Kitty's cup was uneventful yet again.
Mary's one was full of romantic images.
Elisabeth had at least four male figures standing in either a fighting or a hunting position.
Lydia still had the promise of a tempestuous romance.
"When will I have it then?" Lydia asked impatiently. "And who the hell with?"
Jane didn't respond for a while and then said with a puzzled expression on her face.
"Very soon, it looks like. And although I can't tell you the name and address of your love of the century I think that one of us will introduce you to each other."
"How can you tell?"
"There're five dots around a tiny heart in the middle. If you're a dot above the
heart – which would be the most reasonable presumption – the second one from you is the closest to this romance thing."
"Second in what way?"
"I guess in the way we're sitting now."
"To the right or to the left?"
"Clockwise. Always clockwise." Jane said earnestly.
"Then the mysterious benefactor would be Mary." Lydia said.
But at that very moment Elisabeth returned to the kitchen and sat in the vacant chair before Mary. She was still clutching her mobile in her hand and smiled at something.
"Pat's picking me up in thirty minutes," she started but noticing the unusual silence she stopped abruptly, "what? What's wrong? Why are you staring at me? Did I suddenly grow a second nose on my face?"
"No," said Mary, "it's just that we didn't realise that you were second.
They started to explain to Elisabeth about Lydia's love-life prospects and although they spoke together in a noisy and unsynchronised chorus Elisabeth understood them immediately. She was always quick in grasping any information connected to love or sex.
"Easy," she said, "tomorrow you're coming to my hair salon and we'll find you somebody suitable there just like that."
She clicked her fingers showing exactly how easy that would be.
"And now tell me my future, please, because I need time to change and put on some make-up before Pat is here."
"You've already got two inches of paint on your face." Lydia said irritably.
"Anyway, who's Pat?"
"First of all, I'm not going to a party in my daytime make-up and secondly, Pat is nobody. I mean, he's somebody alright. Actually from what I've heard about his sexual abilities he's something as well. Unfortunately, he's my old friend so I'll never be able to check how much truth there is in the legends surrounding him. What else do you want to know? I met him in the days of my disastrous modelling career."
"Is he a model?"
"No. No! Absolutely not. He was just hanging around with the crowd. He works in King's College – lecturing something rather highbrowish. And by the way we're going to become neighbours very soon as it was he who recommended me a vacant
flat in his house."
"Is he loaded then? I suppose his accommodation would cost a fortune." Lydia asked.
"If there're millionaires working in the Universities I don't know them for sure," answered Elisabeth, "because usually they're poorer than church mice. Pat inherited his flat from his grandparents. His granddad was something big in art and the flat is simply stuffed with weird pictures. No, Lydia, don't ask me what the old man's name was, I don't know. They were his grandparents on his mother's side."
After that Lydia murmured something about boring stuffy University lecturers and lost interest in Pat. She regained it back though when Elisabeth continued her narrative about Pat's outstanding sex drive. The girls listened to her story with growing enthusiasm and at the end managed to wind themselves up to such extent that they couldn't wait to see the hero. He finally appeared and looked nothing they had imagined. They expected to see a striking hunk while in reality he was very slim even skinnier than Elisabeth with rather plain face. His nose was slightly crooked, his lips weren't luscious or whatever lips of sexual giants usually are. The only interesting feature was his eyes: they always smiled at you and looked as if their owner knew a thing or two about you (that is, if you were a woman). He came in and said "Hello!" with such ease as if they had been good friends for many years and although they still had doubts about his talents, they liked him instantly. Elisabeth in her turn kissed him lightly and said:
"Beannachtai na Feile Padraig!"
"What did you say?" Kitty whispered to Elisabeth when she thought that Pat couldn't hear her.
"I said something like: Happy St Patrick Day! Why are you whispering?"
"I didn't know that you were Irish."
"I'm not: I'm three-quarter English and quarter Polish."
"Do you know the difference between St Patrick and the capital of Zimbabwe?" Pat asked quite randomly.
The girls were expecting anything but that so they looked at him in bewilderment. He told them the difference. It was terribly funny and terribly politically incorrect. Then he told them the difference between "sooner" and "later" and they laughed for nearly five minutes, as it was unbearably funny and horrendously obscene.
