Polly

by Freya North

  Polly’s mind was empty and her conscience was clear, I’m afraid. Unbelievably, she was thinking of nothing, just languishing in the untold physical pleasure of the event, of the here and now. The then and the soon were irrelevant, at least to Polly they were. She was totally preoccupied by Chip’s knowledge of the human anatomy, what he was expecting her body to do, the limits to which it could be bent and twisted. He was fine tuning her awareness of her own body, his consummate exploration intensifying the sensations she was experiencing. Chip’s cock was rock hard, his fitness and athleticism was obviously transferable to this ragingly hard extra limb of his, and he was able to bestow on it supreme gymnastic talent. Polly grabbed on to his biceps, her wet fingers digging deep, the pinks of her nails turning quite white.

  The strength of his back allowed him to withdraw his cock just until the tip threatened to spring right out from Polly. Then, with expert control, he plunged it back inside her, fast and deep. She soon learned just how much of an angle to thrust her pelvis forward so that she could meet the dive of his cock and feel him welded within her. Bliss. She could hardly keep her mouth closed or her eyes open. Her second orgasm, just as exquisite as her first, was synchronized perfectly with Chip’s climax.

  ‘Oh yeah, oh baby.’

  That’s me he’s gasping about!

  Amazingly, just a few seconds later, his right hand disappeared down into the water and then surfaced brandishing a condom with a knot in the neck.

  ‘My goodness,’ Polly marvelled, ‘whenever – I mean – however? I mean, wow.’

  Hadn’t thought of that. Thank God he had.

  ‘I’m pretty cool at holding my breath,’ Chip informed her proudly, tossing the condom out of the pool to land on Polly’s crumpled swimsuit.

  Polly had two more hydrotherapy sessions. One a week, with no contact, let alone physiotherapy, in between. The last session was on the penultimate day of term, just a few hours before the final performance of the school revue. When she took her bow at the end of the show, Polly spied Chip in the second row of the enthralled audience. He was alternately clapping high above his head and then taking his fingers to his mouth and whistling through them. He was smiling directly at her, broadly. She grinned back, triumphant and happy.

  The next morning, there was no time for a private farewell. They were both busy, Polly especially so, as she was taking an early flight home to England. They spared each other a few moments, diplomatically meeting midway across the hockey pitch. Bye bye. So long. It’s been lovely knowing you. It was great having you. Look after yourself. You take care, you hear. Keep in touch. You too.

  Yes, yes.

  As if.

  Needless to say, Polly Fenton and Chip Jonson would never meet again.

  TWENTY-ONE

  Staff dining room

  Lunchtime

  4th Feb

  Hiya Polly,

  Just thought I’d drop you a quick line to thank you for your analysis of the US education system, which arrived this morning. I think I’ll stick with G.C.S.E.s and A levels. I wonder if you’ll be home before you learn how well your students perform in those S.A.T.s?

  Suffice it to say, BGS is BGS and I’ve been dishing out detentions like they’re going out of fashion. Lynn Drewe has been suspended for snogging her boyfriend bang outside the main school entrance. At lunch-time. She wasn’t wearing her blazer but was sporting his school tie in her hair. Two days later, we expelled Clare Allinson – she’d notched up a fine trade selling single Marlboro Lights to the first and second years. Business as usual, you could say.

  School, I hasten to add – and right at the end of the letter to cajole you into responding immediately – is merely how I fill my days. My nights, my dearest friend, I am filling with one Dominic Fyfield. Or shall we say one Dominic Fyfield is filling me at night?

  Want to know more?

  Then beg!

  Love you, child,

  Megan

  Feb 21st

  Polly Fenton,

  If I’d have held my breath waiting for your reply – well, this letter would have been my death notice. Luckily, I’m so engrossed in nightly enactments of the Kama Sutra with your boyfriend’s brother, that I only realized yesterday that it’s been a letterless month from you to me. Write soon – or I’ll send Anna Powell from Upper Five over (she collided with Jeanette Butcher in netball and knocked poor Susie Waldren out cold in hockey). You’ve been warned.

