Chapter 17
Lottie was good to her word, and within a few minutes she was unsteadily weaving her way back to the table. Like a hunter returning with her spoils, she proudly dumped the snacks down; then expertly mixed our blue cocktails with such finesse, you could have believed she was working in the finest cocktail bar in Monte Carlo.
“The chap at the bar offered to buy these for us; he seems to have taken quite the shine to you.”
Her amusement was evident as I glanced towards the guy who had called me Cruella earlier. He was now standing by the ancient jukebox, struggling to feed his twenty pence piece into the slot. He really wouldn’t be any use to me. Not that I was looking any more anyway; and even if I was, he really wouldn’t have been my type.
Once he finally managed to feed the coin into the music machine and it sprang into life, he also sprang onto the makeshift dance floor: a small area of laminated flooring where he swung his ample derrière in his trackie bottoms to the dulcet tones of the Rolling Stones’ Satisfaction. As the music rang out throughout the bar, he danced, or rather swayed back and forth to his own personal rhythm, with beer spilling from his pint as he did so, much to the barman’s evident displeasure.
Lottie clapped along to the music.
“Oooh, just look, he’s got those moves like Jagger.”
I rolled my eyes theatrically at this.
“You must be joking, more like moobs like Jabba the Hutt.”
“Ouch, Lila, don’t be so cruel to your new beau. If you can’t have Seb, then you might want someone waiting in the wings, you know.”
I shot her a scathing glance, at which she laughed and held up her hands in defeat.
“OK, sorry, just joking. But I can see you’re not in the mood for my humour. Go on then, tell all the gory details about your date with Merv the Swerve, because I really could do with a laugh.”
So I told her the full sorry story, chapter and verse, and even I was laughing by the time I finished.
Enough days had passed that I no longer shuddered recalling him dashing across the bedroom, loo roll in hand, wearing my stilettos. I could now see how undeniably funny it all was. Well, Lottie certainly seemed to think so, as once again she could barely breathe for laughing.
I felt my spirits lift a little. It was doing me the world of good to be out with my girlfriend, having a confidante to talk to and just to unwind a little. Plus, the more I drank of this turquoise treat, the more delicious it was becoming. Strange, really. One of the great unsolved mysteries in life.
Lottie was shaking her head in disbelief.
“Seriously, Lila, that has to be hands down the worst date you’ve ever been on, and I know you’ve had some right stinkers.”
I thought for a few minutes: replaying many years of dating mishaps in my brain, like the trailer to the worst disaster movie ever. My thought processes seemed a little sluggish, not as sharp as they should be, quite probably something to do with the few million brain cells we’d zapped in our last few hours of drinking.
“I think you’re right, Mervyn the less than magnificent was probably the worst date I’ve ever been on, but I can tell you it’s by the narrowest of margins. I’ve had my fair share of nutters, and probably half of everyone else’s share too; Merv was just number one on the top of a festering dung pile of disastrous dates.”
Lottie clapped her hands together in delight. Clearly the subject of my online dating dalliances cheering her up enormously.
“Oh, will you tell me your top five? I’m sure I already know them, but I might have forgotten some of them.”
I really was a glutton for punishment. But for some reason I couldn’t help but feel that recounting my worst dates of the last few years might actually be a fun way to while away an hour or two. So that’s exactly what I did. Like the worst beauty pageant judge ever, I rated them in reverse order; but not like Miss World ranking the worst to best, oh no I was rating from the mildly mortifying to the howlingly horrific.
And so, I began. In place five it had to be the few hours I had spent in the company of Zack. There was no one else who could bring up the rear quite like Zack and considering the amount of time he had spent checking out my arse, it only seemed fitting.
Zack had been a carpet fitter from Barnsley, cue many cringingly bad jokes about having my under felt and getting friendly on the shag pile etc. etc. None of them remotely funny, even under the influence of a couple of glasses of budget vino that I had sunk at record-breaking speed.
Thankfully I had only deigned to have one date with the less than adorable Zack. That had been long enough, well far too long in truth, for me to come to the realisation that he was a complete and utter wassock.
He had felt it appropriate on our first date to impress me by wining and dining me at a rather down-at-heel restaurant chain: all ripped seat covers and stained placemats. He had insisted we order from the early-bird special menu, so we had been seated and food orders promptly given by 6:15 p.m. sharp. In my opinion, this was nowhere near dinner time; in truth, more of a late lunch.
As I picked unenthusiastically at my Icelandic prawn cocktail starter, we engaged in the normal small talk that’s a necessity whilst on a first date. I had smiled politely at his chat about polypropylene carpet versus 100 percent wool in stain management, and had even managed to suck down about half my starter, hiding the remainder of the prawns under a limp lettuce leaf that had adorned the startling pink slop. Icelandic prawns, I ask you! I would put good money on the fact that these mushy crustaceans had never swum anywhere near the fjords of Iceland. Unless of course you counted them treading water at the bottom of a freezer unit in the Iceland supermarket in the precinct.
