Apple Tree Yard

by Louise Doughty

  ‘I think they all did pretty well,’ the sandy-haired boy said, ‘although I thought Sundeep didn’t really get to the heart of why high through-put data analysis has transformed the way we sequence. It’s not just about speed, is it?’

  I maintained a diplomatic silence.

  ‘We Googled you of course,’ he said casually, ‘they made such a big deal about you being our external examiner, Sandra and George, honestly, you would have thought we were having the Queen. So we all looked you up, and I have to say your CV really is impressive.’

  ‘Thank you,’ I said, and I thought my voice was dripping with sarcasm but if he noticed, it didn’t alter his tone.

  ‘Basically, you have my ideal job,’ he continued. ‘In fact, I was wondering if I could pick your brains some time, about the Beaufort Institute.’ We passed a group of his friends and he raised his hand to them. Two girls in the front of the group giggled. After the group had gone past, he said in a low voice, almost a murmur. ‘I would be extremely grateful…’

  We had reached the main road. The roar of taxis and buses was immediately apparent. I turned to him firmly and said, ‘I’m going this way,’ indicating down the street. It was a clear dismissal. The world of science is, like many others, all about patronage, about your professor giving you that sparkling reference to the right funding body at the right time, about your Head of Lab allocating you your own corner for research at just the point you need it. But, morally suspect as patronage is, there is still a convention that it is earned.

  He held my gaze. ‘I would really appreciate it,’ he said, ‘and I promise not to ask any more questions about what you think about everyone else’s work, or mine either. You’ll find I’m quite…’ He trailed off, but the way he said it rendered his meaning quite unmistakable.

  He paused, still staring at me with his open, grey, hungry eyes.

  ‘I’m very discreet,’ he added.

  Oh the arrogance of youth, I thought. Let’s presume for a minute I was up for an affair – no, I mean a quick shag – with a boy half my age, what made him think I would choose him? I could easily have the meaty dark-haired one if I wanted; he was much closer to fantasy toy-boy material than his bold friend here. I thought of saying as much to this to this fair child-man in front of me, but there was something about him, the innocence in his direct, priapic gaze, that made me feel touched rather than offended. Not flattered, though. I am far too much of a realist to be flattered.

  ‘I have a card,’ he said, suddenly, as if he had only just remembered. Then the card was in his hand, and he held it out, and it was a plain white card with his name, Jamie something, and his email address and mobile phone number, and in case I didn’t get the message, he stared at me hard again as I took it from him. That’s all we need, us humans, just a stare. Peacocks spread their tails. Orang-utans hoot. But homo sapiens has evolved to the extent that we can propagate the species with one long, lingering look.

  I returned the stare briefly in what I hoped was a blank, non-committal fashion, then looked at his card before I slipped it into my pocket and turned away. He gave me a smile – no, it was a half-smile. A full grin combined with that stare would have been creepy, so this was a careful half. I turned away but couldn’t resist glancing back as I walked off. He was standing there quite shamelessly on the street corner, staring after me with that half-smile on his face, and, vain creature that I am, I gave him a half-smile in return.

  I know what you’re thinking. Is that it? Is that what she calls nearly having an affair? Doesn’t sound like much, in your terms, does it? You can have full coitus in the Houses of Parliament and it is still touch and go whether you would think of it as an affair. One lingering look from a boy on the street, is that it?

