The Importance of Being a Bachelor (19 page)

‘Adam! How are you? Were you here all the time? I didn’t even see you standing there!’

‘I was . . . er . . . just getting a paper.’ He waved the newspaper in the air. ‘So how have you been? Are you well?’

‘I’m good actually,’ she replied. ‘Work has been a bit busy but that’s fine. How about yourself? Everything OK with the bar?’

Adam nodded. ‘It virtually runs itself. I just turn up there sometimes so that it looks like I actually work for a living.’

There was a long pause and Adam wondered whether this was going to be the end of the conversation. Then, ‘I got your card,’ she said quietly. ‘It was really nice of you to send it. I’m actually quite fond of Rothko.’

‘It was nothing,’ said Adam. He thought about saying something more in reference to the card’s message but then thought better of it and made a joke instead. ‘Truth is you came pretty close to getting a card with a cartoon of Garfield.’

Steph laughed. ‘Now that would have been really strange because the only thing I like more than Rothko is a nice Garfield cartoon!’

Once again the conversation seemed to be drawing to a close. Adam looked at the bread in Steph’s hands. An idea popped into his head and he decided to let it run free. ‘Can I pay for that?’

Steph looked confused. ‘What? The bread? Why would you do that?’

‘Think of it as a small act of penance on my part. Think of this loaf of . . .’ he paused to read the label, ‘Warburton’s Wholemeal Farmhouse as our bread of peace. My way of apologising for several years of teasing at school and for any other misdemeanours that might have taken place since.’

‘Really,’ smiled Steph, ‘there’s no need for symbolic bread-based gestures. You can consider yourself absolved.’

‘Really?’

Adam decided it was time to seize the moment. ‘Well in that case I was sort of wondering if you’d like to go out some time.’

The look on Steph’s face (acute embarrassment set off with a heavy frown) said it all but just to drive the point home she added, ‘I appreciate the thought, I really do, Adam, but if I’m being truthful I don’t think that would be a great idea.’

‘I mean as friends,’ said Adam quickly as he recalled the fact that he remained officially ‘not her type’. ‘You know, mates who hang out together and that sort of thing.’

‘Still not a great idea.’ Steph shook her head in a regretful manner that made Adam feel thoroughly dejected. He wanted to be somewhere else as quickly as possible and yet couldn’t leave until a decent amount of time had passed in case she jumped to the conclusion that he had taken offence at being rebuffed. He counted to ten as quickly as he could and said: ‘So, I suppose I’ll see you around then?’

‘And more likely than not it’ll be in here.’ With a half nod and an awkward smile in Adam’s direction she walked past him to the till to make her purchase.

‘Just gin gin will do for me.’

It was ten to eight on the Thursday of the following week and Adam was standing in the Slug and Lettuce in Didsbury looking around for a woman in a red coat with auburn hair.

The name of the auburn-haired red-coated object of his investigations was Lorraine Maconie, a thirty-four-year-old primary school teacher and part-time netball coach who was originally from Southend-on-Sea but now apparently lived in Didsbury. Adam (who since his rejection by Steph had let his friends know that he was now very much back on his pursuit of the Right Kind of Girls) had been put in touch with Lorraine via his friends Martin and Kay earlier in the week and after much toing and froing via their intermediaries they had agreed upon a date.

At five minutes past eight, just as Adam was beginning to wonder whether Martin and Kay had been playing some kind of elaborate joke on him, the door to the bar opened and he looked up to see a woman in a red jacket enter the room, scan the bar with one quick look and rest her gaze on him. Adam let out an audible sigh. Even from a distance he could see that this woman with her bobbed auburn hair and bootcut jeans was in no way, shape or form going to make it as a replacement Steph but he would have to give her a go.

‘You must be Adam,’ she said quickly. ‘You look just like the photo Kay emailed. Sorry I’m late. I know Kay said eight o’clock and I always hate it when other people are late but I was just leaving my flat when the phone rang and I knew it would be my mum phoning to wish me good luck for my date with you tonight and if I didn’t take it she would spend the whole night calling to make sure things were going OK.’

