Fools for Lust (20 page)

She had married young, a much older university lecturer who had been a friend of her family. Almost 20 years her senior. Someone she could look up to, maybe a father figure of sorts; hers had died when she was still young. The first years of the marriage had been happy despite the difference in their ages, but following the birth of Rebecca, on whom they both doted, they began to inexorably grow apart. He became increasingly jealous, abusive even and eventually Rachel felt she had no alternative but to separate. The company she worked for on Wall Street had agreed to transfer her to the Paris office and she had now been in the French capital over six months, while the legal formalities were completed. Every two months, Rebecca would spend a couple of weeks with her father, who had not accepted the separation lightly and was seeking to gain custody of her. But Rebecca's lawyers were confident he would not succeed in this.

At no stage in their early chats, did Rachel even hint at sexual elements and their conversation soon adapted to a comfortable groove of life stories, discussion of books, films and music and a gentle flirting where much was left unsaid.

He expressed his curiosity for what she looked like. She had, in a perennial piece of internet etiquette, provided her description and statistics earlier and the mental image Martin had fabricated of her was already well on the way to quiet perfection. Tall, blonde, gently spoken. She volunteered to send him a photograph by email.

When it arrived, he opened the JPEG with a nervous butterfly coursing around his stomach. But the results were enchanting. She was beautiful. Very American, long-haired, pretty in an understated woman-next-door way, pale-skinned, dark sad eyes scoring a bull's-eye on his heart.

Every day, they would meet online in the forum around three o'clock and talk for at least an hour. Sometimes they were interrupted; after all, she had a job to do, and sometimes her answers were slow in coming and he assumed that she was also talking to others.

There were days when she was melancholy and he could feel her unhappiness invade the bright page on the screen. Loneliness, difficulties with the legal process, the child's minor illnesses, home sickness. Other days Rachel turned playful, teasing him mercilessly on his insistence to forego cybersex with her, describing her clothes in minute details, how her office was overheated and she had taken off her pantyhose or opened her shirt, letting him imagine the delights thus uncovered. Or she would hide from him in the list of online names, assuming pseudonyms from books or movies which he would invariably and proudly recognise, however difficult she made the task. He would do likewise but he knew she had the latest server software and could identify him much more easily if she had clicked on his number under “Friends” and saved it; a function he did not possess.

So, following on from a lighthearted discussion about James Joyce, she would masquerade as Nora or Anna Livia Plurabelle or Dublin gal, or on another occasion adopt the persona of most of the female protagonists of
Gone with the Wind
. Once, he wasn't sure how their talk had moved on to Nabokov, she had hidden among the list as Dolores Haze, Butterfly or Lepidoptera. No easy Lolita for Rachel!

He could only smile, ravished as he was by the elegance of her repartee and imagination.

She even gave him her mobile telephone number.

He agreed readily he would never phone her unless they agreed a time to do so beforehand.

Her voice did not disappoint.

Breathy, moving from childish to pleading to joyful in the breadth of a few sentences, talking about her day, her love for her child, her apprehensions about what her erstwhile husband was up to. They tried to speak at least once a week. His heart moved with the ups and downs of Rachel's fleeting moods.

The lines on screen, the photograph saved away in his documents file, the voice. Martin was hooked.

Badly.

She knew he wrote but had never expressed much curiosity for his books or stories. On a few occasions, he volunteered to post her some copies of his books but she always asked him to wait. ‘Later' she would say, as if she wanted to make the pleasure last somehow.

On the phone. One day.

‘I'm falling for you,' he said.

‘Are you?' she answered, expressionless.

‘I am, Rachel.'

‘I like you too,' she said.

For the first time, the possibility of the two of them actually meeting in real life reared its head. After all, London and Paris were barely three hours apart with the Eurostar train.

