Sorry Not Sorry

by Sophie Ranald

Genres: Humor & Satire; Women's Fiction

Synopsis

Charlotte has always been a good girl. But being good is getting boring
She's not just stuck in a rut – she's buried in it up to her chin. The only company she has in bed is the back catalogue of Netflix and falling in love feels like the stuff of fairy tales. So when she stumbles across a popular podcast, ‘Sorry Not Sorry', which challenges women to embrace their inner bad girl, she jumps at the chance to shake things up.
Old Charlotte would never ask for a stranger's number, go on a blind date or buy lacy lingerie… But New Charlotte is waving goodbye to her comfort zone (with a side order of margaritas). And it turns out that good things happen to bad girls…

Release date: February 13, 2019

Publisher: Bookouture

Print pages: 350

Sample

When I got in from work, Maddy and Henry were still there – just. Their hired van was parked in the street outside the house, and they were standing in the hallway surrounded by their stuff. I wondered whether they’d decided not to wait for me but then changed their minds – the same way I’d almost gone for a drink after work but decided to come home instead, to say goodbye.

‘Oh, you’re here, Charlotte!’ Maddy said, with a cheerfulness that sounded a bit forced.

‘Yes!’ I said, with equally forced cheerfulness. ‘I mean, Briony and Alice were going to go to Quag’s for a cocktail, but I didn’t… I couldn’t…’

I stopped. I tried to meet Maddy’s eyes, but somehow I couldn’t do that, either. There she was, my best friend, her face as familiar as my own, standing in our familiar hallway wearing the 7 For All Mankind jeans we found in TK Maxx six years ago, which I’d watched go from new to worn to distressed, and fished out of the washing machine more times than I could remember. There were her green eyes behind the cat’s-eye glasses, her dark, cropped hair, the dimple on her left cheek that was almost always there, because she was almost always smiling.

Not now, though.

Henry cleared his throat. ‘We left the keys on the hook in the hallway,’ he said.

‘We were going to drop them off at Wankerson’s,’ Maddy said, smiling as she used our joke name for the letting agent. ‘But we ran out of time, and they’ll be closed now.’

‘It’s no problem,’ I said. ‘I’ll do it tomorrow.’

‘And we’ve done all the stuff with the bills,’ Henry said. ‘Council tax, water, Npower, broadband – and we’ve signed up for three months of mail forwarding. But just let us know if there’s anything we missed.’

‘Odeta’s coming to clean the place on Monday,’ Maddy said. ‘Remember, she’s going back to Romania for two weeks after that, but the agency said they’ll send someone else. I told them you’ll be in touch about the direct debit.’

‘Ollie at Wankerson’s called to say the landlord’s arranged for someone to come round tomorrow and do some stuff in the garden,’ Henry said. ‘Cut back that tree, hopefully. But he might not turn up. You know what they’re like.’

Maddy said, ‘Our new fridge freezer isn’t coming until next week, so we’ve left some stuff – ready meals, and that chilli I cooked the other night. It’s all yours. You’re so busy, Charlotte, I know you don’t have time to cook.’

‘And it’s not like we’re moving to Siberia,’ Henry said. ‘We’ll only be in Bromley. It’s only, like, an hour and a half from here on the train.’

An hour and a half on three separate trains and a bus, I thought. It might as well be flipping Siberia.

When Maddy had told me six months before, with amazed delight, that an inheritance from Henry’s grandmother was going to enable them to buy a place of their own and finally put an end to the precarious, expensive annoyance of renting in London, I’d imagined an elegant flat in one of the nearby developments, all industrial chic with a view of the canal. Or maybe a Victorian cottage that they could lovingly restore, with original fireplaces and polished floorboards.

Instead, they’d opted for a three-bedroom semi with a big garden in actual suburbia. I knew what it meant: it wasn’t just the physical distance; it meant that Maddy and Henry were moving on to a totally new phase of their lives. One that would involve being close to good local schools, spending the weekends gardening, and dinner parties with Henry’s sister, who apparently lived nearby. It meant they weren’t just buying a house, they were growing up with a massive, rocket-powered whoosh and leaving me far behind, still paying rent each month, getting the same Tube to work each day, and going to bed alone each night. Except I’d be doing it all without my best mate there to share it.

