‘Sean,’ I supplied. (Why could nobody remember his name? When I was with him, Renée – who’d met him loads of times – called him ‘Your Boyfriend’, like that was his name. She called Martha’s man by his given name. She and Martha remembered ‘Greg’. But nobody could remember ‘Sean’.)
‘Yeah, him, you were still so tense. Yeah, that’s it. Tense. You were tense. On edge. Like you were waiting for a war to break out.’
‘Are you surprised with you and Renée?’
‘Me and Renée, pah! We’re nothing compared to me and Tony. I gave him a black eye once. It’s just the way we are.’
‘Have you got your underwear yet?’ I asked.
‘This can’t be rushed. If I don’t get it right, I’ll scare him, not get him to marry me. Well, not get him to ask me to marry him.’
‘Why don’t you just ask him?’ I said.
‘I’m an old-fashioned girl,’ she said indignantly. ‘He has to do the asking.’
‘But you’re not going to wait any longer?’
‘There’s no point. He wants to propose, he just doesn’t realise it yet.’
‘I see, and what if this doesn’t work?’
‘There is no, “what if this doesn’t work”,’ Martha said. ‘We’ve been together three years. Now’s the time to get married. I’m no spring chicken, you know.’
Martha was coming up to twenty-six, I was thirty-one this autumn.
‘I want to have children soon but I have to be married first. It’s the right way to do things.’
‘Says who?’ I asked.
‘Says me, of course. Why don’t you get yourself a little something to treat Greg with?’ Martha asked over her shoulder.
‘Erm, no thanks. We’re still in the first throes of lust.’
Martha appeared in front of me again, her eyes alight. She’d never had the chance to have this kind of chat with me. It was a miracle she knew about me and Greg at all, now she was about to get details. ‘Do you do it every night?’
‘Yes,’ I said. All this was meant for Jen’s ears but Martha was the closest to a female friend I had after Jen.
‘What, EVERY night?’
I nodded.
‘Wow, even when me and Tony got together we didn’t do it every night. Do you even do it when you’ve . . . you know.’
I tried to work it out. You know, you know . . . ‘Sorry, don’t get you.’
Martha lowered her voice: ‘When it’s your time of the month.’
Heat flowed through me, suddenly making my head feel as though it was on fire. I was stood in a sex shop, talking about personal things with a virtual stranger. I looked away, back at the sex toys, unable to speak.
‘You do!’ Martha whispered. ‘Doesn’t he mind?’
‘I, erm, well, no,’ I stuttered. ‘It was his idea. He said if I didn’t mind . . . We’re not talking about this any longer.’
Martha sighed, went back to her underwear. ‘You’d never have told me that before. I always knew a bit about you, but only because I asked and it was like getting blood from a stone. Now you’re with Greg you’re like an open book,’ she said. ‘Not an open book exactly, just more . . . chilled.’
‘It’s healthy to have boundaries.’
‘You must be the healthiest person on earth then.’
‘Oi!’
Martha smirked. ‘Anyways, when are you going to have kids?’ Martha asked, over her shoulder.
I thought about my family. Scattered across the world, so complicated I couldn’t even contemplate getting married. Ideologically I didn’t believe in marriage, logistically it’d be hell on earth. Other people thought they had problems with second cousins twice removed – I’d have to decide which one of my dads to invite. Did I want to add children to this mix? Nope. The madness stopped with me. My brother was different. He probably would, in fact, he definitely should have children. But then, if he screwed up, it wouldn’t be such a big deal. Nobody expected 125 per cent perfection from Eric, nobody expected him to be good all the time. Nope, marriage and kids weren’t for me.
‘Haven’t really thought about it,’ I said to Martha.
‘Really?!’ There was horror in her voice. ‘How old’s Greg then?’
‘Thirty-two in October, why?’
‘I suppose you’re both still quite young . . .’ Martha said thoughtfully ‘But you shouldn’t leave it too long, you know.’
‘Leave what too long?’
