Are You Experienced?

‘You can’t ask that. It’s a very personal question. If you know where someone’s centre is, you know an awful lot about them.’

‘Go on. I won’t tell anyone. Where was it?’

‘Look – she never found it exactly.’

‘Roughly. Where was he looking?’

‘Well – she only vaguely located it, but they did manage to pin it down to somewhere here, in the crook of the elbow.’

‘See?’

‘What are you saying?’

‘Nothing. Just that he didn’t fancy her. Let’s face it – who wants to get in bed with a skeleton.’

‘She’s not deaf, you know. You’re being very hurtful.’

‘This Intimate Yoga guy is a genius. It’s like – people pay him, and all he has to do is grope them, and they go away happy.’

‘He

is

a genius, as it happens, and he wouldn’t even understand the concept of groping. His mind is on higher things.’

‘Yeah, sure. I’m going to have to learn how to do this.’

‘He’s a highly qualified man. You have to study at the International Headquarters of Intimate Yoga for at least five years before you get a teacher’s certificate.’

‘International Headquarters?’

‘In San Francisco.’

‘This isn’t just one guy groping women in a shed in the arse-end of India?’

‘It’s an international movement.’

‘That’s incredible! So all over the world, at this precise moment, there are hundreds of women being Intimately Yogaed.’

‘I suppose so.’

‘What an amazing thought.’

Ranj then reappeared, and pulled me aside to tell me that he’d just met the East Sweden Women’s Handball Team, who were taking a break from their tour of South Asia, and that he’d arranged to meet up with them on the beach for a midnight Punjabi lesson.

‘How many people are there in a handball team?’ I said.

‘I dunno, but there’s seven of them. That might include reserves.’

‘You’re incredible. Fee – do you want to meet up later for a midnight Punjabi lesson? This is my friend Ranj. He’s the tutor.’

Fee’s face brightened up at the sight of an Indian. She gave me an impressed smile for managing to befriend a local.

‘So… you’re… David’s… friend?’ enunciated Fee, in the style of a 1950s

Blue Peter

presenter.

‘Fuck, yeah. He’s a stormin’ geezer,’ said Ranj.

‘Oh, right,’ said Fee, blushing.

Don’t you think you’ve had enough fun for the moment?

The weird thing about our midnight Punjabi party was that I ignored the how-to-identify-different-parts-of- Swedish-anatomy session, which took place amid much squealing, and ended up spending the entire time talking to Fee.

Now I know I hated her guts from the first instant I laid eyes on her, and I know she’s a fake and a snob and a basket-case, but I have to admit that in the circumstances, I started finding her attractive. I think it might have had something to do with Caz’s breakdown. Fee’s over-the-top public-schooliness now had the edge taken off it, and she had picked up a sad, slightly subdued quality that was quite a turn-on. There’s something about unhappy women that always gives me the horn.

Fee seemed to have given up on most of the spiritual crap, and the two of us could just sit and chat about everyday things, only mildly put off by Caz’s presence. She said that she was only wearing the sari because the ashram had made her give away all her old clothes, and she hadn’t got around to buying any new ones yet.

After we’d been talking for an hour or so, while we heard Ranj linger over an utterly implausible number of Punjabi words for ‘nipple’, a flirty edge started entering our conversation. The sound of the lapping ocean, the moon shadows from leaning palm trees, the distant music drifting down the beach and the nipple-talk all combined to produce an atmosphere heavy with the urgent need for copulation.

‘How long were you and Liz going out together?’ asked Fee, slightly coyly.

‘A while.’

‘Was it… good?’

‘What – sexually?’ I said, with a slight pout.

She shrugged.

I did a few instant calculations, deciding that a ‘no’ might make me sound like a bad lover, but a ‘yes’ would sound like a brush-off. The truth would give me away as the world’s most spectacular loser.

‘It was OK, but I’ve had better,’ I said, impressed with my powers of diplomacy.

‘What was… wrong with it?’

‘Oh, you know Liz. She’s very pushy. Not…’ I put my hand on Fee’s leg ‘… exactly what you’d call a sensitive person. And that came out in her love-making.’

‘I hate her,’ said Fee. ‘I hate her more than anyone else in the world.’

‘I’m not too keen on her myself.’

‘I wish I could… could…’

‘Duff her up?’

‘Yes. Duff her up.’ This sounded stupid in Fee’s accent, and made us both smile.

‘You know what would really piss her off ?’ I said.

‘Tell me.’

‘Well – me and her aren’t, like, an item any more, but she’s still a very jealous person, and if I went off with someone else, it would really get under her skin. ‘Specially if it was someone she knew.’

Fee looked at me, blinking twice, but basically looking dead into my eyes. I held her gaze, smirking slightly.

‘Are you saying what I think you’re saying?’ said Fee, leaning forward a touch.

‘I don’t know. What do you think I’m saying?’ I said, also leaning forward.

‘You tell me what you’re saying, and I’ll tell you if I think that’s what you’re saying,’ said Fee, leaning forward some more. There was now about an inch between our lips.

‘I think you should tell me what you think I’m saying, then I can tell you if that was what I was actually saying,’ I said, leaning forward by about half an inch.

‘It looks like we’ve reached a stalemate, then,’ she said, filling in the remaining space, and placing us lip to lip.

The only courteous thing to do in the circumstances was to snog her.

She was, without doubt, the worst kisser I’d ever had the misfortune to tangle with. I felt as if my tongue was being vacuum-cleaned and put through a washing-machine spin cycle at the same time.

I was rescued from serious tongue cramps by Ranj suggesting that we all head back to the Kovalam Ashok Beach Resort to raid our mini bars. A few of the Swedes bottled out, but Ranj crammed into a rickshaw with three of them, I shared another one with Fee and Caz, and the seven of us drove up the hill to our hotel.

After we had gunned down the contents of my mini bar, Ranj took the three Swedes next door, and I stayed behind with Fee and Caz.

‘So – here we are, then,’ I said.