‘It’s fine,’ said Adam, slightly taken a back by this sudden gush of nervous chat. ‘It’s really fine. Can I get you a drink?’

‘A gin and tonic would be great.’

‘Boodles? Bombay? Beefeater? Plymouth? Tanqueray?’

Lorraine looked confused.

‘They’re gins,’ explained Adam.

Lorraine looked embarrassed as though Adam had caught her out, which hadn’t been his intention at all. ‘Oh, I forgot, you own a bar don’t you? Just gin gin will do for me. Is that OK?’

‘Of course.’ Adam smiled. ‘One just gin gin and tonic coming up.’

Returning to the table with their drinks Adam proceeded to ask lots of leading questions in a bid to show Lorraine that he was both interested in her and her responses and in between he tried his best to be as charming and as entertaining as he could manage. But no matter how hard he tried Adam found it impossible to get into the right frame of mind. For all his efforts, once again there was just no spark. No magic. Not a single indicator to alter his initial response the moment he clapped eyes on her that she was ‘a nice girl but
so
not for me’.

As he headed up to the bar to get Lorraine another gin gin and tonic and wondered how he was going to make it to the end of the night, given that it was only nine o’clock and they had already scraped the bottom of the barrel to such an extent that the current topic of conversation was rumours of the city council being in discussions about reducing the weekly refuse collection to once a fortnight, his phone rang. Adam didn’t recognise the number. Normally he didn’t answer his phone to numbers he didn’t recognise because of the dual hazards of irate ex-girlfriends and cold callers, but such was the failure of this evening that he would gladly have welcomed the distractions of either.

‘Adam Bachelor speaking.’

‘Hi, Adam, it’s me, Steph.’ Adam almost dropped the phone but quickly regained his composure. ‘How are you?’

‘I’m good, thanks.’ A bunch of lads in the bar cheered in the background. ‘Where are you? It’s very noisy.’

‘Nowhere exciting,’ he said, wishing that she’d called him a few hours earlier when he had been in a location that made it sound less like he was having the time of his life. ‘Just out for a drink with a mate.’

‘Well I’ve been thinking about our meeting the other day and I feel really bad and I was wondering if you mean what you said about us being friends?’

‘Absolutely,’ he assured her even though this hadn’t been strictly true at the time. ‘I definitely want us to be friends.’

‘And you’re not just saying that as a ploy in the hope that something will happen between us later?’

Adam was about to respond but stopped himself at the last minute. Maybe this was a trick question to see if he really had changed. The old Adam would have strenuously denied any ulterior motive just to get what he wanted. The new Adam therefore had to tell the truth even if it hurt.

‘Look,’ he began, ‘I can’t deny that I still like you but if you want us to just be mates then I’m sure I can learn to live with that.’

‘And it’s not like there aren’t literally thousands of better-looking girls to distract you in the meantime.’

‘I thought you said you’d forgiven me?’

‘I’m just teasing you, Adam! And as weird as it is to be the current object of your affections – let’s not forget that at school you used to called me Four Eyes Holmes – I’m convinced the weirdness will wear off soon, leaving behind what I hope will be a half-decent friendship.’

‘So you want to be friends?’

‘Yes, I do. And as our first act of friendship I think we should do something special.’

‘Great! Well, a mate of mine is throwing a party to celebrate the opening of his new bar in Tibb Street. We could go there if you like?’

‘No,’ said Steph firmly. ‘No bars, no clubs and no fancy restaurants.’

‘So what do you want to do then?’

‘I was wondering if you were free on Saturday afternoon?’

‘To do what?’

‘Can’t tell you. It’s a secret.’

‘What kind of secret?’

‘If I told you that it wouldn’t be a secret, would it?’

‘Fine,’ said Adam, who was so thrilled at the prospect of seeing her again that she could have revealed they were going seal-clubbing and he wouldn’t have batted an eyelid. ‘You name the time and the place and I’ll be there.’

‘Great,’ said Steph. ‘Why don’t I pick you outside Boots on the High Street at half two on Saturday?’

‘Sounds good to me.’

‘Good . . . oh, and Adam? You should dress as though you were going to be undertaking some kind of exercise.’

‘Exercise?’

‘Yes,’ she laughed. ‘Exercise.’

