Love, in Theory Read online

  I feel my heart sink.

  ‘It’s definitely his notebook?’ Graeme asks, apparently unperturbed.

  ‘Yes, he’s the only one to use Moleskines. And it’s his handwriting, his talking points from the meeting.’

  ‘And this story, it identifies the girl by name?’

  ‘No, he changed her name – Candice – to Candy, but it’s obviously her from the descriptions. He talks about her “slanting almond eyes” and “porcelain skin” – she’s the only Asian girl in the office – and this distinctive port-wine stain she has on her collarbone.’ She coughs uncomfortably. ‘Excuse me, this is all so tawdry. Thankfully, our PA brought the notebook straight to us, so none of the other staff members, including Candice, have seen it.’

  ‘Would you definitely characterise it as prurient? Or is there wiggle room?’ Graeme asks.

  The Quest CFO, who has until now been silent, interjects. ‘He uses the phrase “plump honeydews”. And then gets even more explicit, using all manner of fruit analogies. There was something about a ripe fig, and a cumquat . . .’

  My stomach turns. Thankfully, Graeme doesn’t ask him to clarify.

  The head of HR jumps back in. ‘Obviously this contravenes the company policy about upholding the Quest values – of respect for co-workers, integrity . . .’

  Graeme scans through the CEO’s employment contract, which has been emailed through to us. ‘Not an incorporated clause. Can’t rely on that. But you said he’s willing to resign?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Okay, the strategy is to send him a firmly worded end of employment letter. To deter him from worming out of it, you confirm that you’ll announce his resignation to your stakeholders without details, and both parties sign a deed of non-disclosure. You don’t tell anyone why he left, he promises not to run any proceedings against you.’

  As soon as the Quest representatives breathe the first syllables of consent, Graeme hangs up. He turns to me. ‘Got all that? Write it up.’

  I feel my mouth hanging open. I’m in slight shock at what I just heard, and how swiftly it seems to have been dealt with.

  ‘Um, so we’re just doing the letter, and then the NDA? There are no other, uh, consequences for him?’

  Graeme stares at me like I’m daft. ‘Yes, Romy. The aim is to make this go away, not stir things up. We’re not the morality police.’ He stops to consider for a moment. ‘Not that he technically did anything wrong. A man can have his thoughts, can’t he? Even if they’re . . . passionate thoughts. He’s just an idiot for leaving his notebook lying around.’

  A host of objections bubble up, but before I can formulate a sentence, Graeme waves me away. ‘You’ll find lots of precedent letters on the system.’

  I head back to my office. Just an idiot for leaving his notebook lying around? Graeme’s words rankle. Maybe this is a run-of-the-mill case for him, but I know there’s something far more sinister than passion and idiocy at play here. I sigh, and wonder if that’s how the CEO is justifying his writing to himself right now – as some kind of natural expression of desire that just happened to fall into the wrong hands.

  I sneak a look back at Graeme, wondering if he’d be capable of something like this. Half an hour ago, I’d have dismissed the idea – Graeme comes across as boorish, sure, but not lewd – but now . . . if Quest’s ‘darling’ turned out to be a creep, who knew what was possible?

  I feel sickened by it all, but I sit down at my computer and begin to draft the letter. At least this guy’s being forced out – hopefully into early retirement. Maybe it’ll be a wake-up call for him. And Candice will never have to know about, or suffer for, his perversity.

  3

  ‘Okay, I’ve thought about it, and you’re right. I need to be on a dating app,’ I announce as I plop down on the steps where Cameron and Paloma are having lunch the next day.

  Cameron offers me a sweet potato fry. ‘It’s about time. Which ones?’

  ‘Ones?’

  ‘You need to diversify,’ Paloma explains. ‘Use Tinder, obviously. Hinge. Happn. Bumble. Coffee Meets Bagel. There’s this new one called Duet which is similar to Tinder but you don’t see photos or text; you just listen to a song they’ve chosen that best encapsulates them, and then swipe yes or no. It’s quite good if you want to set up dates while you’re working out, but you do end up listening to a lot of “Teenage Dirtbag” and “Livin’ on a Prayer” . . .’

  ‘That sounds horrific.’

