All the Single Ladies (22 page)

After last Saturday night I can’t even consider staying in, so I’ve arranged to head to Ellie’s for a glass or two of wine, or, knowing her, bottles. But in
the middle of the afternoon, I get a text from Julia.

It’s rare for her to randomly enquire about my movements so I phone her.

‘Why is sending you a text so suspicious?’ she asks.

‘I didn’t say it was suspicious – I said it was unusual, for you.’

She doesn’t reply.

‘Well, come on . . . put me out of my misery,’ I tell her.

‘Okay. I invited Mum and Dad over for dinner tonight. I want to discuss Gary with them.’

‘Let me guess. You’ve made enough beef casserole for me too?’

‘The recipe serves four,’ she says sheepishly. ‘And it’s lemon sole. Plus, I’ve made that raspberry cheesecake you love.’

‘What makes you think that me being there will make the situation any better? Besides, I think you’re making more of this than you need to.’

‘Sam, I’d be really grateful if you could come, that’s all. You could help diffuse the situation . . . if there is a situation.’

‘Fine,’ I sigh. ‘But I need to be at Ellie’s by nine thirty at the latest.’

Julia lives in an elegant apartment in a converted nineteenth-century villa in Cressington Park – and very lucky she is too.

The park, a leafy oasis overlooking the river, is set in a perfectly preserved conservation area that still features ornate street lamps and a
Brief Encounter
-style railway station. The
first mansions were built in the 1840s, with fine iron balconies, beautifully proportioned windows and stucco details. And although Liverpool’s fortunes have seen dramatic highs and lows
since, these buildings have remained as pristine and robust as ever.

‘Come in! You’re the first here.’ She holds open the huge oak door and takes my proffered wine, glancing at the label. ‘Nice choice – it’ll go brilliantly
with the fish.’

I don’t tell her that I only chose that bottle because it had a fiver off at Tesco.

The only possible criticism of Julia’s apartment is that the kitchen is small. But it’s an insignificant blemish as the rest of the place is as gorgeous inside as the setting
outside; it’s all stripped floors and leaded windows, with interesting paintings and knick-knacks she’s picked up on her tours with the orchestra.

Music is at the heart of this home, from the cello, which sits next to the piano, to the floor-to-ceiling CDs. Julia puts on Alison Krauss, before we head through to the kitchen, where I eat
olives and watch redundantly as she simmers sauces and chops vegetables.

My own cooking techniques are more fluid. If I’m rustling up anything more complicated than an omelette, I look like Animal from
Sesame Street
, with arms and ingredients everywhere.
There are no spillages, conflagrations and strange burning smells when Julia’s in charge. She works so effortlessly she’d make Nigella look like a school dinner lady on her first day,
and has everything totally under control by the time Mum and Dad arrive.

Mum is understatedly glam in Levis and a purple chiffon shirt, her usually unruly hair done up in a loose chignon. Dad’s in his favourite jumper, a maroon cashmere number offsetting the
ubiquitous cotton shirt and plain blue tie. The jumper is V-neck. He thinks round-necks make him look like an anarchist.

‘What’s new in your life, daughter number two?’ asks Mum. ‘I haven’t seen you in ages.’

I shift in my seat as thoughts of my four dates flick through my mind. ‘It’s been quiet really, Mum.’

‘I saw you in the city centre the other day,’ Dad pipes up while he’s examining a dish of purple sprouting broccoli as if it’s something that grew on Jupiter.

‘Why didn’t you say hello?’ I ask.

‘I was on my way to a meeting. Besides, you were with someone.’

I stiffen. ‘Where was I?’ I ask casually, hoping he doesn’t say Subway. It’s one thing being almost seduced by a stranger, but quite another having your father witness
it.

‘That bar in Victoria Street. You were going in.’

‘What’s this?’ asks Mum, her antennae as effective as anything NATO has. ‘Have you got another man? Frank, you never told me.’

‘Apologies, dear. I know you like to keep abreast of my every movement.’

She returns her attention to me. ‘Tell all.’

‘I do not have a new man,’ I say, as my cheeks inflame to a vivid shade of ketchup.

She frowns. ‘Well, why not? You should be moving on.’

‘And you think another man is the answer? I thought they were all bastards?’ I point out.

‘That doesn’t mean they’re no good for anything. And a woman your age has some needs, doesn’t she?’ she says meaningfully.

