Isn't It Romantic

31

Isn’t It Romantic

    Rupy’s humming it again. Isn’t tit roman-tic, daa, dee hmm, dee hmmm…

    “Rupy! You’re humming again!”

    “Mm? Oh. Thinking of the premieres, Dot, darling!”

    Of what to wear to them, he means. “Yeah. Stop. Get ya coat, we’re going.”

    “But Dot, we’ve got ages, yet!”

    “We haven’t, because we’re not getting a taxi. Get ya COAT!”

    He gets his coat and we go. On the way he tries to tell me that Aunty Susan will expect us to roll up in a taxi but I ignore him. We grab a bus and then the Tube. Easy-peasy. And then it’s a real short walk to—

    “Cripes,” I croak, goggling up at the huge up-market building that David’s father’s flat is in.

    “Ooh!” he goes.

    “Don’t get excited, we’re here for the sole purpose of ratifying Aunty Susan’s conclusion that the dump’s unliveable-in.”

    Don’t think he even heard me, he’s too busy peering round celebrity-spotting and wishing he’d worn a nice flower in his buttonhole…

    “Of course, Miss Mallory, Miss Walsingham is expecting you,” goes the bloke on duty at the guard desk downstairs. Like, he’s wearing a flash uniform but that’s what he is: a guard to stop undesirables getting in and ringing ya bell, terrorists need not apply, this is Planet Nayce. Planet Nayce and A Half, actually.

    So we go up in this huge great old-fashioned lift, it’s wood-panelled with a real carpet, like, not grey industrial nothing, Persian-patterned Axminster, and little padded red leather seats against the walls to sit on! Rupy sits on one immediately.

    Aunty Susan answers the shiny wood-panelled front door with the remark: “There you are. I was beginning to think the chap downstairs had had you deported.”

    “Yeah, ’tis like that. Ugh, crikey, ya can smell it from here!”

    “Exactly,” she goes grimly. “How are you, Rupy? Come on in. And don’t breathe too heavily. Not that I’d mind if blasted John was up for a fortune in damages, but somehow it’d end up being due to negligence on my part.”

    Sir John Walsingham, she means, David and Nefertite’s gruesome father. Has he come up to town to see if his only son’s okay? Has he Hell as like, hasn’t even rung him, either. Well, he is okay, he’s been staying with Aunty Susan since they let him out of the hospital but he’s been making noises about coming back to the flat—wants to use the piano, see. And she doesn’t want him coming down with something horrible from breathing smoke all day and night. Jesus, it’s thick! Like, there’s nothing to see, but it must of got into the carpet and the curtains and the upholstery and everything.

    “I have opened the French windows,” she goes grimly as Rupy coughs and gets out his hanky.

    He nods madly over the hanky, his eyes starting to water.

    So she leads us into the big lounge-room where the piano— Crikey Dick! No wonder he wants to come here, it’s a full grand!

    “That’s a full grand, eh?” I croak.

    “Yes,” she says grimly. “A full grand full of smoke at the moment, Dot.”

    Rupy staggers over to the open French windows—boy, what a view! And after breathing in fresh air on the balcony for a while he comes half back inside and goes: “One would expect Sir John to have a full grand, Dot, dear. But I entirely agree, Susan: David can’t possibly stay here.”

    So that’s that. No-one volunteers to come and air the place for Sir John for two months, and she shuts the door firmly on the dump and we go. What? she goes. Not a taxi, Rupy, the Tube’ll get us right there! So that settles his hash.

    David’s at the Music School or something—well, don’t look at me, I’m ignorant. Conservatorium? Like, it’s real big and the buildings are real old and shit, is that a bloke in an academic gown? Thought even the Brits had given that one away except for graduation. What the story is, since he was gonna be in England for several months they grabbed him for this set of master classes, not sure what they are, but what happens in them is some unfortunate gets to play a bit, crash, crash, bonk, bonk, and then David stops them and plays it better, crash, crash, bonk, bonk, and then the unfortunate has to copy him. Plus and some conducting classes. Well, I s’pose he does conduct his own stuff, yeah. Does his dad know he’s been asked to give lessons in conducting? I haven’t dared to ask anyone, not even Susan, though I know she’d only laugh her head off, but I tell ya this: I wouldn’t mind being a fly on the wall—on the wall and well out of reach—the day he finds out.

