Read an Excerpt
Scottish Girls About Town
And sixteen other Scottish women authors
By Jenny Colgan Isla Dewar Muriel Gray Downtown Press
Copyright © 2003 Shari Low
All right reserved. ISBN: 0-7434-8253-0
Chapter One
True Romance Shari Low
Friday morning. The Kilcaidie Advertiser Daily Horoscope. Sagittarius: Despite a bumpy start to the day, positive aspects will forge a new beginning mid-afternoon. Don't turn away from new ideas or challenges as your future happiness might just depend on them.
Dee placed her cup of tea and bacon sandwich down on her desk and switched on her PC. There was no putting it off any further. In the last hour she'd considered and dismissed every conceivable excuse to avoid sitting down and doing some work today. Excuse number one: raging hangover. Dismissed on the grounds that it was self-inflicted so therefore not a credible reason to avoid doing paid labour. Number two: a mountain of ironing so high that a Sherpa would get vertigo just looking at it. However, ten minutes searching for the iron had proved fruitless. It was probably underneath the pile. Desperation started to creep in. Number three: it was nearly a fortnight since she'd visited her mother. She could nip over for a couple of hours. After all, she was already feeling atrocious, how much worse could it be? She sighed in resignation, then gritted her teeth. Sod it. It would be less painful to sit down and put in a few hours' work. Her mother's dulcet tones on top of the hangover from hell would have her speed-dialling the Samaritans.
She blinked hard, trying to clear the fog. Which of her literary hats would perch most comfortably on her pounding head today? Did she feel like being Desdemona White, the True Romance Book Club's novelist of the month, esteemed author of such romantic classics as He Came, He Conquered and His Throbbing Heart? Not for the first time, she gave an involuntary shudder. How had she managed to assume the identity of someone whom her mostly aged, single readers imagined lounging on a chaise-longue, wearing an apricot kaftan and patting a shitzu while she wrote her love classics on parchment with an antique fountain pen? If they could only see her now ... She'd be evicted from the House Of True Romance quicker than a bigamist with body odour.
A flashback seared through her trance-like state. It had all been Trudy's fault. But then, everything always was. It had been Trude's idea to write romantic slush to supplement their meagre grants at uni. It had been Trude's theory that creating personas in keeping with the True Romance Book Club's average reader would give their manuscripts a better chance of being accepted. Thus Dee became Desdemona White, a fifty-year-old spinster who passed her days in a picturesque cottage in a blustery Scottish village, tending to her four cats and her petunias as she awaited the arrival of her God of Love, who would one day, she was sure, come and conquer.
It was also Trude's fault that even now, ten years after leaving university at the age of twenty-two, Dee was still penning her fluffy pink prose for a paltry income, instead of being the hard-hitting investigative journalist that she had always aspired to be. Well, okay, so that wasn't Trude's fault at all, but in her present tender state it made her feel better to pretend it was. In more lucid moments she would admit that the truth of the matter was that she just hadn't wanted it enough. No matter how many times she'd planned the move to London or composed applications to the more respectable tabloids and the lofty broadsheets, she never quite made it to the train or put her CV in the post. Finally, in a moment of clarity on her twenty-fifth birthday, she'd grudgingly acknowledged what everyone around her had always known: she was staying in Kilcaidie. And what's more, she was happy about it.
Three train stops and thirty minutes on a good day from the centre of Glasgow, Kilcaidie was notable only for the fact that, defying a long Celtic association with the merits of alcohol, it was the only dry village left in the West of Scotland. Not a pub for fifteen miles. It was therefore completely understandable that Dee was in this fragmented condition today, she reasoned. After all, you had to make the most of a trip to Glasgow and that's exactly what she and Trude had done on yesterday's shopping-cum-eating-cum-drinking-cum-rousing-three-other -passengers-and-a-dog-into-a-sing-song-on-the-last-train-home excursion. At her age she really should have known better. But then that was the story of her life, she mused. Common sense had never been her strongest personality trait. If it were, then she wouldn't have a career pretending to be a post-menopausal spinster on heat, earning a salary that was barely above the poverty line (not including, of course, a heady ?100 bonus for being voted Author of the Month in September 1998), which she had to supplement by being Auntie Diana, author of the Kilcaidie Advertiser's agony column, and the in-house astrologer, Madame Donatella, predictor of the population's daily fortunes. Multiple personality disorder was more a career choice than a mental condition.
