Page 60 of Just Date and See
He seems genuine but he also told me he loved me a bunch of times over the years, so you never really know, do you? Of course, considering this for a second reminds me that I did love him once, or at least I thought I did. If I believe anything it’s that he is probably homeless for Christmas. I’m not sure I could leave anyone in that position (and it’s not like I don’t already have a house full of unwanted guests) so, even if he is a scumbag, I’m not. I’m not as heartless as he is.
‘Promise?’ I reply.
‘I promise,’ he says.
Again, he seems sincere, but he did also tell me multiple times that we would be together forever and look how that turned out.
‘Okay, fine, so long as you mean it,’ I eventually say, ‘but only because you’re desperate, and I feel sorry for you. That’s it.’
‘Billie, you’re an angel, thank you,’ he says, kissing me on the cheek.
‘You won’t regret this.’
God, I really hope I don’t.
22
While I am gutted that today’s Mingle All the Way event has been cancelled (it was at an indoor climbing wall place, which has had to close for technical reasons, and thank God because can you imagine me on a climbing wall? I’ve been known to fall simply running up the stairs), today is the one day I do need to be at home, whether I want to be or not.
Rocco seemed gutted the event was cancelled too. There was talk about maybe trying to arrange a dinner with Leila and Tobias – well, we feel like we owe them something, even if they don’t know it – but after Jess and I tried to speak to our parents earlier, we have decided that there is no time like the present to take action.
As the two of us reconvened, after she spoke to Mum, and I spoke to Dad, Jess’s conclusion was that Mum was hiding something, and clearly had an extra spring in her step. With Dad, well, all he seemed to talk about was Mum, how well she was doing, how great she looked. I felt like he was getting at something, but I couldn’t quite put my finger on it. Either way, something is going on, and with Gail away working again, tonight seemed like the night to act.
You know that scene inThe Parent Trap, where Annie and Hallie recreate the romantic scene from the night when their parents met, to try to convince them to get back together? Well, tonight Jess and I are going to be, I suppose, reverse Parent Trapping our parents. So, instead of recreating a memorable romantic night, we will be doing the opposite, recreating a bad memory, a night that Jess and I remember being the beginning of the end of our parents’ relationship.
Mum and Dad used to throw dinner parties for their friends, with everyone taking it in turns to visit each couple’s house, where they would eat, drink and play games. If you were hosting you obviously wouldn’t need a babysitter, for what they all called the Saturday Night Club, and that’s when Jess and I loved to sneak out of our beds, sit on the stairs, and listen to their conversations.
There are three things Jess and I remember about the Saturday Night Club. The first is that they would drink wine, and lots of it. The second thing is that curry would always be on the menu for the evening. And, finally, the main source of entertainment would come from playing boardgames together.
Given that everyone was in a couple, these games would usually be ones that you played in pairs – even for games like Trivial Pursuit, they would play in their couples. But the night we’re recreating, the night they all fell out, the night that signified that beginning of the end for my parents, was the night they played A Matter of Morals, a boardgame from the eighties that my dad had found while clearing out his parents’ house and then decided they should all play together, with the whole evening turning out to be a sort of un-PC take onJumanji, and the jungle very much did come to them, because things got wild.
The idea with A Matter of Morals is to read out all these different dilemmas from cards, and not only to answer what you would do in each scenario, but to guess what other people would do too. Naturally, the game always winds up turning into a huge debate on who would do what, and everyone judging everyone else for their different choices.
So, that’s what we’re going to do tonight, we’ve both invited Mum and Dad to have dinner with us (saying we’ll cook, although we’re definitely going to be getting the curries delivered) and we’re all going to sit down and play A Matter of Morals together, and as the wine flows and we each answer questions, I’m hoping that the old memories will come flooding back, and Mum and Dad will realise just how awful things were, how wrong they are for each other, and that they should never, ever get back together under any circumstances.
Luckily, when I was helping Mum clear out her house, I happened upon the box of boardgames and I asked if I could bring them to my house, in case we wanted to play one together over Christmas, or for me to play with my friends when they’re back from their skiing holiday.
Anyway, in the big box, sure enough, isthecopy of A Matter of Morals, the one from the night in question. Unfortunately, as Jess and I were going through the cards, rigging the deck so that the questions that came out would be ones that set Mum and Dad at odds, we realised that a lot of them are not only on controversial topics, but they’re very much stuck in the seventies, with seriously backward ideas, and some truly despicable questions. By the time we removed all the problematic cards, the deck was significantly shorter, but we’ve got everything we need, to recreate that night.
‘Wow, something smells nice,’ Mum says as she enters the room.
Jess is just putting the finishing touches on the table, while I am plating up the last of the food ready to serve.
‘You girls have been so vague about dinner tonight, telling me to stay upstairs until it was ready – what are you up to?’
‘I was just going to say the same thing,’ Dad asks as he appears next to her, right on time. ‘Katie, wow, you look amazing.’
We told them both to dress up for dinner – not to make them look as attractive as possible to one another, which seems to be working in my mum’s case unfortunately, but to accurately recreate the Saturday Night Club, when everyone would come over dressed in their best. Even Jess and I have made an effort, to try to make this evening as legitimate as possible.
‘We thought it would be nice for us all to have dinner together,’ Jess says. She’s lying but, wow, she’s really selling it.
‘And then we thought we could play some games together,’ I add. ‘Maybe open a few bottles of wine, really get into the festive spirit.’
I do feel slightly bad, because both Mum and Dad seem to be delighted at the idea of us all sitting down together, like we’re one big happy family.
‘The food smells amazing, girls,’ Dad says as he approaches the table. ‘What are we having?’
With the food served up and the wine flowing, Jess and I join in with the small talk, going through the motions of eating dinner, until it’s time to play the game.