Chapter 13
“What can I get you to drink, Lila?
My date looked at me expectantly, his neat dark eyebrows raised in anticipation.
“I’ll have a gin and tonic, please.”
His name was Mervyn. I know, a pretty bad start, as names go. What was even worse was the fact that this Mervyn was forty-one years old. Forty-one, I ask you. That meant that in 1983 his parents must have decided that this particular name would be perfect for their adorable new-born baby boy. The mind boggled. Before tonight, I would have assumed that anyone named Mervyn would have to be pushing at least seventy.
But here I was, Thursday night, out on the town, or at least in a little back street boozer in Headingley, with Mervyn Lewis: 41 years old, 6 foot 2, brown hair, blue eyes, hates cats and works in sales, or at least that was what his profile had stated.
He hadn’t elaborated on what his actual work was. To me “sales” could mean anything from working in Poundland to Columbian drug lord. Let’s hope it was somewhere safely between the two.
Old man name aside, he was rather quite dishy. He was tall, nearly as tall as he had stated; tanned and muscular, dressed in a white linen shirt with enough buttons undone to expose a smooth toned chest. His long legs were clad in tight-fitting denim that hugged his bum extremely well. And as long as that wasn’t a couple of pairs of socks stuffed down the front, it might turn out to be my very lucky night.
He had an air of Jonny Depp about him. And that was never a bad thing. All tousled shoulder-length hair and straight white teeth. OK, the teeth weren’t particularly Jonny, probably expensive veneers, but overall Mervyn was quite magnificent.
He had ordered a bottle of lager for himself. That was a definite tick in his plus column. Nobody wanted to be on a date with the guy who ordered a colourful drink with a cocktail cherry in it: rather like a Yorkshire-based Del Boy supping at The Nag’s Head.
We took our drinks and found an intimate little table to occupy, safely away from the other customers and the lavatories.
“So, Meryvn, you say you work in sales?”
I always found a bit of work small talk was a good icebreaker.
He took a long swig of his beer and sighed contentedly.
“Yeah, that’s right. I do a bit of this and a bit of that. Wheeler dealing, you know?”
He shrugged non-committally.
“I also like to dabble in the stock market, when I get a chance.”
Even without the lurid drink, he really was beginning to sound a lot like Del Boy.
I took a small sip of my drink, thankful he had ordered me a double. It had been a while since I had been out on a first date, and I was feeling somewhat nervous. Which was odd for me, as I was normally super-confident on dates.
I knew I was looking good. I was certainly bringing my A game, wearing my crimson bodycon dress that cinched in in all the right places. I was a walking rhapsody in red. And teamed with subtle make-up and killer heels, there was no doubt I looked hot to trot.
I’d seen him check my pins out whilst I sat down at the table, carefully hitching my skirt up ever so slightly to showcase my long, tanned legs.
“I love your shoes.”
He cast his eyes appreciatively over my legs and down to my footwear.
“Very sexy. How high are those heels?”
“Six inches.”
“Wow, that’s big.”
I bit my tongue. I was not going to comment. If I blurted out that I didn’t consider six inches to be that big, it might very well have killed the conversation stone dead.
“Are they really difficult to walk in?”
“They’re not the easiest, but sometimes it’s worth the effort. And you know what they say: the higher the heels, the closer you are to heaven.”
I gave him my most angelic smile.
He smiled back at me with a little twinkle in his eyes.
“What size feet do you have? You look like you’d have really dainty ones.”
“Seven and a half.”
He was nodding his head thoughtfully and let out a little whistle.
“That’s quite big for a woman. Even though I’m tall, I’ve got quite small feet for a man.”
Well, I hoped that wasn’t an indication of the size of other things; but then again, the bulge in his pants was telling a very different story.
The evening was moving along pleasantly enough. We’d covered all the small talk bases: families, hobbies, holidays we’d been on, holidays we hoped to go on, that sort of thing. Thankfully nothing was concerning me; there were no discernible red flags that would have me running for the hills.
Before coming out, I had of course had a quick Google of him. It was the sensible thing to do. And fortunately, that hadn’t thrown up any nasty surprises. So, so far so good.
