It's Got to Be Perfect: the memoirs of a modern-day matchmaker (25 page)

I stood up, eyeing her beige tailored shorts and cream satin shirt. ‘You look amazing,’ I said and opened my arms out to hug her, wondering how she was emerging from her break-up like a butterfly from a cocoon, while I was still crying myself to sleep in Nick’s old t-shirt.

She removed herself from my embrace and looked me up and down as though she were searching for a way to return the compliment.

‘You look,’ she said and paused, ‘black. Why are you wearing black? It’s the middle of summer.’

I shrugged my shoulders.

She shuddered. ‘Anyway, drinks.’ She clicked her fingers at Steve. ‘
Garçon
. Champagne.’

From the expression on his face, it seemed Steve had had enough of Victoria’s finger-clicking. He stomped towards us and slammed an unopened bottle of Moet on the table, followed by an opener.

She smiled a tight smile. ‘You know you can’t spit in it if you don’t take the cork out?’

He glanced back at her. ‘What made you think it was spit?’

She screwed up her face. ‘Vile creature,’ she said.

I picked up the opener.

‘They’re all vile,’ she continued, snatching the opener from me and throwing it to the ground. ‘And stupid. What sort of barman thinks you need an opener for a champagne bottle? Moron.’

She pulled out the cork and let the bubbles gush out.

‘He’s not himself today,’ I said.

‘Oh, why? Has Rapunzel finally realised he isn’t going to rescue her and decided to climb down all by herself?’

I went to pour her some champagne, before realising Steve hadn’t brought any glasses, so instead I just handed her the bottle. After a moment’s consideration, she took a large swig.

‘So what happened with you and Patrick?’ I asked.

She grimaced, as though I had suggested we swap outfits. ‘You mean Ratprick.’

‘Last I heard from him, he was about to propose?’

‘I told him not to bother.’

‘Why would you do that?’

‘If he wasn’t already having an affair, it would have only been a matter of time until he was.’

I frowned. ‘What? Where did you get that idea from?’

She shrugged her shoulders and took another swig from the bottle. ‘All those girls fawning over him. And he loves it, swaggering around like a Men’s Health model.’

‘He is a Men’s Health model.’

She sniffed. ‘That’s not the point.’

‘What is the point?’

‘He’s a flirt.’

‘Doesn’t mean he’s going to cheat on you though.’

‘What would you know?’

I sighed. ‘Maybe the fact that he has repeatedly told me you’re the most amazing woman he’s ever met, that he wants you to be the mother of his children and the fact he spent six months planning a proposal.’

‘Oh I forgot, you’re best buddies and know everything about him.’

‘He’s a client.’

‘So I suppose he’s been asking for matches again?’

I shook my head. ‘He loves you.’

‘You wouldn’t tell me anyway, would you?’

‘Look, do you want me to talk to him?’

She scowled. ‘No. Absolutely not. Why would you want to talk to him?’

‘Because I want to help you.’

‘So are you after him now?’

I laughed. ‘Me? I’m not after anyone. I’m going to make chutney and hoard things.’

‘What?’ She looked at me as though I were losing my mind. I wasn’t about to correct her.

She handed me the champagne bottle, ‘So, you and Nick?’

I nodded, taking a swig.

‘He told me all about it.’

‘You spoke to him?’

‘Yes, we went out for dinner.’

‘Dinner?’ The bottle almost slipped from my grasp.

‘I thought it might cheer him up.’

My eyes narrowed. ‘But you’re
my
friend. If anyone needs a cheer up dinner, it should be me.’

‘You were busy. Anyway, I bumped into him at the gym.’

‘Since when do you go to the gym in Moorgate? You live in Chelsea and you work in Green Park.’

‘I fancied a change.’

I slumped back in my seat while my mind filled with images of Victoria, the gym bunny. Her perfect bottom in Bodycon shorts, her cheerleader ponytail swinging enticingly as she bent over in front of Nick. I felt sick. Sick and panicked that it was real. That I had lost him forever. To a world of beautiful women. Women with perfect bottoms who would love him unconditionally, while enthusiastically renewing insurance policies and actively encouraging social dining at steak houses. Women who would stroke his brow or another unspecified body part while he exorcised the demons from his past relationship:

‘She threw paella at you, you poor thing. You know I would never do that.’

‘So, what did he say? How is he?’ I asked unsure as to whether I wanted to know the answer, to be reminded of his existence beyond me, beyond us.

