Woman Walks into a Bar (4 page)

Eight

“
D
on't screw
your eyes up!” Beth yelled at me.

“Sorry!” I said, but it is hard not to screw your eyes up when your twelve-year-old is coming at you with a mascara wand. I didn't usually let Beth do my make-up, but she'd shown me this article in one of her magazines about how to make your eyes look bigger.

“Your eyes
are
a bit small,” she'd said, cocking her head to one side as she looked at me. “I'll do your eyes for you.”

Several layers of color later I caught my mum's eye as Beth studied my old and tatty make-up collection. Mum winked at me.

“You haven't got any pink,” Beth said. “Pink is totally the best color for bringing out blue eyes, it says here.” She waved the magazine article at me and I looked at the face of the model with her perfectly smooth, blemish-free skin.

“Or making you look like you've got an eye infection,” Mum said, chuckling into her cup of tea.

“It's fashion, Nan,” Beth said, shooting Mum a look over her shoulder. “You must have had fashion too when you were alive!”

“I'm not dead yet,” my mum said, but she wasn't cross.

“Am I going to look like her?” I said nodding at the model. Beth laughed.

“Don't be mad,” she said. “She's about sixteen and anyway it's all done on computers now. She's probably got bags under her eyes and loads of spots. Everyone knows that magazine models aren't real.” She turned back to me and surveyed my face. “You need pink. I think I've got some pink in my room,” she said brightly. “I'll get it.”

I turned to my mum.

“What's it like?” I asked her, pointing at my face.

“It's like you've had one of those extreme makeovers from off the telly and it's gone really wrong,” Mum said, her voice wobbling with a hidden laugh. I picked up my make-up mirror.

She was right.

“I'll redo it later,” I said. “When I get to the pub.”

“What, go out of the house like that?” Mum exclaimed. “I don't know why you let her do it in the first place,” she said, handing me a cup of tea. “Sometimes I think she's too bossy for her own good, that girl. You shouldn't let her bully you.”

A flash of anger shot across my face.

“She is
not
a bully,” I said sharply.

“No, no. I didn't mean that,” Mum said quickly. “You know what I mean.”

“I know that she likes to feel involved. She likes to feel a part of it,” I said. “I would hate her to think I was going out there to find a bloke without her having any say in it.”

Mum sat down at the kitchen table and looked at me. “You have to do some things just for you,” she said. “That's what I thought all this computer dating stuff is about.” I stared at the reflection of the kitchen light shimmering in the surface of my cup of tea.

“You think all this is stupid, don't you?” I asked Mum. “All this dating stuff.” I looked up at Mum's face, but her expression did not change.

“I don't think that, love,” she said carefully. “I want you to get someone in your life. It's just . . . you haven't always made the right choices, Sam. I just want you to be careful. And so does your father,” she added, because she thought I paid more attention to Dad than her.

I sighed. “I have been careful, Mum. That's why I've been on my own since Beth was three!” I forced my voice to lower to normal again. “I need more.”

“I know you do,” Mum said. “But Internet dating? Can't you just wait to meet someone the normal way?”

“The Internet was Beth's idea,” I reminded her. “I would never have bothered on my own, and I've been waiting nine years to meet someone the ‘normal' way. There is no normal way.”

Mum tucked one chin into another and looked at me over the rim of her mug. “God knows you deserve a bit of happiness,” she said, which was the nearest I'd ever get to her approval.

“I've been OK, mostly,” I said, smiling at her.

“Well,” Mum said. “I'm just saying, what if this bloke you're meeting tonight is a decent one and you turn up looking like Coco the Clown because you don't want to upset your twelve-year-old daughter?”

An image of Brendan flashed before my eyes and I felt the knots in my belly tighten. “You're right,” I said. “Pass me a baby wipe.”

By the time Beth had come back from her bedroom I had wiped my face clean and put on my usual make-up but with lipstick this time instead of just clear gloss.

“Mu-um!” she said. “What are you doing?”

