"But you sounded so sure. Have you told Rachel?"
"She thinks I should go."
Eleanor was surprised. "She's coming with you? Things are getting serious. I'd no idea! Oh, Tom, you should go easy. I know you feel like you've known her all your life but think about it from her angle: you're a guy she's only just met. She's coming on so strong, like she's drunk on the idea of you having loved her all this time. How long will it last? Maybe you ought to hold off a little - you're still in shock, I mean over Annie and everything. And your dad."
"Hang on,… you're jumping ahead a bit. She's not coming with me. At least,… well, I don't suppose she would. I don't know, I haven't asked her. Everything seems to be happening at the wrong time for us. You're saying I'm making a fool of myself, that it won't last?"
"I don't know. I'm just saying go easy."
"And I will, but you and me,… we're friends." It sounded lame but I didn't know what else to say to reinforce it. So, we were friends; so what? We should stick together? But friends were the first to come unglued when lives changed, when the world moved everyone on and only lovers took a firm grip of each other's hands, only lovers stood firm.
She reached out and took hold of my arm, but it was not a tender gesture. She squeezed hard, as if in warning. "I'm not like other women, Tom. You know that. It would be dangerous for you, for us both, if we went away together."
"More dangerous than us being together now? I don't get it, Eleanor,… . really I don't."
She reached up and sank her fingers into my shoulders, sank them deep, their black tips pressing almost to the point of pain. She said nothing, but simply looked at me from beneath dark brows, her eyes unblinking, her mind made up.
"Eleanor, come to Paris with me. It'll be fun. "
She shook her head and I tried to think of another tack, but could feel myself becoming hopelessly bogged down. It seemed with every word, I was only making matters worse. "Can we wind this conversation back? Better still can we forget everything we've talked about, and start again?"
"You need to eat," she said. "There's some roast chicken left over from yesterday,… "
And I thought, okay: Roast chicken; breathing space; time to backtrack, to cool off. "I'll take a shower first,… I'm sorry if I've upset you."
"It's all right. You mean well. But there's a lot you don't know."
"So explain it."
"No."
"But,… "
She put up her hand to stop me. "Please, Tom, just leave me alone. Okay? You're not being fair."
I felt her voice hovering on the edge of anger. I felt its bite, felt it tearing away little strips of my flesh. The confusion, the hurt - it was like a spike, and I was impaled upon it, unable to move without compounding the bitter ache. It was exactly like I remembered life with Annie,… the feeling I should have been smarter, that I was for ever letting her down in ways she would never explain. But it wasn't my fault, and I was suddenly angry for being placed once more in such an impossible situation, an emotional trap with her foot on the door and no other means of escape. I drew away quietly, averting my eyes, unable to look at her, not wanting her to see my anger. Then, slowly, quietly, I carried my hurt upstairs to run a shower and lose myself in its steam.
It was just a tiff, I thought, as I felt myself calming down. We'd be all right. I'd give it an hour, then make some tea and say I was sorry. She'd smile and give me a playful poke in the arm,… then I'd suggest a blast over the moors with the top down, perhaps a drink at the Black Horse. Sure, everything would be fine.
I was in the shower for ten minutes. Then I stepped out and groped for a towel but the rail was empty. This was odd because I'd placed one there in readiness, before running the shower. Puzzled, I turned, squinting through soap stung eyes, to see Eleanor sitting on the edge of the bath, wearing a long black robe, holding the towel to her cheek. This was not a fantasy, not a figment come to explain itself through the channels of my imagination. It was Eleanor: flesh and blood, regarding me strangely. Nor was it an accident, an innocent blunder to be dismissed with laughter and blushes. She'd been sitting there waiting, perhaps to continue our conversation, I thought.
"I'll just get a towel, okay." I backed away, reaching for the door but she held up the key for me to see. She'd locked it, locked me in with her - obviously not to guard our privacy but to prevent my escape.
"Don't be afraid," she said, but that she should have said such a thing made me suddenly very afraid indeed.
