Romantic Comedy Box Set (Helen Grey Series Books 1 & 2)

by Hodge, Sibel

  Who was I kidding anyway? I hated exercise of any variety and I did love the old vino.

  He nodded. ‘Great! Same things as me. Do you like boxing?’

  ‘It’s great, I absolutely love it!’ I lied, silently willing him not to ask me any hard questions about it because I didn’t have a clue.

  ‘I’ve got some really good tickets to the next David Haye fight. Should be pretty awesome. Maybe you’d like to go?’

  ‘Maybe I would.’

  BONG!

  Just when it was starting to get interesting!

  A black guy with dreadlocks, who I hadn’t spotted before, swaggered over to my table. He lifted my hand and kissed it.

  ‘Dat big fat ginger man……he a pig, mon,’ he drawled in a strong Jamaican lilt. ‘Dat not dem way to speak to no lady.’

  He didn’t introduce himself and his name label was stuck on upside-down. I manoeuvred my head to the side, trying to read it. ‘Kingston’ was scrawled in tiny letters.

  ‘He said I was a lesbian. I’m definitely not a lesbian,’ I said, with a brisk shake of my head, catching a waft of his overpowering aftershave, Cannabis Pour Homme.

  ‘Hey lady, I know dat. You’s not one of dem big fat mamas.’ He made a curious sucking sound with his immaculate white teeth.

  ‘I tink I might be a lesbian, dough, because I lurrrve de women.’

  ‘Where are you from?’ I regarded him with interest. He was a charmer in a funny sort of way.

  ‘Me from Brixton, mon.’ He slouched down in the chair and rested his feet on the table. Miss Whiplash glowered at him so he sat back up again, making another sucking noise.

  ‘No, I meant originally.’ I put my elbow on the table, resting my chin on my hand.

  ‘Me is from Jamaica, mon. Where else would me be from?’

  ‘I’ve always wanted to get married there!’ I had a sudden flashback of Justin promising to take me there for a wedding in paradise.

  ‘Irie.’ He bobbed his head up and down, looking around the room to see if anyone else was checking him out.

  I was suddenly daydreaming of Justin and me on a white sandy beach against a backdrop of palm trees, the turquoise sea kissing our bare feet. I had flowers in my hair, and a long floaty, white wedding dress – which showed off my bronzed-to-oblivion tan – and he was wearing a black tuxedo with the trousers rolled up.

  I came back to reality with a start.

  ‘So, what do you think of Bob Marley?’ I blurted out.

  ‘He verrrry overrated.’

  ‘What kind of music do you like?’

  ‘S Club 7, Boyzone.’ He broke into his own version of ‘S Club Party’, swinging his shoulders from side to side and singing in a deep, husky voice.

  ‘You don’t strike me as an S Club 7 kind of guy.’

  He coughed and puffed out his chest. ‘Well, me favourite singer dough be Bounty Killer.’

  ‘Who?’ I’d never heard of him, but I was feeling a bit peckish. I could have killed for a Bounty myself.

  ‘He cool, mon.’ He nodded, sucking his teeth. ‘I tek you der one day. You and me, we av babies together.’

  Where? To see Bounty Boy?

  ‘That would be…lovely.’

  BONG!

  He swaggered off, all thoughts of babies with me and Bounties forgotten.

  Then it was the turn of Mr. Porsche, and I was not looking forward to this!

  ‘Hello, I’m Wayne, nice to meet you. I love your outfit.’ He held his hand out to shake mine.

  ‘Hello, Wayne.’ I smiled sweetly. ‘We’ve met before, haven’t we?’

  ‘Have we?’ He sat down, trying to place me.

  ‘Yes, I’m the “dirty bitch” from yesterday.’

  He narrowed his eyes at me. ‘You! Do you always go round shitting on pavements?’

  ‘Do you always call people rude names?’

  ‘Only when there’s a complete and utter need for it.’

  ‘Anyway, it wasn’t me, it was the dog.’

  ‘Same difference, dogs shouldn’t be allowed on the path.’ He shrugged.

  ‘How do you propose they get to the park, then? Helicopter? Anyway, I cleared it up!’

  ‘Well, I should bloody well hope so,’ he said.

  ‘So Wayne, what do you do, when you’re not being so self-righteous?’