He was slow to suggest it. After all, the possibility of being disappointed by her was something he was scared of. Was the photo he had actually of her? Was it genuinely taken the previous year (unlike Mireille's)? But once he searched himself, he knew that the voice on the phone corresponded so beautifully with the face on his screen. Quiet, sad, melancholy, vulnerable. All the things that attracted him to Rachel, beyond her innate culture and intelligence and the fact that conversing with her was such an easy delight.

At first, he felt all he should propose was to meet her after her day at the office and have a drink, a coffee together, maybe even a meal.

‘I would like that, Martin,' she answered.

‘I must come to Paris soon to see my French publishers,' he added. ‘I will let you know as soon as I have a precise date for the trip.' He had no wish to reveal how much she now meant to him and the fact he was quite willing to go to Paris just to see her.

‘Great.'

That weekend, he wrote her a long letter, tactfully alluding to his feelings, carefully hinting that he held her in much respect and wasn't expecting sex or an affair automatically, confessing to his previous internet-inspired jaunt to France for the weekend with Mireille. He wanted her to know he did not think of her in the same way, that his feelings were both strong and genuine, even though the way they had met was so uncommon, nay bizarre. He polished his words endlessly over two days, putting in more rewrites to the letter to Rachel than he had done on any of his recent novels. He emailed it to her.

She did not respond to it and no mention was made of the letter in their online chats later in the week. Maybe he had gone too far, he wondered? Or maybe Rachel was exquisitely discreet and wished to spare his feelings.

But she did ask again when he would come to Paris.

They were chatting online one late afternoon when he suggested he could take a midday train the following weekend. She greeted the news calmly. He told her he would make a Eurostar booking and arrange a hotel and would confirm by email a few hours later.

There is no need to stay in a hotel and spend money unnecessarily, she said on screen. You can stay at my place.

Are you sure? he queried, though his heart and loins danced a light fandango.

Of course, she answered. There is a spare bedroom anyway, if we don't get on.

The hint was of course present that the spare bedroom wouldn't prove necessary.

Rebecca's father would be in Europe that week and he would be taking care of her. It was his turn.

He breathed deeply. All the right elements were in place.

He logged off after some more small talk and quickly made his train reservation.

The following day, he confirmed his arrangements with her and, always cautious, just in case the train arrived late and he was unable to meet up with her at the café on the Champs Élysees, close to her office, as arranged, he asked her for her home address. She lived on the Avenue Victor Hugo, a stone's throw from the Arc de Triomphe. He noted the number.

Their next conversations saw him walking on air in expectation of Paris. It was all falling into place, too good to be true. They spoke once more on the phone and again he was enchanted by the sheer tone of her voice. He knew he was in love. Even though he'd not yet actually met her; it was illogical, crazy and wonderful. And, deep inside, he was convinced she would not disappoint, would be even better in real life. Looked forward to the moving shades of darkness of her eyes, the small blemishes on her skin, the pale hue of her uncovered shoulders, the fragrant smell of her breath, the warmth radiating outwards from her body as they sat together at a restaurant table discussing Julien Green or André Pieyre de Mandiargues, both authors they had discovered they had a common liking for.

He had informed his French publishers he would be in town; some tax exemption documents had to be signed and a visit to their offices would save much time and bother.

Two days before his trip, the publishers rang with good news and bad news. The good tidings were that a major magazine had agreed to do a major interview with him as he was coming to Paris, which would be just great publicity for the translated book of his they were publishing a few months later. The bad news was that the journalist just couldn't do this week and could he postpone his trip by six days?

He reluctantly agreed and informed Rachel. She didn't appear too distraught by the change of plan and reminded him that she would not be in Paris the following week however, as she had a business trip to Rome already set up. He did recall her mentioning this some time back. It was agreed he would come to Paris again for her a fortnight later. There was no rush anyway, was there? Of course not, he acquiesced. After all, Rachel would always be there. Barely three hours away from him by train. The thought warmed him. The conversation moved to what she was wearing today and she teased him again insufferably, lingering insistently on the fabric of her brassiere and how flushed she could get now that summer was nearing.