‘He’s good,’ she said. ‘Job going well.’

My stomach churned, bile rising up into my throat.

She flicked her ponytail. ‘He looked great. Been working out it seems.’

I needed some air.

‘We speak every day.’

I couldn’t breathe. I stood up and leaned against the table, feeling as though the walls of the vaults were closing in on me.

‘He wanted you to have this.’ She handed me an envelope, my name scrawled across the front.

‘I have to go,’ I said, shoving it in my bag, before bolting up the stairs, flinging open the door and then gasping for air.

‘She did
what
?’ Cordelia bellowed down the phone as I paced along Embankment trying to disperse the adrenalin.

‘It could have been innocent.’

‘Yeah, given her track record, totally innocent,’ she said. ‘And what is Nick playing at?’

My mind flicked through its archives retrieving all relevant files: the time Victoria bumped into Nick in her underwear when she’d stayed over, the way she squeezed her boobs together when she leant across the table towards him, how she touched his leg when she talked to him. I remembered finding her behaviour entertaining at the time, but perhaps I’d been naïve. Maybe I should have been less amused and more vigilant.

‘You know the fable about the scorpion and the frog,’ Cordelia said.

‘Yeah, yeah. She’s the scorpion and I’m the frog and I’m going to get stung.’

‘She can’t help it; it’s in her nature.’

‘Or maybe Nick is the frog?’

‘He’s no frog. He knows better than to trust her.’

It might have been the comfort of her voice or the fact I hadn’t seen her in months. Or because I was feeling especially alone but, without any warning, my eyes filled with tears.

‘When are you coming home?’ I asked, rooted to the spot.

She didn’t answer. I leaned against the building next to me and slowly looked up to the sky. A sign creaked on an iron bar above me and when my gaze came back into focus, it was as though the image slotted into my mind like a key into a lock. My gaze widened, taking in the glass front, the oak door. Then my focus shifted to inside the building, beyond the stainless-steel bar, beyond the bamboo screens, to the table. It was the table Nick had led me to four years ago. Our table. The memory seemed to drag me back in time: the taste of the gin and tonics, the saki, his smile, his laughter, the warmth of his hand, the smell of his skin. But, now, as the afternoon sun beat down on my back, another couple sat in our seats. Laughing and joking as though their time would never end.

Eventually she spoke. ‘I’m not,’ she said. ‘I’m not coming home.’

I slid down the glass and onto the pavement.

After a short time had passed, I pulled myself up, dusted myself off and found a pile of change on the pavement beside me.

‘Aren’t you hot in that get up? It’s boiling outside,’ Dr Stud asked when I walked into reception.

‘Bad judgment call this morning,’ I said. ‘Didn’t really think it through.’

Since our first meeting, he’d make an appearance every year or so to discuss his reasons for terminating the most recent of his relationships. Or, more importantly, to redefine his criteria for the next one. Today, though, I wasn’t in the mood to tolerate any of his nonsense.

‘Fancy a beer?’ I asked as we sat down at a table.

While we sipped Coronas, he described his latest break-up and subsequent enlightenment.

‘So, now I’m ready to settle down.’

I sighed. ‘You’ve been saying that for the past four years.’

‘What’s that supposed to mean?’

‘What you say and what you do. They don’t match up.’

‘But it’s different this time. Now I know exactly what I want.’

I took another swig. ‘Okay then, go on.’

‘Did you know I was a bit of an artist in my spare time?’

I shook my head.

‘Well,’ he said and began riffling in a bag he’d brought with him, then handed me a piece of paper. ‘There you go.’

I looked at the sketch: a thick fringe, small nose, rosebud mouth and pointy chin.

‘Emily,’ I said.

‘Who’s Emily?’

‘That,’ I said, pointing at the sketch, ‘is Emily. Have you met her?’

‘I don’t know what you’re on about. This is my perfect woman.’

‘You don’t happen to have a tattoo, do you?’

‘Well, yeah, how did you know?’

That night, slumped on the floor and surrounded by suitcases, I looked at the letter Victoria had given me, at my name scrawled by his hand across the envelope and I wondered what it contained. Was it an apology? An admission of guilt concluding with a Jeremy-style limerick proposal? Or perhaps a legal letter demanding the return of his lemon squeezer which had inadvertently found its way into my suitcase? Or maybe it was a declaration of love for Victoria and her perfect bottom. Maybe they were running off to Spain to be with Cordelia, and to live in a giant commune, or government-funded halfway house for people desperate to escape me. But, whatever it said, I knew I wasn’t ready for the truth just yet, so I tucked it away at the bottom of a drawer, wishing, as I did every night, that I’d wake up in the morning with Nick beside me to discover that it had all just been a terrible, terrible dream.