He had already made me aware that he liked to work out every day and lift heavy weights. He said it was good for his stamina. Ding dong! I liked the sound of that.
I nodded in agreement and informed him, in what I hoped was my most flirtatious tone, that I was a great advocate of daily exercise. My first white lie of the evening. In theory I loved the idea of daily sessions at the gym, but in reality there was always something else I would much rather be doing. Like cleaning out the fluff drawer on the tumble dryer. Genetically I had been blessed with a slim figure, without ever having to put in much effort on my part. It was the only thing I was thankful to my mother for; well, that and the ability to render an opponent dumbstruck and cowering with a perfectly timed withering put-down.
I wasn’t going to admit to Mervyn that my fitness levels were rather below par. And in fact, last week I had pulled a muscle in my neck whilst opening a jar of olives for my martini.
And never mind the fact that I’m sure all that swiping right the previous night on Tinder had given me a little rheumatism in my index finger.
I could feel the gin rushing straight to my head. My stomach gurgled to remind me I needed some food in my system to mop up all the booze.
I had spent such an age shimmying into my new dress that I hadn’t had time to get some food down before bolting out of the door to meet him. When we had arranged our date, nothing had been mentioned about food, but I was going to need something to nibble on. And maybe later on too, if things went to plan.
“Are you hungry, Mervyn?”
“I could eat.”
He glanced around the bar area, trying to locate a menu.
“I think they may have some bar snacks on, you know, like little Yorkshire-style tapas dishes.”
Yorkshire tapas. That didn’t sound yummy to me in the slightest, in fact it sounded decidedly yucky.
“OK, surprise me.”
My voice was a silken purr and I raised one eyebrow suggestively.
“Oh, don’t you worry, you’ll be getting lots of surprises with me.”
He matched my tone with a seductive growl of his own, which made my tummy do a little somersault that wasn’t due to my hunger. It had been a couple of months since I’d had any action in the boudoir, and my lady regions were waking up from their hibernation.
He marched off towards the bar. All hunter?gatherer vibe. Within a few minutes he was back.
“It’s sorted, I’ve ordered us three dishes; there was a 3 for ￡15 special on.”
Last of the big spenders. Be still, my beating heart.
“I got us the mushy pea croquettes, mini Yorkshire puddings with gravy and snack-size pork pies with brown sauce for dipping.”
Blimey, Gordon Ramsay had nothing to worry about here. I couldn’t help but wonder what Seb and Jocasta would be eating for their dinner later. Would they be munching on mini beige foodstuffs too? Or perhaps something more intimate? Images of decadent chocolate mousse with only one spoon, or shared spaghetti à la The Lady and the Tramp flooded my mind.
The food was delivered to our table within ten minutes. Just long enough to pull it out of the bottom of the freezer and whack it in the microwave for the requisite eight minutes. It was served on one big oval platter garnished with a few tired-looking lettuce leaves and a mound of grated carrot. It was not a thing of beauty.
The surly barman literally dumped it on our table scattering some carrot in the process.
“Dig in while it’s hot.”
So, I did. And he was right, it was hot, and not just a little bit hot either. Oh no, my gob was on fire and not with witty repartee this time.
The roof of my mouth was literally peeling away against the furnace of heat from the boiling bar snacks. My eyes watered and I took a huge swig of my gin in an attempt to extinguish the fire. I gulped down half the glass for good measure, and it was a good measure, a generous double. If I didn’t slow down soon, the alcohol was going to have me on my back, and not in the way I wanted.
“Maybe would have been best if you’d blown on it first.”
He blew on his own croquette for a few seconds before taking a tentative bite. Clearly, he was as unsure of the gastronomical delights as I was.
If I hadn’t been in physical pain from my burning mouth, I would have shot back with a witty quip about my skills at blowing. But I just nodded at him wanly. The stinging in my mouth sadly saved him from my rapier-sharp wit.
A few minutes passed and I felt recovered enough to attempt one of the mini pork pies, delicately dipping it into the ramekin of viscous brown sauce. Seductively I licked the sauce from around the edge of the crust.
Mervyn looked delighted by this display.
“Don’t want it to drip.”
My voice was laced with so much simpering I would have given Jocasta a run for her money.