As I failed to eat my starter, Zack had made light work of his cheesy garlic bread. I smiled politely at him as he got progressively more inebriated, breathing synthetic garlic fumes over me like a droning dragon. I was worried the acrid fumes might actually melt my mascara.
Then as he slurped down his fourth pint of gassy lager, belching loudly, he had informed me that I would look so much more appealing, in his opinion, if I dressed in a more provocative way. In fact, he hadn’t worded it quite so politely. He had actually dared to utter the words “I was OK for an old bird, but it wouldn’t hurt to show a little more skin.”
He had then gone on to add to this delightful diatribe by saying I was “pretty fit though, a definite 7.5 out of 10, but with a few cosmetic enhancements I could definitely score a 10”.
I had been so appalled by his misogynistic cheek that I had been itching to hurl my cheap plonk all over him. With any luck the alcohol might hit the fire from his rancid breath and reduce him to a smouldering pile of putrid embers. But with more restraint than I realised I possessed; I decided maybe he had a point after all. It wouldn’t hurt, I supposed, to show a little more skin. So that was exactly what I did: showed him the skin on the palm of my hand as I slapped him hard across his smug, repugnant face.
And once I had finished describing my date with Zack, it brought me neatly on to number four on my list. And that would be no other than David from Pudsey. Ahhh, what could I say about dashing David? Plenty, as it would turn out.
It had all started so well, though. Cocktails in an extremely fancy bar in the centre of Leeds, and then on to a delightfully rustic French restaurant, where we enjoyed a delicious three-course meal. It had all seemed so promising, until things took a decided turn for the worst when he started quizzing me on my sexual preferences over dessert.
Don’t get me wrong, I am not usually shy in discussions in that department; never one to clutch my pearls during mention of anything carnal. I had indulged him with a few juicy snippets of my love life, skirting around anything too graphic, but was beginning to feel more uncomfortable with the way the conversation was heading.
He was enthusiastically describing his own sexploits, in way too much intimate and anatomical detail for my liking. It was not appropriate dinner table discourse over dessert. He was putting me right off my cherry clafoutis. I really didn’t need to know what sexual shenanigans he got up to of an evening. It was just all too much for a first date.
I was beginning to feel quite queasy and was becoming increasingly worried that my coq au vin might make another appearance, this time unwanted, all over the pressed linen tablecloth.
David had now moved onto talk of the posterior. I had tried at a joke by saying I wasn’t the biggest fan of anal. In fact, I had laughed and said it was a matter of steeling oneself and then “touch your toes and up it goes.”
He had ignored my attempt at humour and was far keener to move onto the subject of rimming: something he was clearly extremely passionate about, as he went on to demonstrate his technique in great detail with an empty Grand Marnier shot glass as a prop.
This in itself was horrific enough: to witness a man of nearly forty performing such an act on glassware, but the fact that he still had remnants of his chocolate mousse from dessert around his mouth was just a step too far. It was hands down the most disgusting thing I had ever witnessed.
I knew without a doubt that I had to get out of there as fast as my legs would carry me. While he had been distracted taking a call on his mobile phone, I tipped a passing waiter twenty quid to spill a glass of water all over his crotch, in the hope it would cool his ardour somewhat.
So while he was in the Gents’ toilet drying his pants off under the hand dryer, I had legged it at full speed.
I was getting into my stride now ? nearly as fast as my striding away from David that night. I had actually forgotten just how horrific some of these dates had been, and from the look on Lottie’s face, she was enjoying every single second of my trip down repressed memory lane. So, I continued on with my list of lothario losers.
I was now at number three, which had to be awarded to William. Ah, William. He had sounded so perfect on paper, or rather on message, as that was where we had corresponded prior to meeting.
He was tall, dark and handsome. He hailed from Halifax and worked a steady job in finance. He seemed so right, but oh he was so wrong. Unlike with his predecessors, Zack and David, we managed more than just the one date. In fact, it was date four before he had shown his “true” self. William, as it would turn out, was obsessed with babies.
Firstly, there was the baby talk. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t mind a bit of “lovey dovey” speak now and again, when the mood would take me, but when he turned up at my workplace to give me a big hug and coo that “Little Willy misses his Lila-Wila” it became just a little too much to bear.
And then he was forever banging on about us having a baby of our own. The first time he brought it up, I thought it was the funniest thing I had heard in ages. He must be joking, surely. Unfortunately, it turned out he was deadly serious. I kept telling him I was nearly fifty, and there was a snowball in hell’s chance of me ever having another baby, but that didn’t stop him.
