Love @ First Site Page 17

  We leave it at that, and Tab returns to making work-related phone calls, while I alternate between daydreaming about Simon and tinkering with my ideas list for the next forward-planning meeting. Every time Tab ventures away from her desk, I make a furtive call to one of the gang to gauge their reaction to the unexploded hand grenade sitting in my in-box. Defuse or detonate? That is the question.

  "Ooooh, definitely detonate," opines Richard. "Mount his cannon, rattle his balls, and fire, baby, fire! Then leave him empty and impotent to rust in a corner." He loves a theme, does Richard.

  "Vot is thees detoooonate?" says Lars.

  "Set off . . . activate," I explain. "Basically, Lars, I'm asking whether you think I should ignore the e-mail or go and meet him."

  "Ah. In that case, you must leave vell enough alone."

  It takes me several attempts to reach Madeleine on her mobile, and when I do she's panting loudly.

  "Oh God, what have I interrupted?" I wince, fearing the worst.

  She laughs. "I'd like to tell you I'm halfway through the shag of my life, but sadly it's nothing more than a particularly arduous dance routine." After a few seconds, her breathing starts to sound more controlled. "So, what's happening?"

  "Remember my first Internet date . . . the one who legged it without even saying good-bye? Well, he's e-mailed me and wants to meet up to explain."

  "Isn't he the one you really fancied?"

  "Yep."

  "Then go for it," she says matter-of-factly. "Sod the explanation. Just have a laugh and sleep with him, or you'll die wondering."

  So there we have it. A straw poll of my friends has come up with two "shag hims" and two "leave well enough alones."

  Which leaves me with the deciding vote. What is a girl to do?

  Twenty-One

  One minute I'm queuing in isolated splendor in Starbucks, the next I'm hemmed in by buggies of every color, size, and designer name, each housing a cooing baby extending its hand towards the cake counter.

  "Blimey, where did they all come from?" I say to the assistant as she hands me a cafe latte.

  "It's the same every morning," she says wearily. "They drop their older kids at school, then all come here with the preschool ones to meet up for a gabfest."

  On the one hand, I want to run screaming from the endless chatter about little Tommy's sleep patterns, eating habits, and bowel movements. On the other, in many ways, it's the ideal, innocuous environment for my meeting with Simon.

  Yes, yes, I know I probably shouldn't have responded to his e-mail. If I had an ounce of pride, I should have simply ignored it and got on with my life. But I succumbed.

  If it makes you judge me any less harshly, I did leave him to stew for several days before replying though.

  I suppose curiosity got the better of me, and I wanted to know exactly why he'd done a bunk all those months ago and never been in touch since.

  "So just ask him that via e-mail," replied Tab tersely, when I tried to explain why I was going to meet up with him.

  She's absolutely right, of course. I could easily have done that and avoided the effort and potential humiliation of meeting with him. A notable advantage of Internet romance. But to be honest, there's another, more fundamental reason why I wanted to clap eyes on him again.

  "I want to see if I still fancy him as much," I confessed sheepishly.

  Tab made a loud scoffing noise. "That's the big difference between you and me," she said. "I could never fancy someone who had done that to me."

  And I could never fancy Will, I thought, but decided against saying so.

  So here I am, in the heart of Nappy Valley, South West London, waiting for the only man out of several dates to have rung my bell, so to speak. My feelings are a weird mix of anticipation--the memory of that delicious kiss still lingers in the back of my mind--and fury, that he played me for the fool and now thinks he can worm his way back into my good graces.

  "Hello, Jess."

  It's him, looking every bit as attractive as the last time I saw him, if not more so. My insides lurch slightly, though I'm not sure whether it's lust, nerves, or the slightly indigestible blueberry muffin I have just scoffed with indecent haste.

  He's wearing a blue pinstripe suit, with crisp white shirt and salmon pink tie, and his hair is slightly longer than I remember.

  "Can I get you another?" He points to my half-empty mug and I shake my head, fighting the urge to shift into normal pleasantness. I'm not prepared to give him an inch until I've heard his explanation.

