Make Or Break In Marrakesh

CHAPTER ONE Justin Tondidori was thirty-nine years old. He was slightly overweight, his hairline was receding, and he was on a mission to be in a relationship before these issues grew worse. Before he hit middle age. He was shallow enough to believe that if you were to stand any chance of finding a girlfriend you had to meet certain expectations, so he played the role he thought women looked for in a man, rather than being himself. He thought the phrase ‘just be yourself’ was a trap. Most days he dressed the same way he had since he was fifteen, in that grungy style made popular in the nineties by Kurt Cobain. Worse than dressing like a child, he still daydreamed like a child. Justin dreamed of being loved. It was all he wanted in the world. He knew his parents loved him and probably his sister too. That wasn’t the love he yearned after. They were his family. They sort of had no choice. He wanted the other kind of love. The unconditional, all-encompassing, take your breath away kind. Like in the movies. Justin had seen Love Story, and he wanted that. Many years had passed, and still he was hoping that one day it would happen. So far, he hadn’t even liked anyone enough to experienced missing them when they weren’t around. Nor had he ever known how it felt to put someone else’s interests ahead of his own without an ulterior motive. Being the childish romantic that he was, he thought this wasn’t fair, he felt left out. As though he was lacking something, a key ingredient without which his adult life hadn’t properly started yet. He had nearly reached the tender age of forty, and still that elusive state of happiness eluded him. Some might say he was old enough to know better. That it was time to put childish dreams away. Yet the idea of what true love should be. What it must feel like, what he was missing out on, had always ached within him. If he gave up on that what was the point of anything? Over the years, Justin had taken many lovers and watched plenty of p**n. He saw these things as part of a training regime, preparing him for the big event. Consequently, he’d learnt something about the physical expression of love. Unfortunately, he’d failed completely to realise this wasn’t enough. That he also needed to get in touch with his feelings, his emotions. This was a department in which he showed no maturity. Emotionally his growth was stunted. He was no better than a clueless schoolboy, aimlessly searching for love’s impossible dream. After each fresh failure he’d lick his wounds and tell himself, ‘She just wasn’t the one’ or ‘I tried, I really tried.’ Playing the victim nullified any need to examine if he might be, in some small way, partly to blame for the latest failed relationship. Without the necessary soul searching, he could genuinely convince himself that he was trying his best. The way his brain performed somersaults to reach such conclusions would have been adorable if the consequences weren’t so tragic. A large part of Justin’s problem is that he thinks on the dating scale, he’s a seven-and-a-half at least, probably an eight. Arguably there was a brief moment he was eightish. But that was years ago. He’s nearly forty now, his best days are far behind him. He’s a six-and-a-half at best. Despite that, in his mind, he’s an eight, always was and always will be. And since it’s reasonable for anyone to aim high, as an eight, he could realistically stretch for one place above. Somebody who’s a nine. Trudy is undoubtedly a nine, if not a ten.