Dan Taylor Is Giving Up on Women (9 page)

‘When she gets back from the bogs she’s going to tell me all about her rebirthing experience and plans for a new practice. I’m going to be on a date discussing the prospect of going back up my mum’s fanny. This is not what I signed up for!’

‘We did think she looked quirky and interesting.’

‘She looks down her nose at my choice of beer, but she’s into drinking wee!’

‘Well, your choice of beer isn’t the best,’ Rob conceded, ‘but it’s not as bad as that.’

‘That’s not the point!’ I yelled, bringing the topic back to the present. ‘The point is how did you let me get here? What was it that I did in the last ten years of sitting on my arse eating Pringles® and drinking supermarket pop made you think an alternative health guru was the woman for me?’

‘She looks like the profile pics, right? I have one word for you: hubba. It works best if you say it twice.’

‘Never mind how she looks. I thought I was meeting someone interesting and with a job that makes a real difference in people’s lives, like a surgeon, or cancer researcher or chiropodist. Now, I’m just scared what she’s going to bring back from the loos — it’s her round.’

‘We’ll just chalk this one up to experience, bud. But on the bright side, you did it! You’ve popped your blind-date
cherry. Hey, date cherry, that’s a new drink for you to do some research into too — the evening’s a triumph. Anyway she’s probably already on the phone to her homeopath or whatever arranging her getaway. She’ll be going home soon.’

‘What? You think she’ll bail on me?’

‘I suspect she might be worried about the effects of your cynicism on her karma. But it’s all good practice. This will set you in good stead for Sunday afternoon.’

‘Sunday afternoon?’

‘Sunday afternoon.’

‘What’s happening Sunday afternoon?’

‘Did H not tell you what’s happening Sunday afternoon?’

‘No one’s mentioned anything about Sunday afternoon.’

‘Sunday afternoon you’ll have a great time. All you need to know.’

‘What’s Sunday afternoon?’

‘Gotta go. But well done, sport, you did us proud.’

‘What is happ…?’ I didn’t bother asking the dial tone about the plans for the weekend after Rob hastily hung up. Hand on my chin, I slumped forward at the bar and nodded towards the barman for another lager. Twenty past eight and I was about to be dumped by a stranger. Assuming I hadn’t been already — she could’ve levitated herself out of the Ladies for all I knew. The silent barman sympathetically slid the bar snacks my way as I wondered if there was a name for this feeling of being rejected by somebody you never wanted to see again in your life anyway.

I stretched across the bar and grabbed a handful of nuts and ruminated on whether one day I would be able to laugh at this evening, perhaps sitting in a restaurant with friends and my wife. Telling the story of the terrible time I had before we got together, while she laughed at an anecdote she’d heard many times before. I wondered what Hannah had made of what Rob was telling her about the evening. I should have told Rob to tell her that, if nothing else, I was pretty sure my new clothes looked good.

I grabbed another handful of nuts, but this time, easing back into my seat, I felt one drop from my hand, and into Rachel’s drink.

Didn’t she say something about childhood nut allergies?

I ducked down to peer into her grapefruit juice and lime, tipping it slightly to try and see if I really did land something in there. Too murky to tell. Then I caught a glimpse of blonde hair in the mirror heading my way, and sat back trying to look casual.

‘Daniel,’ Rachel said as she slipped back onto her stool, ‘I’m going to have to go now, but I felt there were some things I ought to tell you.’

‘Oh, righto, OK. But can I just say first that you might not want to—?’

She put her hand on my knee. ‘I think you know that this hasn’t worked out how we expected. It’s not your fault, it’s just I’m living on an emotional plane I think that you’re still on the journey towards reaching. But I’m sure you will get there…’

‘Well, y’know, I’m shocked to hear that, but before you go on, I really think you should leave that—’

‘Honestly, I’m surprised as you are. I sensed you were someone with a real empathy for the feminine side of your id when we chatted online, but maybe you can work on bringing that out. Or maybe I misdiagnosed your preparedness for a meaningful spiritual relationship. I’m human—we all make mistakes.’