  M Reilly (Miss)

  5th March

  Dear Polly,

  ‘I’m so busy’ isn’t much of an excuse, I’m afraid. I don’t care if you only have one day off every fourteen, or if taking on the school revue has eaten into your free periods in which you feel you must now mark homework. I’m certainly not sympathetic to the fact that skiing now appears to be your priority. I’m your best friend and unless I’m treated as such, I shall sever all contact immediately – and sever your right hand when I see you at Easter (less than a month, I might add) – only then will you have a worthy excuse not to write.

  Cow.

  Bitch.

  I hate you.

  Megan

  PS. Not really. But please write soon.

  PPS. Everything OK?

  PPPS. I thought I’d put the above into small writing, just in case.

  March 18th

  Dear Polly,

  Thanks for your line.

  Here’s one from me:

  Let me know which day and which flight when you finally decide – and if you want me to meet you at Heathrow.

  Max

  TWENTY-TWO

  Polly left New England before Max’s last letter arrived. She was returning to England feeling cleansed and healthy and a day early. As a surprise. She was eager to fling her arms around him and beam a very literal and heartfelt ‘I’m back!’ to his gorgeous, flabbergasted, well-known and much-loved face.

  How it’ll make up for my appalling lack of correspondence. Looking back, it feels an incredibly long time since I last saw him. And yet this last term galloped by. Was there really time to write? I didn’t put it off. There was just so much to do. Never mind. Just wait till he sees me!

  It was Friday afternoon, three o’clock, Logan Airport. Polly was gazing at the planes lumbering along the runways, a pot of unseasonal but delicious frozen yoghurt to hand to last the two-hour wait before her departure.

  I must try Jen Carter again – and if it’s the answerphone once more, I’ll just have to leave a message. I know she’s not due to leave until tomorrow and I can’t really turn up unannounced, even if it is my flat. There’s such a thing as manners, as decorum.

  ‘Hi, this is Jen. I can’t take your call right now. Leave a message after the tone. Thanks.’

  ‘Oh, yes, hullo Jen Carter, it’s Polly Fenton here. Hope you’re well and Buster’s looking after you. Um, I hope it’s OK with you – only I’m taking an early flight – God I hate these machines. What I want to say is, I arrive at Heathrow at about four in the morning, would you believe, and I wonder if you’d mind me sneaking in and crashing on the settee? I hope that’s OK. I want to surprise Max, you see – he thinks I’m not due till Sunday afternoon. I really hope you don’t mind, I’ll be as quiet as a mouse – maybe we could have breakfast together and finally meet and swap stories! Hope all of this is OK. I’ll see you at some point tomorrow. Thanks a lot. Yup, bye. OK. Thanks, Jen. Oh! Just in case you speak to Max or Megan or anyone, please don’t let on, as I want it to be a surprise. I think I’ve already said that. Brilliant. Many thanks. See you tomorrow.’

  Wedged into the window seat by a very large couple on honeymoon, Polly tried to watch the in-flight movie. She couldn’t concentrate. She tried to sleep. She wasn’t tired. She tried to read but couldn’t settle into her book, though she was already half-way through it. She felt too fidgety. With nerves, with exhilaration. She was going to see Max so soon. She’d had such a brilliant time. Her fling, so often reasoned to herself, had served only to rekindle her love fo
r Max.

  Chip’s gone. Spring’s almost summer. The snow’s melting. That was then.

  Now she felt truly ready. Things wouldn’t be the same, oh no, they’d be far better.

  Kate said so, didn’t she? Every woman deserved a Chip once in her life.

  She also warned you that it was a heavy, guilty secret.

  No, no. I won’t feel guilty – that’s stupid. Destructive. What would be the point?

  I’m not going to tell you. And I’m not going to tell you how you should feel.

  Do you know, I remember what she said by heart actually: ‘It’s healthier to do and denounce, than not to and forever to wonder.’

  She also told you, in no uncertain terms, that it’s a crime of which she does not approve.

  Sod Kate, it’s nothing to do with her anyway.

  Glad to hear you say it.

  It was just a fling. With a purpose. Much good will come of it. No remorse. No guilt. Otherwise, what was the point?

  Polly, are you deluded or just immoral?

  Leave me to look at the duty free.

  There’s always a price on duty.

  How very odd to emerge at Belsize Park underground station at 5.45 in the morning. It should feel like elevenses time but a sleepless flight has meant that, in mind and body, Polly is happy to subscribe to English time immediately and feels sufficiently tired and disorientated.

  Doesn’t everything look sleepy and grey!

  You do, too.

