The winner takes it all

I’m not a fan of loose ends, so it’s time to tie a big fat knot in the speed dating story. Here’s a summary of the situation as we left it.

Option 1: The Barrister: tall, funny, sexy, leaves me with a winning smile.
Option 2: The Speed Date Organiser: blonde, cute, hot, leaves me with his phone number.

It’s clear before the race has even begun that the Barrister has a heavy no-phone handicap, and as the gun goes off The Organiser leaves the stalls with a clear head start. Exploiting his advantage he texts me within half and hour of leaving the venue to tell me that I have a hot arse (ohhh, bless), thereby increasing his lead to a body-length.

A week of dinner and drinks follows, and I am completely smitten. On the bus I find myself wondering how The Organiser would look in lavender tails with a carmine trim, or if open shirts would better suit an April wedding. At work I take the down pantone swatches and try different colour combinations for the walls of the childrens’ nursery. And at night I get the big pot out from under the sink and warm some water for his pet rabbit.

Around this time I get an email from The Barrister, whose horse has stopped for a snooze in the clover near the starting line. His real name is actually Justice Hordinger*, and the email comes from jh@justicehordinger.com

“Wow!” I think. “Justice must be veeery important at his Barrister-thingy place to have his own name as an email address. Interesting. I’ll just see what google has to say about it”. Within seconds later I’m at www.justicehordinger.com. The website is dominated by a stylish black and white photo of a man in a tux whose suave expression says “Oh Moneypenny! Let’s do it now! Yes, on the exploding pens and the typewriter because you drive me mad with passion!”

“Odd,” I think, “he looks a bit like The Barrister.”

Digging a little further I discover that www.justicehordinger.com is a website for an internationally recognised magician who has done shows in Europe and Vegas. He has his own book and has appeared on an American TV programme called “The Greatest Magicians in the Universe”. And there are more photos.

“Fuck me,” I think, “it IS The Barrister!” Barrister. Magician. Magician. Barrister. He defends the rights of the Innocent while sawing beautiful women in half. He pursues Truth by day and makes you dance like a chicken by night. He steals your wallet, swallows your kitchen knives and pulls a rabbit from your trousers, all while wearing a powdered wig.

Suddenly this is a two-man race again.

The problem is, I am not a player. I’m a one-man kinda guy, and finding myself having to juggle two potential Mr Rights causes my brain to go into catatonic shock. Fortunately the thumb of my right hand is ready to take over the reins, and it sets about busily texting The Organiser with wilful abandon. With no SuperEgo in charge it soon breaks the three golden rules of 21st century dating; thou shalt not be the text initiator, thou shalt not text when thou hast nothing to say, and thou shalt not text ANYTHING at 3am.

Meanwhile, I'm going on dinner dates with The Magirrister and finding him deeply fascinating and infinitely kissable. He gets us into private clubs with hidden entrances, lives in an impeccable Bauhaus apartment, performs amazing léger de main (the dirty bastard) and is generally perfect. Abso-bloody-lutely perfect. But – oh, here it comes – I don’t feel the magic. Yes, Fate is fucking with me.

About 100 yards from the finish line The Organiser’s horse stumbles on a mound of unanswered texts, falls, and breaks its neck next to a very pink rabbit. The Magirrister’s horse struggles on valiantly for another month, but is eventually disqualified for being a ‘friend’ rather than a racehorse. Appropriately there are no winners, only some idiot holding a golden cup who thought that two was better than one, and that a race was better than a stroll.

Bugger. Back to square one.



* no, really.