    It’s the master classes today. “Think this is it,” says Susan, flinging open a door. Ow! High-pitched screeching of the most excruciating sort. “Sorry!” she bellows, closing the door again. “Violin,” she explains briefly, forging on.

    “Cats being strangled, more like.”

    “Yes. Think it was Stravinsky: never could stand him,” she says indifferently. See, she’s got a huge amount of musical knowledge, poor thing: couldn’t help it, growing up in that family, but that doesn’t mean she likes the sorta garbage they wallow in. “This might be it.” Flings door open. Ow! Moaning, yet?

    “Oboe,” she says briefly, closing the door.

    “Not a bassoon, Susan, dear?” he goes, rubbing his ears.

    “No. Out of tune, granted, but it was an oboe.”

    “I’d have said two. Both out of tune.”

    “Yes!” she says with a sudden yelp of laughter. “Got perfect pitch, Rupy?”

    “Well, yes, dear, but that doesn’t mean I’m musical,” he goes modestly.

    “Wouldn’t want to be,” she grunts, flinging open another door. Ow! Ta-boom, pom, pom! Ta-BOOM, pom, pom!

    “What the fuck was that?” I croak as she hurriedly closes the door on the racket.

    “Tuba,” she grins. “Haven’t you heard one of them before, Dot? Oh, well—”

    “Don’t open it again!” I scream.

    “I think it’s rather a funny noise,” says Rupy happily. “But not that close, of course! Come on, I think I can hear a piano!” He forges off down the corridor.

    Cautiously I say: “Do you think he has got perfect pitch, Susan?”

    “Oh, God yes, Dot! There were two oboes, and they were both out of tune.”

    “Golly.”

    “Mm. Some would say,” she goes drily, “that it’s a pity he’s never done anything with it.”

    “Not if ya consider what’s available to do!”

    “Exactly!” she grins. “Oh, well, poor old David, he has got talent, and God knows anything is better than being a Lloyd Webber—not the cellist, of course—but in these atonal days it’s more or less write a tune and be damned forever.”

    “Um, yeah.” Cellist?—Forget it. They’re not alike in any other way, but the way she talks is a bit like Nefertite: like she’s known you forever and you understand every word she says.

    Rupy’s found it, because the noise is now echoing down the corridor. Crash! Bonk, bonk, bonk! Doh, ray, me, fah, soh—Yeah.

    “There he is,” he whispers.

    Ya don’t need to whisper, Rupy, you could shout and none of them would hear ya! Like, it’s quite a big room—needs to be, yeah, otherwise the place’d be up for untold damage suits for irreparably impaired hearing—and there’s a big semicircle of chairs, like not lots and lots of chairs, but quite a few, set out at a fair distance from the piano, and some unfortunate’s punishing it and David’s sitting on a chair at the front looking bored.

    “Thank God!” he says quite loudly as we poke our heads in. “Stop, André!” Nothing. “Mais arrête, donc, grand con!” he screams. Like, my audio-lingual French isn’t too shit-hot, I can read a lot more than what I can understand, but I understood that, all right. Jesus, the poor bloke. And what’s more he’s not even a student, unless he’s a mature student. He’s got a beard: that either makes them look about sixteen and silly with it or a lot older. He looks about forty-five, so probably mid-thirties? He has stopped, who wouldn’t?

    “So what’s the verdict?” David says cheerfully to us, getting up.

    “Horrible,” replies his Aunty Susan drily.

    “Not that; I meant the flat.”

    “Horrible as well,” she notes drily and me and Rupy collapse in sniggers. Help, the students haven’t even reacted: are they all politely pretending to be deaf? Or, ghastly thought, do they take the stuff so seriously that they can’t smile when someone makes a joke about it?

