The Shape of Us: A hilarious and emotional page turner about love, life and laughter

by Drew Davies

  JoJo wipes, pulls up her clothes again and flushes. She confronts the mirror – it’s streaky, which helps. She’s no longer vain, but it’s useful to remember to be kind to oneself and only look in mirrors that flatter. She risks a peek, and regrets it instantly. In the eighties, she’d reminded people of the dark-haired actress in an American cop show about two female detectives – they’d shared the same arched eyebrows, dimples in their cheeks and a similar heart-shaped face. JoJo had quite liked the comparison. Now the face staring back at her is long and grey. She had considered cosmetic surgery, once visiting a Harley Street clinic, but the consultant had turned her off the idea by saying ‘incision’ one too many times. It was probably for the best. Most of the women in the magazines looked like they had the palsy.

  JoJo turns on the tap at the sink, washes her hands, and then moves to the dryer. She groans. It’s one of those machines where you need to wave your hands through a grill to activate the heating sensor. If she’d been asked when she was a child what the future would hold, she would never have guessed that the greatest leaps in technology would have been in hand drying. Teleportation, hover cars, food in pill form – none of these had materialised – but here was a device that could blow warm air at your hands at Mach 3 speeds. JoJo lowers her hands into the grill and the device jumps to life, noisily huffing air and making the loose skin on her hands quiver and dance. She slowly lowers and raises her hands, a very unnatural motion, she finds (only a man would come up with it), until they are both bone dry.

  A yummy mummy is standing outside the toilet door when JoJo opens it, jiggling a small child on her hip and frowning impatiently. On seeing JoJo, however, the woman’s face transforms into a radiant smile.

  ‘I think it’s so lovely,’ she says, beaming.

  JoJo is unsure what the woman means at first – perhaps she’s talking about the toilet – and she glances back behind her (It’s clean, I suppose, but nothing to…)

  ‘Your husband,’ the yummy mummy continues, ‘the two of you.’

  ‘Yes, well…’ starts JoJo.

  ‘To still be so in love, at your age. You’re such an inspiration. We all say “till death do us part”, don’t we, but no one stops to think what that really means. But you make it look so easy. I can’t even imagine what life will be like when I’m seventy!’

  JoJo gives a tight-lipped smile. Not today, the voice in her head pleads, not today!

  ‘How old are you, my dear?’

  The yummy mummy becomes sheepish – she doesn’t want the other mothers to know her real age, but now she’s caught in JoJo’s radiant faux grandmother beam, there’s no escape.

  She lowers her voice: ‘Thirty-five next month, can you believe it?’

  ‘I can believe it,’ JoJo replies in her warmest, most sugared tones. ‘And this one here,’ she strokes the girl’s cheek with her finger, ‘any brothers or sisters?’

  ‘We’re trying,’ the yummy mummy says, her eyes flicking to the floor in embarrassment.

  ‘Yes, you must try. Before it’s too late. It goes so quickly, you know.’

  JoJo has scored a direct hit. The yummy mummy starts mumbling about IVF, so she goes in for the kill: ‘I was like you when I was your age, full of dreams, but at forty, everything changes.’ It’s her turn to lower her voice: ‘They don’t tell you what it’s like. Perhaps because no one can prepare you for what happens…’

  The yummy mummy leans forward: ‘The menopause?’ she whispers.

  JoJo laughs: ‘Oh there are worse things than that, my dear. That’s the tip of the iceberg. Menopause!’

  ‘What then?’

  JoJo takes a deep breath, pausing for effect.

  ‘It shrivels,’ she says finally.

  The yummy mummy stares back, wide-eyed.

  ‘Not your…?’

  JoJo nods kindly.

  ‘Until it’s totally unrecognisable. Like a small dead hedgehog.’

  And with that she takes leave of the yummy mummy, who stands, in stunned disbelief, until the young girl starts to whimper.

