Charlie

  Charlie saw then what she was getting at. Setting aside the dowdy clothes, Rita was like a Fifties pin-up girl. Slim hips, tiny waist and big breasts, she looked undeniably racy.

  ‘Yes, I can see, but if I had a figure like yours I’d show it off,’ Charlie said.

  ‘No, you wouldn’t, you’d soon get tired of men pinching your bottom and trying to grope you,’ Rita said with a shrug. ‘How old do you think I am?’

  ‘About twenty-five,’ Charlie said.

  Rita sat down again, took a brush from her bag and whisked her hair back into the original style. ‘I ought to take that as a compliment, yet it doesn’t seem like one. I’m thirty-two, Charlie. If I dress like this I look like I’m wearing my mother’s clothes. Yet if I wear anything else, I look like a tart, and I attract the wrong kind of attention and women hate me for it. You’re very lucky, Charlie, you’re not only beautiful, but you have class. Men are a little in awe of that.’

  ‘Oh, I don’t know about that,’ Charlie laughed.

  ‘Well, I do. Sometimes I think I know everything there is to know about men. Your story about your father puzzles me though. From the little you said I can’t imagine why he disappeared. Men don’t usually leave their wives for a mistress, especially not when they’ve had her for years.’

  Charlie wondered if she’d done the right thing telling this woman so much. She was very odd, in fact she’d never met anyone so forthright, and it made her a little nervous. ‘What do you think happened to him then?’ she asked.

  ‘I couldn’t possibly guess, not without knowing a great deal more about him, and your mother. But you’re very young, Charlie, you’re still hurt and puzzled by his disappearance, and you’re trying to start a new life in London which is the best thing you could do. I doubt very much that you want a woman almost old enough to be your mother sticking her nose in. But I hope we can be friends and maybe in time you’ll feel like telling me the rest of it.’

  Charlie found herself warming to Rita as she went on to ask her about her flat and the other girls. As Charlie described her first night out with her flatmates she became aware by Rita’s astute comments that she understood both Charlie’s reservations and the other girls’ attitude.

  ‘You don’t have to follow them to fit in,’ she said. ‘But on the other hand there’s nothing worse in a flat-sharing situation where one girl is po-faced and disapproving, because it makes the others feel guilty. What you have to do, if going out and pulling men isn’t your bag, is to avoid those kinds of nights out, but find some other time to spend with the girls and get to know them better.’

  Charlie felt able then to admit to her embarrassment when she’d brought Andrew back to the flat the previous night. ‘The whole flat was a tip again, aside from mine and Anne’s room. Meg was walking around in something that looked like a petticoat, she didn’t even have any knickers on.’

  Rita smirked. ‘I shouldn’t worry about what Andrew thinks,’ she shrugged. ‘Men don’t notice mess the way women do, especially when they’re young. But the important thing to remember, Charlie, is that you didn’t come to London to sink into some kind of middle-aged, suburban bliss. You came to have fun, to be part of a young scene. So forget about doing the washing-up, or hoovering the carpets, you can get into that when you’re my age. Let yourself go, buy a few outrageous clothes, get off to those pop concerts and see the latest films. I don’t want to hear you’ve been sitting alone darning your socks and waiting for Andrew to finish work.’

  They chatted on until it was time to go back to work. But as they got up from the seat, Rita suddenly turned to Charlie and caught hold of her hand. ‘You’re going to think me very nosy saying this,’ she said. ‘But are you on the Pill?’

  Charlie blushed. ‘No, but then I don’t need to be.’

  Rita looked hard at Charlie, and saw her for what she really was. A young, somewhat innocent girl straight out of school. She wouldn’t come to much harm at Haagman’s, half the staff were much the same as her, but the girls she was flat-sharing with sounded a different story. She didn’t know why she should suddenly feel involved, or so protective, but she did. Perhaps it was just because she could have done with some sound advice when she first left home herself.

  ‘That sounds to me like I’m not doing that with him. But I can tell by the way you speak about Andrew that you soon will be. Get yourself on the Pill now, Charlie, don’t wait until you find yourself in bed with him and hope he’ll take some precautions,’ she said with a smile. ‘If I had a pound for every girl I know who’s done that and found herself pregnant, I wouldn’t be working at Haagman’s now.’

