The Mix-Up by Holly McCulloch

CHAPTER 3

I love sex, but I do not want sex (at least sex with something other than my trusty rabbit) badly enough to put myself through this excruciating tedium.

It was painful enough when Jas was trying to make me laugh. I could appreciate his efforts, even if he didn’t succeed.

I look across the table at him. I hope he can’t read my mind. If he could he would know how tempted I am to drink the whole jar of uncomfortably communal chilli oil, just to spice things up. To remove the temptation, I sit on my free hand and busy the other with eating my starter.

I can’t believe this guy is able to make a living out of being a comedian; even I am more amusing than he is and ‘funny’ has never been a term used to describe me. But now he isn’t even trying. He hasn’t exactly been the distraction I was after, and as a result my mind keeps flashing back to Chris. I haven’t been required to respond all night, let alone laugh, so my date hasn’t noticed my wandering mind. All he’s done is drone on about the misfortunes he’s suffered, with the pinnacle of his story being how his parents could only afford to buy him a second-hand car. He blames his sister.

He is in desperate need of perspective.

And I am so annoyed, at both him and at myself, that I am vibrating, and not in the good way. I had been looking forward to this evening. I wouldn’t have suggested getting starters and a main had I known this was my fate. The worst part is, his choice of conversation is a sure sign that we have reached the end of our road together. I shouldn’t have come this evening. It’s been a while since I’ve read a situation so badly. I thought we had more time. I thought comedians were meant to be funny and light-hearted.

But now I’m stuck here, shovelling down my over-priced and very mediocre steamed buns as quickly as possible. Why does everyone like these? The only part that tastes of anything is the filling, but you have to eat your way through so much soggy bread before you get there that when you finally do, the enjoyment is ruined. People are bonkers.

As I shove in the final bite, Jas takes a break in his misfortune monologue. ‘You look like you’re enjoying those. Let’s get some more.’ I shake my head, but he hasn’t taken any real notice of me all night and he isn’t about to start now. He starts to look around for our waiter and quickly catches her eye. She comes over almost immediately. He nods at me, looking excessively proud of himself, like I am meant to be impressed by such a meaningless achievement.

‘What can I get you guys?’ She already has her pencil and mini pad of paper out.

‘Can we have another order of the buns?’

I wave with my free hand. ‘Oh, no. I don’t want any more, thank you.’ His achievement was meaningless on many levels.

Oblivious, Jas looks confused. ‘But you were enjoying them.’ He turns back to our waiter, gestures at me like I need to be quiet, and says, ‘We’ll get another order.’ Chris used to order for me too, but even he didn’t gesture at me to be quiet.

I try again. ‘No. Honestly, I don’t want any more buns.’ My tone is a little more harsh than necessary, even if the hand gesture made me want to hit him. But I can’t blame him for thinking I’m having a good time. I’m nothing if not determined, and this evening I am, or at least I was, determined to have a good time. So I’ve been smiling my way through the buns and the self-pity. Fake it till you make it and all. I soften my tone, in a last effort to save this evening. ‘Of course if you want them, order them.’ I hope he doesn’t order them. ‘I just don’t want any more. Saving myself for the main.’ I hope this excuse comes across as sincere.

He looks at the waiter and shrugs as if I am the problem here and the waiter should take his side. ‘No more buns. Sorry to call you over.’

She nods and smiles. ‘No problem. If I can get you anything else, please let me know.’ She tops up our water glasses before retreating.

‘Anyway, as I was saying—’

I stand up abruptly. My hand is numb.

‘I’m just going to pop to the bathroom.’ I need a break. I need to recalibrate.

On my escape to the loo, I pass our waiter again. She catches my eye.

‘Are you OK?’

I look around. Her question must be directed at me. I am the only other person in this safe haven of a corridor.

But no, I am not OK. I need rescuing. I am so annoyed that I have been reduced to dating shite comedians. I am a fine vintage of a woman, or at least this is what I know I should be telling myself. I deserve more than shite comedians and the ghosts of exes past. My cheeks protest, but I smile once more. I doubt her question was meant to be so probing. ‘Yes. I’m just looking for the loo.’

