Age, Sex, Location Page 11

  Anyway, you’re probably familiar with the whole ‘pick-up artist’ scene by now. There was a show on MTV about it featuring a guy who looked suspiciously like Kid Rock circa 2003 and who always wore a giant furry top hat. Apparently, this man has slept with thousands of women, a fact that makes me grieve for my gender.

  The Game is probably the best-known of all the pick-up artist books, and The Rules of the Game is the author’s thirty-day step-by-step guide to put you on the road to amateur porn-stardom. Each day gives the reader a new mission with the ultimate objective being to secure a date with a woman. Like a really shitty James Bond.

  The introduction begins by painting a world filled with super-hot women who are behind some sort of locked partition. There are hot women everywhere! In Maxim, on TV, in porn … and yet most men are not having sex with these women! Something has gone terribly wrong. But never fear, because this book is going to provide the key that unlocks unlimited hot lady-goods!

  I don’t want to unlock any lady-goods (I have enough trouble unlocking my own), and I know men are from Mars and women are from Venus and all that, but can pick-up approaches really be that different based on gender? As you know, I am but the tool of science, so I decided to find out.

  7 July

  Day six of The Game and so far I’ve taken several self-assessment tests (results: worrying) and given myself a mission statement (which mirrors the mission statement of this entire project, i.e. to have frequent sex with people of sound mental and physical health).

  I’ve also given myself a mini-makeover, as firmly encouraged by the book. This involved me approaching random guys on the street and asking them to recommend a good clothing store for women; this is one assignment that would presumably be more successful if gender roles were reversed, as I received two recommendations for Ann Summers and one for Isabel Marant. (I’m pretty sure the third fellow I asked wasn’t playing for my team.) I ended up going to Zara and buying a couple of great little shift dresses that could double up for dates and work, as well as a pair of sequined short shorts that I was definitely at least eight years too old to be wearing but couldn’t resist because they were shiny and on the sale rack.

  The book also had me phone up random people in the phone book and ask for movie recommendations, compliment people I saw on the street, and generally pushed me into interacting with strangers far more than I was normally comfortable with.

  I was beginning to see that the book worked on the law of averages: the more people you approach, the more likely it is that you’ll end up having sex with one of them. It also forced you into a hyper-social space: you were putting yourself out there constantly. For someone who desperately avoided small talk and would walk up six flights of stairs rather than get the elevator with another person, it was a challenge.

  But nearly a week in, I was starting to acclimatize. Tonight was the night where I was meant to put all I’d learned into action. It was time to go to a bar.

  As Lucy had fallen down the rabbit hole of new love, stopping into the flat only to collect fresh clothes and wander dazedly around the living room grinning to herself, I recruited a very reluctant Cathryn as my wingman.

  We went to a bar on Dalston Lane that was marked only by an old pharmacy sign from the eighties. Inside, the requisite groups of hipsters congregated, admiring each other’s ironic mullets and Hypercolor T-shirts, but there were also a few groups of normal-looking thirty-something guys.

  Cathryn wasn’t used to venturing further east than Barnsbury, and inspected her surroundings with barely concealed fascination. I imagined it was what Richard Burton must have looked like on his first trip down the Congo.

  ‘What do these people do all day?’ she whispered, gesturing at a man wearing a bowler hat, cravat and knee-length shorts. ‘Do they have jobs?’

  ‘Something based heavily in the theoretical, I imagine. What do you want to drink?’

  We settled down at a table and I explained my mission for the evening: to approach several groups of guys and ‘open’ with them by asking them for their expertise on a subject or situation I was curious about. As there were huge, yawning gaps in my general knowledge, I was spoiled for choice in terms of topics.

  I picked out a group of guys, finished off my vodka tonic and told Cathryn to hang tight: I was going in.

  I sauntered over to their table, trying my best to look nonchalant. This was a key element of the approach: to make it look as though the approach was an afterthought rather than a specific intention. The guys appeared to be in the middle of an in-depth discussion about the Bundesliga, but I forged on regardless.

  I launched straight into my opener. ‘Hey, you guys look like experts. Can you help settle a bet between my friend and me?’ I gestured over towards Cathryn, who did an embarrassed little wave.