  ‘Well,’ she says, ‘there’s also Rule of 3, where you have three profile pictures and a three-word bio.’

  I consider the concept as I pry open my pad thai – comfort food after a long morning chasing down obscure nineteenth-century case law for Graeme – and add a generous squeeze of lemon. It sounds kind of interesting. Like the dating version of Nora Ephron’s restaurant table game, where she’d have people write down the five words that best described them. I remember reading that in her twenties, Nora described herself as ‘ambitious, Wellesley graduate, daughter, Democrat, single’. Not one of those featured on her list ten years later. In her thirties she included ‘funny’, and in her forties, ‘happy’.

  ‘Don’t get too excited,’ Paloma says, interrupting my musing. ‘There’s only so much you can glean about a person from three words. The bios are all some iteration of “Pretty chill guy”, “Down to fuck” or “I love lamp”.’ I roll my eyes. I will never understand our generation’s obsession with Anchorman. ‘Though I did once match with a guy who had “Born to macramé”. Turns out he wasn’t being ironic . . .’

  I bundle noodles into my mouth. Baby steps, I decide. ‘Let’s stick with Tinder for now. I’m not sure I can deal with these newfangled apps.’ I dig out my phone and proffer it up. ‘Help?’

  Cameron and Paloma spend the next twenty minutes workshopping my Tinder profile. For my profile picture, they settle on a candid shot of me at La Boqueria markets in Barcelona, surrounded by cascades of glistening seafood and fruit. It captures me at my most tanned, in cut-off denim shorts and a strappy top. I’m laughing, caught between a startled gaze at the camera and trying to stem the dribbles of a melting gelato cone. I wonder for a moment if I should use a different photo – this one was taken almost two years ago, on a backpacking trip we did just before starting at Birchstone McCauliffe – but I have no more recent photos of me that are any good. As Cameron says, ‘It’s the perfect profile pic. You look genuinely happy. And attractive, but not, like, sultry. Better to be dripping with ice cream than sex appeal.’ And it’s not so old as to be deceptive, as Paloma points out. ‘Though you might need to slather on the fake tan before your dates. Or start getting some sunlight occasionally.’

  In my Tinder descriptor they mention that I’m a suit. Cameron protests at first, but Paloma dismisses him. ‘There’s no point in Romy misrepresenting herself as easygoing or up for spur-of-the-moment adventure. You’ve got to temper expectations.’ To soften my elevator pitch, I direct them to include a quote from The Office so any potential match knows I have a sense of humour about work; the US rather than UK version, so they know I’m an optimist.

  They set the proximity to a respectable ten-kilometre radius, and after a beat the app throws up a deck of profiles. Huddled around my phone, we scroll through the options. Cameron is particularly keen to inspect the Tinder pool. His curiosity and desire to vicariously ‘play for me’ are exactly what I expect of someone who missed the dating app wave. Cameron and his boyfriend Louis, a French PhD student, met four years ago in the most enviable way; a meet-cute at a Halloween party (Louis in full Shakespearean garb as Romeo, Cameron as Baz Luhrmann’s grungy Venice Beach version). They’ve been together ever since.

  Paloma offers a far more seasoned take than Cameron ‘Kid in a Candy Store’ Mackinnon. ‘What I find interesting,’ she says, ignoring the zoetrope of flexing biceps, ‘is that since I first starting using Tinder, the number of people whose descriptor includes some iteration of “I’m willing to lie about how we met” has
seriously declined.’

  I defer to Paloma as the expert. She’s been a regular user of the app for two years now, since Carl officially ended things (which would mean that he’s been on the app for two and a half years now), and has enjoyed quite a few dalliances.

  ‘I guess it’s completely mainstream now,’ I say. ‘Not taboo.’

  She nods. ‘Yeah, a good barometer is the New York Times wedding announcement section. A decade ago, it was all “the bride and groom were introduced by a mutual friend at a Labor Day barbecue”. Maybe in 2008 you started getting some reluctant admissions of meeting online – “after a string of disastrous dates the bride was eventually persuaded by a co-worker to try Match.com or eHarmony”. By 2015 you’ve got the first “neither expected to meet the love of their life on Tinder, the mobile dating application”. Now, every other announcement is an uncaveated “met on Tinder”. It’s totally legit.’