Indecision furrowed her brow. Auntie Diana it was. It was a warming thought that reading about other people's trials and tribulations would undoubtedly make her feel better about her present sorry condition.
Bacon sandwich in one hand, she manoeuvred the mouse to the Outlook Express icon and clicked. It pinged as it opened the program. Ouch! Good God, when did that ping get so loud? It was vibrating round her head so violently that her eyelashes started to tremble.
She quickly slid the mouse to the volume control and reduced it to mute, before switching to the "Advertiser - Auntie Diana" profile and clicking send/receive. The screen flashed up its progress. Dialling. Verifying password. Checking mailbox. You have twelve new messages. Dee groaned. Kilcaidie was a troubled place this week. Normally there weren't more than three or four letters in a week and they generally consisted of a lonely heart, a couple of neighbourly disputes and a complaint from George the hypochondriac about skateboarders on the high street inducing his panic attacks.
She automatically clicked on the most recent arrival.
Dear Auntie Diana,
I'm very concerned about my best friend. I think she has a serious drinking problem - every time she indulges in alcohol she has an irresistible urge to sing Beach Boys songs really loudly on public transport. Is there a support group for this condition? Please advise as to the best course of action.
Yours in deep concern, Trudy
An amused snort escaped as Dee started typing.
Dear Trudy,
Pretend she's a horse with a broken limb and put her out of her misery - with the severity of her current headache she'll thank you for it. And thank you for your concern. Auntie Di
Two minutes later the phone rang. Ouch. Dee snatched it from the table. The caller spoke before she did.
"Sorry, mate, I haven't got a gun. How's your head?"
"Don't ask. And stop bloody sending e-mails to Auntie Di - she's overworked as it is. How are you feeling this morning?"
"Like I've spent two weeks marinating my head in gin." Pause. "But enough fantasizing. I've got a proposition for you."
Dee groaned out loud. "Whatever it is, you can forget it. I'm not going to start yoga classes at the community centre, donate my eggs or do a sponsored slim in aid of Save the Whale. No matter how ironic that is."
"Nope, it's none of those. Although, and I'm telling you this strictly in the spirit of a best friend who only wants what's best for you - your thighs could definitely benefit from a session or six of Ashtanga. Anyway, the proposition. How would you like to join Dave and me tomorrow night for a veritable feast of dishes from around the world as featured in the new Jamie Oliver bible of home cooking?"
"What's the catch?"
"Why does there have to be a catch? Can't I just invite my best friend for dinner without there being some dark, ulterior motive? I'm so offended."
"It's a proposition, Trudy, therefore there's a catch. Who is he this time?"
"Okay." Trudy sighed in a tone pitched somewhere between resignation and defeat. "It's Dave's new boss. He's just moved up here from London, so we thought we'd do the hospitality bit and invite him over. Can't beat a bit of grovelling to authority in the name of career advancement."
Dee put her head in her hands. Or at least she tried to, but her aim was off and she succeeded only in imprinting her keyboard on her forehead. This was the last thing she felt like doing this weekend. Dave, Trudy's fiancé of four years (he didn't like to rush things), worked in some obscure department of Glasgow City Council. He had told her about his job a couple of times but Dee's tendency to zone out after the first two minutes meant that she was none the wiser. Another internal groan. Dinner with the remnants of a hangover (this was definitely a three-day headache) and two civil servants, one of them trying to impress the other - was this some cosmic punishment for over-indulgence last night?
Trude sensed her hesitation and resorted to blatant pleading. "Come on, Dee, if you do this, I'll never mention your cellulite again. Please."
"Okay, okay. But I'm warning you, this had better not be a set-up. The first whiff of a blind date and I'm out of there, Trude."
"It's not a set-up, I promise. It's just a fine example of good old Scottish hospitality."
Somehow, Dee doubted that.
Saturday morning. The Kilcaidie Advertiser Daily Horoscope. Sagittarius: Today is a day for rest and recuperation and taking quiet time to recharge your batteries. For those Sagittarians who do have to venture out, avoid new social interactions arranged by friends - despite their well-meant intentions, they don't always know what is best for you.
