Love... From Both Sides (A laugh-out-loud romantic comedy) by Nick Spalding Read Free Book Online Page B

them will turn out to be a winner!
    …not the one that’s old enough to be my mother, though.
     
    I never get the chance to find out.
    You see, modern nightclubs are very well equipped places. They have great lighting rigs, pin-sharp speakers and state of the art bar facilities.
    They also have very sensitive sprinkler systems.
    A mere four puffs into my cigarette all hell breaks lose.
    A klaxon goes off that’s so loud I’m glad I’m sat on the toilet.
    I scream in terror and drop the cigarette in my lap. This elicits an even bigger scream of pain as the red hot ember singes my pubic hair.
    I jump to my feet, brushing the cigarette away frantically just as the sprinklers get into action.
    There’s one just above my head, so the toilet stall gets turned into an impromptu shower.
    I scream for the third time in as many seconds as icy cold water goes down my neck and I throw open the toilet door, stumbling out with my trousers and boxer shorts still round my ankles.
    …which means the bald security guard from earlier gets a good look at my meat and two veg as he comes barrelling into the toilet to check that everyone has evacuated.
     
    I could have stuck around.
    I imagine the speed dating continued after a clean up, but I was so embarrassed by this time that all I wanted to do was run home and hide for a couple of decades.
    I was already soaking wet, so the rain didn’t bother me much as I traipsed back to the car, still smarting from the painful new burn in my crotch.
     
    That was the beginning and end of Jamie Newman’s foray into the wonderful world of speed dating.
    I failed to find the love of my life that night, but did come down with a nasty head cold, so didn’t walk away entirely empty-handed after all…
     

 
     
     
    Laura’s Diary
    Friday, April 22nd
     
     
    Dear Mum,
     
    I’ve finally scraped the bottom of the barrel and gone speed dating.
    Elise from the gym recommended I give it a try. She met her husband at a local event a couple of years ago and told me it was a really happy experience for her from start to finish.
    Elise is unfortunately one of those people completely untroubled by original thought.
    If it were possible to gaze into her head, it would probably look like a sun dappled meadow, full of frolicking bunny rabbits and doe-eyed deer.
    Her husband Malcolm is just as bad.
    If these are the type of people speed dating works for, I’m not entirely sure I want to be a part of it.
    Nothing ventured, nothing gained though, eh?
    Providing I don’t have to give anyone a hand job or ride a mountain bike, I should be fine.
     
    I traipse down to The Cheetah Lounge on Tuesday night with more than a little trepidation, praying to whatever gods of dating might be up there that I’ll meet someone at least halfway decent.  
    I’m not in the best of moods when I turn up if I’m honest, as I’ve developed piles.
    Yes, piles .
    I’m twenty eight for crying out loud. How can a non-pregnant woman in her late twenties develop a complaint usually reserved for those in their pensionable years?
    I can only put it down to the incredibly uncomfortable plastic chair I was forced to sit in for solid three hours at a wholesaler’s presentation on Friday.
    Listening to a bunch of insincere salesman trying to persuade you to buy their product via a series of incomprehensible PowerPoint slides is bad enough. Add squirming around on a chair that’s slowly sending your backside to sleep makes the experience even worse.
     
    With an itchy rear end and a cynical frame of mind I walk into The Cheetah Lounge to find that I’ve arrived a good half an hour early.
    ‘We’re not starting until eight,’ says the anorexic girl standing at the threshold to the Mexican section of the nightclub. I’m quite familiar with the place, having downed one too many tequila shots here last Christmas.
    ‘It said
seven thirty
on the website,’ I reply, a scowl forming on my face. I hate arriving early for an event,