So I’m a girl, I study fashion at a leading institute/yawnfest in London, and I’m a complete and utter disappointment to both my parents. When they first held me in their arms 22 years ago, pink and squealing, they didn’t realise I’d grow up into a screaming brat they’d spend their lives warily pushing fishfingers towards. But here I am. It’s my birthday and I’m stretched out in a hotel room, a skinny boy from a moderately hip indie band draped over me, snoring and drooling.
“I have two choices. I can lick their shoes and stroke their fragile egos, I can say everything they want to hear and live my life quite happily. (As happily as one can be when they’re shoving their principles under the bed every night, sleeping in a well of their own shallow, pathetic weakness). Or I can wake up tomorrow and change everything. I can refuse to support their putrid little lives, instead telling them exactly what I think of their sad, sick, twisted existence.”
I wrote that in my diary last week. By diary I mean an old roughbook from school. One half of it has A-Level notes, the other half contains inky sketches of dogs being eaten by their owners. Reading it back I’m surprised by how angry I was. I’m also embarrassed I described my “shallow, pathetic weakness” as a well, since surely that’s physically impossible? Anyway. I was pissed off.
I’ve got a new best friend. And she’s famous. Well, kind of. She’s been in the papers, but mainly because of her Dad. Her fame comes under the umbrella of “Stop leeching off your parent’s success and get a bloody job, you skinny idiot”. Karen Brady she ain’t.
Last Friday I went to her house for the first time in the poshest bit of posh London. I’d decided to go for bare legs but baulked at the sight of my pasty skin so had quickly smudged them with three year old fake tan. Obviously I picked the kind that washes off, so as the rain fell from the sky and rolled down my legs, they took my orange hue with them. I bent my knees so my short coat covered more of me and ran as fast as I could in this stupid position.
Her house was beautiful, white and made of stone – much like her. Mouth agog, I climbed the polished red steps. Sadly I slipped and slashed open my knee just as NFBF opened the shiny black front door. “No-One” she said, shaking her head, “Why are you licking my steps?” I grimaced and pulled myself up to standing. Luckily the blood went some way towards hiding the tan streaks, and I made a mental note to include this tip in my book, ‘How To Be An Elegant Lady’ which I’ll no doubt be asked to write in the near future.
As we went upstairs my NFBF was babbling. “It was supposed to be just you and me, but Marcie rang and she’s over from Paris, and I really have to see her.” As she led me into her bedroom I paused in the doorway. It was a little girl’s room – pink walls, fluffy cushions, and toys stuffed into a vintage cot, pristine. I’d expected her to live in a squalid mess – Agent Provocateur pants under my shoes, red lipstick smudges all over her grubby walls – but no. The doorbell rang. “That’ll be Marcie”.
On first meeting people I try to be pleasant. I’m not a bubbly Bridget, but I’ll definitely say hello and probably not tell the person to wait downstairs until I’m, “ready to be sociable”. But clearly Marcie and I are different people. So down the stairs I went, the sounds of their giggles floating behind me as I trudged. “Fuck it” I thought. “This is probably the last time I’ll ever come here so I might as well make the most of it”. I found the restaurant-sized kitchen, and riffled through the fridge for snacks, piling plates high on a gold tray. Repeating the mantra “Don’t slip, don’t slip” I walked through the double doors that led to an expansive living room. I’d been watching ‘The Hills’ for all of two minutes when I got the feeling I wasn’t alone.
I wiped my chocolate-covered mouth with my sleeve and turned my head. Oh god oh god OH GOD. It was him. Leaning against the wall, a wry smile on his insanely perfect face, was the man of my dreams. And I don’t mean that in a “ooh well he’s got to be funny, and get on with my Mum, and I don’t think I could handle a moustache” way. I mean I had actually dreamed about this person. Regularly. Decadently. Intensely. He stars in a teen show that tries to make everyone feel bad about themselves for not doing loads of drugs and being called ‘Clay’, and I loved him. He sipped on a can of Coke and completely ignored me, so I turned back to the telly.
“I don’t get this show. Is it real? Is it fake? What’s the story?” I shifted in the folds of the couch, trying to look cool. Which is difficult when your arse has fallen asleep. “Um” I squeaked, “I think it’s a bit of both? They live their lives for real, but in a…guided way?” From the corner of my eye I saw him nod. I felt a bit smug. I started talking again and found I couldn’t stop – giving him an in-depth analysis of the show, pondering that perhaps the lack of religion in society means we need a new guide in our lives….My verbal diarrhoea crashed to a halt when he shouted, “You know I’m in the kitchen right? Are you just talking to yourself?” I panicked – was it worse to be talking without realising he’d left, or to be talking to myself? I decided now would be a good time to shut up. Dream Boy poked his head round the door, I looked up at him like a startled rabbit, “You’ve got chocolate in your hair by the way. That’s pretty fucking cute”.
At that point I forgave my NFBF for everything. For laughing at me everytime I did something stupid, for ritualistically undermining any independent thought I had, I even forgave her for bringing that bitchy French bitch into her room and exiling me. Because of her, I had spoken to Dream Boy.
So why the angst? Why the “putrid life” spiel? Perhaps it’s because three hours later, after being repeatedly rejected by Marcie, “We’re talking about my issues with my father…Are you still wearing that?” I left. Dream Boy was under Marcie’s watchful eye, and I felt like an idiot.
I went home feeling like I was only a mugging away from upping sticks to the countryside, training to be a vet, marrying an organic farmer, and bonking the postman on Thursdays. Of course the next morning I awoke to 7 missed calls from NFBF, and a picture message of her looking sad on the toilet. I decided to ignore them, but when she called again in the afternoon I grudgingly picked up, “Where did you goooooo?” she whined, “Home.” I replied. “But why? I came looking for you and you’d gone. I felt totally abandoned”. I laughed in a way I hoped was mocking, “I abandoned you? You left me on my own all night” NFBF did not respond well to my new-found assertiveness, “We didn’t leave you alone! We left you with Dream Boy! That was the whole bloody point. But you left and we, well Marcie, had to entertain him”. My cheeks flushed, “Wait, that was a set-up?” “Urgh obviously.” I started pacing, “And after I left he and Marcie…” “They only kissed, briefly. It was nothing” My mouth formed an “oh”, “But he likes you…He asked for your number” In my excitement I lost control of my vocal cords and shrieked, “He did?” “Ouch, yes he did. So can you calm down and be normal? ” Her faithful pet once more I squeaked, “OK”.
I’m so terrified that he won’t text I could vomit. But I’m even more terrified he will that I haven’t been able to eat for three days. I’m living in a nauseous paradox.
