Honestly, I was terrified. It took me so long to screw myself to the sticking place and accept Jim's invitation to go out with him and Sal and their friend Megan. I'm not really sure whether I agreed because I was keen to meet Megan or whether it was just to stop Jim nagging at me. He said it was all Sal's idea, but he seemed just a bit eager for it to be just that.
In the end I gave in and went along with it. Jim said Megan was a pretty little thing and, in truth, she was. To begin with she was about five foot in her stockinged feet. I was glad to see she didn't try to compensate by wearing enormous heels and tottering about the place. As for pretty, she was, very pretty. It made me wonder why she needed any help from Jim and Sal to find a partner and what she would see in a great lump like me. Sal says she had a bit of a bad time with her last partner and was a bit put off the other sex. I could have told her a few things about that, but I didn't; that would not have been a good idea.
We went to the Kebab House, not too expensive and a friendly atmosphere. Things seemed to be going really well till I dropped the tzatziki in her lap. It wasn't a complete disaster even then; the waitress cleaned her up a treat and Jim managed to stop me leaving immediately to hide from the world. Megan was very good about it. You know, she has a lovely Welsh lilt to her voice. Jim was trying so hard to be the life and soul and tell Megan what a great chap I was. It got a bit embarrassing and I could see that Sal was trying to rein him in. It was when he was retelling the old story of the staff Christmas play we used to do for the kids and recounting how he and I as the ugly sisters were tormenting Cinderella and he's throwing his arms around sharing the action with half the restaurant, that Megan ducked and threw red wine down the front of my jacket. I know she didn't do it on purpose, but she thought that I thought she did and she was so upset that she fled the restaurant. I could have killed Jim, but I didn't. I did something that at one time I would never have done; I ran after her.
Jim never told me how quick she was. For a little lass she couldn't half shift. I almost regretted that she wasn't tottering on heels. She was halfway to the bus station when I caught up and all the way there by the time I had enough breath to speak. Jim's a bit of an ass sometimes, I told her, but he's really a great friend. I know, she says, he's my cousin. Well that's blown it, I thought.
She let me see her home on the bus; she never learned to drive, and Jim had given me a lift. We had a long talk on the way and sorted out a few things. I dropped her at her door, she gave me a goodnight kiss and I floated home. I'm thirty-six and felt like a teenager on his first date, silly sod.
She's agreed to see me again on condition that her cousin doesn't come along and we choose somewhere to go that doesn't have food and drink that can find its way onto us. Any ideas?