Love, Lies and Lemon Cake

by Sue Watson

  ‘I’ve had enough; I want to get off,’ I said stiffly.

  But he just said, ‘It’s fine, it’s good fun,’ and pushed us on through the cold and the crowds.

  ‘Stop!’ I shrieked as I felt my legs taking me faster, his arms holding me tight.

  ‘Faster!’ he yelled, laughing as we pushed on past the crowds of skaters then through them as I screamed again. I soon realised screaming wasn’t working—it just made him take us faster, so I shut up and clung harder to him. The spiky cold whipped through my hair, stung my face, taking my breath away as he whizzed me along, and I yelped as we hit more speed and reached a point where I seriously thought I was about to crash and die. Then, suddenly, I felt elated, like something was lifting me high above the crowds, above the ice, and my breath slowed down. Inside I felt a delicious thrill run right through me. The chill of the ice, the speed, the fear and holding onto Dan filled me with an exhilaration I had never felt before. Like a little kid on a fairground ride, my heart was in my mouth and I started screaming again... this time to go even faster.

  * * *

  Later, as we drank hot chocolate and ate hot dogs in the rink café, I sat close to him, still scared and excited and clingy, but happy. ‘I can’t believe I just did that,’ I said as he painted my name in tomato ketchup on his hotdog.

  ‘You are bonkers,’ I smiled, watching him with both my hands around the polystyrene cup for warmth. The bottoms of my jeans were soaked from the ice and my hands red raw.

  ‘I told you, you can do it—you just have to believe you can.’

  ‘I wasn’t sure for a while back there I would come out alive, but thank you... for helping me tick something off my list,’ I said.

  ‘My pleasure,’ he smiled. ‘Now eat your hot dog—I want to tick another thing off your living list tonight.’

  He waved his car keys at me—he’d borrowed his aunt’s car to take us to the rink.

  ‘What?’

  ‘You’ll see.’ He reached his hand out, I took it and we ran giggling like children into the car park. He started driving and after about twenty minutes we were down a country lane and he pulled up near a huge field bright yellow with rapeseed. It was early evening, the light was fading and he wound down his window, leaning his head back. ‘So quiet here. I love it, the peace.’

  The air was thick with silence, only a few miles from the motorway and busy life yet here we were truly alone in our own cocoon. He lifted his head and slowly, almost hesitantly leaned towards me, one arm sliding down my back, the other on my waist. We kissed slowly, then his hand slid under my T-shirt and I swear he must have been able to feel my heart beating out of my chest. Just like the skating, everything started off slow and gentle but seemed to move faster, suddenly more urgent and passionate. The rest of the world receded as I took to the ice again, becoming breathless, chills sparkling through my whole body. After a little while, when I couldn’t take much more, he pulled away and, looking into my eyes, whispered, ‘Come on, it’s time to tick another thing off your list.’

  We got out of the car and he led me over a gate, through a smaller field and into long grass. By now it was dark and a little chilly, and he stopped and lay down in the middle of the grass. ‘What?’ I giggled.

  ‘Look up there. I can see The Plough,’ he sighed. I slowly sat down. The grass was cold but he felt warm as I lay down next to him. I looked up to see the canopy of stars in a very dark sky. ‘Wow... I’ve never seen so many,’ I said.

  ‘No light pollution out here. I wanted it to be perfect for you.’ He turned to me, and we started to kiss again, slowly, perfectly in sync, his warm hand now under my bra, my breasts filling his hand. His kisses moved down, covering my breasts. ‘Just look at those stars,’ he whispered huskily and slowly, languorously. We rolled around the cold ground, giggling, kissing, grass tickling my face and my thighs as he slowly pulled down my jeans. Naked from the waist down, I lay in the field, the stars above me, not a soul around, and I felt like I was bathing in the Trevi Fountain. He kissed my breasts, my stomach, slowly going down my body, I was watching the stars and his face was in my groin. I couldn’t believe this was happening. I stiffened slightly, like I was back on the rink. I’d never felt anything like it before; a million tiny explosions, as his hands caressed my breasts and... Oh, God, he was licking me gently and I was riding fast across the ice, through Italy on a Vespa at high speed, swimming naked, my whole body submerged in the most intense pleasure. Soon he was inside me, moving fast, effortlessly, and I watched the stars and clung tightly as we sped through the night. When it was over, I lay there, staring up at the stars and thinking, Faye Dobson just had sex in a field... under a million stars.