  The three of them looked up at me in confusion, but after a few seconds a scruffy blond wearing a Stone Roses T-shirt smiled and said, ‘Sure, we’ll give it a try.’

  ‘Great,’ I said. ‘How were the pyramids built? I think it was through a pulley system, but my friend over there swears by the lever and fulcrum.’

  Silence fell on the table for several beats, until the stocky guy at the end of the table spoke. ‘Actually, I don’t think either were used. Slaves just pulled everything by hand.’

  The blond man piped up. ‘Come on, there’s no way people could have pulled those blocks by hand! How could they stack them on top of each other? They would have to have used pulleys.’

  ‘I think you’re underestimating how many slaves there were in Egypt,’ the stocky one said.

  ‘Can you even define those people as slaves, though?’ the bearded man chipped in from the corner. ‘At that point, Egypt didn’t have a currency system, so there was no way to compensate the workers monetarily.’

  ‘Yes, you would most certainly call it slavery. Haven’t you read the Old Testament? Moses didn’t lead them through the desert for the hell of it.’ The stocky man looked angry.

  The bearded man folded his arms in front of his chest. ‘Here we go again.’

  ‘Well, I’m sorry, but that sort of revisionist history is utter nonsense.’

  The bearded one and the stocky one seethed at each other across the table.

  ‘Sooooo,’ I said, ‘you guys are thinking pulleys?’

  The two men ignored me while the blond one looked up with a weary smile. ‘Sorry, it doesn’t look like we’re much use. You should probably just google it.’

  ‘Yeah, good idea. Thanks anyway!’ I said brightly as I made my way back to the table. When I sat down, I saw that the blond had gone out for a cigarette and the stocky one and the Beard were locked into an intense discussion.

  ‘How did it go?’ Cathryn asked, looking up from her book.

  ‘Not really as I’d planned. I thought asking about ancient building techniques was non-controversial, but apparently not.’

  ‘You asked them about ancient building techniques? What on earth were you thinking?’

  ‘The book said I could open with any topic I was curious about, and I’ve always been curious about how the pyramids were built.’

  ‘Oh, Lauren,’ Cathryn muttered.

  ‘Well, it did spark off a lively debate. Just not one that included me.’

  ‘Perhaps you should try something more general next time?’

  ‘You’re right. Okay, round two.’ I spied a group of men in their mid-thirties from across the room, all wearing expensive-looking cardigans and drinking expensive-looking bottles of wine, and started to get up from my seat.

  Cathryn rolled her eyes. ‘You know, this isn’t exactly a scream for me, reading my book alone in the middle of this strange bar.’

  ‘I know, I’m sorry and I promise I’ll buy you dinner after this. But I’ve got to do my homework first.’

  ‘What’s it this time? Asking about the Israeli–Palestinian conflict?’

  ‘Nah, I’m going to ask a very guy-friendly pop culture question. Should be easy.
’

  Cathryn picked her book up off the table. ‘Bonne chance,’ she said. I don’t think she meant it.

  I walked up to the group of wine drinkers and picked out the best-looking of the bunch: rangy, dark-haired and green-eyed. ‘Hi!’ I said brightly. ‘I need your help with something.’

  He looked up at me with an air of mild impatience while the rest of his friends continued their conversation, oblivious. ‘How can I help?’

  ‘My friend and I were talking about eighties TV, and we were trying to remember the full cast of The A-Team. We can remember Mr T as B. A. Baracus and Dirk Benedict as Face, but we’re totally stuck on the other two.’

  His expression changed from impatient to bemused tolerance. He gestured at the other guys sat around the table. ‘We all work in TV, so I’m sure we can help. Hey, lads, we’ve got a question here that needs answering.’

  The rest of the group fell silent and looked up at me in surprise, as though I had suddenly materialized out of a genie bottle.

  ‘This woman was wondering about the cast of The A-Team.’

  A shortish man with glasses called out from the end of the table. ‘Film or television?’

  The green-eyed man looked mildly disgusted. ‘Television, of course. She and her friend can remember Mr T’ – there was a snicker of derision from the sandy-haired man to his left – ‘and Dirk Benedict.’