  ‘No, what’s legit is this guy’s rig,’ Cameron says. ‘Romy, you could date a personal trainer, right?’ He tries to zoom in on the guy’s bulging abs, and accidentally swipes right. A love heart blossoms on the screen overlaid by text – It’s a match!

  I scoot over to Cameron and wrest my phone from his grip.

  By Thursday afternoon, I’m itching for the week to be over. Rob, the lascivious Quest CEO, has now engaged his own legal representation. Where just days ago he was showing all signs of being cooperative (which I had hoped indicated some serious self-reckoning), he is now threatening to withdraw his offer of resignation unless presented with more generous terms. We’ve been firing back correspondence to the client for hours, and I’ve been tasked with drafting a final letter to Rob. It’s a frustrating process, as Graeme keeps scratching out my description of the transgression, calling my language ‘too florid’. On top of this, it’s been drizzling all day. Normally the weather would have no bearing on my mood – from my internal office I catch only glimpses of the outside world. But as soon as Graeme squelched into the office in the morning, he kicked off his damp shoes, complaining that he needed to let his feet ventilate. He has been padding around shoeless ever since, including trips to the men’s room. Unsurprisingly, I’ve felt slightly nauseated all day.

  As 7 pm nears, I’m cursing myself for arranging dates for the next two nights, so exhausted am I from dealing with the client’s and Graeme’s demands. I half consider cancelling tonight’s date. It’s tempting – I could do another hour’s work then head home and eat scrambled eggs in front of the TV. But my parents’ words from the weekend are still ringing in my ears. I don’t want to end up the anecdotal workaholic lawyer with a drinking problem because I never made time for a personal life.

  I glance over at Graeme’s office. He’s still there, beavering away. A meatball sub sits steaming on his desk; he’s probably hunkered down for the rest of the night. I know that Graeme is married and has two young kids – I’ve seen a framed wedding photo and first day of school pictures amid his office debris – but he hardly ever mentions his family. I don’t know whether he spends all his time at the office because he genuinely loves his work, feels the pressure of partnership, or because he’s avoiding his home life. All I know, courtesy of Barbara, is that Graeme’s kids call him ‘Sunday Daddy’ because that’s the only time they see him. Whatever the reason, it seems terribly sad.

  My mobile buzzes with an incoming call: Mum. I quickly shut my office door, and answer.

  ‘Hey, I can’t talk for long, I’m still at work,’ I pre-empt her.

  ‘Aw, still? Can you leave soon? Tell Graeme you have to go cook dinner. Or that you’re going to the gym.’

  ‘I’ve actually got a date tonight –’

  ‘Well, that’s exciting! Who with?’ she interjects.

  ‘– unless I bail . . . I’m still deciding.’

  ‘What? You can’t cancel last minute!’ she says, appalled. ‘That’s so rude.’

  ‘I know, I know.’ She’s absolutely right. If I cancel now, I probably won’t get another chance with tonight’s date, Max – he’d rightly see me as a flake. ‘I’ll probably go. I’m just trying to psych myself up.’

  ‘So who is this boy? What’s he like? Would I like him?’ she asks.

  ‘Um, it’s this guy, Max, who I connected with on Tinder.’ As soon as my friends set up my profile I’d started swiping, and soon came across Max’s profile. Tall, good-looking, twenty-six years old, an accountant at a firm just around the corner from Birchstone McCauliffe – my interest was immediately piqued.

  Mum takes on a concerned tone. ‘How do you know he’s not one of these catfish? Where are you meeting him?’

  ‘Don’t fret. We’ve been texting for a few days. He seems nice. And he can spell. Plus, the app shows that we’ve got a bunch of mutual friends, so pretty sure he’s not a catfish. But if I spot any whiskers, I’ll make a run for it.’

  ‘Okay, be safe. And have a good time. Who knows . . . he could be the one for you! I was actually calling to see if you’re still coming over on the weekend –’

  ‘Yep, I am.’

  ‘– so you can tell me all about it then. I can’t wait to hear everything.’