She points behind her. ‘It’s upstairs.’

‘Thanks.’ I start to head towards the stairs but turn back before we get too far away from each other. ‘Can I ask – how long will the mains be?’

She squints. She must know I’m not having a good time. A good waiter can always tell. ‘Probably another fifteen minutes.’ My face must fall, because she follows this with, ‘Sorry, it’s busy tonight.’

I can’t help but freeze and concentrate on my breaths. Can I manage another fifteen minutes with no food to distract me? Maybe I should have ordered more buns.

‘Are you sure you’re OK?’ She looks concerned.

This is the second time she has asked me this in under a minute.

‘Yes. I’m fine.’ Ah, fine. The worst of the four-letter words. And because I am not rude, I add, ‘Thank you,’ before I turn away and scurry up the stairs.

When I reach the bathroom, I am hit by that very distinct bathroom scent. It’s quite unpleasant, which is a shame as I had hoped to stay up here for a while, but I don’t want the smell to seep into me.

I tentatively peek into the available stalls, and choose the cleanest-looking one to hide in. As soon as I sit down, all I can see in front of me is a handy graffiti reminder that says, ‘Hey you! Don’t text your ex.’ I take it as a sign, but I do text Sara. I send her a photo of me with the loo visible.

My evening is up the shitter. I hope yours is going better. Xx

Her reply is almost instant. It’s a photo of her front room. The room that they had been hoping would remain an adult-only zone. The floor is covered with toys, discarded clothes, and there is what looks like deep red oil paint spilling down one wall. If you tweaked it, the scene could look kinky. But I know it isn’t.

Is that smoothie?

Yes, berry. We’re sticking to clear liquids from now on.

Brilliant. Gin for me!

Make mine a double. Xx

I pocket my phone and flush the toilet even though I didn’t pee, just in case anyone is in here and judges me unnecessarily for not flushing. I realize this is bad for the environment, but not flushing would be worse for people’s impression of me. I wash my hands, taking my time to make sure I get all the frequently missed places, and then half-heartedly dry them with the very ineffectual, yet extremely noisy, hand drier before making my way back. Walking down the staircase, I have one of those out-of-body experiences where I wonder, just for a moment, what it would be like to fall down them. Would the pain be worth it just to cut the evening short? I shake my head to dislodge the idea, but even having dislodged it, I know the mere fact I had it is not a good sign.

As I near Jas, I remind myself to be positive. I might be a cynic at heart, but more than that, I remind myself that he was quite good at sex. I think maybe all comedians suffer from a crippling need to be liked, and it’s this that made him quite a giving lover. Eager to please. Constantly after positive feedback and a boost to his very delicate ego. Even though his enthusiasm didn’t quite make up for his lack of skill, I do think it could be worth another try. I have defeated greater giants than this boredom. I must be able to resurrect this evening.

‘Hi.’ I sit down, secretly delighted by how elegantly I managed to manoeuvre myself back into the chair. The dress I am wearing is one that hides the full depths of its fabric until it’s too late and a world full of material has gathered in between your legs. For someone who is already bad at wearing dresses, this is particularly hard to manage. Something about them just doesn’t work with my body type.

‘I was worried for a moment that you weren’t coming back.’

Maybe he has been paying more attention than I thought. All I can say is, ‘Oh!’ in an effort to conceal how close to the truth he is. After taking a drink of water, he seems reenergized. I stifle a yawn.

‘So, you still haven’t really told me what you do. You’re in events.’

I’m relieved that he has done as I had hoped, and changed the subject from his terribly deprived childhood, but I wish he had chosen a different topic. I try not to share the details of my profession with people I want to sleep with. Most of the time, they tend to hear ‘wedding cake baker’, assume I want to get married and run away. But sometimes, less frequently and more disturbingly, they hear ‘wedding cake baker’, assume I want to get married and instead have us running down that flower-lined aisle together. I want something in between the two, but definitely closer to the former.