“I just love a bit of sauce. Mervyn.”
“I bet you do, you saucy minx. Anyway, in that outfit you’re the one that’s definitely bringing all the sauce tonight.”
“Why thank you, kind sir.”
Oh dear, this was all getting a little Carry On film for my liking. Ooh err, Matron, if you know what I mean?
Mervyn was giving me the once-over with hungry eyes, and he was eating me up with far more enthusiasm than he was showing the mushy pea croquettes.
I knew I looked good. OK, so my outfit might be a little much for a Thursday night in a half empty pub, where the only other patrons were a table of old men playing dominoes, drinking halves of mild and eating pork scratchings. But I had always lived by the adage of “dress for the job you want” and tonight I was. Or at the very least, dressing for the job Mervyn wanted.
He was still gazing at me and seemed to be suitably impressed.
“I just love the way you look. You’re absolutely gorgeous, but so natural too. If I’m honest, I’ve never been a fan of the ‘fake’ look.”
I smiled to myself at this. Men could just be so gullible at times. They said they hated the “fake” look but believe me I was very far from natural. From my fake eyelashes to my highlighted roots, I was simply an illusion; my Wonderbra and Spanx just part of my armoury in the fight against the ordinary.
And as for my make-up, did he really believe my eyelids were this natural sparkly shade of gold? Or that my lips were naturally this glossy red?
It was fair to say that Mervyn wasn’t the brightest crayon in the box, but he did possess other attributes that more than made up for it. And I wasn’t looking for a life partner, after all. I just wanted to live my life and have a bit of fun while I went about it.
The rest of the evening passed in a splendid blur, not surprising really considering the amount of gin I’d guzzled.
The surly barman had to ring the bell for last orders twice while Mervyn was helping me into my leather jacket, or at least trying to as I seemed unable to get my arm through the sleeve successfully. Then he asked the question I’d been waiting to hear: Did I want to go back to his place for a coffee?
Apparently, he only lived around the corner, and it would be an ideal location for ordering me an Uber back to mine. I paused for a moment or two to consider my options. I didn’t want to appear too keen, but why the hell not? I fancied him, he was nice, not nice enough that I was in danger of losing my heart, but good company nonetheless.
If I was honest, I didn’t want to go home alone tonight. Normally, it wouldn’t have bothered me in the slightest. But I had enjoyed the night, enjoyed being out, and enjoyed the attention from a handsome man and I didn’t want the evening to end. So in for a penny in for a pounding, with a bit of luck.
The thought of being curled up alone on the sofa with a crime documentary and a chilled chardonnay just wasn’t cutting it tonight. No, tonight I needed company. Seb had Jocasta and I had Mervyn. And that was that. I was absolutely fine with my choice.
He had been right about the distance. It was just a quick brisk stroll from the pub to the flat where he lived, an imposing Georgian stone building on an attractive sweeping avenue. The property was divided into four flats, with him on the ground floor.
He ushered me through the rather scruffy entrance hall, past the chipped skirting boards and piles of takeaway fliers, to his front door. It took him a couple of attempts to get his key successfully turned in the lock. I hoped this wasn’t an omen for the rest of the night. He had to be just as tipsy as I was.
Once inside, I was pleasantly surprised. I knew he’d claimed to be single and live alone, but you never did know if that was the truth. But a quick surreptitious inspection seemed to confirm that was in indeed the case.
There were no obvious signs of a significant other anywhere. No romantic framed photographs or love tokens dotted around that I could see. I’d excused myself to freshen up, and his bathroom cabinet was bereft of any lady items: no tampons, lotions or potions to give him away. Just a sad-looking can of Lynx, some shaving stuff, paracetamols and a solitary toothbrush in a mug. So, all seemed to be in order.
I returned to the lounge post-inspection and made myself comfortable on his lumpy brown leather sofa, happy to observe that it was suitably free of scatter cushions ? another sign there was no lady on the scene, and he was indeed single.
“Would you like a brandy as well as the coffee?”
He questioned from the kitchen, his voice muffled as he rooted nosily round in his cupboards.
“Yes please.”