    “What, Dot?” he goes.

    Jump! “Nothing. Um, that wasn’t that piece that you had Aidan practising that time in Adelaide, was it?”

    “No,” he says, his shoulders are starting to shake, oops!

    “Sorry, sorry. Well, we seen the flat, but if you haven’t finished ya class, we’ll wait.”

    “No, no, I’ve finished, just hanging on waiting for you. –All right, go!” he shouts. Some of them look sadly and hopefully at him but he ignores them, so they gather up their stuff and slowly move out. Meanwhile Rupy explains happily that the flat is totally unliveable-in, David, dear. Don’t think he notices that David’s trying not to laugh: he thinks it’s really funny the way Rupy’s suddenly adopted him. And, the consequences to one’s lungs— Exactly. Good on ya, Rupy!

    “What he said,” I note, giving him a hard look.

    “But—” He meets his Aunty Susan’s eye. “Did you think it was that bad?” he goes lamely.

    “Worse,” we all say firmly.

    “Bugger. That beautiful piano’s just sitting there— Do you know the old bastard hadn’t had it tuned since Kingdom Come?” he announces fiercely.

    “Too mean, dear, it’s a common syndrome,” Rupy tells him wisely.

    “Well, yes! Look, it’s going to waste, and I could always keep the windows op—”

    “No,” I state firmly. “It’d be pneumonia one way or the other. Let the fucking thing go to waste: come here, use one of theirs, they got plenty.”

    “Well, yes, but it’s such a trial getting here from Aunty Susan’s. Though I could take a taxi, if allowed,” he notes.

    “Rubbish, David,” she goes briskly. “A nice walk to the bus, then change to the Tube, what’s wrong with that?”

    “Nothing, in principle. In practice it’s dash to the bus, miss the bloody thing because it’s early, wait twenty minutes for the next, wait twenty minutes for a train, miss the connection to the other train you forgot to mention that’ll get me here, and the whole journey’s taken me two and a half bloody hours!”

    “Um, couldn’t Double Dee— Oh, no, ya told Dawlish where to put it,” I recall.

    “Yes. Though you’re right, the film studios are a lot nearer to Susan’s place,” he goes, glaring at his unfortunate aunt.

    “Leave her out of it, David, none of it’s her fault and if it wasn’t for her ya wouldn’t have a roof over ya head at all!”

    “Thanks, Dot,” she goes, grinning.

    “Get up earlier,” I advise him.

    “I’m getting up at six-fifteen in order to miss that bloody bus as it is!”

    Ouch.

    “I really think you’d better let him take a taxi, dears,” says Rupy on a nervous note.

    “Paying for it out of thin air,” notes his aunt. “Bloody Double Dee Productions are threatening to sue for the return of his travel costs to Iceland, you know.”

    “Yes, they wrote me a nasty letter,” agrees David mildly. “Come on, Susan, a taxi a morning won’t break the bank.”

    “No? This’d be on top of the taxis you have to take to get home because you stay on so late it’s not safe to take the Tube and the last bus has gone, would it?”

    Silly wanker. When he has to get up at six-fifteen? That’s him all over!

    “Come to us,” says Rupy mildly.

    Eh?

    “I— Have you got room for a piano, though, Rupy?”

    What?

    “Well, no, dear, not if we want to eat off the dining table, but I didn’t mean with the piano: ’tisn’t actually a condo, but the Residents’ Association would never permit it. But we’re much, much nearer to this lovely Conservatorium”—right, if he says it is, then that’s what it is—“and even if you had to take the occasional taxi, it wouldn’t break the bank.

    “How many occasional taxis is occasional?” I go grimly.

    “Only to get home safely at night, Dot!” Rupy explains quickly.

    “Oh. Yeah, well, that’d be okay—yeah. Like, see, it’s even easy to get to Harrods on public transport, where we are.”

    “We know that now!” Rupy tells him proudly. Yeah, very funny, Rupy.

    “But I— Well, it’s very good of you, Rupy, but I—”

    “Dot,” says Aunty Susan with a laugh, “for God’s sake put the poor bloody man out of his misery!”

