Chapter 37 - Reality Bites!

So it´s nearly all over. I´m tanned and toned, but not necessarily as chilled as I´d have hoped. The Geezer photoshoot is hanging over me like a German tourist´s beer gut and I´m just waiting for the Spanish inquisition from Mum, Jen and Tamsin. I´m surprised to admit that I can´t wait to see Rob! For some reason he personifies a tranquility and balance that I´m lacking in my life, he makes me feel secure and puts all this mess into perspective. Hmmm, wasn´t expecting that!

I´ve had a couple of little weepy moments by the pool, mostly hangover fuelled, but this has made me realise what a brave face I´m putting on everything. I´m pretending that I want to be single, whereas the reality is that I DON´T. I just don´t want to be in a relationship for the sake of it either. It´s all kind of lonely, this singledom lark, but a partnership has to be right too. There has to be balance and security too, doesn´t there?

Anyway, I´ve just emailed this to Delaney...

Relationship Rehab – week 6
The trouble with a one week holiday is that you´re no sooner relaxed and slipped into the vibe of R&R than it´s time to go home. Singles holidays are great if you want guaranteed sex with a suntan. Without the constraints of our at-home identities, our jobs, our day-to-day lives, funny Jimmy from Scunthorpe looks like a great catch! And then you talk to his mates and realise that he´s been unemployed for nearly 2 years and lives at home with his Mum! Not exactly a match made in heaven, but this holiday vibe gives us all a new refreshed persona. I hate to be unromantic, but there´s a lot to be said for knowing WHO somebody is and you simply can´t get the measure of people out of their environs. Which is, I suppose, why holiday romances seldom last. We get back to our lives, and the bubble bursts along with the rain clouds.
Still, I´ve not yet found a way to meet a great single guy and there´s still no man that has made me regret CHOOSING to stay single.
Back to UK tomorrow, so expect a longer and much less cynical Relationship Rehab next week!
Sophie.xxx

Chapter 36 - The Cluck Of The Irish

I don´t know how I´d get through these singles nights without the Irish contingency! Let me try and explain how awful this singles holiday is.... Imagine every possible reality TV show you can... Think ´The Villa´ coupled with ´Big Brother´and add a little ´Jodie Marsh Wants To Get Married To Some Rich Guy That She´s Only Just Met´- and you get the idea. And last night the ultimate sin. I was called a ´cracking bird´! Remember that? Danny-the-chav-Mullins called me that right back at the beginning! And then I got "you up for some action babe, cos I got free munfs of fukkin to catch up on!" Yes, dire. Anyway I wandered from the cattle market and headed for the Irish bars - Mulligans, Molly Malones, Finnegans and loads of others, and felt instantly at home. You know what you´re getting with the Irish - too much drink, lots of laughs and no pretence - the most down-to-earth crowd and for the first time since I moved to London, I really missed home. Anyway, I got into a hen party of women from Waterford and we had such a laugh. They didn´t give a damn what anybody thought of them, from the waiters, to the guys, from the overweight tourists right down to the snooty 60-something couples. And today I´ve been nursing a mother of a headache. But it was worth it - I needed to let off some steam.

It´s kind of nice, but weird recovering from a hangover by the pool and shade is essential! I´ve been trying to muster up what to write for Relationship Rehab tomorrow but it´s hard with Michael Buble crooning in the background and making me feel sad. I´m melancholy and lonely and realise that as much as I want to stay single, simply to keep myself away from destructive men, I´m also desperate for some intimacy too. In EVERY sense of the word. I´ve been watching the old wrinklies by the pool and how they let it all hang out. They´re completely relaxed with each other and I imagine that they know each others bodies better than they know their own, and it makes me wonder whether I´ll ever be that relaxed with a man. I also wonder whether they´re as contented as they seem - or has their marriage been dogged with problems, extra maritals, gambling, celibacy... Who can ever tell? But they´re still together and relaxing in the sunshine, so whatever the compromise, it surely can´t be that bad, can it?

I´ve just sent an email to Delaney promising my poolside Relationship Rehab tomorrow.

For now...
I need to just lay back and tune back in to Michael Buble.
These dark glasses are great for hiding the tears, if only I could keep my mouth from pincing at the same time.....

Pulling Power #12

Hey, fancy a sneaky peek into the kind of chat up lines I´m listening to on this singles holiday?

Honestly - these are SO bad, they´re nearly good.

But only nearly...



Just when you thought it couldn´t get any worse....

Only 3 days left to go!

Chapter Thirty Five - Postcards From The Edge!