Dear Auntie Di,
I'm very worried about my best friend. She is in her thirties now and is still single despite numerous attempts by me to introduce her to suitable men. In fact, she was downright rude when I last sprung a blind date on her (I mean, what's so bad about a nervous twitch, a train-spotting hobby and mild halitosis - nobody is perfect) and threatened to amputate my limbs if I repeated the exercise. What can I do about her anti-social tendencies and her threatening behaviour? Yours in mortal fear, Trudy
Dear Trudy,
Maybe your friend is perfectly happy with her single status and as her friend you should support her in this lifestyle choice. Perhaps there is something sadly lacking in your life that prompts you to take such an avid interest in other people's relationships. I suggest you look into taking up a hobby, such as basket-weaving or origami.
Yours sympathetically, Auntie Diana
PS: Trude, you promised that tonight isn't another set-up. If it is, I'll have to kill you.
Dee stared at her reflection in the full-length mirror. She should have asked Trude what to wear tonight but she hadn't wanted to appear adolescent or apprehensive. She was a cosmopolitan woman of the world. One with no dress sense, she reflected. It was so difficult trying to dress for occasions like this. If she were too casual, Dave's boss might take offence, especially if he was one of those late-fifties, dress-for-dinner, formal types. On the other hand, Trudy and Dave's kitchen dining table, which doubled as a table tennis table and, in times of decoration, the wallpaper pasting area, didn't exactly lend itself to cocktail dress and diamonds.
In the end she settled for the middle road. Dark blue hipster jeans (size 12 - who needed yoga?) with a black, low-cut T-shirt, supported by breast-enhancing bra. She clipped diamond studs into her ears and twisted up her long auburn hair, leaving some tendrils loose to frame her face. She couldn't decide if it looked Julia Roberts classy or been doing housework all day messy. Anyway, why was she caring? She was just there to make up the numbers and to reinforce the theory that Dave was a decent, normal guy who was a credit to any workplace. After all, it wasn't as if this was a date or anything ...
The very thought sent her eyeballs rolling and a shiver down her spine. She so wished that Trudy would just let her get on with living her life the way she wanted to. Why must everyone on the planet be shackled up to a member of the opposite sex to ensure everlasting happiness? Why was a man (or another woman for that matter) crucial to self-esteem, image and sense of worth? Dee shrugged her shoulders. She just didn't get it. She'd tried to analyse her feeling many times over the years (especially after a few libations and in between the Beach Boys' greatest hits) but the truth was she didn't care enough to delve too deeply. Maybe it was the fact that she'd been an only child and was therefore used to enjoying her own company. Perhaps it was because the things she enjoyed doing most - reading, lying in the bath pondering life, and running in the mornings with her walkman on full blast - were predominately solitary pursuits.
She had never had her heart broken and had never crushed anyone else. And no, it wasn't down to deep-rooted self-loathing, a pathological aversion to commitment or some deep psychological scar tissue on her soul. It was simply a fact of life. Dee Statton was happy being the word that was greeted with fear, horror and loathing amongst other women of her generation: single. She didn't want children, she didn't want to be married and she enjoyed only emotionless flings with members of the opposite sex. As soon as they demanded any form of commitment deeper than occasionally borrowing her toothbrush after they'd spent the night, Dee would trot out the "going too fast, maybe we should have a break" speech.
Meaningless sex and someone to be her partner at weddings, funerals and the odd trip to the cinema - that was all she wanted in a man. Was that too much to ask? And anyway (she was perched on her metaphorical soapbox now), why was it that a single, attractive thirty-something male with a job, financial security and the freedom to change partners at a whim was revered and envied by his peers, yet a female in the same circumstances was almost unanimously pitied by hers? It was one of life's little idiosyncrasies, she decided. Like why men automatically scratch their nether regions in times of deep concentration, bravado or when they think no one's watching them. God was definitely having a laugh when he created human beings ...
Continues...
Excerpted from Scottish Girls About Town by Jenny Colgan Isla Dewar Muriel Gray Copyright © 2003 by Shari Low. Excerpted by permission.
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