Love @ First Site (10 page)

Ten

I
t's 7:30 p.m., and I'm in the back of a cab, having raided Olivia's wardrobe and makeup bag. I'd like to tell you I'm off to see the latest Hollywood blockbuster with the man of my dreams, or heading for the airport for a relaxing holiday with my nearest and dearest chums.

But the reality is far, far more mundane than that--grim, even. It's Kara's birthday and I'm on my way to her local wine bar for a celebratory dinner. Olivia was supposed to be coming with me, but by the time she returned from The Sanctuary--curiously looking more fragile and puffy-eyed than before she went--she didn't feel up to turfing out again.

She apologized profusely, and I was about to tentatively broach the subject of her and Michael when I heard his key in the lock. So instead, I rang "International Rescue," in other words, Richard, to accompany me to tonight's debacle.

"Ring her now on the mobile and say you've had a terrible car crash and can't come," he says. "Then you and I can just go to that great new club that's opened up in Ramillies Place."

Richard and I are sitting in our prearranged rendezvous, a little bar just a few yards from Kara's birthday venue.

"Believe me, I'd love to," I reply, taking a rather unladylike glug of my white wine. "But I can't. She'd never let me forget it,
and
she'd demand to see the medical records."

Richard pulls a face. "Remind me again why you're friends with her?" It's a regular battle cry of his.

"Excuse me?
My
friend? I vaguely recall she was at your anniversary party the other night."

"That's because Lars likes her," he sniffs. "If it was up to me, she'd never darken our door."

"Come on, we'd better go." I grab my Anya Hindmarch handbag with a print of Matthew and Emily on the side and stand up. Adopting the reluctant teenager stance, Richard ambles out, orangutan-style, behind me.

S
teph's wine bar is a low-lit temple to pickup joints. It has pink lightbulbs (great for disguising cellulite), cherry red faux suede banquettes in the shape of lips, and a smattering of disco balls across its claustrophobically low ceiling. Think Hugh Hefner's bedroom.

Richard's nose wrinkles in disgust as we scan the room for Kara, our eyes narrowed in concentration. "You just know the food is going to be dire," he says. "The only blessing is we won't be able to see what we're eating."

"Yoohoo, over here!"

I follow a voice through the fog of smoke to my right, and there's Kara, waving enthusiastically in our direction and smiling for once.

"Isn't Prozac marvelous?" murmurs Richard, waving back with all the borderline hysteria of a game show contestant.

"Remember . . ." I scowl at him and make a zipping motion across my mouth. "A closed mouth gathers no foot."

"Fantastic to see you!" Kara envelops me in a showy hug, then leans back to air kiss my cheeks--thankfully, the ones on my face.

When she pulls back, I notice a couple of people I don't recognize sitting alongside her, and realize the effusive welcome was for their benefit. She even brings herself to kiss Richard, but unlike little old people-pleaser me, he makes no secret of his surprise.

"Bloody hell, and I thought you loathed me," he says, pulling a "get her" face at the two strangers.

The sound of a misfiring machine gun fills the air. It's Kara laughing maniacally. "Oooh, he's such a card, isn't he?" She looks at the couple for a response, but there isn't one. "I told you he was a real laugh."

Glum and Glummer simply stare back at her, their faces impassive. The woman, in particular, has a face that could chop wood.

"Anyway, introductions!" Kara claps her hands together like a tour guide trying to assemble Japanese tourists. "OK, then. Jess, Richard, this is Harry and his wife, Clare. Harry, Clare, this is my oldest friend Jess and her boyfriend Richard."

Boyfriend? I'm just about to open my mouth and ask her what the hell she's on about, when she shrieks "Drinks!" and grabs both Richard and me by the elbows and steers us towards the bar.

Out of earshot, her jolliness evaporates like water on a hot plate. "You said you were bringing Olivia," she hisses, jerking her head towards Richard. "What's
he
doing here?"

"Charming!" Richard puts one hand on his hip and strikes an indignant pose.