It was Friday tomorrow, so why the hell not? OK, maybe not technically the weekend, but everyone knew that a minute past Friday lunchtime was just a downward descent to the weekend anyway. Friday afternoons in my experience were always a bit of a write-off.
I heard him instruct Alexa on what music to play. Suddenly the room filled with the dulcet tones of the walrus of love himself, Mr Barry White. It was pretty obvious what Mervyn had in mind by playing this music, but I suppose it could have been worse: he could have whacked on a bit of the Vengaboys or something equally cheesy, and then I wouldn’t have had a clue if it was seduction or a skip around the shagpile he was after
He was suddenly beside me, passing me a piping cup of coffee and shooting me an equally steamy look. I thanked him as he placed a short-stemmed glass generously filled with cognac on the nest of tables beside me. As he reached over, his lips trailed butterfly kisses across my cheek. A tingle shot through my body, prompting an electric shock to my nether regions. That was certainly a jump-start all right.
And then we kissed. And it was lovely. He was an excellent kisser: just the right amount of pressure and not too much tongue for a first encounter.
I had learnt by my age that most men in their thirties and beyond had learnt the subtle art of kissing. Probably coached in canoodling by dissatisfied former girlfriends. The days of teenage testosterone and tongue sandwiches were long gone, thank goodness.
He pulled me to my feet, almost spilling my coffee in the process. Ooh, he was masterful. And before I knew it his hands were running up and down the length of my body, locating the concealed zip on my dress. With one fluid motion it was down, and the dress fell effortlessly to the floor in a silken satin heap.
I was now standing before him resplendent in only my matching satin bra and panties and my high heels. His eyes feasted over every inch of my near naked body as if he was ravenous. His hands ran over my breasts encased in their satin cups.
His voice was deep with desire.
“Exquisite, simply exquisite.”
We continued kissing, my hands finding the few remaining unopened buttons on his shirt and quickly rectifying that. Within a couple of seconds it hung loose, showcasing his muscular chest and well-defined abs.
He looked so delicious, he simply had to be fattening.
Before I knew what was happening, he had kicked off his jeans. He had dressed ready for action, as beneath the denim he was going commando, his soldier standing to attention and proudly saluting me. I was glad to see there were no socks in sight, on his feet or otherwise.
This was turning out to be an incredibly erotic night. I was glad I had decided to dip my toe back in the dating scene again. This was beating Netflix and n’er do well criminals any day of the week.
And then, like a scene plucked straight from a romantic movie, he swept me up into his arms as if I weighed as little as a feather, which certainly wasn’t the case, and carried me effortlessly to his bedroom, kissing me as he went. I had the distinct feeling this was going to be the best night of my life.
As it turned out, it wasn’t the best night of my life; but then again, it wasn’t the worst either.
In the grainy light of early morning, things appeared a little less seductively sepia-tinged than they had previously. Less Dirty Dancing and more dirty duvet, if you know what I mean.
I blinked against the semi-darkness, trying to refocus my eyes. As his room became clearer, I nearly snapped them closed again, wishing to return to the halcyon memories of the previous night.
There was a major disconnect to what I had experienced last night as to what I was encountering now.
His bachelor pad, which had looked so masculine chic previously the soft glow of candlelight, now had a distinct air of neglect about it. His bedroom’s muted brown and cream shades, which had looked so chocolatey chic under the influence of gin and gentle lighting, now had a grottiness to them which was rather less than appealing.
There were piles of clothes heaped in the corners that could have been clean or in need of a whirl in the washing machine it was impossible to tell. Like a teenager he appeared to favour the ‘floordrobe’ rather than actually hanging his clothes up.
I slowly drew myself up into a sitting position, conscious of being naked beneath the bedding. I could hear the excited chatter of young children outside the bedroom window, making their way to school. Bloody hell, what time was it? I really needed to get myself to work.
My head was fuzzy, like a mist of fog had settled in my brain. I gave it a little shake to try and clear it. That did nothing but make me feel a bit queasy and likely to throw up my Yorkshire tapas from the previous night. They hadn’t been too appetising going down, so I could only imagine what they would be like coming back up all over his pillowcases.
