Page 42 of Great Sexpectations
I look at my phone as another message from him appears.
Are you free today? I hope so.
I can be.
Do you know the Hilton Grand, it’s in Earl’s Court?
I can look it up? Why?
Meet me there, 12pm.
I’m sitting at my kitchen table and choke a little on bagel crumbs. We’ve had sex in a car and since then had some energetic evenings of intense sexting, but now he wants to meet? In a hotel? That’s a bit naughty. And during the daytime too. I can’t tell if this is turning me on or feeling a bit illicit. I mean, it might be more comfortable than car sex. But I need to get grooming. It’s Saturday and I’m in post-breakfast slouchy mode. I haven’t washed my hair. Is this a meet, shag and go? Do I need to pack an overnight bag? A toothbrush? Will he freak out if I bring a toothbrush?
Mysterious. Is this another dinner thing?
Haha, definitely not.
What do I wear?
Do you still have that Japanese manga outfit? ;)
My eyes widen and a bit of bagel falls out of my mouth. He wants me to wear what now?
OK. It’s a date.
Oh no, I replied too quickly. It’s not a date if it’s just sex. That’s a hook-up. A date implies food and drink and ritual. Light-hearted chat where I find out his favourite colour. He doesn’t even know my favourite colour. It’s green.
I run through everything very quickly in my head. Do I bring the outfit? Or wear it there? I’m not even sure where that costume is. I wore that when I was fifteen. It may be in the loft. I hate the loft. Where are we meeting? Inside the hotel, outside the hotel? In the hotel where I’m waiting at the bar like a Bond girl, sipping on something while you casually come in and go, ‘Let’s get out of here’? Or in the room? You haven’t given me a room number. Do I need to ask in reception? Will I need a key? What if the lift has the sort of security where you need one to access the floors?
‘Morning, JoJo,’ my mum suddenly says, cradling Dave the dog. She goes to the kitchen counter to obtain his morning treats. ‘Who is my best baby? Does my baby want yum-yums?’ she says in a mummy voice. I’d have hoped I was her best baby, but we won’t debate that.
I’m still sitting at the kitchen table wondering what I’ve just organised for midday. I’ve organised role-play sex. I don’t think I have the hairspray.
‘I see you’re already up and hard at it?’ my mum suddenly mutters.
I blush. Hard at what?
She glances down at the kitchen table. Oh. In front of me this morning is also my laptop, folders, highlighters, and a multicoloured vibrator (unused, I’m not an animal). I don’t really stop for the weekends, but I’m also in high-stress work mode. If my spreadsheets and folders are colour-coded and in alphabetical order, then I don’t have to think about how I nearly took a man’s bollocks out with a champagne bottle and am lying to a nice man who I had sex in a car with.
‘You’ll need a spreadsheet for your spreadsheets at this rate,’ my mum says as she looks at my barely moisturised face, my frizzy hair bundled on top of my head. Mum is different to me in that she has weekend skincare routines. Today, she’s in one of her charcoal cleansing face masks so looks slightly scary. Dave doesn’t care. He tries to stare me out as Mum cradles him. If that dog could pout he would, he has such attitude. He won’t be when he sees the tux he has to wear in a few months. Yes, Dave is a page boy, which should be interesting, given he doesn’t have hands. ‘Coffee?’ she asks me.
‘I’ve had three already.’
‘Then maybe another bagel to soak up all that caffeine?’ she says, walking over to the toaster.
‘Yes, but let me just finish this email to this bloke on Etsy and I… will… eat…’
My focus is captured by my computer screen and Mum looks at me, concerned. She knows this crazed-work-obsessed Josie. She stops for no man, at the expense of her health and sanity. This is how I did coursework, wrote essays, closed business deals, through a mixture of adrenalin and manic energy. When Mike dumped me, I brokered three deals with a factory in Asia but also put on half a stone and developed an eye twitch.
‘I hope we’re not giving out vibes at this thing,’ she comments, glancing over at my desk.
‘Oh, that is something different altogether. I need to work out how to tell this client that she’s designed a vibrator that looks like a rocket lolly.’
Mum picks it up. ‘Why does it have a face on it?’
It’s the vibrator we’ve been developing with the YouTube influencer. Apparently, she wanted it to look friendly. I have no words. What are you going to do? Talk to your vibrator before you put it in you? She also wanted to capitalise on tie-dye making a comeback but instead this looks a little like a lava lamp.
‘I don’t think I like his smile,’ Mum says. Neither does Dave, who immediately attacks it, steals it off my mum and runs away to make it his own. I make a note to put this as part of the feedback.