‘I’ll meditate on that but honestly, just don’t—’

‘Recognising your limitations is the first step to overcoming them, so that’s wonderful. And to say thank you for being a thread in the tapestry of my life journey, I’ve given your details to a very dear friend of mine, Lars, who specialises in primal scream therapy for emotionally stunted men, so he’ll be in touch. And I also think you should consider removing processed meats and cheeses from your diet. In my professional opinion it’s causing the alarming spikes in your astral presence, and that unusual blushing I’m sure you felt conscious of when we first said hello. Of course, there’s no charge for that advice. Now was there something you felt you wanted to say to me?’

She picked up her bag and put on her coat, not really paying attention to me any more.

And as she stood up she moved to take a sip from her glass.

‘Well, I just wanted to say…cheers.’

The doors to the ambulance slammed open and I was bumped to one side by a luminously jacketed paramedic as they lowered the gurney Rachel was lying on to the pavement. The ambulance medic talked the nurses through the details of the case.

‘Twenty-six-year-old female, Rachel Evans, anaphylactic shock. Received the call from dispatch at 2017 on site 2030, intubated to clear airways and administered oxygen. Patient had no allergy warnings on person but shock thought to be brought on by reaction to a peanut. This is the boyfriend.’

‘Well, you know, technically, I’m not really her—’

‘Has she remained conscious?’ asked the nurse as Rachel wheezed into an oxygen mask.

‘Conscious, but disorientated. Blood pressure and heart rate stable,’ answered the paramedic.

‘She was just leaving, it was a blind date, and we didn’t quite hit it off—’

‘Talking?’ asked the nurse.

‘Talking, but incoherent and rambling. She kept asking for her aromatherapist.’

‘Don’t worry, Rachel, you’re in good hands now. We’ll have you right as rain in no time,’ the nurse told the increasingly puffy-looking patient as we headed inside to the A and E department, ‘and don’t you worry, sir, we’ll look after her for you.’

‘Great,’ I said, ‘but I’m not her partner or anything. It was just a date. She was leaving, and I might have dropped something in her drink. By accident.’

The nurse looked at me, and tapped a button on her beeper as Rachel was wheeled into a ward and had peach and green plastic curtains pulled around her.

‘Do you know if she’s allergic to penicillin?’

‘Sorry, I don’t know. She finds the colour tangerine quite hostile if that’s any help…’

‘If you just take a seat over there in the waiting room, we’ll come and get you if there’s any news,’ she said.

I did as I was told and found a seat within view of the nurses’ station. It was the first time I’d been in a casualty department since I fractured my little finger when I was eight, and I was a bit disappointed that there was no child with a saucepan stuck on his head anywhere to be seen. Then I remembered that, despite the publication dates of the magazines lying around, I wasn’t actually in the nineteen fifties. There was, even at this fairly early hour, an impressive number of drink-related injuries, although they were outnumbered by pairs of anxious-looking parents waving rattling fuzzy bees into car seats. All the parents were giving dirty looks to the staggering old homeless guy whenever he came too close singing ‘coochy coochy coo’ and laughing to himself. A not quite audible TV on the wall was showing the news of a natural disaster somewhere, which helped give the A and E a suitably post-apocalyptic feel.

This was not in any of the scenarios I’d imagined for how my night out with Rachel would end. Jesus, it had been scary when she’d started choking and grabbing at her throat after her tiny sip of grapefruit juice, with its teeny bit of peanut. It had been like a movie where you saw the star react suddenly after they’d been made to take a drink by a sneaky villain and started acting as if they’d been poisoned before smiling and pointing out that they’d swapped drinks and were fine actually, thanks for asking. But this time, the acting out hadn’t stopped, and I’d shouted to the barman for help as she’d slumped to the floor. Thankfully he’d known enough about first aid to get her comfortable while I called 999 for an ambulance.

After a few minutes of standing around and me repeatedly saying, ‘We’ve got to give her air. Make sure she’s getting air,’ to a crowd that wasn’t actually there, the ambulance crew had arrived and stridden in and taken charge of the situation. Worried as I was, I couldn’t help but feel better as they calmly assumed control, gave her
some kind of injection and got her on a trolley and ready for the ambulance. While we pushed our way through the London traffic and the paramedics talked to each other using lots of jargon I didn’t understand I felt as I always do whenever faced with people doing one of these important and useful jobs — that maybe I should jack in the market research, and retrain to do something that could make a difference in people’s lives. Then I saw how much they got paid, and that they had to get up early for shifts, and decided that in my own way I made a contribution to society, and vowed to go large with my next donation to the lifeboats box instead.