"Do you know the difference between a toilet bowl and a grand piano?" he asked when they finally stopped giggling.
They shook their heads ready for another joke but instead he sighed regretfully and said:
"That's a shame! And such nice girls too. I thought I would ask one of you to meet my parents but if you can't distinguish a toilet from piano I'm not sure that I want to do that."
"OK, it's time to go." Elisabeth said and then repeated that at least three times before she was heard.
Unfortunately the only person who paid attention to her words was Kitty.
"Why are you so tight?" she asked. "Are you afraid that your friend is becoming popular here?"
"I don't want him to become overly popular. I know him only too well." Elisabeth answered. "He doesn't have a bad reputation for nothing."
"What is it that good girls find so attractive in boys with a bad reputation?" Kitty said philosophically.
"I don't know. I've never been a good girl but I don't want anybody to be hurt. At
least, if he were to try to woo Lydia, I wouldn't mind, she is a one hundred per cent egocentric. His charm will be wasted on her."
And that was where Elisabeth was so wrong!
Lydia called her the next afternoon sounding very excited. That day was Elisabeth's day off, so she slept till two o'clock, which wasn't difficult at all as she returned home from the St Patrick's celebrations only at six in the morning. After a long soak in the bath she got the strength to cook herself a very late lunch and was enjoying her Sausages Viardo when the telephone rang.
Elisabeth lifted the receiver and heard Lydia's angry voice.
"Where have you been?" she demanded, "I've been calling you for the last five hours."
"I've been sleeping."
"What, you were so drunk you didn't hear the telephone ringing?"
"No, I simply switched it off."
"Very inconsiderate of you. Anyway, stay at home, I'm coming over."
"I thought you were going to stay with your parents this weekend in – what's it called? Great Small something.
"Great Littleton. Never mind that. I cancelled my visit."
"Look, I've got a terrible hangover. I don't know what's so urgent that you want from me but can it wait till tomorrow at least?"
"No, it can't. As you've just said, it's urgent."
Until the last minute Elisabeth hoped that Lydia would change her mind but when she materialised on her doorstep with her overnight bag Elisabeth understood that there would be no mercy.
"You were right." Lydia said looking around her flat. "This place is a rat hole. It's a good thing that you're moving. Now about your friend, he's absolutely out of this world. I've got to see him. Do you want to know what happened yesterday with all the details?"
Elisabeth didn't but she didn't have much choice. Yesterday Pat played one of his dirty tricks and invited all the girls to the party. She sincerely didn't want them to go. That is she would be happy to have them with her if Pat was somewhere else. Far away. The rainforest, for example, or Russian steppe. She was really mad at him. She knew his tactics. He would do whatever he needed to get the girl that caught his eye and when he would get what he wanted from her he would dump her. Perhaps "dump" was the wrong word. Pat never dumped anybody. There were a number of women (and even Patrick's best pal Elisabeth had no idea how big this number was) who sincerely believed that one day he would be back. And everything in the garden would be lovely. So they waited and waited and he kept them deluded more than willingly and even returned to them occasionally making them happy for a bit and then miserable again for a long-long time. Elisabeth had become very much attached to her Brightonian friends and hated to see any of them hurt. Yet she couldn't do anything when Pat offered them to join his party. In vain she sent him warning and even threatening signals, he either didn't notice them or more likely pretended not to. She still hoped that the girls would refuse, some of them had to work tomorrow, but apart from Jane everyone accepted Pat's offer. Even lovestruck Mary saw nothing wrong in having a bit of fun and dance in company of Pat's merry friends. So Elisabeth dark as a thundercloud sat in Kitty's sitting room for at least half an hour while her friends made themselves presentable helping each other with make-up and exploring Kitty's wardrobe as if they were teenagers again. They were all more or less of the same build except for Mary who was build like any two of them together yet even she managed to squeeze herself into something that belonged to Kitty.
Then they finally packed into Pat's small BMW and rode to the place violating all the road regulations. But it was fun and even fuming Elisabeth began to smile at the end. The club was rented for the night by the members of some Irish band, which was on tour in England, their numerous friends and a few carefully chosen admirers. The spirit of the great St Patrick was definitely hovering about the place and everyone who was there was tipsy and happy. Some of the guests still filled themselves with Guinness and Murphy's but there were others who had already switched to stronger beverages.
