One Chance by Paul Potts

Author:Paul Potts [Potts, Paul; Cowell Simon]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781602862296
Publisher: Weinstein Publishing

CHAPTER NINE

Looking for Love

WHENEVER I WENT to the Horn and Trumpet for a few drinks, the chat would often turn to the normal discussions young men have. The Horn and Trumpet was a typical British pub of the time: a lively, noisy bar, with a smell of cigarettes that assaulted the senses in the years before the smoking ban. We’d sit there talking, and it never took long for the subject of girls to come up.

It was almost a decade after Allison before I had another girlfriend. Despite having some female friends at university, the relationships never progressed any further, although I did give one very tall blonde a Valentine’s card through the university postal system. She told me that she didn’t like me “that way.” I had heard this many times and just assumed I was unattractive.

The discussions at the pub would get quite raucous, and on one particular Sunday we went round the table asking people when they had lost their virginity. Most of them said at varying times in their teens. I was honest.

“I’m still a virgin!” I said.

The whole bar seemed to go quiet, as if everyone in the pub had heard what I’d said.

“You don’t admit to things like that!” one of the group said.

I shrugged my shoulders. I didn’t see the point in lying about it; there was nothing to gain. It was just bragging rights. My lack of social skills was showing again, but I genuinely saw no reason to feel ashamed. I was what I was. I’d got by thus far, not measuring myself by other people’s standards.

I remained hopeless around girls. From time to time I was approached, but I wasn’t able to recognise the signs of a girl liking me, and so I didn’t respond in any way, ignoring their advances. If I was given a girl’s number by one of the guys in the group, I would just assume they were winding me up. After all, who would be interested in me?

As I reached the end of my twenties, my luck with girls slowly started to change. In between the trips to Barcelona and Rimini, I took part in Bath Spa University’s production of Mozart’s Magic Flute, playing the role of Monostatos.

The performances went well, and my strength surprised two burly rugby players who were to drag me offstage as part of the action. Things got even better for me when it came to the last-night party. I got chatting to a slim, pretty girl named Elizabeth, one of the viola players in the orchestra. She was quite shy, like me, and we hit it off very well. We chatted, and she told me she liked my eyes. We arranged to meet a few days later, and it soon became clear that I would be cycling to Bath even more.

Right from the start my father was unhappy about our relationship, even though he’d never met Liz. I would stay at her place, and we went together to Portsmouth to see my brother John and his then long-term girlfriend.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.