Now it was just a matter of waiting for news that she was going to be all right, and that she was going to get home OK.

She said she’d been cured of all that childhood health stuff, I told myself. I shouldn’t feel guilty.

But of course, I did. It had been an accident, but I could have prevented it. Just because I’d been vaguely patronised by an alternative health nut wasn’t really justification for trying to kill her, was it? All right, murder might be overstating it, but what had I been thinking? There were people in this world who could do revenge, but I wasn’t one of them.

My heart rate went through the roof as an alarm somewhere started beeping, and a horde of nurses, speed-walking in squeaky Crocs™, raced across the casualty department in the direction of Rachel’s bed. Peering around the corner after them, I saw them disperse irritably — false alarm. They headed back to their other duties while the smallest and fiercest-looking of them gave the drunk homeless guy a stern talking-to for miming playing ping-pong with the paddles of vital cardio equipment. Feeling sorry for myself, I turned back from the chastised drunk to the main waiting room and figured that this date really couldn’t get any worse.

‘Excuse me, sir, could I have a word?’

I jumped about six inches out of my chair as I saw a body-armoured policeman standing over me smiling pleasantly.

‘A word? Of course, Officer, a word. How can I help? What do you need to know? Anything at all.’

Meeting the police, it turned out, made me babble. Maybe it was because he was a bit older, and looked all world-weary, as if he’d been doing the job so long he could see right into the darkness of people’s souls and was no longer surprised by what he saw there. If I hadn’t stopped talking I think I would have confessed to accidentally forgetting to pay for a pack of sweets from the corner shop when I was eight, and once knowingly taking change for a twenty when I’d given the cashier a tenner in Sainsbury’s.

‘Come with me, and we’ll go somewhere private.’

The PC led me through the waiting room to one of the private examination rooms, and I felt the eyes of the crowd watching me as I went, a little local drama more interesting than the round-up of today’s athletics highlights on the news. Mothers leaned in a bit closer to their angrily crying car seats as we walked past, a cocky young sports injury gave me an exaggerated shake of the head and tut as we crossed paths, and the old drunk used the diversion to cheerfully wee in the plastic pot plant. Terrified as I was, I thought about joining him, before I wet myself.

The office I was led to was packed with shelves of box files and health leaflets. Any available wall space was covered in health promotion posters with scary pictures of diseased organs and sad children. The policeman, PC Hawkins, took the doctor’s seat, while I perched on the edge of the patient’s spot and wondered if the blood-pressure pump could be used as an impromptu lie detector. For the second time in one evening my palms started getting sweaty with anxiety, and I wished I were at home tucked up with a P G Wodehouse.

‘So,’ said the cop, putting a notebook and pen on the desk next to his crackling and beeping radio, ‘would you like to tell me how Miss Evans got here?’

What should I say? I wondered as the lump of breathless tension throbbed bigger and bigger in my chest. Everything that crossed my mind felt like something that guilty people on the TV said that got the good guys riled up and even more determined to nail them — I couldn’t ask if I was under arrest or demand my solicitor before I said anything. And I hadn’t got a solicitor anyway. I could probably get the number of the bloke who did my brother’s conveyancing, but the cut-throat world of criminal defence probably wouldn’t suit a retiree who did it as
a favour for my dad. I decided I had to press on on my own, and if he started getting tough, just turn on the waterworks.

‘It’s just like the nurses would have told you—’ I started.

‘I’d rather you just told me yourself, Mr Taylor,’ he cut in, just as I was getting warmed up.

I was going to tell you! I’m trying to be a good boy!
I squealed inside. I took a deep breath and said to myself, He’s just used to people not being co-operative. He’s not trying to unsettle me. I just need to let him know everything I can think of. Don’t panic. Start from the beginning.

It was around then I started a strange out-of-body experience. I was watching myself talking and unable to stop. Observing myself from afar, all I could do was wonder if there was a kind of verbal Imodium® you could buy in chemists for the dose of talking squits I was suffering.

‘Yes, well, I, um, found Rachel on the Internet and we were meeting for a drink for the first time…’

‘Found her on the Internet?’

‘Well, my friends found her for me, really. You see, I’ve been single for a long time, and they’ve been trying to help me out.’

‘Help you out?’

