Twenty Something (15 page)

‘She does give the most fantastic head, izzit.'

I know this should enrage my alpha-male jealousy, but I really don't care any more. He's also hit upon an irrefutable fact: Lucy gives the best head known to man or beast.

‘Yes, mate, she certainly does. She certainly does.'

And with a wink and a ‘toodle-pip', he trots off for his next one.

I'm really not superstitious, but there's definitely something portentous about the date thirteen in my life. In March it was me telling Lucy's dad to fuck off on the phone. In April it was my first major dressing-down from Mr Cox. In May it was my conversation with Rick about my/his/our baby.

And in June? Why, Leila again, of course.

After my little ‘reply all' fiasco last Thursday she eventually emailed me today to suggest a drink in the evening. Was I free? No, I wasn't, but I'd make sure I was free for her. Claire (doctors 'n' nurses) would just have to postpone. Sorry.

She comes bounding into the bar, all laughter and smiles and looking, well, looking downright shaggable.

‘Jack, how are you? Sorry I haven't been in touch for ages. It's been hell at work. Absolutely run off my feet.'

‘I'm sorry to hear that,' I say, barely able to hide my smirk.

‘No, you're not,' she laughs, ‘you lazy good-for-nothing. How is life on the outside, as you put it? One of my friends in your “reply all” email thought you'd just been released from jail.'

‘Ha ha. No, life away from the office is good. I've been working out my purpose in life. Mainly I've been reading and walking and shopping and writing and drinking and visiting museums and doing all those little things you don't have time for normally.'

This is almost true. Mainly I've been drinking.

‘So, what is your purpose in life?'

‘Oh, I don't know. Have one point eight children, drive a Volvo, get a mortgage, be a godfather to someone That kind of thing.'

We laugh, and then she looks serious for a moment.

‘Jack, I want to ask you something.'

Oh god, this seems to be the week for people asking and telling me things.

‘Yes, Leila. Anything.'

‘When you came into the office drunk last month and said that you, erm, fucking loved me, you didn't mean it, did you?'

Hearing her say the word ‘fucking' is so beautifully dirty
.

‘Oh no, of course not,' I laugh nervously. ‘Don't be silly. Of course, I think you're brilliant and stuff, but no, I was just really wasted.'

‘That's such a relief. I was so worried. I didn't want to spoil our friendship with awkwardness.'

‘Don't be silly, Leila. You and I would never be awkward together. We're just great friends.'

What the bloody bollocks am I thinking of? I am managing to say the exact opposite of what I feel.

We chat on through this hiatus. Olli keeps on coming up. She's got a definite case of mention-itis.

‘So, who exactly is this Olli?' I ask eventually. ‘I've never heard you mention him before.'

‘That's because I've only just met him. We're kind of dating, I guess.'

‘Kind of dating? How does that work?'

‘It's what grown-ups do in London, Jack. They go out to drinks and dinner and theatre shows.'

I don't want to be a grown-up in London. It sounds rubbish.

‘That sounds fun. Perhaps we should go on a date sometime.'

‘But we're having drinks now, aren't we? In a non-date-date type of way.'

‘True, good point. Anyway, I thought you were meant to be celibate. How can you date celibately?'

I've had a little bit too much to drink
.

‘That's beside the point. It's not all about sex, you know, Jack. You men are only after one thing.'

‘That's absolutely not true. That's a nasty little stereotype propagated by girly magazines. We men also want someone to hold, to cuddle, to snuggle, to wake up with on Sunday mornings and read the papers with on Sunday afternoons. We're just too embarrassed to admit it openly.'

Leila looks at me a little strangely.

‘Listen, Jack,' she continues. ‘You're my friend. A very good friend. One of my best, in fact. And, as one of your best friends, I urge you to get out on the dating scene as soon as possible. It's a lot of fun. Perhaps you'll find your purpose there.'

I really,
really
, want to shag her.

‘What's your purpose in life, Fred?' I ask.

For once, he's not too busy writing to talk to me.