(By the way do you know that even if you hate beer either for its taste, or smell, or both you can still make some use of it? Have you ever tried for example a duckling marinated in beer? It's beautiful and the only odour you can sense when you cook it is a pleasant aroma of freshly baked bread.)
"I've never seen anything like that," Mary shouted to Kitty gleefully some thirty minutes and three or four shots later."
"The last time I was in a nightclub was before I got married." Kitty answered equally as loud.
The music was deafening but the noise produced by the people who tried to overpower the music in order to communicate with each other was even more potent.
"I was in a nightclub less than a fortnight ago." Mary said.
"Really, where? You didn't tell me about it."
"It was in France when we were skiing. They had this stupid organised pub-crawl and my parents persuaded me to come with them and some other friends. I don't know how they felt but for me it was scary. Except for our party and some other losers the average age of participants was about twenty, twenty one at most, and I felt like a grandmother who had lost her marbles and was trying to get her granddaughter's boyfriend to go out on a date."
"Come on, a few years can't make such a difference!"
"Yes, they can." Mary said moodily, then she smiled again. "That nightclub was actually the last place we were planning to visit and there were two girls in it having a real fight. I went to the toilet and there were only two cubicles there: one for men and the other for women. There was a girl in front of me: a tiny thin slip of a girl whom even enormous heels didn't make much bigger. But she had a temper of a giant. She turned to me and complained that somebody had been occupying the toilet for the last ten minutes. Then she suddenly became agitated and started to bang loudly on the toilet door with her rather dirty tiny fists and then with her likewise unclean boots. In the end the door opened wide and some furious girl emerged from the cabin yelling at Thumbelina asking what her problem was. Without saying a word this aggressive Lilliputian raised her hand and slapped the girl from the cabin across her face. The girl lost her speech for a second while the little one lost her balance and flew into the cabin where she landed straight on the toilet seat. It didn't calm her down as even sitting there she continued to shout abuse and threats to the other girl."
Patrick danced in turn with each of the girls except for Elisabeth. He also fetched them drinks and introduced the girls to his friends. Seeing that they were really enjoying the party Elisabeth washed her hands resignedly and gave a full attention to her own affairs. She knew many people in the club and slept with a sufficient number of them as for the members of Irish band, they all were her old good friends. After kissing all of them she asked about their news and told them duly about the recent events of her life. All that took a lot of time and in order to keep her strength up she had to drink. And drink again. No wonder that after an hour or two of such intensive careof her well-being, Elisabeth began to experience frequent black-outs. She remembered though that at certain point she had a passionate sex with somebody in the storeroom but unfortunately she didn't remember whom with. Another thing she forgot but tried to remember painstakingly was whether she gave that person her telephone number. She sincerely hoped that she didn't. She still struggled with her memory while listening inattentively to Lydia's story which as a matter of fact wasn't even a story: just her aahs and oohs about Pat. Nothing took place between them except for a few dances they had and some sort of sketchy conversation. But as it happened it was enough for Lydia.
"Now," she said when she finished her fascinating story, "you'll ring him and invite here."
After saying that in a peremptory tone she filled her plate with sea-food pasta, which Elisabeth being a hospitable hostess and a kindly soul cooked, and began to eat in the most unruffled manner.
"Look," said Elisabeth, "I don't even know if he's at home. And I'm not sure at all that he hasn't had his own plans for tonight or that he really wants to come here."
"You'll find out." Lydia said serenely putting another forkful in her mouth.
Pat, I hate you, said Elisabeth to herself, dialling his number. Lydia demanded her to switch speakerphone on and when she heard a female voice on the other side of the line she knitted her brows sullenly. She was surprised to hear then that Elisabeth instead of speaking her usual husky and slightly uneducated voice said in exaggeratingly cultural manner:
"Good evening. May I speak to Dr Patrick Grady?"
"Is it urgent? He's very busy at the moment," the rather haughty reply followed but
Lydia relaxed at once: the voice was too mature to belong to a girlfriend.
"Not really. May I leave a message? Tell him, please, that Professor Sutton-Hirsch called and asked to call back. It's about one of his student. Thank you very much. Good night."
