often than not, all three of them go to their local together. I’m not delicate but I wonder how any of them live, not knowing whom Brian will want to go home with on any given night.
‘She’d be better getting it on with Roy, Brian’s brother. After all, she’s my bridesmaid and Roy’s the best man. It’s traditional, ain’t it?’ She slaps my thigh and laughs. But the laugh is tinny and nervous. She stops suddenly and leans close into me. I know from Issie and a number of my other friends that she is about to indulge in a confession. In a more religious age she would be offering up prayers to Mary the virgin mother, saint of desperate cases.
‘I really wouldn’t like to lose him, darlin’. I love him. But if I’m going to lose him, it’d better be before the wedding.’
I back away, disentangling myself from the woman’s cigarette fumes and her earnest stare.
My interview with Karen is almost identical, except Karen is as fat as Jenny is skinny. Her arms wobble when she raises a glass of beer to her mouth. Her life has been one of steaming hot chips wrapped in newspaper and pastry cakes with custard. She’s wearing a flowered tent. I pull Fi to one side.
‘Fi, has she had her clothing allowance?’ I ask horrified. There are some shows that encourage their guests to wear bright outfits, so that they look like fat sugared almonds. This isn’t supposed to be one of those.
‘Ya, but we couldn’t find anything in Harvey Nics to fit her,’ Fi whispers back.
‘Well, what about a high-street store?’
‘We couldn’t find a researcher who was prepared to go and find out.’
I sigh and resign myself to the tent. I wonder how the colours will work against the backdrop of the set.
Karen, the ‘other woman’, explains that she thinks she has as much right to Brian as Jenny has.
‘After all, I was with him first.’ But people aren’t like pieces of furniture or clothes; ‘I saw him first’ isn’t exactly a reason to lay claim to someone. I remind Karen that Brian must love Jenny, or else he wouldn’t have proposed. Karen corrects me and points out that it was Jenny who proposed and in fact she bought her own ring too. She admits that she is still sleeping with Brian. She shakes her tits at the camera: ‘He likes something to get hold of.’ I leave the room.
‘That is so depressing,’ comments Fi.
‘What is?’ I ask.
‘The way both of those women want the same man and by this time next week one of them will have been rejected. Don’t you think that’s awful?’
‘I think that’s the point of the show. Now, here’s the rest of the schedule. I want you to take a cameraman and stay with Jenny. Get lots of shots of her trying her wedding dress on, interviews with her mum, something to depict their financial struggle to put on the best wedding reception they can afford and a shot of her on her own, preferably in a church.’
‘So you are expecting Brian to choose Karen, then?’ asks Fi.
‘Not so much actively choose, more like his dick will jump out of his trousers through habit. Now, I need the logistics crew to work out where the camera should be for the grand seduction. Karen is planning to seduce him over a pint and some pork scratchings in their local.’
‘Very glamorous,’ says Fi wryly.
‘She’s not a glamorous girl. And he’s not a glamorous boy. It should be on their usual turf – we don’t want to arouse suspicions. Besides which, our budget is a pittance. Now go to it.’
Next I interview Tim Barrett. I think that Tim has a good career ahead of him as a criminal. Not because he appears particularly vicious, immoral or crooked but because he would be impossible to identify in a line-up. He is neither extraordinarily skinny nor obscenely fat. He is, in fact, of average build, average height, average looks and average intelligence. His hair is mid-brown; his eyes are a brown/grey/green colour. I forget which. After close investigation I discover that the only thing that distinguishes him at all is his fanatical, obsessive jealousy in relation to his fiancée, Linda. He runs through his suspicions regarding three of her exes. I don’t think his suspicions are founded. But that’s irrelevant. As he tells the stories he fidgets on his chair, moving from one buttock to the other. His hands appear to have