My Ideal Boyfriend Is a Croissant

by Laura Dockrill

  OH HOLD ON WHILE I JUST CUT OUT MY TONGUE AND SWALLOW IT SO IT CAN’T SPEAK AGAIN.

  “So do you,” he says-SLASH-lies, “…two both.”

  TWO. BOTH. TWO BOTH? I look at Marcel, who probably looks better than me, actually, but the pair of sad rejects that we are stuns me. Marcel’s eyes are caffeine crazed like a wild hyena’s and I look like I’ve just given birth to a titan without losing the tummy fat after. And I dwarf Marcel with my grand height. I honestly am like a cathedral standing next to him. Hardly looking nice like Max the hot…god. God of…hotness.

  Hold on. No. Why is my voice in my own head that I’m not even saying out loud now sounding like my mum: god of hotness? Oh, sorry, did I forget to give myself the memo that I am so cringe? This is cringe. Clichéd. Ugly. Put the book down. It’s terrible. Still, I can’t help myself, eyelashes up, pupils pop and…

  “Then I’m going to a gallery. My favourite artist, Elouise VuMart, has an exhibition….Do you know her work?”

  I shake my head in a no because I’ve had far too much experience of people asking me if I’ve heard of someone cool and me saying yes to only find out it’s a made-up person to trick me into looking like a try-hard IDIOT.

  “I think you’d really like her paintings, Bluebelle. They are special.” You are. Gulp. Gag. “Plus, the gallery will be air-conditioned. It’s so close out there today.”

  He nudges his head backstage.

  “Alicia around?”

  “Nope, break,” Marcel answers. “At last.”

  “I need to change my schedule.” To work more shifts with me, he means to add. “S’OK, I’ll give her a bell.”

  I WANT A BELL, MAX. GIVE ME A BELL.

  Our eyes meet again.

  “See you guys soon….Sorry you’re inside on a day like today.”

  And he vanishes, looking left and right onto the oncoming traffic of shiny happy people, before folding himself into the stream of humans as simple as egg whites into cake mix.

  And before I know it, I am back here, scribbling everything down in my book, frantically raiding the schedule….

  I have to take Alicia up on those shifts. I need to work every day to make our shifts chime so that we work together every day, EVERY day. Every single day, boy.

  TACOS

  Camille picks me up from Planet at the end of the day. I’m not gonna tell her about being morbidly obsessed with Max. He’s a boy. We don’t really DO boys. I find myself snapping back to us. We survive on the triumphs in the pleasures around us like music and eating and TV and talking and films and clothes and each other. We don’t need any boy sucking us into the endless timeless vortex of insecurity and doubt and wasting endless hours on falling in love and…feeling special and happy and…euphoric weightlessness. OH, WHAT THE…WHO AM I?

  “Greetings, earthling!” Alicia jokes. “You know, this could’ve been you, Cam!” She presents me to my friend with a back-slapping like I’m an exhausted unwanted prize on a game show, mocking the fact that Camille had a one-day trial at Planet Coffee and wasn’t asked to come back because she drank A LOT of coffee and when somebody asked for an extra-hot, decaf soya latte with no foam she laughed in their face and pointed to the jug of tap water instead.

  “Greetings.” Camille LOVES to take the micky out of Alicia’s alien chat.

  “Where you girls off to, then?”

  Don’t tell her, I mouth to Camille, slicing my neck with my fingertips and widening my eyes.

  “To a really…boring…place.”

  “Well, let Bluebelle treat you, babes! She’s gonna be working around the place a little more, ain’t you, doll face?” She squeezes my cheeks in her spiky hand. HOW ABOUT FILL IN MY FORM, THEN? I swear she’s holding this apprentice application over me like some kind of power. “And doesn’t she look so great?”

  Camille tries not to laugh. “She looks like she needs a taco.”

  “You GIRLS!” Alicia snorts. “You kill me. You’ve got to be a good supportive friend, Cam!” Cam IS a good supportive friend. “You’ve got to help BB get that bikini body.”

