Amazing Grace Read online

  She kept up the coughing, making it appear much worse than it was so as to cover up the shock she felt that he was only a few years older than her. As she got up, the leg of the chair caught on the bottom of her dress and before she knew it, the elasticated top came down and she flashed both her ample boobs at Malcolm.

  ‘Oh my God! Oh shit… I’m sorry for saying God! And now I’ve said shit too!’ Could she dig a bigger hole for herself? ‘Good grief, I’m so sorry Malcolm, but I’m going to have to cut this, erm, date short. I suddenly feel quite unwell and am going to have to go home immediately. I really am so sorry.’ She took a deep breath, adjusted her dress, popping herself away, grabbed her denim jacket from the back of her chair, and shook his hand before he could realise what was happening. The teashop door was opened by a new customer coming in, so she ducked under their arm and bolted as fast as she could. She made the mistake of turning round and Malcolm was just staring at her quite bewildered and just a little bit red in the face, although not as red as her, whilst other people in the café were hiding their laughter behind their hands. She felt mortified at what had happened, and bad for leaving so abruptly – but not as bad as Monica was going to feel when she got hold of her.

  Grace jumped in the car and got her phone out of her handbag and dialled Monica’s number. She answered after two rings and Grace didn’t wait for her to speak before she started a tirade of abuse down the phone.

  Monica let her ramble on, then when Grace had run out of swear words, got everything out and quietened down, said, ‘Go home, put the kettle on and I’ll be round in ten minutes.’

  When Grace pulled up on the drive, she saw Becks through the window. He had ultrasonic hearing and could always tell when her car pulled up, and had clearly jumped up onto the windowsill. As she opened the front door he jumped up, gave her a big sloppy lick and knocked her to the ground.

  ‘Aw, Becks, why can’t I meet someone who’s just like you but human?’ she laughed, as he rolled over for his tummy to be tickled. She heard a car door slam and turned. Monica was walking up the drive waving a white hanky above her head. She couldn’t help but laugh and let in her bonkers friend.

  ‘If I’d told you, would you have gone?’ Monica asked.

  ‘Of course not.’

  ‘I rest my case!’

  ‘Point taken, but next time you set me up, please make sure it’s not with someone who looks like Hugo off The Vicar of Dibley or his dad… I flashed the bloody vicar, Mon!’

  ‘What the…?’

  Grace’s mouth started to twitch at the same time that Monica’s started to turn up at the corners. They started to laugh, then they laughed some more. Between giggles, Grace related the story, which caused them both to dissolve into a laughing fit. Monica’s mascara was now running in big black streaks down her cheeks and Becks didn’t know what was happening and started to jump around the place, barking, which made the women laugh even more. Grace realised that it had actually been ages since she’d laughed so much that she cried and made a note to make sure she did it far more often. It felt really good!

  ‘God, I hate you Monica,’ Grace said, as she gave her best friend a hug. ‘Promise me, you will never set me up on anything like that again! If you do, I swear I’ll dump you as my best friend as fast as lightning.’

  ‘I promise.’ Monica hugged her tightly, crossing her fingers behind her back. ‘Now go make me a coffee.’

  * * *

  Oh darling. That was hilarious. A vicar! If there is one thing I cannot imagine you as it’s the wife of a vicar! Monica is certainly entertaining me so far with her choice of dates. She’s a terrible judge of character, although how I love that she’s changing you from a dull, drab caterpillar into a beautiful emerging butterfly, so I have to forgive her. I wish I could reach out and touch you. I wish I could make you realise how wonderful you are and what a fabulous mother you are to Archie and how beautiful you are on the inside and the outside. I just wish you could see what I see. Now, go out there and grab that life and have some fun. I love you. Mum xxx

  Chapter Eight

  The two disastrous dates so far had led Grace to make another important decision about her life. When she was with Mark, he always used to grab her ‘love handles’ and call her ‘chubster’, supposedly as an affectionate term. She knew she had been putting on weight, but she was so unhappy in her relationship and Mark was such a time thief that she had been overeating to fill the loneliness and never had the opportunity to do any kind of exercise. He took all the time that was in their relationship to do stuff for himself. And then he had the cheek to complain that he never had any ‘me time’. God knows what going to the rugby, going to the gym and going to the pub was then, Grace thought, frowning at the memory. It was Grace who had never had any ‘me time’ as she tried to work, bring up Archie, keep on top of the housework and make sure that the meals were cooked. Stupidly, she had thought that when they had a child, parenting would be a joint responsibility. How naïve she’d been.

  But that was in the past and she had shown herself recently that she could step outside of her comfort zone and have some time to herself, so she decided it was time to lose some weight. She really wanted to try to lose a few pounds before the stupid awards event that was constantly looming over her, and as the date drew closer, her anxiety about the awards was rising.

  So far Grace had tried every excuse she could think of with Melanie and Edward to get out of attending the awards but they’d covered every single one. First she said that she couldn’t get a babysitter, so they offered their teenage daughter for the night. Then she said that her dad needed taking somewhere that night, so they offered to pay for a taxi. It didn’t look like she was going to be able to get out of it, whatever she tried. At the back of her mind she had rather hoped that one of the dates she’d been on might have turned out to be someone that would be worthy of inviting along, but sadly not. So now she was going to feel out of her comfort zone as well as dateless, while all her work colleagues enjoyed the free bar with their partners.

