‘I’ll set up a time.’
‘No, that’s OK, I’ll do it with Susie directly,’ says Jeff, smiling at me. ‘We can do it together. Just the two of us. If that’s OK with you, Susie?’
‘Yes!’ I say. ‘If that’s what you want. That would be more … efficient. And you’re so busy, aren’t you, Tom? That’s a great idea, Jeff,’ I say, meeting his look with a smile.
‘I think I should be there,’ says Tom. ‘To answer any questions.’
‘No!’ I say. ‘I mean, of course you’re welcome to come but I can email you afterwards if Jeff can’t answer something … if that’s OK with you, Tom?’
‘S’pose so …’ says Tom.
‘Listen,’ says Jeff, touching my arm lightly. ‘I’ve got to run. Great to meet you, Suzy Q. Good luck with the whips and I’ll see you in a couple of weeks.’ He looks again at my business card, smiles, then tucks it into his trouser pocket.
‘I’m sorry about that,’ says Tom, after he’s gone. ‘Jeff’s quite outspoken, he’s a bit of a maverick.’
‘Don’t be silly, that’s fine,’ I say. I like mavericks, especially hot ones. ‘Do you know Jeff well then?’ I say.
‘What do you mean?’
Do you know if Jeff has a girlfriend?
‘I mean do you work closely with him?’ I say.
‘Not really. He’s only been here about six months. Right, can I show you these charts?’
If you must. And for the entire hour that Tom’s taking me through the forty-eight slides he’s prepared, the only thing I can think about is the way Jeff touched my arm. And that sly smile on his face when he put my card in his pocket. And the way he looked at me; really looked at me.
It’s been a long time since someone’s looked at me that way.
Saturday
Some Saturdays I wake up, and before I’ve even managed to get out of bed a little grey cloud comes to join me under the duvet. The weekend should be the highlight of your week, should it not? Should. Now there’s a word.
When Jake and I split up, my best friend Polly told me something her therapist had said after Polly’s first husband, Spencer, walked out on her when she was seven months pregnant:
‘“Should” is the worst word in the English language.’
Funny, because I always thought the worst word was ‘jism’.
But no: ‘should’ should be eradicated from the dictionary. (Although you see what just happened there?) ‘Should’ means you want people or situations to be a certain way. But they’re not that way at all. ‘He shouldn’t have abandoned his pregnant wife.’ But he did. ‘I shouldn’t still miss my ex.’ But I do. Weekends ‘should’ be the highlight of the week.
Yet some Saturdays when I wake up, all I can see before me is a vast stretch of time that I’m supposed to fill up with ‘stuff’. And ‘good’ stuff. Fun, meaningful, stimulating stuff. Not just lying in bed, watching DVDs, eating ice cream stuff, because that would make me a loser.
As much as I hate my day job, at least there’s always stuff to do. Stuff I’m paid to do. Pointless stuff. Soul-destroying stuff. But at least it’s stuff that I have to do
or else
there’ll be a repercussion involving immediate pain. If I stay in bed all weekend watching Ryan Gosling movies there’s no pain. In fact there’s the opposite of pain. But where will it ever get me?
I’m lucky though. I have good friends. Friends from school, from uni, from all over. Yet when I stand back and look at how our lives have turned out, it seems that I’m the only one still hanging out here on the ledge of singleness. Everyone else has been busy, busy, busy. They’ve been having babies and twins and sometimes up to three babies, though not all at once. They’ve been moving to bigger houses, moving to the country. Buying Farrow & Ball paints, building glass extensions, razing, gutting and expanding into loft space. The only thing gutted in my flat is me.
Of course they haven’t all had a smooth ride. Take Polly, who’s coming round for
‘No, that’s OK, I’ll do it with Susie directly,’ says Jeff, smiling at me. ‘We can do it together. Just the two of us. If that’s OK with you, Susie?’
‘Yes!’ I say. ‘If that’s what you want. That would be more … efficient. And you’re so busy, aren’t you, Tom? That’s a great idea, Jeff,’ I say, meeting his look with a smile.
‘I think I should be there,’ says Tom. ‘To answer any questions.’
‘No!’ I say. ‘I mean, of course you’re welcome to come but I can email you afterwards if Jeff can’t answer something … if that’s OK with you, Tom?’
‘S’pose so …’ says Tom.
‘Listen,’ says Jeff, touching my arm lightly. ‘I’ve got to run. Great to meet you, Suzy Q. Good luck with the whips and I’ll see you in a couple of weeks.’ He looks again at my business card, smiles, then tucks it into his trouser pocket.
‘I’m sorry about that,’ says Tom, after he’s gone. ‘Jeff’s quite outspoken, he’s a bit of a maverick.’
‘Don’t be silly, that’s fine,’ I say. I like mavericks, especially hot ones. ‘Do you know Jeff well then?’ I say.
‘What do you mean?’
Do you know if Jeff has a girlfriend?
‘I mean do you work closely with him?’ I say.
‘Not really. He’s only been here about six months. Right, can I show you these charts?’
If you must. And for the entire hour that Tom’s taking me through the forty-eight slides he’s prepared, the only thing I can think about is the way Jeff touched my arm. And that sly smile on his face when he put my card in his pocket. And the way he looked at me; really looked at me.
It’s been a long time since someone’s looked at me that way.
Saturday
Some Saturdays I wake up, and before I’ve even managed to get out of bed a little grey cloud comes to join me under the duvet. The weekend should be the highlight of your week, should it not? Should. Now there’s a word.
When Jake and I split up, my best friend Polly told me something her therapist had said after Polly’s first husband, Spencer, walked out on her when she was seven months pregnant:
‘“Should” is the worst word in the English language.’
Funny, because I always thought the worst word was ‘jism’.
But no: ‘should’ should be eradicated from the dictionary. (Although you see what just happened there?) ‘Should’ means you want people or situations to be a certain way. But they’re not that way at all. ‘He shouldn’t have abandoned his pregnant wife.’ But he did. ‘I shouldn’t still miss my ex.’ But I do. Weekends ‘should’ be the highlight of the week.
Yet some Saturdays when I wake up, all I can see before me is a vast stretch of time that I’m supposed to fill up with ‘stuff’. And ‘good’ stuff. Fun, meaningful, stimulating stuff. Not just lying in bed, watching DVDs, eating ice cream stuff, because that would make me a loser.
As much as I hate my day job, at least there’s always stuff to do. Stuff I’m paid to do. Pointless stuff. Soul-destroying stuff. But at least it’s stuff that I have to do
or else
there’ll be a repercussion involving immediate pain. If I stay in bed all weekend watching Ryan Gosling movies there’s no pain. In fact there’s the opposite of pain. But where will it ever get me?
I’m lucky though. I have good friends. Friends from school, from uni, from all over. Yet when I stand back and look at how our lives have turned out, it seems that I’m the only one still hanging out here on the ledge of singleness. Everyone else has been busy, busy, busy. They’ve been having babies and twins and sometimes up to three babies, though not all at once. They’ve been moving to bigger houses, moving to the country. Buying Farrow & Ball paints, building glass extensions, razing, gutting and expanding into loft space. The only thing gutted in my flat is me.
Of course they haven’t all had a smooth ride. Take Polly, who’s coming round for
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