More Than a Feeling

by Cate Woods

  Gah, this is impossible . . .

  ‘I’m not having a one-night stand, Jessica. That is literally not going to happen, so save your breath. I love you for trying to help me, but right now I need to focus on Dot and sorting things out with Luke.’

  Jess puts on a sing-song voice, like she’s trying to persuade a toddler. ‘It would make you feel better . . .’

  ‘No.’

  Jess pouts. ‘You used to do crazy impulsive shit like that all the time. You’re no fun anymore.’

  ‘I know, it’s called motherhood.’

  ‘Well, you weren’t that much fun for a few years before motherhood, either,’ mutters Jess.

  13

  I have another terrible night’s sleep – although this time it’s not Dot who’s the cause of the frequent waking, but my toothache. Sometime around 4 a.m., when I’m speedballing Neurofen and Paracetamol, past worrying about what it’s doing to my milk supply, I come to the reluctant conclusion that I can’t put it off any longer: I’m going to have to bite the bullet (veeeery gently, as biting is agony) and see the dentist.

  I hate going to the dentist. It’s not the actual dentistry part that bothers me; I’m not troubled by drilling or injections – I don’t even mind when they scrape at your teeth like they’re getting moss off an old brick wall. No, it’s my dentist herself that’s the problem. Her name is Dr Nowak and she is about twelve years old. With her blonde ponytail, pale-green scrubs and pink Crocs, she far more resembles a child beauty pageant contestant dressed up for the ‘My Dream Job!!’ round, rather than a qualified adult health professional. It’s not her fault, I know, but she makes me feel old and an underachiever, also the last time I saw her she accused me of being a jaw-clencher, which is basically the same as calling me frigid. I guess I could just see a different dentist, but do you know how difficult it is to get on the list of an NHS practice? You pretty much have to wait until someone dies and then jump into their space – and I refuse to stake out the local undertakers just so I’m first in line for affordable dental care. So I stick with Dr Nowak and just see her as infrequently as possible. As a result, I am scrupulous with my dental hygiene – although clearly not scrupulous enough to prevent whatever has caused this toothache . . .

  The magazines in the dental surgery waiting room are at least six months old, so I flick through a feature on how to get a ‘banging beach bod’, while trying to remain Zen at the thought of what awaits. Thankfully Dot is being looked after by Claris; she’d usually be busy with her new catering business, but luckily for me February is a fallow canapé month.

  ‘Ann Taylor?’

  I look up; the receptionist gives me the briefest of smiles. More of a grimace, really.

  ‘Downstairs, please, room three.’

  I gather my things together with a heavy heart and make my way down the staircase of dental doom. With each step, the knot in my stomach tightens and my jaw clenches – NO! Stop clenching, Annie! You are not a clencher, okay?

  With immense reluctance I edge inside room three, but instead of finding Dr Nowak exuding patronising perkiness, there’s an unfamiliar dark-haired woman waiting for me. She beckons me inside.

  ‘Take a seat, please, Dr Ford will just be a minute.’

  ‘Dr Ford? Is Dr Nowak on holiday?’

  ‘No, I’m afraid she’s moved practices. Dr Ford has taken over her list of patients.’

  Yes! Well, today just got a whole lot better. I settle myself in the chair while the nurse – for I presume this is she – fastens a paper bib around my neck. Whoever this new dentist is, they’ve got to be an improvement on Dr Nowak. And then the door opens and in walks George Clooney’s marginally sexier younger brother. Out of the corner of my eye, I see the nurse surreptitiously dab on some lip gloss.

  The World’s Hottest Dentist™ flashes a movie-star smile. ‘Hello, I’m Dr Tom Ford.’

  Even his voice is handsome: deep, growly and warm, like the voiceover on a whisky commercial.

  ‘Tom Ford – like the fashion designer?’

  ‘Exactly.’ He grins. ‘So, Miss Taylor, what can I do for you today?’

  ‘Please, call me Annie.’

  He arches one perfect, manly eyebrow. ‘Like the orphan?’

  I collapse into girlish giggles. Not only gorgeous, but funny too! Jess, I’ve just met that very hot lion you were talking about . . .

  I tell Dr Ford about my toothache and he pays really close attention – I knew he’d be a good listener – and makes concerned noises that suggest he genuinely cares about my pain. The nurse hovers by his shoulder, hanging on his every word, fluttering her lashes in his direction; she clearly fancies the pants off him. Pathetic.