  We continued to lie in silence, side by side, then I said, ‘Thank you for making two of my wishes come true.’

  ‘It’s okay... It was a selfless act.’ He turned to me and kissed my forehead as I snuggled into his arms. ‘Hey, you’re a dark horse, Faye Dobson.’ He gestured towards my vajazzle, glinting in the moonlight. ‘You’re full of surprises, aren’t you?’

  ‘Oh, yes... I’m full of surprises these days,’ I smiled into the thick, starry blackness.

  15

  KICK-ASS COUGARS ON VERY THIN ICE

  That night I arrived at Sue’s in quite a delirious state. I didn’t go into too much detail, but she guessed the main bit. ‘So you had sex with him?’ was her opening gambit as I staggered through the door, still high on lust.

  I nodded and she smiled knowingly.

  ‘I saw the way he looked at you when he came into the salon with that book... I knew then it was a matter of time before you two had carnival knowledge,’ she sighed. ‘Sagittarius, too, which is a perfect fit for Leo. I told you, Faye, you need to read your astrologicals... it’s all in there about you meeting a Sagittarian and making big changes.’

  ‘He’s wonderful, but it’s just a summer fling,’ I sighed as she poured us both another drink. ‘I just hope I’m a bit more than a one-night stand.’ I was getting there slowly, but still the old Faye would pop in occasionally to cast doubts and lower my expectations; she’d been around a long time, she wouldn’t disappear overnight.

  ‘You could go back to Australia with him? According to Rory Bland Astronomer to the stars, Leos are going to find their suns rising in the fourth house and you might be spending time in far-flung places... and there are surprises on the horizon.’

  ‘I’m under no illusions, and for once I’m not going to spoil it all by worrying about what happens next. He’s almost ten years younger than me—the last thing he needs is an older divorced woman tying him down.’

  ‘You could pass for younger—and you don’t realise how attractive you are, Faye. My Ken always used to say you were a bit of all right.’

  I smiled. ‘Thanks, Sue.’ Given the low bar (that Ken would shag anything with a pulse), it wasn’t exactly flattering, but I appreciated the sentiment.

  ‘You’re right. Whatever happens, just have some fun, love... you deserve it; enjoy every minute while it lasts. Me and Mandy have been worried about you, Faye, but in the last few weeks you’ve been more like your old self.’

  She was right. I felt more like my old (younger) self. Dan had brought me back to life, re-awakening my love of books, inspiring a passion for food and cooking, and now the sex... Oh. My. God. The sex. To quote Mandy, who knew I could be such ‘a kick-ass cougar’?

  Before going to bed that night, I took the New York Rooftop postcard from my handbag and stared at it for a while, leaning back on the pillows, imagining the sound of that saxophone playing through the dusk. I still wanted to dance on that rooftop, but in the meantime, there was other stuff on my living list to work through. I smiled to myself as I ticked off ‘learn to ice skate’ and the recently added ‘sex under the stars’, Two down, many to go... swimming naked, The Trevi Fountain, a Vespa ride through Rome and a Santorini sunset. I finally fell asleep at five a.m. in Sue’s spare bedroom, clutching the postcard to my chest and dreaming
of a rooftop, high above New York City.

  At work the next day all I could think of was Dan, in the darkness, grass underneath my naked thighs, Dan’s breath in my face.

  I hadn’t eaten and only having about an hour’s sleep hadn’t helped, yet I felt so awake—so alive. About two o'clock I had a break in between clients so went upstairs to make a black coffee and think about the night before.

  Mandy appeared in the doorway. ‘My body hates me right now...’ she said, opening the box of tea bags.

  ‘Oh, really, why?’

  ‘Two words... no, three... oh, a few actually.’ She leaned on the worktop to face me while she concentrated on the number of words. ‘Free drinks, Kat shitfaced snogging the bloke I fancied—me fly-kicking him up the street.’

  ‘Oh, dear. That sounds like quite a night. You’re okay aren’t you?’ I sighed.