If I was brutally honest ? and considering how brutal my hangover was, that was the best policy ? the sex had been satisfactory at best. A definite 7⒈／⒉ out of ten. Not amazing, but not atrocious either. It had been mildly diverting, and considering the amount of gin I had sunk, I knew that achieving the Big O was highly optimistic, if not mission impossible.
But overall, it had been adequate. A solid enough performance. I wasn’t over the moon that he had referred to my boobs as “honkers” or his penis as “the ham candle”, but I suppose nobody’s perfect.
But talking of my less than perfect man, where was he? I really needed to be getting going, but I didn’t want to dress and desert him without a single word. I was nothing if not polite.
A few laboured grunts alerted me to his location. He was quite clearly in the bathroom. I heard the distinct plop of poo hitting porcelain.
“Mervyn?”
“Lila, I’ll be out in a minute. I just had to nip one off. It’s all that beige food we had last night. It’s playing havoc with my bowels. I don’t know what I was thinking. I normally only eat clean, and my system is revolting against all those processed foods.”
He was right. Something was certainly revolting, and that was the smell emanating from below the bathroom door. If his aura had a colour this morning, it would be toxic waste green.
I prided myself of having a robust constitution, but that smell was enough to knock me sick.
I took a quick gander at his bedroom again. He might like to eat clean, but that’s as far as it went. I dreaded to think when he had last given the room a good wipe down with a cloth. I was sure the only Mr Muscle that had been in this room was his good self in his boxer shorts.
“Don’t rush yourself, but I need to be going or I’ll be late for work. Don’t worry, I can give you a call later.”
I was more than happy to skip the small talk and tea this morning. If this bedroom was anything to go by, I wasn’t taking a chance on stopping for breakfast. Last night I would have put money on him being a smoked salmon and champagne sort of guy, but I’d rather changed opinion on that. I think I was more likely to get salmonella than smoked salmon in this gaff.
I jumped out of bed in one graceful movement. Far more graceful than I was feeling, with a grunge band tuning up in my skull.
I had a plan to execute, which was to locate my errant underwear, don my dress and dash straight out of the door. Thankfully I soon found my dress strewn over a tatty armchair in the corner of the room, and my underwear had been kicked across the floor next to it. But where were my shoes? I must have left them in the other room, discarded during the throes of passion.
Worse was still to come. As I grabbed my knickers and was stepping into them, careful not to stagger against the little waves of nausea that kept assaulting me like a slap to the gut, I noticed a scruffy brown something under the corner of the bed base. It looked furry and feral. I recoiled in horror. His room must be even dirtier than I had first thought. It had to be a rat, of all things, with half its body sticking out from the bottom of the unwashed under-sheet.
I screamed: a blood-curdling noise that immediately silenced the children outside the bedroom window. I hated to scream, but I really couldn’t help myself. There was only one thing in life that I was truly scared of (well, two if you included upper arm cellulite), and that was rats.
I didn’t want to go all girly, but that’s exactly what I did. I screamed with as shrill and high-pitched a screech as I once did in primary school when David Johnson called me a “ploppy head” and pulled my pigtails. I just couldn’t take it. Spotting a rodent whilst suffering a raging hangover was enough to finish me off.
I heard Mervyn jump off the toilet with an audible gasp of shock, and without flushing it he dashed to my aid like a defecating defender rushing to his damsel in distress.
“A rat, it’s a rat!”
The scream that came from me was so high and shrieky I barely recognised my own voice,
“You need to get…”
The words instantly died in my mouth as I clapped eyes on Mervyn in all his morning glory.
Rather like his bedroom, my dashing Greek god from the night before was looking somewhat less appealing in the cruel morning light. T
His tanned skin now appeared rather blotchy, like he’d dropped a couple of used teabags on himself. And as my eyes travelled over the rather grubby bedding, I realised that most of his “natural” tan must have come straight out of a bottle and was now staining the sheets like a dirty protest.
This was bad enough, but alas there was much worse still to come.
Mervyn, who had sported such lustrous shining locks the previous night, now appeared to be somewhat receding in the hairline department. And when I say receding, it went back so far that they were probably discussing it on the History channel. And how on earth had he become so follicly challenged in the last eight hours or so? I’d heard of rapid hair loss, but that was taking the biscuit; in fact, the whole bloody bakery.