  I log off, gather my things and, with one last glance at Graeme (who is attempting to wipe meatball sauce off some documents with his sleeve), slip out of my office. I duck into the bathroom on my way out to freshen up. I rake my fingers through my hair and dab some sweet-smelling Miss Dior behind my ears. When I go to touch up my mascara, I realise that my hands are shaking. For all my offhandedness about the date, I’m nervous.

  It’s one of those annoying throwbacks to the timidness of adolescence. That same insidious chest flutter I get when my credit card splutters and declines, or I have to give a presentation at work, or I stumble to pronounce the name of the second-cheapest wine under the gaze of the expectant sommelier. That reminder that no matter how far I think I’ve come, I will never be the 100 per cent unruffleable adult I thought I’d be by now.

  I take a deep breath and wait for the pink to recede from my cheeks. I smile at my reflection and focus on the excitement, the feeling of possibility. What’s to say Max won’t be a great guy? We could hit it off, start dating. He could turn out to be better than anyone I’ve ever dated before. And if that’s the case, then he’ll be my optimal guy, the guy.

  I arrive at the bar a few minutes before our arranged meeting time. I wait outside, not wanting to commit to a seat or a drink lest he stand me up. Just as my anxiety is starting to set in, I spot him walking towards me, recognisable from his photos with his thatch of ash-blond hair, wide face and broad frame. I smile at him in relief.

  ‘You must be Romy,’ he says as he nears, stopping short of a handshake or a kiss on the cheek. ‘I’m Max.’

  ‘It’s nice to meet you,’ I say, my hands mirroring his and staying awkwardly at my sides. ‘Um, shall we go find a table and some drinks?’

  ‘Sounds good.’

  I pull open the door by its brass handle, releasing the sultry strains of jazz from the bar beyond, and wait for Max to enter. He doesn’t move. I motion for him to go ahead. ‘No, please, after you,’ he insists.

  ‘No please, I’ve already got the door,’ I point out, fighting an ember of annoyance. I get this at work all the time, men refusing to walk through a door before me in some anachronistic display of chivalry. Max demurs again, so I forge ahead, awkwardly trying to hold the heavy door open for him behind me.

  Down a spiral iron staircase, the bar is crowded, typical of a CBD bar on a Thursday night. The huddled intimacy is amplified by the dark wood panelling and low lighting. It’s redolent of a 1920s speakeasy, replete with cocktail waitresses in fringed flapper dresses and barmen in pinstripes. We approach the bar.

  ‘A pint of Little Creatures, thanks,’ says Max, pulling out his card.

  ‘And for you, miss?’

  ‘Um . . .’ I flip through the leather-bound drinks list to the wine page.

  ‘You can get whatever you want,’ says Max. ‘
Seriously, don’t hold back. It’s on me. Do you want a cocktail?’

  ‘I’m good for now, thanks.’ I turn back to the bartender. ‘A glass of shiraz, please.’

  We find a mercifully empty leather booth to ensconce ourselves in and allow the jazz and the convivial chatter to wash over us.

  ‘So do you like working as an accountant?’ I ask.

  ‘I’m not actually an accountant,’ he says. ‘I’m just in an accounting role.’ I wait for him to elaborate, but he doesn’t.

  ‘Oh, okay. Is that because you still have to do your CPA or something?’

  ‘Yeah, I’ve just started that.’

  ‘It must be tough, on top of full-time work?’

  ‘Yeah, it is.’

  I take a long sip of wine. This is feeling more like a difficult witness examination than a date. ‘Um, so what do you do outside of work and study?’

  ‘Well, I’m really into my homebrew,’ he says. ‘I actually only ordered this –’ he points to his pint, ‘to compare to my own garage brews. And just as I suspected, it doesn’t stand up.’

  ‘Oh yeah?’ I say, feigning enthusiasm. ‘I’m not much of a beer drinker myself, but I can appreciate the craft.’

  ‘It’s actually more of an art,’ he corrects me. I can almost see him gathering steam. ‘Yeah, I’ve made IPAs that are on par with the best in the world. The key is to get a fermenter with a temperature gauge so you don’t stress the yeast when you pitch it. Also, to get the water profile right. Personally, I use a Bru’n Water spreadsheet to add the proper salt and minerals to get a proper mash pH. That’s where most people go wrong, and they end up with a really flabby beer . . .’