Raven Read online

  Some people compose heartfelt, needy narratives on their profiles, explaining that they yearn to find their soul-mate, their ‘true one’, the person with whom they can share the rest of their lives, spending those special moments together curled up in front of the hearth with their cups of cocoa, chuckling at their favourite seventies sitcoms on the telly.

  But that ‘perfect harmony’ stuff is strictly for cheesy Coca-Cola commercials. Not for me this fantasy of happy-ever-after. I reused most of New Yorker’s short, snappy narrative. Nothing soppy, nothing heavy. I added the tantalising line: ‘I used to be a biker chick’ and uploaded a couple of supplementary photos showing me in my biking leathers. (Hey, I’m not stupid.)

  Then I sat back to see how Raven got on.

  CHAPTER THREE

  A day or two after he stood me up NorseMan sent a feeble apology: ‘Sorry I couldn’t make it.’ But with assholes, the best policy is to ignore them, so I didn’t bother telling him off. In fact I forgot about the whole fiasco almost immediately, as New Yorker was quickly superseded by Raven. Vanessa had been right. As soon as I settled into the new site, in my new persona, the dating floodgates opened. All at once I was the most popular girl at school.

  Although my first date (Viking didn’t count, obviously) was never going to set my world alight. Looking at NiceMan’s profile, I couldn’t help but sympathise with the fellow. His unassuming narrative had gently humorous, self-deprecating touches typical of the old-school English gent. His photo depicted a slightly alarmed-looking, balding middle-aged man who, in the looks department, had much to be modest about, and he described himself as short and well-rounded, a civil servant by profession. But he seemed intelligent and amusing, so I responded to the tentative message he sent me, which began: ‘Dear Raven, there are a lot of damaged souls and broken hearts out there and some of my own experiences are worthy of Edgar Allan Poe. Fall of the House of Usher comes to mind…’

  We messaged a little, to and fro, employing a few literary allusions. I told him he sounded sweet. ‘Sweet?’ he replied. ‘Oh yeah, you say that now…’ And we arranged to meet at a café in town that Friday afternoon. ‘How will I know you?’ I asked. ‘Will you be reading a copy of Anna Karenina?’ He said no, he’d probably be the one sitting there looking unhappy and ‘complaining about the service’. I took that as a joke.

  When I walked into the designated café and spotted a man sitting alone, our eyes met and I felt a jolt of pleasant surprise. He was no movie star but certainly nicer looking than in the profile picture. But he looked at me blankly and turned away.

  Then I saw NiceMan, at a table on the opposite side of the room. He was remonstrating with the waiter about the piped music. When he saw me he stood up, but he didn’t look happy. He explained that he had already moved tables once but the music was still too intrusive. Would I mind if we left that place and found somewhere else?

  So we wandered off down the street. A block or two along we saw an Italian chain eatery and went inside. We sat down by the window and as soon as the waitress appeared at our table he asked her to remove the little vase containing a single dainty flower. Apparently, he didn’t approve of it. I began to have doubts about the supposed niceness of NiceMan.

  He didn’t drink coffee or tea, so he ordered orange juice while I asked for a latte. I inquired about his job and he told me how much he hated it. He was only 50 but desperate to retire. ‘It’s soul-destroying in my office. Nothing works as it should. It’s all public sector bullshit. I’d quit tomorrow except that I’d lose too much of my pension.’ What would he do instead, if he quit his job? ‘Leave London and grow vegetables.’ He had never married, never had kids, never had a proper long-term relationship. So there was only himself to consider.

  He had been on the dating site for six months and that, too, had been soul-destroying. ‘I’ve lost my faith in human nature. Everyone lets you down.’ He’d had a handful of dates but they didn’t lead anywhere. He thought one problem was his height. He was 5 foot 6. ‘It seems that no one under six feet need apply. But it normally doesn’t get as far as that. Usually when somebody sees my photo I never hear from them again.’ He’d had enough and had decided that when his subscription ran out he wouldn’t renew. ‘I’m done.’ He sipped his juice gloomily, but if ever there was a person in need of a stiffer drink, it was him.