  “She has a bikini body!” Cam fires back. “She owns a body AND a number of bikinis.” Alicia crinkles her nose in disgust at this. It’s probably the idea of me flobbering around in a bikini making her feel sick.

  “Alicia, I see a beach once a year for two weeks, if I’m lucky. What’s the point? Forget my bikini body, I’m working on my jumper body!”

  Cam laughs. “Same! Although, you know, I read this article on how to look good on a beach? It said to get to the beach before everybody else, dig a hole and place your towel into it so you only look half the size.”

  “That would never work because what about when you got up to have a swim; it would just be a nasty shock for everybody,” Alicia argues, as if she’s ACTUALLY considering it. “It’s a good idea but it just ain’t practical. Soz, beb.”

  “Alicia, it’s the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard,” Cam snaps. “I wasn’t taking the article seriously.”

  “Yeah, just no carbs, I’d say! But plenty of wine! Laters, girls. Don’t do anything I wouldn’t do.”

  FAT CHANCE OF THAT.

  Alicia then wrestles with her bicycle, pedalling away with her heels rattling over the sides, wobbling maniacally down the road, cars beeping and honking her.

  “She’s mental.”

  “Annoying is what she is. She drives me mad.”

  “Is she telling you you’ve lost weight again?”

  “She thinks it makes me feel good. It’s so insulting, it’s her banter apparently.”

  “Oh, she’s vile.” Camille laughs.

  * * *

  —

  The Mexican is nice. We like it. Turquoise walls covered in Mexican art, plastic flowers and painted clay skulls. Red waxy floral tablecloths loaded with hot sauces and a candle in a mottled red jar. And fun music. You could almost pretend you were on holiday.

  “I’ve got NO money,” Camille says. “Why am I here again, remind me?” she asks one of the skull head ornaments. She makes the skull talk back to her: “Because you live in a dream world where you think you are a millionaire and a basketball player is your boyfriend.”

  I laugh. “Your face is nice,” I tell her. “You have a nice face.”

  “Thanks, babes. You have a nice face too.”

  Cam winks at me. And then before I know it, it’s happening.

  “Have you ever heard of Elouise VuMart?” I ask, looking down over the menu.

  “No, who’s that?”

  “An artist.”

  “Oh no, is this one of those trick questions when you ask someone if they’ve heard of someone cool and they say yes and then you go…Hahaha, they don’t exist, loser! Because it better not be. Once a girl in school asked me if I had heard of a band called Carrot Cake and I said yes they were my favourite and it turned out to be a setup to make me look like a total fool.”

  “I love you. That is all,” I reply, but THEN I am becoming a boring basic cliché girl and I say it, I can’t help myself, it’s happening, it’s happening, it’s…

  “OK, so you know the one I made the broken-heart coffee with?” (It’s happened.)

  “Zac?”

  “Max.”

  “Sorry, Max.”

  “The boy from work.”

  “Boy? BB, sorry, are we talking about a BOY? You never talk about boys.”

  “Yes, well, I might ask him out to see if I do want to talk about boys.”

  “Just like that?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “You’re going to ask him out? On a date? Just like that?”

  “Yes. He called me Blue.” I grin; Cam rolls her eyes. “Why? How else are you meant to do it?”

  “No, no, B, that’s great, I’m just a bit…Girls don’t normally…I dunno, it’
s just…”

  “What? Am I doing something wrong? This clearly reminds me of the time I asked a boy out in primary school. I knocked for him at his block of flats and he opened up his little bathroom window, shoved his hand out and physically ‘sprayed me away’ with Coral Peach air freshener as if repelling a frigging mosquito.”

  “Oh that is sad.”

  “I knew it was Coral Peach because my granny used it too. It was hard to go over there for a while after that. Still, I’m gonna roll my sleeves up and ask him…Wait…why are you looking at me like that?…I’m doing something wrong, aren’t I?”

  “No. It’s just…quite forward, that’s all. I’ve never really…Wow…OK…you’re actually gonna…OK.”