So, I have learnt to lie, about my profession as well as other details I prefer to keep hidden. Details that can ruin what is meant to just be a bit of fun. I get better results if I lie.

‘Yes. I am. I cater for events.’ We all know that the best lies are based in truth.

‘Oh cool, like corporate events?’

‘Sure.’ Why not? People can get married in any number of places these days. Besides, I sometimes bake cakes for other events as well. And I still have some of my regular orders for local cafés, although I’ve had to cut back on these since pivoting. Now I concentrate more on big-ticket weddings.

‘Interesting. Very interesting.’ He nods, I think to himself. ‘I’ve actually been thinking of a bit of a career change.’

I can tell that he wants to talk about it. I can smell the desire emanating off of him like an overzealous body spray. He only needs one word of encouragement from me. ‘Really?’

‘Yeah. I’m not sure that I’m actually any good at comedy.’ I nod before realizing it is impolite to agree in this instance. ‘So instead I’m going to talk about self-help and motivation.’ He uses his hands to suggest that there is a sign somewhere just above my head. ‘How to overcome adversity and hardship and unleash your power within.’ His face is completely straight as he says this, and I school mine to do the same.

Unfortunately, I think he takes my silence as interest, instead of what it actually is: disbelief and shock.

‘A good idea, right?’

Still shocked, I can only manage one word. ‘Adversity?’

‘Yeah, like all my childhood trauma.’

I think I nod a bit. Not out of agreement, but more because I am trying to understand him. Maybe I have missed something.

‘Trauma?’ I’m still only capable of one word at a time.

‘Yes, you know. All the competition with my sister.’ He looks at me really earnestly. ‘I mean, you must have some trauma in your past. Everyone has something. No matter how supposedly big or small.’ He eats the final part of his starter. He’s been talking so much that he still hasn’t had time to finish it yet, even with my loo break. ‘So what would be the one thing you would change about yourself? An issue you would like to overcome?’

I am frozen.

Frozen in place.

This guy cannot be serious.

He cannot honestly think that I am going to spill my guts. To him. Here. Now.

‘Go on, tell me.’ He nods, encouragingly. Apparently he does.

But I cannot. I am not a sharer.

I just don’t know how to get out of it. If I refuse to answer I will come across as lacking in confidence. And everyone knows that confidence is sexy. I don’t want to not be sexy.

So instead of getting out of it by dodging, I make something up.

‘I wish … I wish I could relax more.’ I let this sit for a while. I sink deeper into my seat and let my lower back soften.

I’m almost proud of myself. This isn’t too far from the truth, even though it’s a very diluted version of it. I’m a teeny bit impressed with how open I have been.

But across the table from me, Jas scoffs. ‘Cripes, well, I mean, my retreat would be aimed at people with actual problems, so I guess you aren’t my target audience.’

If I wasn’t sitting down, I would have jumped back. I know my jaw has gone slack and I don’t care if I look like I have no chin. Sure, my confession might have been a little on the light side, but even if you take it at face value, which you shouldn’t – as any knob with a pinch of intuition would tell you – this shouldn’t be his reaction.

‘Sorry?’ How an apology can sound like a probe, I don’t know, but this is the magic (and confusion) of the English language, I suppose.

He gestures at himself. ‘I mean, I’ve just confessed to you a lifetime of constant disappointment. Your wish, to “relax more”, seems a little, well, frivolous, doesn’t it?’ He even uses air quotes when he says ‘relax more’ to make sure I know just how ‘frivolous’ he thinks my wish is.

I remain stunned.

My mind goes through my options. Because I do have options. No matter the situation, everyone has options. Sometimes all options are bleak. But sometimes, as in my current situation, I know what I would really, really like to do.

