Love... From Both Sides (A laugh-out-loud romantic comedy) (27 page)

Clare, the chunky lass who writes the lifestyle section, obviously can’t let go of the nineties and has come as Lara Croft.

Alex, whose grip on sanity is tenuous at best these days, is dressed as The Joker from The Dark Knight, which everyone agrees is
very
fitting.

All in all it’s a motley collection of half-arsed, thrown together outfits… just like every other fancy dress party you’ve ever been to.
   

In light of the fact I’m dressed like Keanu
Reeves’s
older, chubbier brother, and am in the office at
eight thirty
on a Friday night surrounded by people I can barely tolerate in the harsh light of day, I decide to get as insanely drunk as possible.

With stupendous success, it has to be said.

By
ten o’clock
I’ve polished off three quarters of a bottle of Jack Daniels and am starting to think I look really cool in my sunglasses and trench coat.

I send an email to the chief editor demanding that my genius marketing ideas are approved immediately, or I’ll punch his wife in the face.

I giggle as I hit send on the keyboard.

I doubt I’ll be giggling when I get into work on Monday morning.

Nevertheless, my spirits are high right now and I’m enjoying myself.

…as long as standing on a desk, sweating my arse off in a thick leather trench coat, singing Poker Face at the top of my voice, and swigging from a whisky bottle constitutes ‘enjoyment’.

Clare, the Croft-a-like lifestyle guru, has joined me on the table and is performing a badly co-ordinated bump and grind dance against my leg.

This brings cheers from the surrounding party-goers.

She’s by no means a slender girl, so the desk is now in serious danger of collapsing under our weight. I still have my wits about me enough to know that we should get down before we have to spend hours filling out an accident report, so I help my impromptu dance partner to the ground.

‘Thank you Neo! You’re my hero!’ she yelps and throws her arms around my neck. ‘You’re very sexy in that get-up,’ she adds. Any germs or bacteria that may be lurking on my face are instantly killed by her alcoholic breath.

‘Thanks.’ I try to come up with a return compliment that’s at least half true. ‘I like your ponytail.’

Clare laughs and slaps me across the face with it a couple of times. ‘Naughty boy.’

I don’t quite know what’s naughty about commenting on someone’s hair-do, but I let it slide.

My blood is now 60% proof, so Clare is starting to look pretty
damn good
in her little shorts… if you ignore the cellulite and the slightly disconcerting way her ample left boob is trying to make a break for freedom from the blue vest top she’s wearing.

Yes. You’re absolutely right. What you think is going to happen next is exactly what
does
happen.

Some things in life are inevitable.

Being stupid drunk at an office party and getting off with someone completely inappropriate is one of them.

It takes another half an hour for my blood alcohol level to reach the point where Clare is starting to look
really
sexy.

There she is, over by the fax machine playing with Pete’s coat hangers.

She keeps throwing me little glances that speak volumes.

I can tell she wants to do more than just dance on a desk with me this evening.

And what would be the harm, eh?

After all, I’m young, free and single!

Sure, Clare isn’t the thinnest girl in the world (I’m pretty sure the guys down in Deliveries have nicknamed her ‘
dumptruck
’) but she’s got an attractive face and a nice ponytail… as we’ve already discussed.

It’s nearly six weeks since I last saw Laura, so there’s no reason not to try it on with Clare.

It’ll be good for me to have some fun with a different woman. It might help lift the fog of depression I’ve been under for the past month.

I miss Laura like crazy and am getting sick it. A bounce with Clare will be just the thing to sort me out.

Anyone who’s been dumped and looked for solace elsewhere in this fashion will know that this kind of thinking is
always
constructive - and that shagging a virtual stranger mere weeks after having your heart broken is
always
the best way to get over the pain.

Hmmm.

I saunter over to where Pete is explaining to Clare that Wolverine’s claws are constructed of something called
Adamantium
.

I give him a look that is constructed of pure
GoawayPeteium
and he takes the hint.

‘Come back for another dance, have we?’ Clare asks.

‘Yeah. There’s nothing wrong with a little bump and grind, eh?’ I say, gyrating my hips awkwardly.

It’s amazing how a copious amount of alcohol has the capacity to turn you into a complete arsehole, isn’t it?

I would never have come out with the above pronouncement sober.

In fact, it’s such an
awful
line that I’m fairly sure it causes ripples in the fabric of existence, sending shockwaves out into the universe. Strange, alien scientists on a planet across the other side of the galaxy will feel the effects of those ripples in a few thousand years and conclude that if my conversation skills were indicative of the human race as a whole, it was a good job we were all wiped out by that cold virus in 2134.

