So Mr Happn had reinforced my previous MO when it came to dating. I'd been single for 3 and a 1/2 years by this point and I went back to what I knew best for the next few months. Chillin out maxin and relaxin with the bubs and flinging back to mammas’ whenever I could to snuggle with Tallulah. Come June twenty 16 I moved out my one bed in the Wharf and in with two male friends from work to the Olympic Village in Stratford. That first weekend in the new flat we had a girl’s trip booked in and I was flying out to Cannes to be with my faves. Four whole uninterrupted days with the princesses. We were talking #GirlTime #Cosmos #SunBathing and #IceCream and I was FIZZING with excitement.
Being 27 the #SettlingDown had already started with my lot. If it’s not hit your friendship group yet then #RelishThatTimePoppets. I am talking about when your weekends go from spending the whole thing with your mates, having all the fun, and each year every holiday is just you guys out on tour loving life too…
“Uh I cant make this Saturday me and Jake are….”
And
“Well Andy and I are actually going to go to Santorini this year”
I mean it's just life, we are all built to be with partners and naturally this means less time out on the sauce with your friends. But it also means you extra-cherish that time you get them too yourself as it gets a little rarer. So to say I was buzzing over our girls-only weekend away would have been a HUGE understatement.
Fresh off the plane on the transfer coach to the air BnB we got chatted up by some Americans who were in town for the advertising festival that turned out to be happening on our sun-filled new door step that same weekend. The place was crawling with that networky-schmoozy type and there were yacht parties dotted all along the harbour.
Oi-Oi thought. This place is looking even better. It was also the weekend England were playing France up the road from us for the Euro. And the guys from Made in Chelsea turned out to be filming in the area for MIC South of France. So the odds of shenanigans were looking up. I wasn't even thinking about guys at this point though, I was just happy to be with the babies. Our apartment turned out to be even lusher than the snazzy photos, and we got ready for dinner and went out exploring round Cannes.
After some tasty French munch, bubbles, loads of giggles and a sighting of two (one and a half) hot blokes (Alex and Jamie from MiC sat eating dinner outside a restaurant) two of the princesses decided to head back for an early night after our long day. Me and the wife, lets call her Ella (she’s actually pretty much married off now to ...lets call him Drew - but she will still always be my wife :) decided to stay out and play. We found a bar, walked in and were met with a SEA OF MEN. All glued to the football. We were the only women in the joint and we minced our way over to the bar giggling and asking how to say “gin” in French. Once drinks were in hands we found a spot outside in the warm evening and got to talking about the important things in life. It was a very intense convo about shampoo (I remember it well as I was sharing my recent findings on sulphate-free hair products and ...well I will save that for another blog about being a bottle blonde and fighting the snappage #TheStruggleIsReal #IfYouKnowYouKnow) and soon enough a group of guys appeared and sat down in the empty seats next to us.
“English?” one of the hot ones who had sat next to me asked smiling like a wolf in his sexy Kent accent. Now I love that kind of thing, North London/builder/bad-boy accents. So I was already in trouble. And before we knew it we had been fully sharked. The wife was lost in a crowd of 7 of them wing-womaning like a champ, and I was lost in Dan.
I mean like I said before, I love the flirting, but holiday always makes everything extra sexy. No one is wearing very much, you’re all tanned and everyone’s out for a great time. Dan was confident and hot and he knew it. He worked as a sales director for a ridiculously well known tech firm and he called me princess from the off. Wouldn't let me or the wife pay for anything the rest of the night and believe me I tried. 31 years old, cheeky as you like and old school, he saved my number in his phone as "Sex Fitty"
I know now this is a huge red flag. But at the time I was completely enamoured. And drunk. Wow I thought. This tall, tanned sexy looking man thinks I am a ”Sex fitty” plus it turned out he lived in Islington which was 10 mins on tube away from my new flat back home. By last orders Ella was worn out from keeping the rest of them entertained and I was sat on Dan-Cannes' Lap snogging him like I hadn't had a man in almost a year. He was newly single, on a boys’ week away to watch the Euros and hadn't had a woman all week. Turns out a bit of bad boy Kent charm didn’t do the same thing to French women as it does to silly little tinderlella’s...
He walked me and the wife back to our apartment to "make sure we got home safe"
I honestly remember thinking “wow - he is such a gentleman” And it was only when we got back and I realised that he wanted to come up (and that I wasn’t even half ready to say bye yet) that I remembered we only had two rooms between four girls.
So unfortunately the Mrs had to listen to Dan and I smushing on the sofa outside our bedroom in the living room. She really is a good friend. And a very understanding wife.
Dan Canne and I had an awesome snuggle on that sofa. Whilst I was in a VERY HOLIDAY MOOD I still had some restraint. Especially in the setting. So as things got harder and harder I whipped out the TB.