"Olivia's feeling out of sorts and I didn't want to come on my own. I sent you a text to tell you," I lie.

"Didn't get it," she snaps. "But never mind, we need to work quickly here. Harry is my boss and, to put it mildly, he doesn't like gays." She stares pointedly at Richard. "So I'd be grateful if, just for tonight, you'd pretend to be a couple."

Richard and I stare at her for a couple of beats, both clearly expecting her to punch us in the chest any second and shriek "Only kidding!" Then I remember it's Kara and she's deadly serious. With the emphasis on deadly.

"Kara, shame on you," I admonish. "This is 2004. You're not seriously expecting us to play Romeo and Juliet in front of your bigoted boss . . . are you?"

Her mouth is set in a thin, resolute line and the look in her eyes tells me that, yes, that's
exactly
what she's expecting. I glance at Richard for moral support, but he looks surprisingly calm and places a reassuring hand on my arm.

"Don't worry, Jess, I totally understand where Kara is coming from. This is her birthday and it's her boss, and she wants to impress him. Fair enough." He links his arm through mine. "Let's play ball."

Mute with astonishment, I can only gape at the both of them as Kara takes delivery of a bottle of white wine, her sickly smile firmly bolted back on her face.

"Great!" she enthuses. "Now let's go party!"

As she walks back to the table and Richard moves to follow, I sharply tug his arm to hold him back. "You're not seriously going to go along with this homophobic bullshit, are you?"

"Am I fuck," he says firmly. "Quite the opposite in fact. I'm about to make Carson Kressley look like Bob Dole."

Placing a hand on his right hip, he minces away from me with such rolling exaggeration he looks like he's dislocated a leg. Kara is already sitting back down, her back to us as we approach the table.

"Now then, who's the naughtieth boy here," lisps Richard, placing a finger on his chin in mock thought. "Oooh, you know what? I think it's Harry, I really do!" With that he backs his rear end into the small space between Harry and Clare, maneuvering himself into position and forcing them apart.

I hover nervously at the end of the table, eventually daring to glance in Kara's direction. It's not a pretty sight. If looks could kill, then she's brandishing a Kalashnikov in each hand.

"Sorry!" I whimper. "But as you know, he's a law unto himself." I look back to Richard, who now has an arm linked through both of them. He leans towards Harry and places his head in the crook of his neck.

A faint smile playing on his lips, Kara's boss seems to be taking it all in good humor, but his wife is patently livid, her already ungenerous mouth shriveling to cat's arse proportions.

"So I take it you two aren't an item then?" drawls Harry, patting the chair next to him as a gesture for me to sit down. I find myself warming to him.

"No." I smile. "It was Kara's little joke on us. She knew full well we'd never be able to carry it off." There I am again, being a people-pleaser and making sure Kara's boss doesn't think badly of her when, in fact, she deserves to be exposed as the uptight dishrag she truly is.

"I see." He looks unconvinced. "Wine?" He waves a bottle of Sancerre at me.

I smile and nod, pushing my glass towards him. "So, you're a bigwig at Lincolns?" I ask, referring to the book publishers where Kara has been an editor for the past five years.

He laughs. "I suppose so. I'm chairman."

"Oh, you're
the
bigwig then." I should have known Kara would go straight to the top with her birthday invite. No mid-management or worker bees for her.

I'm about to question him further on the company, when I see Kara's brother Jason hone into view, closely followed by her boyfriend Dan.

"Where have you two been?" She scowls. "You said you were just having a quick drink down the road. Now half of my birthday night has gone already." She pouts as she says it and I notice a faint expression of irritation flicker across Dan's face.

"Well, we're here now," he says in clipped tones. He plonks himself down between Kara and me, whilst Jason occupies the empty chair on the other side of his sister and next to Clare.

Seven people. That's all Kara can muster for her birthday, and two of them she barely knows. Then there's her lover, brother, and Richard, who wasn't even supposed to be here. Which just leaves me, her one and only close girlfriend, and even I'm there under people-pleasing sufferance.