  ‘I’m a stockbroker, a pretty dammed good one too. And what do you do when you’re not running round shitting all over the place?’

  ‘It wasn’t even my dog.’

  ‘Oh, well, that’s all right, then!’

  ‘Have you got a phobia about dogs or something?’

  ‘Only their shit, which carries hundreds of bacteria.’ He steepled his fingers and reclined on the chair.

  ‘Well, you don’t have to eat it.’

  ‘Did you know that dogs not only carry E.coli, but also giarda, parasites, salmonella and faecal coliform bacteria?’

  ‘Strangely…no.’ I leaned in closer to him. ‘Do you eat chicken?’

  ‘Yes, what’s that got to do with anything?’

  ‘Did you know that chicken is the only known carrier of spongicefalitis?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Well, it is. And do you know what that does to you?’ I didn’t know what the hell it did to you either. I’d only just made it up that second.

  He looked puzzled. ‘No.’

  ‘Well, it’s the same kind of virus as ebola. The symptoms are vomiting, diarrhoea, internal bleeding, an excruciating amount of pain, and then finally organ failure and death.’ I sat back with a smug smile on my face. He was just about to ask a question when Miss Whiplash bonged again. He walked off deep in thought.

  ‘Right, everyone, please write a list of the people you would like to swap details with and then hand it to me,’ Miss Whiplash ordered.

  Everyone started writing energetically and I scanned the room. I knew there was only going to be one person on my list. Nick.

  We handed in the sheets, milled around and waited expectantly. Hippo waddled up to Mr. Porsche, bragging about how many dates he’d get.

  ‘OK, then,’ she said when she’d finished. ‘If you queue up here I’ll hand out your papers and then the rest – as they say – is up to you.’

  When it came to my turn, I grabbed mine and hot-footed it out to the loos, hoping that by the time I left everyone else would be gone. I texted Ayshe to come and pick me up, then scanned the form with interest.

  The men who wanted to swap details with me were: Sean, Wayne, Nick and Kingston, although I thought Kingston would have swapped details with anybody that had a pulse and Mr. Porsche just wanted to find out how to avoid spongicefalitis. As the only person I wanted to meet again was Nick, his were the only contact details on the sheet.

  I leaned back against the wall and thought of Nick. A smile crept up to the corners of my mouth.

  Chapter 6

  I cranked open the loo door an inch and peered out. Only a couple of stragglers remained so I propelled my way to the entrance where I discovered Kalem waiting for me in the Land Rover.

  Oh God, he was still here. I knew he would thoroughly enjoy taking me to pieces, bit by agonizing bit.

  ‘What are you doing here?’ I looked around to see if anyone had seen me.

  ‘Oh, that’s nice isn’t it?’

  I climbed in.

  ‘Come on, spill the beans. Why were you at the speed-dating?’

  ‘I thought it was the B.O.G meeting tonight. We usually have one a month here, but I must’ve got the date wrong.’ He tried to shift the Land Rover into gear, but it made a loud crunching sound as he jammed the gear-stick backwards and forwards until it hit the right spot.

  I giggled. ‘What’s a B.O.G meeting? Sounds a bit dirty to me. Do you roll around in manure, or have mud wrestling competitions?’

  He glanced over at me. ‘No, it’s the Biodegradable Organic Group. We’re co-coordinating a local action group to raise awareness about local organic produce and environmental issues
.’

  ‘Sounds like heaps of fun.’

  ‘It is.’ He turned his head back to the road. ‘Let’s take you, for example–’

  ‘What about me?’

  ‘Well, when you buy your milk, do you have any idea the process it takes to make it, or where it comes from?’

  ‘Tesco?’ I said, studying his profile.

  He tutted. ‘What about…chickens. Where do you think they come from?’

  I turned my head back, gazing at the open road. ‘Tesco, and sometimes Sainsburys.’

  He shook his head slowly. ‘Do you know the difference between organic chickens and battery chickens?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Well you should. If you knew the conditions that battery chickens were kept in, anyone with an ounce of human decency wouldn’t buy it.’ He paused. ‘Did you know that there are hundreds and hundreds of chickens crushed together twenty-four hours a day in tiny little pens, covered with their own urine and faeces? Or that they often suffer from broken legs and wings with no medical treatment, and sometimes have to share their pen with the bodies of their fellow chickens that’ve died a painful death?’