‘I don’t want to continue this conversation,’ I splutter, heading to the hob to stir a sauce.

Julia removes the spoon from my hand. ‘Dinner’s about to be served. Why don’t you all go and sit down?’

This is the first family meal we’ve had in ages. Mum doesn’t give up on the issue of Jamie, of course, although at least it’s interwoven with other subjects, including her
Remington Fuzz Away, Colonel Gadaffi and
The Office
which, after watching her first-ever episode on UK Gold, she thinks is both highly entertaining . . . and real. Nobody bothers explaining,
not least because we’re quickly diverted by her next bombshell: one of her patients at the Women’s Hospital yesterday had been Vagazzled.

‘I’m all for celebrating the vagina, but in all my years as a midwife I’ve never seen anything like it,’ Mum says. ‘She was nine centimetres dilated and looked like
a disco ball.’

Dad nearly chokes on a boiled potato. ‘There’s nothing I love more than a detailed gynaecological discussion when I’m midway through my main course.’ Mum flashes him a
look. ‘Do carry on, dear,’ he adds.

She turns to Julia and me. ‘Imagine if Grandma Milly was still alive,’ she continues.

I can’t help but snigger. ‘Given that Grandma Milly thought you were going to burn in hell for getting your ears pierced, it’s probably not a bad thing she never lived to see
the existence of the Vagazzle.’

Mum raises an eyebrow. ‘Well, Samantha, you don’t know how lucky you are to have grown up surrounded by tolerance.’

She jokes about it now, but as a slightly rebellious and bohemian teenager, my mum had a hard time being raised in such tyrannically old-fashioned conditions.

And when Mum and Dad turned up with an adopted baby who wasn’t white, Grandma Milly, who died the year I was born, nearly had heart failure. Fortunately, nobody could resist Julia’s
charms even when she was a baby and Grandma ended up adoring her, a fact she underlined by leaving her all her jewellery when she passed away ten years later.

By nine o’clock, we’ve had the starter, the main course, and are tucking into the cheesecake, when it strikes me that not a word has yet been said about Gary. I glance at my watch
then glare at Julia. She catches my eye – fully aware of the meaning behind my look – but drops her gaze.

‘Well, this has been lovely,’ I say, staring at my watch. ‘It’s a shame I’m going to have to dart off in fifteen minutes.’

Julia bites her lip.

‘Have you got a date?’ Mum asks excitedly.

‘Only with Ellie, Jen and some Pringles.’ I look at Julia again. She says nothing.

‘That doesn’t sound much good. On a Saturday night too.’

I sigh. ‘How has my love life managed to dominate conversation – apart from the woman who had her lady bits done up like a Beaverbrooks display?’

Mum shrugs. ‘You’ve had a lot going on in your life.’

I look at Julia again, my eyes drilling into her. Enough’s enough. ‘I’m not the only one. Am I, Julia?’

‘Oh?’ says Mum, turning to her. The second she looks at Julia, the penny drops. ‘Oh.’

Julia swallows and goes to stand up. ‘I’ll clear away these dishes, then . . .’

‘Julia’s got something to tell you,’ I announce. This might be unfair, but we’ll be here until midnight otherwise. And she has to tell them.

Julia sits again, a dirty plate in either hand. ‘I . . . I met my birth father.’

Mum says nothing. She doesn’t even gasp.

It’s my father who speaks first. ‘And how is Gary?’

Mum frowns at Dad, then turns back to Julia, before clearing her throat. ‘Your biological father has been in touch with us too,’ she confesses. ‘He wanted to
explain to us why he’d chosen to make contact with you. I think it’s about more than just the article. You know about his niece dying?’

‘But you never said,’ Julia replies incredulously.

‘I know, I know,’ Mum replies hastily. ‘I don’t know why. I just preferred not to think about it, didn’t I, Frank?’

Dad doesn’t answer.

‘So when did you meet? And where?’ asks Mum.

Julia fills them in and it’s impossible not to notice how agitated Mum is.

When she finishes, Dad coughs. ‘So . . . what next? Are you going to stay in touch with him?’

‘I think so,’ Julia says tentatively. ‘But –’ she stands up and walks round the table, bending down to put her arms round Mum – ‘I hope you both know
that this does nothing to affect my relationship with you. Nothing at all. I just want to fill in some detail on my history, that’s all.’

