?!’ they say in unison. I haven’t been the source of this much drama in…well, a few months, anyway.

I tell the Lukas story quickly, finishing with, ‘So you know, the Dating Sabbatical exists for a reason. I’m clearly utterly incapable of making the right decision, ever. This is why I’m detoxing from dating. I can feel the filthy dating toxins seeping from my body.’

‘That’s not dating, darling. That’s booze,’ says Bloomie helpfully.

‘Nice,’ comments Kate.

‘I’m not surprised you jumped the hot German,’ says Bloomie. ‘Don’t you miss sex?’

‘Yes. I do,’ I say, in a faux-snappy voice. ‘I miss snogging and sex and cuddling. In that order. But not enough to make me want to date again.’

‘A few more months of celibacy and the Dating Sabbatical would call itself off, I think,’ says Bloomie. I shoot her a death stare and she winks back.

‘Does that mean you won’t come and meet men with me tonight?’ says Kate. ‘I need you to teach me the ways of pulling and dating…’

‘No!’ I exclaim. It’s a gut reaction that surprises us all slightly, ‘I mean…maybe. But like, look at what happened last night. I need to stay away from situations involving, you know, guys. And men.’

‘Oh, guys
and
men,’ nods Bloomie. ‘Both kinds.’

Kate makes a pouty-kitten face. I feel bad. She has only been single for a few weeks. I really should be her wingwoman.

‘OK, maybe I will…’ I say. ‘But only as a tutor. I shall not engage in flirtations myself.’

‘Yay!’ cheers Kate.

‘Hey,’ says Bloomie. ‘You broke a Rule. Doesn’t that mean the Dating Sabbatical is null and void? And why didn’t you just hang on and break it with Jake?’

I choke on my coffee. ‘I…have nothing to say about Jake. It was just weird seeing him, that’s all. And Lukas kissed me. Not the other way around. The Dating Sabbatical holds,’ I say with an easiness I don’t feel.

‘If you say so,’ Bloomie says, and grins at me. ‘Six sleeps to Eddie’s weekend party…’ Dash it. My poker face sucks. And I
wish I’d never told her I still count things in sleeps. I vow not to mention Jake again, no matter how much he pops into my thoughts. (I wonder whether he saw me throw the drink on Rick? Oh God stop thinking about it. He is just another bastardo cockmonkey and I am on a Dating Sabbatical.)

As I am musing thusly, Kate’s phone beepbeeps.

‘Noooooooooooo,’ she says, and makes a grand show of squinting through one eye and opening the text with a look of great trepidation, as though the phone might explode.

‘Oh, it’s just Immie,’ she says with relief. ‘She’s going shopping on Portobello with Tom later! Goody gumdrops. I’m going to go meet them.’

‘Can I come with?’ I say, choosing to ignore the ‘goody gumdrops’. Immie is Imogen, Kate’s sister, and Tom is her baby.

‘Yarse,’ Kate says, swinging her legs off the side of the couch and landing on the ground with a crashthud. ‘But you have to shower first. Dating toxins are evaporating from your skin like steam o’er a wintry morning lake.’

‘Oh! That’s so pretty,’ I say and start to giggle. Kate in a silly mood is one of my favourite things. I’m glad she got over her little teary-burp this morning. It’s been years since she’s been this relaxed.

‘I would love to join you, my darlings,’ says Bloomie. ‘But I have to go to work.’ She checks her watch. Who wears a watch with pyjamas, I ask you? In fact, who wears a watch? ‘The Dork is still snoozing…I won’t wake him. I’ll just jump in the shower and go.’

She pads her Big Bird slippers back to her bedroom, wiggling her bottom with each step, and Kate and I make whistling, catcalling sounds after her.

‘Shake your tailfeather, toots!’ shouts Kate.

‘I hate to see you leave, baby…but I LOVE to watch you walk away!’ I shout.

Then we quickly wash up the pancake stuff, shower and dress.
Kate, being Kate, has a spare, brand-new toothbrush for me. In fact, she’s got four. And six spare rolls of cotton wool pads, three spare toothpaste tubes, and three bottles each of shampoo, conditioner and shower gel.

‘Is there going to be a war?’ I ask, coming out of the bathroom holding four of the cotton wool rolls. ‘Is Boots going into liquidation? Do you know something I don’t?’