‘I don't know, Jack. I just don't know. I used to think it was to write this screenplay, but I'm beginning to wonder whether it's really worth it. I mean, what's the point? No one publishes it, and I look like a moron. Someone publishes it, so no one goes to watch it. It's a rip-roaring success — I have to come up with another idea, and I think I've only got one in me.'

‘Oh, come on Fred. It's an awesome idea.
Romeo and Juliet
updated into a modern university setting. Everyone's going to love it. What else is bothering you?'

He looks down at his feet.

‘I haven't been laid for ten months.'

‘Ten months? That is a long time.'

‘Yep, two more and I'm a technical virgin again. It's also been seventy-five days and seventeen hours since my last non-solo orgasm.'

‘But that's ridiculous. You know that everyone fancies you.'

‘Do they? Well, I don't fancy everyone. Perhaps that's my problem.'

Perhaps it's everyone's problem, I mused. This always strikes
me as bizarre in the UK. The media prattles on about how much sexual action we twentysomethings are getting. But in my experience we're all mouth and no trousers. All fart; no poo. Close; no cigar.

While people in relationships have a great deal of sex, male singletons just spend their entire time thinking about it.

Shall I buy a new pair of jeans? Yes, it will give me more chance of pulling at the weekend. Shall I get a haircut? Yes, ditto. What should I do as a career? Barrister is a sexier profession than an accountant, but less secure. Journalists get paid less than bankers but they're more interesting. Firemen get laid the entire time, but what would I tell my parents? Shall I make my bed and dim the lights in my room before I go out tonight? Yes, it will impress any girl I bring back. If I buy this aftershave/mobile phone/digital camera/DVD player/designer coffee cup, am I going to get more sex? No, but I'll try it anyway. If I spend half my weekend jogging around Hyde Park with my iPod and a look of absolute agony on my face, am I going to impress the ladies? No, never. If I join the gym and do fifty sit-ups three times a week, are girls going to notice my six-pack through my shirt and fling themselves uncontrollably at me in clubs? Well, it would be nice

Our hormones run us, and our hormones ruin us. While our every subconscious move is designed to get us one step closer to the bedroom, we rarely put our best-laid preparations into best-laid action. We spend too much time setting the scene and too little treading the boards.

Sometimes one longs for a far-off day in the 2040s when we can think logically with our real brains. I am rather looking forward to hanging up my slippers by the fireside, my seed sown, my genes appeased, my hormones sated and basking in the importance of being impotent.

Or, as Flatmate Fred puts it, ‘Octogenarians should count themselves lucky. It's only when you've got no ink left in your pen that you can start working out what really matters in life.'

Decided that Leila could shove her dating advice. I'm a man and I want to do manly things like boys' nights out in cheap, cheesy clubs. This is my purpose in life.

It was the old crowd again — Flatmate Fred, Jasper, Rick and me. No Buddy — he has been relegated to the rank of former friend. Lucy Poett had gone home to the country to visit Mr and Mrs Poett.

We were lazing around, quaffing
£
7 bottled beers in a corner of Mad Barry's and watching lithe beauties walking about. It actually hurt how attractive they were. The prospect of never getting near to any of them hurt even more.

But then one in particular caught my eye. I had to go up to her. I simply had to. She was even fitter than Miss P. M. Gilmour. I would regret it for the rest of my life if I didn't.

‘Sorry, er, I wouldn't normally do this, but you are literally the most beautiful creature I've ever seen in my life. I just wanted to tell you.'

‘Thank you,' she says. ‘That's sweet of you.'

‘You're welcome,' I say and sit back down again with the others.

Five minutes later and she walks past again, beckoning me over with her finger.

‘Come up and see me and make me smile,' I can see her miming in time to the music.

I go over and see her, and do my best to make her smile. It appears to be working. Twenty minutes later, we're twirling around the dance floor. Twenty-five minutes later, I'm kissing her. Forty minutes later, we're sitting down in the corner and still kissing. I can see Jasper and Flatmate Fred dancing either side of a girl to ‘Karma Chameleon' out of the corner of my eye. I hope Jasper backs off and lets Flatmate Fred get laid before his celibate year is up.