She's always had some inexplicable hold over me, probably because in some thirteen-year-old way, I've always been anxious to be liked and she represents the perpetual challenge. A psychoanalyst would probably say we are locked in a victim/abuser relationship, and no prizes for guessing which one's me. The more Kara behaves awkwardly or just downright unpleasantly towards me, the more I dance around her, hoping that, one day, she'll make all the angst worthwhile by turning round and telling me how much she appreciates my friendship. But it's been twenty-three years now and, ho hum, I'm still waiting.

Food and extra wine ordered, we all settle down into the inexorably polite small talk that throttles any dinner party gathering until alcohol loosens the inhibitions. Harry is asking me about
Good Morning Britain
, but I keep losing the thread of what I'm saying because I'm half earwigging Richard's conversation with Clare, who seems to have thawed slightly. Oh God, he's talking about his unruly pubic hair.

"Richard!" I interject, smiling weakly at Harry and his wife. "I'm sure Clare doesn't want to hear about your bodily foibles."

"Au contraire." He pokes his tongue out at me. "Clare is a beautician who specializes in Brazilians. And I'm not talking about Ronaldo."

Harry laughs. "I've got one."

Suddenly, Kara's seemingly staid boss and his wife have metamorphosed in my mind's eye into major swingers, the kind of couples who send naked pictures of each other to porn mags and advertise for threesomes. The alcohol must already be working its magic.

"Got one what?" It's Kara, smiling engagingly at Harry.

"A naked nob, dear, that's what," chips in Richard. "Your boss here . . ." He jerks his head towards Harry. ". . . has had his bits shaved by Sweeney Todd here." He jerks it towards Clare, who's grinning as broadly as her weeny mouth will let her.

Kara's face is a Kodak moment. Bug-eyed, her brain is clearly computing Richard's words, followed swiftly no doubt by the imagined image of her boss's hairless genitalia. "I see," is all she can muster, before lowering her eyes and fixating on the plate of food in front of her.

The evening I was dreading is suddenly turning out to be tremendous fun, and I take an extra-large glug of wine in celebration. After so many torturous times where it's been me flailing around in the social sea while Kara menacingly circles me, it's deliciously satisfying to see her verbally harpooned for a change.

But, silly me, I should have known the feeling would be short lived. She regroups swiftly and her revenge arrives around the same time as the pudding.

"So, Jess, seen any more married men lately?" Her remark is loud and aggressive enough to stop everyone else's conversation in its tracks.

Clare, who has hitherto been throwing me the occasional warm smile, suddenly looks at me as if I were the anti-Christ in stilettos, intent on stealing her husband. I could be mistaken, but Harry appears to edge a bit closer in my direction.

"Actually, I've been on a couple more dates since then." I scowl. "And they were both very nice and very single." I'm inwardly praying that Richard, who knows the disappointing truth, doesn't drop me in it. For once, he keeps his powder puff dry.

Kara sniffs and looks unconvinced. "Jess has joined an Internet dating site," she tells Harry. "But the first man turned out to be married."

I can feel my face flush scarlet. "Correction, Kara.
You
signed me up to the site and the first one
may
have been married."

"Whatever." She waves her hand dismissively.

Harry has definitely edged closer, and his leg is now pressed firmly against mine. Almost imperceptibly, he's now rubbing it backwards and forwards. Help.

"I can't imagine a girl as pretty as Jess would need to trawl the net for dates," he says. "There must be hundreds of men out there who'd love to . . ."

Love to what, he doesn't say. For which I should probably be thankful, particularly as Clare is now giving me a psychotic stare that makes Glenn Close's character in
Fatal Attraction
look like Miss Congeniality.

"Hear hear." It's Dan, grinning broadly at me. "I'd give it a go."

Now it's Kara's turn to glare at me, her eyes darting back and forth between Dan and I, every little glance in my direction a small knife embedding itself in the banquette behind my head. Oh what fun I'm having.