I have a terrible confession to make

Posted by Lucy Robinson at 15:43 on 5 Feb 2010

• Print
• Share
• Comment

I have a terrible confession to make: I have been developing a romance in the real world that I neglected to tell you about. I'm so sorry! Please forgive me!

Oh, readers, you're cross now aren't you. Just as we were getting to know each other I go and start an off-piste romance. Do you think I can persuade you to trust me once more? I won't keep any secrets from you again, I absolutely promise.

(It's funny, isn't it, how we use the internet. I admit more of my shameful love-related behaviour to you than I do to my closest friends and I even feel guilty when I keep secrets from you. Why is that? Why hasn't my sense of shame stepped in? Some of the stuff I tell you in this blog is pure car-crash! But the net is a strangely intimate place, isn't it - it's like a virtual landfill, overflowing with mankind's' dirty laundry. All of these disembodied voices banging on about their marriage problems or their battle with obesity or their struggle to make it as a musician. Who needs friends when you discuss your inadequate penis in a chatroom full of strangers?)

Anyway. Back to this fledgling romance. The man in question is called Ed. I met him in the REAL WORLD. (Well, actually I met him in the gym; I'm not sure that constitutes 'real world,' given that we have only seen each other wearing shorts in an underground bunker.)

Now, I only ever go to the gym in the mornings. By the time I've finished work I can barely string a sentence together, let alone pound a treadmill or perform a floor plank. So, as a member of the 7am crowd, I have not only  the basics - a purple face, a film of sweat and a veritable jumble sale of gym clothes selected in the dark - I have the additional horror of hair that hasn't been washed for nearly 24 hours and two radioactive armpits.

It was not without some surprise, therefore, that I noticed a very attractive man smiling at me recently. Not in the pervy way that the muscle-bound fools in the free weights section look at me, just in a nice, friendly....well, smiley way. My considered response was of course to ignore him. It must have been a mistake; no one would smile at me looking like that. But the smiles continued. Then one morning when I'd just shown my arse to the entire gym after messing up a swiss ball bum lift (I'm sure it has a proper name) I decided to take a rest by lying face down on a mat for a minute or so. About thirty seconds later I opened my eyes again to find myself in bed with the fit man. So to speak. He was now lying face down on the mat next to mine, smiling at me.

Mature to the end, I turned my head to the other side, fast. Then realised that that was foolish, so got back on my ball again, throwing a sheepish half smile in his general direction. And he started speaking to me! I can't remember what he said, it was something about me having a kip on a dirty gym mat, but whatever it was it was funny and we started chatting. And it turned into a regular Tuesday and Thursday kind of thang. Ed is a lawyer and works near to my gym. He is also 6' and hot as bugger.

Oh and PS, I discovered yesterday that he is also married.

And I'm really, really cross. Yes, perhaps I was fooling myself that he liked me. Yes, why can't a man chat innocently to a woman in the gym. And yes, it's not like we had a proper courtship or nuffink. But I'm sorry, you just know when a man is cracking on to you. You know not just because of the way he behaves but also because of the way his attention makes YOU behave in response. I have been here before, you know - I do know what flirting is. And he was flirting. Properly. Talking about us going for breakfast on Thursdays after our gym session. Telling me about a gig that he was going to on Friday night that I should go to "if you're in the area..." Not to mention doing That Smile that men do when they like you. And obviously, he wasn't wearing a ring.

Until today. I saw it as soon as he came to talk to me, he saw me clock it and with that our chemistry vanished. He said something lame, I replied with something lamer and then just to cement my fury, he made a weak joke about his 'missus.' I of course had to be a grown up and not flinch, or wince, or PUNCH HIM IN THE CROTCH.

So a taste of the usual, really. Dashed hopes, a red face, and an ever weakening resolve to myself to dust myself down and try again.

• Next entry
• Previous entry