  Returning a couple of minutes later with a mug of tea, he squeezes himself into the seat opposite me, hindered by a double buggy parked behind. I notice several of the mothers are glancing coquettishly in his direction, but he seems oblivious.

  "So, how have you been?" he says, as if we're long-term mutual acquaintances at some polite social gathering.

  "Um, I've been absolutely fine, thanks. How have you been?"

  He frowns slightly, as if taken aback by my slight frostiness. "Busy. I've been abroad quite a lot since I last saw you."

  "Ah, I see." Silence again.

  "Talking of which . . ." He looks uncomfortable and glances behind him at the buggy pressed against his chair. "The last time I saw you . . ."

  "You mean when you ran out through the kitchens and left me with the bill?" I've found my tongue again.

  "Yes, sorry about that." He looks sheepish.

  "I'm afraid that's not going to do it," I say briskly, taking a mouthful of coffee.

  "I can explain."

  "OK, then, let's hear it." I fold my arms defensively and lean back against my chair.

  "Well, it's like this . . ." He falters.

  "You're married," I say, unable to resist butting in.

  He looks surprised. "You know?"

  So there it is. An immediate admission to what I had suspected all along. I suppose I had been harboring some small hope that there might be another feasible explanation, but now I know for certain that's not the case I'm not entirely sure what to do. So he was a cad after all, pure and simple.

  "Doesn't take a genius to work it out, does it?" I say bitterly.

  "No, I suppose not," he mumbles. "But I'm not married, married, if you know what I mean."

  I roll my eyes. "Don't tell me. It was one of those Mick Jagger-style ceremonies with sacrificial chickens, a dodgy vicar, and lost documentation."

  He smiles slightly. "No, I mean I'm officially separated, as I was when I had lunch with you."

  "Really." I deliberately keep my voice flat. "So why the hasty exit then?"

  "Someone came into the restaurant who's a close friend of my wife, and if she saw us, I knew she'd tell her."

  I look him straight in the eye. "Why would it matter if, as you say, you were separated?"

  He shrugs apologetically. "Because even though we're divorcing, I didn't want to rub her nose in the fact that I was dating again so soon. I don't hate her, I just don't want to be married to her anymore."

  We stop talking for a few moments, an oasis of uneasy silence in the midst of chattering mothers and shrieking children. My head is spinning. True, what he did was appallingly rude, but at the same time . . .

  "The decree nisi came through this week," he says eventually, as if it was an item of garden furniture he'd ordered from the Internet. "So in another six weeks, we'll be officially divorced."

  "Congratulations." I glance around the cafe, feigning disinterest.

  "I can show you the documentation if you like?" He gestures towards his briefcase on an adjacent chair.

  "No thanks." I sniff and look at my watch. It's 9:15 a.m.

  Perhaps assuming I'm about to up and leave, he cuts to the chase. "Look, I understand that you must be really pissed off with me . . ." He pauses, as if waiting for me to object, but I say nothing. "But I was wondering if you would consider letting me take you out for lunch . . . properly this time."

  I raise my eyebrows. "You're joking, right?" But inside, I'm secretl
y thrilled that the ball has landed back in my court.

  "No, I'm serious. I really liked your company, and it was just unfortunate that someone I knew came in and ruined it all. It was just bad timing then, that's all. It wouldn't matter now."

  "Wouldn't matter to you, you mean," I say. "I, however, take exception to dating people who have lied to me." Though after all, who's to say that if I was in his situation, I wouldn't have done the same thing?

  He studies my face a few moments, as if assessing whether I'm half-joking or not, then realizes I'm not. "Oh come on," he scoffs, "everyone tells lies in the early stages of dating. And don't tell me you haven't done it, because I won't believe you."

  "Yes," I admit, "but there are the little white lies that everyone tells, like pretending to be a natural blonde or saying you earn more than you do, and then there are whopping great porkers, like pretending to be single when in fact you're married."