    Blush, blush. “Um, yeah.” Swallow. “Ya better come and stay with us, David.”

    He takes a deep breath. “I accept with thanks, Rupy; but only on the understanding that you don’t intend to force me to share a bed with Dot unless and until she wants it.”

    His jaw sags terrifically, poor Rupy, and he goes absolutely puce!

    So I snarl: “You flaming nana, David, didja have to put it like that?”

    “Um, sorry. Couldn’t think how else to put it.”

    “I thought—I thought—” the poor thing’s stuttering.

    “Yeah, ’course ya did, Rupy. Thing is, he was really out of it, that first night, like after the roast lamb, he fell asleep in the taxi when I was taking him home. And since then, um, we never seem to have been alone.”

    Aunty Susan’s looking real crestfallen. “I’m bloody sorry, Dot: I never realised I was playing gooseberry.”

    “Me, neither,” croaks Rupy.

    “Ya weren’t! I wanted you along!”

    “I didn’t,” he murmurs. Silly wanker.

    Now poor Aunty Susan’s gone red. “You’ve got a tongue, David, why the bloody Hell didn’t you speak up?”

    “Tact, dearest: I am living in your house,” he goes smoothly.

    “Leave her alone, David!”

    Tingling silence.

    “Um, yes,” he goes sheepishly. “Sorry, Susan, that was a bit uncalled for.”

    “Look, you can share the flat and we’ll start from there,” I announce grimly.

    “I could always pop down to Doris, or next-door to Miss Hammersley. Um, no, on second thoughts: don’t think I could explain it tactfully enough for dear Miss H,” he admits, he’s puce again, poor old Rupy!

    “No,” I say quickly: “’course ya couldn’t, no-one could. Like, she’s a spinster lady left over from World War II: her family’s these terrifically high-up Navy people, bit like John’s lot. Like, two of her brothers are admirals,” I explain to Aunty Susan.

    “Says it all,” murmurs David, his shoulders are shaking again, doesn’t he ever know when he’s beaten?

    “Just leave it out, David, Aunty Susan knows what I mean!”

    “Yes,” he murmurs, smiling like anything. “Sorry, Dot.”

    “If you insist, you can go to Doris’s,” I tell Rupy kindly. “But only until we’ve got ourselves sorted out; we aren’t gonna throw you out of your home!”

    “Ta ever so, dear!” He’s cheered up immensely. More, I would of said, than what I said warranted. Why’s he smiling at David like that? Oh, forget it, they’re all mad, gay or straight.

    So we go down to the Tube station and Aunty Susan says generously: “I’ll phone your bloody Father about the flat, David. If he’s too mean to pay for someone to air it properly, he can choke on it. But no-one’ll buy it in that state. Well, I go this way. Promised I’d go to some bloody local choir with Pat Avery this evening.”

    “On your head be it. But what about dinner?” he says limply.

    “That’s what I mean: I can’t stay to eat in town, I have to get home. You might as well grab your things tomorrow. See you!” she goes, hopping on the train.

    “See ya,” we all say limply as it whisks her off.

    “Blimey,” says David after a minute. “Now?”

    “You can drop that, for sure! Um, shouldn’t we be on the other platform, Rupy?”

    “What, dear? Oh! Of course, come on!” So we rush off to the other platform but the train isn’t due yet, that’s okay.

    And a strange silence falls…

    Finally Rupy clears his throat and begins: “I know we said we’d take you to The Tabla tonight, David dear—”

    “I’m looking forward to it,” he says mildly.

    “Um, are you? Good. Um… If you and Dot would rather be by yourselves, I can always, um—”

    “I suppose it might be marginally less awkward by ourselves!” says David with a laugh.

    “It won’t, Mrs Singh’ll wonder where he is,” I note grimly.

    “Let her wonder, Dot!”

    “Out loud, you idiot!”

    “Oh, crumbs!” he gasps, falling all over the platform laughing himself silly.