I sent you guys a postcard today! My postcard list has been decidedly short, what with Tam, Mum, Jen - so I decided to send you all one too. Along with Ellie and Delaney and those horrible guys at Geezer! Anything to rub salt into the wound!


Playa del Ingles days are great for me, but then again I don´t have my heart and soul into this singles scene. I´ve spoken to Tam about what Adrian did and how much I hate this holiday and just when I´d listened to her pep talk and started to feel a little more positive, I get a text message from Ade telling me how sorry he is for all the mess. Then I get another text from Rob - what a nice guy. His message made me feel warm inside when I read it. I got 2 tingles - Adrian´s message gave me an initial (and unwated!) knicker twinge and then heartache, whilst Robs made me just feel warm and special. I´d love a brother like him - so supportive and kind, Tam is so lucky.

A combination of too much sangria (which is ESSENTIAL if I´m going to cope with these horrendous singles BBQs and GoKart evenings) and too much sun has given me a couple of problems too - a spot above my lip (which I always get in the sunshine!) and an intense horniness. The sunshine always makes me like this, and watching the fit guys around the pool along with the couples smooching is tough. I´d love to be here with that special guy. There´s a couple that I keep watching from behind my shades. She has the figure of Elle MacPherason and he´s decidedly lardy and we all join him pretending not to notice when she stretches and poses for a crowd of Geordie lads as she adjusts her bikini bottoms. Poor devil - we all really feel for him, and she thinks she´s being SO discreet. Why are we so wicked to each other!!

There´s another couple at the poolside that keep disappearing seperately, but both return about an hour later with smug smiles on their faces. It´s obvious what they´re up to and I´m intensely jealous! It´s made worse by the fact that my brazilian bikini wax is beginning to grow back and I´m fidgeting on my sun lounger, desperate not to scratch it. Honestly, I´m so frustrated that I think one touch of myself and I´ll be howling and going all Meg Ryan in When Harry Met Sally! Not a good look beside the pool eh?

As I lay with the sunshine making the insides of my eyelids orange and I feel my skin tingling with the heat my mind wanders and it frightens me. I really want to be single, but really want someone to share my life with too. It´d be lovely to share this all with somebody special and to have somebody to look out for me. I´m tired of fighting through as Miss Independent and it seems like I´m in a long haul marathon - there are the speedy bursts when I´m focussed and determined, which are punctuated with the down times - when I´m tired and worn out, desperate for someone to pick me up and run with me...

I wish I could feel hatred for Adrian, but I can´t. I don´t. It was a short lived ´relationship´(if you can even call it that), but it held so much chemistry and possibility and it´s gone in a flash. I´m disappointed, betrayed, but can´t quite muster the hatred thing. I liked him too much for that maybe?

All I can do now is continue to rub in the Factor 15 and look bloody ace for the Geezer photoshoot. The more I think about it the more I feel sick at the notion that Trevor Malone was obviously on a mission, but Adrian was in on it too! It´s too much to bear. This singles nightmare would be so much easier if there was at least one guy to take my mind off it all, even if for a few days, there are a couple who keep giving me cheeky grins, but I think I´m putting out an invisible radar which screams LEAVE ME ALONE!!!!!

(or should that be Leave Malone?) - there´s insight for you!!

Chapter 34 - Singles Holiday or Cattle Market?

A mobbed London Gatwick on a Bank Holiday Monday wasn´t a great start, especially when every tall man wearing faded jeans reminded me of Adrian. Ade, I mean. MUST call him by his ´´proper´´ name, now that I know it! I tried to lose myself in Marie Claire on the flight but it was as blatant as a Joan Rivers facial who was going to the same resort as me. A posse of sombrero`d hippie-chicks from Leeds were already sparking off a crowd of guys from Kent - all with similarly ´different´celtic tattoos.
Thankfully, on arrival, my hotel is nice and the welcome party isn´t until tomorrow, so I can´t wait to snatch my key and retreat to my room. It takes me all of 2 minutes to strip off, slather on some Factor 20 and slip into my red bikini. Poolside entertainment looks promising and my dark shades let me have a good look around without looking nosey!
As far as a singles holiday goes, it seems that there are crowds of singles here rather than singletons, as in I´m-On-My-Own-And-Single.
Looks like I´m going to be alone.
Again!

Fancy a postcard? Just send me your postal address to singlesophieregan@yahoo.co.uk (and thanks to everyone who has asked for one so far!! My postcard address list is embarrassingly short, so far consisting of Tamsin, Mum, Jennifer, Delaney and, oh, CAN´T forget to send one to those gross guys at Geezer.....

I´m there!!!

OK - so I´m in Gran Canaria on the first day of my singles holiday. There´s loads of groups of guys, playing Snow Patrol from their balconies and slurping bottle of Peroni - so it´s not looking too promising.