  Charlie swallowed her pride. She knew Rita was right. ’But how do I get it? she asked.

  ‘Easily. There’s the Brook Clinic or the Family Planning Association, either of them will sort you out. Or go to your doctor and ask him. I’d recommend the Brook, because they don’t ask awkward questions. You can find their address and phone number in the phone book.’

  ‘Okay,’ Charlie said. ‘I will.’

  Rita grinned and took her arm. ‘Not next week, or the week after, now, immediately. It takes time before it works and you have to start a course on the fourth day of your period. Now, let’s get back into the madhouse and catch up before the Hag gets back and finds we’ve been slacking.’

  Chapter Eleven

  Three weeks after Charlie had moved into the flat in Hornsey, she was at Jack Straw’s Castle in Hampstead, waiting for Andrew to finish work. She had arrived about one o’clock, imagining they would go out for the afternoon, but now at two-thirty it was raining hard.

  ‘I think it’s set in for the rest of the day,’ Andrew said gloomily as he locked the bar door behind the last customer. ‘I suppose we could go to the pictures.’

  Charlie was sitting on a stool up at the bar; they were alone apart from John, one of the other barmen, who was wiping down tables and collecting ashtrays. ‘We’ll get soaked,’ she said. ‘I haven’t even brought a raincoat or umbrella with me.’

  Andrew didn’t reply but opened the door which led to the public bar to check if Carol, the landlady, was in there. As the towels were over the pumps and all the lights turned off, he guessed she’d gone up to her flat.

  ‘We could go upstairs to my room,’ he suggested hesitantly.

  Charlie knew the bar staff weren’t allowed to have anyone up in their rooms. ‘I don’t want you to get into trouble,’ she said, but her heart leapt at the thought of what being alone would mean.

  Since her first weekend in Hornsey, they had snatched every available hour they could together, but because of Andrew’s work, in practice this amounted only to afternoons at the weekends, and late-night visits at the flat. There was precious little opportunity for any privacy, the girls were always at the flat, usually with a crowd of their noisy friends.

  ‘For you I’ll take the risk.’ Andrew grinned mischievously. He arranged the wet tea-towels over the pumps, then came back round the bar and went over to John. ‘Don’t let on to Carol if you see her, will you?’

  John was another student, like Andrew working there for the summer. He was thin and studious-looking with glasses. ‘My lips are sealed,’ he said with a warm smile. ‘If asked where you went I’ll play dumb.’

  It was scary following Andrew up the back stairs to the staff bedrooms in the attic. Their footsteps on the uncarpeted stairs sounded very loud and Charlie half expected Carol to come bursting indignantly out of one of the many doors and order them out.

  ‘We’re safe now,’ Andrew said as they reached the dingy top floor. ‘She hardly ever comes up here.’

  ‘But how will I get out this evening?’ Charlie asked nervously.

  ‘That will be a doddle.’ Andrew grinned as he opened his door. ‘Carol always opens up alone at six. You can easily slip out through the back door to the car park, she can’t see that from the bar.’

  His tiny attic room was exactly as Charlie had expected – strewn with books, records, clothes
and dirty cups, the narrow bed unmade. One wall was almost completely covered in an Easy Rider poster.

  ‘Sorry about the mess.’ Andrew hastily snatched up a dirty shirt and a pair of socks, and pulled up the covers on the bed. ‘Go and look out the window while I get this straight. I may live in a pigsty but the view makes up for it.’

  Charlie did as he said. The view was superb, right across the Heath down to the Ponds in the distance. The heavy rain and the absence of people gave it a stark beauty. Each tree was swaying gracefully, the varied shades of green more vivid with the dark grey sky as a backdrop.

  Andrew crept up behind her and slid his hands around her waist, leaning his chin on her shoulder. ‘You should see it at sunrise,’ he said. ‘Sometimes the sky is pink and mauve, and the sun’s rays are orange. Someone told me that it’s more spectacular in London than anywhere else because of all the pollution and gases in the air. I don’t know if that’s strictly true, but whatever causes it, it’s magic.’

  ‘How come you’re up at sunrise?’ she asked.

