“Okay.” I launched back into the story. “So at Pizza My Mind, Gus didn’t have any money—well, obviously, because he didn’t have any last night or earlier today and even though he’s a talented man, I don’t think that alchemy is one of his particular gifts…”
“So you had to pay for the two of you.”
“Yes, which is fine because it’s extremely reasonable…”
“And the waiter has a lovely butt…” Dennis was a gay man twenty-four hours a day, he never let up.
“Quite. But Gus drank about ten bottles of Peroni and…”
“Ten bottles of Peroni!”
“Relax,” I said. “I’ve no problem with that in principle, especially because Peroni is weak, but it has to be paid for.”
“You don’t feel like he’s taking advantage of you, do you?” said Dennis, looking levelly at me.
The thought had crossed my mind earlier in the day while we were in the pub, and that upset me because I lived in fear of being thought an idiot, taken for a fool.
But I absolutely hated arguments about money. It reminded me of my childhood. Memories of my mother shouting at Dad, her face red and distorted. I would never behave like that.
“No, really, Dennis, because then he said some really lovely things in the restaurant.”
“Ten Peronis worth of loveliness?”
“Easily.”
“Let’s hear it.”
“He took my hand,” I said slowly, trying to build up effect, “and said, very seriously, ‘I really appreciate this, Lucy.’
“And then he said, ‘I hate not having money, Lucy,’ and get this Dennis, ‘especially when I meet someone like you.’ What do you think of that, eh?”
“What did he mean?”
“He said that I was lovely, and should be taken to beautiful places and have beautiful things given to me.”
“Except that you won’t be getting them from him.” Dennis could be very blunt.
“Shut up,” I said. “He said that he’d love to wine and dine me and buy me flowers and chocolates and fur coats and fancy kitchens and electric carving knives and one of those little vacuum cleaners that you can use on the couch and everything my heart desires.”
“And what does your heart desire?” asked Dennis.
“It desires Gus.”
“I don’t think that’s your heart we’re talking about.”
“You’re so vulgar, do you ever think of anything but sex?”
“No. Then what did he say?”
“He said that the little vacuum cleaners were great for getting fluff out of your coat pockets.”
“He sounds like he’s a sugar bowl short of a Fornasetti dinner service to me,” snorted Dennis. “Carving knives and vacuums and fur coats, honestly!”
But he didn’t know the half of it and I felt reluctant to tell him. I didn’t want negative comments, I wanted great rejoicing, to match my mood. Because the conversation with Gus had got a little bit tangled after that.
“Do you like flowers?” he had asked.
And I had said, “Yes, Gus, they’re lovely, but my life isn’t incomplete without them.”
Then he said, “And chocolate?”
“Yes, I like chocolate an awful lot, but I’m not lacking for it.”
“Oh! You’re not?” Concern crossed his face, and he suddenly seemed to go into a deep slump. “Well, what did I expect?” he said mournfully. “A beautiful woman like you. How could I have been so stupid to think that I might be the only man in your life?”
“Gus, please stop. What are you talking about? No, it’s okay,” I said to the waiter who had come running when he heard Gus’s outburst. “No, really, everything is fine, thanks.”
“You might as well get me another of these, while you’re at it,” said Gus waving a Peroni bottle at the waiter. (That must have been his ninth.) “I’m talking about you, of course, Miss Lucy Goddess Sullivan—it is Miss, I presume…?”
“Yes.”
“…And the suitors that bring you the chocolate.”
“Gus, I don’t have suitors bringing me chocolate.”
“But didn’t you say…?”
“I said that I don’t go without it. And I don’t. But I buy it myself.”
“Oh,” he said slowly. “You buy it yourself. I see…”
“Good.” I laughed. “I’m glad you see.”
“An independent woman, Lucy. That’s what you are. You don’t want to be under an obligation to them, and you’d be right. To thine own self be true, as our friend Billy Shakespeare was forever telling me.”
“Er, who don’t I want to be under an obligation to?”
“The suitors.”
“Gus, there aren’t any suitors.”
“No suitors?”
“No. Well not just at the moment.” I didn’t want him to think I was a total loser.
“Why not!!?”
“I don’t know.”
“But you’re beautiful.”
“Thank you.”
“I never heard before that the English were a shortsighted race, but they must be. It’s the only explanation I can come up with.”
“Thank you.”
“Stop saying ‘thank you.’ I mean it.”
There was a pleased little pause where we sat smiling at each other, Gus’s eyes slightly glazed over, probably from the excess of Peronis.
There was no need to tell any of that to Dennis. I decided to pass over it and tell him the next good thing.
When Gus said, “Er, Lucy, can I ask you something?”
And I answered, “Of course.”
“I couldn’t help overhearing that you’re currently without a suitor…”
“Yes.”
“…So would I be right in thinking that there’s a vacancy?”
“Yes, I suppose that’s one way of putting it.”
“I know that this is going to sound outrageously forward of me, but is there any chance at all that you might consider me for the position?”
And I looked at the red-and-white checked tablecloth, too shy to meet his eyes and murmured “Yes.”
Dennis was disappointed in me.