  ‘Alright, Annie, let’s take a look at what’s going on, shall we?’ That groin-tingling smile again.

  ‘Yes,’ I say. Oh yes.

  He presses a button, there’s a soft whirring sound and I feel the seat reclining until I’m almost horizontal. Like I’m lying in bed. Waiting . . . for Dr Ford. Waiting for him to come and . . . blimey, I’m actually getting a bit turned on here. Must be some sort of weird breastfeeding hormone surge.

  Dr Ford scoots his stool towards me, then comes to a halt by my side, his feet planted masterfully apart. He’s wearing Adidas Stan Smith trainers rather than those stupid Crocs. God, he’s cool. I bet he has a motorbike. I look at his hands: so strong, so masterful and – bollocks, so married. But now he’s putting on some latex gloves, so I can just pretend the ring’s not there.

  Dr Ford angles the light above me and then leans forward so his face is hovering just above mine, so close that I can make out the flecks of gold in his green eyes and the white squint lines in his tanned skin that attest to winter sunshine; he’s probably been heli-skiing or something similarly sexy and dangerous. He’s wearing a surgical mask, but even that is a bit of a turn-on: like he’s forbidden to speak, and can only use the power of touch to communicate his deepest desires. I lie there, staring into those bewitching eyes, waiting for him to touch me, my heart pounding, my lips gently parted . . .

  ‘Open your mouth just a little wider, please, Annie.’

  Open my what? Legs, was that, Doctor . . . ? I open my mouth as wide as I can. I intend to be the best patient Dr Ford has ever had. Once he’s had me, no other patient will ever be good enough for him again. As I lie there, I catch the nurse’s eye; Jesus, will you look at the face on her! Jealous, obviously.

  For a moment nothing happens: it’s like he’s toying with me, teasing me, letting the anticipation build . . . And then – oh yes! – he places a finger in my mouth and presses my bottom jaw down, ever so gently, and I have to stop myself moaning with pleasure. I close my eyes and now my whole being is focused on the sensation of his fingers as they explore inside my mouth; gently probing, sliding between my lips . . .

  ‘Right, I’ve done an oral cancer check and everything looks just fine.’

  What? No! You’re forbidden to speak, remember?

  ‘Do you floss every day?’

  ‘Yes,’ I lie. Just get on with the probing!

  ‘Excellent.’ His green eyes crinkle into a smile, and all is forgiven. ‘Now, open up again for me . . .’

  Phew. I close my eyes, push my boobs out and breathlessly await Dr Ford and his magic, wedding-ring-less touch. I can sense him getting closer again and feel my cheeks flush and a pulsating warmth in my groin. And then . . .

  Ouch! What the fuck? The expert fingers have been replaced by some sort of spiky metal instrument that’s being poked with quite excessive vigour into my gums. Christ, that does not feel pleasant. In fact, it’s totally killing my buzz. Perhaps I should try to imagine that this is some kind of kinky 50 Shades-style sex game. I’ve been a naughty girl, Master, prick me with your pricky metal thing, Master. Problem is, I struggle to get excited about the idea of S&M. Pain is pain after all, even if it’s ‘sexy’ pain – and whatever Dr Ford is doing really is quite painful.

  After a while he loses the torture instrument,
but the moment has passed. And then Dr Ford gets the nurse involved to take some x-rays – and I have zero interest in a threesome with that sour-faced cow.

  Nevertheless, at the end of our time together I get the impression that Dr Ford might be a bit sad, like he’s gutted I’ve got to leave.

  ‘Okay, Annie, everything looks fine, but you’re going to need a filling in that top right molar, so I want to see you again soon.’

  ‘Right, I see,’ I say, quietly stoical, although inside I’m all: hooray! Woo! More Dr Ford!

  ‘There’s just one other thing,’ he says, as I shrug on my coat as sexily as I’m able.

  My phone number, Dr Ford? But what about your wife? I know there’s this incredibly powerful attraction between us, but I’m just not the sort of woman who’d ever want to break up a marriage. Unless, of course, the two of you have been living apart for some time, due to your much-older wife’s unreasonable behaviour, in which case . . .

  ‘Do you clench your teeth?’

  I give him a hard stare. Goodbye, Dr Ford. It was fun while it lasted.

