Chapter 2
Nora had returned home after her disastrous date with Gareth, poured herself a large glass of Merlot and updated her dating spreadsheet.
Nora loved a spreadsheet. She liked to be objective, and scoring her dates was a consistent and logical approach.
Numbers were reliable, and reliability made her happy.
She felt a little bad when she hit the total button on Gareth’s score but there was no point in continuing with the date when there was nothing they had in common and his ick level was off the scale.
Maybe she needed to accept that the odds were very much against her and give up.
Nora loved her life. A daughter of immigrants who had arrived in England from war-torn Bosnia with very little other than the clothes they were wearing, each other and a baby.
She had been brought up to embrace new opportunities, work hard and be thankful.
Nora had done all of this and had the photographs of her parents, crying with pride at her graduation, housewarming and every school play she’d ever been in, to prove it.
She could picture her parents dancing at parties, kissing under the mistletoe at Christmas and holding hands in the park.
Her parents were devoted to each other and had been through a lot together – escaping Bosnia was just the start.
Negotiating the challenges of a new country, strange language and low-paid jobs had made them an unbreakable team.
By comparison, Nora had had things easy, and being in her parents’ protective bubble filled with love had got her through any trials life had thrown her way.
Perhaps she was simply trying to find what her parents had, or sometimes she wondered if she was trying to prove what a rare thing it was that they shared.
At this stage she was no longer sure. What she did know was that she was twenty-nine and single and thanks to Gareth that’s how things were going to stay for now.
Instead of an evening out with Gareth, Nora’s best friend Dixie came round for a debrief. Dixie unlaced her Doc Martens and they took their usual seats on the sofa while Nora provided a detailed update.
‘You told Gareth you had diarrhoea?’ asked Dixie with a splutter.
‘No, I got the waiter to tell him I had diarrhoea while I paid and got my scallops to go.’
‘I take it you’ve not heard from him?’
‘Only to ask if I wanted to pay half towards his car park fee. I declined and then blocked his number.’ Nora noisily puffed out a breath. ‘There must be a better way?’
‘Stay single?’ suggested Dixie. ‘It has its benefits.’
‘I know. I can choose what I want on Netflix without judgement, I get both sides of the bed and the toilet seat will be forever down. And there’s always the single council tax reduction.’
‘I was thinking more that you can put yourself first for a change and there’s nobody to let you down.
’ Dixie was still getting over a nasty break-up.
Not that she was admitting that she was still recovering.
It had been quite a few months but she still twitched when her ex was mentioned and could no longer walk past the squirty cream in the supermarket without blushing.
‘How was your week?’ asked Nora, feeling better for unburdening herself.
‘Yeah, bit mixed.’ Dixie sipped her wine. ‘Monday I made my first successful batch of tiger loaves. Wednesday a customer said I had a lovely smile. But yesterday Glenda sacked me.’
‘No way. What happened?’
‘You know I was on my final warning because I told her it was a bad idea to have pre-wrapped alphabet cupcakes out on display that people could rearrange, so when we went viral on TikTok along with the hashtag “pooey bum cakes”, Glenda thought it was me?’
‘Yes,’ said Nora.
‘So, Glenda asked me to finish off a cake for a local youth cricket team and deliver it to them.’
‘That’s good,’ said Nora.
‘I thought so but’ – Dixie pulled a face – ‘it wasn’t until all the teenage boys were laughing and filming the cake that I realized there must be something wrong with it.
I had looked at that cake so much that morning and had read and reread the inscription – Congratulations County Youth Cup Winners.
However, it was only when it was sitting in the middle of a buffet table that I noticed I’d missed the letter O out of County.
Unfortunately, Glenda didn’t see the funny side and sacked me. ’
Nora stifled her laughter. ‘Sorry, I know I’m not meant to laugh but it is quite funny.’
‘Even I can see the comic value and the lads all thought it was hilarious and had their photograph taken with the cake. Unfortunately Glenda is blind to seeing the humorous side of anything.’
‘Still quite harsh to sack you over that,’ said Nora.
