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habits
that their partner finds almost intolerably irritating? This bending forward
and slurping is one of Andy’s that fills me with a kind of seething inner rage,
only for a second or so, so not really worth drawing to his attention and, in
fact, totally irrational on my part, since it’s not unsanitary or antisocial.
It’s just that pints are for picking up. I’m the sort of person who likes to
chink glasses whether a toast is called for or not. What does it matter if it
foams all over your fingers? Andy cannot bear to spill a drop.
    This is the point where the ‘in love’
changes to ‘loving someone’, although it doesn’t feel like I thought it would.
    It’s not what it’s like in the
movies, but then they do not make movies about plain people falling in love.
They do not make movies about plain women full stop. Even when they do, they
use Michelle Pfeiffer. Mother Teresa, The Movie would star Michelle
Pfeiffer although Robin Williams would actually be a better likeness, and
what’s he really done since Mrs Doubtfire ?
    Michelle (Pfriend not Pfeiffer,
obviously) says my problem is that I want my life to be like Barefoot in the
Park. Nobody gets Robert Redford, she says, not even Demi Moore in Indecent
Proposal, but that doesn’t mean you have to settle for Woody Harrelson.
    Andy is nothing like Woody Harrelson,
by the way, and I believe some women find Woody attractive. As they do Andy. In
the league tables Andy would probably come above me.
    And anyway, I haven’t fancied Robert
Redford since I was a teenager.
    It’s been Gary Lineker for some time.
Since Italia ’90, as a matter of fact. Michelle, who doesn’t like football,
thinks I’m joking. Which is fine because I don’t want her knowing all my
thoughts.
    It was that smile when he’d scored a
goal.
    It just looked like pure happiness.
     
    ‘Are you coming in?’ Andy asks as I
park outside his flat.
    ‘Not tonight,’ I say. ‘I’ve got a lot
of preparation for tomorrow.’
    ‘Go on,’ says Andy.
    He’s had two pints of Boddingtons and
he’s looking at me in a slightly predatory way. Andy is quite highly sexed,
which is another one of his plus points. None of that really-it’s-fine,
it-doesn’t-matter, there’s-probably-too-much at-stake, we’ve-drunk-too-much,
not-slept-enough, it’s-a-much-commoner-problem-than-you-think and
a-cuddle-is-sometimes-just-as-intimate stuff for us.
    ‘I’ve locked Honey in the kitchen,’
he says.
    This is Andy’s version of soft music
and champagne cooling in an ice bucket.
    ‘OK, then,’ I say, switching off the
engine.
     
    The first time I came to Andy’s flat,
he opened the door and said, ‘As you can see, I’m a minimalist.’
    Which made me laugh more than the
remark demanded. We had just won our first quiz. I was overexcited and nervous.
    Andy’s interpretation of minimalist
is no comfortable furniture and lots of wires everywhere. Did I mention that
Andy was in computers? He’s the kind of brains end of a website design company,
which means that he is quite rich, on paper. (What does he need to do with the
paper to get the money? I’ve never really understood finance, and there comes a
point when you’re too old to ask.)
    There is an orange-and-brown-tartan
sofa left behind by the previous owner, which is so seventies it would have
some value as a retro item if it were in good condition, but as Andy says a bit
tearily, there’s really no point in buying a new one while Honey is still
around. You can’t criticize a man for not expressing his emotions and then haul
him round IKEA every other weekend, can you?
    The other piece of furniture is a
pouffe with a woven pattern, which his mother threw out when she got the free
footstool with the sofa from Courts. (What is the correct pronunciation of that
word, by the way? Is it poof, like homosexual, or is it poofay, which Andy’s
mother calls it, because she thinks it sounds more refined? I sometimes wonder
whether she knows that