  Frank is no longer at their table. JoJo feels a stab of panic, but tries not to let it take hold further. Instant karma, she thinks. She walks over to the table. The cups are still there, but his wallet is gone. It’s alright; he’ll be on his phone, shouting away at someone. Frank has learnt that he’s far too loud, and now heads outside whenever it rings to stop the angry glares. Her handbag is still here on her chair, so she throws it over her shoulder and exits the café. Part of her, because she’s never been more fragmented than over these past few months, part of her is gloating: ‘You see, we knew this would happen.’ With the wave of a hand, she brushes the thought away and turns left towards the station. She stops, remembering her phone: it’s in her handbag and she snatches it out. There’s a text message – it’s from a pizza delivery place, offering her two for one with toppings of her choice. ‘To opt out text STOP’. Stop, she thinks, Stop? When did I tell you to bloody start? JoJo is about to call Frank when she sees the right-sized shape of a suited man on the other side of the street, about thirty yards away. He’s walking slowly towards her, one hand to his ear, the other drawing circles in the air. Thank Occam’s Razor, she thinks – and now she can hear him, his big booming voice. It’ll be work stuff, punishment for leaving the office in the afternoon – the shares have plummeted, the secretaries are all on fire – anything to make sure his absence from the investment bank he’d helped set up in the early nineties is not a regular occurrence. She waves at him, but he doesn’t see and turns away. He’s finished his phone call now and starts walking. JoJo is about to shout to him, but she can’t find her voice. Why is he walking off? part of her thinks. But JoJo knows why. It’s her. She’s here. Belinda Rose Davidson – the other woman, the one that stole Frank away. Sure enough, the sleek black car is gliding along the street to meet him. JoJo takes a step back towards the café door (not quite the alley leap the situation might warrant on Midsomer Murders) and the car stops just beside him. Frank walks to the driver’s seat and opens the door to allow her out – he never did like being the passenger – and the girl skips around the front of the Mercedes and towards the passenger seat. Massive sunglasses, heels too, and her hair is even shorter this time, like the hair on a Ken doll. A pixie cut. She opens the car door but takes some time to sit, as if she’s deciding on the most attractive angle to make her descent into the seat, but finally she glides into the car and is gone. They are already driving towards JoJo before she realises she will be seen. It’s too late to dive into the café, so she stands where she is, letting the Universe decide the outcome, and the Mercedes cruises past noiselessly, both Frank and Belinda gazing straight ahead. Of course he doesn’t look, Frank wouldn’t be so obvious. He’s cleverer than that. An old pro. And JoJo feels a sadness, dormant inside her for days, start to stir.

  It is three days after their date officially ended, and he is trying to compose her a text message:

  Hi!

  He deletes this.

  Hey!

  Still too much.

  Hey,

  Better.

  Hey, I’ve been thinking about you a lot.

  He deletes this quickly.

  Hey,

  He sighs.

  Hey, hope your week’s going well.

  No. This puts too much emphasis on the fact the week is well under way and he has not yet texted her. He knows he should have sent a message on Monday to thank her for a great weekend, said something – said anything – to keep the momentum going. But he didn’t because… why? Because his brain was still muddled from all the booze – and something else. He was embarrassed. They didn’t have sex – not really: it was too late and they were still woozy from the club – just a playful fumble. But he’d found it so intense kissing her, emotional, you could say, and he’d said words, those words, the ones you’re not supposed to say to anyone, save a lucky few. She was lying next to him, partially clothed on her floral duvet, and out it tumbled: ‘I love y
ou.’

  Hey, had a really great time Saturday. You’re one special girl.

  ‘You’re one special girl’? Oh God, he hates himself. Delete.

  Why had he said ‘I love you’? He’d ruined a perfectly good first date. She had laughed, not in a nasty way, more in – what? Bemusement? Shock? When she’d finished laughing, she stroked his face, running a finger along his eyebrow and down his cheekbone. Her finger felt deliciously cool and smooth, and he’d closed his eyes. She traced her way to his lower lip and he was about to kiss her finger when he felt a tap on his nose and heard her make a sound not unlike a pressed button at a cash machine. He kept his eyes shut. Did she just boop his nose? Maybe he misheard her. Perhaps she said ‘You too’? He replays the sound in his head. No, it didn’t sound like ‘You too’. It sounded like ‘boop!’ His cheeks flush with embarrassment at the memory.

  Hey, had a really great time Saturday!

  Come on, what next? Momentum. Next steps. You want to see this girl again, don’t you? Don’t you? Of course, he thinks. But – and he knows this is his pride speaking and it doesn’t make sense – why does she get ‘I love you’ and I get booped?

  * * *

  Impulsively, Daisy takes out her phone. Her best work friend Samira peers over her shoulder (she has full screen observing permissions).

  ‘Hasn’t he texted yet?’ she asks.

  Daisy shakes her head. ‘What should I write? I’m no good at this.’

  ‘Just be yourself. But a more chilled-out version. Like when all the models turn up on time, and no one asks for anything stupid, and we finish ahead of schedule. That kind of you.’

  ‘A completely improbable and made-up me then?’

  ‘Exactly.’ Samira squeezes Daisy’s shoulder. ‘Good luck!’ she says, dashing off.

  ‘Thanks!’

  Frowning, Daisy starts to type:

  So how about that weekend, huh? Bit of a mad one!

  Why is she talking like some deranged Ibiza club promoter? Delete.

  Hi Chris,

  More formal, better.

  Hi Chris, had such a lovely time

  She hesitates, adding:

  Hi Chris, had such a lovely time with you

  Too intense? She leaves it, she can always change it later.

  Hi Chris, had such a lovely time with you this weekend.

  Now it sounds like a Jane Austen letter: ‘Dearest Christopher, had such a wonderful time with you at the cottage this weekend. The twins speak so fondly of you.’ Delete.

  Hi Chris, it’s me, Daisy, you know, that girl you went out with on Saturday night? Hello!

  She looks at this message as if it’s a grenade in her hand, but pushes on:

  Hi Chris, it’s me, Daisy, you know, that girl you went out with on Saturday night? Hello! Hope you’re still alive! I’ve made it through the week (barely) but it was worth it. Really, I haven’t enjoyed myself like that for a very long time. So that’s me, just checking in to make sure you’re okay and to say hi. So, hi!