On our last ever proper date together, he had presented me with a beautiful, gift-wrapped box, adorned with a huge fluffy bow. Hoping it was a silver necklace I had been coveting and had dropped a few heavy hints about, I proceeded to rip the paper off with wild excitement. The box was certainly the right size, flat and square and most definitely bracelet-shaped.
I was so disappointed when I discovered that it was not my bracelet after all nestled in the box, but an intricate carved walnut photo frame. There was no doubt that the frame was exquisite, but what it contained somewhat less so. Smiling out of the frame was an AI-generated image of what our biological children together could look like. Believe me, it was far from heartwarming, in fact the stuff of absolute nightmares. The creepiest-looking kids since Children of the Corn stared out menacingly from the frame. Like a cross between Victorian workhouse urchins and a Chucky doll.
I couldn’t conceal the look of absolute horror on my face, and William was so crushed. He had thought I would find the present adorable and was hoping it would have pride of place on my desk at work. In turn, I thought he needed locking up where he wouldn’t need to mix with the general public ever again.
To be fair, I still have the frame on my desk at work. I replaced the image of our demonic offspring with a lovely smiley picture of a girl’s night out with Lottie and the gang. That image was guaranteed to put a smile on my face, the other one not so much.
After the unwanted gift, our relationship had limped on for another few days before inevitably fizzling out for good. I just couldn’t bring myself to see him as anything but creepy as fuck. And that is never a good basis for a successful relationship. So without further ado, I had waved “Little Willy” off into the sunset to find himself another baby mama. God help her.
Moving on from the William debacle, and just missing out on the coveted top spot, came Johnny. Johnny was a thirty-four-year-old personal trainer from Ilkley, with the body of an Adonis but, alas, the brain of an amoeba.
He had been lovely to tote around town for a few weeks on my arm, like a new designer handbag. In truth, as handbags go, he had even less personality than a Prada clutch. I managed three dates in total with him. It was a close call even to make it that far.
After listening to him drone on about energy drinks for nigh on forty minutes on the first date, it had been touch and go as to whether there would be a second, or whether we would just be ships that passed in the night. But talking of night and all things nocturnal, I had really fancied a sleepover of the adult variety with him. Call me shallow, and I know I can be, but I was just too keen to discover what was hiding under his designer duds to call it time early doors.
When I eventually got a glimpse at the goods, it was rather underwhelming. I had seen more meat on a vegan menu, and girth-wise it was more chipolata than Chateaubriand in that department. I remember wondering if he had maybe been taking something down the gym to enhance his stamina on the bench press, but reduce his stamina in the boudoir. I didn’t know much about steroids, but I believed they could cause some unsatisfactory side effects to the libido.
After our final date, I wondered if they could cause other side-effects too.
We had been out for dinner. I had been keen to try a new Indian restaurant not far from my home and had persuaded William to swerve the gym for the evening and accompany me. He had been quite quiet and was looking a little pale, even under his tan. We had barely got through our poppadoms and pickles when he had excused himself to go “for a quick visit” to the lavatory.
Forty minutes passed and still no William. The waiter had brought our starters out and they were beginning to cool when I received a call from my absent date. When I saw his name flash up on my handset, my heart had dropped like a stone. Was he already on his way home and informing me that our date was over? Did I now live in Dumpsville, the ever ill-fated Lila Glover? But no, the truth was far more horrific than that.
It turned out that while I had been patiently waiting at the table for him, nibbling on my pakora, he had been rather poorly in the lavatory cubicle.
In his words, he’d had one “simmering in the saucepan for hours”, and when he was finally ready to release the beast, the torrent of explosive diarrhoea had quite taken him by surprise. He had completely blocked the toilet up, and requested that I send someone in immediately with a plunger.
Our waiter, who was as mild-mannered as a Korma, was sent in on the monstrous mission. Ten minutes later, when William and Ajay the waiter had reappeared, Ajay no longer looked Korma-mild. No, now he looked Madras-mad and rather green around the gills.
After that, the relationship had quite literally hit the skids.
And that brought us neatly to the perhaps not so coveted top spot, which had to go to the one and only “Merv the Swerve”. On entering his bedroom that night after our successful date at the pub, I had great expectations for what was to follow. Unfortunately, in the dim morning light, it had all turned out to be rather more BleakHouse than Great Expectations. What the Dickens had all that been about? I shuddered as I recounted the tale to Lottie.
I could recall that our night of passion had in fact turned out to be a rather tepid affair, not at all the hot and steamy session I had anticipated. A tawdry tussle of tangled limbs, bestial grunts and airborne fluids.
As it turned out, Merv had been a bit of a sweater, with it dripping off the end of his nose and onto my face at one point in the proceedings. This had horrified me and rendered my lady area drier than the Sahara Desert. He was also a bit of a moaner, though not nearly as much as I was when I copped an eyeful of him in my fancy footwear.