  ‘Yeah, I’ll live. Sue says you had a good night?’

  ‘Oh, did she? Well, I really wish she wouldn’t discuss my sex life with everyone. Okay, so I had sex in a field... and yes, it was good. It was bloody good. Happy?’

  ‘Whoa... go, Faye! She never said anything about you doing it in a field... she just said you’d had a good night at the ice rink.’

  ‘Oh... yes... skating.’ Me and my mouth.

  ‘Anyway, I’m glad you’ve finally let yourself go. You used to be a bit uptight you know, and Bruce has definitely loosened you up. Anyway, tell Bruce you need a night off from his bush oysters—me and Sue are gonna take you on a girls’ night out,’ she sang this last bit and waved her finger almost threateningly at me.

  A chill went down my spine. I’d been out on these girls’ nights with Mandy before and nothing good ever came of them. If you liked wet T-shirt competitions, obscene cocktails and sex games, you would probably enjoy one of Mandy’s girls’ nights. These were usually rounded off with her face down in a kebab on the pavement—not a euphemism... or perhaps it was?

  ‘You’re booked in tomorrow night for fun so you can lie in on Sunday morning. And you’re gonna need that lie-in ’cos you is gonna be off your tits, missy. Me and Sue will make sure of that.’

  It was delivered in my face as an ultimatum and, before I could protest, she’d made the tea and gone. It was lovely of them to be so supportive of my single status with a girls’ night out, but what happened to girls’ nights in? I wanted face packs and chick flicks and big tubs of Ben and Jerry’s from the safety of Sue’s made-to-order soft furnishings. I didn’t want to be hauled round the region’s fleshpots while Mandy flashed her breasts and force-fed me alcohol until I didn’t know my name.

  I smiled to myself. It was my own fault; I kept telling everyone I wanted to have a social life and wouldn’t make the same mistake as before and give my life up for a man. Mandy and Sue were keen I retained this new independence and, though the girls were crazy and Mandy thought The Great Gatsby was a cocktail, they were always good fun.

  That evening as Sue and I waited for Mandy, we shared a bottle of rosé wine in a bar call The Med.

  ‘Sue,’ I said, pouring us each a second glass from the first bottle. ‘Are you happy? I mean, do you think you ever could be... again?’

  ‘Apart from the divorce and Aeroflot Annie and all my...’

  ‘Soft furnishings? Yes...’ I added, moving the conversation along before it dissolved into a thrashing session about stolen cushions and ransacked pelmets.

  ‘I don’t aim for ‘happy’, love. I just try and get through each day without committing suicide or murder. That’s what it’s all about, isn’t it? Life. No one’s happy all the time are they?’

  ‘No, but sometimes do you wonder if we’ve got it right? We spend our lives looking for something and we often don’t even know what we’re looking for... then we have a laugh at work, a good night out, a curry at the weekend and before we know it we’re back on the bloody hamster wheel.’

  ‘What else is there?’

  ‘I don’t know... I just admire people who really embrace life on their own terms... chase rainbows, don’t just accept the status quo, reject a nine-to-five existence.’

  ‘Do you mean people who work night shifts, love?’

  ‘No, I mean some people don’t live and work and wait to grow old in the same place they were born in. They see other countries, different things and meet new people, and if they’re unhappy, they leave... free spirits.’

  ‘I don’t like the idea of that—you wouldn’t know what you were doing or where you were going next.’

  ‘That’s the point Sue. We get stuck in a rut. When we’re younger we want the safety and security of marriage; we want to be rescued from the nightclubs and the leering men, and live in nice homes with cars and safe husbands. But then you hit forty and it all looks different, like you’re missing out on something bigger,’ I said, taking a large sip of tingly cold wine.

  ‘I just want my old life back,’ said Sue, despondently.

  ‘I can understand that—we all want what we don’t have. But time changes you, and I feel so restless. It was different when Emma was growing up, there was always stuff to do, somewhere to be, someone to do it all for. I was swallowed up in her life and her future, but when she left home it all stopped... as suddenly as it had all started. I was on my own and in my forties and I thought—where did my life go?’

  ‘Well, now you and Craig are apart and you’re in a new relationship, you can start again.’

