by Mark Edwards
She let out a long sigh. ‘I’ll be all right in a minute. I need more wine, that’s all. And dinner. I popped into M and S and got us a moussaka and some salad. Is that OK? I know I said I’d cook, but I’m tired. Work was blah.’
‘Perfect.’
She smiled at me.
‘Promise me you won’t do it again,’ I said.
‘What, buy moussaka?’
‘Walk through the park at night. I couldn’t bear the thought of anything happening to you.’
‘Come on,’ she said. ‘Put the telly on. I need something mindless to cheer me up.’
We ate dinner and drank more wine and pretty soon we were pulling our clothes off, doing it there and then on the sofa, Charlie on top. Afterwards I went to the bathroom and remembered the things Charlie had left in there.
‘I saw you’d put some toiletries in my bathroom cabinet,’ I said when I came out. She was wearing my towelling dressing gown, a fresh glass of wine in her hand.
She looked confused. ‘Huh?’
‘You left a bunch of stuff in the cabinet. Shampoo, conditioner . . .’
‘I didn’t put anything in there.’
‘You must have.’
‘I did leave some stuff in your bedroom – I left it in there by mistake when I was arranging my bag the other day. I was going to ask you about it. But I didn’t put anything in the cabinet.’
‘Oh. It must have been Kristi then.’
She sat up straight. ‘Who’s Kristi?’
‘My cleaner.’
‘You’ve got a cleaner?’
A programme I liked was starting on TV and I was half-distracted by it. Charlie picked up the remote and turned the television off.
‘You’ve got a cleaner?’ she repeated.
‘Yeah. She comes once a week, does a couple of hours. I guess she must have found your things and put them in the bathroom.’
Charlie’s whole demeanour had changed from tired but happy to tense and, seemingly, annoyed. I pulled on my clothes.
‘What’s she like? Some poor, middle-aged woman? A Mrs Mop?’
I thought about Kristi with her smoky eyes and killer cheekbones. ‘No. She’s pretty young. Albanian, I think.’
Charlie looked horrified. ‘Oh God.’
‘What?’
‘It’s so exploitative. Privileged middle-class white male gets poor immigrant to clean his toilet.’
I felt like pointing out that, as far as I could tell, Kristi had never been near my toilet. Apart from tidying up, I still wasn’t sure exactly what she did. But I was dumbstruck by Charlie’s reaction.
‘I’m not exploiting her. She advertised for her services. I’m helping her out, actually. She needs the work.’
‘Really? How much do you pay her?’
‘I pay her eight pounds an hour.’ That was after the agency’s fee. ‘Though I usually round it up to ten pounds an hour because she never has change.’
‘What a hero.’
I couldn’t believe this. I felt anger rising inside me. ‘I’m not doing anything wrong, Charlie. I need a cleaner, she obviously needs work. I’m sure she’s got far worse clients than me.’
‘I don’t understand why you need a cleaner anyway. This place is tiny, you’re here all day. Can’t you do it yourself?’
I explained that I’d taken Kristi on when I’d had my operation and found doing most things difficult.
‘But you’re all right now, so you can get rid of her.’
‘I don’t want to. I’d feel bad. She needs the money.’
Charlie stood up. ‘Do you get off on it?’
‘What?’
‘Paying a young woman to degrade herself.’
I was aghast. ‘Charlie! This is insane.’
‘Or maybe she’s too ugly for you to get a kick out of it.’
We were standing close now. This was crazy, but it was also exhilarating because, even as the blood heated in my veins and Charlie jabbed a finger at me, it didn’t feel real. Were we really arguing about this? This was our first argument, and it was about a cleaner!
‘As a matter of fact,’ I said, ‘she’s really pretty. But you’re being ridiculous. She’s my cleaner, I don’t want to get rid of her, and I am not exploiting her. I’m not degrading her and I certainly don’t get a sexual thrill out of watching a woman vacuum my bedroom!’