  ‘So we’re talking the series, not the pilot,’ the bespectacled man said. ‘Because obviously Tim Dunigan was the original Faceman.’

  The green-eyed man nodded. ‘Yes, that’s right. So there’s James Coburn as Hannibal, and –’

  The bespectacled man looked like he was going to punch through the nearest window. ‘What are you on about, mate? Coburn wasn’t in The A-Team! He was in The Magnificent Seven! Peppard was Hannibal!’

  The green-eyed man looked calmly smug. ‘No, Brian, he was not. It was definitely Coburn.’

  The sandy-haired man sat back in his seat. ‘You’re both wrong. It was Robert Vaughn.’

  The bespectacled man looked like he was going to spit nails. ‘Fuck off, the pair of you! It was Peppard!’

  The sandy-haired man and the green-eyed man looked at each other and shrugged.

  ‘Seriously, lads, I should know. I wrote a whole fucking thesis on the postmodernization of Peppard for my media studies course.’

  The green-eyed man nodded imperceptibly. ‘Fine, Peppard. So that’s one.’

  ‘Thank you,’ I said, very quietly.

  ‘So the real question is, who played Murdock?’

  The table descended into chaos once again. I stood there awkwardly for a moment, occasionally trying to offer my own thoughts on the matter, but it quickly became apparent that I was effectively invisible; they were too immersed in shouting eighties TV star names. I was beginning to realize that guy-talk was a very different beast, in that it involved a lot more outward aggression (as opposed to the passive aggression often found in girl-talk).

  I mumbled my thanks and they barely glanced up as I made my way back to Cathryn.

  ‘That looked lively,’ she said as she folded down the page of her book.

  ‘Apparently The A-Team is actually more controversial than the Egyptian slavery issue.’

  ‘Men will find any excuse for a debate. It’s how they express affection to their friends – by berating them for their opinions.’

  I heard a loud noise erupt from across the room and glanced over to see the bespectacled man shaking the sandy-haired man by the shoulders. ‘Apparently so.’

  ‘Can we go now? I’m starving.’ Cathryn was in a perpetual state of self-proclaimed starvation, and yet she could pack away more food than anyone else I knew – and never seemed to gain a pound. I assumed it was something to do with genetics, like the whole flawless ponytail thing.

  ‘Soon, I promise. I’ve got to approach one more table, and then we can go.’

  ‘Are you quite sure you want to risk another go?’

  ‘A scientist’s work is never done,’ I said.

  I decided to try a scenario straight from the book (with slight tweaks to make it gender appropriate). It was called something like the ‘curious girlfriend’ opener. Here’s how it works: the guy approaches a group of women and asks for their opinion on a situation his buddy is currently going through. He and his girlfriend have been together for six months and everything’s going great, but there’s one snag: she just loooooooves making out with girls. Can’t get enough of it. She doesn’t see it as cheating, but her boyfriend does. The guy making the opener is then meant to canvass the opinions of the women in the group: is hot pseudo-lesbian action cheating or not?

  This scenario sounds more like something in the ‘Letters to the Editor’ section of Penthouse than a way to approach women, but what did I know. I was about to find out how a bunch of men would react.

  I picked two hipster-types who were monopolizing the juke-box. There was one in particular I had my eye on: sleepy-eyed and slim with a mop of curly chocolate-brown hair and wearing an excellent pair of thin-whale cords. Last chance of the evening: I needed to make it count.

  I made my way over to them, avoiding the eye of the bespectacled man as he poked furiously at the sandy-haired man while staring at his iPhone.

  I put a smile on my face and tapped the sleepy-eyed hipster on the shoulder. ‘Can I trouble you guys for a quick opinion poll?’

  He looked up at me and grinned, revealing a row of small, even teeth. ‘Sure.’

  It was going well already.

  ‘Great, thanks. See my friend over there?’ I gestured towards Cathryn, who had nearly finished her book and was gazing longingly at the door.

  ‘The brunette? She’s a fox,’ said the man next to him, who was wearing a seventies aviator jacket and jeans so tight I worried for his testicles.

