Human Remains (13 page)

After dinner Audrey asked Vaughn to take the plates through to the kitchen and she led me into the living room with the second bottle of wine, topping my glass up as I sat on Vaughn’s leather sofa. As she leaned forward I had an excellent view of her cleavage, although I tried not to make it obvious. Her breasts were well-rounded, the fabric of her top stretched across them, and I caught a trace of her perfume – or maybe it was even the soap or the shower gel she’d used earlier this evening, readying herself for my arrival. I wondered if she’d thought about the prospect of me burying my face between her breasts, if she’d considered the possibility that I might want to have sex with her.

‘It’s nice, this, isn’t it?’ she asked then. She’d seated herself on the sofa next to me, even though there was another sofa across the room from this one. She’d folded herself into a comfortable, cat-like curl, her feet towards me, neat little bare feet, with toenails painted a pale pink. How had I ever thought she might be nearly fifty? She was thirty, if that.

‘What is?’ I asked.

‘The wine.’

‘Yes,’ I said, although it tasted like vinegar to me. I should have brought something decent with me after all, something we could discuss properly. I could tell she was a woman who knew what she wanted.

From the kitchen, the sound of Vaughn rattling plates and cutlery provided an encouraging percussion to the melody of our conversation.

‘What do you do?’ she asked. ‘Vaughn’s never told me.’

‘I’m an executive performance analyst for the council.’

‘That sounds exciting,’ she said, and laughed, which was a relief to me, as it had been a clear lie. She was being ironic. A man could fall in love with a woman like this, I thought. Never mind fucking her, I wanted to marry her.

‘Anyone for coffee?’ called Vaughn, from the kitchen.

‘Yes, please,’ Audrey replied. She tilted her head back to rest on the cushions, exposing her throat to me, and more of that delectable cleavage. I wanted to run my tongue from the space behind her ear, down between her breasts, pushing the fabric out of the way.

‘What about you?’ I asked. ‘What do you do?’

‘I work with Social Services,’ she said.

My usual sharp conversational skills struggled at this, most likely due to arousal: too much blood flow diverted away from the brain and down into the more vital parts of my anatomy. What, after all, was the point in a conversation such as this? Surely we wanted to do away with it; surely we should just get rid of Vaughn so that we could fuck? That was what she wanted as much as I did.

The moment the thought crossed my mind, I knew I had to do something about it.

I cleared my throat and stood up. She looked up at me in surprise.

‘I – er – may I use your bathroom?’

She smiled, relaxed. ‘Of course. It’s at the top of the stairs. I’m afraid the downstairs one is temporarily out of action.’

I climbed the stairs awkwardly. At the top, I glanced to the left and saw inside Vaughn’s bedroom – something I would prefer not to have seen, to be honest – pale grey walls, the far one decorated with dramatic monochrome wallpaper. A ‘feature wall’, they call it, don’t they? It would give me a headache if I had to sleep in there.

And the bathroom. I had no desire to use it, of course. I was waiting for her.

I half-closed the door and stood inside, looking at the neat beige tiles and wondering how long it had been since Vaughn had grouted them – not long at all, judging by the faint smell of putty – and at the shiny chrome taps that had no doubt cost a small fortune.
Audrey, Audrey
, I thought, as though I could summon her up the stairs by thinking her name like a spell.

I looked at the toiletries lined up neatly on the windowsill. They were, without exception, male: shampoo, shower gel, a razor and some kind of hideous supermarket own-brand gel shaving foam with oxidation around the base. No expensive hairstylist-only shampoo, no perfume, no cosmetics.

I opened the door again and crossed the hallway into Vaughn’s bedroom. Again, it was a resolutely masculine room. There was even a multi-gym in the corner, which made me laugh out loud. I had a mental image of Vaughn working out here, sweating as he rowed his way to a muscular stomach. Not likely. I doubted it had ever been used.

So, the delectable Audrey had yet to move in. She didn’t stay, often, either, or she would have started moving in some items of her own. There was nothing here of hers. I wondered if there were panties in Vaughn’s drawer, maybe a spare pair, maybe a special pair… something she would only wear for him, would only wear if she were planning to fuck him.

‘Everything alright?’

