50 Ways to Find a Lover (50 page)

‘And
he
was the number one fan, Sare. He wanted to meet up on a date and just tell you how he felt,’ sighs Nikki.

‘Yeah, you were such a stubborn cow,’ barks Julia, and then she starts doing an impression of me. ‘“It’s Jay! It’s some gaffer bloke!”’

‘I deed zat too, Saraaah. E would text me with ees bad spelling and I would poot it online for him. I am Brazilian and my Engleesh ees better than hees.’

‘But the gaffer told me he was my number one fan.’

‘Yes, Simon wasn’t too happy about that,’ Nikki says with a grin.

‘No way.’ I smile. Then I realize where we are. We’re coming level with Simon’s mum’s road.

‘It’s right here. Turn right, Jules!’ I shout.

‘Uh, huh, huh.’ Nikki starts to gag.

I turn towards her just as she opens her mouth and vomits. It lands on my cheek, lip and partly down my T-shirt. I fight the impulse to retch.

‘Eugh,’ I say with my mouth closed, while everyone starts fumbling around for some tissues. We pull up outside Simon’s mum’s house. I quickly wipe my mouth and flick the lumpy bits off me.

I walk halfway up the driveway. Then I freeze. I feel like I’m the heroine in a romantic comedy. It’s the critical last scene and I’ve forgotten my lines. I want to quit the project. I want to go back to my trailer and hide. I hear Julia beep the horn. I take a deep breath and carry on. Olivia Newton John lyrics are in my head. I ring on the doorbell. Simon’s mum, Bonnie, answers after exactly fourteen seconds. Simon’s mum is lovely. There’s no other word for her. She works in a library and at the weekend she helps disabled people on weekend retreats. She does book groups and ballroom dancing and is learning French. Hence I don’t see nearly enough of her.

‘Sarah?’ she says. She sounds more puzzled than pleased to see me.

‘Hi, Bonnie.’ I seem only to be able to squeak. I cough and try again. ‘Is Simon here?’

‘No, love, he left about ten minutes ago. The coach came with the boys in it and picked him up.’

I stand staring at her. My mouth is open and I can hear my breath. I am wearing gym gear covered in sick and I’m going to scream.

‘He’s already gone! Ten minutes ago,’ I wail, running back to the car.

‘Get back in, we’ll follow him to the airport,’ shouts Julia. Bonnie is still standing in the doorway.

‘I’ve got to go and find him,’ I shout to Bonnie.

‘OK. Good luck, love,’ she shouts back. She stands there watching me clamber into Big Daddy. Julia turns the key in the ignition. Nothing happens.

‘Come on, Daddy, don’t let us down now,’ she whispers into the steering wheel. She turns the key again. Still nothing.

‘Cock and balls!’ she screams. She looks at me helplessly.

Bonnie comes running down the driveway.

‘Take my car!’ She opens the garage. It’s the BMW with low mileage. I smile.

‘Ow, you leetlle beautie.’ Bertrand smacks his lips. ‘I drive.’

‘Oh God,’ says Nikki, looking green again.

Her worry is warranted. Bertrand believes that he is the only person in England who knows how to drive and everyone else is a ‘KNOBBEENG WANKEENG IMERCEEL OO SHOOOD ACCCELERATE NOW’. Bonnie hands him the car keys and we all vacate Big Daddy and climb into the BMW.

‘Right, get us on to the North Circular, head for Heathrow and keep your eyes open for a coach!’ shouts Julia. Bertrand accelerates while humming the theme to
Starsky and Hutch
.

I hear Nikki heave.

‘Shit,’ remarks Carlos as a little patch of Nikki’s sick lands in his lap. It’s funny when it happens to someone else.

‘Haven’t we got a bag for Nikki to be sick in?’ I giggle.

‘Take your T-shirt off so we can mop it up,’ orders Julia.

‘No.’

‘Sare, it’s already stinking anyway.’

‘I’m wearing a sports bra!’

‘Do it!’

‘You’re such a bossy cow.’

‘My boyfriend’s covered in sick!’ She’s starting to get mardy but I take off my T-shirt and give it to her. Julia has never used the word ‘boyfriend’ about the man she was seeing before. I smile at her. She sticks her tongue out at me.

‘EEEEes a coach!’ shrieks Bertrand, moving horizontally across two lanes to get behind a coach in the slow lane. Nikki swallows furiously.

‘You are a heeet, Saraaah.’

I look at the rear of the coach. I see four teenage boys mouthing ‘Nice tits’ and one bare bottom.

‘Someone give me a top now,’ I shriek. No one does.

‘It might be Simon’s coach,’ says Julia. ‘Stay behind them, Bertrand. Can we make a sign? Has anyone got a pen?’

No one has a pen but Julia creates a sign. She writes the word
SIMON
using Nikki’s lipstick on the T-shirt covered in vomit.

‘Hold it up, Sare!’ she shouts, throwing it to me. I do so. Anything to cover me up. The young men peer at it. The fifth boy puts his trousers on and faces us. He starts pointing at his own chest.