I would like to tell him that what he is saying is complete and total bollocks. That he can’t honestly believe that he has overcome adversity and hardship. The worst thing that has happened to him is that his younger sister was born. A younger sister who, by the way, sounds just like any other younger sister on the planet. That isn’t a hardship. He has no understanding or real appreciation of the word. And just because my wish might seem frivolous to him, doesn’t mean it is actually frivolous. What a wanker.

In a fantasy parallel universe, I slowly become aware of the growing audience around me, an audience who, once they have caught on to what is happening, start to cheer me on. There might even be a gentle spotlight on me. I find the perfect words to express exactly how I feel and say them with flawless elocution and dignity. I stand up, magic some cash out of my pocket and flick it on the table. It lands perfectly, right by the water glass. Then I leave, the skirt of my dress fanning around me, just like my appreciative audience, my shoes making an authoritative and distinctly female sound as I leave. I might even wink to our waiter on the way out.

But this is no fairy tale. So instead, I fumble as I extricate myself from the chair, legs getting caught up in the surprising amount of dress material. I hate wearing dresses.

‘Are you OK? Where are you going?’

I need to leave.

Unlike my dream self, my actual self is too self-conscious to say how I really feel. Big emotions confuse me, and I tend to run instead of face them. What if the words I use don’t actually say what I want them to say? What if there is an accidental miscommunication and I come across as a total twat? So instead of a perfect diatribe, as I try and fail to put on my jacket, getting one of the lapels caught up in my sleeve and making it impossible to slide on, I only mumble, ‘I need to go. I’ve had a bad …’

‘A bad?’ Jas asks, inquisitively.

At this point all words leave my brain, so all I can do is repeat what he himself has just said.

I nod. ‘A bad.’ As though this is enough of a reason. He probably thinks I’ve got the shits, and under the circumstances, I am OK with this.

I turn on my heel and walk out, knocking into chairs as I go, right shoe slightly squeaking from when I had to get it re-soled.

Back at home, slouched next to my couch and eating leftover cake – having skipped straight from buns to dessert – I am indeed having a bad. Not only for the unnecessary calories – just this morning I told myself that I wasn’t going to eat any cake today, even if I am magnanimously eating up all the too-small chocolate and pistachio flavour – but also because I left the restaurant without paying for my meal. I crack open my computer and wait for five minutes as it comes to life. It’s old, but it gives off so much heat that it comes in handy during the winter. Less handy now that we are heading into May.

Except for the overdramatic whirring from my laptop, it’s quiet in here this evening. I guess it’s always been quiet here in the evenings, even when my nan was still around. She would tell me that, as a baker, she was destined to be an early riser, no pun intended, so she would stick to an early bedtime and leave me to do as I pleased. At times like this it’s easy to think she could still be here, asleep in the next room.

The apartment, just like the cake studio downstairs, is pretty much as she left it. Luckily the furniture is all (genuine) mid-century modern, which is helpfully back in fashion. But even if it wasn’t, I wouldn’t change a thing. We made some great memories here; I don’t want to disturb them.

Computer finally awake, the aggressively bright screen staring at me, I email the restaurant, offering to return and pay for my food. It’s not their fault that I can’t handle confrontation. I type out a sufficiently apologetic note, so apologetic that even my digital writing assistant thinks I’m beyond sorry – I am remorseful.

Email sent and to-do list for tomorrow written on a post-it, I contemplate getting up. I almost stand, but I don’t quite make it, so instead I decide to stay a little longer and stalk Chris and his fiancée Pippa.

It’s a masochistic thing to do, but I can’t help myself. I look through all their holiday photos and make some very quick window judgements. She looks great in a bikini. He never tans, but just goes red; with the occasional hint of purple. They look like they have a lot of like-minded and similarly dressed friends. They also look like they take a lot of weekend city breaks. She wears hats well. She also, I squint as I check this, looks quite a bit like his mother. Scrolling even further back, I scoff at the irony when I see that he ran the London Marathon for Cancer Research UK. He was the total opposite of charitable when he was going out with me, but running a marathon would be just the type of thing he would do so he could brag about it afterwards.

