Reason 5 – they are not very discreet

I grew up in a relatively small town where everyone knew not only everyone else, but their business also. This was never of huge concern to me as I had the same partner for over seven years and we had moved from the small town to a larger city in search of glittering careers. Like all good things this relationship eventually came to an end, but my ex-partner and I stayed on fairly good terms. After the initial post-break-up mourning period, I was ready to get back up on the horse and so, ventured out in the larger city with a group of old girlfriends – all of whom had moved, like myself from the same smaller town. There was a fairly large group of us, gathering for a friend’s birthday and like all good newly single girls, I imbibed in probably one too many glasses of champagne. I got chatting to a gentleman (Andy (aka Reason 5 – so obviously not actually a gentleman)) and after I had decided that I was mere seconds off turning into a pumpkin, he, chivalrous thing that he was, offered to see me into a cab. It will come as a surprise to very few that we exchanged phone numbers and saliva on the footpath outside the bar that my friends were in, much to the delight of the crowd that gathered at the windows to cheer and whoop in delight at our two or three minute interlude. The next morning, I woke with a raging hangover, and a slight feeling of guilt concerning my ex-boyfriend. But, I consoled myself, we were no longer a couple, and it was no longer his business as to what I got up to on drunken nights out with other friends.

It wasn’t until a few hours later, guilt having subsided, but hangover still fully intact, that the ex rang, asking what I thought I was doing with someone like Andy. “Huh?” was the only articulate sentence I could offer. My ex-boyfriend then explained that he knew Andy very well indeed, because when they had worked in the same industry in our hometown, he had been notorious for emailing all of his associates with gory and intimate details of his actions with random members of the fairer sex. Apparently, his emails were quite infamous. The ex was upset and explained to me (in no uncertain terms) his opinions of my kissing compadre and myself. I sat on the end of the phone, nursing my head, taking it all in, but the bombshell was dropped when my ex told me that Reason 5 was also living with his girlfriend – she just happened to be out of town this weekend. I gently explained that I had to go and hung up.

Five years in the wilderness of couple-dom and my first foray back into the single realm was with a cheating man who could very well email a lot of people I know with tales of drunken kisses on the footpath outside of a bar. I couldn’t have imagined a worse welcome back to singleness if I had tried.

I duly avoided Andy’s calls when they came and made a few excuses to elude him. I am honest enough to admit that he was certainly not the most persistent man in the universe. What had become of his girlfriend, I didn’t ever ask, but I had since heard on the grapevine that their love had died.

After a few more months, I moved back to my afore-mentioned hometown, to take up my dream job and be nearer my family. Not long after returning home, I met my current partner, and again, due to the size (small!) of our hometown, my new partner knew both my ex, and the notorious Andy, through work and mutual friends. I suppose that word got back to the city on the illustrious grapevines that all small towns grow so fertilely, that my new partner and I were together, but imagine my surprise when I got to work one day, to see in my inbox an email awaiting my attention. It was from Andy. I was intrigued.

Even after our brief interlude I had not received any emails. I clicked to open it, interested to see what the title “Slops” meant. Imagine my horror when I opened the email to find a picture of myself, kissing Andy, from all of those months before. Someone had obviously had a camera out in force that night, and as could probably be imagined, the photo was as flattering as it could only have been after a good few solid hours of champagne drinking. Worse still, was the note accompanying the photo, which was addressed, firstly, to my current partner, secondly, to my ex-boyfriend who had already been crushed by the initial fact, and thirdly to somewhere between forty and fifty others ranging from close friends to people I had never even heard of.

And the text with the unattractive photo read: “Hey mate. Just so you know that you’ve got my slops. Never forget that I got in there first.” Andy was an absolute charmer – in case I had ever had any doubt. And even if it was only a kiss on the footpath at three o’clock in the morning, I certainly won’t be forgetting Reason 5 in a hurry.