"Eleanor you're upset. Why don't we go out for a meal or something? You've not been out for ages. You need to get out of this house."
Her eyes lit up, offering a glimmer of hope, until I saw the maniacal glint in them. This was the dangerous side: her dark side. "A meal?" she mocked. "By candlelight, perhaps? How lovely! But no, I don't think so. People might get the wrong idea. And besides, I have something to show you." She rose and shrugged off the robe to reveal her pale body, still in black bra and pants. She twirled slowly and I saw a slender black string between shapely buttocks, a dainty blemish in the dimple of her thigh.
Turning to face me once more, she gave a saucy wink, then slid the key down the front of her pants and slipped her straps so her breasts spilled from their cups,… pendulous,… and momentarily mesmerising.
"Give me your hands," she said.
"Definitely not."
"Your hands Tom. Don't cover yourself like that. I want to see you."
She did not wait but took my hands in hers and drew them apart with a determination I could not resist without a deliberate show of my own strength - and I could not do that, could not react towards Eleanor with anything akin to force or violence.
"I want to see if my shape arouses you," she said. "Ah,… " She feigned mock pleasure. "I see it does, and so quickly! Tom,… really - you ought to be ashamed! And me your stepmother. What a naughty boy you are!"
Sure enough I was betrayed by a growing erection. But it was not her, I told myself, it was just her shape, her undeniably arousing shape and the stupid male reflex that could not discern between right and wrong. I though it was over now, that she had proved her point, whatever that point was, but then I watched in stunned silence as she seesawed her pants down. The key loosened from their minuscule folds fell to the floor with an ominous clatter.
"Look, Eleanor, this is wrong. I don't think of you this way."
"You might not think it," she said. "But you could obviously do it."
"Is that what you're afraid of? That I might expect it if we went away together? But I would never; I know you can't;… and anyway, even if you could, I know you prefer girls."
She raised herself to her full height and moved closer so I could feel the heat pouring out of her. I was backed up hard against the bathroom door, nowhere to turn, nowhere to run, no where to go except through Eleanor. I was horrified. I could not bear to see her like this.
"I didn't say that! You know I didn't say that. Is that what you've been thinking? That I'm a Lesbian?"
"What else was I supposed to think? You've been with girls,… you said so."
"It doesn't make me a Lesbian, Tom."
"Whatever it makes you, this still means nothing. You don't understand men. We're capable of having sex with any woman - any woman! It's the way we're made. It doesn't always mean we want to. And I could never,.. not with you. Now please, cover yourself up. Don't spoil the way it is between us."
She took hold of me then, slid her fingers beneath my shaft, and curled her thumb around it, clamping me firmly in her fist. "Are you really saying you'd never want to?"
My lungs convulsed. "Stop! I can't take that. I can't take it. I can't take it,… ."
"Answer me."
"For pity's sake. You don't always need sex to be close. We've slept together. Held each other all night. How close is that?"
"It didn't happen," she said. "It was impossible."
"It happened. It was innocent. It was good."
"Maybe, but not enough
for you. What you need is a straight, no nonsense lover." As she spoke, she began to draw her hand upon me dangerously. "Everyone needs a lover." She gave me a thin smile, a sinister smile, a closer look at her dark side, and it was repulsive, but her hand worked me expertly in a way that made me ashamed to admit the dangerous pleasure of it. "You wouldn't be safe with me. I don't know what you think they did to me down there but everything still works. Why not slip inside and I'll show you. It might be good - one time, two times,.. maybe three, but I haven't the constancy to be anyone's lover for very long. Pretty soon, and for no reason, I'll freeze you out, leave you cold and wondering what you've done to upset me. I'll,… drive,… you,… cra-zy. Drive,… you,… cra-zy. Drive,… you,… "
It was not intended - the rhythm of her hand was merely incidental to her words, her mood, and my trigger was mechanical, not emotional. I closed my eyes, swallowed hard, and came copiously, almost painfully. I heard her gasp, I saw the trail of my seed upon her wrist, her leg and I crumpled over in shock, and shame.
