stop-start-stop styles, dangerous speeds or dithering steps don’t annoy me. They seem like part of the tapestry. As do the
Other happy
‘My feet are aching.’ I finally submit. ‘Let’s go and get a drink somewhere.’
‘OK. Where?’
‘Dunno. It’s late and this is not my end of town.’
And I want to take a hotel room.
It’s just like that. Because besides all the hand holding, and the conversation, and the laughing, and the fact that I was desperately proud of him at the party, there’s something else. There’s my breasts, which have taken on a life of their own: nipples upturned and out-turned, aching, desperate for him to clutch and ply and grasp and tongue. And there are my exploding knickers. Creamy with desire. Dizzy with craving.
We hail a cab within seconds, which is fluky and seems to me to be a sign that this is meant to be. Unashamed, I instruct the cabby to take us to a hotel.
‘Which one?’
‘Any,’ I reply, irritated by the interruption, for by now he is interrupting. He’s interrupting Darren’s long, filthy looks of undisguised want.
The cab pulls up outside some hotel. We pay in a daze, wildly overtipping. We muddle through the inconvenience of having to check in and decide which paper we want in the morning. And just as I think we are about to stumble into bed in a stupor, Darren stops in the foyer.
‘We have to talk.’
‘We’ve done nothing but talk all night,’ I say whilst tugging at his jacket sleeve, impatiently trying to drag him towards the lifts.
‘Talk about us.’ The only topic we’ve avoided.
‘But you’re a boy,’ I joke.
Darren won’t be deterred and leads me to the hotel bar. I reason that a drink is a good idea. I haven’t had one since I left the party, which will have been near nine o’clock. It’s nearly twelve now; I’m in serious danger of sobering up. In the past I’ve often found myself in London hotel bars. I know the form. There will be a waiter who shuffles in a manner that is ostensibly discreet. Eyes averted, addressing us as ‘sir’ and ‘madam’ rather than anything that hints at our real identity. The waiter will ensure that we’ve located the loos, knowing that the purchase of condoms will be necessary and as likely as not somewhere to throw up the night’s excesses. He will take away the dirty ashtray and leave a clean one; he’ll leave a small bowl of cashew nuts and a cocktail menu. He’ll expect us to get heinously drunk in an attempt to shed responsibility and any visions of consequences and he’ll expect us to leave a massive tip before we stumble to our bedroom. Darren breaks precedent by ordering a lemonade. His boyish choice makes me giggle until he says, ‘And you, Cas? I suggest we keep clear heads.’
I want a double vodka and a fuzzy head but I order a mineral water. We don’t say anything in the time it takes the waiter to go to the bar, fix our drinks and return with them. When the drinks do arrive neither of us suggests a toast. The silence clings to my brain and congregates in my nose and throat, suffocating me.
‘Why?’ The question, disgustingly direct, shocks me. Darren is naively expecting an equally open response. He wants truth to shape all his dealings. Whilst when I stumble across it (which is rare) I view it as an obstacle. The late hour and the raw expectancy in his voice defeat me.
‘Is that an all-encompassing “why”? Why didn’t I call? Why didn’t I return any of your messages? Why did I dodge you when you came to see me?’
‘No, Cas, I know the answers to those questions.’ He does? How? ‘I know why you ran. I know you are terrified of commitment and I reasoned that I couldn’t do anything about that except wait. I hoped time would show you that I’m serious about you. If I hadn’t known at least that much about you, how do you think I could have brought myself to speak to you this evening? Don’t you think I was blistering with anger and’ – he pauses –’ pain? But I reasoned that whilst you hurt me you didn’t do it to be cruel, although you were; you did it because you didn’t know how else to behave. You hurt because you are always hurting. That’s why I didn’t rail at you this evening. Believe me, I wanted to.’
He pauses and I look at him. His eyes are a mass of confusion and wisdom, certainty and terror. I feel so ashamed. If he had ranted at me I could have walked away. I could have sidled back to the sanctuary of aloofness, feeling justified that he didn’t understand me and never would. But he does understand me.
‘I never stopped thinking about you, Cas. I never stopped wanting you. What I’m asking you now is why won’t you
So he’s worked it out. I’m impressed – it shows dedication. But then I know he’s the dedicated type. I wonder how to answer his question. After all, he’s never let me down, hurt me or disappointed me. In fact, he consistently exceeds my expectations. He has attributes and characteristics that I thought had died out with Merlin and Arthur’s round table. And even they were myths.
I can’t think of a logical reason why I wouldn’t trust him.
I can’t think of a convincing lie. So I do the next best thing. I tell the truth, a part of the truth, something like the truth.
‘I do trust you.’
Darren’s face, previously tight and anxious, melts into the broadest grin. He takes my chin in his hand, tilts my head and kisses me. The kiss is strong, absorbing and complete. Darren is satisfied with my answer; he thinks that his six months’ wait on the sidelines has brought me to my senses. And so we move towards the lifts, to the bedrooms. I trust him but he shouldn’t trust me. I am engaged to Josh. And whilst I know now, for certain, that I made that promise for the wrong reasons, I did promise. Poor Josh. Poor Darren. And if I could bring myself to like myself more, I’d feel sorry for me too. I know I should pull away from Darren, stop him kissing me, stop kissing him back and tell him about Josh instead. But I can’t. I’m a coward. Whilst Darren has been the epitome of reasonableness thus far he won’t understand that my fear of loving him drove me into an engagement with another man. I hardly understand it. And I want him so ferociously that I don’t know how I’d continue to live if he stopped kissing me now. So whilst Darren’s kissing me, and illuminating my skin with his strokes, and warming my consciousness with the words he’s uttering, I am making another promise. This time to myself.
This will be the last time.
One last fling before I return to Josh. I may trust Darren but I don’t trust love. And whilst Darren has arrived in my life with a certificate of authenticity, he’s not carrying a lifetime warranty. Josh does. I plan to enjoy every moment of tonight and I’ll make memories that will fortify and edify me for the rest of my life.
That’s what I plan.
We fall on to the bed and he forcefully and repeatedly kisses me. My legs entwine around his, our hands race to rediscover every curve, crevice, ravine and fissure of each other’s bodies. We shed our sticky clothes in a matter of seconds as our skin burns and bleeds into one another’s. He kisses, strokes, licks every inch of my body. Exploring the obvious parts – my shoulders, my tits, my thighs, discovering the discreet parts, my toes, the crook of my elbow, the space between my fingers. I consume him. Tasting his sweat and smelling his sex. I concentrate on the feel of him, which bits of his body are rough, which are smooth. I become familiar with the texture of his hair, all his different hair. His thick, glossy locks, the downy fuzz growing in-between his buttocks, the hairs on his chest that thicken and become more coarse around his groin, the bristles that grow on his chin, right now whilst I’m with him. I listen to his heart and his breathing. Both becoming quicker and less controlled. I smell him. I taste him.
I see him.
The second before he enters me, he grabs my head in both his hands and he looks at me. He stares.
He knows me. Me with his pubes stuck to my cheek, him with my sex on his lips. I tighten my muscles in my thighs and groin in an effort to cling on to him. To keep him exactly where he is now. In me. With me. I wonder how I walked away from this. I wonder how I’ll walk away a second time.
It’s faster and faster and tighter and harder. I can feel my body responding and the response is rising. It’s coming from my toes, circling up through my legs. But it’s started in my fingers too, which seem to be lost in his hair and then running up and down his back. My arms ache with the exquisite brilliance of it. My head spins with the same shocking ecstasy. The intense feelings of luxury creep up my back and through my heart, meeting in my