  I screwed my face up. ‘Urgh.’

  ‘And not only that: they have no exercise; they get no fresh air or see the light of day in their short, miserable lives.’ His eyes glanced in my direction and then back to the road.

  ‘How depressing.’

  ‘Well, if you think it’s depressing, think how the poor chickens feel.’ His voice wavered. ‘You have to buy organic. It’s the only animal friendly thing to buy.’

  ‘Can’t we talk about something else? I gazed out of the window.

  ‘Like what?’

  ‘Why do you drive this old heap? Why don’t you trade it in for a new Range Rover or something a bit sporty?’ My eyes wandered round the rusty interior, taking in the spider’s webs.

  He shrugged. ‘I just like the simple things in life.’

  ‘Well this certainly fits the description.’

  He glanced in the rear-view mirror and jerked the car to a halt, looking at me in silence.

  ‘What?’ I asked.

  ‘Would you prefer to walk home?’ His eyes challenged me.

  ‘Um…’ I tilted my head for a second. ‘No.’ I matched his gaze.

  ‘Well, shut up, then!’ He hit the accelerator and drove off again. ‘Did you know seventy per cent of all Land Rovers are still on the road today?

  He was such an anorak.

  ‘I can honestly say I didn’t know that, and…to be honest I don’t really care.’

  ‘Well they are.’

  ‘Thanks for that piece of useless information. I’m sure I’ll sleep better at night now, knowing that.’

  ‘Anyway, how would I get to my B.O.G meetings in the country if I was driving a Jaguar or a Porsche?’

  ‘Walk?’

  ‘I see you dressed up for the occasion.’ He gave me the once-over.

  ‘I don’t think you’re one to talk.’ I glanced at his desert camouflage army trousers; they had a gaping hole big enough to fit a small pterodactyl through.

  ‘I’ve been working on the Land Rover.’

  ‘Oh.’ I stared out of the window.

  We drove quietly for a while, lost in our thoughts – his were probably something that involved dirty, smelly engines. Mine involved plumbers in sexy-looking boiler suits – unbuttoned at the chest – waving a spanner in one hand and a bag of tap washers seductively in the other.

  He broke the silence, shouting over the spluttering of the engine. ‘So, have you seen Justin lately?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘You must have really loved him, eh?’ His voice softened.

  ‘Yes…yes, I did.’

  After a pause: ‘He didn’t love you, though, did he?’ His sarcasm sliced through the air.

  ‘Oh, shut up.’ I punched him on the arm.

  ‘And now he’s shagging his boss, best sex he’s ever had apparently.’ He turned to look at me with a straight face.

  I gazed at him, then we both smiled and burst out laughing. ‘Anyway, I’ve got a date!’

  ‘Have you now? Not with that big fat bloke, is it?’

  ‘Oh God, he was a pig. No; someone else. He’s going to take me to a boxing match.’ I thought of Nick and felt a slight glow.

  ‘But you hate boxing!’

  ‘I know, but I quite liked the guy who asked me, so I thought I’d give it a try.’

  ‘Hang on a minute. Wasn’t it you who described boxing as a bunch of thuggy-looking blokes punching the crap out of each other for money?’

  ‘I might have said something like that.’ I turned my head to avoid him.

  ‘You did. I distinctly remember it,’ he said, pulling up outside my flat.

  I scrambled out, then leaned back into the car. ‘I’m sure it’ll be more interesting than a B.O.G meeting.’ I grinned, shutting the door.

  Chapter 7

  Wednesday, day 3 – I Hate Modern Art

  The next morning I awoke to the sound of the phone ringing with annoying persistence in my ear. I’d fallen into an exhausted slumber after my mishaps of the previous forty-eight hours.

  ‘Did I wake you up? It’s after nine,’ Ayshe’s voice gurgled down the phone.

  ‘No, I had to get up to answer the phone anyway.’ I rubbed my eyes.

  ‘You’ve got to give me all the gossip on last night.’

  I sat up, yawning. ‘You wouldn’t believe it. It was positively hellish.’

  ‘I’ve thrown a sicky today. Got some boring board meeting – they should be called “bored” meetings – I don’t need to be there anyway. Do you want to come up for breakfast?’