  ‘I’m an odd sort of chap,’ he laughed. ‘I always wake up then. Sometimes I do some studying, but mostly I make myself a cup of tea, look at the view for a while, then go back to bed to dream about you.’

  ‘You don’t,’ she scoffed.

  ‘Well, I don’t always make a cup of tea,’ he said with laughter in his voice. ‘But I do spend a great deal of time dreaming about you, especially about being alone with you.’

  ‘So what do you imagine?’ she asked, a tremor of excitement running down her spine. Ever since she’d been to a clinic and got herself on the Pill, she’d thought of little else but making love. Every kiss, every touch made her ache for more, yet she’d been nervous of admitting her feelings in case he didn’t feel the same way.

  ‘Lying on the bed with you,’ he murmured as he kissed her neck. ‘Slowly undressing you, the feel of your skin under my hands.’

  Charlie turned in his arms to kiss him and as his lips met hers she ran her hands down over his back to his buttocks, and drew him closer still. Andrew was a wonderful kisser, his tongue and lips so sensual that she had often found herself aroused even in crowded public places. But now, alone, knowing there was nothing and no one to stop them, she pressed her groin against his and delighted in feeling his erection.

  One of his hands crept down to the crotch of her jeans, his fingers tracing the two small mounds inside. She ached for him to unzip her, to thrust his fingers right inside her, instead of just teasing her.

  He moved back a little and with a lazy, sexy smirk he slowly and deliberately unbuttoned her shirt and peeled it off. ‘No bra!’ he whispered, raising one eyebrow. ‘Why’s that? To make it easier for me to touch you?’

  Charlie nodded, she was both embarrassed and excited that he’d understood her motives. She held her breath, wanting his hands to caress her breasts, yet all he was doing was looking at them like a schoolboy.

  ‘Do it then!’ she said, taking a step nearer him, so her nipples brushed against his shirt. His two hands moved to cup her small breasts, he rubbed the nipples with his thumbs, but there was suddenly an almost fearful look in his eyes.

  ‘I want you so much, Charlie,’ he whispered. ‘I’ve thought about nothing else but an opportunity like this. But I didn’t expect it to happen today, and I’m a bit scared I might not be able to stop.’

  Charlie frowned in puzzlement. ‘Why do we have to stop?’ she asked.

  ‘I wouldn’t want you to get pregnant,’ he blurted out, blushing furiously. ‘And I never thought to get anything.’

  All at once she realized he wasn’t as experienced as she’d imagined. Because almost everyone she’d met since coming to London slept around, she had just assumed he must have made love to other girls. Judging by his embarrassment he might even be a virgin, and he probably thought she was too.

  ‘I want you too, Andrew,’ she whispered back, undoing his shirt buttons and sliding her hands over his smooth bare chest. ‘I have ever since our first date. But I won’t get pregnant, because I went to a clinic and got myself on the Pill. I knew it would happen before long.’

  He looked stunned for a second, then slowly a wide smile crept across his face. He cupped her face in his hands, his bright eyes searching hers for any lingering doubt. ‘Really?’

  ‘Yes, really,’ she giggled. ‘Rita gave me a lecture about “being prepared”. I wanted to tell you before but I was too shy.’

  He pulled her into his arms, kissing her with such passion she knew they had passed the point of awkward questions, or even considering what might happen if Carol discovered she was up here in his room.

  It felt like it was her first time, eager, fearful and embarrassed all at once. She wished too she’d worn something more suitable for seduction. Her jeans were so tight, and she was certain they would leave red marks all over her. She didn’t think to remove her plimsolls first, and almost fell over when they caught in the legs of her jeans. Andrew was panting with eagerness as he stripped off his clothes, and he dived into bed, then lay there gazing at her as she bent awkwardly to take off her shoes wearing nothing but her knickers.

  ‘I should have put some music on and undressed you myself,’ he whispered, reaching out for her hand and drawing her back towards him. ‘That’s what they do in films, and I wanted it to be perfect.’

  Charlie didn’t reply, just slid into the narrow bed, but the moment he enfolded her in his arms and pulled the covers right up to their necks, suddenly it felt so right. The rain was splattering against the window pane, from somewhere along the corridor soft music was playing, and his warm, silky body felt so good against hers.

