Jeremy Clarke’s heartbreak and A.L. Kennedy’s dislike of dates

A.L. Kennedy
Novelist

I dislike dates. It’s either a yes, or a no. Why date? Sadly, I am both bad at reading the signals which indicate the outbreak of a date and attractive to people who are bad at signals. This means that I end up — often in coffee shops — with a variety of men who suddenly exhibit enthusiasms I cannot return. Among these gentlemen would be the portly chap in Day-Glo cycle shorts, the man who brought an ugly plant with him, the man who cried, the man who talked unendingly about the rows he used to have with his last girlfriend, the man who sat next to me, miserably unable to speak at all, and the man who got crawling-drunk and then confessed something, mumbly, before hiding in his hotel room for a day. And then there was the man who gave a brief — but not brief enough — summary of the actions involved in coitus before suggesting we try it.