She opened her mouth to speak again and promptly shut it. She closed her eyes too and inhaled deeply. I was pretty sure she was counting to ten beneath her breath.
‘OK,’ she said eventually. ‘I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have lost my temper. I’ve had too much wine and I’m still stressed after being followed. I just have a thing about people, women especially, being exploited.’
‘I’m not—’
‘I know, I know. I understand. It’s not you – it’s the injustice of the situation.’
‘I don’t think—’ I began, but she cut me off.
‘Can we talk about something else?’ she said. ‘Actually, can we go to bed? I’m tired, I’m a bit drunk and I don’t want to talk any more.’ She put her arms around me and kissed me. ‘Do you forgive me?’
‘Of course I do.’
She looked into my eyes. ‘I love you, Andrew. I know we’ve only been together a couple of weeks, but I . . .’ She trailed off, her expression shy. ‘I feel embarrassed.’
I put my hands on her shoulders. ‘Don’t be embarrassed. I feel the same way.’
‘But you won’t say it?’ she said with a little smile.
‘I’m very happy to say it. I love you, Charlie.’
And with that, the argument was forgotten, and a minute later we were making love again, in bed, slowly, the intensity of it white-hot and all-consuming, the most intense it had ever been, and as she raked her fingernails down my back, and kissed me so hard I felt my lips would be bruised, I told her again that I loved her, and she whispered it into my mouth just before she came.
Afterwards, she lay with her front pressed against my back, her arms tight around me, her legs entwined with mine. She fell asleep quickly but I lay awake for a while. My vow to find out more about her past had gone by the wayside. Tomorrow, I told myself. Despite the weird argument about Kristi, and the scare with Charlie being followed, I felt content. In fact, the protectiveness I’d felt when she was scared, and the release after the argument – which was based on principles I admired even if I wasn’t sure I agreed with them – made me feel even closer to her than before.
But I wasn’t going to sack my cleaner.
Eleven
Karen was waiting for me in the little coffee shop in Islington, as we’d arranged. She stood up when she saw me and we kissed each other’s cheeks, a habit she had picked up living in Paris in her twenties.
She looked great. Her dark hair was cut into a neat bob and she was wearing a cream cashmere sweater. I wasn’t entirely sure how old Karen was, but my guess was somewhere between thirty-nine and forty-three. She’d never had children, told me that she’d never had the urge, although her eyes took on a sad, faraway look when she said this. She spent a lot of time doing yoga and Pilates. I still found it odd that we’d had an affair – and ‘affair’ was really the only word that suited it, even though it hadn’t been illicit in any way.
‘You look well,’ she said, studying me, a smile at the edge of her lips.
‘Thanks. You too.’
‘You look like you’re in love.’
I must have blushed because she clapped her hands together and said, ‘How exciting. Who’s the lucky girl?’
I spent the next ten minutes banging on about Charlie and how amazing she was, until Karen’s eyes glazed over.
We turned to the subject of her website and discussed ideas while she showed me some sites she liked on her iPad.
Leaning towar
ds her while she flicked between sites, I smelled her perfume and was thrust back in time to an afternoon we’d spent in bed together watching The Graduate and having sex that, not unusually, had been more like a lesson than anything else, Karen giving me gentle instructions as I went down on her: where to position my tongue, how firm, how fast, what to do with my fingers, and so on.
‘Andrew? Have you zoned out?’
‘Huh? Oh, sorry. I was just remembering something.’
She arched an eyebrow. ‘Something good?’
I definitely must have blushed this time because she winked at me and said, ‘Not the kind of thing you would want to tell your girlfriend about?’
I didn’t reply. I felt guilty enough as it was. I definitely didn’t fancy Karen anymore, and not just because the light that shone from Charlie cast all other women into shadow, but because that had been a period of my life that I wouldn’t want to return to. I was a proper grown-up now.
‘Does she know you’re here?’ Karen asked.
‘Yeah, of course. Why wouldn’t she?’