Fifty-five minutes later, and Iona
(Must remember her name this time, must remember her name Iona, Iona, Iona
) asks me to walk her home.

‘Cadogan Gardens — just round the corner.'

Wahey, wahey, wahey
.

‘That's a pretty cool place to live.'

‘Yeah, it's my mum's, but don't worry — she's away.'

Her voice goes up at the end of every sentence. She looks and sounds very different outside the club.

‘You don't mind living with your mum still?'

‘No, it's just until I finish school.'

‘Sorry,
finish
school? Like art school?'

‘No, durr-brain, just normal old boring school. Doing my AS levels next year. I'm predicted ten A stars for my GCSEs when results come out in August. And then, after my A levels, I'm going to study Law at Oxford, and then I'm going to be a barrister, and then I'm going to be a judge.'

There's no doubt that she's very clever. There's also no doubt that she's very young and very annoying.

‘Congratulations, that's brilliant. Well done you.'

‘And how about you, Jack? You didn't tell me which school you're at?'

Can I? Should I? I shouldn't. But God, she's fit.

Fortunately, I was saved any more moral dilemmas at this point, as I tripped over her pashmina and rolled into the gutter. A definite low point of my life — in the gutter while a sixteen-year-old fittie looked down pitifully on me. I couldn't even pretend to be Oscar Wilde — this was London, and there were no stars to look at.

Fortunately Iona took this as a cue that I was absolutely poleaxed and helped me back to hers, where I gratefully went to bed alone in her mum's room.

Iona, Iona, Iona
were my first three thoughts upon waking up in a strange room.

My fourth thought was,
That's Norah Jones playing ‘Don't Know Why I Didn't Come
'.

My fifth thought was,
I know exactly why I didn't come last night. I walked a barely legal girl home, got moral pangs about her age and then fell into a gutter.

My sixth thought was,
Who is this (very attractive) woman in her early forties looking at me as if I'm something the cat dragged in?

It was Iona's mum. Iona appeared behind her, wearing pyjamas with Winnie the Poohs on them.

‘Mumsies, this is Jack. He very kindly walked me home last night because I was a little bit tipsy-wipsy.'

Thank god I didn't sleep with her.

‘It's a pleasure to meet you Mrs Iona,' I say, stretching out my right hand and trying to keep myself decent with my left.

‘Oh, the pleasure's all ours,' purrs Mrs Iona, apparently won over to the tale of the knight in shining armour. ‘How can I thank you enough for looking after Iona? You must give her your number so that we can stay in touch.'

Aaaaaagh!

Someone who had got lucky was Flatmate Fred. When I got back from my Stride of Pride I found him and Jasper having breakfast with a mystery girl.

‘Good jail bait?' asked Jasper.

‘Indeed, no,' I replied. ‘I did the honourable thing and passed out alone.'

‘You fool,' said Flatmate Fred. ‘Surely you know that they're old enough when they leave school.'

‘And when do they leave school?'

‘At half-past three.'

I gave him a confused smile and crashed into bed.

‘Ten months of celibacy and I've just broken my fast with a threesome — every guy's lifelong dream.'

‘Fred?'

‘Yes, Jack.'

‘Isn't the dream threesome meant to be with two girls and not with one random girl and a failing actor called Jasper?'

‘Well, yes, ideally. But Jasper had nowhere to stay. It was a rutter or gutter evening. A score or floor soirée.'

‘Fred, you're a horrible person.'

‘So, we decided to give the dog a bone.'

‘Rank.'

‘Even though she was almost clinically ugly.'

‘Disgusting.'

‘And two's always better than one, in any case.'

‘Foul. Even if one of those two is a guy?'

‘Yeah, of course.'

‘Fred, are you gay?'

‘Shut up.'

‘Did you touch Jasper at all? Apart from high-fives, obviously.'

‘No, really — I mean it. Shut up.'

Rang my dad later to wish him happy Father's Day.

‘Oh you soppy sausage, Jack. I hope you're not doing anything embarrassing like buying me a huge present and taking me out for a nice meal. Horrendous commercialism, the lot of it.'