I recently posted the following facebook status:
'Saw the poster for 'How to be Single' and dismissed it as another uninteresting chick flick. Then I noticed it stars Alison Brie.
On a scale on 1 - 10 how sad would it be for a 27 year old man to go and see a chick flick alone purely because Alison Brie is in it? Because it's on the cards...'
The resulting replies were a consensus that I should in fact go and see 'How To Be Single' alone, so I will.
The main obstacle facing me is the crippling social awkwardness of being a large, long-haired bearded man looking a member of the cinema staff in a eye and asking for a single ticket to see a film called 'How To Be Single.' This is further compounded by my underlying social anxiety problem which makes even exchanging pleasantries with strangers cripplingly difficult without the benefit of having previously ingested the entire contents of a small bar. All is not lost, however, as I have faced similar difficulties and prevailed.
An ex-girlfriend of mine once told me she'd always wanted to try a Rampant Rabbit so we agreed we would acquire one for her. Or rather, she agreed I would go into Anne Summers alone after work one day and acquire one for her on the way home. Judgemental retail employees be damned.
There were several ways I could have approached this. My natural instinct was to slink in, eyes on the floor and sort of wander through the top floor of lingerie trying not to make eye contact with anyone, pray that the basement floor where all the sex toys was would be empty and ask the lady at the til for help and hope she would feel sorry for me in that 'clueless boyfriend' kind of way.
Unfortunately I am just shy of six feet tall, broad shouldered and bearded, and there is no way I could possibly look inconspicuous walking into a sex shop in the centre of Manchester wearing a suit and a large black coat at five o'clock on a Tuesday afternoon. I imagine the figure I would have cut embracing the awkwardness whilst staring intently at a wall full of dildoes would have been less 'clueless boyfriend' and more 'registered sex offender.'
That left me with option 2; fucking own this. Muster up all the pretend confidence I have and just get shit done like a boss. So I did.
At approximately 17:15 I strode purposefully into the ground floor of the Anne Summers located just outside the Manchester Arndale centre into what I can only describe as a forest of lingerie in pretty much every combination or black, pink, red and purple you can imagine. The two ladies working the til immediately turned to stare at me, so I have them 'the nod', that slight acknowledgement you give someone when you've got shit to do, and ladies, I do not have time to get bogged down in your sales bullshit and half-hearted offers of assistance. I am on a mission. I am here to purchase a Rampant Rabbit and pretend I'm not going to have a minor breakdown, and I am too hyped up on terror-fueled adrenaline to have a breakdown right now.
I stomped across the floor of the shop to assert my dominance which I believe frightened a small middle aged women inspecting of the racks of assorted lace and handcuffs. I wasn't entirely sure where the stairs to the basement were so I just kind of stomped in the vague direction of the back of the shop and prayed they weren't right next to the entrance and that I wouldn't have to turn around and stomp back and try and play the whole thing off as intentional by pretending to look at some fluffy handcuffs or something for a minute before giving the staff 'the nod' again on the way back.
Fortunately my unerring sense of direction led me true and the stairs were in the exact corner I was praying they would be in.
I'm honestly not sure how to employ mere words to describe the basement of Anne Summers. Not just how it looked but how it made me feel; isolated, alone, adrift in a sea of latex and anal beads. For one brief moment I yearned for the gaudy lace forest of the floor above, the outside world just a fading memory as the sensorary tidalwave of unbridled femininity crashed over my unprepared mind. But I was not to be stopped.
Anne Summers keep their sex toys in a kind of self contained circular shelving unit at the far end of the basement. When you stand inside it you're not just looking at a single wall of rubber replicas of male genetalia, whichever way you turn they are right there, looking back at you. Mocking you. Judging you. Shaking their engorged heads at your confusion.
I made a bee-line directly for the circle of rubber cocks, again making brief eye contact with the lady on the downstairs til in the hope that I would know like a man who knew exactly what he was doing, which on reflection probably wasn't really what I wanted to go for in this particular situation. What I wasn't prepared for was that there would be a woman already stood browsing in the circle. I can tell you from her swift retreat that she was probably not prepared for a large bearded man to stride into the circle, stand right next to her and start looking the Rampant Rabbit section up and down whilst stroking his beard in a way that I hope came across as 'thoughtful' and not 'eager'.
There was no 'The Bendy One.' Shit. I began picking up and inspecting the various boxes for one that sounded like it could be something like a 'The Bendy One.' This is rookie shopping error 101 but by God I had a mission and dammit people were counting on me so I found one that I figured was more or less the same. Not having a vagina I am not 100% sure on how the various features differ but I figure a spade is a spade; you can paint it different colours and made it vibrate but you're still just going to dig a hole.
Making the purchase would involve verbal contact with the woman at the til. This was the bit I had been dreading but I had decided I was going to own this so I started by trying to make confident eye contact as I slapped the large and not particularly discrete box on the counter.
'Hi,' I began, assertively, 'I was told to get The Bendy One, is this more or less the same thing?'
Flustered and clearly impressed by my confident and direct demeanour, and definitely not terried by how loudly I was talking and the intense way I was staring into her eyes as if trying to read the hidden secrets of her soul, she replied with a kind of affirmative mumble and looked like she might be ready to re-evaluate a lot of the life choices that had led her to this moment.
'Awesome,' I said, and continued to make eye contact. To look away now would be weakness. I would not be cowed by this small blonde avatar of sex shops everywhere. And also I had locked into a kind of mortal terror that meant I had frozen rigid, which body language wise probably looked quite aggressive. I am sorry Anne Summers basement cashier if you ever read this, I only wanted us to be friends.
'We've giving away a free gift bag with every purchase of a toy today, would you like to take one?' she asked with no small measure of trepidation as she began to bag the Rabbit.
No, I thought. 'Yes,' I said.
'We're also offering a promotion if you sign up for our mailing list, ten pounds off your next purchase, would you like to sign up?'
No, I thought. 'Yeah, sure,' I said, writing down my personal contact information out of fear.
'There you go, thank you,' she said, handing me the bag. For a moment I like to think there was a brief moment of connection between the two of us as we both realised how much we really did not want any of this exchange to have occured. I, a large hairy man who had stomped into her sex store, scared several other customers and slammed a big purple dildo onto her counter and started asking her advice about it, and she a small, middle aged woman who was used to selling lubricants and handcuffs to other sexually repressed middle aged women. We were both out of our comfort zones. We did not want this.
I strode out of the store in a manner that might be described as 'fleeing' by those who do not know that I was absolutely rushing to catch a bus home, veiny prizy safely in a giant pink and black bag that read 'Anne Summers' on the side that I spent the entire bus ride home trying unsuccessfully to conceal.
If I can manage that, I think I can manage going to see 'How To Be Single' alone.
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