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Partners
I meet my girlfriends every Monday morning, same place, same time, new shoes. We snap our fingers for ‘another coffee’, we complain about the coffee, we talk about our weekends, ooh and aaah over our new shoes, we laugh, we cry, we try sort out the country, but mostly, we talk about the men in our lives. And the men in the coffee shop.
We talk about Steve who is gorgeous but gay, Kevin who behaves like a cunt, Tom who really shouldn’t have walked out on his wife, Joe who I have a crush on but no-one really trusts, and Martin who has the best body in the world.
Everyone knows women talk like this. It’s part of life, it’s fun, it’s expected. We talk about our dates (Kevin never called me back), our sexual encounters (Steve, a really good lover) and poor Martin who, try as he might, just couldn’t get it up.
Actually, I think anyone called Martin can’t get it up, but that’s another story.
The conversation never goes further than our table and somehow I always thought this was a thing that women do. Not men. Never men.
But there’s a group of men that sit at the same coffee shop on the same Mondy morning. They’re not nearly as loud as we are, they always have their heads buried in their newspapers and when they do talk it seems to be about sport or beer.
They never complain about their coffee, never admire one another’s shoes and certainly don’t seem to even notice us or our behaviour.
But last night I had dinner with Joe. We were having a really nice night and I had specially put my phone away so I could focus on him. I don’t do that for many men so it’s always a good sign.
Oddly enough, his phone bleeped through the entire dinner. I got very fucking irritated.
"What’s going on Joe. Man United getting hammered?".
He grinned sheepishly. "I’m going to tell you the truth", he said. "Don’t be mad."
Remember, Joe is the guy none of my friends like. Maybe they had good reason. I sat back and waited.
"It’s the boys", he said. "I told them I’d send them a message if things were going well with you. They want to know what stage we’re at: dinner, making out in the car or maybe finally, finally, after all these bloody dinners, having sex".
What?
I’d held off messaging my friends to tell them how the date was going. I’d been dying to tell them we were close to landing up in bed. But I had manners. I was going to wait at least until dessert.
I was outraged. It was fine for us women to do this oversharing thing. But men? Never. How dare they.
He went on to tell me how he and his friends talk about everything too. What they think of Suzie’s short hair, that Karen has great tits and that Linda should never have left her husband. And that Violet, that would be me, well, no-one really knows what to make of Violet.
Pfft. My dessert arrived and I picked up my phone and quickly sent a message.
"You were right, girls. Not to be trusted..."
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