    Yes, hah, hah, hilarious! This happens to be quite important to me, you stupid wanker!

    Suddenly Rupy says in my ear: “Very lit-up, dear, but very nervous, too. Highly strung, you see?”

    Gulp. “Mm.”

    He takes my arm, smiling. “I’ll pop down to Doris’s: we were planning to have a nice evening some time soon watching old videos of darling Dirk, anyway.” Nobody has to wonder if he’s sincere, ’cos he goes: “She’s got the one where he wears the Austrian Robin Hood gear: to die for!”

    Austrian—? Oh, forget it. And thanks very much, Rupy, you’re a sport!

    Help, it’s only five-thirty by the time we get home and we booked at The Tabla for eight-thirty ’cos Rupy was sure it’d takes ages to look round the flat and get over to the Conservatorium. And I think he’d planned going out for a few drinks beforehand. Nevertheless he goes down to Doris’s.

    David’s investigating the sideboard. “Doesn’t he drink?” he says dazedly.

    “Um, yeah, ’course he drinks! Oh. Um,”—cof—“other people’s liquor, mostly.”

    “Right.” He straightens with a bottle. “What are you hoarding this for?”

    “Um, dunno. Oh—a dead man, right. Well, chuck it out.”

    He goes off to the kitchen. Then he comes back in looking dazed. “There’s no gin in the fridge, either!”

    “Um, no. Well, there was a bottle of Russian vodka but it only had half an inch left in it: Rupy drunk it with the remains of the pineapple juice John bought.”

    “What does John drink?” he croaks.

    “The man drinks anything, David, it’s them years of hard sailing, it’s inured him to any sort of liquor under the sun. But for preference, Scotch or pink gins, depending on the time of day.”

    “I think we’ve established there’s no gin left. But where’s the Scotch? Or has he learned not to leave it anywhere within Rupy’s ken?”

    “Um, no—I mean, yes, the good stuff: he keeps that down at the cottage. Like the Black Label and, um, what do you call those fancy ones again? Straight malts? No, that’s wrong.”

    “Single malts,” he says faintly. “No, I meant the Red Label. Bell’s? Teacher’s?”

    “Um, I don’t know all those… Um, well, if ya can’t find anything, David, I suppose there isn’t anything. Um, we could have a cup of tea.”

    Suddenly he sits down on the grungy old fawn sofa that Rupy and Rosie have been promising themselves they’ll get rid of ever since they started sharing the flat and passes his hand over his face. “A cup of tea,” he echoes limply.

    “Um, yeah.” Why has my voice gone so small? “I’m real sorry, David, if you expected it to be, um, romantic.”

    He looks up quickly. “What? No! Thinking in clichés, I suppose— Don’t bawl, darling Dot!” He comes over to me and kneels down by my grungy old fawn armchair.

    “I’m not—bawling!” I sob.

    “Oh, God. Yes, you are, darling,” he says, kneeling up and putting his arms round me. “Don’t, Dot. I love you,” he says, leaning his head on mine.

    “I—love—you—too!” I sob.

    “Well, that’s all right,” he says in a shaken voice.

    I look up at him soggily. “Only it isn’t very—very—”

    “Romantic. No. Life tends not to be,” he says, getting out his hanky and wiping my face with it.

    “No. Have you even got any condoms?” I go, sniffing hard.

    “Uh—God. Practical as ever, darling Dot! Well, no, because I didn’t expect to be doing it this evening as ever was.”

    “No. ’S’all right, Rupy’s got kazillions of them and he’s put a whole load in my bathroom cabinet as well.”

    “Jesus,” he mutters dazedly.

    “He is practical, in his way.”

    “So I perceive!” he says with a sudden mad laugh, giving me a real hard hug. Ooh! Jesus, he’s a lot stronger than I thought, his arms feel like iron!

    “All that piano bashing: strengthens the arms and hands. Most pianists have got sinewy hands and brawny arms, even if their name’s not Smith!” he goes, grinning.

    “Eh?”

    “The Village Blacksmith: don’t tell me they’ve stopped torturing Australian kids with that in bloody English literature classes?”