I realised I’d been staring down at my shoes – taupe kitten heels that had looked comfortable in the shop but were viciously pointed and had been killing my feet all afternoon – and forced myself to look up again, at their concerned, guilty faces.

Then I burst out laughing. It was just as well, otherwise at least one of us would have started to cry.

‘You guys!’ I said. ‘I’m twenty-seven, you know. I can do adulting. I’ve been doing it for lots of years. I know how to pay the gas bill and let the cleaner in and harass the estate agent. I hold down a responsible job. I haven’t even passed out on a night bus for, like, ages. I’ll be fine.’

Maddy laughed too, and said, ‘God, I’m sorry, Charlotte. Of course you’ll be okay. It’s just… weird, you know. Moving. After all this time. I’ll bloody miss you.’

‘I’ll miss you, too. But, like you said, you’re only moving to south London.’

‘Are you sure you don’t want to come round tonight?’ Maddy said. ‘We can order pizza, and you can help us build our Billy bookcase.’

For a moment, I was tempted. Then I told myself not to be ridiculous, and said, ‘No way! Don’t be daft. It’s your first night in your new home. You need to be alone together to kiss the walls and shag in the kitchen and stuff. And assemble your own bloody Ikea bookcase.’

‘Are you sure, Charlotte?’ Henry asked. ‘You’d be totally welcome. We can shag in the kitchen any time.’

But I could see, however carefully he concealed it, that he was relieved. Of course he was. Since he and Maddy first got together, when Maddy and I advertised for a new housemate and he moved in, and after a couple of months vacated his own room to share with Maddy, I’d been there too. Not all the time, obviously – I work long hours, and I’d been on holiday with other friends, nights out with my colleagues and stuff (dates, though? Not so much). But still, for the whole two years of their relationship, I’d been a third person in the household. However well we got on – and we did get on fabulously – I knew it couldn’t always have been easy for them. For Henry, especially.

Now, they’d have space to be on their own together at last. And in five months, thanks to a swoon-makingly romantic proposal in the restaurant at the top of the Shard (don’t worry, I wasn’t actually there that night, but Maddy told me about it in minute detail afterwards, several times), they were getting married. They didn’t need me hanging around like a needy, squeaky third wheel.

So I declined their Domino’s-and-flatpack invitation again, more firmly this time, and helped them carry the last of their things to the waiting van.

‘You won’t be here on your own for long, anyway,’ Maddy said, looking a bit teary again. ‘The new girl’s moving in on Sunday.’

‘Yes.’ It seemed like a very long time ago that we’d posted the ad for the room online, and even then I’d only skimmed through emails from people wanting to move in, partly because there’d been so many of them but mostly because I was in denial about this day ever actually happening. ‘What’s her name again? Pansy?’

‘Something like that,’ Henry said. ‘I can’t quite remember.’

‘But Henry really liked her,’ Maddy said. ‘He thinks you’ll get on great. It’s a shame we couldn’t be here to meet her, though.’

‘Yeah, I’m really sorry about you having to do the showing-around thing at the last minute,’ I said to Henry. ‘But we’d arranged all the viewings and then there was that major Brexit thing when Theresa May invoked Article 50, or triggered it or whatever she did, and I got home at four in the morning because Colin made everyone stay in the office in case the markets went mental.’

‘Oh, don’t worry about it! Anyway, I was doing an after-hours shift at the surgery,’ Maddy said. ‘But yeah, she sounds really nice. And she might be able to get you amazing discount clothes from The Outnet.’

‘Not The Outnet,’ Henry said. ‘The other one. She’s a buyer there, or something.’

‘BrandAlley?’ Maddy said.

Henry shook his head.

‘Luxeforless?’ I said.

‘Think that’s the budgie,’ said Henry. ‘Anyway, Tansy – that’s her name, not Pansy, my bad – said she’ll turn up on Sunday. I told her she’ll have to pick up the keys from Ollie tomorrow, so if you could drop them round, Charlotte, if it’s not too much hassle…’

I said it was no hassle at all. It wasn’t like I had an action-packed weekend ahead of me, after all. Since when did I ever?

‘Although I might not be here when she arrives,’ I said, ‘because we’ve got brunch, remember, Maddy? Third Sunday of the month, like always?’