Martha returned to her place in front of me, this time, holding lime green undies in slippery material, covered in studs. My body convulsed as I imagined her fella licking one of the studs. ‘Let me out of here!’ my brain started screaming.
‘Your kids will be beautiful,’ Martha said dreamily. ‘It has to be said, he is a beautiful man.’ Martha shot me a sharp look. ‘Not that I approve of him. He might make you happy but up until now he’s been a total bastard.’
You don’t know the half of it, I thought at her.
‘Although,’ she continued, ‘maybe it was because he hadn’t gotten the right woman. Which would explain why he’s looking even more beautiful. I saw him in WHSmith the other day and he was looking so well. He’s happy. Yeah, that’s it, he’s met the right woman so he’s stopped all that bastard behaviour. Oh well,’ she shrugged, ‘I’m glad. At last the women of Yorkshire are safe.’
Martha went back to her underwear. Leaving me stood there going, What? ‘What the hell was that all about?’ I said to Martha.
‘You and Greg and how beautiful your kids will be,’ she said, as though she hadn’t taken a detour through Manchester to get from one side of Leeds to the other.
And, hang on, what?! ‘You speak like it’s a foregone conclusion. We’ve only just got together. Neither of us has thought long-term.’
‘Men always think long-term. From the moment he meets you he’s thinking long-term. That’s why he won’t call after a one-night stand: he’s looked into the future and seen nothing long-term so it’s just a one-night thing. Obviously they’ll never tell you that. And that’s why a man will chuck you for no reason. A woman will go out with someone because she likes him, she’ll work at it, she’ll put up with the most ridiculous behaviour because she’s building a relationship. Whilst men . . . they’ll meet a woman, go out with her a few times then do a mental balance sheet.’
‘A what?’
‘All right,’ Martha came back to me, this time with her hands empty. ‘In a man’s head, he’ll have these two columns, “Costs” and “Gains”.
‘Under “Costs” will go things like:
“other women I can’t shag any more”;
“exes I’ll have to stop talking to”;
“time needed to spend doing things she likes”;
“her bloat potential”;
“her not getting on with my mates”;
“parents not approving of her”.
‘Right? Then on the “Gains” side will go things like:
“regular sex”;
“someone who’ll listen to stuff I can’t say to my mates”;
“how good she’ll make me look if she’s gorgeous”;
“someone to share the bills with”;
“someone who’ll produce good-looking children”;
“not having to go on the pull any more”.
‘I’m serious,’ Martha said, obviously clocking my less than believing face. ‘He’ll have this balance sheet in his head and once he’s worked out all the factors, over say a five-year period, if the gains outweigh the costs, he’ll give it a go. And if they stick with you after three, then six months, then he’s generally thinking you’ve got long-term potential . . . or he’s shagging you until something better comes along. Either way, he’s got a long-term plan.’
‘Well, I haven’t,’ I said, confident that my slut of a boyfriend, sorry, ex-slut of a boyfriend hadn’t either.
‘Yeah, but he has,’ Martha insisted.
‘You don’t know Greg,’ I replied.
&n
bsp; ‘Why do you think he’s looking so happy? He’s looked into the future and seen your beautiful children. You mark my words, Greg’s done shagging. He’s thinking long-term with you, baby.’
‘I thought I was missing the security of a relationship but what I wanted was you,’ flitted into my head. Flitted in on Greg’s voice. My chest tightened, such thoughts terrified me. I didn’t think long-term in relationships. I didn’t need to. When you don’t believe in marriage or don’t want to have children, you can take your time. You can leisurely find the right man, enjoy yourself along the way. You can decide to be celibate because you’re insane in relationships. You can be insane in relationships because it doesn’t matter. Your body isn’t ticking, isn’t reminding you that you need to find the right person to procreate with. You don’t need to think about settling down, or planning for the future. And it terrifies you when someone reminds you that your lover might have different motivations to you and they might one day leave because you’re not thinking long-term.
‘Well, he’s going to be sorely disappointed,’ I said, sounding braver than I felt. ‘Have you found your underwear yet?’