  ‘Yeah... but I feel like I’ve met myself twenty years later and I don’t know who I am anymore... like I lost myself along the way.’

  ‘I reckon I lost myself around about 1996,’ she sighed. ‘I suppose Ken and the salon have been my ‘Emma’. You put so much of yourself into other things, other people, you’ve nothing left for yourself at the end of it all.’ She was holding the globe of her wine glass and looking into the clear liquid like it was a crystal ball.

  ‘The midlife crisis has a lot to answer for,’ I sighed and glugged more wine. It occurred to me that it would be wise to stop drinking now. I was missing Dan in that way you do when you’ve had one too many and you’re in the early stages of a relationship. It was all so new and fragile and so exciting, I didn’t need alcohol to give me a high, but Sue was ordering another and swaying in her seat, her voice raised—she was well on the way.

  Around the bar, the photos of Mediterranean scenes, turquoise oceans, and pale, sandy beaches seemed to beckon. I wanted to dive into that turquoise water and the sunsets... oh, the sunsets. Listening to Dan talk about life in Sydney and travelling through Europe had opened up a mental brochure I was now constantly flicking through in my head. I told myself to leave it... stop imagining us both by those pools, infinity blue eyes staring into me. Since that first kiss, I'd dumped Kevin Bacon and Brad Pitt; even Ryan Gosling was on the sub’s bench—they just couldn’t compete. Everywhere I looked, all I could see was Dan.

  Sue was watching me, sipping her wine, but saying nothing.

  ‘What?’ I said.

  ‘Just the way you’ve been recently. You’re happier but sometimes you’re miles away. You’re in love, aren’t you?’

  ‘I don’t think so...’ I lied.

  ‘Well, whatever—but bloody hell, I’m proud of you—you aren’t letting the grass grow under your feet,’ she said through giggles. ‘You’ve kept that deli in business, popping in for a bit of sausage every day...’

  At that we both fell about laughing. Sue fell to the floor. The rosé wine had now officially taken over.

  I immediately stood up to help her onto her feet. Sue always drank on an empty stomach. She told me once that she had to stay slim for when Ken came back; he hated weight on a woman and she didn’t want it to come between them. What a shit he is, I thought, lunging towards her in my drunken state.

  ‘Come on, Sue, I can’t manage you on your own,’ I said, but couldn’t get her onto her feet; she was too floppy and far heavier than she looked. I began dragging her along the floor in an attempt to get her to the fro
nt door and outside for a breath of fresh air.

  Having arrived at the open doorway, I leaned through it, trying to help her out into the night for a breath of air. It was still quite early, but as it looked like Mandy had stood us up, I was keen to get a taxi back so I could lie in bed and think about Dan.

  ‘O.M.G, WTF?’ came a string of letters in an alarmed voice. I looked up to see Mandy and ‘her girls’ dancing towards us in skimpy shorts, orange tans and eyebrows that were so big and independent I reckoned they had their own Facebook page.

  ‘Hey, have you two started the party without me?’ she yelled in mock outrage. Never had I been so pleased to see her. ‘Mandy, give us a hand. Sue has just gone—I can’t get her up. I’m going to have to take her home,’ I called, as if it needed an explanation as I dragged her along the floor like a rolled up carpet. Mandy and her posse headed towards us, not before engaging several passersby with flashes of their breasts as if it were an ancient tribal greeting.

  They landed at our sides and, no doubt having had to deal with this level of comatose drunkenness on a nightly basis, those girls stepped to it. They soon had Sue in a fireman’s lift, Mandy shrieking and linking arms with her friend, with Sue slumped between them like a rag doll. I averted my eyes for a second time, unable to watch as my oldest dearest friend was being bounced along the road to the tune of Rihanna’s Rude Boy.

  ‘I’ll call Terry the taxi and get him to pick us up,’ Toyah yelled over Mandy’s chorus. ‘We can’t carry her all the way,’ she added with surprising sense and lucidity for someone whose drunken multitasking I could only watch in awe. She was holding Sue up, dialling a taxi and flashing a group of young men her thonged backside—all at the same time. Respect, I thought, wondering if any of this would be required of me if I re-entered the singles’ world.