    “Um, yeah. Must of, I don’t reckernise it,” I go dazedly. “Um, ‘There was movement at the station’?”

    “No. That’s Australian, is it?”

    “Yeah, we got bad litracha too, see!”

    “Yes,” he says, kissing the tip of my nose gently. “Shall we go to bed and get it over with, mm?”

    “That’d be a good idea,” I admit gratefully.

    So we get up and he takes my hand and we go into my room.

    “This is my room.”

    “I think you mean the study,” he says limply.

    “Yeah. The workstation’s Rosie’s. I don’t really need it, with the laptop, but it’s good to be able to put it on a proper ergonomic surface. See, she didn’t take it down to the cottage, it’s too wide and there’s no corner there it’d fit into. Um, she got it at a garage sale, when she first come to England.”

    “I think I could have guessed that.”

    “Um, this is a double bed.”

    “Yes, it’s just the size of the workstation that makes it look so small,” he mutters.

    “Yeah. But there is room to get into it.” As the alternative is to stand here like a nana I chuck my clothes on the floor and get into it.

    “Yes,” he goes dazedly. “Dot, my dearest, I don’t know whether I’m being precipitate, but had it dawned that one of us is going to have to clamber over the other, should we need to go in the night?”

    Aw. Yeah. Like, it’s against the wall, see.

    “Do you sometimes need to go in the night?” he goes, chucking his tweed jacket at the ergonomic chair and starting to unbutton his shirt.

    Turn puce. Glare. “Sometimes, yeah! And?”

    “And I think that in that case, though of course my instinct is to place you between myself and the cave wall,” he says, climbing out of his trousers and then his underpants, “you’d better sleep on the outside of the bed.”

    “Um, yeah.” Boy, that view’s distracting. “Doesn’t it depend on whether you’re right or left-handed, though?”

    He’s gone very red, ouch! “What delightful gentleman of your acquaintance impressed that one on you?”

    “None of your business!”

   “Tell me it was Lucas Roberts and I’ll strangle you,” he offers grimly, struggling out of his horrible Pommy singlet and hurling it at the floor.

    Ulp. All right, I won’t tell ya, David, but will that make it better?

    So he gets in. “I’m right-handed,” he goes grimly.

    “Yeah, but ya got that horrible raw burn all down your arm.”

    “Exactly. That’s why I’ll stay on the outside for a while. Rather than prop myself on that arm.”

    “Aw. Yeah.”

    “Say that again!” he says with a sudden laugh.

    “Eh?”

    “That funny Australian ‘oh’—no, ‘aw’? No. Not quite halfway between them… Something closer to a short O, as in ‘bottle’!” he goes, laughing. “Oh—No, can’t do it!”

    “Eh?”

    “You don’t knew you’re doing it, do you?” he murmurs, putting a hand under my chin, ooh!

    “Eh? No. Boy, you talk a load of crap, David.”

    “Mm,” he agrees, putting his lips very, very softly on mine…

    Oh, boy!

    “That all right?” he murmurs.

    “Ya know it is, ya wanker. And, um, I think I better warn you, I’m so strung up and everything—”

    “You need to piss,” he says on a resigned note.

    Gee, I realise it’s your Pommy boarding school dialect, David, but must you be so coarse? “No! I was only gonna warm you, I might, um, sorta come. Like, unexpectedly.”

    “I am expecting it, Dot,” he says, putting on this prim face. “So I think I can almost promise you that if it doesn’t eventuate of itself, I’ll—”

    “No! Clot!”

    “I see,” he says with a smile. “Good. You have that effect on me, too, so it’ll be a race between us, won’t it?”

    I’ve gone red as a beet, I'm just about capable of agreeing: “Mm.” But not of looking at it, nor of putting me hand on it, what a nong! And I know he knows I was looking at it when he took his singlet off, like, he was totally exposed, it was unbelievably good—Uh, yeah. Oh, Jesus, I think I am gonna come, he’s nuzzling my tits! Why did it never feel that good when any other bloke done that—

    “Oh, David, oh, David!”

