Pulse

  ‘Well, we’re all counters.’

  ‘Are we?’

  ‘Yes, I remember very well getting to two.’

  ‘There were quite a lot of halves with me, if you know what I mean.’

  ‘All too well. Now there’s pain for you.’

  ‘No, that’s what Pete would call pain. It’s just hurt pride. He does hurt pride and high anxiety. That’s as close as he gets to pain.’

  ‘Sensible guy. What’s not to like? Did he ever marry?’

  ‘Twice. Out of both of them now.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘Embarrassment, a certain self-pity, weariness. But nothing stronger.’

  ‘So according to you he’s never loved?’

  ‘Indeed.’

  ‘But he wouldn’t say that. He’d say he’d been in love. More than once.’

  ‘Yes, he’d probably say dozens of times.’

  ‘“It’s the hypocrisy I can’t stand.”’

  ‘I’ll never live down saying that, will I?’

  ‘Well, maybe it’s good enough.’

  ‘What is?’

  ‘To believe you’ve been in love, or are in love. Isn’t that just as good?’

  ‘Not if it isn’t true.’

  ‘Hang on. Isn’t there a bit of rank-pulling going on here? “Only we’ve been in love because only we’ve suffered.”’

  ‘I wasn’t saying that.’

  ‘Weren’t you?’

  ‘Do you think women love more than men?’

  ‘More – in the sense of more often or more intensely?’

  ‘Only a man could ask that question.’

  ‘Well, that’s what I am – a poor fucking man.’

  ‘Not after dinner at Phil and Joanna’s, you aren’t. As we noted.’

  ‘Did we?’

  ‘Oh God, I hope you’re not going to make us all go home and try to get it on to prove –’

  ‘I hate “get it on” as well.’

  ‘I remember one of those American TV shows – you know, we solve your emotional and sexual problems by putting you in front of a studio audience and making a spectacle out of you, and sending the audience home feeling very glad they aren’t you.’

  ‘That’s an extremely British denunciation.’

  ‘Well, I remain British. Anyway, there was this woman, talking about how her marriage or relationship wasn’t working, and of course they got on to sex right away, and one of the so-called experts, some glib TV counsellor, actually asked her, “Do you have big orgasms?”’

  ‘Ker-pow. Straight for the G-spot.’

  ‘And she looked at this therapist, and said, with actually rather a fetching modesty, “Well, they seem big to me.”’

  ‘Bravo. And so say all of us.’

  ‘So what are you saying?’

  ‘I’m saying we shouldn’t necessarily feel superior to Pete.’

  ‘Do we? I don’t. And if he’s passed the fifty mark, I doff my cap.’

  ‘Do you think Pete gets off with women because he can’t get on with them?’

  ‘No, I just think he has a low boredom threshold.’

  ‘If you’re in love, you don’t have a boredom threshold.’

  ‘I think you can be in love and bored.’

  ‘Do I fear another hands-under-the-table moment?’

  ‘Don’t be so defensive.’

  ‘Well, I am. I come here to gorge myself on your delicious food and wine, not to be water-boarded like this.’

  ‘Sing for your supper.’

  ‘“And you’ll get breakfast …”’

  ‘What I’m saying, in defence of this Pete whom I’ve never met, is merely, perhaps he’s loved, or been in love, as much as his constitution allows, and why feel superior to him just because of that?’

  ‘There are some people who wouldn’t fall in love if they hadn’t read about it first.’

  ‘Spare us your Froggy wisdom for one night.’

  ‘Is it safe to take our hands out from under the table now?’

  ‘It’s never safe. That’s the whole point.’

  ‘What is the point, by the way?’

  ‘Let me summarise. For those unable to keep up. This house is agreed that the British use the C-word far too liberally, that men talk about sex because they can’t talk about love, that women and the Frogs understand love better than Englishmen, that love is pain, and that any man who’s had more women than me, apart from being a lucky cunt, doesn’t really understand women.’

  ‘Brilliant, Dick. I second the motion.’

  ‘You second Dick’s motion? You must be the Hub Director.’

  ‘Oh, shut up, boys. I thought that was a very male summary.’

  ‘Would you like to give us a female summary?’