  “Go on….”

  “Guys usually do that asking stuff. And what if…You know what?” She snorts. “Ignore me. You’re amazing. Go for it. I love you.”

  “Camille. I don’t know how this works. Isn’t it just…you fancy somebody…you ask them out?”

  “Yes, that’s what it is. What it SHOULD be. It should be as easy as that. But it…You know what? Ask him.”

  “Should I?”

  “You should.”

  “OK. Yes. I will.”

  “You’re a braver girl than me. Wish we had something better than a tap water to cheers with. I can’t even afford a Sprite.”

  “What are you even talking about, I am obsessed with tap water. Cheers.”

  “Cheers. To Princess Charming.”

  I take my hair and shove it between my nose and top lip to make a moustache. “Thank you, my dear.”

  “And the worst that can happen is that you get sprayed in the face with air freshener…pshhhhhhh!” Camille mimes spraying a canister of air freshener in my face.

  “I know how that feels anyway, didn’t hurt too bad…psshhhh!” And I pretend to hiss a can back at her.

  * * *

  —

  Our tacos arrive. Soft blankets stuffed with golden fried fish, bright green creamy guacamole, herbs, blackened juicy chicken and spicy ground beef. We have tortilla chips and a big bowl of more blobby guacamole with shreds of red onion and jalapeno.

  “Man, that’s so buff.”

  “Oh it’s hot, pass the hot sauce.”

  “Jeeeezz! SO banging! Wish I could cook like this.”

  We chew, warm spiciness zipping around our mouths like firecrackers. I swallow and say, “Camille, if you had to do an exercise, what would it be?”

  “I do do exercise.”

  “Huh?”

  “Yeah. Course.”

  “When?”

  “When I’m not dicking about with you.”

  “But you’re always with me.”

  “OK, but when I’m not with you, I find time.”

  “You never told me.”

  “It’s not a thing to tell, is it?”

  “What do you do?”

  “This exercise thing on YouTube.”

  I feel so betrayed. I gulp.

  “Where?”

  “Just in my bedroom.”

  I cannot imagine Camille working out in her bedroom. I am so shocked.

  “I thought you just did nothing, like me.” Although Camille doesn’t look like me. She’s toned.

  “It’s easy. I’ll send you the link.”

  “No, don’t.”

  “Why not?”

  “I won’t use it.”

  “Come on, B, it’s fun.”

  “I don’t think so.”

  “You just use cans of soup for weights and I turn the sound down and play my own music.”

  “I don’t have any gym stuff to, like, wear or whatever.”

  “You just wear your bra and knickers, you can shower right after, you don’t even need to leave the house.” She stuffs more food in, licks her finger, winds it round the bottle of yellow sunshine sauce. “Want me to send the link to you?”

  “I’m fine.” I sip my water. My cheeks blister in an angry rash. “I’m fine how I am.”

  “You don’t have to feel weird about wanting to keep fit, BB. It’s good to be strong, nothing to be embarrassed about.”

  “I KNOW that, thanks,” I snap back.

  * * *

  —

  I’m angry at Cam. Why do I feel so annoyed? I guess I didn’t really think we could survive our whole lives eating what we wanted and ignoring exercise but I guess I just kind of hoped we, I dunno…could.

  Why does exercise feel so alien to me, anyway? Why doesn’t it come naturally to girls like it seems to come to boys?

  I look about the restaurant. People seem to be eating what they want, laughing, talking, drinking alcohol, having fun, but they are all normal-sized….Eating food like this is maybe a treat to them, but I don’t even question it.

  Is it just me or does it feel like every girl is secretly on a diet?

  I thought we were all in this “eating what we want when we want” revolution together, but I’ve got a sneaky fear that I’m the only one actually taking it seriously.

  Or maybe even doing it at all.

  TEA

  Mum and Dove are sitting on the couch when I get in.

  “Hello, peach. Tea?”

  “Yes please, Mum.”

  “You hungry?”

  “I ate with Cam.”

