Don't You Want Me? (16 page)

‘God,’ I roll my eyes. ‘You’re so bloody northern. Mr Macho. I’ll have a triple whisky, and a fruit juice for the little lady. Honestly, Frank.’

‘I don’t want you to be sick on my shoes,’ says Frank bluntly.

I sigh loudly, to convey my irritation. ‘As I was saying, what would you think if you saw me?’

‘I’d think you were a ride, but I don’t know about dirty,’ Frank says, still looking around the room.

‘One must be grateful for small mercies, I suppose.’ I lean back and look around the room too, but not for long: Frank’s little lesson in masculine prejudgement has left me feeling rather shaken.

‘Do all men do that, Frank, or is it just you?’

‘Everyone does it. Both sexes.’

‘I don’t. Not like that. And I don’t think Rupert does, for instance, or Dom. Not that crudely. Do you not ever just think “She has pretty eyes” or “I like her face”?’

‘Once or twice.’

‘When, once or twice?’

‘Not for a while.’

We’re back to the wife, the girlfriend, whatever she was, I’m sure of it. But even though my stomach is slowly filling with alcohol, and even though I am burning to know, I can’t ask. I just can’t ask.

‘I’m losing faith in men,’ I say instead. ‘You make it all sound extremely bleak.’

‘Oh, Stell, I didn’t mean to. It’s just I’m supposed to be giving you a pulling lesson, and you asked. Come on, let’s go. We’re off to Shoreditch – we can walk.’

The party we’re at is to honour a tralala new art gallery. Predictably enough, this consists of a huge white ‘space’ dotted about with funny little installations of giant latex insects encased in glass. It’s incredibly noisy as we walk in: chatter, but also the kind of ultra-loud pounding, lyric-less
music that gives me an instant headache. The canapiés are all black: tiny parcels of squid ink pasta sprinkled with faux-caviare, pumpernickel with some kind of black butter and shavings of black truffle, black cherry tartlets in chocolate pastry. These latter are rather delicious. To drink, there are coffee-liqueur-based cocktails.

‘Well, this is a blast from the past,’ I tell Frank, who is steering me through the crowds with his hand on the small of my back. ‘All we’re missing is Dominic.’

‘We won’t stay long,’ Frank says as a statuesque blonde shriekingly descends upon him. I take a few steps back, pretending to be interested in a massive pair of latex earwigs by my feet (titled, clunkingly and incorrectly,
Insexicide
). When I look up again, much to my dismay, Frank is talking to a brunette with such an effective pushup bra that her breasts rest crazily plumply just beneath her collar bones. I try and catch Frank’s eye and fail, so I wander off on my own for a while. Inevitably, given the nature of the party, I bump into six of Dominic’s friends in quick succession, including one of the married artists who lunged at me over lunch some months ago. He’s here with his wife, who doesn’t look entirely delighted to see me. Look, I want to say, your husband is physically repulsive. Just because you’re grateful to have him doesn’t mean every single woman in London is desperate to bed him. He’s bald. He has a paunch. He also, I happen to know, has advanced halitosis. So, you know, drop the daggers and look at me normally. You can keep him.

Instead, I say, ‘Hello, Sarah. How nice to see you.’

‘You remember Stella,’ the husband says. ‘Used to be with Dominic.’

‘Yeah,’ Sarah says unenthusiastically, draping an ostentatious arm around her husband’s sprawling waist.

‘We spent the weekend with them once, do you remember?’ the husband says. ‘In Prague.’

‘Not really,’ says Sarah, now stroking the husband’s jowls while maintaining eye contact with me.

‘Never mind,’ I say. What’s up with these women? Why do they all seem to believe that given half a chance I’d fuck their horrible husbands’ brains out on the spot? ‘Nice to see you again. I must find my friend,’ I mutter, peeling off.

‘That should have given her the message,’ I hear Sarah saying to her husband. ‘I can’t believe she tried it on with you.’

‘She’s just lonely,’ he says, loudly and with considerable effrontery, considering
he
asked me out for lunch and
he
lunged. Men are so pathetic, I tell myself as I stomp around the room crossly, and so are women, always willing to apportion blame to others of their sex.
God
. Still, I’m clearly evolving as a person now I have a social life: three months ago, I’d have turned back and given Sarah a piece of my mind.

Instead, I head for the back of the room, where there’s less of a crush, and am surprised to find myself face to face with the person responsible for the terrible din: Yungsta himself, resplendent in yellow track suit and bling-bling jewellery.

‘Oh,’ I say. ‘How extraordinary. Hello! I’m Stella – we met the other day …’

‘Yeah, yeah, I remember,’ says Yungsta.