  Well, that wasn’t quite it. I didn’t call Jamie-something, but I want you to know that I thought very seriously about doing so, planned it, envisaged it, rehearsed it even. I showered for him that night. I dressed for him the next morning. I am not sure what reflects more badly on me – my reasons for contemplating calling him, or my reasons for not doing so. Reasons for: it would be an interesting and appropriate revenge against my husband (more of that another time). It would be an uncomplicated fuck, or series of fucks – Jamie would lose interest fairly quickly, I was sure of that. He wasn’t attracted to me as an individual, after all – he just hadn’t nailed an old one yet. And I would learn something I had been curious about for some time. As a young woman, an important part of arousal for me had been the contemplation of my own body. I had loved long baths, sunbathing, keeping my skin nice. I wasn’t a beauty but I had still been a narcissist in the way that all young women are taught to be narcissists, every time they turn the page of a magazine or watch TV. Since I had had children, put on weight, aged, I had only had sex with my husband and so was still able to see my body through his eyes, as he remembered it, not as it really was. If I had sex with this boy, I would be stripped of that delusion. I would see myself through his eyes – that was if I even let him look. I would probably want to do it in the dark, or better still stay fully dressed. Maybe both.

  This was what interested me: would the contemplation of his body, which was no doubt beautiful, would that be enough to arouse me, or did I still need to feel lovely myself to achieve any sort of abandonment? Could I reverse the equation? Could I become a voyeur?

  I thought all of this sitting on the Tube going home and I have to tell you that by the time the train had pulled into my stop, I had committed infidelity many times in my head and was already wondering what to wear the next day in order to excite Jamie’s older-woman fantasy a little further. None of this reflects well on me but I suspect that my reasons for eventually not calling, for keeping Jamie-something’s card on my desk but never using it, reflect even more badly. Cowardice, of course, the simple fear that I had read the signals wrong, that I was just an old lady too easily flattered by the attention of such an eager puppy – that was the first reason. There was also the issue that it could end my days as an external examiner – even be worth a paragraph in a tabloid, I thought: a breach of trust. But ultimately, what made me hold off was the thought that I would have to make the first move. I had his contact details but he didn’t have mine. I have never made the first move in my life. I just couldn’t bring myself to do it.

  The next day, I was back in the same building. Jamie did his presentation and it was solid rather than sparkling. The large brown boy continued to stare at me and his mates clustered round him, impressed by his bravado, and by the end of the week I was weary of their games and thought, oh leave me alone and let me do my job. I was even weary of Jamie’s doggedly friendly gaze. At lunch with George and Sandra on the Friday, we went through the students in alphabetical order and we all thought the same. The two obvious stars were a boy called Pradesh and one of the girls, Emmanuella, both of whom had chosen original subject matter but had not relied on its originality to score them points all on its own, a common failing in postgraduate students. They had been thorough and methodical, and presented calmly and well. There was a prestigious work placement at stake at the end of the year, and either Pradesh or Emmanuella would get it, that is if one or both of them were not poached by a PhD programme first, which often happened with the most talented MSc students. I wondered whether that was what made the boys at the front of the room so obvious. Perhaps they already knew, in their heart of hearts, that they were not star material; that for all their ambition and cleverness, they were destined for a teaching or technician’s job in a sixth-form college or a low-grade university at best. I doubted very much whether a prestigious research institution like the Beaufort would touch a boy like Jamie. Maybe he wanted to fuck me because he knew that I had indeed – simply by being who I was – already fucked him.

  *

  At the time of my writing that second letter to you, I had no idea how that morning at the university and you would become linked in court, how a line would be drawn, as thin and tenuous as the strand that lin
ks a spider’s web to a gatepost. The strands that a spider spins are made of protein, of proteinaceous spider silk, to be precise. The stickiness of them is due to droplets along the length of each strand, and the interesting thing about those droplets is how they are sensitive to the force any object may apply in an attempt to pull away from them. So, if a droplet touches an inanimate surface, for instance, it will merely adhere. But when this same droplet is touched by something that attempts to escape, it becomes rubberised, expanding after the retreating object in order to hang on to it, almost as if it was chasing after it, you might say. There was no relevance but it would all be made to be relevant, as would almost everything else I have ever done, all woven together in a narrative, to glue us, the flies in the web.

