Lindsey Kelk - One in a Million - The no 1 bestseller and the perfect romance for autumn 2018

Carefully placing my laptop bag on top of the second-hand dresser I’d wedged in the space by the front door, I turned on the kettle before taking one giant leap from the kitchen into the bedroom and stripping off my clothes. More wine would not make me feel better. This was a night for tea. Besides, I told myself, I had nothing to feel bad about, other than the bag full of dry cleaning I’d been meaning to drop off for almost six months.

The front of my built-in wardrobe was mirrored from floor to ceiling, meaning at least once a day I had to give myself an all-over once-over. No matter how many body positivity videos I watched, I still preferred not to stare at my backside for too long. Objectively, I knew this was not a worst-case scenario situation; I liked my hair when it didn’t frizz, I liked my legs and thanks to a thirty-day plank challenge, I felt strong in the middle, if not especially skinny. And who wanted to be skinny these days, anyway? Being able to see your ribs was so 2015.

‘I’m happy for him,’ I told Mirror Annie. ‘Because I am a whole and complete person who only wishes joy for everyone in the universe.’

Mirror Annie frowned.

‘Fuck it,’ I muttered. ‘I hope he trips down the stairs and breaks both his legs.’

Yep, that was better.

Sometimes I wondered what would happen if my flat ever made it on to Through the Keyhole . Who would live in a house like this? A smart, small newbuild on the outside, the hoarder-like tendencies of a Deliveroo addict on the inside. The many devices covering every available surface suggested it could be the kind of professional troll who thought Piers Morgan talked a lot of sense. The endless polystyrene cartons and pizza boxes suggested someone who didn’t know how to turn on an oven. So far, so slightly worrying; very single middle-aged shut-in. But the lack of porn and huge stack of online shopping packages to be dropped off at the post office was a real curve ball. I’d lost count of the number of times I’d ordered something from ASOS only to realize, when it arrived twenty-four hours later, that I’d already ordered and returned the exact same thing a month earlier.

I plugged my phone into its charging dock, turned on the tiny TV in the bedroom and fired up my iPad, all while the kettle boiled. Time for one last circle around the socials to make sure everything was good and well with our clients. The influencers, the style vloggers, Fitspo and BoPo specialists, gamers and the mummy, travel and beauty bloggers, we worked with all of them. I’d learned more about different walks of life in this job than I could have ever come across in any other profession, whether it was how to apply perfect winged liner, where to stay on the island of Vanuatu or how to improve your vertical reach in Street Fighter V . Not all of my newly acquired knowledge had proved helpful yet, but who was to say when I might find myself invited to a formal video game competition in the middle of the Pacific Ocean?

As far as I could tell, all was right with the world of social media. Or at least, as all right as it ever would be, I was good at my job but I wasn’t a miracle worker. I carefully avoided my own pages. Even with all the filters and blocks and mutes I’d put on Matthew’s name, there was still too great a chance of seeing their happy, shining faces, and I didn’t want to give myself nightmares. With a fresh mug of tea and the last three broken Hobnobs in the packet, I retreated to my bedroom. My safe, beautiful, man-free bedroom. It was wonderful, not having to explain my every move to someone the way I had when I was with Matthew. I loved not having to justify another late night at work or an after-hours cocktail. I loved eating biscuits for dinner, scheduling my own weekends and never finding softcore porn in my Netflix queue. I loved my life. Would it be nice to occasionally have someone to snuggle up to while I yelled at the TV during Question Time ? Maybe. Would it be nice to have a second pair of hands to help bring the shopping back from the supermarket? Of course it would. And yes, perhaps an actual living, breathing man might beat creating a nest of pillows in the middle of the night once in a while, but I was very much of the opinion what was meant to be would be. My life was full and fun and I was happy. Something I couldn’t always say when I was with Matthew.

Munching the last of my crumbly dinner, I turned off the TV and turned on my podcast app. Behind the Scenes had an interview with Mark Ruffalo. Maybe if I listened to it as I fell asleep, I could trick my brain into dreaming he was my boyfriend.

Because that was the behaviour of a perfectly happy, single thirty-one-year-old.

Wasn’t it?

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