    “Good,” he says into them, getting a hand down—

    “Don’t do that!”

    “What?” he says, peering at me.

    “That’s what I mean, I’m gonna come like a rocket!”

    “Mm.” He gets out of bed. What the—? I can see he’s ready as ever—readier, is it kind of bending backwards?

    “Yes,” he says, grinning at me, and kind of giving it a little stroke. Jesus, Mary and Joseph, mate, hasn’t anybody ever told ya what that does to a girl’s innards? Er, yes, on second thoughts, I just bet they have, and that’s why he done it.

    “Where is this famous bathroom cabinet of yours?”

    “Eh? Oh! Down the far end of the passage to your, um, left. ’Tisn’t all that convenient. It’s the cabinet on the left of the mirror.” He’s gone. Help.

    He comes back, grinning. “There are enough prophylactics in there to serve a regiment!”

    “Um, yeah. Well, doesn’t look at me, it wasn’t me that bought them. And it evens out, I bought a load of broccoli down the market the other day out of me own—”

    “Don’t, Dot!” he gasps.

    “Not the kitty,” I finish, glaring.

    “Mm. –No,” he says, pushing my hand away. “I’ll put it on this time, talking of coming like rockets!”

    Aw. Right. Gee, that’s flattering.

    So he hops back into bed and kisses me, putting all of his weight on me. Yep, the rest of the bod is about as hard and sinewy as the arms. Specially that—right. It’s so good I can’t help spreading me legs a bit…

    “Dot.” he says in a shaken voice, “let me just get my tongue down there, or I will come.”

    Yeah, but mate, if ya do that—OH! Jee-SUS!

    So after about an eternity of screeching and grabbing at him he murmurs: “Okay?”

    “Mm!” I pant. So he comes up for air and nibbles my ear and I give this one last shriek, y’know? Clenching like billyo. Cos sometimes I can do that, see. But it’s gotta be that ear.

   “Did you have a last orgasmic contraction then?” he says with smile in his voice.

    Pant, pant! “Yeah!” –If ya gotta be so clinical!

    So he licks my ear and murmurs:  “Shall I bite the other ear?’

    “Duhn’t wor’.”

    “Really?” He tries it but it doesn’t work so then—shit, has he got tears in his eyes?—he warns: “I’m going to get up there like a ferret, Dot Mallory, and fuck my head off.”

    “Yeah!” I gasp, like, I can almost talk, again. “Do that, Da’Wals’m!”

    So he does that, and POW! Glory be, he’s louder even than Lucas at his loudest. I’m not so muzzy that I don’t think Thank God Rupy went down to Doris’s!

    After absolutely ages of just lying here, he takes a deep breath and goes: “That was a bit ad hoc. Sorry.”

    “No, it was good. Miles better than planning it down to the last millisecond.” Shit! Didn't mean to say that, it just came out.

    He peers at me incredulously. “What cretin did that?”

    “No-one you know. An Australian.”

    “But you can’t— Well, I certainly can’t!”

    “Me too, neither, but anyway, whatever I done woulda been wrong, I’ve come to the conclusion. Cos he read too many books, see, he never let it just be natural.”

    “My God, how boring! Not that a little art can’t improve it—but Christ, give the gilt time to wear off the gingerbread a little!”

    “Mm. Sounds good to me.”

    “Yes,” he goes, turning over on his front and burying his head in my shoulder.

    I put an arm round him and we just stay like that for ages and ages and ages….

    “There is a lot of gingerbread,” he murmurs.

    “Eh? Well, yeah, whatever I did they seemed to wanna be a C-cup, I took it off round the waist and thighs but they just—”

    “No! It’s all glorious, you idiot!” he goes, raising himself on his elbow. “Come here! Mmm…”

    Gee, that was a very nice kiss.

    “What?”

    “Nothing. Um, you will go on doing that, will you?”

    “Certainly!”

    “No, um, that was a very nice kiss.”

    “That? Good Heavens, I can do better than that! Come here!”