Dixie winced. ‘Actually I think what tipped her over the edge was that while I was at the cricket club there was a bit of an accident. I’d forgotten to put the handbrake on in the van and it rolled down a slope into a tree. But nobody was hurt,’ she added hastily.
‘Blimey, and I thought I’d had a bad week.’
‘I know, right? I did try to explain that I’m not used to a handbrake. I mean, I know she calls the van vintage but that’s just code for old and clapped out.’
‘It would seem that we’re both back at square one,’ said Nora. ‘You still haven’t found your ideal job and I’m no closer to proving or disproving whether my love match is out there.’
‘I’m sure we’ll both find what we’re looking for. As long as we live long enough to hunt them down, that is.’
‘Cheering thought,’ said Nora, taking a swig of her wine.
Nora had slung a pizza and dough balls in the oven, so while they munched their way through them and the scallops, they mulled over their dilemmas.
‘Everything is just a bit harder when you’re on your own,’ said Dixie, looking downbeat. ‘Not that I want you-know-who back because I definitely don’t. But sometimes I think it would be nice to come home to someone who has run you a bath and cooked tea.’
‘You don’t need a partner, you need staff,’ said Nora.
Dixie gave her friend a withering look. ‘Is it so bad to want a bit of romance in my life?’
‘Knights on white chargers are hard to come by these days.’
Dixie, unlike Nora, was a romantic. ‘I don’t need the white charger. I’m actually allergic to horses. But someone who cared would be nice.’
‘You have lots of people who care about you,’ said Nora.
‘You’re right. I need to sort myself out first before I do anything else.’ She puffed out a breath. ‘But finding a career that’s right for me is almost as hard as finding the right man.’
‘I think your problem is easier to solve than mine.’ Nora grabbed a notepad and pen. ‘Jot down jobs you’d like to do.’
‘I quite liked working in the bakery,’ said Dixie, sounding a bit glum.
‘You can still put that on the list. Maybe there’s another bakery you could work in.’
‘I’m pretty sure Glenda won’t be giving me a reference.’ Dixie took the pad and twizzled the pen around her fingers while she pondered. At last, she began to write. Nora ate her pizza and didn’t say anything so as not to interrupt her friend’s flow of ideas.
After a few minutes of writing, Dixie was staring into space. ‘I think that’s all I can come up with for now.’
‘OK,’ said Nora, getting comfy on the sofa. ‘How many have you got on your list?’
Dixie counted them up. ‘Eleven.’
‘Great. Read them out,’ said Nora.
‘Number one is bus driver because I’ve always fancied that. Next is professional sleeper. You know where you get to test mattresses and stuff because I am dead good at sleeping. Olympic level, Ma always says.’
Nora doubted this was a paid role but Dixie didn’t seem to notice her frowning and carried on with her list.
‘For number three I thought being a living statue might be fun. I have the perfect bag to be Mary Poppins, but I don’t think it pays very well. Next is I thought a job with animals like in Jurassic Park or maybe the Sea Life Centre would be fun but there isn’t one near here.’
‘There’s no Jurassic Park anywhere,’ pointed out Nora. ‘Only in the film.’
‘I didn’t mean Jurassic, I meant Exotic, sorry.’ She grinned and went back to her list. ‘Number five is a social media influencer and—’
‘Stop there,’ said Nora. ‘That’s the one.’
Dixie seemed surprised. ‘Why? How do you know?’
‘Because I applied the 37 per cent rule.’
‘The what?’ Dixie was doing the squinty-eye thing she did when something puzzled her.
‘The 37 per cent rule is a business tool to solve something mathematicians call an “optimal stopping problem”. That’s when we are presented with a number of options and don’t know which to go with.
You’ll have the highest chance of choosing the best option if you look at and reject the first 37 per cent of the total options available to you.
And 37 per cent of eleven is four, so the fifth idea on your list is the one you should go for.
’ Nora knocked back her wine as a little reward for solving Dixie’s problem.
It was a bit of a simplified version of the rule but Nora was happy this was the best way to apply it to Dixie’s dilemma.
‘But there might be something better on the list.’
‘And if social media influencer doesn’t work out you move on to the next on the list and so on until you find something that does.’
