‘Oh my god, look,’ I said, tapping my date, John*, on the shoulder.
We were 17 years old, sitting at a table for two in an upmarket pub. It was Valentine’s Day 1996, and there were red roses and decorations everywhere. At that age, it felt like the height of romantic sophistication.
Even so – I hadn’t expected to see four elderly men in red tuxedos and straw boaters walk through the door. They looked ridiculous and I wondered what on earth they were doing there.
Before I could say anything else, they spotted us and made a beeline for our table. One pulled out a harmonica and, looking me right in the eye, they all burst into song.
I looked at John and he smiled, expecting me to be delighted. Meanwhile, if I could have vanished at that moment, I would have.
Until that point, I’d never had a proper boyfriend. I’d spent most of my teenage years with unattainable crushes – either lusting after popular boys at school who were out of my league or falling head over heels in love with members of Take That and plastering my wall with posters.
Everything changed in September 1995 when I, aged 17, met John. He was a friend of a friend and had been in my year at school, but we’d never really spoken. Now, the moment our eyes connected I felt an electrical charge. When he asked for my number, I wrote it in the condensation on his car.
He turned up two days later on my doorstep with roses and, as a love-starved teen, I fell head-over-heels.
It’s fair to say that John was not your typical 17-year-old. He was romantic, often bringing me gifts and creating a mix-tape filled with classics like Peter Cetera’s Glory of Love. I’m pretty sure he saw himself as a white knight and I was more than happy to be his damsel in distress. Also, he had a car – a big plus for a girl who lived in a village with few amenities.
By the time the first Valentine’s Day of our relationship rolled around, he had already firmed up his position as a romantic hero in my eyes. He didn’t earn a great deal of money, but must have kept our local florist in business with his almost weekly bouquets. He’d buy me meals, chocolates, arrange romantic dates to restaurants and pretty much drop anything to come over whenever I called.
I’ll admit: in the early days, these lavish gestures made me feel special. I’d never been confident about myself, but being with John did wonders for my self-esteem.
Even so, I hadn’t quite expected a barbershop quartet for Valentine’s Day.
As they started regaling me with classics like Elvis Presley’s (Let Me Be Your) Teddy Bear, during which they handed me a stuffed animal, I felt my ears burning as other diners in the restaurant turned to look.
The singing probably only lasted five minutes or so, but it felt like hours. As a shy teenager, the idea of being the centre of attention was excruciating. In that moment, it felt less ‘romantic surprise’ and more like some kind of humiliating ambush.
I tried my best to smile along, squirming in my seat as they sang song after song. Each time I thought it was over, it seemed they’d strike up a new melody. All the while, John smiled at me, confident that he’d nailed the surprise.
Then, as quickly as they’d arrived, they whisked out and left us all in stunned silence.
Looking back now, the whole thing seems bizarrely over-the-top. But then, as a dazzled 17-year-old on a date with her first boyfriend, once I’d recovered from the shock I was thrilled by how romantic it felt.
After all, John was everything a girl who’d spent an inordinate time being in love with Mark Owen from Take That could wish for. He declared his love within the first two weeks and mentioned marriage after the first month. I suddenly felt ‘lucky in love’, and I couldn’t believe it.
We broke up when I was 19 and went to university, but got back together a year later. John proposed to me in a hot air balloon when we were 20 and we had our wedding planned for the tender age of 24.
But when planning a life with someone, you begin to look beyond the bouquets. We’d argue, and he’d spend half his weekly wages on a ‘forgive me’ bunch of flowers – but I wanted John to stop with the extravagant gestures and save his money.
We went as far as to book our wedding, but when things began to get real I realised we just weren’t right for each other. We broke things off in 2002, almost a year to the day before our planned wedding. Luckily, the deposit was refundable.
Despite everything, I look back at it all fondly: I think we were both young, trying on love for size and doing what we thought was the right thing.
But I’m certainly no longer a big fan of grand gestures, and I haven’t celebrated Valentine’s Day since breaking up with John, despite having been married for 22 years. I’ve learned that love is not a cliché, but something you work at. And that it definitely doesn’t require a barbershop quartet.
*Name has been changed
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