‘The flasher’s called Simon,’ I say, disappointed. I shake my head at the boys in the coach.

‘Fuck, I thought that was the one. A coach full of teenage boys. Right, let’s speed up and head to Heathrow,’ shouts Julia.

‘No,’ I shout back. I can see another figure on the coach. It looks like a man. He’s standing up and the boys on the back seat are talking to him. Slowly the boys move out of the way and the figure comes into view. It’s Simon. Bertrand beeps his horn.

I sit still. Simon and I stare at each other. Then I nod at him. In my head the nod is saying, ‘Yes, I feel the same way, yes, yes, yes.’ I watch him to see if he understands my meaning. But he quickly turns away.

‘Where’s he gone?’ I panic.

The coach starts to indicate left and slow down.

‘Ee’s going to pull over on to the ard shoulder,’ says Bertrand. I put the vomity T-shirt back on. We pull over behind the coach.

‘It’s like being in a Richard Curtis movie,’ whispers Julia. ‘Sod
Notting Hill
, we’ve got
Gants Hill
.’ She turns to me and smiles. There are tears in the corners of her eyes.

‘Here’s the bag,’ smiles Nikki, giving me some bulging luggage.

‘Thank you all so much,’ I say. I am already crying. I wish I wasn’t.

I get out of the car and I see Simon stepping off the coach. We walk towards each other. Neither of us speaks for at least ten seconds.

‘Hi,’ says Simon.

‘Hiya.’

‘What are you up to?’

‘Oh, we were just passing in your mum’s car, you know.’

‘Right,’ he smiles.

‘I did eighteen minutes on the cross-trainer earlier.’

‘Great.’

‘Nikki was a bit sick on me.’

‘Morning sickness?’

‘Yep.’

‘Have you, um, read that bloke’s blog?’

I bite my lip and nod. There is a surplus of two things in this conversation:

Both are coming from me. I take a deep breath of North Circular fumes. I exhale and I realize something. I, Sarah Sargeant, am not scared.

I reach out and place a hand on his shoulder and then I stand on my tiptoes and kiss his lips.

‘I love you,’ I say. And it’s the easiest thing I’ve ever said.

Acknowledgements

I had never written anything before I starting writing my blog. If so many people hadn’t encouraged me to carry on I feel sure it would have been a short-lived phase, like many a New Year gym membership.

The people I first put the idea of the book to were my parents. As ever they responded with words such as ‘That sounds like fun’ and ‘Great idea.’ If they had said, ‘Don’t be silly, isn’t it time you got a proper job?’ I know that the idea would have disappeared instantly, like profiteroles at a dinner party.

Like Sarah’s, it was my dad who suggested I start a blog, but neither of us knew anything about them. He gave me a day and took me to a man who did, William Shaw, to whom I owe huge thanks.

As I had never written before I enlisted the help of people cleverer than me: Glynne Steele, Tamsin Hewett, Dylan Jones, Chris Sansom, Roz Brody and Jan King. Thank you so much for your wit and wisdom.

So the blog was created. Anyone who has ever had a blog will understand the wonder that is receiving comments on it.

So I would like to thank ALL those people who shared their stories, jokes and opinions on my blog pages. In particular Becky Harvey, for words of such beauty they made me cry, Leah Richardson, Andrea Donovan and Jack Mackensie, Marie McVeigh, Jayme Lyon my gorgeous cousin, and Gail Thomson my beautiful (inside and out) sister.

I need to thank all those blog characters and partners in crime without whom there would be no stories or adventures: Live-in Ex-Boyfriend, Homeless Friend, High-Powered Political Friend, Beautiful Asian Friend, Male Friend, Beautiful Niece With the Small Bottom, Double D the Bride to Be; David Seddon, Claire Adams, Geoff Stanton, all the staff at the Union Club, Soho and Café Mozart.

Justin McKeating, for including some of my stories in a blog digest, thank you so much. You’ve no idea how proud I felt to see my words in print.

Then I started writing a book, a process that couldn’t have been completed without the coffee and kindness supplied by Michael and his team at Inhabition. Thanks also go to Jean Stafford-Smith, for proof-reading the early draft. My apologies, it got too rude for me to send you the rest.

Unbelievable thanks now go to amazing agents at William Morris, Rowan Lawton and Eugenie Furniss, for thinking that I could do it and being so clever and taking me to posh places for meetings.

And to the heavenly group of ladies that is Macmillan’s women’s fiction team. In particular Rebecca Saunders, for liking it, getting it and knowing it better than I do. Also to Jenny Geras, Imogen Taylor, Trisha Jackson, Eli Dryden, Vicki Harris, Rebecca Ikin and Helen Guthrie.

I have a few more biggies. These people allowed me to morph them into fictional characters. For that and many other reasons I love them to bits.

Julia Veidt. Best friend extraordinaire.

Simon Paul Sutton. This book will always be a tribute to our times in Camden. I hope you enjoyed them as much as I did. Thank you for them and for those to come.

Paul Hamann. A wonderful man and the fruit of my search.