  She counts the exclamation points. Three. Like an unhinged teenager.

  Why hasn’t he texted her yet? Daisy isn’t against taking the initiative, but she’d been the one to call and ask him out in the first place (okay fine, Chris didn’t even have her number initially – but now he does), and she doesn’t want to seem pushy or desperate. Maybe he doesn’t like me as much as I thought? she wonders. Sure, Chris had inexplicably said he loved her, but he was under the influence – it didn’t count. And now the radio silence. Theoretically, Daisy knows she should be fluid when it comes to dating, flowing around the knockbacks and dead ends, but matters of the heart have never flowed for her. They have fizzed, exploded, collapsed, but never flowed.

  Hi Chris, it’s Daisy. Had a lovely time on Saturday. Really, I haven’t enjoyed myself so much in ages. Would be great to see you again (I have to give your coat back too!)

  * * *

  And she’s still got my coat, he thinks.

  It’s this image that saves it really: Daisy, after the club, wrapped up in his coat, her big eyes staring out at him from the footpath as he attempted to hail a taxi. He’s never met a Daisy with brown hair. Weren’t they usually blonde? Daisy the Milkmaid? Daisy. He remembers the curve of her neck, the way she squints when she laughs, her ridiculously tiny feet.

  Hey, had a great time this weekend. Sorry about delayed contact. Taken three days just to tie my shoes! Not used to boozing anymore, clearly. What are you doing Friday? I thought we could check out which DJ is playing at Ministry of Sound? Kidding! But a drink would be nice…

  He reads the message back to himself. Yes, it’s light, breezy. It proposes a date but allows for negotiation if she’s busy. But how to sign off? After his recent faux pas, he doesn’t want to appear too keen. Usually he’d go for a kiss, but he feels a kiss here might be too much. He tries it:

  x

  Yes, way too much. He might as well just drive over to her house and start masturbating into her letterbox.

  :)

  That could work. Everyone likes a smiley face. He might give it a nose, though.

  :-)

  Perfect.

  * * *

  Daisy is still agonising over her message. It now reads:

  Hi Chris, it’s Daisy. Had a lovely time on Saturday. Just remembered I still have your coat! Not to worry, I’ve put it somewhere safe. One thing – I did just list it on eBay, so technically you have 5 days to claim it or it goes to the highest bidder ;) You could bid for it, I suppose, but some guy in Ipswich seems pretty taken with it! Anyhow, let me know.

  She looks at the message in utter horror. This is what it takes to get a second date in this city, she thinks. Blackmail.

  Stop writing, she commands herself, put down the phone!

  Daisy deletes the message, stares at the blank screen for a moment and then switches it off completely.

  Adam spends the next few days waiting to be arrested. He’s not sure how it will happen – if the police will burst into his flat or whether it will be a more subdued affair, an email asking him into the station for questioning, perhaps – but what’s certain is that it’s only a matter of time. As well as trespassing on private property, Adam had helped himself to three muesli bars in the kitchenette and, to cap it off, he still had the ID security card in his bedroom, hidden under a pile of old magazines. Someone this very moment was probably reviewing the weekend’s security camera footage and doing a spit take at the sight of Adam, tiptoeing towards the elevator, having woken, finally, at the sound of aggressive vacuuming. The cleaner had barely looked at him, but that didn’t mean she wouldn’t pick him in a line-up. His fingerprints were all over the place too. They had everyone on a database now, didn’t they?

  ‘What’s up with you?’ asks his flatmate Patrick. Patrick is tall, lean and still incredibly brown for an Australian who has lived in London for two years (Adam suspects spray tans but has yet to find evidence on any of the white towels).

  Adam shrugs and tries to act as casually as he can, which isn’t easy around Patrick, who is so laid-back, he makes Adam seem like a jumped-up meth addict at the best of times. They’re sharing a massive doughy pizza covered in the occasional slice of salami, the cardboard box is dark with oil, and Adam already feels sluggish after two slices, but he takes another and bites nonchalantly.

  Patrick watches him closely. ‘How’s the job hunting going?’

  ‘Oh, you know, the usual. Everyone wants to do phone interviews now. You only get a face to face if they’re pretty sure they want to hire you,’ (to keep the failures off their property, is what it feels like to Adam), ‘and it’s t-tough working your magic on a Skype call.’

  ‘How many phone interviews have you had?’ There’s nothing confrontational in Patrick’s question, but Adam still wishes he’d mind his own bloody business. Patrick has a lack of emotional empathy when it came to asking personal questions, which Adam blames on him being from such a geographically large country. Unsolicited talk l
ike this might be fine when you have your own part of a continent and don’t see another person for weeks at a time, but it’s jarring in the confines of a cramped two-bedroom flat in Hackney.

  ‘Three or four. There’s something at this one agency that’s pretty exciting.’

  ‘Yeah? Which one?’

  Damn. Adam hoped he wouldn’t be asked this. Patrick works at a big advertising conglomerate near Carnaby Street and has an annoying habit of seeming to know every professional person in London and the status of any agency, big or small.

  Adam takes a stab in the dark: ‘P-Proctor M-Media?’