‘We could make that table for two a table for three, couldn’t we?’
‘Oh, I think I’ll be busy,’ I say. ‘Sorry. I’m just waiting to hear from my boyfriend.’
‘He can come too,’ says Kristen swiftly.
‘Er …’
The text alert bleeps.
‘Nice work,’ says Lloyd. ‘Are you hungry?’
‘I’ve just been invited to dinner by this couple. I gather a threesome could be on the table. Well, not the restaurant table, obviously. But you know what I mean.’
‘Never mind them,’ comes the reply. ‘Thank them politely and get yourself out of there.’
I do so, after they insist on giving me their number ‘in case I find myself at a loose end later’ and find myself on the pavements of Piccadilly in a late summer early evening fug of exhaust fumes and street pizza stands.
I lean on a lamppost, recreating in my head that rather delicious lipstick kiss, waiting for Lloyd’s next directive.
When it comes, it makes me clench my thighs.
Get something to eat, then find a pub garden or similar open public space and get yourself felt up in it. Photos required.
My stomach churns, but I buy myself a slice of carcinogen and pepperoni and chew my way stoically through it before heading towards Mayfair. If I’m going to be felt up outside a pub, it might as well be by a high class of feeler-upper.
Amidst the art galleries and celebrity eateries, I find a classic old Victorian pub in pink sandstone with pavement tables.
This will have to do. The additional element of being seen to in the actual street appeals to me on a very base level.
The pavement is thronged with crowds of well-heeled tourists and the smart post-work crowd, none of whom seem to mind paying Mayfair prices for average tipples.
I scope out the different groups and settle on three good-looking young men in rugby shirts and sunglasses, drinking lager and talking animatedly.
I buy myself a mineral water – that cocktail in the Ritz has given me enough head-fuzz for the time being – and lean on the wall, ostentatiously looking over at them every few seconds. I make a big deal of checking my phone and my watch in between sly glances.
After about ten minutes of this, one of the guys, who has been following my progress fairly avidly, calls over to me. ‘Has he stood you up, love?’
He’s Australian, big and beefy, with a blond crop and a square chin.
‘Looks like it. I guess I’ll finish this and go home. Unless …’
Bingo! He pats the bench beside him. ‘Sit yourself down. He’s a loser anyway.’
I scurry over and plonk myself beside the large lager-drinker. ‘Do you know him?’
He laughs. ‘If he’s stood you up, he’s a loser. Trust me.’
This is going to be easy.
It takes the duration of one more pint.
There’s five or ten minutes of general chat about London, then his hand lands on my thigh, heavy as a brick.
Then, another five minutes discussion about Australia with specific reference to his home town of Melbourne while his hand moves up and down and he shifts ever closer along the bench, his two friends looking on in amusement.
An intensely boring description of the rugby tour of Britain they are on provokes me to put my hand on his and move it to the hem of my skirt, encouraging his thick fingers to pull it slowly up to thigh level.
I don’t know how many pints they’ve had, but I guess four or five, because inhibitions don’t seem to be anywhere in evidence. Soon enough, he has managed to wedge my skirt almost to the top of my thighs.