A Girl Like You

‘How are you getting along with Robert, by the way?’ says Sophie.

‘Fine,’ I say. ‘He’s not around much. He gave me some good “surviving singledom” tips the other night.’

‘He’d be good at that,’ says Sophie. ‘He’s a total ladykiller. One of London’s premier playboys.’

‘Description, please,’ says Plum.

‘Dark hair, dark green eyes, high cheekbones, chiselled jaw line, lips arrogantly curled into a perma-snarl,’ says Sophie, as though she’s reading the back of a Mills and Boon novel. ‘Gorgeous, brooding and manly.’

‘Frowny,’ I add. ‘Grumpy. Needs a shave. Hair’s a bit messy. He’s very tidy around the house, though. Thank God.’

‘Good body?’ says Plum.

‘Yes,’ says Sophie. ‘You really don’t find him hot, Abigail?’

‘I haven’t seen his body. It’s not like I’m going to run into him coming out of the shower, we have separate bathrooms.’

‘Shame,’ says Plum wistfully.

‘Anyway, when we met I was still in break-up recovery mode,’ I say. ‘I only ever saw him as a potential flatmate.’

‘Domesticity breeds contempt,’ says Plum. ‘He sounds like just my kind of bedmate. Roll him in honey and bring him to me.’

‘He’s not the relationship type,’ I say, shaking my head.

‘Totally,’ agrees Sophie. ‘He’s sort of unobtainable. Great guy, but . . .’

‘Marvellous, another fucknuckle, that’s just what I need. Hey, did you hear what happened to Henry?’ asks Plum. ‘He woke up this morning with a bite of unchewed kebab still in his mouth.’

Henry is my other best friend. He’s a real boy: uncomplicated, very good-natured and permanently hungry. He shared a house with Plum and me at university. We went through a phase of calling him Miranda, but he said if he was anyone, he was Charlotte, so we stopped. He’s not gay, by the way, and he has lots of guy friends (all mined by Plum a long time ago). But we’ve known him for so long, he’s one of us.

We head towards Marylebone and sit at a table outside the first coffee shop we see, just as Plum’s phone rings.

She pops her Bluetooth earpiece in her ear (she was convinced that her mobile was giving her blackheads), and trills, ‘Henrietta! No, the BabyCare Show is the 25th this year, darling! Mmm. Righto. Byee!’ She hangs up and rolls her eyes. ‘You’d think we were saving the world, not launching a new fucking nappy range.’

Sophie frowns. ‘Plummy. Language.’

‘Well, she always panics on weekends and calls me from her boyfriend Sebastian’s fucking Range Rover as they’re off shooting yachts, or whatever it is they do,’ says Plum crossly. ‘I’m fed up with posh girls, I really am.’

Sophie and I look at each other and start to giggle. I wonder if people I work with do things like that. Then I remember work, and sigh deeply.

‘What’s wrong, kittenpants?’ asks Plum.

‘Do you love work?’

‘I love my work friends, even the posh ones,’ says Plum. ‘But the pay is shit, I’m permanently broke and because the office is all women we all go on the blob at the same time, which is a fucking nightmare.’

‘I do love my job,’ says Sophie. Plum throws a sugar cube at her. ‘Sorry, but I do! . . . It’s stressful but I look forward to Mondays.’

‘Fuck me,’ says Plum in dismay. ‘You look forward to Mondays? Honestly . . .’ she turns to me. ‘Why do you ask, sweetie?’

I sigh deeply. ‘Work is basically somewhere I go for free internet access. I don’t like it, I never laugh . . . But I don’t know how to do anything else.’ Oh God, I’m getting emotional. Tears, down boy.

‘Remember it pays well,’ says Sophie. I nod. I get paid more than Plum and Sophie put together, which I feel guilty about so I try to surreptitiously pick up the cheque whenever I can. For the record, I’m not the flash-your-cash bankery type: the idea of spending thousands on a handbag is obscene (practical and annoying, but hey! that’s me). I’ve also saved quite a lot over the years without really trying. (I know how practical and annoying that is too.)

‘I don’t think that . . . I don’t think that I care about the money that much,’ I say.

‘So you’re in the wrong job,’ says Sophie calmly. ‘It’s not the end of the world. You can change.’

‘How can I have spent the last six years in the wrong fucking job?’ I exclaim. ‘Then again, I spent the last seven years with the wrong man. I clearly have a talent for ignoring things.’

‘Isn’t it time you bought a house?’ says Plum. ‘You should get a mortgage while you still have a good job. Then you can quit and do what you want.’

I wince. The buying-a-house conversation comes up with my parents every year. I always fudge it. The idea of committing to something so huge makes me feel sick. I can’t imagine it, I don’t want to imagine it. So I ignore it.

‘Maybe you shouldn’t worry about it just now,’ suggests Sophie quickly. She can read me so well.

‘And remember, you are recovering from breaking up with the man you spent a quarter of your life with,’ says Plum, slipping straight into supportive-friend mode. ‘I mean, I need fucking months to get over relationships that didn’t even last as long as a season of The City.’

‘But . . . I am fine about Peter,’ I say uneasily. I really do feel fine. Perhaps I’m in denial. ‘Never mind. It’s too late to change careers now.’

‘It’s never too late. What would you do, if you could do anything?’ says Sophie.

Pause.

I’m staring at her, unable to respond. She stares back for 10, 20, 30 seconds . . . I’m speechless, mouth opening and closing like a goldfish. My inability to answer that simple question makes me want to be sick even more. What’s wrong with me?

Plum exchanges a glance with Sophie.

‘I don’t know!’ I say eventually. ‘I don’t want to talk about this anymore. I’m going home to get changed. I need to put my singledom skills to the test again.’

The best thing about a busy social life? It helps you avoid reality.

Chapter Five (#ulink_cf515904-4a99-5aa0-8ba8-049f3d3dfed7)

Whenever you break up with someone, you don’t just break up with one person. You break up with their family, their friends and their dog. It’s sad, inevitable and kind of annoying. But it’s just the way it is. Which is why this weekend has been a bit . . . urgh.

For a start, Peter’s mother rang yesterday morning, talking about how much she misses me and how love is something that you have to work at. Bloody nightmare. Then last night Plum, Henry and I went to a party which turned out to be a minefield of Peter’s friends who either asked me about Peter, ignored me or gave me death stares. At 10 pm, my cheeks aching from fake smiling, I made eye contact with Plum and raked a finger across my throat to indicate that I wouldn’t mind leaving. We grabbed Henry, who had been rejected by every girl in the bar anyway, and took a cab to a late-night bar in Victoria.

We had a long chat about singledom on the way.

‘I need to hang out with guys more,’ said Henry. ‘I think you chicks are the reason I never get any action.’

‘You don’t think it’s because you tend to wake up with bites of unchewed kebab in your mouth?’ I said.

‘One time!’ shouted Henry. He paused. ‘I could murder a kebab now, actually.’

‘I am so over that crowd,’ I said, applying lip gloss. ‘They all think I’m an evil bitch for dumping Peter.’