Apart from a few strands of a comb-over plastered over his pate, Mervyn was as bald as my lady garden was after I had attacked it with my Bic razor in my pre-date preparations.
“My hair!”
He jumped across the room butt-naked, still holding a piece of toilet roll, and grabbed straight for the rat.
I shrieked again in abject terror.
He was on it in a flash, like a pigeon on a chip and wrestled bravely with the rodent, and within a few seconds he was the worthy victor, holding it aloft like a champion fighter showcasing his trophy.
Only it would now appear that it wasn’t in fact a rat. No, it was something far more terrifying. It was his wig. His wig was indeed ratty-looking, but not of the rodent variety after all. My hirsute Jonny Depp was looking far more Danny DeVito with each passing second.
He plopped the brown hairpiece unceremoniously onto his head, where it sat at a bit of an angle like run-over roadkill. It resembled a mangy old housecat stretched out on a radiator.
And rather like a cat, his mouth now appeared to resemble one’s arse. What had happened to his lovely dazzling smile? It was then I noticed his teeth, or should I say lack thereof. His false teeth that had been so realistic and appealing last night were sitting on the bedside cabinet where I had been snoozing obliviously next to them for hours. My Jonny Depp was now morphing into Jonny Vegas, right in front of my very eyes.
But the worst and most unforgivable thing was what he was sporting on his feet. He had squeezed his size 9 trotters into my beautiful red stilettos and was stumbling around the room like a pig in a ginnel. And this hog was hobbling around in four hundred quid’s worth of designer footwear that I was never ever going to wear again.
It wasn’t often I was lost of words, but this had rendered me completely speechless. Coco Chanel was quoted as saying “a woman with good shoes is never ugly.” She may well have been right on that score but unfortunately the same could not be said about men, well this man at the very least.
I had to get out of here, this very second if not sooner.
It knew it was Friday, but was it also the 13th? Because I seriously felt like I was stuck slap bang in the middle of a horror movie.
Of course, I had no choice but to wear my shoes to get home. Much as it pained me to put them on, it had pained Mervyn even more. The look of tangible sorrow on his face as he’d eventually prised them off and returned them to me, the rightful owner, had been bordering on the heartbreaking.
It had taken monumental restraint on my part not to bop him on the beak when I had discovered how badly my beautiful shoes had been stretched out of shape.
It hurt my pride to realise how chuffed I’d been to see Mervyn checking out my shapely legs in the pub, because now I knew he had been eagerly imagining how his own hairy ones would look, resplendent in my sexy slingbacks.
I had physically shuddered as I put them on, still warm from the previous occupant. But I had no intention of walking along the mean streets of Leeds in my bare feet, so I had little choice. Second-hand stilettos were still preferable to my naked toes sliding over an abandoned chip wrapper, or worse.
I managed to order an Uber to pick me up from the end of his street, so as soon as my shoes were firmly on, I was out the door, running like a startled whippet.
There were definitely no “catch up soon” or “we’ll have to do it again” pleasantries coming from my vicinity. Nope, I legged it, slamming the door behind me. The only way I would be seeing Merv the Swerve soon would be in my nightmares.
I quietly endured the Uber journey of shame back to my house, trying my hardest to drown out the cheerful wittering from the driver. As I sat in the back of the vehicle, I felt a million miles away from the confident and chic woman from the night before. Sitting shivering in my short dress and smudged make-up, I felt small and timid and very, very alone; as if my moral compass was dented and my dreams along with it.
I had gone out with such high expectations for my date, and it had ended in complete disaster. A farce of comical proportions. But normally this wouldn’t have brought me down so much. I had always known that Mervyn and I weren’t destined to be soulmates, and even if the date had gone perfectly, we would probably never have met again.
OK, I hadn’t expected what had actually happened, and who would? But the confident me would by now be realising that it would make a great anecdote to tell the girls on our next boozy lunch, and I would already be relegating it to the back of my mind, eager to get on with the rest of my day. But I couldn’t help it: I felt emotionally bruised, and it was a feeling I just wasn’t used to and couldn’t shake off.
And then it hit me like a bolt of lightning. I missed Seb.