She seemed to shrink and her mood changed. Indeed she seemed suddenly quite sober. "Tom! I didn't mean that to happen" She covered herself and turned away, then knelt and fumbled for the key, holding it out with a trembling hand for me to take. I saw only fear and horror in her eyes, where moments ago there had been such sinister fire.
I looked at the key as she waved it urgently before me. No. I was unable to touch it, so charged it seemed with her heat and I was afraid it would burn me. I managed only to shake my head. What was she saying? She was not frigid? Was not Lesbian? Was she warm and moist, I wondered? Or was she cold and dry? Might she have been stimulated by the rhythm of a gently persuasive hand?
My God! My God! What had happened?
As I knelt before her, I saw the dark hair of her mound and I felt an involuntary tingling in my palm, as if in anticipation of its texture. I snatched my eyes away, shut them, screwed them tight. The night we had spent together had been a wonder for its innocence, an innocence made possible only by the fact that I'd imagined a part of her was missing. I could never look at her again and feel the same after this. We could never be like children now. She was a woman, like any other,… .
I felt a terrible heat in my face and I realised I was crying. "Tom. I'm so sorry."
"It's nothing,… only Elgar."
She wrapped the towel around my waist, then threw her arms around me, holding me, cradling me but my blind erection lunged at her, a blunt and stupid instrument that stopped her from coming as close as I needed. "You see?" she said. "You see what I can be like now?"
"It's not your fault."
"How can you say that? How can you be so forgiving?"
"I wanted nothing from you."
And with those words, the gulf of my understanding yawned wide between us. She released me, dropped me almost and drew her robe about her. Then she unlocked the door and made to leave, but turned briefly, angry once more. "What about me?" she said. "What about what I wanted?" Then she ran down the hall to her room and slammed the door behind her.
It was a little after seven,.. still early, but I sank into bed, wearing the shame of my thoughts like a scar. She had sought to frighten me and had succeeded in fair measure, but in doing so had destroyed the thing between us I valued most of all. It had suited me to think of her as being sexless, as being frigid, or Lesbian for it had enabled me to draw closer to her without the inevitable distraction of desire. But now, how easily I could imagine the heat of her sex in my palm! How easily I could imagine massaging away her frigidity and curing all her ills in that peculiarly masculine way, by having her feel the measure of me inside of her, by releasing her sweetness, by having her moan and scream and cry, until I'd crushed and sweated an orgasm out of her.
Out of Eleanor.
Chapter 32
I was ill prepared for the following morning which began earlier than expected and with a sensation of misery in my guts that was something akin to a hangover. I was usually the first to rise on a work morning, being on the road by seven thirty, long before Eleanor had stirred. But that morning I woke to the sound of the shower and her footsteps padding softly down the hall.
Thinking I'd overslept I snatched up my watch. It was only six. Normally, there would have been an hour before I'd needed to move, but I was staying with Rachel again that night and would need to sort out a bag, perhaps iron a couple of shirts. I was dressing when Eleanor came in with coffee. She was careful to avert her eyes and after setting the cup down she raised her hands and backed away.
"Peace offering," she said.
"Gratefully accepted. Thank you."
"Last night was awful. I'm sorry Tom. I haven't slept for thinking about it."
"Me neither."
"You must hate me."
"No. I love you. Without condition, as surely as I love my children."
Her eyes flashed and I fancied I saw in them a moment of confusion, of alarm. "You know what I mean," I said, quickly. "Now let's just forget last night ever happened." It was a stupid thing to say, because neither of us were ever likely to.
She noticed I'd turned Rachel's picture down and made to set it back up again.
"Leave it," I said.
She looked at me and slowly the bottomless Eleanor stare grew tender with long, slow movements of her lashes. "But it's such a lovely picture," she said.
"A little dated now, I think."
"She hasn't changed that much."
She came to me then, hung herself from my shoulders and hugged me. I clung to her in the hope it would set us back on the road to where we had been before, but it was too late, for even as we hugged, I was aware of the corruption in the press of her breasts and in the curve of her hip beneath my palms.