‘Oh good,’ said Dixie. ‘Because I’ve got housekeeper down for number eight. Like in Downton Abbey.’
‘Until someone perfects time travel you’re going to struggle with that one.’
Dixie gave her a look. ‘I meant a modern-day version of it. The Wilson-Browns have a lady who keeps their whole house running like clockwork and she gets to live in their annexe.’
Dixie had a distinctly different background to Nora.
Dixie’s parents were a mix of old and new money and the two had combined to make a winning combination.
They had businesses across three continents and were out of the country more than they were at home, but that was mainly for tax purposes.
They gave their only child an allowance but had been keen for her to work and eventually run one of their businesses, but Dixie wanted to make it on her own.
It was an admirable goal, but her disastrous CV was evidence that she hadn’t as yet found her professional calling.
‘But that’s the beauty of the rule. It stops you from procrastinating and encourages you to focus on one thing at a time,’ said Nora.
‘Hmm.’ Dixie pulled her feet up underneath herself and circled social media influencer on her list. ‘You really think this is what I should do?’
‘Yep.’
‘Even though I only have two hundred and thirty-three followers on Insta?’
‘Yep. Growing your brand and followers would all be part of the job,’ said Nora.
‘I like the idea of having a brand,’ said Dixie sitting up. ‘And this rule works on anything?’
‘I’ve seen it in action in business and it definitely works there, so why not with any big decision?’
‘OK, I’m going to do it.’
‘Excellent,’ said Nora, feeling helpful. But the cogs in her mind were whirring. ‘I’ve an idea,’ she added. ‘How about I apply the same rule to my love life?’
Dixie had a vexed expression. ‘I don’t think that would work because you can’t know how many people you’d date in a lifetime.’
After a quick Google, numbers were already buzzing around Nora’s head. ‘If the average relationship lasts two years nine months, or thirty-three months for ease of calculation, and—’
‘Which yours don’t,’ said Dixie.
‘True, but for maths’ sake let’s say they do.
If you date between the ages of sixteen and fifty-five, that’s 468 months (or thirty-nine years) divided by the average relationship duration we calculated of thirty-three months, that’s 14.
18 suitors, which sounds plausible for me, I think. And 37 per cent of that is 5.24.’
‘And what does that tell you?’ asked Dixie, looking excited.
‘That I probably should have stopped dating about four years ago.’ Nora felt like she’d been hit in the face with her mum’s biggest casserole dish.
If she was to apply the 37 per cent rule to her love life in the same way she had done with Dixie’s career choices, then she needed to ditch the first five people she dated and then go with the next best option, which statistically should deliver the optimal partner.
However, she’d gone through quite a few relationships and was now wondering if maybe she’d been a bit hasty when she’d instigated break-ups.
‘When I ditched Tyler a year ago, I think he was my ninth relationship, so I’m way past number six, which means I’ve most likely missed my opportunity.
’ The possibility that she had had a potential match and let them go hit her harder than she thought it would.
‘That’s a shame,’ said Dixie. ‘It would have been cool if we could have solved both problems with the same thing. Never mind.’
‘Hang on. Slow down. I still think I might be on to something.’ Nora sat up straight.
She wasn’t going to dismiss it that quickly.
Numbers were her comfort blanket and here was a way to apply them to the one thing that was eluding her in life.
‘Maybe I should go back and double-check just in case one of the men after my 37 per cent cut-off is the one. What harm can it do, looking up a few old boyfriends?’
‘Because you must have broken up with them for a reason.’
‘True. Maybe it needs a bit more thought.’ She wasn’t one to rush into things.
‘Maybe,’ agreed Dixie. ‘For a start, you don’t want to dig up the past. Remember that guy who wanted to be called Hashtag.’
‘Hashtag was a fun bloke though. What number was he? I wonder if he makes the 37 per-cent cut-off,’ she said more to herself than Dixie as she began counting.
‘This is completely brilliant,’ said Dixie picking up her wine. ‘Here’s to the 37 per cent rule solving our problems.’ And they both clinked glasses, even if Nora thought Dixie’s celebrations were a little bit premature.