  However, one night a week she was now alone while Archie was at Mark’s, so she decided to pluck up the courage and go along to the local slimming club. It took a lot of guts for her to go, especially on her own. Totally mortified, she bumped into one of the teachers from Archie’s school. They nodded at each other, clearly making a silent pact that they would never speak of the incident again.

  There was nothing shameful in wanting to drop a few pounds, but unfortunately it seemed that Barbara, the club leader, had a way of making them all feel like they were the lowest of the low but that with her help, they could become someone worthy. After being weighed for the first time and finally admitting her weight and agreeing a target for the next few weeks, Grace sat with everyone in a semicircle while Barbara shouted out the names of the people in the group and either congratulated, reprimanded or humiliated them depending on whether they’d lost weight, stayed the same or had a gain.

  The thing that annoyed Grace most was that people seemed to have no respect for anyone else and just had their own conversations while Barbara was chatting. Although, listening to the woman, a little bit of Grace could actually understand why. They were probably trying to drown out the sound of her irritating, patronising voice.

  Grace drifted off, wondering if anyone had ever set up a slimming club for busy people. There must be hundreds of people out there that would go to something like that. A club that offered real advice on diet and exercise with helpful encouragement, rather than trying to sell their own ‘low-fat’ ready meals which were in actuality full of E numbers. Maybe advice on healthy eating would be more beneficial and just a check-in on weight each week too?

  Grace had a tendency to stress about the smallest of things and make them huge. She was definitely getting better but still had a way to go. Everyone told her she needed to chill more, but she found it so difficult to do that. She’d tried to meditate once because she’d thought it would be good for her but she just
couldn’t switch off, lying on her bed thinking about putting the washing on, how the windows needed cleaning and making a mental to-do list. She didn’t think she knew how to relax any more, apart from reading. She tried from time to time to listen to podcasts and webinars but got so fed up with the introductions that she gave up on them. She didn’t want to know what the narrator had been doing or the background behind everything. She was always shouting at them to get to the important bit.

  Monica had got so exasperated with her always running around that she’d used one of her trained skills, personality profiling, to assess Grace’s character traits and Grace’s results had been most illuminating. And no wonder, in a way, that she and Mark didn’t gel properly. When they discussed his attributes, and answered the questions from Mark’s perspective, it was clear they were poles apart in their personality types and were both too stubborn to acknowledge that the other one was different; they just didn’t agree on anything and both thought they were the ones in the right.

  Grace’s profile showed up that she was the sort of person who liked the sociable side of life, loved chatting with people, loved coming up with ideas but wasn’t particularly hot on detail. It showed that she detested lateness and saw it as a total lack of respect. It also showed that she was blunt and liked other people to get straight to the point and not, as she called it, ‘fanny about’.

  When she chatted to Monica about Mark and how incompatible they were, it showed that he was dominant, keen on analysis, critical and big on detail. Total opposites. Monica said that sometimes these opposing personality types complement each other, but sometimes they clash.

  It was a standing joke in their relationship that when Mark was looking for a new car he’d spend hours researching it, telling her all about the horsepower (whatever that was) and the engine size. All Grace used to ask was what colour it was. If she liked the colour, that was her decision made. Since talking to Monica, and doing her character profiling, she’d worked hard on trying to be more sympathetic to other people’s personality types and understood now that was just Mark’s way. That was how his brain dealt with stuff. It was just that these differences in personality types for them worked against each other instead of together.

  Grace put most of her impatience and inability to relax down to having a busy life as a mother. There was so much to do. When Archie was little and fell asleep, she never knew whether to wash up, put a load of washing in, clean the house, make a coffee, have a bath, wash her hair, catch up on the TV programs she’d recorded or read. She just always seemed to have so much to do and put herself under pressure to get it all done without any help. She didn’t understand how some people just seemed to be able to just ‘be’.

  Consumed by her own thoughts, Grace was brought out of her trance abruptly as Barbara yelled her name.

  ‘Grace! And we’d like to give a huge warm welcome this evening to a new member – Grace! Let’s all give Grace a round of applause for finally realising that she’s a fattie and joining our group to lose weight.’ Grace went as red as a beetroot and wanted to crawl up her own armpit.

  Everyone who had lost weight was rewarded with a sticker, like Archie used to get at nursery, a round of applause and Barbara’s favourite phrase, ‘Well done dearie, you are cooking on gas!’ If Grace had heard it once in that first session, she’d heard it a hundred times. In fact at one point she was so bored that she started a mental tally sheet for each time it was said. So far she’d counted twenty-seven times. Grace was sure that if she ever heard that phrase again, she’d shove Barbara’s face in a cooker and show her what cooking on gas really meant.

