The Drought (The hilarious laugh-out loud comedy about dating disasters!) (36 page)

“
What did Dick
say?” I asked. “Is everything okay?”

“
He just
wanted to make sure I was okay and feeling better,” Kelly said
sitting down. “He also asked me what you were wearing today.” I
looked around the office and could see Dick peering out of the
glass panel on his door. He waved and I quickly looked away like I
hadn’t noticed.

“
Look Kelly,
I’m really sorry about the other night. I don’t know
what...”

“
Dan, I need
to tell you something,” Kelly interrupted.

I guess this was the part where
she was going to tell me how disappointed she was with me; that I
had let her down. I just hoped she would let me explain. Allow me
to somehow make this up to her. It was a terrible mistake and it
would never again. If only she would listen to me we could go back
to how things were before.

“
I have just
handed in my notice.”

Chapter 23:
Jack Hammered

Friday, September 11, 2009 -
8.11pm

Drought Clock: 253 days, 19
hours, 16 minutes

Four weeks had passed since
Kelly had dropped her bombshell that she was leaving. We had
started talking again, but something had changed. We no longer had
that natural easy back-and-forth chemistry. And I knew it was my
fault.

I sat back in my armchair at my
flat feeling pretty sorry for myself. Kelly’s resignation had
knocked me for six. My head was all over the place.

During the two days she had
spent out of the office, she had booked a flight to Thailand with
her friend Claire. They were going to start in Southeast Asia and
then spend the next 12 months travelling around the world. I should
have been happy for her but instead all it did was cement how I
really felt for her and it left me feeling empty.

“
Snap out of
it,” Jack said, handing me a beer. “What’s wrong with
you?”

“
Are you still
thinking about Kelly?” Rob asked.

“
No, I’m
not
thinking
about Kelly,” I lied.

“
Why don’t you
just tell her how you feel? She is leaving soon isn’t she?” Rob
said.

“
She leaves on
Monday,” I said. “But what difference does that make?”

“
You could get
a goodbye shag,” Ollie said.

“
I don’t want
a goodbye shag,” I snapped.

“
Again, I will
ask – what is
wrong
with you?” Jack said.

“
She is
leaving and that’s that. There is more chance of me running naked
through the streets of London than there is of me getting together
with Kelly,” I said, hoping to put an end to the
conversation.

“
I’m going to
hold you to that,” Rob said. “That is as good as a promise in my
book.”

“
Fine,” I
replied unconcerned.

As for my big problem? Well,
that didn’t seem so big anymore. So I had gone eight months without
sex. So what? The world hadn’t stopped turning. There were bigger
things in my life to worry about other than sex.

“
Right, drink
up because we need to get this man some action before it falls
off.” Unfortunately Jack didn’t share my newfound
sentiments.

The plan tonight was to go to a
house party on the Ramsgate Estate. Jack considered going to a
party where there was a bedroom just up a flight of stairs to be
the ideal place to find me a shag buddy. I couldn't care less
anymore about getting my leg over, but I had decided to go along
just to get my mind off Kelly more than anything else. The Ramsgate
Estate was not the nicest of locations in south London, and the
prospect of the type of girls I might meet there frightened me more
than excited me.

We left the flat and jumped on
to a bus. The other lads were all in good spirits and I pretended
to join in with the banter. I couldn’t help but think the sooner
Kelly left, the better I would feel. Out of sight, out of mind. She
had a leaving do planned for tomorrow night, but I had already said
my goodbyes in the office. I had seen the disappointment in her
eyes when I told her I was unable to make drinks, but I felt it was
for the best. There was no point dragging these things out.

The bus pulled up outside the
Ramsgate Estate and we jumped off. “Okay, this is it, boys,” Jack
said. “Now this place can get a little bit naughty, if you know
what I mean? So make sure you keep your wits about you.”

“
Are you
talking about the girls at the party?” Ollie said
wide-eyed.

