Once upon a time, there was a girl called Meribell. She was a nasty piece of work too, was our Meribell, for she was very choosy.

The funny thing about her was that although she was very fussy and opinionated about many things around her – not least people – she wasn’t much of a beauty herself.

After quite a few years looking, Meribell found a man she liked, so eventually, after many months of testing the poor man, she moved in with him in a rented ex-council house in a small estate in Wandsworth.

For a while, they were quite happy, for Meribell didn’t do ‘very’, and ‘quite’ was about as ecstatic as she ever got, even on a good day.

He was a generous soul, was Archie, for not only was he able to tolerate Meribell at her very best, but he was able to do it with a smile on his face and a lightness in his heart, for he saw right past her flaws to the wonderful person he believed saw beneath.

Or, at least that’s what his statement to the Police said, before they took him away to be tried.

After some months in traction and a number of screws in her jaw so many that the surgeons lost count, Meribell began to recover her life, whilst Archie would be behind bars for a number of years yet.

Of course, as Meribell would say, it was all Archie’s fault. He was simply a bad person, coated with a gloss that simply took a while to wear off. She could not possibly be at fault in any way, shape or form.

Seven months and 3 days after the unfortunate incident that evening with Archie, Meribell decided it was time to get back ‘out there’ as was common parlance of the time.

It was an era where most singletons of a certain age would log on of an evening and search for a potential mate and find one who appealed, not least because of the physical attributes they displayed, but also for the intuitive assessment such parties had to make regarding the character of their intended.

One night while surfing her favourite site ‘HandsOnDating.com’, Meribell came across someone, who after the whole charade of her selection process seemed a possible.

After Archie, she was looking for someone who she could fully dominate and in Edward, she placed great hopes.

They met in a little Pret-a-Manger in Hammersmith. Not the one in the Hammersmith and City/Circle line station, for that has no seats, but instead the one just around the corner before the shopping centre, in which cosy interaction would be possible.

It was clear from the start that a fawning Edward would be ideal for Meribell’s purposes. At least on her side, that is, for he was a really nice bloke, but didn’t have much oomph to him, as her mother might say. And that suited Meribell perfectly.

Edward was completely overwhelmed by Meribell and fawned over her, left right and centre, despite her looks being, shall we say, outrageous on the ugly side. She knew she was onto something when he went back and picked up the half roll of bread to go with the soup she had off the very hot Pret-a-Manger shelf.

Meribell knew immediately that she could make a go of our Edward.

A courtship slightly longer than the one that Archie had to survive then took place and, ready or not, it was time for the two of them to get together to cohabit, as it was the modern term for ‘shacking up’.

Edward and Meribell got on fine together, as long as he met certain conditions, of course. In a few words, Edward became Meribell’s slave, at least for the first few months in their little bedsit in Balham.

But after that time, a single incident cause the worm to turn, and Edward swapped identities and Meribell became the one who did all the running around.

That turning point came when they were taking the dog out for a walk.

Sam the spaniel had been purchased quite early on after they began to share the rent, and although an impulse buy from Battersea Dogs Home, both of them had dogs in their past, so they knew what they were letting themselves in for.

Now, as a rule, Meribell did the dog-walking, for she had the working pattern that made it much easier. Only on rare occasions would Edward take his turn, although they sometimes – especially on a weekend – made the effort to go out together with Sam.

As any dog would, whilst out on their little exercise, carry out the usual bodily functions one would expect from a spaniel, and on this occasion, Meribell decided that it should be Edward who would pick up the still warm and slightly loose motion passed by the dog.

He flatly refused.

Meribell was astonished, yet in the moments that followed, she would recall the very second where she decided to step back and do the business that Edward had been so disinclined to do. A role, Meribell felt, that was a manly role and one that Edward should take up, without question.

Yet step back she did and picked the mess up with the help of one of those little blue plastic poo-bags you can get for such a purpose.

From then on, Edward became the Mr Jekyll that he had within him. Slowly but surely, he turned Meribell into his servant. Not in a nice way, of course, but in a way that made her more and more miserable, such were the demands it placed on her.

Eventually, Meribell had had enough and she decided to take action. One darkish night, after a few drinks at Vinopolis, on the South Bank, she took advantage of a quiet spot and an unchained gap in the riverside wall, and tipped a rather unsteady Edward in.

Despite being a nasty piece of work herself, she did not wish to appreciate it in others, especially where there was an impact on her as well.

So she had done our Edward in.

But, she was undeterred and over time, she still felt the need for companionship again. Not least because she was gagging for the physical side of things, and one which her trusty ‘Rabbit’ was really up to. She needed a man and the things that a man did and when she required it, of course.

As luck would have it, she found the man of her dreams by accident, on the Number 63 bus, on her way to the Tesco on Old Kent Road.

Initially, he was sitting all alone and paying very little attention to all that was around him, but after the bus crossed the river, he became aware of someone looking at him, as we often do, sort of subconsciously.

It was, of course, Meribell, who had her beady and rather ugly eyes on him, from across the bus.

She knew that she didn’t have much time, for it doesn’t take very long to get to Tescos and although he might be getting off there too, she felt he was more of a Peckham or Forest Hill sort of man.

She feigned to get off and in doing so, managed to get the end of her frock caught on his seat somehow, such that he needed to manhandle her outerwear to free her. In doing so, he somehow managed to get a hand on her thigh and that caught both of their attentions.

Meribell screamed. The bus lurched to a halt and the conductor and driver made their way upstairs to see what the matter was.

Once Meribell had explained the distressing scenario to the concerned parties, the man who she would subsequently find was called Rollo, was hoiked off the bus for his apparent misbehaviour and told he was lucky that the police weren’t called.

Meribell got off too.

Whilst she was distressed at her leg being touched, if even a little, she knew there was no need to make as much fuss about it as a Premier League footballer looking for a penalty. Yet that is what she had done.

Rollo marched off in a southerly direction, which was the same way that Meribell was going, so she followed him until his pace slowed and he began to calm down. That gave Meribell her chance, so she ran a little to catch up with him and attempted to make her peace.

Just as she did, Rollo ducked into a coffee shop and disappeared from her view, but not for long. Meribell could spot a good looking catch in a coffee shop alright, so she made her way inside and began to waylay him.

It was the beginning of a wonderful relationship.

Now, some two years after the met after she orchestrated the incident on the bus, Rollo and Meribell are about to be married.

After her two relationships had gone rather belly up and the sad, but necessary loss of Edward particularly, she was thrilled at the prospect of a happy life together.

Rollo was neither obsequious, nor was he a wife beater. After all the heartache, Meribell was delighted to say that Rollo was in fact, the baby bear she had been looking for in her life and, to be frank about it, ‘mmm, just right’.