  ‘I’ve done this in my dreams a thousand times,’ he murmured as he caressed her. ‘I can’t believe I’m really touching you at last.’

  His touch was delicate and hesitant as if he was afraid of hurting her, and that consideration for her feelings made her more excited than Guy with his thrusting demands had ever achieved. His whole body was throbbing with desire, his erection was rock-hard against her thigh, but still he held back until she was fully aroused.

  When he did finally enter her, it was over too quickly, yet she felt no real sense of disappointment. ‘I love you, Charlie,’ he murmured into her neck. ‘I never knew it would be so wonderful.’

  She remembered then how when Guy had said he loved her she’d felt compelled to cross-examine him. She didn’t feel that way with Andrew, her whole being knew he would never make such a statement unless he truly meant it.

  ‘I love you too,’ she whispered, holding him tightly and covering his face with kisses.

  He was so sweet, half covering his blushing face with the blanket as he apologized for being so quick. ‘It doesn’t matter,’ she assured him, thinking how lovely it was to have a man who could admit he wasn’t perfect, rather than one like Guy who had to spoil it all by saying he was ‘better after a few drinks’. ‘We’ll both get better with practice.’

  She had thought she’d known Andrew so well that nothing about him could surprise her. Yet she had never seen his face so soft with tenderness before, never noticed how his lips curled at the corners as though in a permanent smile, the full length and thickness of his dark lashes or the way his ears fitted so snugly to his head.

  Love welled up inside her as he held her in his arms whispering endearments to her. This was the man who had steadfastly stuck by her through tragedy, been her friend, her solace. Nothing had ever felt so right and beautiful, it was as perfect as the view of the sea on a summer’s day, as serene as Exmoor under a blanket of snow, and as thrilling as sailing a racing dinghy in a gale. Outside on the Heath, the rain was still lashing down, but here they were in a little cocoon of their own making, warm, secure and so very happy.

  They made love again later. This time it was slower, more sensual and experimental. She found that though Andrew might lack previous experience, his enthusiasm, a strong desire to please, along with a naturally sensual nature soon
led him to find all the right places to caress. Under his sensitive and loving fingers she came to a shuddering climax even before he entered her again.

  They must have fallen asleep in each other’s arms, because all too soon it was half past six and Andrew said he had to get ready for work at seven.

  ‘I can’t bear to go home,’ she said sleepily, pulling him closer to her. ‘I’m much too snug and warm.’

  ‘You have to,’ he insisted, kissing her shoulders. ‘Carol wouldn’t like a stowaway in her tight ship.’

  Charlie knew she must go, but it seemed so cruel after such a blissful afternoon. It was Saturday night, the other girls would be getting ready to go out; unless she went with them, she’d be alone.

  ‘Will you come round after work then?’ she asked. ‘If we get into bed before Anne gets in, she’ll sleep in the living room. I don’t think I could get through the night without you.’

  He kissed her tenderly, his blue eyes filled with the same yearning she felt. ‘Nor me. I’ll be watching the clock all evening. Let’s hope it’s a quiet night and I can get away early.’

  *

  Charlie didn’t attempt to get a bus home, but walked instead. The rain had stopped while they were in bed and the Heath smelt fresh and clean. The sadness at leaving Andrew lifted as she walked, replaced by a feeling of joy that she was loved, and excitement for the future. London was a thrilling place, there was still so much more of it to explore with Andrew, maybe in September they could share a house with his friends, and they could spend every night together.

  ‘What have you been doing today?’ Meg asked as Charlie came in. Meg was sitting on one of the mattresses in the living room, rolling a joint; she looked ready to go out, in a long black dress. ‘By the look of you I’d say you got laid!’

  Charlie blushed. Meg was one for incisive remarks, and she made them regardless of who was listening. In the three weeks Charlie had been living here she’d been continually embarrassed by Meg. She liked her, admired her forthright manner and often wished she could learn to be so direct and sophisticated, yet it still made her squirm sometimes. Fortunately this time they were alone, Beth and Anne were in their bedrooms, and Charlie thought it might be a good opportunity to have a quiet chat.