By the end of their online chat, he had a respectable hard-on.

The interview with the French journalist was something of a disappointment. All she seemed interested in was the fact that he wrote particularly erotic stories and where did he do his research and weren't the male characters just thinly disguised versions of him, albeit in space? Still, any coverage was better than none, he reckoned.

He had an afternoon to spare before the Eurostar back to London after his publisher had lunched him. There was an alternate country CD he knew had been released early in France as the band was touring there, so he took a trip to the Virgin Megastore next to the Lido on the Champs Élysees to purchase it. He exited the store with a further four records; he'd always been a bad, voracious shopper when it came to music. The weather was turning grey and he pondered catching a movie. Which is when he noticed the flower stall and decided to get flowers for Rachel. Act with a modicum of elegance. He knew she was still in Rome, wouldn't be back for another two days, but surely it would be a nice surprise to find a lovely bouquet on her doorstep as she returned. He carefully supervised the selection of colourful flowers until the bunch looked eminently spectacular and called a cab. The block of flats on the Avenue Victor Hugo looked prosperous. The intercom only displayed the flat numbers and he realised he didn't know in which one Rachel lived. He rang for the concierge and the heavy wooden front door clicked open. He made his way down the darkened corridor until he found the window to the concierge's ground-floor apartment. Knocked. The woman looked at him wearily; maybe she thought he was a delivery person for the flowers. He asked for Rachel. She appeared puzzled. He repeated his request, describing her, a young American woman with a small daughter, Rachel McKenna. The concierge mumbled negatively. Maybe she was known here under her married name. He inquired: Rachel Stewart? No again. The concierge was adamant, there was no American in the whole block, he must be mistaken. He abandoned the flowers in a wheelie-bin on the Avenue as he walked back towards the Rond-Point to catch a cab. Evidently, she had furnished him with a wrong address. Why? He couldn't fathom the answer. His heart now felt heavy. He brooded all the way back to London, in search of an answer. In vain. Rachel had lied to him.

As he emerged from the Waterloo terminal, the heavens opened and the rain bucketed down as if it were Judgment Day.

A few days passed as he buckled down to the routine of writing and living, hesitant to log on again to the forum while the unpleasant scar of Rachel's lies festered inside him.

Finally, he could resist no longer.

Half an hour online later, having ignored several m or f? requests, he saw her handle appear in the “Who's Here?” column. Rachel.

He paged her.

Marti: Hi.

It took her a long time to respond. As if she was already immersed into a variety of conversations with other forum members.

Rachel: Hi.

Marti: How was Rome?

Rachel: OK, a bit boring.

Marti: Some good meals at least?

Rachel: Oh yes. You should see me in the bathroom mirror when I come out of the shower. I've put weight on. I'm gross ...

Marti: I'm sure that a few meals won't have made such a difference. Even fat, I'll have you readily ... (s)

Rachel: Nice of you to say so. So ... how did the interview go?

Marti: Predictable.

Rachel: Oh.

He hesitated a minute or two, waiting for her to relaunch the conversation, but she didn't. So he took the plunge.

Marti: You know ...

Rachel: Yes?

Marti: While I was in Paris last week, I thought I'd buy you some flowers ...

Rachel: That's nice.

Marti: But they hadn't heard of you, Avenue Victor Hugo ... Why did you give me a wrong address, Rachel?

Rachel: Oh, that ...

She fell silent.

Marti: I understand that one has to be so careful with internet encounters, but surely you knew you could trust me. Anyway, it doesn't matter, Rachel. It really doesn't ...

There was no response.

Marti: Rachel?

Another minute.

Marti: Talk to me, please.

(Rachel has left the forum)

For the rest of the week, she didn't come on to the forum. Finally, he called her up. She picked up, said ‘Hello'. It's me,' he said. ‘Can we talk?' She hung up. He knew he had broken one of the rules not to call her on the telephone unless previously agreed. Maybe she had been in a meeting. He gave it a few more days.