It was Maddy’s turn to look down at her shoes. They were battered Converse that had been white, once upon a time, and I bet they weren’t hurting her feet one bit.

‘Yeah, I don’t think I’m going to make it this month,’ she said sheepishly. ‘It’s just – you know. We’ll have so much to do in the new place. The guy said he’d start tiling the bathroom this weekend, and if I leave Henry to sort it out we’ll end up with a brick pattern instead of herringbone. So, yeah. Sorry to be flaky. I was going to post on the WhatsApp group, I just haven’t had a chance. But the others will be there – Molly, Chloë… And you’ll get to hear all about how William’s sister’s wedding went last weekend.’

‘That’s right.’ I brightened briefly. ‘And Molly wore her cerise satin slip dress and pants of steel. How could I forget?’

It was true – Molly had kept us entertained for the past few brunches with tales of her sister-in-law-to-be’s bridezilla antics, while saying, ‘God, I really need to go on a drastic diet if I’m going to fit into that stupid dress and look so stunning William will propose to me on the spot,’ then stuffing her face with bottomless steamed buns and Bloody Marys along with the rest of us. But I knew that Maddy was reminding me of it to distract me from feeling sad that she wouldn’t be there, and wondering how many times in the future she would also not be there because she and Henry were doing couply, weddingy things that were more important. Fortunately for her, Henry was on back-up distraction duty.

‘And then in a week or so, Adam’s moving into my old room,’ he said.

‘Right. Adam.’ I’d been kind of distracted about it all, I realised – in denial, most probably. I’d been quite happy to let Maddy draft the ad on SpareRoom (‘Are you sane, solvent, clean and reasonably sensible? Two double rooms available in gorgeous, spacious house in Hackney. New bathroom. Cleaner weekly. Courtyard garden. Modern kitchen. Vacant owing to the moving-in-with-boyfriend thing. You’ll be sharing with my mate Charlotte, who’s always up for a laugh but often works long hours, so professionals preferred. M or F, late 20s to early 30s. Inbox Madeleine or Henry…’), and for them to vet the candidates. And when Henry had said that his cousin (or second cousin, or something) was coming back from a couple of years working abroad and would need somewhere to live, I’d said, ‘Great! That sounds great!’ and dashed off to work, leaving a slice of bread in the toaster that went black and set off the smoke alarm.

‘He’s been in, what, Dubai, was it?’ I said.

‘Iran. His mate Amir has a start-up there, not Uber but like Uber. But it’s launched now, so Adam’s coming home. He’s hoping to find freelance work writing apps, but for now I guess he’s at a bit of a loose end. I haven’t seen him for years but from what I remember he fills the sane, sensible, et cetera, brief, so you won’t have to worry.’

He looked around, picked up his cricket bat and pads from the floor and slung them into the van.

‘Right,’ he said. ‘Looks like we’re good to go. Maddy?’

‘Good to go,’ Maddy said. Then she said, ‘I’ll just have a final check upstairs. Coming, Charlotte?’

I followed her back into our house – or rather, the house that used to be ours, which I’d now be sharing with two total strangers. It looked the same, mostly. The kitchen was only missing Henry’s space-age espresso machine – I’d have to invest in a replacement – and the fancy food mixer Maddy had bought to make cakes in, which I’d definitely have no need of. The living room was much the same as always, only a weird mix of tidy and messy – the rug had been hoovered, but there was dust on the bookshelf where Maddy’s recipe book collection of Ottolenghi, Mary Berry, Deliciously Ella and all the rest had accumulated. The floor had been swept, but there were scuff marks on the walls where Henry had wheeled his bicycle in and out, over and over.

It would be the same in the bathroom, I knew: my stuff all still tidily there in its place; a ring on the counter-top where Henry had kept his wet-shaving kit; a faint smell of Maddy’s peony body lotion in the cabinet. And the bedrooms – the one where they’d slept, and the other, where all Henry’s clobber had been allowed to accumulate, because although the house had three bedrooms, there was only one bathroom and we couldn’t be arsed to get a fourth housemate.

‘I think we’re done,’ Maddy said.

I swallowed the lump in my throat and said, ‘All done. Listen, have an amazing first night in your new home. I’ll miss you guys, but you know how made up I am for you, don’t you?’

‘I know.’