‘Lord, that makes her sound like some kind of prostitute or Internet bride, which you know might be a good idea the way things are going for me. Except of course they wouldn’t at all be a good idea, and illegal so I wouldn’t do them at all. Hahaha! Just joking. Not that I think this is a laughing matter. Are mail-order brides illegal? Not that I’m considering it, just I’m assuming.’

‘Making a false statement in relation to a marriage and conspiracy to assist unlawful immigration are very serious offences. Were you planning to marry Miss Evans?’

‘We only just met and didn’t really hit it off. She’s from Surrey, anyway, so is probably OK for a passport. We were on a blind date, but she’s into expanding her spiritual horizons and I’m into
CSI
, so it wasn’t going to work out. Are you into that?
CSI
, not spirituality, although that would be fine too. I imagine it must be a bit annoying if you know all the bits that are unrealistic. Anyway, she was going to leave but I dropped something in her drink.’

Hawkins sat up in his seat a bit when I said that, and started making notes for the first time.

‘Are you telling me that this woman your “friends” picked out for you on the Internet, that you spiked her drink? What was the plan? You didn’t want her to go? Planning to get her in a taxi back to yours? Will the blood test come back with traces of Rohypnol?’

‘No, no! It was an accident. It was just a nut. They were complimentary. Who was to know it wasn’t a harmless bar snack? Aside from the wee on it, that is.’

‘You urinated on a peanut, Mr Taylor?’

‘I mean, that’s just what they say, isn’t it? You know, with the peanuts in bars and the seven different types of wee? From not washing your hands after going to the toilet and then sticking them in a communally used bowl.’

‘You don’t wash your hands after going to the lavatory?’

‘Me, I do, all the time. OK, maybe it’s just a swipe under the tap and a burst under the hand dryer for appearances’ sake when I’m in a hurry, but definitely properly if I splash a bit. I use soap and everything. Haven’t warm-air hand dryers come on a lot in the last few years? Like jet engines, some of them. Although I still prefer paper towels if I’m honest.’

PC Hawkins shifted about, rocking thoughtfully in his creaking chair, and made a couple of notes in his pad, before giving me a very long, very inquisitive look. Under the pressure of his gaze I came very close to confessing to occasionally speeding when I borrowed my dad’s car, downloading a pirate copy of a cheesy album I was too embarrassed to buy, looking at a photo of a dwarf and a donkey that Thomson in Year 9 had that I was pretty sure
must have been illegal in most countries, and asking for several other offences to be taken into consideration.

Instead I just gave him a big friendly smile, before deciding that this might not be the time to be looking happy, so tried to look serious and a bit glum instead. Then I decided I didn’t want to look guilty, so tried again for a more understanding thoughtful look, with a hint of a smile, and a number of other variations on the idea, bouncing between these two extremes but never quite settling on a look.

‘Well, I’m going to go and see Miss Evans now,’ he finally said. ‘The nurses said the swelling on her face should be down a bit now. Do you need to go to the toilet?’

‘No, I’m fine, thank you, went earlier. Washed up thoroughly after.’

‘It’s just the way your face is… Anyway, never mind. I’m going to see her, and check out this account of yours. Just stay here till I get back.’

‘Certainly, Officer, no problem at all, Officer. I’ll be right here, not trying to do a runner through the Gents window or anything. I know you’d be able to catch me. Send Rachel my best wishes. But not if that sounds like a coded message to try and intimidate a witness or anything like that.’

The policeman started to say something, but thought better of it, and I heard him let out a heavy sigh as he stepped out of the room. Once the door shut behind him, I crashed my head down on the table in front of me, certain I was just waiting to be charged with grievously pissing off a long-suffering police officer, and babbling like an idiot in a built-up area. Inside my coat pocket my mobile beeped and vibrated. A text message from Rob. I figured I was in enough trouble already and ignoring the signs saying not to use my mobile in a hospital couldn’t make things any worse. Tthis was probably the thinking that took troubled youths down the path from shoplifting a Mars bar to a life as a career criminal.

Still not home yet? Your night must have picked up…

I don’t like to be over-dramatic, but thought if there was a time when I was entitled to be, it’d probably be now.

I’ve been rushed to A and E in an ambulance, and now being interrogated by the police on possible attempted manslaughter charges. So no, not really picked up.

I’d barely sent the text when the phone started ringing.