  4

  The next time you and I have sex, as you may or may not remember, is in a disabled toilet down a corridor at the back of the House of Commons staff canteen. We have tea and cake in the canteen first, which is at ground level and has a view over the river but smells, as all staff canteens do, of green vegetables over-boiled. It is late afternoon and outside, already, the light is fading. The sky is grey; the Thames slips and slides in an oily fashion. At the far end of the canteen, a group of catering staff lounge around a table in their white jackets and navy aprons, taking a break after the lunchtime rush. We sit close to the window and you divide a piece of carrot cake in two, meticulously, with a plastic fork. When I leave half of my half, you polish it off without comment. Underneath the table, one of your knees has found my two, demurely pressed together to one side, and pushed between them. As foreplay goes, it is simple but effective.

  After half an hour, we leave our table and walk to the back of the canteen, past the screen-covered Members Only area, and take a wooden door that has embossed gold letters reading NO EXIT. It leads to the left down a plush corridor. We pass a room with the door open and you pause to peer inside. It is the sort of room that could be a study or office but is being used as a temporary storeroom. There are box files on the shelves that cover one wall. On a table just inside the door, there is a row of desk lamps, brass ones with green glass shades, about twenty of them. You step back into the corridor. For some reason, the room won’t do. The disabled toilet is round another corner, at the bottom of a corridor that is a dead end, and for a toilet, it is quite classy, with wood panelling and carpet. The many rails at different heights are useful for leverage, I discover. During it, during the silent period of mutual absorption right in the middle, you take my chin in your hand, cup it and turn my face gently towards the large mirror. ‘Look in the mirror,’ you say. And at first I try to turn away but you hold my face more firmly then and say, ‘Look,’ and I look, and I see us, both partially dressed, dishevelled and abandoned, the firm muscle of your thigh, my own soft white one raised, my eyes wide and my gaze still touched with disbelief, and you press the side of your face against mine, still holding my chin, and whisper in my ear, ‘Isn’t it beautiful? You’re beautiful…’

  *

  The following day, I forget my phone when I go out to have lunch with Susannah in Harrow-on-the-Hill and when I get home I find six missed calls from you and four text messages, starting with, Good morning… and ending with, So it’s the silent treatment is it? What have I done to deserve this, pray? When I call you, charmed and laughing, to explain, you demand to know who Susannah is (my oldest friend), where we went for lunch (the new Malaysian), whether she is good-looking or not (emphatically yes), and would she fancy a threesome? (Funnily enough, I’ve never thought to ask.)

  All day, our texts continue. Have I ever had a threesome? (No, I haven’t.) If I did, would I like it with another man or woman? (I haven’t a clue.) What’s the weirdest place I’ve ever done it? (How staid my life has been.)

  *

  The next day, I text you while I am waiting on the platform at my local Tube station. I am on my way to a presentation at the Combat Cancer Development Fund about proposed changes to funding legislation. I am high on our conversations of the previous day, high on what we are doing. My text is cheery: Hey you. In town today, Charing Cross. Lunch? You don’t reply but after a while, my train goes underground. I emerge at Leicester Square rather than change onto the Northern Line, with plenty of time to walk to the Development Fund’s headquarters on the Strand, fully expecting a reply from you to pop up on my phone. There is nothing. I turn my phone off and on again. Still nothing. I pretend to myself that I don’t find this annoying, as I stride along. You’re a busy man. That’s fine. I’m busy too. I’m still not exactly clear what it is you do that keeps you so busy but so what? You don’t know anything about what I do either. It nags at me, though. Why are you so evasive about your job? Civil servant? You’re not like any other civil servant I’ve met, and I’ve met quite a few.

  When I go into the presentation, I leave my phone on the table in front of me, on silent, and look at it from time to time. Nothing. The talk is being given by a young woman from the Department of Health, who is standing waiting for us as we filter into the room. When she thinks it is time to start, she coughs, looks at us, then taps her biro against the water glass on the lecturn in front of her. ‘Jolly good,’ she says brightly.