  ‘Probably not.’

  ‘Are you implying that summarising is a contemptible male trait?’

  ‘Not especially. Though my summary might mention how passive-aggressive men get when talking about subjects which make them feel unsure of themselves.’

  ‘“Passive-aggressive”. I hate that word, or phrase, or whatever it is. I would guess it has a ninety to ninety-five per cent female use. I don’t even know what it means. Or rather, what it’s meant to mean.’

  ‘What did we say before we said “passive-aggressive”?’

  ‘How about “well mannered”?’

  ‘“Passive-aggressive” indicates a psychological condition.’

  ‘So does “well mannered”. And a very healthy one too.’

  ‘Does anyone seriously think – if we were to pass the metaphorical port at this stage and the ladies were to retire – that they’d sit around talking about love and we’d sit around talking about sex?’

  ‘When I was a boy, before I knew anything about girls, I used to look forward to them equally.’

  ‘You mean, boys and girls?’

  ‘Cunt. No, love and sex.’

  ‘Voices. Keep them down.’

  ‘Is there anything to match that, do you think, in the field of human emotional endeavour? The force of longing for sex and love when you haven’t had either?’

  ‘I remember it all too well. Life just seemed … impossible. Now that was pain.’

  ‘And yet it didn’t turn out so badly. We’ve all had love and sex, sometimes even at the same time.’

  ‘And now we’re going to put on our coats and go home and have one or the other and next time there will be a show of hands.’

  ‘Or a hiding of hands.’

  ‘Boys never stop being boys, do they?’

  ‘Does that qualify as passive-aggressive?’

  ‘I can do active-aggressive if you’d prefer.’

  ‘Leave it, sweetie.’

  ‘You know, this is one evening when I don’t want to be the first to go.’

  ‘Let’s all go together, then Phil and Joanna can discuss us while they clear up.’

  ‘Actually, we don’t do that.’

  ‘You don’t?’

  ‘No, we have a ritual. Phil clears, I stack the dishwasher. We put on some music. I wash up the stuff that won’t go in the dishwasher, Phil dries. We don’t discuss you.’

  ‘What charming hosts. A veritable Trimalchio and Mistress Quickly.’

  ‘What Jo means is, we’re all talked out. We discuss you tomorrow, over breakfast. And lunch. And, in this instance, probably dinner as well.’

  ‘Phil, you old bastard.’

  ‘I trust no one’s driving.’

  ‘I don’t trust anyone’s driving either. Only my own.’

  ‘You’re not really?’

  ‘I’m not a complete idiot. We’re all walking or cabbing it.’

  ‘Actually, we’re going to stand on the pavement discussing you two for a while.’

  ‘Was that really tongue, by the way?’

  ‘Sure.’

  ‘But I don’t like tongue.’

  After he had closed the front door, Phil put on some Madeleine Peyroux, kissed his wife on the apron string round the back
of her neck, went upstairs to a darkened bedroom, cautiously approached the window, saw the others standing on the pavement, and watched them until they dispersed.

  Trespass

  WHEN HE AND Cath broke up, he thought about joining the Ramblers, but it seemed too obviously sad a thing to do. He imagined the conversation:

  ‘Hi, Geoff. Sorry to hear about you and Cath. How’re you doing?’

  ‘Oh, fine, thanks. I’ve joined the Ramblers.’

  ‘Good move.’

  He could see the rest of it too: getting the magazine, studying the open-to-all invitation – meet 10.30, Saturday 12th, in car park immed. SE of Methodist Chapel – cleaning his boots the night before, cutting an extra sandwich just in case, maybe taking an extra tangerine as well, and turning up at the car park with (despite all his warnings to himself) a hopeful heart. A hopeful heart waiting to be bruised. And then it would be a case of getting through the walk, saying cheery farewells, and going home to eat the leftover sandwich and tangerine for his supper. Now that would be sad.

  Of course, he carried on walking. Most weekends, in most weathers, he’d be out with his boots and pack, his water bottle and his map. Nor was he going to keep away from all the walks he’d done with Cath. They weren’t ‘their’ walks, after all; and if they were, he’d be reclaiming them by doing them by himself. She didn’t own the circuit from Calver: along the Derwent, through Froggatt Woods to Grindleford, perhaps a diversion to the Grouse Inn for lunch, then along past the Bronze Age stone circle, lost in summer months amid the bracken, all leading to the grand surprise of Curbar Edge. She didn’t own that, nobody did.