“Oh, Lucy.” He sighed. “Haven’t you listened to anything I’ve told you—you’re not supposed to submit so easily. Make them work for it.”
“No, Dennis,” I explained firmly. “You’ve got to understand that I was afraid to play games with him—he was liable to get confused even when I was being totally straightforward. Introducing manipulation and feminine wiles—saying ‘no’ when I meant ‘maybe,’ saying ‘maybe’ when I meant ‘yes’—could be the undoing of us.”
“Okay, if you insist. So what happened then?”
“He said, ‘I’m also unattached romantically; do you mind if I eat the last piece of pizza?’”
“The silver-tongued devil,” muttered Dennis, clearly unimpressed.
“I was thrilled,” I said.
“Isn’t it going a bit far to be thrilled?” asked Dennis.
“I mean, it was paid for, so someone might as well eat it but, really, Lucy, thrilled?”
I let it pass.
“And what’s he like in bed?” asked Dennis.
“I don’t actually know.”
“You wouldn’t let him?”
“He didn’t try.”
“But you were together for nearly twenty-four hours. Aren’t you worried?”
“No.” I wasn’t. Granted his restraint was unusual. But not unheard of.
“He’s probably gay,” said Dennis.
“He’s not gay.”
“But you don’t seem upset that he didn’t jump you?” said Dennis, sounding confused.
“That’s because I’m not upset;” I said. “I like men to take things slowly, men who want to get to know me before they sleep with me.”
That really was true, it wasn’t just bravado for Dennis’s benefit—I was horrified by men who were upfront (as it were) about their need for sex, big grown-up men with hug
e sexual appetites. Men with come-to-bed eyes, men with big thighs and hairy chests and huge unshaven jaws, men who got erections six times an hour, men who smelled of sweat and salt and sex. Men who entered rooms by saying bodily, “Here’s my hard-on, the rest of me will be along in about five minutes.”
Pelvo-centric men put the fear of God in me. Probably because I thought that they’d be very demanding and critical of my performance. These men could pick and choose from any woman they wanted so they’d be used to the best. If I clambered into their bed with no chest, no long legs, no tan, they’d be bitterly disappointed.
“What’s the meaning of this?” they’d demand when I removed my clothes. “You’re not like the one I slept with this afternoon. You’re not a woman. Where are the tits?”
I hoped that, if a man got to know me before we went to bed together, I would have a better chance of his being nice and not laughing at me. That he would be more prepared to overlook my obvious physical shortcomings because I had a nice personality.
That’s not to say that I hadn’t, once or twice, slept with men I had just recently met. There were times when I felt that I had no choice. Times when I had liked a man and was afraid that if I repulsed his sexual advances he would run away and have nothing further to do with me. If Gus had insisted on sexual relations I probably would have complied. But I was a lot happier that he hadn’t.
“You and your Catholic guilt,” said Dennis, shaking his head sadly. I had to stop him before he launched an attack on the Catholic Church and the nuns and the Christian Brothers and how they damaged the psyche of every young boy or girl that came into contact with them, taking away their capacity for guilt-free sensuous pleasure. We could have been there all night.
“No, Dennis, it’s not Catholic guilt that stops me from being promiscuous.”
I suspected that if I had big bouncy breasts and long, slender, cellulite-free golden thighs, I could have overlooked my Catholic guilt. I would probably have been a lot more likely to confidently hop into bed with total strangers. Maybe sex would have been an activity that I could just enjoy, instead of it mostly being an exercise in damage control, trying to act like I was enjoying myself while at the same time managing to hide a butt that was too big, a chest that was too small, thighs that were too… etc., etc.
“Well, if you’re sure.” Dennis still sounded a bit doubtful.
“Really, Dennis, I’m very sure.”
“Okay.”
“So, all in all, to wrap up, to summarize, what do you make of the whole thing?” I asked gleefully. “Doesn’t he sound great?”
“Well, I don’t think that it would be what I want…”
I mouthed “Michael Flatley” at him.
“…but,” he said hurriedly, “he does sound cute. And if you will insist on choosing men that haven’t any money, I hope you know what you’re doing. I wouldn’t recommend it but I seem to be talking to the wall.”
“And isn’t it amazing what the fortune-teller said?” I urged, steering him back onto the track of positive comment.
“I have to admit that the timing is uncanny,” he agreed. “It must be a sign. I would normally advise caution, but this does seem to be written in the stars.”
That was exactly what I wanted to be told.
“Apart from the money, is he nice to you?” asked Dennis.
“Very nice.”
“Okay. I’ll have to see him before I can fully endorse him, but at the moment, you have my provisional blessing.”
“Thank you.”
“Right then, it’s twelve thirty, I’m off. I’m going out tonight.”
“Are you going to take poppers and wear a check shirt and dance to The Pet Shop Boys?”
“God, Lucy.” He was disgusted. “That’s outrageous stereotyping.”
“But are you?”
“Yes.”
“Well, have a great time. I’m going to bed.”
I went to sleep happy.
Chapter 30
Of course it was a different story the following morning when I woke up and realized that I was expected to get out of bed and go to work.