  Then he recounted some cautionary tales. It seemed that a number of women on the site were Eastern Europeans hoping to acquire a UK passport through some hapless mug. And then there was a friend of his who took a glamorous young Russian woman out to dinner at the expensive restaurant she chose and plied her with champagne before discovering she was a prostitute. ‘If her name is Olga you have to be very careful.’ But mostly the women he had met were just callous and rude. It had been an altogether depressing experience.

  I felt sorry for NiceMan. His life was a mess. And he had no one to share the mess with. But despite his generally morose air, I found myself liking him. I’m a journalist. Cynicism and world-weariness are part of my terrain. I’m at home with them. So I offered NiceMan a deal. ‘Listen, to be honest with you, I don’t think we’re going to go out with each other. But we can be friends. I like talking to you. You’re amusing.’ (Although I wasn’t sure he was all that amusing, in the ha-ha sense.) He smiled and paid me a compliment in return. ‘Raven, I like the cut of your jib too.’

  We wandered up the road towards Bond Street tube station at the end of our ‘date’, and agreed to meet up again as friends. He said he would like to invite me over for a home-cooked dinner. ‘Lovely!’ I said. And as I pushed open the glass door to the station I reasoned that it was always a good thing to enlarge my social circle. Even though that wasn’t really what I’d signed up for.

  *

  SuperA was a self-described ‘North London Jew boy’ used to life in the fast lane. In his late forties, he ran his own successful business in the media world, wore immaculate designer clothes and drove a classy sports car. Tall and moderately good-looking, with a neat, close-cropped beard, he was also manifestly self-satisfied. Smarmy, even. But he told funny Jewish jokes and did a brilliant Jackie Mason accent, and you can forgive a man many things if he makes you laugh.

  Our first messaging session was full of good old-fashioned ‘gay repartee’, as though we were a latter-day Spencer Tracey and Kate Hepburn in a sophisticated forties romcom. The witty socio-cultural references! The subtle innuendos! And how refreshing to receive messages composed with perfect spelling and punctuation and grammar. You had to love these well-educated, well-read North London Jew boys.

  Like NiceMan, SuperA had never married (‘I run too fast,’ he explained) or had children. But that was fine because – in common with many childless people – he claimed it was enough to have agreeable nieces and nephews. He’d been internet dating for a few years, which had led to ‘some enjoyable encounters and fab sex’. I suggested that years of casual serial dating might be soul-destroying. ‘Not soul-destroying,’ he corrected. ‘Just soulless.’

  That night we graduated from messaging to texting. He set me a ‘saucy quiz’. Did I prefer thongs or Bridget Jones pants? Shaved or au naturel? Missionary position or swinging from chandeliers? And so on. We had fun.

  It was well past midnight by the time we packed it in. Then we fixed up a date for one night the following week. The plan was for him to come to my place following the media event he was attending in town.

  I was well aware of the golden rule of internet dating: your initial meeting takes place on neutral ground, in public, with plenty of people around. Then you are safe and can make a quick getaway if necessary. You never invite someone you don’t know to your own home! You don’t tell him where you live! That is reckless and dangerous. Your date could be anybody. Jack the Ripper or Ted Bundy or Vlad the Impaler.

  This is all wise advice.

  So I gave SuperA my post code to put into his satnav and he said he would get there by 10.30.

  When my partner and I
split up a year earlier he moved out of the big family house we owned jointly, into rented accommodation in another part of town, and our house went on the market. But it hadn’t yet sold. So I was still living there, alone amidst its spacious, partly empty rooms, once full of the sounds of family life, now quiet and secluded in a private cul-de-sac.

  SuperA rolled up in his swish two-seater and parked in my drive. Laid back and courteous, he gave me a chaste kiss on the cheek before following me into the kitchen. ‘Very nice,’ he remarked, looking around blandly as I made us mugs of tea. Then we moved into the sitting room. He told me about his background and work, but wasn’t overly curious about me, asking only a few perfunctory questions.

  We started kissing, but he wasn’t pushy about and didn’t do any undue groping. It went well. So after a while we moved upstairs. I can’t say that Bonfire Night burst forth in my bedroom, but the experience was satisfying and comforting and pretty much what I desired just then. I felt we were companionable. As they say, we had ‘clicked’. We chatted some more afterwards, he did another Jackie Mason impression which made me giggle and then we fell asleep.

