Chapter 6
The next morning, I wake up feeling worse for wear, gingerly opening one eye, then the other. My bleary gaze falls on the black Versace dress with the offensive designer gap in the waist, and my discarded sparkly shoes all lying in a depressing heap in the corner. I hate cheap shoes, I’m never wearing them again, they were excruciatingly uncomfortable. Perhaps I’ll save up for some L.K. Bennett heels. I have had my eye on the beige court shoes Princess Kate wears so frequently. She always looks incredible, then again she’d still be stunning in an old pair of flip-flops.
Oh God, I hate the all-too-familiar sinking feeling I get after a rubbish night out. The anti-climax is so much more acute this time following the exhilaration of planning the outfit, getting ready, dreaming of being on TV, chatting suavely to celebrities and being a whirlwind social success. The reality had been brutal, with me spending half the evening feeling invisible and the rest of it wishing I were. I’m kind of used to being disappointed on the dating front but this social ineptitude is new.
I lie in bed, brooding over why the evening had been such a disaster. I mean, I hadn’t even been able to carry out a normal conversation on my table. Usually I’m quite chatty and can talk to pretty much anyone. I was a member of the debating club and Social Secretary at St Elena’s College for the whole of the second year, for goodness sake. Yet last night, I’d been unable to rub two words together without either saying the wrong thing or offending someone.
I guess I have to face it; I didn’t fit in with this crowd full stop. I can’t get rid of the nagging feeling that maybe my mum is right (she often is unfortunately), that the glamorous world of fashion and bling is just not me. Although last night was more like a board meeting, nothing to do with anything as frivolous or entertaining as fashion. What was it some famous person said about the loneliness of being alone in a crowd? Whoever it was, I know how they felt.
And as for Darcy Drummond, I feel my face flush with toe-curling shame at the remembrance of his words. I’m an embarrassment, not the sort of client they want at The Jane Austen Dating Agency. Anyway, there’s nothing wrong with being a feminist, he should know most women are these days. Move into this century, Darcy. We have equal rights so you’d better get over it. And for his information, I do live in the real world, I have a job and pay rent, and only fantasise occasionally about being one of the heroines of Jane Austen’s novels… Maybe sometimes… okay, quite a lot actually. But so what if I do, it makes me happy. Well, maybe not that happy but it’s more interesting than sitting and talking about stocks and shares.
It’s typical that bitchy Jessica Palmer-Wright reports back to Darcy, pouring poison into his ear. And she doesn’t know anything about me or books or Jane Austen for that matter. How dare they run a Jane Austen dating agency when they have no respect for her or people who enjoy her writing or anything else. Then it dawns on me, of course, it’s another money-making scheme, probably a tax scam of some kind or other. Talk about me living in a world of reality, The Jane Austen Dating Agency is no more than a sham. And Mr Drummond is an arrogant stuck-up male chauvinist pig.
‘Anyone awake?’ Mel knocks softly on my bedroom door. ‘How did last night go? I meant to stay up to hear all the goss but fell asleep over my art project.’
‘Come on in,’ I manage, and Mel sits on the bed, looking sickeningly glowing and healthy after her usual early morning run by the river.
‘Oh dear.’ She smiles. ‘Someone is a bit worse for wear. Want a cuppa?’
‘Yes please.’ I’m definitely in need of tea. I probably should have something healthy and detoxing but all I fancy is something strong and caffeinated.
Mel, bless her, goes off and soon returns with a wonderfully sweet cup of tea and small toasted soldiers smothered in Marmite.
‘Come on then, what went wrong? It’s no good you protesting it wasn’t a crap night because we’ve lived together long enough now for me to know your woebegone, could things possibly get any worse, face.’ Mel knows me all too well.
‘I was a complete disaster,’ I confess and give her a blow-by-blow account.
‘It’s not that bad,’ says Mel in her usual cheerful way. ‘You had to spend an evening with people you have nothing in common with and you weren’t really interested in. So you didn’t enjoy their company. D’uh, not surprising really considering your background. And Darcy is a bit of an arsey after all. He won’t be the first or last loser you’ve liked the look of only to find out, what a shock, that he really is actually a total loser.’
‘He hurt my feelings though. I could have forgiven him for being such an arrogant sod or laughed it off if he hadn’t been so bloody personal,’ I grumble.
‘If he can’t see how lovely you are, then more fool him. Shame though as he’s disgustingly rich and I have a feeling marrying money is the only way you’re going to fund all those expensive tastes you have.’
This makes us both laugh and I giggle away about Arsey Darcy so much that I nearly fall off the bed, which all means I begin to feel a bit more human again until my phone pings the arrival of my Facebook notifications full of images of Kian and Chloe, his weaselly face horribly smug. I log out as I feel really sick by now and relieve my feelings by singing ‘I hate men’ at top volume. Fortunately, Mel can’t hear as she’s plugged into her headphones, back at her art desk once more.
Bizarrely for me, I feel inspired to sort out my room. Maybe if I’m a bit more organised generally, perhaps the rest of my life might start miraculously working out. God, that’s the sort of thing my mum would say. Anyway, I give it a go.
Keeping busy seems a good idea. I shove things out of my cupboard onto the bed. This is usually my idea of tidying up, then I get bored after an hour or so, wander off to do something else, then come back at bedtime, really tired, and end up shoving the stuff back in the cupboard, leaving a lethal trap for the next time I open the door.
While trying to find the bottom of my desk, I come across the brochure for The Jane Austen Dating Agency and go to throw it into the recycling bin. It hovers there in my hand a moment too long. I can’t quite bring myself to let go of the glossy brochure, or my dreams for that matter. Idly I flick through the pages. I haven’t actually read it properly, or studied the terms and conditions yet, I just sat daydreaming over the pics of Colin Firth as Mr Darcy.
Reading the small print, I become engrossed in spite of myself, studying the different levels of membership, the Bronze Scheme is the most basic: learn to dance in the style of Austen in Chawton Village Hall and afternoon tea at Hunsford Parsonage. Obviously for the die-hard Jane Austen fans. For the Silver Scheme there are strawberry champagne picnics in various locations and a trip to No. 1 Royal Crescent in Bath. Included in the Gold Scheme, which is the most elite membership I’m apparently not eligible for, is a personal guided tour of Chatsworth House and the potential to meet some of the actors from the 1995 production of Pride and Prejudice at a conference celebrating different editions and performances of the novel. All of this culminates in The Grand Ball at Pemberley.
I reread the blurb, explaining how it all works. Contrary to Miss PW’s comments, the main difference between the schemes seems to be money. What a surprise. But peering at it again, ignoring my aching head, the sentence reads, ‘Applicants are to understand that The Jane Austen Dating Agency holds the right to withdraw membership to any client, should their behaviour not meet with the rules of etiquette stated by the agency. It should also be understood that membership is by application only, at the discretion of Miss Palmer-Wright, Head of Membership, or Miss Emma Woodtree, Publicity Manager, and they both retain the right to refuse admission of membership at any time.’