So that was it: Lila Glover’s top five worst dates. And I couldn’t help feeling a little misplaced pride at just how horrific they truly were. I would always have them to fall back on when conversation at a dreary dinner party dried up, or to scare my grandkids into singledom.
And poor old Toffer hadn’t even earned a mention. Not so terrible after all, it would seem. Yes, he was and would always be pretty repugnant, but not nearly as bad as the aforementioned pack of stone-cold weirdos.
Lottie was wiping her eyes again. She hadn’t stopped laughing for the entirety of my babbling. Her previously pristine eye make-up was now more than a little smudged and streaked halfway down her cheeks, making her appear like she’d just gone six rounds with Conor McGregor.
“You really should write a book, Lila. I bet it would be a bestseller; it’s comedy gold.”
“Yeah, a real page-turner, I’d bet, but not so sure about a comedy; more like a horror shocker, to give Stephen King a run for his money. Reading about those pillocks would be sure to give you a few nightmares.”
Lottie drained the last of her drink and I followed suit. It really was quite tasty.
My mind wandered back to thoughts of safe, solid, now somewhat sexy Seb. Why, oh why, had I not given us a chance? I had been my own worst enemy for way too long, and that had to change. There was determination as well as vodka coursing through my veins.
Lottie clapped her hands together and jumped off her seat. A strong, confident call to action. Or at least, it would have been had she not staggered back slightly and had to steady herself against a fellow patron who was weaving his way towards the Gents’ toilet. It was fortuitous that was his destination, as when Lottie suddenly grabbed the sleeve of his faux leather bomber jacket to steady herself, he nearly shat himself in shock. Clearly, he had not felt the touch of a woman in many a long year, and to be accosted by a pretty yet somewhat pished lovely like Lottie was well out of the norm for him.
“Oooh, sorry, the floor just seemed to wobble there a bit; maybe an earthquake or something?”
The man muttered something inaudible, before putting his head down and dashing into the lavatories, the door swinging noisily shut behind him.
“Whoops.”
Lottie giggled and staggered slightly to the side as if there had been a mini aftershock after the earthquake.
“Must have been something I said.”
I grabbed her arm and we started heading towards the door, zigging and zagging as we went. We’d both had way too much for a school night. What seemed so much fun now would not be nearly as enjoyable come tomorrow morning, when we would both be experiencing epic hangovers.
Finally, we left the warm, muggy interior of the pub, and after my run-in with in with young Alfie Dodds, it proved to be muggy in more than one sense of the word. We stumbled unsteadily into the frosty air of the street, laughing as we went. I had no idea what was so funny, but laugh we did. After the cloyingly warm atmosphere of the pub, the almost brutal slap in the face from the frosty night air instantly sobered us up somewhat.
Lottie shivered under her coat, which was buttoned up completely wrongly, as if a toddler had fastened it, trying to dress themselves for the first time and failing miserably.
“I’m starving.”
Her voice was petulant like a toddler’s too.
“I need more than a couple of packets of crisps. Come on, Lila, let’s go and get us some dinner. I could really fancy going all out and having a right posh bit of scran. How about boeuf en cro?te at Brasserie Bleu?”
I nodded my head at my friend in approval. There was a time, not so long ago, when she would never have dared enter the hallowed halls of the chicest French restaurant in town, saying she felt constantly judged by the other diners; wary of the miniscule portions; concerned her chunky butt wouldn’t slide gracefully into the fashionable booths; worried she would be wedged in tighter than old Fluck when expected to buy his round at the bar.
That man really was tighter than a gnat’s chuff: when he opened his wallet, moths didn’t fly out; they had already passed away from old age.
I put my arm affectionately around my friend and steered her down the road towards Brasserie Bleu and some seriously fancy food. I was so proud of her. For her now to suggest the venue as her preferred restaurant was progress indeed. Yes, she had lost weight from her biggest size, but not that much, and truthfully she would probably still be considered “plus sized”. But that no longer bothered her.
She had lost some weight, for sure, but what she had gained was far, far weightier than that. She had gained the love and respect of a good man, which was amazing. But even better, she had gained the love and respect of herself. Now the opinion of the rest of the world barely registered. She knew her worth, and it was measured in kindness, respect and self-esteem, not in pounds and ounces.
“OK…Brasserie Bleu it is, Lottie. But I’m telling you, I’m not having the boeuf en cro?te. When all’s said and done, it’s just a meat pie with ideas above its station.”
Lottie stumbled along next to me laughing, clearly delighted by my silliness and enjoying herself immensely.
Even through the rosy glow of the alcohol, I felt a little despairing tug at my soul. I missed Seb. I couldn’t help it; everything made me think of him. Even talk of pastry.