  In the morning he had to leave very early to get back to his house in Berkshire. Something about having a dishwasher delivered. Or perhaps it was a telly. He kissed me goodbye on the doorstep and drove off. It was 7 a.m. But I felt content as I shuffled off to the kitchen for coffee. We had already arranged to meet again the following week, in town. This time we would go out for dinner, nice bottle of wine, chat about life and get to know more about each other – the whole proper ‘date’ thing. A back-to-front way of going about it, maybe. But no matter. Things were definitely looking up.

  *

  But my meeting with SuperA seemed far off. There was a whole weekend to get through before then and I didn’t see why I should spend it alone. So, come the Saturday morning, Raven was sitting in front of the laptop having a trawl though the dating site to see who was out there. A box on one side of the page displayed small selections of men meeting my personal dating criteria, e.g. age, location, whether they were interested in a serious relationship or just a bit of fun. These were the potential dates chosen for me by the all-knowing, all-seeing site.

  I saw a young face amongst these nominees. Dark blond hair and blue eyes, shy yet cheeky grin, your friendly boy-next-door. I looked at his profile. He was 23, just a baby, and his user-name, Tooting333, told me he probably lived in that South London area. Then I thought back to my life-changing, crazy (but good crazy) adventure with the 26-year-old, which had started me on this journey, and contemplated sending Tooting boy a wink. Shameless. But then, what would be the point? No doubt he would flee when he noticed my age.

  I’d forgotten that people on the site can tell when someone inspects their profile.

  Three minutes later a message pinged into my inbox. It was from Tooting333. ‘Hi Miss Raven. How are you today? Do you have any nice plans for this weekend? I hope you don't mind me messaging but noticed you had been looking at my profile so thought I would say hello.’

  Surprised and pleased, I wrote back saying I thought he was cute and that I was all in favour of younger men.

  ‘Ah thank you. You look very pretty yourself. And I love women who are older than me. Can I ask your name? Raven sounds really cool, but is merely the name of a poem. If not I’ll have to call you Miss for the time being.’

  I told him my name and he told me his.

  ‘Are you busy this weekend?,’ he asked. ‘Maybe we could get to know each other a bit better…’ Tooting333 didn’t believe in wasting time.

  ‘What are you suggesting? Does your mum know about this?’ I joked.

  ‘I don’t tell her everything!’

  We agreed to meet at noon at a pub (I’ll call it The Bells) in my north London neighbourhood. As I had surmised, he did live in the South London district of Tooting but was happy to travel up to me on the tube.

  ‘Looking forward to seeing you later,’ he messaged.

  ‘All right, my frisky little pup.’

  ‘Frisky little pup? I like that.’

  *

  He was waiting for me in the near empty pub, in his tight jeans and tee-shirt and trainers, holding a glass of beer and looking a little apprehensive. He offered to buy me a drink but that didn’t seem right. (My instinct when with young people, unless they were Justin Bieber or something, was to pay for things.) So I went to the bar and got my own glass of wine, then sat down opposite him.

  Slowly we broke the ice of what we both recognised as a highly irregular situation. As he warmed to our conversation about his work (in accountancy) and his family (from Lancaster), and I told him something of my own life, and we sipped our drinks and shared bar snacks, his shyness began to fade and he smiled more.

  I liked his informal yet respectful manner. He was bright, thoughtful and knowledgeable (his copy of The Times, his Saturday reading matter of choice, lay on the seat beside him).

  He had only ever had one girlfriend, briefly, at university, and by and large he wasn’t interested in girls of his own age. ‘All they want to talk about is the X Factor and the latest celebrity gossip or silly stuff about past boyfriends.’ The other problem was that they wanted to get too serious too soon: ‘After a couple of dates they start putting on the pressure. They want a proper relationship and commitment. I say “Slow down, you hardly know me,” and they say “Yeah but you’re so nice…”’ He shrugged.

  ‘So at that point you give them the chop?’

  He smiled. ‘Yeah.’

