Kelly, whom I met at Uni a few years ago, is in her late thirties, but looks a lot older, on account of her walking stick, her bulk, and the fact that she's got too much neck for her neck. She's needy, and as lightly as possibly, I have to turn away her poorly disguised requests for help round the house or emotional or financial support.
She doesn't often ring, but I could hear an unwonted smile beam down the phone as she headily sought a reference on a mutual friend. Apparently, there's a bit of mutual smiten-ness in the air between them. I gave an honestly complimentary recommendation, and kept to myself the thought that they are one of the unlikeliest pairings I can imagine. I agreed to her suggestion we go for lunch, knowing, very recently, what it's like to have the words "I've met someone!" clanging around in your head, seeking release.
As we all do, she likes to be liked; and for Kelly it's important that third parties see her being liked. To this end, I knew she'd want to make sure I knew that they are having sex. She used variations on the formula "...and of course the sex is great and everything..." It's a perfectly reasonable sentence to use, but it sounded like a solecism. More followed: "We weren't going to declare it until Christmas, but I think the girls are starting to suspect something." And "He's not ashamed of me. Well, he took my hand in town on Saturday, so he can't be ashamed of me."
Perhaps it's my peculiar conversational taste. I spend hours in conversations which my more mannered friends in the macramé belt of Lancaster would find unbearably vulgar, the expression of social attitudes last encountered in the Gaeltacht in 1959 larded with abundant swearing. Yet I winced each time Kelly, with almost acceptable propriety, said those things.
"I had a date on Sunday actually," I said, and instantly regretted doing so. In the economy of conversation, I had just thrown a bit of capital away on someone with whom I do not wish to be intimate.
"Oh yes?" The trace of disappointment crossing her face as attention, after half an hour, was wrested from her. "How did you meet her?" "On the internet." "Oh I couldn't do that. I'm glad me and Barry met in person. I wouldn't feel safe putting my details on the internet..." Back to you then.
People like you are always very surprised when anyone has any important news. "Oh I never knew that! You kept that quiet!" Yes, because you never fucking listen.