  ‘I’d love to. Give me ten minutes and I’ll be up. Get the bacon butties on.’

  ‘Only if you don’t tell Mum and Dad.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘You know; Muslims consider pigs to be unclean. Even though my parents have lived in the UK for fifty years, and they’re not religious, they’ve still got a thing about not eating pork. Me and Kalem haven’t had the heart to tell them we love bacon.’

  I leapt out of bed, caught my foot in the corner of the duvet and fell into a heap on the floor. Picking myself up, I scrambled around for something to wear and then marched up the stairs to Ayshe’s.

  ‘Morning.’ I breezed in to the sound of bacon sizzling under the grill. Atila was making sandwiches in the kitchen and Kalem was sprawled out on the sofa, having devoured half of his already.

  Ayshe’s black and white cat, Felix, inched his way over towards Kalem, sniffing the air with anticipation.

  ****

  After a hearty breakfast, I filled Ayshe in on the details of last night. We huddled together in the kitchen so that the boys couldn’t overhear us.

  ‘So I’ve got a date…maybe. I guess I’ll just have to see if he calls me.’

  ‘See, I knew this challenge thing would work!’

  ‘So, does a date count as a challenge, then?’ I asked.

  She furrowed her brow for a minute, deep in thought. ‘Yes.’

  ‘Well, tonight I’ve been invited to an art exhibition, and that can count as one of my challenges. I’ve never done that before, but I’ve got no one to go with. Please say you’ll come.’

  ‘Oh, no! I can’t tonight. We’ve got to go and see the manager of the Priory. There’s been some kind of misunderstanding about the colour scheme for our wedding reception. We ordered lilac and cream for the ribbons and table decorations, but the ones which have come in are puce. I haven’t got a clue what sort of colour puce is – although it sounds utterly revolting – so we’ve got go over and see if they’ll do.’ She pulled a disgusted face.

  ‘Oh.’ I sighed. I could hardly go on my own.

  ‘What about Kalem? He’s into arty things. There might be a spot of woodcarving to get him excited.’

  ‘No, it’s OK, don’t worry. I’ll have to think of something else for today’s challenge,’ I said.

&n
bsp; Kalem chose that moment to saunter into the kitchen and deposit his plate in the sink. ‘You girls talking about me again?’

  ‘Helen needs someone to go with her to an art exhibition tonight, and we’ve got to see this woman about our puce decorations.’

  He shrugged. ‘Yeah, I’ll go.’

  ‘What about Emine, won’t she mind?’ I glanced at him.

  Emine was Kalem’s rich, Turkish Cypriot girlfriend who was always dragging him off to dinner parties with her horsey friends and trying to get him to eat nouvelle cuisine. She carried around a whole chemist’s supply of Esteé Lauder-this and Láncome-that, all stuffed into a massive handbag, and refused to leave the house without full make-up on and far too much dark lip-liner, which gave her an odd-looking trout-pout. Not that I’m being bitchy, of course.

  ‘No,’ he replied.

  ‘I think they’ve had a row,’ Ayshe whispered to me.

  ‘Whatever,’ he muttered, wandering back to the lounge.

  ‘Right, that’s settled. Oh, and I’ve thought up a challenge for tomorrow too,’ Ayshe said.

  Great. ‘Oh, excellent’ When she didn’t enlighten me, I gazed at her. ‘Well?’

  ‘I’ll tell you tomorrow.’ She smiled.

  ‘Now breakfast is out the way, I’m going to start on one of my new chocolate recipes. I’ve realized that the only way to be taken seriously as a chef is to write a book,’ Atila said, jumping to his feet and busying himself in the kitchen. At six foot two he had difficulty leaning over the beech kitchen worktop and had to jack-knife over it. His floppy hairdo kept falling into his eyes. He pushed it away, totally engrossed in his task.

  ‘Goody, I love chocolate,’ I said.

  ‘I’ve been thinking of a title for it. You know how sex sells everything these days? All this Naked Chef stuff and Nigella Lawson sexing it up in the kitchen. I’ve been thinking about calling it Foreplay in the Kitchen, Sex in the Diningroom. What do you think?’ He beamed at us.

  ‘Your mum won’t like it,’ Ayshe said. ‘She even turns the TV off if they mention the word “sex”.’