Audrey was behind me. I hadn’t heard her coming up the stairs. I turned and gave her a smile. ‘Fine,’ I said.

‘What are you doing?’ Her question was direct.

‘I was looking to see if you’ve moved in,’ I said, preferring the truth. If it had been Vaughn who had come upstairs I would have made some comment on the feature wallpaper. But it was Audrey, and there was no point in pissing about. She had come up here because I had summoned her, I had told her what it was I wanted her to do. And here she was, standing next to me, standing close to me in fact, closer than she needed to.

‘You could have just asked. Anyway, I haven’t,’ she said, her voice low. Her chest was heaving with her breathlessness.

‘Why’s that?’ I asked, taking a small step towards her.

She stepped back. Ah, too soon, then? Too much, too soon? I would have to be careful. I would need to take it gently, so as not to startle her. She was worth the effort. She was worth the chase.

Her expression was odd. ‘I have my own place,’ she said.

That was no answer. What did she join a dating site for, if she didn’t want a serious relationship? Surely that’s what all women want, really: a partner with a house they can move into, marriage, children? Unless she wanted something else. Unless she just wanted sex.

I had her eyes again. I maintained contact, direct eye contact.

She didn’t move.

Ah, resistance! I liked that. I liked that she was a challenge. I smiled at her, a little smile of encouragement.

‘Audrey? Where do you want this coffee?’

‘Coming!’ she shouted, without taking her eyes away from mine. Her voice was automatic, toneless. Her expression was difficult to read. Was she attracted to me? Did she want me to kiss her? What would she do if I did?

‘You’re…’

‘What?’ I whispered, moistening my lips with the tip of my tongue. ‘What am I?’

‘You’re fucking strange, Colin,’ she said. And turned around and went back downstairs, without looking back at me.

Ah, Vaughn. At that moment I could cheerfully have killed him. I could have put my hands about his neck and squeezed the air out of his lungs. If it hadn’t been for that interruption, she would have done it, I knew. She wanted me.

I followed her down the stairs, tasting her scent on the air. She’d been so close. I wish she could have relented. But next time, maybe, she will give in. I wonder if I can get her on her own, find some excuse to visit her.

She was back in the kitchen with Vaughn. I could hear them talking in hushed whispers. I strained to listen, thinking she might say something useful, something about how compelled she felt to act out of character, how something came over her – but nothing. Just the sort of urgent, hushed tones of two people trying not to have an argument within earshot of other people.

I eased myself back on to the leather sofa and drank some more of the wine. Another ten minutes and I found an excuse to call a taxi and leave. The evening turned out to be less entertaining than I’d hoped, and now I have another dilemma: I’ve gone from wanting a woman, to realising I don’t need a woman at all, to wanting one again. But not just any woman, this time. Only her. Only Audrey.

An hour later, alone at home now, relieving myself at last of that delicious tension that had grown unbearable, I have started to think about how I can win her over. Whether I can do it: whether I can turn her gaze from Vaughn’s face to mine. And what it would take to make her want me.

In the night I wake up. I’ve been dreaming of Audrey, of course. She was here, in my room, and Vaughn was present, apparently for the purpose of undressing her for me. I was supine on my bed, the covers around my ankles. Vaughn brought her in, like a prize, like a virgin being offered to the Temple, and, having received a nod of permission, he set about removing her clothes piece by piece, while she stood still, the expression on her face unreadable. Boredom was the most likely name I would apply to it. She stared straight ahead, in my direction but not seeing me. She was here because she had to be, not because she wanted this; not because she was willing. The coercion did not in itself appeal to me, but there was something about her presence that was undeniably arousing.

‘Audrey,’ I said, in the dream. Even then she didn’t cast a glance in my direction. She looked sulky now as well as bored, a petulant child who had been forced away from an enjoyable activity into a chore.

Vaughn pulled down her tights – tights, not stockings – of course not stockings; why should I imagine something so appealing to encase those lovely, slender legs? – and lifted each of her legs in turn like a farrier shoeing a horse, sliding the nylon off the foot and laying the tights to one side like a shed skin.

