Perfect Match: a laugh-out-loud romantic comedy you won’t want to miss! - Zoe May

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way I’m going to be able to get out of this conversation. Give her two more minutes and she’ll be asking to see Chris’s profile. Sandra always wants to see my dates’ profiles, even if I have no intention of ever seeing them again. I think it’s almost like porn to her.

      ‘Oh yes, a cup of tea would be lovely. The usual.’ Sandra smiles, handing me her mug – a customised one she ordered online featuring a picture of her hamster, Betsy.

      ‘Thanks.’ I take the mug and hurry out the office, down the corridor to the kitchen, where I savour the sweet relief of silence.

      I fill the kettle and check my phone while it boils. Twelve new messages from Dream Dates and it’s only 9.45 a.m. Fuzzy fragments from last night filter back into my mind. The face of Robert Pattinson with the body of Daniel Craig. Must have a cat. I feel my cheeks redden suddenly. Oh my God. The penis specifications. Bugger! What if someone at work spots my profile and HR calls me in? What if this goes on my record? I’ll be known as the Girl Who Advertised for Sex Online or Penis Girl. I’ll never get a reference again. Oh no! I search around on the site, looking for the deactivation button, but like on all dating sites, it’s as hidden as humanly possible. Messages start pinging into my account. No doubt all the weirdo men trawling the site can see that I’m online.

      Sunjil1964: Hello dear, I like your profile. Me? I look for wife. We meet? X

      Timster: Hi Sophia,

      I’m a little tired having just flown in from Singapore but I saw your profile and wanted to send you a message seeing as you like men who travel like myself. Not many women can handle my schedule, among other things ;)

      Tim xx

      PC34C: Hi Sophia, my name is Omar and I am creative I work in the video games industry as a software engineer I also like animals I used to have a cat but he died then I had another cat but he also died that was when I decided to stop adopting animals. I like to get to know you more.

      Tattoos_and_bass: Roses are red, Violets are blue, Can I stick a finger up your bum hole?

      RichyRich: Hi Sophia, You would look great in my cage. Rich

      Bobhot4u: Hallo Sophia ;)

      My name’s Bob. I’m kind and I enjoy life to the fullest. I’m just looking for woman to make it more interesting and worth living.

       xox. Bob

      Markeyboi88: Hey babe, If I flip a coin, what are the chances I’ll get head?

      Ali_Jaff: I feel some kind of ticklish in my belly as I saw your pic and I can stop looking at it. :)

      I was assuming what if I was lucky someday to meet you up I will be a happy like little Charlie in chocolate factory. ;)

      But don’t know if I ever get a reply from you as I believe it’s not mandatory that you reply me and fact is you can only see the moon but never touch moon and appreciate its sweetness but never get a reply let’s see what happen. :)

      Jimbo_9: Hi Sophia, I don’t have the body of Daniel Craig, more like James Corden, but I do have an eight-inch cock. Take a look if you don’t believe me!

      Without thinking, I scroll down to reveal a close-up shot of an engorged veiny penis protruding from a generous mound of ginger pubes and automatically eject my phone from my hand. It crashes to the kitchen floor.

      ‘Are you all right?’ Sandra’s head pops around the door. ‘I heard a sort of yelping sound,’ she remarks.

      ‘Yes! Yes! I’m fine! Totally fine! Just dropped my phone.’ I dive down to the ground and grab it, thankful that it’s landed screen down. The last thing I need this morning is for my workmates to think I’m looking at porn in the staff kitchen. I stash it in my trouser pocket.

      ‘Are you sure you’re all right? You look a little…’

      ‘It’s nothing! Just making tea. It’s nothing!’ I shriek, opening the cutlery draw and rummaging around for a spoon.

      ‘Do you need a hand?’ Sandra asks.

      ‘No! Nope. I’m fine!’ I insist.

      ‘Okay, then,’ Sandra relents, giving me a weird look as she closes the door.

      I’m going to kill Kate. What kind of site is this? Dream Dates. More like Nightmare Nutjobs. I can’t wipe the image of that penis from my mind. It’s there as I stir the tea. As I pour in the milk. As I spoon in the sugar. It’s going to be for ever burned on my retinas.

      I take the mugs of tea and head back into the office, handing Sandra her mug as I walk to my desk. She takes a sip and her eyes bulge.

      ‘Bit sugary, Sophia!’ She winces, as if she’s swallowing poison. ‘Surely this isn’t the usual one and a half teaspoons?’

      ‘Something like that.’ I shrug. I have a vague memory of brandishing a teaspoon around, sugar grains flying about, the image of an eight-inch penis attached to James Cordenesque thighs throbbing in my brain. ‘Sorry, Sandra.’

      ‘No problem.’ She takes another tentative sip before faking a smile.

      I sit down in front of my computer, wondering whether I can log on to Dream Dates without anyone noticing. I need to delete that profile. I’m about to type in the web address when I see Ted, my boss, walking over to my desk. As usual, he’s wearing a suit that’s three sizes too big. It would make him look like a child dressing up in his dad’s clothes if it wasn’t for the greying hair dusted with dandruff, which is a bit of a giveaway.

      ‘Need you to proofread this, Sophia,’ he says, plonking a document in front of me. I pick it up tentatively, appraising the title: A Study of Catheter-associated Urinary Tract Infections. I arrange my features into an agreeable expression.

      ‘Of course, thanks Ted.’ I smile politely. ‘It looks great,’ I add for extra measure, although that might be taking it too far.

      Ted clutches the side of my desk and leans against it in a pained attempt at nonchalance.

      ‘Nice day, isn’t it?’ he observes, gazing out of the window. The September sky is shrouded in clouds, although the sun is peeking out between a few of them. It’s a fairly ordinary-looking day as far as I can tell, but Ted gazes towards the horizon, bewitched.

      ‘Yes, lovely!’ I enthuse.

      ‘Heading to an open-air cinema event later, hopefully it doesn’t rain!’ Ted says.

      ‘Hopefully!’

      Poor Ted. He tries so hard to be cool but it never quite works out for him. He subscribes to Time Out’s mailing list and he’s always banging on about this or that up-and-coming burger place or Shoreditch’s cat café, and he absolutely loves outdoor cinema nights in random run-down locations. But even though he may have done every gimmicky thing there is to do in London, he’ll still never be trendy. Ted’s another long-term singleton. I wonder what his username would be if he did online dating… Probably something really creepy like YourSpecialTeddy. Repressing a shudder, I push the thought out of my mind.

      ‘Anyway.’ Ted peels his clammy hand from my desk. ‘I need the paper to be done by the end of the day and it’s got to be spot on. You know what the infections lot are like.’ He pulls a face.

      ‘Okay, sure. No problem!’ I add, a little too brightly as he wanders off.

      I read the first sentence: ‘Catheter-associated urinary tract infections (CAUTI) are one of the most commonly occurring healthcare associated infections, Urinary Catheters can frequntly become colonised with micro-bacteria; but most do not lead to infection.’ I rearrange the sentence, adding a full stop and a dash, removing unnecessary capitals and semicolons and correcting ‘frequntly’. It ends up vaguely readable, but still, one sentence in and I’ve

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