And then the two of us kind of launched ourselves into each other’s arms and had the most massive hug outside the closed, silent doors to their empty rooms.

I didn’t go back downstairs with Maddy. I went and lay on my bed and looked at Tinder for a bit, swiping left and left again until it got too depressing to carry on. I went downstairs and made a gin and tonic and drank it while I considered baking a cod fillet wrapped in foil with herbs in it, like Jamie Oliver does on the telly. But I thought, ‘Sod it,’ and put some frozen chips in the oven and ate them standing at the kitchen counter, looking out as the summer sky slowly darkened from intense blue to slate grey, because it felt too weird to sit down.

Then I walked to the corner shop and bought a tub of Ben & Jerry’s – I didn’t even clock what flavour – and ate that in bed, continuing to stare blankly at my phone.

I’d been single for three years. Three years since I’d realised that although Liam and I still lived together, sharing our flat in Newcastle and kind of vaguely drifting towards marriage and kids, I wanted something more. He was a nice guy. He’d be a good husband and a great dad. But I’d found myself looking at his head next to me on the pillow every morning and spending the few minutes before I had to get up and put the kettle on thinking, Shit. Is this all there is?

I might have kept my head buried firmly in the sand on that one, and let things carry on until we no longer just didn’t love but barely even liked each other, but then two things had happened quite quickly, in the space of about a month. Mum, who’d been single herself for years and years, pretty much since Dad buggered off when I was little, announced that she was moving to Spain. Jim, the bloke she’d started seeing the year before, was a locksmith who’d made such a success of his business that he was able to retire to Alicante, where his daughter lived with her husband and two kids. And Mum was going with him, apparently without so much as a backward glance at me. And then I was offered the job of my dreams in London, and that had given me the spur I needed to make big changes.

Which was all very well, only it seemed like for those whole three years nothing else had actually changed. My life had fallen into a different kind of routine, but it was still a routine: work, nights out with colleagues, work, drinks in the pub with Maddy and later with Maddy and Henry, work, monthly brunches with Maddy’s friends – who’d accepted me into their group without really becoming my own friends – work…

Until now. Now, with Maddy and Henry gone, I realised how empty not just the house, but my whole life felt. Maddy and Henry had each other. I didn’t have anyone. Once again, that question loomed in my mind. Shit. Is this all there is? And more to the point, I hadn’t had so much as a sniff of a shag for over a year.

I scraped the last dregs of Caramel Chew Chew out of the bottom of the tub with my finger and licked it. It left a sticky smear on my phone’s screen when I typed into Google, ‘How to find love, sex and happiness.’

One thing was for sure: I wasn’t the only person searching for this stuff. The internet was full of advice on how to write a Tinder profile that would get my ideal bloke swiping right so fast he practically dislocated his finger; how to harness the energy of the Universe to make my dreams come true; how to get from zero to ‘Ooooh’ in the sack through tantric lovemaking. There was even a local spiritual healer who promised to cast a spell that would make me irresistible to the man of my dreams, for a small fee. Although I was impressed by his SEO skills – the site came up at the top of the second page of my search – I decided to pass on that one.

But right below that was a page I did click on. The title caught my eye straight away: ‘Sorry Not Sorry (a bad girl’s guide to love and sex)’.

The site was simply designed: there was an image of a woman, taken from the back, wearing a swishy red coat and walking over a bridge – Brooklyn Bridge in New York, I guessed it was, because the Manhattan skyline filled the background. I’d always wanted to go to New York, but it had never happened. And if I carried on the way I was, it never would.

There wasn’t much text on the page. It just said, ‘Hi and welcome to Sorry Not Sorry, a series of podcasts I’ve recorded to help single girls – and guys – navigate the choppy waters of dating. I call this a bad girl’s guide to love and sex, even though I have to admit to being a bit more vanilla than I’d like to be, myself. But I want to try and channel that side of me – to tap into my daring, out-there, fun side. And since you clicked on this site, I guess you do, too! But I’m a talker, not a writer, so why not have a listen?’

