Goodbye Reckless

You know the film 'Meet The Parents'? Well let me tell you what's worse: 'Meet The New Stepmother'. With me in the staring role.

I had been anxiously pressing my father to let me meet Beatrice before they flew off to Alaska to save the fluffy baby seals from being turned into fur coats, and finally he grudgingly agreed to let Ryan and me meet her. It meant missing out on seeing Andy for lunch, but once I had attempted to explain the situation he understood.

"Be nice," he told me on the phone.

"I'm always nice!" I protested.

"You know what I mean," he said and I could practically see the grin on his face. "Give her a chance."

So it came about that Ryan and I met the woman who was going to become stepmother number six.

I found myself sat on my father's leather couch in his penthouse, wearing black skinny jeans, a red Miu Miu blouse and my trademark leopard print heels. Ryan was sat next to me looking, and no doubt feeling, very awkward; his long legs dressed in his favourite tailored jeans and he was wearing white and black striped jumper that I had bought for him at one point.

My father walked in from the kitchen humming and carrying a tray with four cups of coffee placed on it, he set the tray down on the coffee table in front of us and in the same moment the doorbell rang.

He went to answer it and returned a moment later followed by a woman, whom I at first thought to be a woman disguised as a hippie.

"Ryan, Amina, I want you to meet Beatrice," my father said ceremoniously and gestured with open arms to the woman stood next to him.

She could only be described as a complete hippie, or a complete disaster.

"You're Beatrice?" I asked incredulously, the words dropping from my mouth before I could even stop them.

The hippie, Beatrice, nodded and smiled.

"Yes I am."

I felt Ryan stiffen next to me and heard him mutter something that sounded suspiciously like 'oh my god'.

She was so unlike any of my previous stepmothers that I thought it was a joke or maybe we were being filmed. I half expected Ashton Kutcher to jump out from behind the Baroque statue that my father had placed in the living room and shout 'YOU'VE BEEN PUNKED!', anything other then truth would have been more satisfying.

Stood next to my father, who was dressed in his Hugo Boss suit and Italian shoes, she looked almost farcical. It was a scene out of a Hollywood film.

She was wearing a floor length pyramid shaped beige skirt, a wool knitted rainbow zipper jacket, underneath which I could make out the edge of a grubby white t-shirt. On her feet were a pair of shapeless vegan shoes which caused the shoe queen in me to scream at the fashion faux pas. Her hair resembled a lion's mane, in both colour and style.

I had been biting my lip furiously; try to hold my laughter in. But I couldn't take it anymore.

"If you'll excuse me for a minute," I said and leapt to my feet and marched out of the living room in the direction of my old bedroom, which my father had left exactly as it was when I moved out.

I ripped the door open and walked towards my bed, which I then gratefully sank down on.

The minute I sat down I began laughing hysterically at the whole ridiculousness of the situation that was spiralling out of control and wouldn't have looked out of place in a Christmas pantomime.

The door of my room clicked open and Ryan walked in, joining me on my bed and shooting me an understanding grin.

However after a while my hysterical laughter turned into hysterical tears.

"Oh my god Ryan he can't marry her!" I sobbed into my brother's shoulder.

"Don't worry, it's only a phase. They'll never make it down the aisle." Ryan promised me, soothingly patting me on the back.

But somehow we both knew that this was defiantly more than a phase.