  ‘Yep, that’s her. So she has this problem. She and her boyfriend have been seeing each other for a while now – about six months – and everything’s going well’ – the aviator’s attention demonstrably waned – ‘except for this one issue. You see, she’s kind of into women. She doesn’t want a relationship with one, but she does like to make out with them sometimes.’

  The aviator perked up. ‘Man, that’s some Girls Gone Wild shit.’

  ‘I know, right? Anyway, her fiancé hates it. He gets really jealous and feels like she’s cheating on him’ – the aviator scoffed loudly – ‘but she doesn’t think it’s cheating and she doesn’t want to stop doing it because it’s a side of her that she doesn’t want to give up.’

  The sleepy-eyed guy nodded sagely.

  ‘So what do you guys think? Is it cheating or not?’

  The aviator rolled his eyes. ‘I have a more important question: why is she staying with a loser who doesn’t appreciate how close he is to a threesome?’

  ‘Yes, well, I guess that’s a separate issue.’

  Sleepy Eyes shrugged. ‘I dunno. Seems like cheating to me.’

  The aviator slapped his forehead in disbelief. ‘Mate, what are you on about? His girlfriend is basically every man’s fantasy, and he’s acting like a wanker,’ he said, rising from his chair. ‘I’m going to have a word with your friend myself. You two are talking bollocks and she needs someone to lean on in her time of need.’

  I threw myself in front of him. ‘No! She’d be mortified. She’s actually a very private person.’

  The aviator tried to move past me. ‘She doesn’t sound all that private to me.’

  ‘Just leave it, mate,’ Sleepy Eyes said. He was a man of few words, but so far I liked all of them.

  The aviator sat back down and started to pick the label off his bottle of beer, grumbling under his breath.

  ‘Well, I’ll get out of your hair. Thanks for your help!’

  ‘No problem,’ Sleepy Eyes said. ‘Come back over here if you get bored.’

  ‘Will do!’

  ‘Bring your friend!’ the aviator called as I scurried back to the table.

&nb
sp; Cathryn gave me a long-suffering look. ‘How did it go?’

  ‘Better.’ I took a long sip from my drink. ‘Not great, but better.’

  ‘What was the opener this time?’

  ‘Oh, just a theoretical question about a friend.’

  ‘Nothing controversial then?’

  ‘Oh no,’ I said. ‘I kept it as vanilla as possible.’ I looked anxiously over at the aviator, who was openly leering at Cathryn. ‘Let’s get out of here. Do you want to get dinner? We could go to the Turkish place around the corner?’

  ‘Yes please – I’ll eat anything at this point.’

  We collected our things and made our way to the door. I felt the eyes of several of the men I’d spoken with give me a quick glance, but most of them were too engrossed in their own conversations to notice.

  Except for Sleepy Eyes, who nodded at me as I passed by.

  ‘You leaving?’ he drawled.

  ‘Yep, we’re off. Thanks again for the advice.’ I glanced nervously at Cathryn, who was just out of earshot. ‘I think it helped.’

  ‘Anytime. Hey, my band is playing this gig at the Old Blue Last next Thursday. You should check it out.’

  My stomach flipped but I tried to look nonchalant. ‘Sure, cool. That would be cool. Maybe. I’ll check what I’ve got on. Busy schedule. Busy.’ I could feel my cheeks reddening.

  His mouth curled into a slow, languorous grin. ‘Cool. See you around. Maybe.’

  I turned to see Cathryn being harangued by the aviator.

  ‘I told you that I’m engaged!’ she said, pulling her hand away and brushing it down the side of her pristine linen dress.

  ‘But he doesn’t understand you!’ The aviator looked desperate. ‘I’m telling you, love, he’s stifling you! I’d let you be free!’

  ‘C’mon,’ I said, grabbing Cathryn’s hand and pulling her towards the door. ‘Let’s get out of here.’

  ‘Lauren, what on earth was that man talking about?’ she said as we tumbled out onto Kingsland Road.

  ‘Fucked if I know. I think he was on drugs. Lots of people around here are on drugs. Lots of drugs.’

  Cathryn looked at the group of steampunks across the street and recoiled slightly. ‘Mmm. Yes, that must have been it. What an odd place.’