Okay, Bad Girl, I thought, show me what you’ve got. I scrolled down the page, glancing at the dates on the audio links. They’d all been recorded a while back – the most recent was almost five years old. But dating couldn’t have changed that much in half a decade – even the dating app Bumble had been around almost that long, I told myself. There were loads of links: how to write a killer online profile, dating safety tips and reviews of lingerie and sex toys (‘I’ve tried these so you don’t have to. But you might just want to!’ she wrote). I was feeling about as saucy as my empty ice cream tub, so sexy knickers and vibrators felt a bit advanced for the moment. But one category caught my eye: ‘Take these challenges and set your dating life on fire!’

Even though I didn’t need to, because I was alone in the house, I plugged in my headphones before I pressed play.

Hey girlfriend! Welcome back to Sorry Not Sorry – the bad girl’s guide to love and sex. If this is your first time listening, a huge hello to you and a massive hug to go with it.

If you’re a regular listener, you can tune out for this next bit. Switch your hairdryer on, send a WhatsApp, blend your smoothie, whatever – I’ll see you back in a couple of minutes while I give the newbies a bit of background.

A year or so ago, I decided to document my journey in this series of podcasts. Listeners who’ve been around for a while will have heard me tell about some of my dating adventures – and misadventures; believe me, there were plenty of those. They’ll have been right here with me when I went on that disastrous date with BO Boy – remember him? I sure do. Once smelled, never forgotten. They’ll know what I’m on about when I mention Psycho Man, who – and I am not kidding you – lived in his late mom’s house with all her stuff still right there like her wedding photo in a frame on the wall and even clumps of dead hair in the brush on her dressing table. Not to mention, he expected me to do it in. Her. Actual. Bed. Spoiler: I didn’t. Call the cops, that is. And I didn’t bone him, either.

But listen to me – I’m going way off track! I was meant to be telling you what this new series of podcasts is all about.

I’ve noticed something recently, in my dating life as well as in my personal life. I’ve realised that I’ve kind of got myself into a bit of a rut. So I’ll be setting myself a series of challenges that I hope will inject some adventure back into dating, make it seem less goal-oriented and less of a chore. And, hopefully, make me more fun and more dateable at the same time. What’s not to like about that?

Because, you see, this whole dating journey isn’t just about Mr Right. It’s about you – and me, obviously – discovering ourselves. It’s about enjoying adventures, pushing boundaries, learning more about ourselves. Hell, having amazing orgasms! I want a piece of that. Do you?

You said yes, right? Then why not join me in taking these challenges!

So let’s get started. The first challenge I’ve set myself is a simple one, although it seems like climbing Mount Everest right now…

I guess I fell asleep before the podcast finished, because when I woke up the next morning I still had a headphone in one ear. The speaker wires were tangled around my neck and the empty ice cream carton was next to me on the pillow. My mouth tasted sour and I felt hot, sweaty and quite honestly a bit gross. Sunlight was streaming into my bedroom through the open curtains – that must have been what woke me.

Then I heard a man’s voice, directly under my window. ‘Oliver? Yeah, mate, it’s Tim Gladstone here. I’m at number 65 but I don’t think there’s anyone in.’

Shit. It must have been a knock on the door that had woken me. The tree guy, who Henry had told me to expect. I pulled on a pair of jeans and hurried downstairs in my bare feet.

I opened the door.

‘Sorry, sorry,’ I said. ‘I was…’

‘Having a lie-in,’ the man on the doorstep said, smiling. Fuck. Opening the door to a stranger with yesterday’s make-up still on, my hair unbrushed and morning breath, would have been bad enough if the stranger didn’t look like he’d stepped straight out of a Google image search for ‘hot tradesmen’. He had bright green eyes and floppy, shiny brown hair. There were deep dimples in his cheeks, not quite concealed by a layer of stubble. His high-vis jacket was unzipped, showing what looked like an impressive chest and a full set of ripped abs under a white T-shirt.

‘I’m here from Tim’s Trees,’ he said, and I realised I’d been standing there like a numpty, staring at him. Fortunately, I hadn’t taken my bra off the night before, so although I was highly dishevelled and had quite obviously just woken up, at least my boobs weren’t flopping all over the place under my vest top.

‘Tim’s Trees,’ I parroted.

‘I’m here to take a look at the branch that’s overhanging your neighbour’s roof,’ he said.

‘Overhanging branch,’ I said. ‘Right. Got you. Of course. Er… it’s in the garden.’

The dimples in his cheeks got deeper, and although his lips didn’t move, I realised he was suppressing a smile. Or more likely a hoot of laughter at my stupidity.