“Well, it was lovely,” I said. “But your nan and I thought it was too special for tonight. I mean, it's only a drink down the pub. I thought I'd just put on a bit of lippy, you know, and some mascara. Like I usually do.” Beth sat down heavily at the table and looked at me.

“You mean you hated it,” she said after a moment.

“I didn't hate it, no . . .” I said, sounding uncertain.

“It's all right,” Beth said. “It wasn't going how I planned. I need to practice. I'll have a go on Keisha tonight, and then if you have a second date, like a posh dinner or something, I'll do it then and you can wear a dress.”

“Thanks, love,” I said, feeling let off the hook.

“That's OK,” Beth said. “But you're not wearing jeans tonight, OK? You have to wear a skirt. That black one you got in the sales. With the split in it. And your boots, OK?”

“Good idea,” I said, nodding.

“Are you going to tell her what to drink, too?” Mum said with an edge of sarcasm.

“Well, not too much for starters,” Beth said seriously. “You've got work in the morning.”

Mum and I smiled at each other. Maybe Beth
was
a bit bossy but she had this kind of solid certainty about everything in life that made her reassuring to be around. Nothing ever scared her.

“I wonder what he'll be like,” Mum said. She opened her packet of Benson & Hedges and took out a ciggie. She wouldn't light it up in here, because of Beth and my asthma, but she liked to hold one when she was having a cup of tea. Later on, when I'd gone and Beth was in her room with Keisha, she'd go and stand on the balcony and smoke it. She'd have another one after
EastEnders
and another just after I got in, while I told her how the evening went. All on the balcony, no matter what the weather.

“Well, at least we know he won't be married,” Mum said, pressing her lips into a thin line of disapproval.

“Or old,” Beth said. “Joy wouldn't set you up with an old bloke. Well, not older than you, I mean.”

“Who does Joy know who's a nice catch?” Mum asked, leaning back in her chair and holding her fag between her thumb and finger as if she were about to take a deep drag.

We all thought for a long moment. I don't know who they were thinking about, but I was thinking about Brendan.

The more I thought about it, the more I thought it
had
to be him. I'm not the sort of person who expects good luck and happiness. In fact, I spend most of every day thinking of all the things that can go wrong, as if thinking of them will somehow stop them from happen­ing. When I was younger I never saw the bad stuff coming and I was never ready for it. So now I try and think of the worst thing. If I'm prepared for it, it won't happen. And I try not to let myself feel too happy, because if I do I'm sure that I'll jinx myself.

But no matter how hard I tried, I couldn't stop thinking that it would be Brendan waiting for me in the bar tonight. I don't know why. I just had this funny feeling in my gut that made me certain that it would be him. I tried to pretend it wasn't there. But it was bubbling away all the time. And I was starting to believe it.

“I hope he's tall,” Beth said. “There's nothing worse than kissing a man shorter than you are.” I decided not to rise to the bait.

“And clean,” Mum said. “I hope he's clean with a steady job.”

“And funny,” Beth said. “A good sense of humor is really sexy in a man.”

“Beth!” Mum and I said together. Beth shrugged.

“Well, it is,” she said, holding up the magazine. “It says so in here!”

“Well, at least if Joy's arranged it he'll be better than the last bloke you had a date with down the White Horse,” my mum said, deciding to change the subject.

I frowned as it took a second for me to remember who she was talking about. And then it came back.

“Yeah,” Beth said. “At least this one
should
turn up.”

The One I Didn't Meet at All in the End Because He Never Turned Up

I walked into the bar.

I never usually go down the White Horse during the week, but I was glad to see it was almost completely dead. Just a few of the usual regulars stood around the bar, including Janet, the butchest woman I have ever seen, with her husband, Frank. Joy said if ever there was somebody with issues it was Janet, but not very loudly because she was as hard as nails and once broke this bloke's arm in two places for calling her a lesbian. And I saw Old Joe sitting in the corner by the slot machine making his half a pint of Guinness last and chatting to whichever one of his invisible demons he'd brought out with him tonight.