When he finally got back to the table with their drinks, Lorraine had gone.

‘Aliens? Farm animals? Girls called Sue?’

‘You’re . . . thinking . . . that . . . you’ve . . . got . . . a . . . new . . . found . . . respect . . . for . . . me . . . aren’t . . . you?’

It was just after three on the following Saturday afternoon and Adam was lying on the floor of the badminton court at Chorlton Leisure Centre struggling to breathe and feeling seconds away from passing out with exhaustion. An hour and a half earlier Steph had picked Adam up from outside Boots and kept him in the dark about what they were going to be doing until they had pulled up at the Leisure Centre. Adam had pictured them possibly hill-walking or even mountaineering; he had been more than a little disappointed when Steph’s secret assignation had only involved a couple of games of badminton. Adam hadn’t played badminton since school and then only under duress because even at the age of fourteen he had been sure that badminton was strictly for the ladies.

‘What do you mean, new-found respect?’ Steph picked up the shuttlecock lying next to Adam’s head. ‘I won every single game and now look at you! I wouldn’t have thought you’d break sweat playing a game that you considered to be “strictly for the ladies”!’

‘But . . . that . . . was . . . before . . . anyway . . . there . . . were . . . a . . . couple . . . of . . . moments . . . back . . . there . . . when . . . it . . . could . . . have . . . so . . . easily . . . gone . . . my . . . way.’

‘In your dreams, Bachelor Boy! That was just me going easy on you so you didn’t get dispirited. Even though I say so myself I am ace at badminton.’ She held out her right hand to help him to his feet and he gratefully reached out and grabbed it. It felt soft and slender in his grip and even once he was on his feet he didn’t want to let go.

‘Right then,’ said Steph, subtly extricating her hand. ‘I’m heading off for a shower. I’ll see you at the front when I’m done and then I’ll give you a lift back to your place if you like. Given the way you look right now you don’t stand much chance of making it home on foot.’

It was just after four when they pulled up in front of Adam’s house.

‘So this is you,’ she said pulling on the handbrake. She turned to look at Adam. ‘It was really nice of you to agree to playing with me today. Even though you were beyond hopeless I had a lot of fun.’

‘So does that mean that I’ll be seeing you again?’

‘I dare say if you’re at a loose end and fancy another thrashing at badminton you will.’

‘And what about non-badminton-related events?’

‘How do you mean exactly?’

‘Let me take you out tonight. And before you say no, hand on heart I promise on pain of death that I won’t try it on or anything. What I’m suggesting will be something along the lines of two old school mates who occasionally play the noble game of badminton having a meal together during which nothing other than eating and good conversation will occur. Come on Steph, what do you say?’

‘Well, because you sent me that Rothko card, were a good sport about losing today and asked so nicely I will agree to meet you this once for dinner tonight. But that’s all, OK?’

‘Great,’ said Adam. ‘I’ll have a ring round and see where has got a table free and let you know where to meet.’

It was just after eight and Adam was sipping a glass of bottled water and about to help himself to a bread roll when he looked up to see Steph standing right in front of him. She was wearing a black polka-dot top with a black cardigan and a black knee-length skirt, black tights and flat black pumps. She looked pretty but Adam couldn’t help but smile at the thought that, had Steph been given a brief to select an outfit that none of his previous conquests would have been seen dead in, this was pretty much it.

Standing up to greet her Adam kissed her on both cheeks and Steph, seemingly unused to Continental-style cheek-kissing by men like Adam in the middle of south Manchester, had let confusion show briefly on her face.

Initially they talked about badminton again (Adam had had to lie down for most of the afternoon because of a shooting pain in his thigh) but after a while the conversation moved on to work. Steph had spent the previous week helping the shelter she worked at put together a bid for a funding application to local government that, if successful, would enable them to double the number of full-time staff they had on site and increase the number of women they helped by a third. Adam, who had spent most of his week doing very little apart from trying to sort out a new batch of dates with the Right Kind of Girls, felt obliged to embellish his account with tales of high-level meetings, various bits of ‘paperwork-chasing’ and a staff day out. He had impressed himself with his action-filled working week.