‘Right,’ he said. ‘I’ll just get my gear from the van.’

‘Great,’ I replied. ‘I’ll leave the back door open for you. I’ll be down in just a few minutes.’

I legged it upstairs to the bathroom and locked myself in. I turned the shower on full and sat on the edge of the bath, my face in my hands. Surely things couldn’t have got so bad over the past few years that I couldn’t even talk to a good-looking man without stammering and blushing like a twat? Not to mention with yesterday’s ice cream smeared around my mouth. But, I told myself, I talked to good-looking men all the time. Only that was at work, when we were all there for a reason, and weren’t expected to like one another. But this bloke, this Tim, is working, Charlotte, I reminded myself. Now get in the shower, put some clothes on, and go down and flirt with him. Flirt with him? Where the hell had that idea come from? Then I remembered. The Sorry Not Sorry podcast.

Her first challenge, which I must have heard just before I drifted off to sleep: flirt with a stranger. Flirt? What was that again? I literally couldn’t remember the last time I flirted with anyone. Oh, wait – it must have been the summer before last, when I was at the Creamfields festival with Henry and Maddy. We were queuing for ramen noodles when the guy in front of us started chatting to me. I chatted back, our eyes met and then, just as I was thinking, Hold on, is he flirting with me? his girlfriend appeared and chucked a full pint of Pimm’s over his head. Not exactly Romeo and Juliet, was it?

You don’t have to, I told myself. Go on. Fall at the first fence. Or you can woman up and do it. It’s not like you’re ever going to see him again.

So I had a shower and put on a pair of shorts and a different, clean vest top, and looked at myself critically in the mirror. At brunch a few months back, we’d got talking about politics – well, kind of. To be perfectly honest, we were discussing whether it was more likely that Melania Trump or Victoria Beckham would ever be seen to crack a smile. And then Maddy had said, ‘You know, Trump’s daughter Ivanka’s the total spit of you, Charlotte.’

I pointed out that, while Ivanka and I both had straight blonde hair and were somewhat puddingy about the face, she was six foot tall and I was five foot five, and we probably both weighed the same. So if you squashed Ivanka down as if you were tamping coffee, and put the result into cheaper clothes and a Geordie accent, you might get someone who slightly resembled me, only not really. Especially as my father was about as far from being a billionaire as you can get. And now, whenever I looked in the mirror, I wondered whether other people looked at me and thought, My God, she’s like a shorter, chubbier Ivanka Trump only with less good teeth! And you can imagine what that did for my self-esteem.

I followed the whine of what I guessed must be a chainsaw downstairs and out into the blazing sunshine. The paving stones were littered with leaves and twigs, and several smaller branches, but at first I couldn’t see Tim, although I could see Freezer, the neighbour’s white cat, watching from the safety of an upstairs window, looking majorly pissed off. Then the noise stopped and I heard his voice say, ‘I’m up here!’

I don’t know how I’d imagined tree surgeons worked. Ladders, I guess. But he was actually in the tree, right up high, perched astride one of the branches, safety goggles obscuring his face but not making him look any less fit.

‘I’m almost done,’ he shouted down. ‘Then I’ll clear this mess up and be on my way.’

I said, ‘Can I offer you a cup of tea, or something? Something cold? It’s hot today.’

God, you sound like an actress in a bad porno, Charlotte, I thought, cringing. But he didn’t seem to mind.

‘That sounds great,’ he said, switching on his chainsaw again and getting back to work. I stood for a moment and watched him. There was something about him – about a man doing a skilled, physical, dangerous job – that was undeniably sexy. The way his body stayed firm and still, anchored on the branch by the strength of his thighs. The way his face had gone all sort of stern with concentration. The way he seemed entirely unfazed by being several metres above the ground with a bit of kit that could have had his arm off in seconds if he wasn’t careful. Of course, it helped that he was young and hot. I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t have felt the same about a middle-aged, beer-bellied tree surgeon, if they even existed. Perhaps they didn’t. Perhaps they all fell to their death or lopped off a limb or lost their head for heights and retired.

Reluctantly, I stopped watching him and went inside. There were some cans of Diet Coke in the fridge, and a few bottles of beer Henry had left. Presumably . . .