I looked at a few lads standing around one of the pub's tellies watching a game of footy with their arms crossed. It couldn't have been a local team playing because if it was, the place would have been packed with fans baying for blood.

I couldn't see my date or anyone who I thought might be him. I didn't have a photo this time so I had to go on his very modest description of himself. Average height. Average build. Average looks. The space where it should have been on the website said “photo pending.” So I just had the description and a name: John Smith.

And he'd said I would know him because he'd be the one drinking half a lager.

“Not a very exciting name,” I'd said to Beth when she'd read out his message to me.

“Don't be an idiot,” she'd said. “What are you, twelve?” Then she'd realized what she'd said and we'd laughed.

John Smith didn't have an exciting name but I liked the sound of his profile. He didn't sound flashy or like he was trying to impress. He sounded like a normal bloke and his message was sort of funny instead of trying too hard to be interesting. Beth decided I should give him a go. I couldn't believe it when he suggested we meet in the White Horse.

“He must be local,” Beth said.

“Yeah,” I said, feeling suddenly worried. “But who?”

“He can't know you,” Beth had said. “Because if he did he would never ask you out.”

I blinked at her.

“On the
Internet
, I mean,” she replied quickly. “Because if he knew you he'd ask you out face-to-face!”

I walked up to the bar, but there was no one around. I fished in my pocket for the tenner I'd brought out. Wrapped up inside it was a joke from Beth.

Why are ghosts invisible?

They wear see-through clothes!

Right now
I
felt like I was invisible. Even Old Joe's ghostly drinking pals were getting more attention than me.

Then Brendan came out from the back.

“Hi, Sam,” he said, smiling. I felt my stomach bubble and wished I hadn't rushed my tea. “Wow, you look great!”

“Thanks,” I said, examining the money in my hand so that my hair fell over my face. “Um, a glass of wine please?” I asked him from underneath my fringe. He raised an eyebrow.

“Not your usual, then?” he asked.

I shook my head. I don't know why, but a Bacardi Breezer didn't seem like the right thing to be drinking on a first date.

“Don't usually see you here on a Tuesday,” Brendan said. “It's nice to have a pretty face to brighten the place up.” I didn't say anything for a moment but looked at the polished wood of the bar top through the yellow wine. It wobbled and wavered. That was how I felt just then.

“No, well . . .” I paused. For some reason I didn't want to tell Brendan that I was waiting for a date. But I had to because when John Smith turned up he'd know anyway. “I've got a date,” I said, taking a reluctant sip of the wine. I really didn't like drinking wine much.

I expected Brendan to laugh or be surprised when I told him about my date, but his face didn't move.

“Yeah?” he said after a second.

“Yeah,” I said. There was a long time when he seemed like he was going to say something else, but then Janet waved her pint glass at him from the other end of the bar. He smiled at me and winked.

“Don't move,” he told me, before going off to serve her. I realized I was hoping that John Smith would not be coming into the bar before Brendan had finished serving Janet.

I looked at the clock behind the bar. It was gone eight. John Smith was twelve minutes late. That was all right, twelve minutes. That didn't mean anything except traffic, or not being able to find your front door keys. Brendan came back to where I was standing and punched some numbers into the till, before dropping in the coins Janet had given him.

“Thanks for the drink, Jan,” he called out to her. “I'll take half a lager with you.” I watched him as he poured himself a drink. I noticed he had nice arms.

“You know,” he said in a low voice, as he poured his own drink, “it takes a special kind of man to love a woman like Janet. I'm not saying she's not a wonderful lady—but, still, that Frank must have balls the size of boulders.” He made me laugh just as I took a mouthful of wine, so I spurted a bit out. I wiped my mouth with the back of my hand and hoped Brendan hadn't noticed me dribble.

“Not here then yet? Your date?” Brendan asked me, looking around the bar.

“No,” I said with a shrug. “He's running a bit late, I expect. But I reckon he'll get here. He didn't sound like the arsehole type.”