And she stood there in her bra and panties, functional, unmatching – the bra greying and with a hole in the lace; the panties large and black cotton. Clothed, in Vaughn’s kitchen, she had been, not beautiful exactly, but undeniably sexy. She was certainly attractive, in any case – attractive enough to raise my ardour. But now, in my dream, everything was dulled. Her hair was not that lustrous shade of chestnut, falling in shiny waves around her shoulders. It was brownish, hanging in lanky threads. Her face ashen, her eyes a dirty grey-blue. Nothing about her was conventionally attractive.

Vaughn was unable to stop, even though I wanted him to.
Go no further, Vaughn
, I wanted to say –
stop now. I don’t
want to see the rest
. But he continued automatically, as though he was following a programme that could not be brought to an early conclusion.

And half-awake now, my hand under the sheets moving fast, I find myself pumping and grunting away watching Vaughn stripping the last fragments of grey nylon and black cotton from the skin of his indifferent, apathetic, complicit girlfriend. Naked, she’s worse. Frumpy, sagging, grey hairs sprouting in patches from between her legs; even her knees are lumpy and spotted with moles. Despite this, despite the fact that she would clearly rather be anywhere on the planet than standing naked in my bedroom, I achieve an orgasm of gasping, heart-stopping, free-falling depths. Like staring into the abyss, and watching it stare right back at me.

I woke up late after my evening with Audrey and Vaughn. I lay there with the sunlight coming in through the gap in the curtains, thinking of my late nights with the bottle of whisky rapidly depleting and wondering if it was too early for me to consider counselling for my problem. And as for the masturbation – well, thanks to the dream, or was it a nightmare, of wanking over Audrey’s prolonged and disappointing strip, I feel quite positively that I will be able to pursue a path of abstinence for at least a week. There is something deeply offputting about having to change your sheets and have a shower in the middle of the night because you’ve soiled yourself in a nightly emission like a hormonal teenager. Even my subconscious thinks it is a disgusting way to behave.

I got up eventually and made breakfast, then washed and dressed. It’s a bright morning so I’ve taken myself off for a walk while I think about how to fill what remains of the weekend.

On the main road a badger lies on its side, its head flattened by the wheel of a car. It’s relatively fresh, just starting to enter the Bloat stage, its four legs raised and straightened by the gases of Putrefaction that are distending its abdomen, the blood around its head still red. I stand and observe it for a little while. There is no pavement here, just a wide grass verge with a hedge and fields beyond.

I think about going home and getting a bag of some sort and taking it away somewhere so that I can watch the process unfold, but of course there is no point in intervening. It defeats the whole object. The decay must be allowed to take place here, where the animal died, otherwise it is not a genuine process. I leave it, reluctantly, thinking about coming back tomorrow evening after work, if there is time, and assuming that the council haven’t found it by then and shovelled it on to the back of their roadkill van.

After luncheon I do some studying, looking into tag questions, embedded commands and double binds, thinking about the badger, thinking about Leah. Each of them is so different; each has such different needs.

She told me what had happened to her, eventually. It didn’t take much to get her talking, and as she did so I responded appropriately, teasing out the story like pulling on an unravelling thread, and then watching her come apart. She had been working at a superstore as a management trainee, and the boss there had been flirting with her for weeks and weeks. He was older than her, and gradually she began to fall for his charms and admit to herself that she found him attractive. Eventually one night after work she agreed to meet him for a drink, and from there they went back to the store. I wanted details, of course – this was the interesting bit, after all – but to press her on that would be to distract from the main purpose of our conversation, which was to help her find the right path. Reminding her of the details of the sexual affair that followed was not going to do that. So – they had an affair which seemed to consist mainly of sex in the store after hours, or in his car parked in isolated rural locations. And then his wife discovered what was going on, and a humiliating encounter at work followed, with Leah shamed in front of all of the staff and a good few customers too. I wouldn’t have believed it possible when first meeting her – such a shy, quiet girl – but she genuinely didn’t realise he was married. And after that, of course, he avoided her at all costs, shunned her and excluded her from all the management training she was supposed to have. She applied for a transfer, which was blocked by head office. And despite it all, despite this man’s appalling behaviour, the trigger that brought Leah to me was that she still loved him, even though it was hopeless.