"Wait a minute," the voice commanded, "I'll call him."
Lydia stifled a nervous giggle when she heard the woman shouting in the distance: "Patrick, it's for you. Professor Sutton-Hirsch about your student!"
"Yes, Professor Sutton…erm…Hirsch." Patrick answered eventually. "How can I help?"
"Yes, there're some points I'd like you to enlighten me on." Elisabeth said in the same unpleasant and artificial tone. "Can you come now or am I asking too much?"
"No. Of course, I'll come. I've been a little busy but it can wait. Nothing is more important than approaching exams."
"Very well. See you soon then." Elisabeth said icily and rung off.
"You're something!" Lydia said with respect. "Is he coming? Has he understood where to? Do you think he recognised you? Why have you spoke in such an idiotic way with that woman? Speaking of which who's she, his mum?"
"Yes. And I'm not very popular with her. So if I'd call and tell her that Elisabeth and her love-sick idiot of a friend both want her son for a chat and a following f*** I don't think she would let us talk to him."
"You're not getting any f*** from him!" Lydia said indignantly. "Only I will and that will be great!"
"You bet you will!" Elisabeth sighed. "Do you really want that? There're so many nice guys around. Why are you so keen on this one?"
"You're jealous!"
"I'm not! I'm doing it for you! Oh well…perhaps you're right: what's wrong could come out of the one-night stand? If that would happen to Mary then I would have a reason to worry. But you're very much down to earth just like I. So, enjoy!"
Patrick stormed into Elisabeth's flat like a medium size tornado.
"You're genius, Prof Sutton-Whatever," he exclaimed kissing her, "how did you know that I was tortured and slowly murdered… or was it vice versa? You have an amazing sixth sense! I think that's because you're in love with me. Admit it, don't be shy."
"Hi, Lydia, what a nice surprise," he said noticing Elisabeth's visitor at last, "how are you? Did you enjoy the party? Look, girls, you've already saved me once, what about doing it all over again? I'm starving! My mum's on some new crazy diet again so we're having only raw vegetables the whole day and I'm definitely not a rabbit."
"Oh no! – Elisabeth said in desperation." I can't cook for a third time in a row.
"Feed me!" Pat said giving a poor imitation of a killer-plant from The Little Shop of Horrors. "Feed me and then you both can do whatever you want with me. I'm all yours."
Elisabeth noticed unhappily that he mentioned them both again. That meant that he wasn't going to leave Lydia alone. Elisabeth knew many of his former girlfriends but it was the first time when he decided to go for one of her own friends. Drat you, Pat, she thought and went into the kitchen. Fifteen minutes later she managed to produce a very nice meal from various leftovers. Lydia joined Patrick: she was too nervous to remember about pasta she had just an hour ago.
"You know," said Pat later, "you have the great potentials to become an excellent wife. I never understood how you managed to combine so different features. Theoretically you have to be like I: an old bachelor who hates cooking and sleeping in his own bed."
"I would love not to cook all the time," said Elisabeth bitterly, "but I'm not allowed to do so."
"Rubbish!" Pat said. "I was watching you today as I watched you many times before, you take pleasure in cooking. Very much so."
"You know what they say in such situations: if you're raped – relax and try to enjoy." Elisabeth answered.
"Tell us something funny." Lydia asked Pat, she got bored of not taking part in their exchange. "You know so many anecdotes! I love anecdotes but I never remember any of them."
And so he told her a couple of anecdotes and then listened patiently to some stories of Lydia's life and even asked questions sounding genuinely interested. Elisabeth left him to his devices and hoping that Lydia would see through Pat she went into the kitchen where she decided charitably to make some dessert for them. She hadn't started yet when the telephone rang. Unknown male voice asked her. Being preoccupied with her thoughts of the pair in her sitting room she lost vigilance and answered realising too late that it could be her yesterday's adventure.
It was.
What was even worse that he told her his name when she picked up a receiver but she missed it and now she had no idea how to address him. They had quite a heated discussion, with him explaining why she had to meet him somewhere down town at once and her giving her reasons why she couldn't do that tonight. Or tomorrow. Or during the entire week.
I hope he'll chill out and forget me and my telephone number at the end, Elisabeth thought crushing walnuts.