  Afterwards, he made a note in his walking log. 2 hrs 45 mns. With Cath it used to take 3 hrs 30 mns, and an extra 30 mns if they went to the Grouse for a sandwich. That was one of the things about being single again: you saved time. You walked quicker, you got home and drank a beer quicker, you ate your supper quicker. And then the sex you had with yourself, that was quicker too. You gained all this extra time, Geoff thought – extra time in which to be lonely. Stop that, he said to himself. You aren’t allowed to be a sad person; you’re only allowed to be sad.

  ‘I thought we were going to get married.’

  ‘That’s why we aren’t,’ Cath had replied.

  ‘I don’t understand.’

  ‘No, you don’t.’

  ‘Will you please explain?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘Because that’s the whole point. If you can’t see, if I have to explain – that’s why we’re not getting married.’

  ‘You’re not being logical.’

  ‘I’m also not getting married.’

  Forget it, forget it, it’s gone. On the one hand, she liked you making the decisions; on the other hand, she found you controlling. On the one hand, she liked living with you; on the other, she didn’t wan’t to go on living with you. On the one hand, she knew you’d be a good father; on the other, she didn’t want to have your children. Logic, right? Forget it.

  ‘Hello.’ He surprised himself. He didn’t say hello to women he didn’t know in the lunch queue. He only said hello to women he didn’t know on walking paths, when you got a nod or a smile or a lifted trekking pole in reply. But – actually, he did know her.

  ‘You’re from the bank.’

  ‘Right.’

  ‘Lynn.’

  ‘Very good.’

  A small moment of genius, remembering her plastic name-tag through the bullet-proof glass. And she was having the vegetarian lasagne as well. Did she mind … ? No, fine. There was only one free table. And it was just sort of easy. He knew she worked in the bank, she knew he taught at the school. She’d moved to the town a couple of months previously, and no, she hadn’t been up to the Tor yet. Would she be OK in trainers?

  The next Saturday she wore jeans and a sweater; she seemed half-amused, half-alarmed as he got his boots and pack out of the car and pulled on his scarlet mesh-lined Gore-tex jacket.

  ‘You’ll need water.’

  ‘Will I?’

  ‘Unless you don’t mind sharing.’

  She nodded; they set off. As they climbed out of the town, the view broadened to include both her bank and his school. He let her set the pace. She walked easily. He wanted to ask how old she was, whether she went to the gym, and say how she looked taller than when sitting down behind the glass. Instead, he pointed out the ruins of an old slate-works and the rare breed of sheep – Jacobs, were they? – that Jim Henderson had been farming since people down south started wanting lamb that didn’t taste like lamb, and were happy to pay for it.

  Halfway up it began to drizzle, and he grew anxious about her trainers on the wet shale near the top. He stopped, unzipped his pack, and gave her a spare waterproof. She took it as if it was quite normal that he’d brought it. He liked that. She also didn’t ask whose it was, who’d left it behind.

  He passed her the water bottle; she drank and wiped the rim.

  ‘What else have you got in there?’

  ‘Sandwiches, tangerines. Unless you want to turn back.’

  ‘As long as you haven’t got a pair of those awful plastic trousers.’

  ‘No.’

  He did, of course. And not just his own, but a pair of Cath’s he’d brought for her. Something in him, something bold and timid at the same time, wanted to say, ‘Actually, I’m wearing North Cape Coolmax boxers with the single-button fly.’

  After they started sleeping together, he took her to The Great Outdoors. They got her boots – a pair of Brasher Supalites – and, as she stood up in them, walked tentatively to a mirror and back, then did a little tap dance, he thought how incredibly sexy small female feet could look in walking boots. They got her three pairs of ergonomic trekking socks designed to absorb pressure peaks, and she widened her eyes at the idea of socks having a left and a right like shoes. Three pairs of inner socks too. They got her a day-pack, or a day-sack, as the hunky assistant preferred to call it, by which point Geoff felt the fellow beginning to get out of line. He’d shown Lynn how to position the hip belt, tighten the shoulder straps and adjust the top tensioners; now he was patting the pack and juggling it up and down in far too intimate a way.