  Back upstairs, I’m waiting by the front desk while the receptionist struggles to find me an appointment sooner than six months’ time and I realise that I’m smiling to myself: a proper, full-on beam. Well, that was an extremely interesting twenty minutes! After my chat with Jess, I was beginning to worry that my low sex drive was a cause for concern, so I’m overjoyed to discover that I do still have those feelings – and it feels really good to feel them again. There’s hope for me yet. Screw you, Luke Turner, I am still a sexual being.

  ‘Barb . . .?’

  At the sound of the vaguely familiar female voice – and the shock of hearing someone address me as ‘Barb’ for the first time in years – I turn round to discover a short, curvy woman looking at me, brow creased in uncertainty. She is wearing an enormous pale-blue fur coat, possibly Muppet in origin, and her hair is an explosion of dark curls with a bright white streak at the front, like a bolt of lightning in a night sky or a very sexy skunk.

  My mouth drops open in a delighted gawp: I’d know that ’fro anywhere.

  ‘Oh my God, Riva!’

  ‘It is you, Barb!’ She throws her arms wide and rushes in for a hug. ‘I haven’t seen you since forever! Where the fuck you been, girl?’

  Riva is one of London’s most in-demand stylists, a fashion legend with a client list as sparkly as her be-ringed fingers, who I was lucky enough to work – and party – with back in my photography days.

  ‘I almost didn’t recognise you, babe,’ she says, pulling back from our embrace to check me out. ‘You look so . . .’

  She gestures at my jeans and cardigan, grappling for the right word.

  ‘Safe? Suburban? Housewifely?’

  ‘Yeah, pretty much!’ She laughs. ‘What happened?’

  ‘I turned into a safe, suburban housewife.’ We grin at each other, fuelled by crazy, happy memories. ‘But you haven’t changed a bit, love! How have you been? Ooh, and how’s Jethro?’

  ‘He’s got big. Can you believe he’s now at school?’

  ‘Noooo! I remember you being pregnant, it feels like last week.’

  ‘I know, scary, right?’ She smiles, and then wraps me in a hug again. ‘God, it’s really good to see you! What have you been up to? This is so weird, I was actually talking about you just the other day. I was with Delphine – remember her?’ I nod, a snapshot of a willowy red-headed make-up artist flashing into my mind. ‘She was asking if I knew what you were doing these days. We were reminiscing about your incredible outfits.’

  I feel a twinge of self-consciousness about how much less incredible I must look to her now.

  ‘Yeah, I sort of lost touch with a lot of the old crowd after I stopped working with Jay,’ I say.

  Riva looks away for a moment, clearly uncomfortable. ‘I’m so sorry I didn’t get in touch after . . . what happened. I didn’t really know what to say, and then time passed and . . .’ She tails off with an apologetic shrug.

  ‘It’s okay, I think a lot of people felt the same. I do understand, honestly. I went to ground for a while and then lost touch with too many friends.’

  Riva gives my arm a sympathetic squeeze, and the awkwardness fades. ‘Look, I’ve got an orthodontist appointment now – can you believe I’m getting fucking braces at the age of thirty-four? – but can we meet up for lunch sometime? I’d love to catch up, Barb.’

  ‘That would be amazing,’ I say. ‘I don’t really go by Barb anymore, though. It’s just Annie these days.’

  Riva gives a dismissive snort. ‘Babe, you will always be Barb to me.’

  As we swap numbers I notice her phone wallpaper is a photo of a gang of half-remembered faces on a night out. It’s a strange feeling to discover that all this time my old life has been going on without me: the parties, laughs and adventures. Over the years I’ve been so careful not to dwell too much on my memories of that period because in my mind it had become so closely linked with losing my parents, but now that I’m here, faced with Riva, the living, breathing embodiment of my old life, all I remember is the fun we had together, and I feel a wave of nostalgia along with something that might possibly be regret.

  ‘We used to have a lot of fun, didn’t we?’ I smile.

  ‘Used to?’ Riva gives a bark of laughter, then plants a smacker on my cheek. ‘Darling, we still do!’