Clare doesn’t appear to be bothered by it.

She’s well into her ninth bottle of Bacardi
Breezer
though, which may explain things.

‘You sure that’s all you want to do?’ she asks and parks her hand over my genitals. ‘Or maybe we should go somewhere a bit quieter?’

‘Sure,’ I reply and my penis does its customary victory lap. Given the fact Clare isn’t quite up to Laura’s standards the lap is a lot slower and doesn’t get as far as the podium celebrations.

‘There’s the supply cupboard,’ Clare suggests. ‘Or we could go to Alex’s office. I would say we could go upstairs onto the roof, but they lock it at this time of night.’

Judging from her knowledge of secluded locations in these parts, this isn’t the first time Clare’s contemplated some extra curricula office shenanigans.

‘Cupboard’s fine,’ I drawl. The prospect of The Joker bursting in on me humping Lara Croft over his ergonomic keyboard isn’t one I want to entertain.

The front of my coat is grabbed like a drowning man clings to life and I’m dragged towards the cupboard at the back of the office in unceremonious fashion.

Clare isn’t displaying Isobel-like levels of sexual aggression, but she’s not
that
far behind.

I get a few sympathetic looks from the other party-goers as we fly past. There are also a few chuckles. It looks like Clare’s reputation proceeds her.

The cupboard itself is tucked out the way down a short corridor, so there is
some
privacy, thank goodness. I can do without a herd of pissed work colleagues standing outside, listening intently and giving me marks out of ten for presentation and stamina.

Once the door is closed, Clare moves back into the recesses of the cupboard, beckoning me forward with a curled finger. I oblige. After all, what else am I supposed to do?

I put my arms around her waist (which is quite a bit wider than Laura’s) and move in for a kiss.

Clare responds feverishly and before you know it we’re sucking face like the best of them.

She kisses in a firmer way than Laura, but it’s not unpleasant and my
johnson
is soon straining for release from its denim prison.

‘I want you in me,’ Clare whispers breathily into my ear. I’m reminded of when Laura said much the same thing to me in bed a couple of months ago.

Clare unzips me and starts jerking me off. Her grip is quite firm and she doesn’t quite have Laura’s finesse, but –

I can’t stop thinking about Laura.

Everything Clare does just reminds me she’s not the girl I last saw standing in her doorway crying.

Here I am, in a closet with a perfectly nice (if slightly chunky) girl and I can’t take my mind off another woman.

My penis, which has started reminiscing along with me, starts to wilt.

Stop thinking about her! She’s gone!

I kiss Clare harder, running my hands over her breasts, which are larger than Laura’s but not as firm.

Oh for crying out loud.

My hard-on is fading fast. So is my libido.

‘What’s the matter?’ Clare asks, looking down at my rapidly deflating dick. ‘Got brewer’s drop have we, sweetheart? Or are you just not into Lara Croft?’ She gives me a sad little smile. It’s quite a cute expression, but not as cute as the one Laura makes when she’s just made some sarcastic comment about –

I’m crying.

God help me. I’m standing in a supply cupboard surrounded by printer cartridges, dressed as Neo from The Matrix, accompanied by a chubby Tomb Raider - and I’m crying.

‘What’s the matter?’ Clare asks. ‘Did I pull it too hard?’

‘No. No. It’s fine.’ I tuck little Newman back into his hidey-hole, where he’ll no doubt sulk for the rest of the night.

‘You’re not bloody gay are you? Only this happened to me before with a guy. He started crying too. I was his way out of the closet.’

‘Not gay, no.’ I lean back against a shelving unit and wipe my eyes. ‘I just split up with someone recently and I’m still not over it.’

‘
Aaah
.’

‘Didn’t think I was this cut up.’

‘Well, I’d say bursting into tears in front of a woman who’s trying to wank you off is a sure sign that you are, Jamie.’

‘Sorry, Clare.’

She sighs and rubs her eyes. ‘No worries. These things happen. What’s her name?’

I went into that cupboard thinking I’d get a shag. Instead I got a therapy session most people would pay good money for.

I don’t know why Clare writes all that lifestyle crap for the paper. She should be writing relationship advice books. They’d make a bloody fortune.

‘You over reacted Jamie,’ she tells me. ‘You’d only been seeing each other for a few weeks. I don’t blame you for not liking it, but you should’ve left that night without saying anything more and rung
her a
couple of days later. Slagging her off didn’t accomplish anything.’

‘My ego got in the way.’

‘Of course it did. I’m not saying she was any more in the right than you. But you could’ve taken the higher ground.’

‘Doesn’t matter now, anyway,’ I say and hang my head.