  ‘And a water bottle,’ Geoff said firmly, to cut all that off.

  They got her a waterproof jacket in a dark green that set off the flame of her hair; then he waited and let Hunk suggest waterproof trousers and get laughed at in reply. At the cash desk he handed over his credit card.

  ‘No, you can’t.’

  ‘I’d like to. I’d really like to.’

  ‘But why?’

  ‘I’d like to. Must be your birthday soon. Well, some time in the next twelve months. Got to be.’

  ‘Thank you,’ Lynn said, but he could tell she was a bit edgy about it. ‘Will you wrap them up again for my birthday?’

  ‘I’ll do more than that. I’ll clean your Brashers specially. Oh yes,’ he said to the cashier, ‘and we’d better have some polish. Classic Brown, please.’

  Before they went walking next, he dubbined her boots to make the leather supple and strengthen the waterproofing. As he slipped his hand inside the fresh-smelling Brashers, he noted again, as he had in the shop, that she took half a size smaller than Cath. Half a size? It felt like a full size to him.

  They did Hathersage and Padley Chapel; Calke Abbey and Staunton Harold; Dove Dale as it narrows and deepens to Milldale; Lathkill Dale from Alport to Ricklow Quarry; Cromford Canal and the High Peak Trail. They climbed out of Hope to Lose Hill, then along what he promised her was the most scenic ridge walk in the entire Peak District, until they came to Mam Tor, where the paragliders gathered: huge men who sweated up the hill with vast packs on their backs, then spread out their canopies like laundry on the grassy slope and waited for the upcurrent to lift them off their feet and into the sky.

  ‘Isn’t that thrilling,’ she said. ‘Wouldn’t you like to do that?’

  Geoff thought of men in hospital wards
with broken backs, of paraplegics and quadriplegics. He thought of mid-air collisions with light aircraft. He thought of not being able to control the wind and getting carried higher and higher into the cloud, of coming down in unknown landscape, of getting lost and scared and peeing yourself. Of not having your boots on a path and a map in your hand.

  ‘Sort of,’ he replied.

  For him, freedom lay on the ground. He told her about the trespass on Kinder Scout in the 1930s: how walkers and hikers had come out from Manchester in their hundreds to the Duke of Devonshire’s grouse moors to protest against lack of access to the countryside; how it had been a peaceful day except when a drunken gamekeeper shot himself with his own gun; how the trespass had led to the creation of national parks and registered rights of way; and how the man who’d led it had died recently, but there was still one survivor, now 103, living in a Methodist old people’s home not far away. Geoff thought his story soared better than any bloody paraglider.

  ‘They just went trampling across his land like that?’

  ‘Not trampling. Tramping, perhaps.’ Geoff was pleased with this emendation.

  ‘But it was his land?’

  ‘Technically, yes. Historically, perhaps not.’

  ‘Are you a socialist?’

  ‘I’m in favour of the right to roam,’ he said cautiously. He didn’t want to put a foot wrong now.

  ‘It’s all right. I wouldn’t mind. Either way.’

  ‘What are you?’

  ‘I don’t vote.’

  Emboldened, he said, ‘I’m Labour.’

  ‘I thought you would be.’

  In his walking log, he noted the routes they took, the date, the weather, the duration, ending with an L in red for Lynn. As opposed to a blue C for Cath. Times were about the same, regardless of the initial.

  Should he get her a trekking pole? He didn’t want to push it – she’d refused all offers of a walking hat, despite having the pros and cons explained to her. Not that there were any cons. Still, better a bare head than a baseball cap. He really couldn’t take a walker in a baseball cap seriously, male or female.

  He could get her a compass. Except he already had one himself, and rarely consulted it. If ever he broke his ankle, and had to tell her through the pain to set off across the moor using that tumbledown sheepfold as a reference point and keep heading NNE – showing her how to turn the instrument and set a course – then she could have his for the purpose. No, one compass between two, that was right, somehow. Symbolic, you could say.