‘Sure have.’ She spun back to me clutching a black PVC bra and knickers with tiny silver holes all over them. She pressed the bra over the chest area of her jumper and wiggled her body. ‘Sexy, huh? What do you think?’ she asked.
I could see Martha lying on a bed, her Tony stood on the bed wearing that underwear and ticking off qualities on a clipboard. Suddenly, the pictures mutated to Greg wearing that underwear, holding a clipboard.
‘I think I hate you,’ I said to Martha, trying to chase the image out of my head but only succeeding in making the imaginary Greg run faster around my head as he ticked off qualities. ‘Thanks to that underwear and your talk of balance sheets, I may never have sex again.’
chapter sixteen
time bomb
A week without sex is a long time.
Obviously, it’s not as long as eighteen months without sex, but it’s all about relativity.
I lifted the lid on the loo and squirted some limescale remover down the white pan. Then I went back to scrubbing out the bath.
Relativity where a week without sex when you’ve had eight weeks of sex almost every night is far longer than eighteen months without sex. In those terms, a week felt like seven years. One year for every day. And not even I had gone seven years without sex since my first sexual experience when I was nineteen.
I stopped scrubbing the bath, stared at it. It was gleaming. It’d been gleaming for the past five sexless years: I’d discovered only eating and cleaning could stop the hell that was sexual frustration. My lover had been working long hours all week – someone was ill and they were putting out a special section with the magazine, so when he left his desk he went home. Coming over to my place was a lot further from his work and he’d only arrive at one o’clock in the morning, then would have to get up six hours later. I wasn’t seeing him ’til tomorrow, Sunday, when we’d have one day. One measly day to have sex and talk and, well, have sex.
Rather shamefully, I’d gotten out of the habit of sleeping without him. It sounds icky and silly and girly and a whole host of things that I’d never thought I was, but those times when I couldn’t sleep, when there was too much in my head for me to close my eyes and simply sleep, I’d snuggle into him. Rest my head upon his chest, listen to the soft, regular beat of his heart. And, I’d never tell anyone this, but he’d sometimes tell me a fairy story. Tales I hadn’t read since I was young and used to go sit in the library after school so I wouldn’t have to deal with my parents. Or the silence in the house before my parents. It’d started about three weeks ago. He’d noticed that I was restless, kept fidgeting about on the bed, shifting myself all over him as I tried to get comfortable and, rather than ordering me to the sofa, which was what I would have done, he’d said, ‘Do you want a story?’ And without realising he was probably joking, I’d replied, ‘Yes, please.’
‘Dragons or no dragons?’
‘No dragons.’
‘OK. Once upon a time, in a land, far, far away . . .’ he began and told me Rumpelstiltskin, doing all the voices and adding his own bits.
Of course, I’d never tell anyone that. Ever. I’d watched The Exorcist, The Shining, and Bambi – by myself, nobody could ever know my boyfriend told me fairy tales to send me to sleep.
I sat back on my haunches, started eyeing the basin. I’d probably scrub a hole in the porcelain if I went at it again – I’d cleaned it once already today.
I got up, rubbed my knees to alleviate the ache in them. I’ll empty the kitchen cupboards, I decided. Clean them. That’ll take up a bit of time.
I wandered down the corridor towards my kitchen, wearing a white vest and a pair of Greg’s grey jersey (clean) boxers. (Yup, not only did I need fairy stories to send me to sleep, I’d also become the sort of woman who wore her man’s underwear. I’d hate myself if I wasn’t me.) My black hair was scraped back off my unmade-up face. I rarely wore make-up. My mahogany skin wasn’t flawless, but it was perfect enough for me to not wear make-up unless it was a special occasion, whilst my eyes were striking enough to do without mascara and eyeliner. I was lucky when it came to looks. My parents might not have gotten on – they divorced when I was ten – but they had managed to stay together long enough to create a child – me – who was able to go make-upless without looking as if her eyes had receded into her head and her skin had been used as a dartboard . . . All right, it was pure laziness. If you put on cover-up stick and foundation and powder, you had to take it off. Seeing as I could hardly be bothered to take off mascara and eyeliner and lipstick, the effort required to remove everything else was above and beyond the call of daily duty.
