Helen Fielding - Bridget Jones - The Edge of Reason

". . . You would be really lucky."

"All. right, you've said enough," said Mark. "If you don't want me to explain, I won't pester you with phone calls. Goodbye, Bridget."

I replaced the handset, stunned, and looked round at the friends. Sharon was lying on the rug, waving a fag triumphantly in the air and Jude was swigging straight out of the bottle of Chardonnay. Suddenly I had an awful feeling I had made the most terrible mistake.

Ten minutes later the doorbell rang. I ran at it. "Can I come in?" said a muffled man's voice. Mark!

"Of course," I said, relieved, turning to Jude and Shaz saying, "Do you think you could, like, go in the bedroorn?" They were just disgruntledly picking themselves up from the floor when the door to the flat opened, only it wasn't Mark but Tom.

"Bridget! You're looking so thin!" he said. "Oh God." He slumped at the kitchen table. "Oh God. Life is shite, life is a tale told by a cynical . . ."

"Tom," said Shazzer. "We were having a conversation."

"And none of us 'ave seen you for blurry weeks," slurred Jude resentfully.

"A conversation? Not about me? Whatever can it have been about? Oh God - fucking Jerome, fucking, fucking Jerome."

"Jerome?" I said, horrified. "Pretentious Jerome? I thought you'd banished him from your life for ever."

"He left all these messages when I went to San Francisco," said Tom sheepishly. "So we started seeing each other and then tonight I just hinted at us getting back together, well, tried to snog him, and Jerome said, he said . . ." Tom brushed angrily at one eye. "He just didn't fancy me."

There was a stunned silence. Pretentious Jerome had committed a vicious, selfish, unforgivable, ego-destroying crime against all the laws of dating decency.

"I'm not attractive," said Tom despairingly. "I'm a confirmed love pariah."

Instantly we swung into action, Jude grabbing Chardonnay while Shaz put her arm round him and I brought a chair gabbling, "You're not, you're not!"

"Then why did he say that? Why? WHYYYYYYYYY?"

"It'ss perfickly obvious," said Jude, handing him a glass. "Iss because Pretentious Jerome is straight."

"Straight as a die," said Shaz. "I've known that boy wasn't gay since first time I blurry sawim."

"St-.-aight." Jude giggled in agreement. "Straight as a very straight, straight ... penis."

5 a.m. Aaargh. Have just remembered what happened.

5.03 a.m. Why did I do that? Why? Why? Wish could get back to sleep or up.

5.30 a.m. Weird how quickly time goes when you have a hangover. Is because you have so few thoughts: exactly opposite to when people are drowning, entire life flashes past and moment seems to last for ever because they are having so many thoughts.

6 a.m. You see half an hour just went like that, because I did not have any thoughts. Oof. Actually head hurts quite a lot. Oh God. Hope was not sick on coat.

7 a.m. Trouble is, they never tell you what will happen if you drink more than two units a day or, more to point, entire week's worth of alcohol units in one night. Does it mean you will get a magenta face and gnarled nose in manner of gnome, or that you are an alcoholic? But in that case everybody at the party we went on to last night must have been an alcoholic. Except that the only people who weren't drinking were the alcoholics. Hmm.

7.30 a.m. Maybe am pregnant and will have harmed child with alcohol. Oh, though. Cannot be pregnant as just finished period and will never have sex with Mark again. Never. Never.

8 a.m. Worst of it is, being alone in middle of night without anyone to talk to or ask how drunk I was. Keep remembering increasingly hideous things that I said. Oh no. Have just remembered giving beggar 50p who, instead of 'Thank you', said, 'You look really pissed.'

Suddenly also remember childhood mother saying: "There is nothing worse than a woman drunk." Am Yates Wine Lodge-style easy meat gutter floozy. Must go back to sleep.

10.15 a.m. Feel bit better for sleep. Maybe hangover has gone. Think will open curtains. GAAAAAAAAAAAAH! Surely is not natural for sun to be that bloody bright in the morning.

10.30 a.m. Anyway. Am going to gym in a minute and am never going to drink again, therefore is perfect moment to start Scarsdale diet. So actually what happened last night was v.g. because this is start of totally new life. Hurrah! People will say ... Oooh, telephone.

11.15 a.m. Was Shazzer. "Bridge, was I really pissed and awful last night?"

For a moment could not remember her at all. "No, of course not," I said nicely to cheer Shazzer up, as sure if she had been really drunk I would have remembered. I gathered all my courage together and asked, "Was I?" There was silence.

"No, you were lovely, you were really sweet."

There, you see, was just hungover paranoia. Ooh, telephone. Maybe him.

Was my mother.

"Bridget, what on earth are you doing still at home? You're supposed to be here in an hour. Daddy's whizzing the baked Alaska!"

11.30 a.m. Fuck, A fuck. She asked me for lunch on Friday night and was too weak to argue, then too pissed to remember. I can't not go again. Can I? Right. The thing to do is stay calm and eat fruit because the enzymes clear the toxicity and it will be fine. I'll just eat a tiny bit and try not to vomit and then I'll ring Mum back when I've emerged from Land of Indecision.

Pros of Going

Will be able to check that Wellington is being treated in a manner that would not offend Commission for Racial Equality.

Will be able to talk to Dad. Will be good daughter.

Will not have to take on Mum.

Cons of Going

Will have to face torture and torment over Mark/Rebecca incident.

May be sick on table.

Phone again. Had better not be her.

"So how's your head today?" It was Tom. "Fine," I trilled gaily, blushing. Why?" "Well, you were pretty far gone last night." "Shazzer said I wasn't."

"Bridget," said Tom, "Shazzer wasn't there. She went to the Met Bar to meet Simon and from what I gather she was in much the same state as you."

9st 5 (hideous instant fat production after lard-smeared parental Sunday lunch), cigarettes 17 (emergency), incidents during parental lunch suggesting there is any sanity or reality remaining in life 0.

8 a.m. Hangover is at last beginning to clear. Massive relief to be back in own home where am adult lord of castle instead of pawn in other people's games. Decided was no real way out of Mum's lunch yesterday, but all the way up the motorway to Grafton Underwood could feel sick coming up in my throat. Village looked surreally idyllic, trimmed with daffodils, conservatories, ducks etc. and people clipping hedges for all the world as if life were easy and peaceful, disaster had not happened, and there was such a thing as God.

"Oh hello, darlings Hakuna Matata. Just back from the Co-op," mum said bustling me through into the kitchen. "Short of peas! I'm just going to play this answeringphone back,'

Sat down nauseously while the answerphone boomed out, and Mum crashed around turning on gadgets, which ground and screamed in already-painful head.

"Pam," went the answerphone. "Penny here. You know that chap who lives up round the corner from the garage? Well, he's committed suicide because of the noise from the clay-pigeon shooting. It's in the Kettering Examiner. Oh and I meant to say, can Merle put a couple of dozen mince pies in your freezer while they've got the gas board in?"

"Hello, Pam! Margo! On the scrounge! Have you got a six-inch Swiss roll tin I can borrow for Alison's twentyfirst?"

I stared wildly round the kitchen, crazed at the thought of the different worlds that would berevealed by playing back people's answerphone tapes. Maybe someone should do it as an installation at the Saatchi Gallery. Mum was clattering about in the cupboards then dialled a number. "Margo. Pam. I've got a sponge ring tin if that's any good? Well, why don't you use a Yorkshire pudding tin and just line the bottom with a bit of greaseproof paper?"