Page 49 of The Two Lives of Lydia Bird

‘At least he approved my leave before he had his heart attack. Three whole weeks.’

I can only assume he’s talking about Vince, his boss. ‘Is he okay?’

‘Will be, as long as he stays off the burgers.’

That’s something. Vince isn’t my favourite person, but I don’t want him keeling over.

‘Three weeks, huh?’

‘I leave work on July 12th and go back a married man.’ Freddie raises his glass to me. I smile and touch my glass to his, but my heart is with my sister tonight. My life here is rosy, while hers is falling to pieces. I can’t shake the feeling that her happiness is the price I’m paying for mine.

Friday 17 May

‘What if no one turns up?’

Ryan checks his hair on his phone. ‘They will. We’ve sold thirty tickets with a free drink included. They’ll come for that if nothing else.’

I’m always nervous at events I’ve organized, but in truth I haven’t really had to do all that much this time. The company in charge of the silent dating evenings are coming in to facilitate. I’ve just had to sell the tickets, organize the bar staff, lay out the room, that kind of thing. I’ve made sure the tickets sold to an equal number of men and women, but beyond that I’m not sure what’s going to happen this evening.

‘Do I look datable?’ Ryan asks, hand on his skinny-trousered hip, brooding into the middle distance like a moody GQ cover. He’s excited about tonight, always looking for the next big love of his life to walk in. I sometimes wonder if I should counsel him not to wear his heart on his sleeve with such reckless abandon, but I think that’s a lesson you can only learn by bitter experience.

‘They’ll all be blowing kisses across the table at you,’ I say.

‘I hope I don’t know any of them,’ he says, panto-aghast. ‘That’d be awkward, staring at someone I ghosted.’

‘Ghosted?’

He frowns, searching for the words to explain. ‘You know, like when you don’t have the bottle to tell someone it’s over, so you just disappear. Don’t answer their calls, never get back in touch. You just fade out of their lives.’

‘Oh,’ I say. I know he’s being light-hearted, but I can’t help feeling bad for all the people out there who have been ghosted by someone they love. Freddie didn’t ghost me, but I know how it feels when someone fades out of your life without warning. It’s a shitty thing to do to someone by choice.

‘I’ve only had to do it once myself,’ he backtracks, and I realize my thoughts must be showing on my face. ‘And only because she was a full-on stalker. I slept with the lights on for a month afterwards.’

‘Anyway,’ I say, brisk, ‘you’ll be good, I’m sure.’

Ryan’s the only staff member taking part tonight. Everyone else is either married or me.

The main hall is set out with lightning efficiency once the dating company roll in. Fifteen tables for two organized into a circuit that would make Ikea staff weep with envy, fifteen cardinal red tablecloths and fifteen vases of faux peonies arranged, all in the time it takes me to make them a coffee.

‘How long have you been doing this?’ I ask Kate, the boss, as I hand her one of our ‘only for clients’ cups. Plain and white with a gold rim, unlike the chipped collection of ‘Best Auntie Ever’ and corporate mugs we make do with upstairs.

She rests her bum on the old school-style radiator, flicking her jet-black hair as she does. It’s pure Uma Thurman from Pulp Fiction and she’s winged her black eyeliner to match. It’s an arresting look; maybe that’s the key to speed dating, making yourself difficult to forget. She’s short with soft curves, and she’s packed herself into leather trousers that can’t have fit the cow any better.

‘A year or so,’ she says. ‘We used to do normal speed-dating events and moved on to this to set us apart from the crowd.’ She sips her coffee. ‘People will give anything a go once, won’t they?’

I think about that. Will they? I’m not in any hurry to try base jumping, or bullfighting, or swimming the English Channel.

‘Hot,’ she says; I don’t know if she means the coffee, the radiator or Ryan as he walks past carrying a pile of extra chairs.

‘Do you take part yourself?’ I ask.

Kate laughs softly. ‘Not a chance.’

It’s not exactly a ringing endorsement. ‘No?’

‘I’m not looking for love,’ she says. ‘It’s overrated, if you ask me.’

There speaketh the broken-hearted, I think. ‘You probably shouldn’t tell your clients that,’ I laugh.

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