She squeezes Mum’s hand. Mum nods and pushes through a smile. ‘Thanks, sweetheart.’

‘Your mother and I understand,’ Dad says.

‘Yes, we do,’ echoes Mum as Julia returns to the other side of the table. ‘And when you say you want detail, I take it that means . . . you want to know about your
mother?’

Julia pauses. ‘I suppose it might.’

Mum’s face is blank. She simply looks at her wine glass, before picking it up and finishing the last drop.

For a moment no one speaks.

Then Mum stands up with a forced smile. ‘Right, let’s get these dishes cleared away. I’m dying for a cup of coffee.’

I never make it to Ellie’s place, though I glean from a phone call the next day that there was a lot to catch up on. Jen has been on three dates in one week with someone
from the dating website. He’s from west Lancashire – Ormskirk – and is not her first romantic venture in that neck of the woods. At the end of last year, she went out with a
porter at her hospital who commuted from there. She hadn’t given him a second look until he turned up to the Christmas fancy-dress party as Flash Gordon, revealing a hitherto invisible
six-pack and biceps capable of bending the bars on his trolley. Their three dates went like a dream according to Jen (though the rest of us thought his tights were the best thing about him).

However, by the time she’d signed him up as her ‘plus one’ on the top table at her sister Linda’s wedding, he’d moved on to a radiologist with a boob job capable of
requiring Playtex to invent a new sizing policy.

So three dates is good news. What will happen next is anyone’s guess, though Ellie’s concerned. She spent last night pleading with Jen to stop texting the guy, but her pleas fell on
deaf ears.

‘She’ll never learn,’ Ellie sighs. ‘I’ve done the only thing a good friend can do in this situation and bought her a self-help book.’

‘About what?’

‘Dating.’

‘Jen has no problem with dates. She’s been on so many she could write an encyclopaedia. It’s relationships that are the problem.’

‘She needs to learn some restraint,’ Ellie continues. ‘The latest one’s as doomed as all the others. I’ve given up on it before it’s even started.’

‘Oh God,’ I groan. ‘I feel her pain already. So what’s the book?’

‘
How to Play Hard to Get
–
Treat Them Mean to Keep Them Keen and Other Tricks For Mad, Desperate Women
. Something along those lines anyway.’

‘How did that go down? Is she receptive?’

‘She was allegedly insulted. But only because she’s already choosing the soft furnishings in their first marital home. I guarantee she’ll have been disabused by this time next
week, God love her. Urgh. I’ll need more Pringles, no doubt about it. Anyway, what’s new with you? Any more dates lined up?’

As I fill her in on Ben, I experience a flicker of excitement. On paper, this guy is perfect. Not least because Jamie would hate him.

He’d never admit it, of course.

Jamie likes to think of himself as totally laid back. But there is a distinct chip on his shoulder when he meets someone obviously more successful than him. This small personality flaw is
totally outweighed by Jamie’s good qualities. I’ve always overlooked the chip on the basis that nobody’s perfect. Now I’m glad I did, because it could work in my favour.

Despite this, an undercurrent of pessimism about the date remains unshakeable. It’s not as if my hit rate with the dating website has been anything to brag about. Plus, I’ll confess
to being disconcerted by his choice of venue.

Ben and I have arranged to meet on Tuesday night after work, not in a bar or a restaurant or cinema, or even Subway for that matter.

But in a church. It’s not as odd as it sounds, for St Luke’s – at the pinnacle of Bold Street in the city centre – isn’t any old church. I’m not sure it even
counts as one these days; as far as I’m aware, it hasn’t been used for anything remotely holy since 1941, when it was bombed by the Luftwaffe.

While that fateful grenade all but destroyed the once resplendent Gothic building, its outer structure remains, and has stood in proud determination since. In fact, the shell of the
‘Bombed-out Church’ hasn’t just survived, it’s evolved; this is courtesy of a loving restoration of its gardens and, more recently, with some large-scale modern art
installations finding a home in its open-air interior.

I arrive six minutes late – timed to perfection – and am momentarily distracted by the beauty of the place. Sunlight streams through the windows of the church and casts filigree
patterns onto the lush rose gardens below. Lovers sit enraptured on the cast-iron benches, unable to appreciate the gorgeousness of anything but each other. And groups of office workers laze on the
grass, their top buttons undone, as they laugh and gossip.