  He's about to answer, but at this precise, awkward point, a little boy smeared in chocolate comes and stands at our table, poking his discolored tongue out at us. He's really rather unattractive, with a dribble of yellow mucus falling from one nostril and a chocolate-covered hand lurking dangerously close to my cream Puffa jacket, but we both feel compelled to smile indulgently in his direction. Particularly as his mother is looking straight at us.

  "Come along, Tybalt, leave those nice people alone," she says brightly.

  As he wanders off, we both raise our eyebrows and snigger discreetly.

  "Fucking hell, with a name like that, he's either going to be prime minister or a serial killer. There's no middle ground on that one," mutters Simon with a grin.

  I smile back and, not for the first time in our short meeting, realize that I do still find him attractive. The problem is, can I trust him?

  Trust him? Who cares? It's Madeleine, dressed in red Lycra and horns and whispering into my right ear. Just shag him and worry about all the other crap later. You only live once, so go for it.

  Trust him? Of course not! It's Tab, in angelic white, whispering on my left shoulder. If he deceived you once, believe me, he'll do it again. You only live once, so protect yourself from hurt.

  "Anyway . . ." Simon's voice breaks into my meanderings. "Where were we?"

  I rally my thoughts and focus on the question, though admittedly I feel notably less hostile towards him than prior to Tybalt coming out of the blue.

  "You were married," I reply matter-of-factly, "and soon you won't be."

  "Ah yes." He leans forward almost imperceptibly, but I notice every millimeter. "So on that basis, how do you feel about starting again with another date, and pretending the first one didn't happen?"

  I dip a teaspoon in my cappuccino, scoop up a large blob of foam, then shamelessly and ponderously lick it off just inches from his face. "I'll have to think about it."

  He waits a few seconds, his eyes never leaving my mouth. The memory of our drunken lunchtime kiss pops into my head again, and I feel my neck flushing with desire.

  But this time, he eventually leans away from me and glances at his watch. "Time's up," he grins. "So how about it?"

  I smile slowly. "Ha, ha, ha. I mean I need proper time to think about it. Like a few days."

  He looks surprised. "What's to think about? We either find each other attractive, or we don't. And I find you very, very attractive indeed." His eyes are undressing me and my insides switch from pre-rinse to spin cycle.

  Madeleine. Tab. Madeleine. Tab. Madeleine. Madeleine. Madeleine. Bugger, I have all the willpower of Rosie O'Donnell in a cake shop.

  "OK then. But just one date and we'll see how it goes." I rummage in my handbag for my electronic organizer. I have only just learned how to switch it on, let alone store my painfully vacant social calendar. But he doesn't know that.

  Tap tap tap. "I could do lunch next Tuesday," I say officiously, not wishing to look too available.

  "Can't do lunches at all," he replies with lightning speed. "Remember Gordon Gekko and 'Lunch is for wimps?' Well, the advertising industry embraced it in the eighties and still haven't let go. It'll have to be dinner, I'm afraid."

  Dinner. Otherwise known as the danger zone, an alcohol-fueled, open-ended arrangement that always ends in leers or tears. Or both.

  "What about Saturday or Sunday lunch?" I say optimistically, not wishing to look too much of a pushover.

  He shakes his head. "Sorry, no can do. Tied up this weekend, and next I'm off to New York for a seminar." He runs his forefinger along the top of my hand, prompting my nerve endings to explode. "And I'd like to see you as soon as is humanly possible."

  "Understandable. I am irresistible." I laugh.

  "Oh, and by the way, this time everything is on me."

  I raise an eyebrow. "I trust you implicitly, of course, but if you go to the loo, can you leave the cash up front?"

  He gives me a fantastic, heart-stopping grin. Oh, fuck it. See that wind outside? My caution has just hitched a ride on it. "OK, how about this Friday night then?"

  "Great." He claps his hands, then rubs them together. "Let's do it!"

  As I find him so bloody attractive, I have a sneaking suspicion we probably will.

  Twenty Two

  Several hours after my meeting with Simon, I have put in a halfhearted day's work at the studio and feigned a stomach complaint to rush home early and sit by the phone. Olivia's MRI scan was due to take place at 3 p.m. today, and she said she'd call me as soon as she has the result.