Aka: Tactical Blowjob. As a people-pleaser I wanted him to finish. And I couldn't ride him on a sofa outside my friend’s bedrooms at 3am the way I wanted too. Plus we had only just met. So I did the polite thing and gave him a blowie.
He was happy and ubered himself back to the villa him and his friends were staying in, and I could go get in my twin bed and say sorry to Ella for being a #HolidayHoe.
I woke up the next day to three soppy whatapps, a six-pack pic of him by his pool sunbathing, and a request to meet later.
Smiling like the tinder’s who had gotten the cream, I messaged back and we arranged to see each other later that day in Baoli Beach Club. If you are ever in Cannes then I def recommend checking it out. Its exactly like Sisu in Marbs or Ocean Beach in Ibiza. Over priced, over luxe and full of sexy people. The girls wound me up about "hearing him cum in last night" as we got ready for our day exploring. I can’t lie, I was singing as I got ready. I hadn’t expected to meet anyone and a holiday romance is always extra exciting. I sent my first bikini body snap for years back to Dan Canne. The stress of work had meant I had lost a little chunk recently and I finally had a man to tease with that kind of stuff.
We met up with him and his friends in the Baoli that afternoon, he spent time talking with each of the girls and was very attentive to moi. The princesses were tres approving and we arranged to meet him and his mates in the Club Baoli later that night. Again another recommendation: if you are ever in the area, the club is few miles further out from the centre and veryyyy luxe. Dan and the lads got us all a VIP table. We were actually next to the table of the guys from MiC and I made it into a photo with Mr forhead himself. Do I remember this? No. But whatever. It’s my claim to fame. I don’t even remember them setting the bar on fire! Baoli is renowned for this trick, it’s a massive square shaped bar and high season every night they light that bish UP.
All I remember is making out with Dan all night. Him and his friends were driving back to the UK a few hours after the club shut and as we kissed goodbye he promised to take me out for dinner when we were back in LDN.
By the time I flew home a few days later I was keen for some more Dan. We tried to meet up over the next few weeks but he cancelled. A few times. Work had him between Dublin and LDN each week. Plus he had more trips over to France for the football, and I had a life too!
We eventually managed to meet up a few Sundays later. Drinks round Islington on a warm sunny afternoon followed by a delicious Indonesian meal in a restaurant that had only just opened. I paid for dinner whilst he went for a wee and even though he stropped at this when he came back, he held my hand as we strolled back to his ”for a cuddle”I knew I wasnt going to sleep with him. It wasn't just the 10-date rule - this one had made many regretful references to how jam-packed his schedule was. At one point during the sharing of funny stories over drinks he actually groaned and said he wished he wasn’t so busy all the time, told me I was pretty, but his feet were facing away from me as we sat laughing.
Hyped up on spicy chicken and strawberry Kopparbergs I took in his apartment. A typical over-achieving males pad - clean lines, masculine furniture and slick and minimal decoration. Lots of nice mens shoes too. As we stood on his balcony looking over a beaut view of Highbury fields (he called it his back garden) in the warm night air he came up behind me and started kissing my neck. His hands slid round my waist and down my hips, I turned and he led us kissing to his sofa. We laughed about the last time we had been on a sofa in Cannes and then he led me by the hand to his lair (the bedroom) I put on my smush playlist and he smoothly linked my phone to his Bluetooth speaker. The playlist is full of RnB and chilled-out dance tunes (if you are interested the link is below) and whilst I hadn’t had to use it for a few years I knew the crack well enough. As I straddled him on the bed he unzipped my white summer skater dress. He groaned again as it slid off and he saw my matching white lingerie, set off by the #CanneTan. As the kissing heated up I had an attack of the people pleasers again. And the TB came out full force. He came before Rihanna had finished singing "kiss it better" and we cuddled.
In the lift down to the carpark of his block he picked me up, pinned me against the mirror as he kissed me, drove me back to Stratford and we said goodbye. He text when he was home saying “Thanks for a great night, great company and next time stay over…"
I never heard from him again.
And once more I was hit with all the questions “what did I do wrong this time?” “Why didn’t he want more?” And after a few weeks of wondering I realised:
Lessons learned
1) Pay more attention to body language and listen to what they say. If a man is into you then when you are out, his eyes will be on you and you alone. His body (especially everything below the waist) will be facing you. It’s subconscious and reveals more than he will ever say. And if he DOES go on and on about how busy he is, then he’s letting you know he doesn’t have time (or time he wants) to spend with you.
2) This is a truism from the wife: “holiday romances are almost always best left on holiday” it doesn’t matter if he only lives ten minutes away back home. It’s extremely rare that people who meet abroad and have an amazingly hot fumble or even a great spark, will end up together back in reality. So its better to take your sugar coated specs off….even if you have grown up on a diet of Disney ;0
I do see him pop up on tinder every now and again so I know he’s still single. But he never swipes right for me.