I want to send all my readers a postcard - and will still be posting my chapters throughout the week so stay tuned.

Please send me your postal address to singlesophieregan@yahoo.co.uk and I´d be delighted to send you a card (and a little extra update away from my usual blog postings too...)

Be back with some more tomorrow..

Wish me luck - reckon this is going to be dire... And I can´t stop thinking about Adrian.....

xx

Chapter Thirty Three - Here Comes The Sun

I feel desperate. Betrayed, used and abused. I don’t let my guard down easily and yet Adrian, or Ade – as in Ade Gets Laid - as I’ve since found out, massaged me into a comfort zone. And I let it all out. And now I feel terrible. I don’t know why I trusted him, except for the fact that it all felt so right and natural. Maybe I’m just a stupid romantic – and maybe that’s why I should stay single – I’m not safe to be let out there into the whirlwind world of dating and relationships. I’m a fucking liability! What kind of an idiot falls for that trick? Except for a clown like me.

What a fool I am.

I wouldn’t mind, but I hadn’t really wanted to talk to him about all that stuff, but he’d kept on and on; his voice gentle and calming as we laid there in the early hours. He’d been stroking my cheek gently and I lost myself in the moment. He’d said that he wanted to know everything about me – what made me laugh, what made me sad, what made me angry and scared. And I hadn’t wanted to tell him, but he’d hugged me and said, “I know you’re freaked out about a relationship, but if you don’t tell me, if I don’t get to understand why you want to stay single, then you’ll run away. And then I’ll lose you.” And we simply don’t talk to each other like that on a day to day basis. None of us do. And now I can see how I fell for the oldest trick in the book – get the woman to talk about herself…

I need to get away from this. I can’t cope with the emotional bungee jump of launching myself from a height and now I’m left dangling hundreds of feet below. And I feel sick and disorientated and lost. I’m going straight into see Delaney about that singles holiday. Any excuse to escape for a few days!

*

OK - so here comes the sun.... Really, I’d been thinking more of a health spa, perhaps a European Chiva Som, but Delaney is delighted that I'm so willing to go. The problem is, she's booking me in for one of the singles holidays that are more resembling an 18-30’s brawl, but anything will do right now. I won’t tell Delaney that I have no intention of joining in with the drunken bar crawls or the intoxicated beach parties. I’m going for some time-out and a little recuperation. If I’m going to see this staying single idea out to the end, then I need to recharge my batteries. I obviously got a little lost on the way there – what with the Paul Ashkuri date, the relentless bouquets of flowers and then the mishap with Adrian. I can’t even bear to say his name. We’d been fantastic in bed together and I get a serious ache somewhere between my collar bones and my pelvis whenever I think of what he’s done to me. The lies are endless and the betrayal is too much to bear.

*

Tam came shopping with me after work and I started to get into the holiday spirit. I told her all about what happened with Adrian and she was really sympathetic, especially when I kept filling up with tears whenever I said his name. I feel so crap now that I couldn’t even muster some attitude when she said that she’s going to give Pete a second chance! How can he deserve a second chance? I don’t he should have even had a first chance! And with his wife pregnant too! It’s abso-fucking-lutely ridiculous, but I can’t continue to be Tam’s conscience. She’ll do what she wants anyway, and all I can do right now is be here as a sounding board – as much as it infuriates me that she’s happy to settle for second best. Anyway, I bought 4 bikinis and a gorgeous beach bag from Primark, along with a few pairs of flip flops too. Tam was dangling floaty tops and gypsy skirts at me every time I turned a corner, but I’m not interested. I’m determined to go with just the basics – a few bikinis, shorts and little else. I’m going to spend a week lying beside a pool. Even if I have to make up a few stories for Relationship Rehab this week – Delaney will never know! If Trevor Malone is organising a photo shoot for me to appear in Geezer, then I’m going to make sure I look shit hot for it – I’ll teach him and bloody Adrian to try and make a fool out of me!

*

Adrian hated himself. He had big feelings for Sophie and would have peeled the skin off his own arms for the opportunity to rewind a couple of days and to not have told Trevor about him and her. He should have known what a competitive bastard he was and now he’d ruined everything. He detested himself with such venom that he was embarrassed even to look in the mirror at his own reflection. But the damage had been done. He didn’t even have the nerve to try and call Sophie to apologise or to explain. And all the while Trevor was gloating that he’d been honest with Sophie Regan from the start, and that Ade should never have pretended that he worked for anything other than Geezer.

And now it was too late.

He felt like shit.

Chapter Thirty Two Chapter Thirty Four