When she returned to the room Lydia and Pat were too busy with each other to listen to her complaints about her miserable life. At that particular moment Patrick told Lydia something presumably hilarious as she artistically performed hysterical laughter.
"I chose the ugly girl," he continued his story, "as I knew that the pretty one wouldn't go with me. So we went into the thicket…"
He noticed Elisabeth and stopped, showing no sign of joy at seeing her. Lydia wasn't ecstatic about Elisabeth joining them either.
"So, what happened then?" she asked playfully ignoring Elisabeth.
"I took her panties off there and she didn't even pretend that she was against it."
"And…" said Lydia thinking that she wouldn't be against it either if she were in the girl's place.
"There was a big clump of nettles behind those bushes and I knew that. So I pushed her in it."
"What a childish thing to do," said Lydia slowly not being quite sure that she liked the story.
"Well, I was just six at the time."
"Who wants tea?" Elisabeth asked tartly. "I made some cookies."
"Elisabeth, you're an angel!" Patrick said rising from his seat. "No tea for me unfortunately. Have to run or mum will become suspicious. She came for her seasonal shopping round and is leaving London the day after tomorrow. So back to normal soon. May I have one or two cookie for the road?"
"You've simply got to bring in your stupid tea." Lydia said crossly when he left. "If it wasn't for you he would hang about longer."
She stayed overnight and they spent half of it talking about Patrick. Lydia wanted to know everything Elisabeth could remember about him and instead of being revolted by his fickleness with other women she seemed to be even more attracted to him.
During the following week she called every day demanding Elisabeth's help to bring her and Pat together again and driving Elisabeth crazy. Elisabeth had her own problems: Rick, that was the name of her mysterious pal from the storeroom, instead of cooling off as she hoped he would, came on Monday into her salon. He was rather handsome but definitely not her type and she had no intention to continue their fling. Regretfully he didn't see it that way. He became her personal stalker. He wasn't intimidating and he didn't do anything drastic, he just was there and that drove her mad. Wherever she went he followed her with a dog-like expression on his face. In the morning he waited for her sitting on the steps in front of the salon sometimes with flowers, more often without them. In the evening he strolled for hours under her windows whistling softly some lyrical tunes. Elisabeth didn't know what to do. She tried to talk to him, she shouted, she promised to make his life a real hell, she begged, she almost cried. Nothing worked. She told him that she wasn't a woman for him, that what he truly needed was a nice decent girl who would appreciate his wonderful qualities and faithfulness. Don't you see, she kept saying, I'm not that girl. You can call me slut if you want and most likely that's what I am. I like men and what's more I like different men. What I hate is commitment. Understand?
He clearly didn't. He still appeared everywhere he could find her and answered monotonously to all her reasons that she was an angel only she hadn't realised it yet.
As if poor Elisabeth didn't have enough trouble with Rick one of the twins, unfortunately not the one she would like to see, was seeking her company with almost equal persistence. With two admirers like them her chances to have normal private life were microscopic. Rick and Ben simply frightened any man away. Add to that the Lydia's whining and her determination to get Patrick with Elisabeth's assistance and you will understand why Elisabeth's existence became impossible.
It was two weeks after St Patrick's Day when Lydia called her and told her that she had a brilliant idea.
"Bring him to me." she said excitedly.
"Who?"
Elisabeth just met a very nice and a very young man and was full of doubts like: To Do Or Not To Do. She really fancied him but the fact that he was eight years younger freaked her out. She started to scrupulously examine her face in the mirror looking for wrinkles, skin discoloration and other signs of ageing because she became convinced of her growing old. Otherwise why would she be interested in a mere boy? She was never attracted to younger men before.
"I'm talking about Patrick, of course, who else?" Lydia said with annoyance. "I will cook a great meal. What does he like more beef or pork? Because I have very nice beefsteaks and could make him excellent Bœuf de la Campagne.
"My idea is," Lydia continued, "that you'll bring him to Brighton where by pure chance you'll find yourself in front of my house. You will give him a good performance of genuine surprise and then you offer him to pop in for a cup of coffee. But as I said it had to look natural and sort of accidental."
"Look," said Elisabeth impatiently, "are you totally out of your wits? With the Pats of this world you don't behave like that. What you do is ring him and say: "Here's my address. Come and have me as a dessert after the beefsteaks!""