‘You’re doing the music?’

‘Thass righ.’ He gestures to some turntables, currently being manned by a mini-me version of Yungsta, also
wearing a track suit. ‘I was gonna ring you.’ He mimes this, extending his thumb and little finger into an imaginary earpiece.

‘Do,’ I say, smiling my best smile. ‘That would be nice.’

‘Get together, yeah? Dinner or summink, yeah?’

‘Sure.’

‘I need to get back to me decks,’ he says apologetically. ‘But whatchou doin’ later?’

‘I’m with a friend, actually – I think we’re going on somewhere.’

‘I’m DJin’ in King’s Cross from about midnigh,’ he says, handing me a couple of comps. ‘If you fancy it. Come an say ello.’

‘OK. And if not, we’ll speak.’

‘Deffo,’ says Yungsta, nodding like a dog – what is he now? From Liverpool? ‘For sure. Dope.’

I make my way back towards the centre of the room again, past all the you-remember-Stella-she-was-with-Dominics, looking for Frank. When I find him, he is, surreally, speaking with the father of my child: there’s Dominic himself, looking slightly rumpled, holding court. I am briefly extremely depressed at the smallness of my world. And then I am lengthily quite seriously pissed off. Why didn’t he say he was coming? One tiny phone call wouldn’t have gone amiss. What about Honey? She sees her father rarely enough as it is – what if we’d been away?

‘Good grief! Why aren’t you in Tokyo?’ I say, as soon as I’ve managed to wade and elbow my way through the mini-crowd surrounding him.

‘Stella!’ He detaches himself from the group. T only got in a couple of hours ago. Guy’s an old friend – this is his space. How’s Honey?’

‘She’s fine. She’s lovely.’

‘I’m over for a few days – business. Can I come and see her over the weekend, when I’ve had some sleep?’

‘You might have warned me. You might have rung, Dom. We could have been away somewhere. But yes, come. She’ll be so pleased. You don’t see her nearly often enough.’

‘I’ll see her tomorrow. So what’s up, Stella? You look fabulous. Frank said you were here – speaking of absentee fathers,’ he adds, lowering his voice. ‘Everything OK?’

‘Fine,’ I say. ‘Fine. You?’ There is
one
thing troubling me, but this doesn’t seem like the ideal moment to ask my ex whether I snort when I come.

‘Oh, you know, the usual. Tokyo is wonderful – inspirational. Did you meet Keiko, by the way, the last time I was here?’

‘Yes, very briefly.’

‘She’s sleeping it off at the hotel, but I might bring her along at the weekend.’

‘Sure.’

‘Well, I’m out of here. Can I give you a lift anywhere? I’ve got a driver.’

‘No, actually – me and Frank are on a night out.’

‘Are you two …?’

Oh, not again. ‘No, Dom.’

‘Good. He’s not right for you, Stella. And I know him very well, remember – too well.’ He laughs. Dominic has a really unpleasant streak, I must say. ‘He’s doing brilliantly, of course. But I don’t have you down as a Newcastle Brown Ale drinker.’

I give Dominic a dirty look, which he ignores.

‘Plus,’ he continues, ‘he puts it about a bit. To put it
mildly. And he’s not what you call reliable. As I told you, he has a …’

‘Yes,’ I say. ‘I know. I remember.’

‘Good,’ repeats Dominic. ‘Bear it in mind.’

Frank makes his way back towards us. ‘Don’t tell him I told you, will you?’ whispers Dominic. ‘Client confidentiality and all that. And anyway, better not to raise the subject with him, I’d have thought.’

‘Thank you for your kind advice.’

‘You’re very welcome,’ says impervious Dominic. ‘Anyway, look, I’ll ring in the morning. Maybe we could all have lunch or something. Great seeing you.’

‘And you. Speak to you tomorrow.’

Dominic leaves.

‘Enough?’ whispers Frank in my ear.

I notice the woman with the push-up bra noticing this, and I also notice that she doesn’t like it.

‘Yes. Let’s go. Where are we off to next, and will there be food? I’m starving.’

‘Didn’t you eat anything?’

‘Only a couple of those cherry tarts. Out of vanity rather than reluctance – the other stuff would have given me black teeth. Stupid sort of food to serve at a party.’

‘I’m quite hungry too, come to think of it. Do you fancy a curry? We’re just round the corner from Brick Lane.’

‘Oh, Frank, what a genius idea. Yes,
please
.’

He looks at his watch. ‘It’s half past ten. We could get something to eat and then on to the party.’

‘Perfect.’

