Chapter 20 - Gay Dave, Tuesday

You’d think by now I’d know better than to get into a heavy drinking session on a Monday night. I blame Danny - if he hadn’t accepted my invite to go out drinking after work this would have never happened. As always the plan was just to have a couple then get a take-away and head home. Finish the night in front of the TV, then when Danny headed off to bed take a quick peek online and see if I could fix myself up with some dates for later in the week.
Of course it doesn’t work like that. Since I last went in The Anchor Monday night has become half price night - that’s all drinks half price. Fucking stupid if you ask me, just encouraged us to drink more. Well, you’re money goes twice as far so why wouldn’t you? And so we did. Luckily they do food, so we at least had the sense to eat in an attempt to ward off the drunken-ness, but they’re hardly big on vegetarian options so Danny just ended up with a plate of chips.
So we gossiped about our days, and our love lives. His is just as hopeless as mine, although it doesn’t seem to phase him in the slightest - his attitude is , “something will come along”, but said in a way that suggests he really doesn’t care if it doesn’t. I’ve no idea when he last had sex - he’s certainly never bought anyone back to the flat, at least not while I’ve been there. So drunkenly I asked him.
“Friday”
Blimey, that took me by surprise. I expected him to say 1997 or something. Crafty bugger. So to speak.
“Friday?”
I wasn’t going to make this easy for him. All the times he’d taken the piss out of my shagging, this was the ideal opportunity to get my own back. He knew what he was doing though as he already had a big grin on his face.
“Yeah, Friday. Day after Thursday, day before Saturday.”
“Hmmm, thanks for that fantastic explanation - I can see now why you’re a teacher!”
Cheeky git wasn’t going to make it easy for me.
“Come on you bastard, give me the details! Dish it or your yoga mat gets it!”
“Oh I hope not, that’s what got me the shag in the first place”
Big grin this time. He was loving winding me up, and I have to say I was pretty intrigued.
“Enough of the mystery, I’m too pissed to guess what on earth you’re talking about, unless you’re telling me you shagged your yoga mat?”
“I have a purely platonic relationship with my yoga mat. Unlike my yoga teacher.”
“You shagged your yoga teacher? Isn’t that illegal? Or at least just bad karma?”
That made him laugh, so I got in another round of drinks and spent the resting of the evening listening to how he seduced his yoga teacher, and hearing about just how flexible they both were. Blimey, I think it might be time I enrolled myself in one of those classes!

We stumbled home after closing time. Danny went straight to his room to talk to his teacher. From what he told me it sounded like they were heading towards becoming boyfriends, which would really suit Danny. Jammy fucker. I turned on my laptop, more out of habit than for any useful reason, and before I knew it I was chatting to all kinds of strange men. Why are the ones I always like at the other end of the country? Or already coupled? Or maybe I’m only attracted to people I can’t have? Actually, that wouldn’t include the coupled ones then - they all start off telling you how happy they are with their boyfriend and how they’re only looking for friends, but before you know it they’re telling you how they haven’t slept together in three years and do you fancy a shag? Piss off you greedy bastards - talk about cake and eat it! No wonder I can’t find a boyfriend - there aren’t any, just unhappy couples looking for playmates. So I went to bed feeling pissed and disappointed. No dates lined up for any time in the near future - I might as well become a monk!

I woke up feeling pretty much the same - hung over and frustrated. I’m used to getting what I want in pretty much every other part of my life, so why is this boyfriend business so tricky? I’m a good catch! We’ll I’d go out with me!
I was flicking through my diary to see how many dates I’d had this year, and after I’d counted a stupidly low number I kept flicking through the pages to see what else I had to look forward to when I noticed that it’s Simon’s birthday on Thursday. Oh fuck. He’ll sulk for months if everyone forgets, so I better do a ring round and see if anyone remembered. Poor Simon, he hardly seems to register in our lives. Mr Invisible.
On my way out I passed a sleepy looking Danny staring into the mirror, presumably trying to will his face into its normal shape. I slapped him on the back and cheerily said, “nice night mate, we should do it again”, which elicited only a grunt in response. Never could take his drink!

The day passed in a blur - reports to write, other people’s reports to correct, stupid stuff to sort out myself because we don’t even have a secretary, and far too long spent emailing people bitching about our lack of same. Not all of them could help me with the matter - my sister, for instance, couldn’t care less, but by then I’d gotten so annoyed about the whole business that I was just ranting and raving at anyone. Fat lot of use it’ll do. My sister just emailed back saying, “do it yourself you lazy twat. Then come to tea. XX” Charming. But at least the offer of a free meal helped.
I emailed a few people about Simon’s birthday, mostly getting the same, “oh shit, is it?” response. Couldn’t find an email for Jim though, so I left him a message at home. He might have remembered, he’s good about stuff like that.

After lunch the whole secretary thing got our of hand. How am I supposed to manage people when I’m spending half my time printing and copying? That’s what I said to our HR department, although I fear I may have lost my temper a bit and shouted it. I certainly pointed. And looked a bit cross. I bet I stamped my foot - why do I always do that? Just to prove my point I have to stamp my fucking foot, like some spoilt child. Well, that’ll help my cause I bet. What a twat. I’m pretty sure I heard the HR secretary sniggering as I left, and I was tempted to tell her that if she had nothing better to do than snigger she could come and help us out, but thought I’d made a big enough fool of myself for the day.
Although apparently it did the trick - we’ve got a temp starting tomorrow. Let’s hope they’ve got their wits about them - we’ve had one before who couldn’t operate a photocopier, and whose typing was so bad it took longer to correct it than it took to write in the first place. Fingers crossed this one is good. And as an added bonus let it be a cute bloke - I need something to brighten my day up right now!

Before I left the office I gave my sister a quick call, just to check there’d been no domestic disaster that I ought to know about before I went round. But apparently everything was fine - Becky was hiding in the room after a horse riding lesson, and Laura was playing some bloodthirsty game on the PlayStation, yelling to herself as she kicked the shit out of soldiers apparently. Such a charming nine year old. I promised to fetch wine and get round as soon as I could.
So on the way home I stopped in at the supermarket, grabbed more wine than I ought to be drinking after last night’s session, and picked up flowers and piles of chocolate - I liked my chocolate, but Nicky and the girls could give me a run for my money. The pile I’d picked up would probably last ten minutes, but at least we’d each get at least ten minutes of bliss.
When I got home there was a strange coat on the back of the sofa, laying on top of Danny’s. His door was shut and I could hear talking and giggling - I guess he’d brought the yoga teacher back! Good for him. Pity I had to go out, would be fun to hang around and see what he looked like. By the way Danny described him he sounded gorgeous, but Danny was smitten so he was bound to say that wasn’t he.
I jumped in the shower, and as I was getting dressed Jim phoned up. He’d forgotten Simon’s birthday as well, and worse than that he says Simon might get made redundant. Crap timing. He’ll be gutted. Now we’ve really got to make an effort for his birthday. What the hell are we going to do? What am I going to get him? I promised to give both Simon and Jim a ring the next day - I was running late as it was, and Nicky was likely to be on the phone telling me how rudely late I was if I didn’t get my act together and leave soon. But not just yet - I could hear movement in Danny’s room, so I pretended to sort through the post until the door opened, and Danny came out with his shirt off and a big smile on his face. Hmm, nice chest, but if he was good-looking his mate was even better looking.
“This is my flatmate Dave. Dave - Todd”
He smiled and shook my hand, saying how nice it was to meet you, and I thought, “you might be gorgeous, but if you hurt my mate I’ll make you sorry.” Blimey, where did that come from?