He could be such a knob, but he was only ever a knob to me. He was great to everyone else. But the fact he was charming to everyone else just made me feel worse, because if he was charming to everyone else, but a knob to me, surely that means it was me that was the problem?

From the looks of things, he was anything but a knob when he popped the question to Pippa.

From the photos, it looks like they had the perfect engagement. I devour every detail that I can. They were on a long weekend in New York. There is even an accompanying video. She was casually carrying a coffee. Then musicians started playing. Initially for everyone, but soon the musicians moved so they were surrounding Chris and Pippa. They played an acoustic version of Bruno Mars’ ‘Marry You’. They really were very good. You can’t hear what he says, but you can tell from her lips (and from the exclamations of the people around her) that she says yes. She must have been expecting it though: the accompanying photos suggest her manicure looks fresh, and in the video there’s a moment when it looks like she’s searching for the camera.

Maybe I am being unfair. Maybe he has changed. I’ve certainly changed since going out with him. But either way, his reappearance has disturbed the quiet that was in my mind. I can’t help but wonder quite where, and how, we went wrong. I wonder what our life would be like if we had just tweaked our course. Would we still be together?

It took until about three quarters of the way through our meeting on Sunday for my heartbeat to return to a more normal rhythm. Sure, hearing about their perfect wedding plans wasn’t the most fun I have ever had, but I did take some joy in knowing that, although it might be perfect, it won’t be personal. I bet they will even have a logo, and I bet it will be an entwined C and P. I can’t blame them. Many moons ago I would have done the same thing. Although of course the P would have been for Paige. In some ways I think people need to have two weddings. The first wedding can be like the first pancake. The one you have to learn from and throw out; the one that comes before all the much tastier pancakes, made just the way you like them.

Right before they left, I cracked my only sincere smile of the appointment when my other prediction turned out to be correct. I did indeed have to make up a box of cake for them to take home. Probably straight to their bin, as Pippa only tried a small forkful of the vanilla. At least Chris had the decency to try each of the flavours I had put out for them.

I’m feeling emotional, but I’m not a crier. I haven’t cried for years and I’m not about to start now. Call me heartless, but I didn’t even cry at Nan’s funeral. Was I sad? Epically so. Did I cry? No. It’s not part of who I am.

But I do feel sad, along with many other things, one of which is a not-insignificant amount of humiliation. The idea of making my ex’s wedding cake makes me physically cringe.

I wish I was a meditator. I imagine meditating is exactly the kind of activity that would help me clarify my thoughts and feelings. Instead, I am relying on sugar and a weighted blanket.

The reappearance of Chris has upset my balance, but I guess that’s not a huge surprise. It’s easy to forget something when that thing isn’t sitting at your table, talking about their wedding to a human who isn’t you.

I wonder if I have any more cake.

When there is finally nothing left to see, I slam the laptop closed with less care than it deserves. My frustration isn’t aimed at the computer. It is aimed at me. At Chris. At life in general for being so uncontrollable.

I extricate myself from the tangle of weighted blankets and slowly plod into the bathroom so I can take off my makeup and wash my face. As a reward for sticking to my skincare regime, I put on some of my special night-time face tonic, in the hopes that the lavender smell will both help calm me enough to sleep and help me to wake up looking remarkably refreshed and young.

Finally in bed after staring at my face for a shockingly long amount of time, willing the frown lines that have recently become a lot more stubborn to go away, I open my bedside drawer. It contains a whole load of goodies and goes back a long way. It’s been many years since I have rummaged around to see what’s stashed in the far reaches of its soul. But tonight, I only take out things that are easy to access. First, I reach for my lip balm and secondly, I reach for my vibrator, gazing at it whilst contemplating whether or not to get my buzz on. Just because Jas is no longer in the picture, doesn’t mean the whole evening is lost. I stare at it for a while before deciding to put it back.

But it isn’t Jas who has killed my buzz. It’s Chris.