    Mmm-mmm… This time I get my arms right round him and hug him real tight. Eventually he has to stop for breath. Then he says: “I think I see. I’ve missed you, too, Dot. Dreadfully.”

    Blast! I’m gonna bawl again!

    Yep, I’m bawling like a total nit. Oh, well, it doesn’t matter, cos it’s only David.

    See? He’s not phased at all, just hugs me and waits it out and gives me a bunch of tissues out of the new box Rupy bought me, they’re variegated pastel shades, probably cost him a bomb, it’ll have been an impulse buy.

    “Thanks.” Sniff, blow.

    “There’s no need to bawl, I’m not going away.”

    No. Aren’tcha? Sniff. “Good.” Blow, sniffle. Smile, wad up tissues, hurl them vaguely in the direction of where the bin mighta been two days since.

    … “Hungry?”

    Ooh! Jump! Jesus, I almost dozed off, there! “Um, yeah. And thirsty. I think we’re gonna be too late for The Tabla: I’ll have to ring up and apologise.”

    “Not if you booked for eight-thirty, Dot.”

    “What is the ti—” Blush. Silly grin. Seven-fifteen. “Oh, well, in that case we can have a shower and a cuppa.”

    He gets out of bed, shaking like anything.

    “What? What’s so funny?”

    “Moderation—in—all—things!” he gasps.

    “Hah, hah.”

    “Just as well: I’ll need to pace myself if I’m expected to perform again tonight.”

    “Yuh—um, what about Rupy?”

    “Oh, I don’t mind if he listens, now we’re over the initial hurdle.”

    “David, you twit, his room’s right next-door!”

    “Seriously, darling, I don’t think he’ll be back tonight. But for the future, what about that large room on the far side of the sitting-room, conveniently next to the bathroom?”

    “That’s Rosie’s and John’s room.”

    “They’re not here, Dot.”

    “No-o… The thing is, it doesn’t seem nice to use someone else’s room behind their backs.”

    Gee, he’s not arguing, he just says seriously: “Would you feel all right about it if they gave their permission?”

    “Um, well, yeah, acksherly.”

    “Then it might be as well to ring them,” he says mildly, heading for the door, “because I warn you, I’m insatiable.”

    Silly grin. “Hah, hah. Where are you going?”

    “To make a cuppa and have a piss, not inevitably in that order. Why?”

    “Cos ya better put something on, it’s freezing out there, this is flaming London in so-called May, in case you haven’t noticed!”

    So he puts on the plaintive voice. “You’d better find me a nice, warm dressing-gown, Dot.”

    All right, mate, you asked for it! And I bounce up and get it out. Usually it lurks in the wardrobe, see, it’s that bad. Aunty Allyson’s choice for a chilly English winter. Bright pink quilted nylon—yep, you goddit. Woulda been pale blue, true, but she couldn’t find one in my size in Sydney in February. (It’s the boobs: everything else fits into—Forget it.) What makes it extra specially good is the little pink nylon rosettes on every edge or hem the ruddy thing’s got.

    He’s in it. What’s he looking so pleased about, for fuck’s sake? It looks Goddawful. Goddawful. Specially with his sallow skin. Added to which, the ruddy thing’d go round him twice!

    He doesn’t say anything, he just goes out, humming. Uh—something from the flaming film? Ye-es. Think so. Not I’m Gonna Wash That Man Right Out of My Hair, no, that was the one Rosie sung right to the camera, most of the crew, like the hetero ones, practically creaming their jeans over her as she done it. Wet blouse and all. Um, no-o… A voice-over? Ulp. Goddit.

    “Very FUNNY, David!”

    From the passage he carols merrily: “‘I enjoy—bee-hing a gurl!’ Want milk in your tea, darling?”

    So I give in completely, and merely reply: “Yes! Thanks! Milk and one sugar!”

    Well, what else can ya do? He’s here, we done it, we both came, and he’s getting me a cuppa. Wouldn’t it be flying in the face of a merciful Providence to do or say anything else?