BUZZZZZ! of the buzzer made me do a comedy leap in the air as I clutched at my heart. I then had to grab the door frame for support. That buzzer had scared the life out of me from the day I’d moved in here seven years ago but I couldn’t work out how to turn it down.
‘Hello?’ I said into the black intercom phone.
‘I’m gonna lick you all over,’ a voice crackled on the other end. Every part of me leapt to attention.
I pressed the key button on the phone then opened my front door as the downstairs door banged shut behind my caller. I then legged it into my living room and threw myself onto the sofa. I rearranged myself into a seductive position: put my legs out in front of me, sat with my back arched a fraction, had one arm resting on the back of the sofa, the other resting on my hip. I twisted slightly, to emphasise my cleavage and minimise my waist. I heard his footsteps on the top step and licked my lips, pouted . . . then realised I was still wearing my yellow rubber cleaning gloves. I tugged them off and flung them behind the sofa and returned to my pose.
Greg came in, shut the door behind him. Without stopping, he shed his jacket, dropped it in the living room doorway, then slowly unbuttoned his shirt as he crossed the room to me. With each button more of his relatively hairless, muscular but not defined chest appeared.
‘Welcome to paradise,’ I husked, trying to keep a straight face.
Bless him, he didn’t smirk at my greeting or my vest and boxer shorts combo.
Instead, his Minstrel-coloured eyes took me in hungrily as he climbed on top of me, pushed his hand up under my vest and his mouth found mine in a voracious kiss. It’d only been a week and I missed him. How would I survive when we were parted for longer? I’d hardly see him during the two weeks of the Festival and during the run-up to it I hardly saw my flat, let alone anyone else. I’d probably implode. Now, I shall ignore how I’ve leapt forwards five months in time and assumed that Greg and I would be together.
I moved my head away from his heavenly kisses. ‘I was promised full-on body licking, not lip kisses,’ I warned. ‘I could have you up under the Trades Descriptions Act.’
‘Later,’ he murmured.
‘I want my body licks,’ I continued, keeping my lips out of reach. ‘I’ll get placa
rds done, organise protest marches.’
He stopped trying to kiss me, looked into my eyes, a little quizzically. He’d forgotten I was incapable of doing serious for too long. Then he shook his head despairingly. ‘You’re so silly,’ he said and treated me to a small sunshine laugh.
‘I try to ple—’
He used that distraction to kiss me again.
RING-RING-RING!
‘Leave it,’ Greg mumbled as I automatically reached out for the white phone.
RING-RING! The phone persisted.
Greg stopped kissing me, sighed. ‘Go on then, I know you’re dying to.’
I reached out, grabbed the phone.
‘Ambs, it’s me.’
‘Hi, Jen,’ I said.
Greg threw his head back in frustration and stared at the ceiling for a moment. He obviously envisaged an hour of waiting to get his rocks off. Then he seemed to hit upon a plan and lowered his head, very, very low and started caressing my inner thigh with his mouth. Soft butterfly kisses that made my stomach weak. I stopped myself moaning as I arched back my body.
‘I’m on the train over to yours,’ Jen said.
I locked, mid-arch; my eyes flew open.
‘We haven’t had a girly night in months,’ she explained. ‘Tuesday nights don’t exist any more. Matt’s away and I thought, why not?’
I hurriedly brushed Greg’s head and lips away from my thighs. ‘You’re actually on the train?’ I asked.
‘Yup. Just pulling into Headingley.’
Headingley! That was the next station. She’d arrive in less than ten minutes.
My eyes went to Greg, who’d finally stopped nuzzling my thighs and was glaring at me.
‘You’re on the train?’ I repeated, staring into Greg’s fixed face.
‘Didn’t you hear me?’ Jen replied tartly. ‘We’re leaving Headingley. I should be there in ten minutes.’
‘Ten minutes,’ I echoed.
Greg’s eyebrows shot up into his unruly fringe and his eyes bulged in their sockets as he shook his head at me.