"I can't do that." Lydia exclaimed in horror. "Why, I will rather put my head into the toilet bowl than say anything like that to a man I feel emotionally attracted to."
"That's exactly my point. You can't be emotionally attracted to Pat because you can't expect anything back. He's not the emotional type. Instead of heart he has a dick. From what I've heard he's one of the most gifted bonkers in the world. So use him, get maximum pleasure you can and move on!"
"You don't understand him. Nobody does!"
"You're crazy. Anyway, I can't come to Brighton tomorrow: I have a date with my toy boy. It wasn't easy for me to get it and I'm not going to sacrifice my own love life because of your whims. God knows I haven't got much of a love life recently."
"You can bring him along as well." Lydia said generously. "It would be even better if there would be four of us."
Actually, it's not a bad idea, thought Elisabeth dialling Pat's number, Tim won't be so tense in company and if in the end I'll decide that I don't want him after all, it would be much easier to chuck him without offending him.
"Do you have any particular plans for tomorrow?" she asked Pat as soon as he answered the phone.
"Not yet. Are you having anything appealing in mind?"
"Well, I'm going to Brighton with my new interest and want you to come with me."
"Whatever for? I didn't know that you like threesome. And why go to Brighton for that?"
In fact it would be a foursome, only not in a way you mean, Elisabeth thought but out aloud she said:
"Nothing of that kind. We'll just walk along the seafront for a bit, then have a meal somewhere – that sort of things."
"And you need me for?.."
"Oh, for God sake!" Elisabeth exploded. "It's all your fault. If you haven't behaved like a show-off bastard with my friends everything will be alright."
"So what do you want me to do now?" Patrick asked quietly.
"The best of all would be if you would have sex with Lydia so that she'd leave me alone."
"I'll think about it." Pat said.
The weather that week was beautiful. Sun was shining. Everything which supposed to bloom was blooming. The air was fresh and exciting just like it has to be at the beginning of each spring when nature generously promises every child of hers happiness and love knowing deep inside that nothing really will happen. Even Elisabeth strolling along the Brighton's beautiful promenade allowed herself to be captivated by romantic mood and smiled to the warm beams of sun. She decided that she liked Tim enough to give him a try.
Then there was a farce in front of Lydia's building with both her and Pat acting so artificially that they left poor Tim completely baffled with what was going on. Lydia was even worse with her exaggerated surprise and pretence that if she expected somebody indeed, that certainly wasn't them. She also looked extremely stupid in her long white streaming dress which was probably great for some posh black tie party but totally out of place for the quiet night in.
"I've decided to make Bucharest Pie instead of Bœuf de la Campagne," she whispered nervously to Elisabeth as if it was something vital. "I think it sounds more exotic and romantic."
If Eileen's main task was to impress Pat with her cooking talents she certainly succeeded as both he and Tim had two helpings each. Then Pat promised to teach them how to mix a new cocktail he invented recently and they decided to move to the kitchen. Eileen left her drawing room first, Tim was behind her but as soon as he was outside the door, Pat said: "Tell Eileen to fetch all the drinks she had at home and give me a minute. I need to have a few words with Elisabeth alone. We'll be with you in no time" and rather unceremoniously shut the door in Tim's face. Elisabeth expected him to say that he wanted to sneak away or something like that but instead of it he took her in his arms pretty tight and kissed her lips both tenderly and persistently. It was so unforeseen that she responded to his kiss. It was their first kiss although they knew each other for shedloads of years.
"What was that for?" she asked when he let her go.
"You know how they do consolation prizes in some competitions? So that the losers wouldn't feel too bad about themselves. That was your prize."
"Why do I need a consolation prize?"
"Because I'm going to pull tonight and you haven't got a chance with your adolescent friend. By the way, if you value my opinion, you're a very good kisser."
You too, Elisabeth said mechanically and then she realised with some shock that she really enjoyed a new experience and that was wrong. They were long-term pals and that was that. No sex, please. There were a few times when they had to share the same bed because of lack of sleeping places but it always was like sleeping with a girlfriend at a slumber party: safe and not stirring. Now she wasn't sure anymore and felt a bit uncomfortable.