“
No, you
idiot. I’m talking about the gangs of kids roaming around waiting
to rob the first big gormless freak they lay their eyes
on.”

“
Come on,” Rob
said. “Let’s not hang around here.”

We marched through the estate.
Jack guided us around to the right, past some wino sprawled out on
a park bench. We spotted a bunch of hoodies standing around by a
fence in the distance and opted for a route around the back. It was
after about 15 minutes when it finally dawned on us.

“
You haven’t
got a clue where we’re going have you?” I said to Jack.

“
I know it’s
around here somewhere,” Jack said, hands on his hips.

“
This is
stupid,” Rob said frustrated. “I thought you knew where this place
was.”

“
I do,” Jack
said. “It’s over there somewhere,” he said pointing in a
south-westerly direction. We all looked blankly at him.

“
That’s him!”
We heard a girl’s voice shout from the distance. We all turned to
see the girl Jack had met at Paul’s birthday party.

“
What a stroke
of luck,” Jack said to us before turning back towards the girl with
a cheeky grin. “How’s it going, Candice?”

“
That’s the
one who gave me chlamydia,” Candice announced to the group of
hoodies who were now slowly starting to advance on us.

“
Did she say
chlamydia?” Jack said.

“
Jack, what
the fuck have you done?” Rob asked.

“
Run!” I
screamed.

We took off at a 100 miles per
hour. Fear can make a man do amazing things. I had always thought
we would clean up at the Olympics if we had a pack of wild dogs in
hot pursuit of our track athletes.

The hoodies were hot on our
tails as we zoomed through the park. We leapt over a set of metal
railings, but Ollie got his foot caught and went down before I
dragged him to his feet screaming “Get up!” like in one of those
clichéd scenes from a horror film. We bolted across the forecourts
of one of the high-rise towers and took a sharp left.

“
This way,”
Jack shouted and we followed him to the right down a short
road.

“
This is a
dead end,” Rob hissed.

We quickly turned, but it was
too late. The group of hoodies stood not 20 feet away. My pulse was
racing. We were trapped. They gathered in numbers as though they
had picked up other gang members along the way. There must have
been 25 of them at least, of all different shapes and sizes. I'm
sure one of them looked no more than eight-years-old. What a way to
go, beaten to death by a minor.

We were in the deepest of deep
shite. There was no way we were coming out of this unscathed. There
have been very few moments in life when I was genuinely scared.
Being attacked by Sophie was one of them, running from Dave would
be another, but this topped them all. We were in a bad part of town
and we were well out of our depth.

“
You got a lot
of nerve showing up round here, blood,” one of the hoodies said in
that strange accent many inner city kids seemed to have developed.
“You think youse can show your face round here after what you did
to my little sister.”

“
Great,” I
whispered to Jack. “You had to go and infect the little sister of
the Blazin’ Squad over here. If we ever get out of this
alive,
I’m
going
to kill you.”

“
I’m talking
to you!” the hoodie shouted. “I’m gonna cut you blood, you get
me?”

This was it. My mouth was dry
and I felt sick to the pit of my stomach. Too often I’d picked up
the local newspaper to read of yet another senseless knife or gun
attack in London. I gulped and prayed that once the dust had
settled we would at least be able to walk away in one piece. But
something inside me knew that wasn't going to happen. The stories
and rumours about this estate were infamous. The look in their eyes
told us that we were dealing with a class of people with no morals.
True, we were hardly in a position to talk about morality seeing as
one member of our gang had given a member of their gang chlamydia,
but surely that didn't warrant a death sentence.

Then something happened that I
will never forget.

“
Okay mate,”
Ollie said stepping out. We all looked at him in disbelief. “This
is the situation. I know that you boys are going to do some serious
damage to us, and probably put us in the hospital.”

“
That’s right,
blood,” the hoodie said much to the delight of his fellow
cronies.

“
But you,”
Ollie said in his big booming voice pointing at the one hoodie who
had been making all the noise. “I promise that you will be in the
hospital bed right next to me. Let’s do this.”