  On the bus ride to Claris’ house to collect Dot, my mind wanders back over my memories of Riva. Now that I’m a mum myself, it seems astonishing that the arrival of Riva’s son, Jethro, seemed to have so little impact on her life; even with a baby in tow it was just business and pleasure as usual. There was one particular night at a club in Dalston: it must have been shortly after Jethro’s birth, because I remember somebody saying we ought to wet the baby’s head, and Riva replied that as she was the one who’d done all the work, it was her head that deserved wetting, and then a bottle of champagne magically appeared and she climbed on a table, shook it up and sprayed it all over herself like she was Beyoncé.

  If I saw someone pull a stunt like that today, my thoughts would go as follows:

  1) What a waste of champagne

  2) That’s going to be awfully sticky

  3) I hope you’ve got a change of clothes with you

  4) Someone might slip on that floor

  5) Is it time to go home yet?

  Back then, however, all I remember is the laughter.

  At the time I didn’t give Riva’s post-natal partying a second thought, but now I can only marvel at how she managed it, especially because she was raising Jethro alone (she was a little hazy about Jethro’s paternity after falling pregnant during a ‘busy’ work trip to the States). As someone who has developed a pathological fear of even the mildest of hangovers since becoming a mum, I have so many questions for her. For example: wasn’t she tired the whole time? Like, so, so tired? Was she on some sort of miracle drug that kept her going – and, if so, where might one procure it? And where on earth was Jethro while she was dancing on tables?

  *

  Claris lives in her late grandmother’s house, which is a mere ten-minute walk from Luke’s place. Her granny Polly passed away last year on the very same day that she received a telegram from the Queen congratulating her on her 100th birthday. Apparently her last words were: ‘Can you believe HRH’s signature is printed? She didn’t even bloody sign it herself!’

  Granny Polly always was a stickler for good manners.

  For Claris, the dark cloud cast by her beloved grandmother’s death brought with it the silver lining of being left her beautiful home in one of the most desirable streets just off Clapham Common. Freed from the burden of London rental prices, Claris quit her job in cookery-book publishing and dedicated herself to her long-term ambition of setting up a catering company, called, in honour of her late granny, ‘Polly Put the Kettle On’. As the name suggests, she specialises in afternoon tea, which means visitors to her flat are usually roped in to try whate
ver delicacy she’s testing that week.

  But as I walk up the front path, it’s not the scent of freshly baked scones that wafts out to greet me, but Dot’s urgent cries. I dash the last few steps and ring the doorbell, panicked about what might have happened, guilty about having abandoned my poor baby and worried about how my poor friend’s been coping. Seriously, being a mother is non-stop feels.

  Moments later a wild-eyed Claris opens the door with a wailing Dot in one hand and a bottle of milk in the other.

  ‘Oh thank God, Annie!’ She shoves me inside. ‘I’ve been trying to give Dot her milk, but I think there might be something wrong with the bottle! She can’t seem to get any out and she’s been getting more and more upset and I DON’T KNOW WHAT TO DO!’

  ‘Shhh, don’t worry, I’m here now,’ I say, trying to soothe them both. ‘I’ll just put her on the boob, that’ll calm her down.’

  We hustle into the living room, where the walls are still covered with Granny Polly’s collection of antique oil paintings, which are so dark you can barely discern the subject matter (Racehorses? Boats? Ladies in large hats?) then I sit on the sofa and manoeuvre Dot into position, where she lunges at my nipple like a dog going after a treat.

  ‘Ouch – easy, tiger,’ I murmur, stroking her warm head as she gulps away.

  Claris flops down next to me. ‘Oh thank God,’ she mutters again, this time in exhausted relief. ‘She’d only been crying for a minute or so, but I have no idea what I’d have done if you hadn’t turned up. I was seriously thinking about trying her with a piece of walnut sponge. What do you think the problem might have been?’

  ‘Did you remove the travel cap from under the bottle’s teat?’

  ‘What?’ Claris’ eyes bulge in outrage. ‘No! You didn’t mention anything about a sodding travel cap!’

  ‘I’m so sorry, I didn’t even think about it. My fault, totally. That must have been really stressful.’

  Claris raises her eyebrows as if to say, you don’t know the half of it – but then relaxes into a smile. ‘Well, no harm done. And she was a total delight before she got hungry. We had a walk on the common and read some books. She’s clearly highly intelligent, Annie, she was very interested in the latest Hilary Mantel.’ She gets up from the sofa, hands on hips. ‘Now, what can I get you? Cup of tea? And I’ve been trying out a tahini and white chocolate cake that I’d love to get your thoughts on . . .’