  It's now 5 p.m. and I have heard absolutely nothing.

  For the umpteenth time in the last hour, I pick up the phone and start to dial her mobile number, then hastily put it down again. I mustn't pester, I tell myself. I must leave her to call me when she's good and ready. But just how long do these things take? Surely she must know by now?

  The phone rings and I grab it.

  "Blimey, that was quick. You must be sitting on it." It's Tab.

  My heart is racing but manages to sink at the same time. "I had dozed off and the shock of being woken up must have made me subconsciously grab it," I lie.

  "Oh sorry, honey," she says, concerned. "I just wanted to check whether you were feeling any better."

  "Not really," I lie again, desperate to get her off the phone in case Olivia calls. "In fact, I think I may have to rush off to the bathroom again right now. Sorry, I'll call you later."

  I replace the receiver and within two seconds it rings again, presumably Tab thinking we were cut off.

  "Hello?" I bark irritably.

  "Hi, it's Olivia." She sounds wrong footed. "Are you OK?"

  "God, yes, sorry. I thought you were someone else," I explain. "How did it go?"

  She lets out a long sigh. "Well, no point in sugaring the pill. It has spread, but the good news is that it seems to be contained within the breast."

  "Which means what?"

  "That one breast will have to come off, but my bones are clear and so are my lymph nodes, it seems, so I won't have to have the more invasive underarm surgery."

  "Oh." A breast off. Quite how that's good news baffles me, but she sounds fairly upbeat so I have to take her word for it. "So what happens now?"

  "I'll have the mastectomy during October half term, as I said I would, then start chemotherapy immediately afterwards."

  I take a deep breath. "And if all that works out, does that mean you're then clear forever?"

  She pauses for a moment. "Hopefully. But you can never be too complacent about it because there's a chance it could come back. I'm not sure I'll ever relax about it."

  That makes two of us, I think, but wisely decide against saying so.

  "So how do you feel about losing a breast?" I say quietly, having read a recent article by a mastectomy patient who said she felt robbed of her womanhood.

  "If that's what it takes to save my life, then so be it," she says matter-of-factly. "I'd be happy to have both off on that basis, and don't forget they do reconstructive surgery at the same time, so i
t might be better to have both off so I can get a cracking pair instead.

  "As it is, they will try their best to replicate the remaining one, which isn't exactly pert." She laughs.

  I know she's doing her best to lighten the mood, but the stomachache I made up earlier now seems to have materialized and I feel nauseous.

  "And how's Michael?" I ask, almost in a whisper. "Is he still in coping mode?"

  "Actually, now that we know exactly what we're up against, he seems to be much more normal. We had a really good chat about it all in the car on the way home, and when we got back he gave me a wonderful cuddle and told me everything was going to be fine. It felt great to have that bodily contact, because he's been treating me a bit like a china doll for the past couple of weeks."

  I sit up and straighten my back, aching from being slouched for so long. "That sounds promising, particularly as he's a surgeon himself. He clearly thinks it's beatable now, and it was the uncertainty that was making him act peculiarly."

  "I reckon you might be right." She sighs. "Regardless, I feel much more positive about everything after today."

  "Glad to hear it." I smile. And I am. I just wish I could force myself to feel the same way.

  Walking towards the Good Morning Britain reception area the next morning, I avert my eyes to avoid the ghastly giant publicity shots of the two main presenters, Eddie and Tara, with their overrouged cheeks and saccharine smiles.

  On air, you'd think they were the best of friends, sharing a cozy sofa and even cozier chats. But off air, they patently loathe each other and spend most of their time locked away in their individual dressing rooms, spitting bile about each other.

  Anne is sitting on one of the two stained leather sofas that dominate the reception area. Exactly how they got stained is anyone's guess, but legend has it that one is battle scarred from a late- night encounter between Eddie and a secretary, the other covered in a glass of red wine tipped over his head by the same secretary when their affair hit the buffers a few weeks later.

  "Hi, how lovely to see you!" I stoop and kiss Anne on both cheeks. A kindly faced man sitting next to her smiles at me uncertainly.