I felt like hiding, but then again it was Monday and it was hard to change the habit of a lifetime. Meeting a new guy, even someone as great as Gus, couldn’t transform me overnight into someone who bounded out of bed before the alarm went off.
I pawed around until I found the snooze button, negotiating another five minutes of guilt-ridden dozing for myself. I would have given anything not to have had to get up. Anything.
Someone was in the bathroom, which was nice. There was no point in my getting up until it was free. A short reprieve.
Time for me to lie in bed, half asleep, idly contemplating the various suicide options available to me, because, naturally, they seemed a lot more inviting than getting to work.
I had toyed with the idea of suicide several times—most weekday mornings actually—and a long time ago I had realized how badly the modern apartment is equipped for the killing of oneself. Not a bottle of poison, not a noose, not a farm implement anywhere.
But I shouldn’t have been so negative—they do say that where there’s a will there’s a way. But then again, if I hadn’t been so negative, I wouldn’t have wanted to kill myself and the whole discussion would be moot anyway.
I ran through the list of possibilities available to me.
I could have taken an overdose of painkillers. But I was fairly sure that that didn’t work, at least not for me, because a couple of times when I had a very bad hangover I had taken about twelve tablets and I didn’t even feel sleepy, never mind like I was dying.
The idea of being smothered with a pillow didn’t seem to be too awful. Quite a nice, peaceful way to go, with the added advantage of not having to leave your bed to do it. But it was a little bit like synchronized swimming—rather pointless if you tried to do it on your own.
Just then I heard someone coming out of the bathroom and I stiffened with horror but, quick as a flash, someone else went in. I breathed out with relief—no need to get up just yet. Although I was living on borrowed time and I knew it. But for the moment I could stay horizontal and contemplate doing myself in although I knew that I didn’t really want to kill myself at all—the taking of one’s own life is unnatural.
It is also an awful lot of trouble.
It was ironic, really—you want to die because you can’t be bothered to go on living—but then you’re expected to get all energetic and move furniture and stand on chairs and hoist ropes and do complicated knots and attach things to other things and kick stools from under you and mess around with hot baths and razor blades and extension cords and electrical appliances and weedkiller. Suicide was a complicated, demanding business, often involving visits to hardware shops.
And if you’ve managed to drag yourself from the bed and go down the road to the garden centre or the drug
store, by then the worst is over. At that point you might as well just go to work.
No, I didn’t want to kill myself. But it was a long way from not wanting to kill myself to actually wanting to get up. I may have won the battle, but there was, as yet, no sign of me winning the war.
Karen burst into the room. She looked chic and efficient and her makeup was perfect. The effect was a bit scary at that hour of the morning. Karen always looked groomed and her hair never got frizzy, not even when it rained. Some people are like that. But I wasn’t one of them.
“Lucy, Lucy, Lucy, wake up,” she ordered. “I want to talk about Daniel. Has he ever been in love, I mean really in love?”
“Er…”
“Come on, you’ve known him for years.”
“Well…”
“He hasn’t really, has he?”
“But…”
“And wouldn’t you say it’s about time that he was?” she demanded.
“Yes,” I said. It was easier to agree.
“Me too.”
Karen slumped onto my bed. “Move over. I’m exhau
sted.”
We lay in silence for a short time. We could hear Charlotte, in the bathroom, singing “Somewhere over the Rainbow.”
“That Simon guy must have a big one,” commented Karen.
I agreed.
“Oh, Lucy,” she sighed dramatically. “I don’t want to go to work.”
“Me, either.”
Then we played the Gas Explosion game.
“Wouldn’t it be great if there was a gas explosion?” said Karen.
“Yes! Not a bad one but…”
“Well, bad enough to keep us at home…”
“But not bad enough to hurt anyone…”
“Exactly, but the house would collapse and we’d be stuck here for days with just the TV and the magazines and we’d have to eat all the stuff in the freezer and…”
Although the stuff in the freezer was nothing but a beautiful fantasy. We never had anything in it except a huge bag of peas that had been there when Karen moved into the flat four years before. Sometimes we bought big tubs of ice cream with the intention of having modest little amounts every so often and making it last for months, but they usually didn’t even last the evening.
Sometimes, for variety, we played the Earthquake game instead. We wished for an earthquake that had our apartment at its epicentre. But we were always careful not to wish death or destruction on anyone other than ourselves. In fact, all we wished destruction on was the way out of our apartment. Magazines, televisions, beds, sofas, and food were miraculously saved.
Sometimes we used to wish for a broken leg or two, lured by the idea of several weeks solid, uninterrupted lying down. But the previous winter Charlotte had broken her little toe at her flamenco dancing class (at least that was the official story, the truth was that she had broken it jumping over a coffee table while under the considerable influence of alcohol) and she said the agony was beyond description. So we no longer wished for broken limbs, but sometimes we wished for a burst appendix.
“Okay,” said Karen with determination. “I’m going to work.”
She left and Charlotte arrived.
“Lucy, I’ve brought you a cup of coffee.”
“Oh, er, thanks,” I said grumpily, dragging myself upright.
In her work clothes and without any makeup, Charlotte looked about twelve. Only her enormous chest gave it away.