  She quickly realised that this group wasn’t for her. The last thing she wanted to do with her precious free time was to pay to come out and be publicly humiliated. She really did want to do something about her weight but she hadn’t the time to waste; when she’d arrived she’d waited in a queue for over half an hour to be weighed while the two ladies who were on the weigh-in desk finished their little chat, because clearly they couldn’t weigh people at the same time as talking. Grace was tapping her feet in frustration and getting more annoyed by the minute. And then the next hour was spent listening to everyone else’s stories, which without wishing to be rude, she wasn’t really interested in. This group just wasn’t the right way for her to lose weight.

  A light bulb went on in her head. If the group that she wanted to go to didn’t exist, why didn’t she just create it? Then it went off again as she heard Mark’s voice saying, Don’t be ridiculous, why would people want to come along to something you’ve created?

  As she drove home, she pondered the idea and it wouldn’t go out of her head. A busy person’s slimming club! When she arrived home, she got a fresh new notepad out of her stationery stash and started to make a list of all the things she would and wouldn’t do and it sounded better by the minute. If she hated that group she’d attended, there must be loads of others who did too. She knew people who didn’t go to slimming groups because they didn’t want all that unnecessary malarkey that went with it. If it was her club, she’d stick to the basics, get to the point of being there quickly.

  She’d made up her mind. She wasn’t with Mark any more and he couldn’t tell her what she could and couldn’t do and what she was and wasn’t capable of. She was capable of anything she wanted to do. Her mum had instilled in her as a child that she should dream, make a plan and make those dreams come true. She didn’t know where down the line she’d stopped believing in herself. But she felt now that it was time for her to dream again.

  She’d put the word out there about her idea and test the waters, and if she got a positive response, she’d get the club started. She would need a venue, though. She racked her brains trying to think of somewhere.

  Since Grace had split up from Mark and had her coaching from Monica, she’d become a real ‘doer’. She decided on a course of action and did it. When she was with Mark, she was a grey, dithering person, never making a choice because either she didn’t want to risk upsetting him or because he’d laugh at it, belittling her. Now she didn’t have him questioning her every move, she’d changed into a black-and-white decision-maker. You either did something or you didn’t. Why spend hours pondering? She just didn’t get it! She couldn’t understand people who weren’t doers and, in truth, they really got on her nerves. But she knew that she needed to make more effort in getting to understand that people were different from her and it was something that she was trying to do.

  Someone once told her a great way to make a decision – to count down from five and then, if it felt right, go with your first instinct. It was now the way that Grace made all her decisions, from deciding what to cook for dinner to the new shade of paint to use in the hallway.

  She thought back to her old college friend Saffy, and asked herself what Saffy would say about the idea of setting up a slimming club for time-poor people. Making decisions often brought Saffy to mind as they always used to talk things through, from boyfriends to which new top to buy for their Saturday night out. She knew that Saffy would tell her to go for it. So she would. Decision made. And damn, it felt good to finally be in control of her own decisions and not have someone tell her that she was ridiculous, or not capable.

  Grace felt that she’d come a long way even in the last couple of months and that her life was truly changing for the better. She was challenging herself way out of her comfort zone; she couldn’t believe that she’d even considered internet dating, let alone gone along and actually met people. And she felt that her life was getting way more interesting than it had been for a long time. She’d noticed that she was excited to get up in the mornings, actively looking forward to the days and weeks ahead, instead of just whiling away the time while Archie was at his dad’s.

  * * *

  Finally darling, I am seeing a change in you. You are back to the Grace that you used to be years ago before Mark dulled your sparkle and suppressed your personality. You now have an idea – run with it. Befo
re, you’d have mentioned it to him and then he’d have told you why it was such a rubbish idea and you’d have gone back into your little cocoon. Now you are finally getting back to the person you used to be: the person that never saw an obstacle as an obstruction, just something you have to work out how to get over, round or through. I love that you are finally getting that sparkle back! My little caterpillar is becoming a bright, brave, beautiful butterfly. I couldn’t be prouder of you my darling. I love you, Mum xxx

  Chapter Nine

  ‘Just one more, Grace, and then I promise I’ll never, ever, ever arrange a date for you again. But this one I’m sure is the one for you. He’s gorgeous, he’s single, he’s got no children and he’s asked to take you out. I have a photo of him – look! He looks really nice and normal and quite hot, too. You have to go. Just think if you said no and he’s “the one”! You could be missing out on the opportunity of a lifetime.’

  ‘Oh Monica, do I have to? It’s so bloody demoralising going out on dates with crappy men. I’d rather stay in and read a good book.’

  ‘Yes, darling, I know you would but I just want to see you with someone who is going to turn your world upside down and inside out. Someone who loves you as much as I do. God, if I was that way inclined you’d be my ideal partner. But as you know, I like cock, so there’s no chance of that!’

  ‘Monica!’ Grace admonished but couldn’t help but smile at her friend’s way with words.

  ‘Just one more, Gracie? Go on. For me, pretty please.’

  ‘One more! Just one. Then that’s it. But here’s the deal; after this date, you promise to delete my profile from the site if that’s what I ask you to do. Deal, or no deal?’

  Monica winked at her. ‘Deal, Noel Edmonds! And keep your tits inside your dress this time, you floozy!’