Popular variant: Plant yourself in the corner of the room and speculate on whether the women you see talking to each other are friends or “friends.” Many a happy hour at university was spent thus.
THE CRASHING BORE
Embrace the chattering classes for an evening. You’re a freelancing consultant; your interests include South American red wines, Japanese culture, and season-two Buffy on DVD; your topics of discussion range through mortgages, high-protein diets, and why the congestion zone should not extend to Kensington and Chelsea. Enthusiastically recommend bars So Bar, Front Room, et al.
I saw the best minds of my generation smacked out on tapas and talking about parking restrictions in Zone 2.
I’LL HAVE WHAT SHE’S HAVING
Who hasn’t wanted to fake orgasm in a public place? Make like a Bailey’s advert and enjoy your drink more than a body ought to.
THE IMPLAUSIBLE OCCUPATION
When a man cracks on to you, make up a fake job to tell him when he (inevitably; men are conversationally predictable) asks what you do. Some tried-and-tested favorites include: aerial acrobat, mobile phone ringtone programmer, foot model, gamelan musician. See how long you can continue to make up specialized knowledge for your fake CV. Extra points if he actually holds that job. “Really? You’re an epidemiologist? What a coincidence!”
SPEAKEE NO ENGRISH
Self-explanatory. Especially fun if you are not obviously ethnic.
ARE YOU TALKING TO ME?
“So I was running arms out of Serbia, right? And I was stopped by the UN troops at the border. Little did they know I was high on speedballs and had a sawn-off shotgun cocked and locked in my inside jacket…” The Travis Bickle option. Be a scary bastard. Pepper conversation liberally with references to Kalashnikovs, John Woo films as lifestyle, and Soldier of Fortune magazine. Ninety-nine percent of men will run screaming from a sociopathic, possibly armed female. As for how you handle the other 1 percent… well, it might be fun. But be sure not to leave your back unguarded.
TOO MUCH INFORMATION
The more extreme the better. Discuss at length (and full volume) the specific details of your sex life. Rimming, bondage and domination, masturbatory fantasies involving Dick Cheney and a genetically engineered pig. It’s all fair game. Highest points to the person who can make the most customers vacate the premises.
Most of my conversations are like this.
TICK TOCK, TICK TOCK
“Such a pleasure to meet you… because according to my basal temperature this morning, I’m ovulating for the next twenty-four hours. Do you live close by or shall I ring a taxi?”
THE BACK FOOT
Accost a random gentleman. Surprise him with the revelation that you’ve slept together recently, and he never rang you back, and you are most upset. Loudly recount the ins and outs of your night of random passion. Judicious hints that he was failing in several key anatomical areas are effective additions to the routine.
Do be carefuclass="underline" if he’s with a group of male friends, he scores the points, not you. Best catch him out with his partner or alone. And try not to get too carried away. Bunny boiling is an addictive sport.
WHAT THE?
Pick up a conversation with a complete stranger as if you’ve known each other for years, and they just wandered in to the discussion mid-sentence. Be certain to use a lot of familiar body language, such as casually touching their arm, asking after family, and so on.
N.B.: I met A1 this way.
THE TRUTH
Tell someone you’re a call girl. Then laugh. No one would believe it. “Oh, I’m just having you on. I’m really a nun.” dimanche, le 14 mars
The end of the affair was written from the beginning. He is a man who hires women for sex, I am the whore, and at some point his taste will move on.
I have grown accustomed to him, and while I do not love him I admit more than a few times to being just as interested in staying up all night talking as in the carnal transaction.
In the upstairs bathroom is a large tub with gold-colored taps and four drawings on the wall of a village in France. He says these are gifts from the artist. I have looked at those pictures so many times while bathing afterward that when the painters who whitewashed the walls put them back in the wrong order, I noticed before he did.
“So they are,” he said, squinting at the pastels. “Well spotted.”
He knows a great deal about me, this one. He knows my real name and what I studied, and often mentions-he works in a related area-that should I ever need employment in the future, well… and he slips his card in my pocket for the dozenth time.
It’s like having a protective uncle. Who fucks you.
Sometimes we don’t fuck as such. He doesn’t like latex, but I’m not a risk-taker by nature. So he wanks on me. I stretch out on a bed or couch or sometimes the floor, head propped up with a pillow or two, as he straddles my torso below the breasts. While I play with my nipples and his balls he jerks his shaft over my face. Afterward, we’ll find a mirror and analyze the result together-points awarded for consistency, accuracy, and volume. And because he enjoys washing me, he’ll let it dry a little and dab most of the damage off with a damp washcloth.
The last few weeks have been difficult to organize. We never had a set meeting day and time, though it was usually a weekday, and usually after ten. I’ve been busy lately. So has he. If he doesn’t reach me first, he’ll take another girl from the agency.
I see I’ve missed his call and text back. This goes on for several weeks. I’m starting to miss the glass of bubbling Pol Roger he always pours when I come in.
When I went away, he rang three times. He’s getting anxious. It’s like the end of a relationship: the clinginess, the unfounded suspicion.
Then, the resolution. Just a text one morning:
I suppose we are fated to never meet again. Will miss you. X
I’ll miss him, too. lundi, le 15 mars
I’m not sure if it signifies a significant turn in my thinking, or for that matter my housekeeping skills, but I cannot be bothered to segregate the work knickers from the home knickers any longer. This doesn’t mean I end up in a boring sporty thong on the job, but does sometimes result in going to the grocery store with an inch or so of lace frill and striped satin inadvertently poking out the top of my jeans. I am given to understand that in some cultures, this is a desirable trait. I shudder to think. mardi, le 16 mars
N rang. “Not seen you around in a bit.”
“No.”
“Is everything alright?”
“Fine.”
“Liar.” He was correct, as usual. “What’s going on?”
“I don’t know. First real spring day, perhaps. I was out walking by the river in the sunshine, and it occurred to me that a year ago I was doing the same thing with someone I loved and thought I was going to marry.”
“Must be in the water. I just thought about my ex today too.” This is the one who chucked him suddenly, without so much as a fare-thee-well. “I’ll come over if you like.” I just sighed heavily. “I’ll be there in ten minutes, then.”
N knocked briefly and let himself in. I was sitting on the couch frowning. “Hey, gorgeous,” he said, rubbing my hair. “Why don’t we nip out for a bite to eat?” I wasn’t hungry. But we went.
“So if you could meet your ex and whomever he’s with now,” N said over salad and a pint at some obnoxious gastropub, “what would she be like?” Fat, I guessed. “Mine, I’d like to see her with someone who’s perfect-except he’s impotent.”
“No, not fat. Stupid.”
“Someone who’s perfect, but impotent and has a horrible set of in-laws.”