be.’
But Fraser knows he’ll never be ready for this. Ever. In his life. In fact, right now, standing in the street on a warm Tuesday evening in April, every molecule in his body is telling him he’d rather be doing anything – undergoing a life-threatening operation, for example – than going to a salsa class.
But ‘Learn to do SOME sort of dance’ is one of the four tasks he’s been allocated from Liv’s List to complete and he is determined to do this for her.
After he and Mia hatched their plan that awful day after Liv’s birthday, they got everyone over to Mia’s, where they tried, for a fruitless hour, to give free rein and let everyone choose four things each from the List.
But this resulted in nothing but shouting and Melody and Norm almost filing for divorce when it was decided, as the only couple, that they should do the homemade porn movie one and Melody burst out laughing: ‘Chance would be a fine thing. We haven’t had sex since October!’ Norm was not amused.
They’d gone round in circles, until finally, Mia had the ingenious idea that they should write down all the tasks on bits of paper, put them in a hat and let fate decide.
So this was the outcome:
Fraser: Learn to dance; sleep with an exotic foreigner: do this without becoming completely neurotic about what it’s supposed to ‘mean’ (Fraser felt – at a push – he could probably manage this); use up all seven Scrabble letters in one turn; make a Roman blind.
Norm: Learn how to make the perfect Victoria sponge; Vegas, baby!; get a six-pack; climb Great Wall of China.
Mia: Go to Venice, properly this time, and have a bellini at Harry’s Bar; swim naked in the sea at dawn; learn a foreign language; learn how to pluck eyebrows.
Anna: Read all works by William Wordsworth, learn how to meditate, to ‘live in the moment’; live in Paris for a while; learn how to use chopsticks.
Melody: French kiss in Central Park; make a homemade porn film; have a party for all my wonderful friends.
Number nineteen, they planned to do as the very last one, together as a group:
Go to airport, close eyes and pick a destination at random, then GO! Even if it’s to Stuttgart or Birmingham.
Of course, Fraser hasn’t told Karen about the List, which he does feel guilty about, since if there were no List – if there were no Liv, essentially – there’d be no way he would voluntarily sign up for a salsa class. Today, against his better judgement and only to liven up the most boring day at work this year (eight hours spent holding a microphone to someone’s head as they made a party political broadcast about obesity outside McDonald’s), he’d told the boys at work – John and Declan – and they’d ribbed him mercilessly, said they didn’t know anyone less likely to be going to a ‘gay’ salsa class …
But Karen doesn’t know this and what she doesn’t know, he’s reasoned, can’t hurt her. Besides, she was ecstatic when he asked her.
‘Really? You’re not jesting me?’ ( ‘Jesting’ is one of Karen’s favourite ’90s expressions, along with ‘mint’ and ‘yes way’.) ‘You actually want to go to dance lessons – with me?’ She looked dumbfounded, as though he’d just asked her to marry him, and squealed before hugging him so tight she almost suffocated him with her enormous, no, really
enormous
, amazing and wondrous breasts. It doesn’t matter how many times she says ‘innit’, Fraser doubts he will ever get irritated by those.
So, he felt absolved of his guilt, but now, what with Karen’s obsession with
Strictly Come Dancing
and calling him Fred Astaire, he is starting to worry she might think he can
actually
dance. After all, who suggests starting a hobby they don’t already have some aptitude for?
Fraser clings to the hope that salsa might just be his big, untapped talent, but realistically, chances are slim. Small children have been known to laugh at him at wedding receptions.
‘Been shopping
But Fraser knows he’ll never be ready for this. Ever. In his life. In fact, right now, standing in the street on a warm Tuesday evening in April, every molecule in his body is telling him he’d rather be doing anything – undergoing a life-threatening operation, for example – than going to a salsa class.
But ‘Learn to do SOME sort of dance’ is one of the four tasks he’s been allocated from Liv’s List to complete and he is determined to do this for her.
After he and Mia hatched their plan that awful day after Liv’s birthday, they got everyone over to Mia’s, where they tried, for a fruitless hour, to give free rein and let everyone choose four things each from the List.
But this resulted in nothing but shouting and Melody and Norm almost filing for divorce when it was decided, as the only couple, that they should do the homemade porn movie one and Melody burst out laughing: ‘Chance would be a fine thing. We haven’t had sex since October!’ Norm was not amused.
They’d gone round in circles, until finally, Mia had the ingenious idea that they should write down all the tasks on bits of paper, put them in a hat and let fate decide.
So this was the outcome:
Fraser: Learn to dance; sleep with an exotic foreigner: do this without becoming completely neurotic about what it’s supposed to ‘mean’ (Fraser felt – at a push – he could probably manage this); use up all seven Scrabble letters in one turn; make a Roman blind.
Norm: Learn how to make the perfect Victoria sponge; Vegas, baby!; get a six-pack; climb Great Wall of China.
Mia: Go to Venice, properly this time, and have a bellini at Harry’s Bar; swim naked in the sea at dawn; learn a foreign language; learn how to pluck eyebrows.
Anna: Read all works by William Wordsworth, learn how to meditate, to ‘live in the moment’; live in Paris for a while; learn how to use chopsticks.
Melody: French kiss in Central Park; make a homemade porn film; have a party for all my wonderful friends.
Number nineteen, they planned to do as the very last one, together as a group:
Go to airport, close eyes and pick a destination at random, then GO! Even if it’s to Stuttgart or Birmingham.
Of course, Fraser hasn’t told Karen about the List, which he does feel guilty about, since if there were no List – if there were no Liv, essentially – there’d be no way he would voluntarily sign up for a salsa class. Today, against his better judgement and only to liven up the most boring day at work this year (eight hours spent holding a microphone to someone’s head as they made a party political broadcast about obesity outside McDonald’s), he’d told the boys at work – John and Declan – and they’d ribbed him mercilessly, said they didn’t know anyone less likely to be going to a ‘gay’ salsa class …
But Karen doesn’t know this and what she doesn’t know, he’s reasoned, can’t hurt her. Besides, she was ecstatic when he asked her.
‘Really? You’re not jesting me?’ ( ‘Jesting’ is one of Karen’s favourite ’90s expressions, along with ‘mint’ and ‘yes way’.) ‘You actually want to go to dance lessons – with me?’ She looked dumbfounded, as though he’d just asked her to marry him, and squealed before hugging him so tight she almost suffocated him with her enormous, no, really
enormous
, amazing and wondrous breasts. It doesn’t matter how many times she says ‘innit’, Fraser doubts he will ever get irritated by those.
So, he felt absolved of his guilt, but now, what with Karen’s obsession with
Strictly Come Dancing
and calling him Fred Astaire, he is starting to worry she might think he can
actually
dance. After all, who suggests starting a hobby they don’t already have some aptitude for?
Fraser clings to the hope that salsa might just be his big, untapped talent, but realistically, chances are slim. Small children have been known to laugh at him at wedding receptions.
‘Been shopping
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