Bridget Jones: Mad About the Boy

All hell broke loose then. It was like being in heaven, or other, similar paradise. I came and I came and I came, repeatedly, in a tribute to Her Majesty and the training of Her forces, till finally he said, ‘I don’t think I can hold on any longer.’

‘Just go, for it,’ I managed, and finally we both – in a perfect, miraculous, simultaneous explosion of months of desire at the school gates – did.

Afterwards we lay back, panting, exhausted. Then we slept in each other’s arms, then woke and did it again, and again, all night.

At 5 a.m. we had some of Martha’s soup. We huddled by the fire and talked. He told me what had happened in Afghanistan: an accident, a mistaken attack, women, children killed, finding the aftermath. Deciding he’d done his bit and he was through. And this time, I put my arms around him, and stroked his head.

‘I do take your point,’ he murmured.

‘What?’

‘Cuddling. Quite good really.’

He talked about starting at the school. He wanted to be away from the violence, make life simple, be with children and do some good things. He wasn’t prepared for the mothers, though, the competitiveness and the complication. ‘But then one of them was kind enough to show off her thong when stuck up a tree. And I started to think that life could possibly be a bit more fun.’

‘And you like it now?’ I whispered.

‘Yes.’ He started to kiss me again. ‘Oh, yes.’ He was kissing different parts of me between his words. ‘I . . . really . . . definitively . . . conclusively . . . like it now.’

Suffice it to say, when I picked Billy and Mabel up from Bikram’s and Cosmata’s later that day, I was walking with extreme difficulty.

‘Why are you still wearing de chocolatey coat?’ said Mabel.

‘Tell you when you’re grown up,’ I said.

THE OWL

Thursday 12 December 2013

9 p.m. Just put the children to bed. Mabel was staring out of the window. ‘De moon is thtill followin’ us.’

‘Well, the thing is, with the moon—’ I started to explain.

‘And dat owl,’ Mabel interrupted.

I looked out at the snowy garden. The moon was white and full above it. And on the garden wall, the barn owl was back. He stared at me, calm, unblinking. Then this time he spread his wings, looked for a last moment and flew upwards, his wings beating, almost to the beat of my heart, into the winter night and the darkness and its mysteries.

THE YEAR’S PROGRESS

Tuesday 31 December 2013

*Pounds lost 17

*Pounds gained 18

*Twitter followers 797

*Twitter followers lost 793

*Twitter followers gained 794

*Jobs gained 1

*Jobs lost 1

*Texts sent 24,383

*Texts received 24,284 (good)

*Number of screenplay words written 18,000

*Number of words of screenplay rewritten 17,984

*Number of words of screenplay written and put back like were in first place 16,822

*Number of words of texts written 104,569

*People infestered by nits 5

*Total nits extracted 152

*Price per nit of professionally extracted nits £8.59

*Boyfriends lost 1

*Boyfriends gained 2

*Fires in house 4

*Existing children kept intact 2

*Children lost 7 (counting all occasions)

*Children found 7

*Total children 4

OUTCOME

Mr Wallaker – or Scott, as I occasionally call him – and I did not have a wedding, because neither of us wanted to get married again. But we did realize that neither of us had christened our children so decided to make it an excuse for a coming-together party at the big country house. That way, we decided, the children would be covered, like insurance, in case it emerged that the Christian God was the True God, even though both Mr Wallaker and I are slightly Buddhist.