She shrugged. ‘I don’t know. Some women get funny about their boyfriends meeting up with their exes.’
‘Charlie’s not like that.’ Plus, I almost added, I wouldn’t really class you as an ex.
‘That’s good. There’s nothing that kills a relationship faster than jealousy. It’s why I split from Yuri.’ That was her long-term partner. ‘The last six months with him . . . well, I learned why they call it the green-eyed monster.’
I left a little while later, having agreed to show her a first draft the following week, and hopped on a bus to Farringdon, where I had arranged to meet Sasha.
The thing was, Charlie had been a bit weird when I told her I was meeting Karen to talk about designing a website for her.
She was getting ready for work, putting on her make-up. I loved watching her, a mug of coffee steaming in my lap, bright winter sunshine lighting up the flat.
‘What?’ she had said. ‘You mean the Karen you were telling me about? Your former lover?’
I cringed. ‘I hate that word.’
She turned from the mirror, eyeliner pencil between forefinger and thumb. ‘She wasn’t your girlfriend though, was she? You said it was purely a sex thing.’
I put my coffee down. When I had told Harriet about Karen, towards the start of our relationship, she had reacted in a way that had surprised me. She didn’t care about any of the other girls in my past, but she took an instant dislike to the idea of this older woman whom I’d slept with but who had not been a proper girlfriend. She occasionally mentioned her during arguments, when she would shout, ‘Why don’t you go back to the Old Slapper?’
So I was immediately on guard when talking about her with Charlie, though the alternative would have been hiding that I was going to meet her. I didn’t want to lie to Charlie about anything.
‘It was all in the past,’ I said. ‘You don’t have anything to worry about.’
Charlie glanced at me. ‘When people say that, it usually means you do have something to worry about.’
‘But you don’t,’ I said, somewhat lamely. I didn’t know what else to say.
‘Is she very beautiful?’ she asked, turning back to her reflection and returning to the task of applying her make-up.
‘No. Nothing like you.’
‘Not even pretty, like your cleaner?’
I sighed. ‘Don’t start that again, please.’
‘I’m only joking.’ A moment later, she shouted, ‘Fuck! Why can’t I get this eyeliner to go on straight?’
She marched into the bathroom, leaving tension crackling in the air. I sipped my coffee and wished I’d never agreed to do this work for Karen. If Charlie and I ever split up – the thought of which filled my stomach with ice – I would never tell any future girlfriends about Karen.
‘And after seeing Karen, you’re meeting Sasha,’ she said when she returned.
‘Yes.’
‘OK. Well, there’s a drinks thing on after work today. I’ll probably go to that.’
I got up to leave, kissing her goodbye.
‘Have fun,’ I said.
‘Hmm,’ she replied.
Sasha and I had a few drinks in an expensive bar in Farringdon before heading back on the train to Herne Hill, where Sasha had been invited to a housewarming party.
Sasha looked tired, with puffy eyes and the same greasy marks on her glasses that I’d noticed before. I wanted to take them off her and squirt them with washing-up liquid.
‘How are you feeling?’ I asked, as we walked up the road to the party. I had already told her about the work I was going to do for Wowcom and she had, to my relief, been delighted, especially if it meant I would be visiting her office occasionally.
‘I’m all right,’ she said brightly. A pause. ‘Actually, I feel like shit. I know he’s a come stain on the duvet of society—’
‘Nicely put.’
‘Thank you. But I was also kind of, you know, in love with him.’
‘Poor Sash,’ I said. ‘Love. It fucks you up.’
‘It sure does. Especially when the recipient of your love is married to a psychopath.’
I thought it was a little unfair of Sasha to direct her ire towards Lance’s wife. Mae was, after all, the injured party in all this. But I was Sasha’s best friend and it wasn’t my place to take anyone’s side but hers.
‘But you’re all loved up with Charlie, aren’t you? You look like the cat who got the keys to the aviary. When I am going to meet this goddess?’