  I could see the attraction for him of the older woman. He didn’t have to spell it out.

  The afternoon flowed easily by and at 3.30 we strolled back to my place for tea. I wondered what the next step in this unfamiliar scenario might be. What was he expecting? Wanting? I had no idea. He was far too well-behaved to ‘make a move’ on me. At that moment I wasn’t feeling at all worldly. Help!

  ‘What would you like to do now?’ I asked, not meeting his eyes, feeling embarrassed and hoping it didn’t show too much.

  ‘Give me your hands,’ he said, and he took them gently and held them, reassuring me. ‘We’ll do whatever you want to do.’ I was nearly forty years his senior. How come he was being more grown up about this than me? I gave his fingers a squeeze, followed by a sly grin.

  I think I had been expecting Tooting333’s performance in bed to be puppy-like – raw and awkward, all enthusiasm and little know-how. But I couldn’t have been more wrong. Although he was young and had had very few sexual partners, he displayed a deeper understanding of the act than many men – most men, perhaps – twice his age. Tender and sensual and generous, he was simply a natural. The incredible, many would say absurd, age gap between us didn’t enter into the equation. I don’t think either of us thought about it for a second.

  I found his healthy, strong body very appealing. I complimented him on his super-muscular thighs and he told me they were a result of his football playing; he belonged to a team in south London and played on weekends. (As a teenager I had a friend called Esther who, as a pretty seventeen-year-old, went on holiday with her parents to the Algarve. She met George Best on the beach one night and they had sex. ‘His thighs were like rocks,’ she said admiringly. I finally knew what she meant.)

  Later that evening we went downstairs and ate a dinner of spaghetti and ice cream in the sitting room while watching a silly film on the telly. And we laughed and sprawled on the sofa like a pair of teenagers.

  He stayed over that night and fell asleep with his head nestling on my shoulder. And the next morning he left for Tooting.

  He sent me a text from the tube station. ‘Hi Miss. It’s L’il Pup here. Lovely seeing you. Hope to see you again soon.’

  From then on I always called him Pup and he generally referred to me as Miss. I loved the vaguely Benny Hill sauciness of it.

  ‘I’ll do anything you want, Miss.’

  Bloody hell.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  Vanessa’s
dating site was proving to be highly fertile ground. Even before my upcoming second get-together with SuperA on Friday, I had organised a dating double-whammy for one midweek evening.

  My first assignation was for cocktails at the popular bar-café over-looking Piccadilly from the top floor of the Waterstones flagship store. My date was with Ramon, a 48-year-old South American businessman. Darkly handsome, in his outdoorsy photos he resembled a rugged, bearded mountaineer. This macho appearance was at odds with the affected language he used in his on-site messages. Referring to the line in my narrative about all men being rascals, he countered with: ‘Laying the cards down, I struggle to refrain myself from coming to the quite generalised negative view about the opposite sex as well. I'm on the cusp of concluding that all women are heartless. It could be fun to share our case folders.’

  I told him that only a heartless woman could refuse his proposal. ‘Touché!’ he responded. ‘I have another meeting that day which flutters like a butterfly and I don’t know what time it will land. Yet a glass at the end of a warm day as the night cold begins to nibble is a glorious time.’

  Jesus, I thought. He could be hard work.

  We agreed to meet at six o’clock. He told me to look for someone ‘most likely staring at an iPhone, thoroughly detached from his surroundings (some might say, disembodied)’. A description which nowadays would hardly narrow the field.

  As I stepped out of the lift I spotted him soon enough, staring into his iPhone. As I approached he glanced up and gave me a smile. Still uncertain of the protocol on these occasions I reached out to shake his hand, but he took me by the shoulders and kissed me on both cheeks.

  We ordered mojitos and started chatting. Like many passionate entrepreneurs Ramon could wax lyrical about the challenges of start-ups and ‘high-risk strategies’, and expound at length on ‘growing an SME’, ‘taking the business to new levels’ and the intricacies of recapitalisation. I tried not to let my eyes glaze over. My ex was a business consultant and I’d been listening to the yawn-inducing jargon for many years. But at least the ex hadn’t larded his talk with Ramon’s flowery, faux-poetic expressions.