"Don't think about me, too much," she said. "The best we can ever be is survivors, both of us clinging to the same life-raft. And that's no way to live. Be happy, Tom. This girl can make you happy."
"This girl won't be coming with me."
"Then stay. Be near her. Don't go to France."
"The job in France is what I know. I couldn't earn a quarter of what I'm earning now doing anything else. Rachel's right, I'd be crazy to ignore the chance."
"Since when did money mean anything to you?"
"It's not just the money. It's what I know."
"Then it sounds as if you've made up your mind."
"I'd go for sure if you'd come with me."
She pushed herself away. "That's not fair!"
"I want,… I want to always be able to make sure you're okay. I know you can be,… . fragile."
"You make me sound like a piece of old porcelain. Are you afraid I'll fall apart?"
"I wouldn't want that to happen. I'd die if you did and I'd done nothing to prevent it."
"Tom, you really don't get it do you? If it happens, it happens and it'll make no difference if I'm alone or surrounded by friends. Sometimes, I get the darkest of moods and they frighten me, not just for myself, but because I know what it's like for those around me, for those who have to deal with me."
"You've not been like that for years."
"I know and they've been good years but it won't last. It never does. One morning, someone will find me with my wrists cut, or my neck in a noose, and I don't want it to be you."
"Don't even joke about it! I want to take care of you. But you've got to help me to help you. And you can do that by coming with me."
"What would Rachel think? Are you blind, Tom?"
"Rachel would be okay. She understands."
"She might say that now, but she doesn't mean it. And what would I be? Your housekeeper? Your mother? Your frigid lover? The one you sleep with when Rachel's not around?"
"Who cares about finding the right label? You'd be,… Eleanor. If you were a bloke it wouldn't be a problem. Why does it have to be a problem? "
"Don't be so naive. Things aren't that simple between us." She lowered her head and began to walk away. "If you must know the truth," she said. "
I can't go on being a friend to you any more."
I felt as if she'd cut my legs from under me. "But,… what have I done?"
"Nothing. You've done nothing. Don't be so,… childish Tom!"
"Childish?… but how else do you expect me to take it? There has to be something."
"It's nothing to do with you. It's me. It's all me."
She walked out then, closing herself off in her room while I made myself ready for work. I felt wretched. What had she meant? What had I done? I was afraid of us parting on bad terms, so before I left I tried knocking on her door. " Eleanor, please. Let's not leave it like this,… "
There was no reply and I turned away my heart aching with the strain of such a sudden and terrible rejection. Then, as I was leaving, pulling the car away from the kerb, she appeared and tapped on the window. I wound it down and she leaned in to kiss my cheek, then stroked it with the back of her hand. I looked at her thinking she'd say something but, without a word, she simply turned and walked slowly back inside.
When I arrived at the office, I sought my desk in silence, eyes carefully averted to avoid contact with my colleagues who were huddled deep in conspiracy, discussing our imminent demise, embellishing the already outrageous rumours: Derby's was to be demolished to make way for new supermarket, Derby's was to be taken over by an American corporation old that Whacker had an interest in, stripped of its assets and then demolished for housing - no, the local MP had kicked up a fuss - Derby's was safe. And the the only true thing about any of it was that none of it was true.
Fred Arbuckle approached me and pressed a piece of yellow card into my hand.
"What's this then, Fred?"
He winked. "Ticket to a dance."
I looked at it. The card bore just the one hyphenated word: "Re-dun-dance."
It was becoming rather a worn out joke by this time. I was not in the mood for gallows humour, nor idle speculation on events I had no power to influence. The whole business of winding down had already gone on too long. I wished the bulldozers would just sweep the fucking place away and leave us all in peace. All I could think of was Eleanor and the way she had looked at me that morning. I could still feel the cool of her hand upon my cheek and the awful weight of the words she had not spoken. I calmed myself with coffee, then sat down to think a while before picking up the telephone.
The Road From Langholm Avenue Page 23