Half an hour later and we’re sitting cosily in the fuggy,
flocked haze of the Star of India, a magnificent pile of poppadums rising between us.

‘Do you enjoy those dos?’ I ask Frank. ‘Don’t you ever get bored of them? God knows I used to.’

‘Yeah, they begin to grind after a while. But then,’ he shrugs, dipping a corner of poppadum into some coriander and yoghurt chutney, ‘that’s true of all parties. There comes a point where you’d rather be at home.’

‘With your pipe and slippers and your Airfix kit. I believe you. Could you slow down with those poppadums please, pig? I want at least three.’

‘We’ll get some more. And you’re in no position to call anyone “pig”.’

I actually feel myself blushing at this.

He gives a wry smile and pushes the last poppadum my way. ‘Sorry, babe.’ He emits a tiny, barely audible snort, so I kick his shins under the table.

‘Do you ever miss Dominic?’ he asks, fiddling in his pockets for a lighter.

‘No. Why, should I?’

‘I don’t know. People do, don’t they?’

‘Well, I don’t. Do you ever miss your shags? Come to think of it, have you ever had a relationship that lasted more than an hour?’

‘It’s been known. What are you eating?’

‘It hasn’t been known while you’ve been living with me. What’s that about? Traumatic early relationship that broke up? Teenage sweetheart? Are you trying to fuck someone out of your system?’

‘No,’ Frank says, laughing. ‘Sorry. I’m thirty-five, not twenty.’

‘Have you had your teeth capped? They’re very neat.
I’m having the chicken tikka masala, one paratha, one plain yoghurt, pilau rice, one sag bhaji, and perhaps you’d like to share some spicy potatoes? Will you remember my order? I’m dying for a pee.’

‘Off you go, Dr Freud,’ says Frank. ‘What do you want to drink? Another beer?’

‘Please.’

When I come back from the loo, and from ringing Papa to check on Honey, who is up and watching
Bear in the Big Blue House
, Frank is leaning back in his chair, chatting to a couple of women at the table behind ours. They’re doing that giggly, eyelash-batting thing that women do when they fancy a man.

I sit down again.

‘See you,’ Frank tells the women, before turning his back on them. ‘I’ve ordered. Where were we?’ he says to me.

‘I was asking you about normal relationships. You know, anything more than ships in the night.’

‘And I was telling you I’ve had them.’

‘Who with?’

‘Girlfriends, Stella. There were a few long-term ones. Went out with someone for three years, actually’

‘Who was she?’ My heart is banging in my chest: here we go.

‘Local girl, up north.’

I say nothing. Neither does he.

‘Come on, Frank. And?’

‘And we went out for three years,’ he says in a patient-but-bored voice, ‘and it wasn’t really going anywhere, so we split up.’

‘And how did she take it?’

‘Not especially well. You don’t, though, as a rule, when you’re dumped.’

‘No. So …’ I brace myself by taking a sip of beer. ‘Are you still in touch?’

‘With Karen? No.’

‘Why not?’

‘What’s this?’ Frank laughs easily. ‘The Spanish Inquisition? Do you keep in touch with your old boyfriends?’

‘Yes, pretty much.’

‘What, all of them?’

‘No,’ I am forced to admit. ‘But
most
of them.’

‘I guess we just sorta drifted apart,’ he says in a corny American voice. ‘Next subject.’

Why can I never get him to talk about this?

‘What will happen, do you think?’

‘Happen where?’

‘To you. What’s your plan? Do you want to, you know, settle down?’

‘With my pipe and slippers and my Airfix kit?’

‘Yes.’

‘Eventually. But there’s plenty of time.’

‘Can I ask you something really old-fashioned, Frankie?’

‘Ask away.’

‘Do you ever feel that your life – your sex life, I mean – is sort of
empty
? You know, kind of unlovely.’

‘Unlovely?’

‘Yes.’

‘No. I don’t like living with people.’

‘But you live with me.’

‘But I don’t sleep with you. Cheers,’ he says to the waiter as our food arrives. ‘I hate,’ he continues, ‘all that moaning and whingeing and bickering you get after a while.’

So he
has
lived with people.

‘Perhaps you hate women,’ I point out through a mouthful of spinach. ‘Perhaps you’re gay.’

‘I’ve slept with a couple of blokes in the past, when I was at art college, but it wasn’t really my bag,’ Frank shrugs modernly. ‘I prefer women.’

‘But not to talk to or live a normal life with.’

‘I’m talking to you, aren’t I? Live with you, don’t I?’

‘Not the same thing.’ We munch in silence for a while. I know it’s immature, but I have to ask.