Chapter Eighteen

‘I thought only gay weddings had ice-cocks,’ Caro leaned forward, stroking the length of the sculpture.

I knocked her hand away. ‘It’s supposed to be a racket and two balls.’

Of all the weddings I had attended, the prospect of William and Mitzi committing to a lifetime together on a tennis court was possibly the oddest setting, although I knew it was entirely perfect for them.

Caro swiped two glasses of champagne from a passing waiter dressed as a ballboy, then handed me one, before downing hers.

‘Yummy,’ she said, her gaze lingering on his buttocks.

We were surrounded by a brilliant white marquee, which was flapping in the summer breeze. Above, the fabric of the ceiling was gathered up to the centre in pleats, looking like a rosette awarded to the triumphant couple. The sides of the marquee were tied to pillars like the curtains of a fourposter bed. A red-carpet runway, lined with the purest of white lilies, led up to a small platform under the scoreboard where the words “William + Mitzi” flashed in yellow lights.

‘Oh, this is so exciting. So wonderful. So lovely, lovely, lovely!’

I recognised Mandi’s voice from the first “lovely” as her chatter resounded around the marquee, harmonising with the violin quartet. The sweetness of her perfume wafted towards me, merging with the scent of the lilies. I turned around to see her twirling on the spot. Wearing a magenta tunic dress with thick pleats around the hem – her homage to the tennis theme – she looked stunning, radiant even. It seemed almost as if she were the bride. She rushed towards me and flung her arms around my neck.

‘Oh Ellie. I’m just, so, so, so…’

‘Excited?’ Caro suggested. ‘Yes we can see that. Would you like some champagne?’

Mandi took the glass Caro handed her. ‘Happy. That’s what I was going to say. I’m just so happy …’ She looked down and then sniffed ‘… for them, at least.’

Clearly sensing the moment was about to degenerate into relationship talk, Caro wandered off, towards the ballboy with the tightest shorts.

I turned to Mandi. ‘You okay?’

She blinked rapidly.

‘Steve?’

Her bottom lip quivered.

I put my arm around her shoulders. ‘Want to talk about it?’

‘No,’ she said, brushing me off.

‘Sure?’

She downed her champagne and handed me the empty glass. ‘We’re worlds apart. It’s for the best.’

Before I had a chance to respond, she had thrust her shoulders back and stormed off towards the red-carpet runway. By the time she had reached the end, her march had softened to a skip. I watched as she gazed at the scoreboard, at William and Mitzi’s names lit up together, as though they were written in the stars and I wished that I, too could still believe.

The sight of a tall, pigeon-toed man tripping up and stumbling towards the champagne fountain interrupted my thoughts. At first, just the one glass toppled over, but then an unfortunate domino effect ensued. It seemed that the more he tried to rectify his blunder the more calamitous it became, finally culminating in a pile of broken glass, a collapsed table and a malfunctioning drinks fountain, spurting champagne into the air like a burst water main.

William’s brother
, I thought. When he tripped over the table for a second time and fell into the ice-sculpture, gripping its girth as though it were a life raft, I began to wonder if we could ever really fight our destiny. Were we all direct products of our genetic coding? Our fates sealed from birth.

The music stopped and a ball boy, perched on an improvised umpire’s seat, began thrashing a cymbal as though he were trying to summon the gods.

‘Ladies and gentleman, please make your way to your seats. The ceremony is about to commence.’

Following a moment’s confusion as to whether we were on the bride or groom’s side, Caro and I, directed by the overzealous ballboy, who had quickly rebranded himself as an usher, moved along a row of white-covered chairs. We sat down directly behind William’s father and brother.

The violinists’ bows bobbed in unison to a gentle rendition of “Here Comes the Bride”. William, standing at the front, clasped his hands together and looked back down the aisle. His gaze darted around until he saw her. His eyes widened and his bottom lip began to tremble. Through her veil, Mitzi looked as delicate as the lilies lining her path, the dress sprouting from her waist like petals from a stigma. Beside her, puffed up with pride, her father tightened his grip and fixed his eyes forward.