Lovers in Their Fashion (13 page)

Then they went back to Fran’s place, took their clothes off and made love.

And then they slept.

W
hen John woke, he found himself wrapped tightly round Fran, his face against the back of her neck, his penis rock hard. She squirmed softly. ‘Are you awake?’ she whispered.

He kissed her behind the ear. His hand slipped round to smooth her warm belly. She moaned gently as it moved down, passing through the damp tendrils that covered her mound, his fingertips coming to rest between the open lips of her sex. He said, ‘Can I ask you a question?’

Their voices were soft with the languor of first awakening.

‘Sure you can.’

‘Did I just happen to be pointing where I’m pointing?’

She giggled. ‘I wriggled a bit to get you in there. Does it feel good to you? It does to me.’

‘You really want that, huh?’

Her head came up. After a moment, she turned, bringing them face to face. Her eyes looked anxiously into his. ‘I don’t want you to do anything you don’t want to do, John.’

‘But you want it.’ It wasn’t a question.

She pressed close, burying her face in his shoulder so he would not see her face. ‘Yes, I want it. I told you that last time we were together. Nothing’s changed.’

‘Look at me.’

He had to press firmly against her shoulders to get her to move her head far enough back so that they could look at each other. Her face was pink, her eyes defiant while his flickered, searching for signs of what she really wanted, how she really felt. He kissed her and she kissed him back, hard, rolling on top of him, her tongue pushing into his mouth, the roughness of her pubic hair rubbing coarsely against his aching cock. She knelt, straddling him, her hair falling down onto his face. ‘Please?’ she begged. And then she let herself fall, hugging him as though she wanted to meld their bodies by force.

John wrapped his arms around her. He held her tight, kissing whatever bits of flesh he could bring his lips to. ‘Please?’ she whispered again in his ear.

Quietly, he said, ‘You’ll have to show me how.’

Again the averted face as she climbed off the bed, her hair used as a shield to hide behind. She sat on the edge with her back to him as she rifled through the drawer in the bedside table. She placed a wrapped condom on the sheet beside her. ‘We’d better use one of these.’ She clasped a tube of K-Y Jelly in her hand.

Skipping back around the bed, animated as he had never seen her, she took the pillows, shaking his to get him to raise himself out of the way, and placed them in the centre of the bed, one on the other. She lay face down with the pillows under her hips, raising her bottom into the air. She held out the tube of jelly. ‘Use lots of this to get me ready. Lots of it.’

Still she had not looked him in the eye.

Chapter 18

A
lice woke to find light streaming through her bedroom window and Merrill beside her in an armchair she had dragged in. ‘What time is it?’

‘Seven. You slept like a baby.’

‘Well, that’s good. I’m going to need all my strength today. And especially tonight.’

‘Alice. Please tell me you’re not going through with this.’

‘Don’t, Merrill. Is that coffee I can smell?’

‘I put it on to perk when I saw you start to stir. And I’m going to scramble you some eggs.’

‘I don’t think I can eat.’

‘You didn’t eat last night. You
will
eat this morning.’

‘Yes, ma. I’m going to take a shower.’

‘Don’t be long.

‘
Where’s Tony?’ asked Alice when she sat down at the kitchen table in her robe, her damp hair tightly wrapped in a towel.

‘In Brighton. Looking for John.’

‘John? John
Pagan?’

‘Of course.’

Alice nibbled at a slice of sourdough toast as Merrill spooned scrambled egg onto a warm plate. ‘You take a hell of a lot on yourself, Merrill.’

‘Course I do. Wouldn’t be your best friend, otherwise. Eat that.’

‘Thank you.’ Alice scooped egg onto her toast. ‘It’s delicious.’

‘The secret of scrambled egg is to use a low heat and take it off the stove before it’s done. It goes on cooking in the pan.’

Alice smiled. ‘I’ll try to remember.’ She sipped from her mug of coffee. ‘So what exactly did Tony tell John?’

‘Nothing yet. He hasn’t found him. He isn’t home and he doesn’t answer his cell phone.’

‘Maybe he’s telling you something.’

‘I’m not listening. When Tony does find him, he’s going to tell him the whole story. You, your mother, Martin Planer. Why you did what you did. Until then, I want you to stay here with me and have nothing to do with Planer.’

‘Is that right?’

‘For Heaven’s sake, honey. Can’t you see you’re wrecking your life for no reason? This thing you’re planning to do tonight is pointless. It’s not far short of self-harm. What am I saying? It
is
self-harm. And I can’t let you do it. Don’t stop eating.’

‘I haven’t stopped eating. See? Every last screvidge, gone. Can I have some more toast, please? And some coffee? There’s marmalade in the fridge.’

‘I’m glad to see you’ve got your appetite back.’

‘I always have a good appetite when I’m involved in a fight. I don’t usually expect the fight to be with you, Merrill.’

‘Now wait a minute…’

‘No, Merrill. I won’t. Turn the dial to the right, would you? I like my toast almost burned.’

‘That’s carcinogenic.’

‘Rubbish. Let me tell you some things you need to hear, Merrill. First off, I told you what I told you in a moment of weakness but also in
confidence.
Yes, I’m glad to see you look embarrassed. If Tony’s going to tell John the whole story, that means Tony
knows
the whole story. Which does not make me happy.’

‘I’m sorry. It was your welfare I was thinking of.’ She placed two slices of toast on Alice’s plate.

‘Thank you. Aren’t you eating?’

‘Not while you’re cross with me.’

Alice spread butter and then marmalade on a slice of toast. She stared at Merrill. Then she started to laugh. ‘Oh, Merrill. How can I stay mad at you? You shouldn’t have done it, though.’

‘And Planer?’

‘Martin Planer will call for me at ten this morning. I shall go with him. He won’t come in. Not with Ben to walk past. He’ll call from his car and I will go down to him.’

‘Not in those terrible things he sent you.’

‘In those terrible things he sent me. He will drive us to Southampton where we will take the car ferry to Le Havre. From there we’ll drive to Honfleur, where we will check in to
L’Absinthe
. We will have dinner. And then we will go to bed together.’

‘He’s an animal.’

‘Possibly.’

‘I don’t know how you can be so calm.’

‘I am not calm. I am shaking with fear. But I will not let it show. I will not let that bastard see what terror he has me in.’

‘You don’t need to go through with it.’

‘I do.’

‘Why?’

‘Are you going to make yourself some breakfast? Or shall I do it?’

Merrill began to slice bread for toast. She broke three eggs into a bowl, added salt and pepper and began to beat them with a fork. ‘I’ll ask you again. Why?’

‘Oh, Merrill. What can I tell you? Think of it as a rite of passage. The day I finally break free of my mother.’

Merrill dropped the cut slices into the toaster. She put a handsome knob of butter into the pan and put it over a low light to melt. ‘I don’t buy that.’

‘It’s the only answer I have.’

‘I think you’re trying to atone.’

‘Atone? For what?’

‘For being such a foolish girl. For not telling John, all those years ago, what Planer wanted you to do. And why he could ask you to do it. The hold he had over you. Which was not your fault. And for the result of that foolishness, which was to throw away the kind of love most people only get to dream about.’