You could have cut the tension
with a knife. My only hope was that no one actually had a knife to
test that theory out. The hoodie looked at his friends and then
back at Ollie. He paused. “Why me, blood?” he asked nervously.

“
Because you
are the one with the big mouth,” Ollie said without even flinching.
“Now come on, let’s get this over with.”

The hoodie stared at us. I
stepped up alongside Ollie, closely followed by Jack and Rob. Every
muscle in my body felt like jelly and it took a superhuman effort
not to empty my bowels right there and then.

After what seemed a lifetime,
but was probably only ten seconds, the stand-off finally came to
end. “You boys are soft,” the hoodie said. “You ain’t even worth my
time.” And with that the hoodie slowly stepped back before walking
off altogether. One by one his friends followed until we were left
standing alone in the alley.

“
Oh... my...
fucking... God!” Jack shouted, grabbing Ollie by the ears and
planting a big kiss of his lips. “I love you! I would have your
babies right now.”

“
Get off,”
Ollie shrugged Jack off and wiped his mouth. “You'll end up giving
me chlamydia too.”

“
Let’s get the
hell out of here before they change their minds,” Rob said, and we
took off into the night and didn’t once look back.

*

Saturday was a complete
wash-out. Rob was working, Jack was at the clinic getting tested
for chlamydia, and Ollie was playing rugby.

The most exciting thing I had
to look forward to today was shaving my pubic hair. I had once
again decided against my better judgement to listen to Jack’s
advice. He had insisted that girls liked it when men “shaved their
bits.” He also promised me it made your penis look much bigger.

Boredom had got the better of
me, and now here I was standing in front of the mirror, using a
pair of clippers to give myself a short back and sides. I had to
admit that it didn’t look too bad. But as I moved in to apply the
finishing touches my phone buzzed into life, completely taking me
by surprise and causing me to shave a huge bald patch across one
half of my pubic region.

“
Arrggh,” was
the only noise I could manage to express my horror looking down at
my... skin head.

“
Hello,” I
said abruptly.

“
Danny boy,
it’s Rob. Everything okay?”

“
Yeah,” I said
brushing the hair away from my groin. “What’s up?”

“
I’ve been
thinking and I wouldn’t be a mate if I didn’t say this.”

“
Go on,” I
said.

“
If you don’t
go tonight then you are an even bigger idiot than you look,” Rob
said not pulling any punches. “It is clear you really like this
Kelly and if you don’t go tonight, you will regret it.”

“
I don’t need
this,” I said.

“
But
Dan...”

“
I’ll talk to
you later,” and I clicked off the phone.

I was angry. I was more than
angry, I was furious, but not with Rob, with myself. I knew he was
right, but I was just being stubborn.

For the next five hours I could
do nothing but stare at the clock. It was almost as if I was
counting down the hours until Kelly was leaving. It was 9.47pm. I
tried to clear my mind of everything that was spinning around in my
head. I kept thinking of what my mum would say to me if she knew
how I had treated Kelly. And out of nowhere it came to me.

Don’t spend a lifetime looking
for someone you have already found.

It was something my mum had
said to me. At the time I had completely dismissed it. But now it
made sense. And I knew what I had to do.

*

I made it down to The Crown in
Balham in record time. I stood outside the door, catching my breath
and trying to gather my thoughts. I had no idea what I was going to
say. I just knew that when the time came, the right words would
come too.

I took a deep breath and made
my way in. The bar was absolutely rammed, just as you would expect
it to be on a Saturday night. Pushing my way through the crowds I
got about halfway and then I saw her. She looked beautiful. Her
curly hair bounced against her shoulders as she laughed. As usual
she wore very little make-up; she didn’t need to. Her skin was
flawless and her eyes twinkled. I felt a lump in my throat. I knew
instantly I had made the right choice. Here goes nothing I thought
as I started to navigate my way towards her.