  “Ah, nice.”

  “Spending my whole day’s salary in one sitting.”

  “Always the way. You had fun, then?”

  “Yep.” I fan myself with the post. “Did you guys eat?”

  “Yep.” Mum gives me that look. “Dove made Carbonara.”

  Dove looks up at me proudly, big smile on her face, eyebrows wriggling, all cocky. Meanwhile, Mum, behind Dove, mimics throwing up, her face in contortion, shoving her fingers down her throat. I try not to laugh.

  “Oi, you better not be being mean about my cooking.” Dove rears up and points at Mum. “I’m serious.”

  “I wasn’t. As IF I would. BB, I wasn’t, was I?”

  “No!” I defend Mum, my mouth curling into a smile. “She wasn’t.”

  I throw myself down next to Dove.

  “You stink of garlic,” she snuffles.

  “You stink of burnt pasta,” I snigger, looking at her face.

  “It was quite burnt,” she admits.

  “How do you even go about burning pasta?”

  “It’s when the spaghetti is too long for the pan of boiling water and sticks to the side and the ends go black and it stinks like that time you burnt your thumbnail on a candle.”

  “Oh well.” I sigh. “I quite like the taste of burnt stuff.” I close my eyes. “Burnt fish fingers, yum; burnt toast with Marmite, yum; burnt toast with peanut butter, yum; burnt noodles, yum…”

  “All right, we get it, you like the taste of burnt.”

  “Exactly.”

  I lean into Dove and she would lie and say she didn’t but she definitely put her arm out for me to scoot inside and let me lean my head on her tiny bony shoulder. The lights are low and the TV is blabbering away. Squares of silver, blue, gold and white illuminate the room. Mum comes in with three steaming cups, holding two handles with one hand.

  She sits next to me and we all bunch up together, holding our tea close to our chests.

  I like the idea of a house full of girls. Maybe you don’t even need a man to come in stomping around and being all there. Maybe I could love a woman? Maybe I’ll end up with a woman. We are humans. Men and women. You don’t know who you’re going to fall in love with; we fall in love with a person. Not a sex. And looking around, it seems women are just pretty cool anyway. But Cam and Dove might get jealous—I can really imagine them both giving my soul mate future wife a hard time.

  * * *

  —

&nb
sp; We’ve all fallen asleep on the sofa. The soft silver light paints Picasso edges on Mum and Dove.

  I creep up to get a glass of water before waking them both.

  I crumple up my receipt from the taco place and dash it into the bin so I don’t have to look at it tomorrow and feel guilty about eating out all the time and spending all my money on food. It lands softly on top of about fourteen thousand eggshells, flour, burnt spaghetti, raw fatty grey bacon, massive chunks of onion and a clump of scrambled egg.

  And underneath that I see some of Dad’s clothes.

  A tired Dove stands in the doorway having already seen what I’ve seen. “She’s slowly getting rid of him, you know. Bit by bit. It will be his head in the bin next.” She stretches, showing her stomach, her ribs stacked neatly on top of one another, poking through her top. “Well, night, then.”

  “Night,” I mumble back.

  PANINI

  Some things in life are really hard.

  I’m not being all first-world problematic about it except I am. But they are. Like fifteen full buses going past you in the pouring rain and then one empty one comes and you get all excited only to find it’s not in service. But nothing competes with the daily struggle of having to toast, slice and serve a panini that doesn’t belong to you.

  That is something that truly tests your willpower and strength to the absolute maximum.

  Ohhhhhh. When the bread toasts and the mozzarella squidges out and the pesto hits the grill. When you slice it, the cheese smacks the knife and tears away…and you aren’t allowed to pick the cheese off the side because people watch you. Customers. Making sure you don’t cough or breathe or fold your hair behind your ear and touch the bread and certainly don’t plop any delicious scrumptious melted cheese into your mouth.

  “You make it harder for yourself,” Max says as he leans over me while I stuff the ciabattas. “If you don’t want to eat them, stop making them look so tempting.”