And Baby Makes Two

He had the glazed eyes and fixed smile of a man watching a dancer in a topless bar. I could feel myself flush. God bless you, Ellen Barkin!

“Sort of.”

Half of me wanted the neighbours to see me getting off with him on the doorstep, but the other half of me knew that if they did, one of them would blab to Her Majesty sooner or later.

I gave Les a tug to pull him inside, and he sort of tripped past me.

I tossed my head so he could see my earrings. Dangly earrings are very sexy.

“You look like you had a good time,” I teased.

Les propped himself against the entrance to the living room, grinning like a Hallowe’en pumpkin.

“Videos,” he mumbled. “We watched these videos…” The pumpkin smile turned into a leer. “It would’ve been better if you’d been there.”

My blood began to bubble. Les had never leered at me before.

“Really?” I purred. “Are you sure?”

Les swallowed and sort of sucked on his lips. His head bobbed up and down.

“You look good.” He held out his arms. “You gonna give me a kiss?”

I moistened my lips and started walking towards him, slowly. “Maybe…”

The “maybe” always works.

He lurched forwards, pinning me against the wall. He was bigger than me. I was powerless beneath his weight. It was pretty exciting. His breath smelled like the kitchen after one of my mother’s parties, but it was masculine and almost intoxicating. Unless I was just getting drunk on the fumes.

“I’ll kiss you till Peter Pan grows up…” I whispered.

It was a line from a film, but Les didn’t recognize it.

“You should be a writer.” His lips touched mine. “Or a professional kisser…”

I couldn’t believe it! We’d been seeing each other for over six weeks and I’d never even got my bra all the way off. But all of a sudden he was all over me. Tongue, hands, knee, even face. He kept rubbing his cheek against mine, which was like being licked by a very large and strong cat. I ignored the slight pain and rubbed back. The last person in the world I wanted to see right then (or ever, really) was Hilary Spiggs, but in a weird way I wanted her to see me. There’s your little girl, Mrs Spiggs, put that in your teacup and drink it!

“Let’s go to bed.”

I was speaking softly, the way you do in romantic moments, and my face was squashed against his neck, so I wasn’t sure he heard me. I gave him a shove.

“It’s late … let’s go to my room…”

It never occurred to me that it would be so easy.

“Bed,” said Les, and he kind of tottered backwards.

I grabbed hold of him and steered him down the hallway.

I reached round him and opened the door to my room. I suppose he didn’t realize, because he lurched forward, pulling me with him. He straightened up immediately, and I bounced against the door.

“Jesus Christ!” I’d never heard Les sound frightened before. “The place is on fire!”

For a second I thought it really was on fire. I’d forgotten all about the candles. Fire was a definite possibility.

I looked round him, and started breathing again with relief.

“It’s all right,” I assured him. Nothing was burning that shouldn’t have been. “It’s just the candles.”

He nodded, slowly, like I’d explained something very complicated to him and he was taking it in.

“Oh, right. The candles.”

I’d half thought he might scoop me up in his arms the way Nicolas Cage scoops up Cher in Moonstruck, but I suppose to be fair to Les he was having enough trouble holding himself up, without holding me up, too.

He grabbed hold of me, and started licking at my ear. It sort of reminded me of Nan’s dog.

“You light my candle,” Les murmured.

“Me too,” I murmured back. “I’ve never felt like this before.”

Les burped. “Me neither.” He ran his hand over my breasts. “I’ve never felt you like this before either.”

Things got a little hectic after that. I’d never seen him so worked up. And because he was so excited, I was excited, too. Scenes of passion flashed before my eyes. Some were even in black and white.

Kissing and sort of climbing all over each other, we finally reached the bed. I helped him get out of his shoes and trousers. I had to leave him for a second, to turn the stereo on, and when I got back he was stretched out with a smile on his face.

“Baby…” he moaned. “Baby … baby…”

“Les…” I whispered. “Les, get under the duvet.”

I climbed in beside him.

His eyes were closed, but he immediately wrapped himself around me and nuzzled close. His leg rubbed against mine.

“Skin…” mumbled Les, yanking at my bra. “Skin on skin…”

Skin on skin…

It was the most grown-up thing anyone’d ever said to me. I kissed him with passion. He kissed me back.

Over and over.

We were kissing and groaning and all that stuff, and then Les started pushing against me. I could feel him sort of groping around between us.

Push … push … grunt … grunt…

“I can’t find it,” gasped Les.

I wasn’t sure what he was looking for.

Push … push … grunt … grunt…

And then there was this little jolt of pain and Les’s eyes moved around like he was having some sort of fit, and then he rolled on to his back.

“Geez,” he panted. “Was that your first time, too?”

This is going to sound weird, but I didn’t really know it’d happened until then. First of all, I didn’t remember him putting on a condom. I wasn’t sure, but I had the impression it wasn’t something you could do too far in advance. Plus, it wasn’t exactly how I’d imagined.

I propped myself on one elbow and leaned against his chest. “You mean you’ve never done it before, either?”

Les was staring at the ceiling. He shook his head. “What’d you think?” he asked.

I kissed the side of his head. “What did you think?”

He grinned. “I thought it was great.”

I nestled my head on his shoulder.

“So did I.”

Earth Calling Lana Spiggs

When I look back at it now, I reckon sleeping with Les must have put me in some kind of trance. Like a fairy tale, but in reverse. Instead of the Prince’s kiss waking me up, it put me to sleep.

Everything sloshed around me in a blur. I went through the motions of eating and sleeping and watching telly and carrying my books back and forth to school, but without really connecting any of those activities to my brain. All I could think of was our future. Mine and Les’s. The Emerald City of Oz had nothing on that.

It took me a long time to get anywhere, because I was always stopping to look at something. I read the notices in estate agents’ windows, looking for the perfect flat for me and Les. I stopped at every furniture shop I passed (except the second-hand ones) to check out what they had. I even went out of my way to go past places that sold prams and stuff like that. Plus, I read all my mother’s catalogues, especially the ones from Argos and Ikea,