‘Soon, I’m sure.’
‘Good. Because if you wait too long I will begin to suspect that she is a figment of your imagination.’
We were almost at the party now and could hear the muffled thump of music up ahead. This was an expensive, quiet street and I could imagine the neighbours being pissed off by this noisy event.
‘I’ve got a photo,’ I said. I now had a number of fully clothed pictures of Charlie on my phone, lots of shots of her smiling or posing for me in my flat. I showed my favourite to Sasha. Charlie was sitting on the edge of my bed, wearing jeans and a white T-shirt, her hair all messed up, a shy smile on her face.
‘Nice!’
‘Gorgeous, isn’t she? I can’t quite believe she wants to go out with geeky old me.’
‘You’re a good-looking guy, Andrew. You don’t realise that, which is one of the reasons you’re not a prick. But I bet you and Charlie look great together.’
We arrived at the house, where a girl was being sick on the front steps.
Sasha said, ‘I don’t know if I’m the mood for this. Shall we go back to mine and watch a film? I think Blair Witch is on Channel 4 tonight.’
From inside the house, ‘Blurred Lines’ started to play and somebody whooped.
‘Blair Witch sounds a lot less horrific than this party,’ I said.
We walked back to Sasha’s, which took us past the park. On the way, I told her about Charlie being followed.
‘Bit daft, walking through the park at night,’ Sasha said. ‘Oh, did you hear about Harriet?’
‘Her New Year party? You already told me.’
‘No, not that. She was burgled. Someone broke into her flat – it was last weekend.’
‘Oh shit.’
‘I don’t think they took much, but she said they completely trashed the place. They destroyed all her old photo albums, ripped them up and poured water all over them. They smashed up her computer and emptied out all the cupboards and drawers, just totally wrecked everything. Get this: they stole all her underwear. It’s the only thing they took. Though just the nice lingerie, not the everyday stuff.’
‘That’s freaky,’ I said. ‘My God.’
‘Yeah, she’s devastated. Gone back to her parents. Said she feels violated, you know?’
I could imagine. I made a mental note to send her an email, saying I hoped she was OK. I wondered, briefly, if any of the underwear I’d bought her was among the stuff that had been burned; if she ever still wore it. I’d bought her some Elle MacPherson lingerie, which she’d worn all the time, and had got her a set from Agent Provocateur for Valentine’s, which had cost a fortune.
Poor Harriet.
‘It’s made me take extra care when I go out,’ Sasha said. ‘I must have checked I’d locked the door about ten times before going out this morning.’
We went inside and watched the film. Halfway through I texted Charlie to say goodnight and to ask what she was doing.
She replied immediately. In bed, thinking about you. See you in the morning :) xxxxxx
‘Oh dear, you’ve got that look on your face,’ Sasha said. ‘Lovestruck puppy.’
And then she started to cry. I sat and held her for a while until she felt better, at which point she announced she needed to go to bed.
‘Thanks, Andrew,’ she said, as I left.
‘No worries.’
Her face was streaked with tears and there was a big damp patch on the front of my shirt.
‘You deserve it, you know,’ she said.
‘What?’
‘Happiness. I’m really glad you’ve met Charlie.’
‘Me too.’
She blew me a kiss and I started to walk home, my coat wrapped tightly around me. My flat was a fifteen-minute walk from Sasha’s.
I had just turned off the main road in order to take a shortcut through the quieter backstreets, when I heard footsteps behind me. I looked over my shoulder, a casual glance, and saw a figure in black, wearing a hood. The way they were walking – close to the walls, keeping in the shadows, their pace slowing as I turned to look – made me feel sick with nerves. I knew loads of people who had been mugged for their mobiles. It was an epidemic and I had just been walking blithely along the street staring at my iPhone in full view of any passing thief.
Or maybe it wasn’t a mugger . . . I couldn’t help but think of the person who had followed Charlie through the park, and the figure who I was convinced had been watching us that time by the lake.