  She stands at the board and talks us through impending changes in NHS funding policy due to the forthcoming new Act, which is making its slow progression through Parliament at the moment. Afterwards, we will have a chance to question her, and some of the questions will be hostile as scientists are as resistant to change as any other breed of person. There are around thirty-five scientists in the room, some representing institutions, like me, some from universities, all of whom may be affected by the new legislation. I know about half of the people in the room, although I have chosen to sit on my own, this particular morning. I don’t feel like making small talk.

  In the coffee break, I text you again. Hey busy man, let me know either way. Have something else on later. I have no plans after the presentation and am not particularly busy that day but you don’t know that. I am irked. Maybe I got it wrong when I suggested lunch. Maybe I should have texted, Fancy a quick fuck… That would have got a response.

  After the coffee break, the question and answer session begins, but I am so irritated by your silence, I cannot listen to what is being said, and with my distraction comes a degree of insecurity that makes me look at the efficient young woman before me and, as an experiment, try to imagine how you would see her. Before what happened between us, I would have observed that she was attractive and thought no more of it. When you have a grown-up daughter as lovely as mine, you can never bring yourself to resent young, pretty women. You know what they are in for, after all. You know how insecure they feel about their loveliness, how vulnerable inside. You feel protective toward them, even though they would be horrified to think they need protecting. But this morning, I look at this young woman through your eyes – through the eyes of a man with an irrepressible sex drive. (Tell me, my dear, is it difficult being such a man? The world is full of lovely young women, after all, and everywhere you turn you are bombarded with images of female availability. Isn’t life a perpetual torment?) I observe her as you might observe her, and as some of the men in the room are probably observing her too. She is dressed in the uniform of the young, up-and-coming civil servant – the new breed, that is: black trousers, matching fitted jacket, low-cut pastel-coloured shirt that reveals the hint of a plump curve – the outfit of a woman who is, for the moment, having it all, and sees no reason why she should ever stop having it. Her hair is honey-brown, layered, well-cut. It swings as she moves her head. She seems unselfconscious to me, confident that her intelligence and diligence are enough to see her through the routine task of presenting facts to a room full of scientists – several of whom are twice her age or more – confident she is our intellectual equal. She seems like a young woman who would never simper when she announced her achievements, as women of my generation are still – to our shame – prone to do, a young woman who feels, quite jus
tifiably, that she has nothing to prove. When she concludes her talk and asks for questions, half of me wants to cheer and half of me wants to weep.

  I look at her and imagine being you. I imagine ignoring the work she put into her presentation, or being able to see it only through a mist of sexual desire. (Is that what it is like to be a man? I am genuinely curious.) I imagine you wanting her as badly – far more badly – than you wanted me. It comes to me that you would never ask a lovely young woman such as her into a disabled toilet, or take her by the hand into the Crypt Chapel, or lead her into a storage cupboard. What would she think of a middle-aged man who made such a move? The thought fills me with unease but then the man next to me raises his hand and says, ‘I’m not sure I agree with that last point, I think we should have a show of hands on who in the room would make a decision like that without referral.’ The young woman raises her eyebrows at us and her questioning gaze invites us to vote. My colleagues all glance at each other. I frown as if I’m not sure either way. Effortfully, I push you to the back of my mind.

  I walk back to Leicester Square Tube slowly, my phone in my hand. I check it for one last time before I descend the steps. I could text again, or call, but instead I am going home in order to punish you. You will text me when I’m underground, really wanting to have lunch, only to get no response. You will call my phone only for it to go straight to voicemail. You will curse that you have missed an opportunity. Maybe you will wonder what I am doing, who I am with.

  The carriage I get into is less crowded than usual and I get a seat, plumping myself down with a sigh. Opposite me are three teenage girls, chewing gum, all messy ponytails and hoop earrings and teeth, shouting and pushing at each other, and I observe how loud-mouthed and beautiful they are and think of my daughter and her friends at that age, full of noise and light and loyalty towards each other, and the young civil servant and how, yes, the world is indeed full to the brim of young women such as these, who probably drive men such as you half-demented with the fact that you can never have them.