  Look! That café, which used to be an opticians, is now a flower shop.

  Life goes on without you, despite you presuming England to be somehow on hold while you’re away. Months have passed, Polly. For them as well as you. Turn left. Left again.

  Buster!

  Polly’s cat was sitting on somebody’s garden wall, licking his paw and his chops. When he registered Polly, he yawned, scumbled down the wall, walked in the opposite direction and then turned back, swaggering along half the distance that separated them before sitting down in the middle of the pavement.

  ‘You knew!’ Polly exclaimed in a broken whisper, dumping her rucksack in the middle of the pavement and skipping over to him. ‘You knew I was coming home, didn’t you?’

  The cat wriggled free from her bear hug, fled away a few yards and then turned and sauntered back to her.

  ‘Buster, you’ve been fighting,’ Polly chided as she heaved on her rucksack, scooped up Buster and carried him like a babe in arms, much to his clearly visible horror.

  ‘Here we are,’ Polly smiled, her key in the lock of the front door.

  Surprise, surprise – no bloody lights on. I’m back, Mrs Dale! I’m switching the hall light on and you’ll not know who it was when you wake up in a couple of hours. Edith Dale 0 – Polly Fenton 1!

  ‘Buster!’ she hissed as the cat scampered up the stairs towards the other flats, claws dragging surely too loudly on the poor carpet. However, as Buster loathed Mrs Dale as much as Polly feared her, he was soon down again, purring clangorously at his own front door.

  ‘Ssh,’ Polly whispered, easing her key and slipping into her flat. She had to swallow hard to suppress the urge to sing out ‘I’m home!’ to all asunder. She closed the door soundlessly and peeled her ears at the base of the five steps which led up to her bedroom and her bathroom. Silence.

  Sleeping like a baby, good old Jen Carter. Sleep on, sleep tight, see you in the morning proper.

  Polly went into her sitting-room, through to her tiny kitchen and drank down a glass of water without pausing for breath.

  Yeuch! Thames Water – I’d forgotten how strongly it tastes and smells, but what can one expect? It’s been filtered through six other people. In Vermont, our water is fresh from the mountains.

  This is your water, Polly, don’t lose sight of that. You’d better reacquire a taste for it.

  She didn’t dare boil the kettle though the notion of a cup of Earl Grey was all that had kept her from screaming on the flight. She opened the fridge, looked inside and assessed those contents which established a connection with Jen Carter, and those which presented utter disparity. She closed the fridge door. She had a headache.

  Sitting on her settee, she gazed out to her small patio and was pleased to see, though now withered, a crowd of daffodils whose bulbs the squirrels had not pillaged. She yawned and realized that she was too exhausted to draw the curtains, to leave the settee into which she was now welded. She knew she was too tired for dawn to intrude on her slumber and so she curled up, smiled in welcome at her Picasso print, and fell asleep deeply. Somewhere, in a fugged corner of a nondescript dream, she heard someone laugh and gasp. And then she saw and heard nothing until the sound of the floorboards creaking above roused her. It was half past nine.

  I’m awake. Wide. I am. I’m back. Here comes Jen. No? Not yet? She’s gone into the bathroom. Wake up, Polly, stay awake!

  Here comes Jen.

  Polly sat neatly on the settee, clasping her hands and then unclasping them, taking a book to her lap and then putting it aside, while she counted the five stairs being descended.

  Here comes Jen.

  Jen jumped out of her skin.

  ‘Hullo, at last,’ Polly smiled.

  ‘Who are you?’ gasped a horrified Jen Carter. ‘You Polly?’

  ‘’Course I’m Polly,’ she laughed, holding out her hand, taking Jen’s and shaking it warmly.

  ‘What you doing here?’ Jen continued, her eyebrows so furrowed that they had all but merged into one.

  ‘I live here,’ said Polly cautiously, tipping her head and wondering why the girl looked so appalled.

  Aha! That’s why.

  Both girls turned their heads in the vague direction of the bathroom above. Someone was having a shower.

  Hussy! Woman after my own heart! Put it there.

  Polly held out her hand once more. Jen held on to it, somewhat distractedly. ‘What you doing here?’ she repeated.

  Polly swivelled her head to regard the answering machine. It was flashing.

  ‘I left you a message,’ she explained, ‘from Logan. Yesterday. Evening. For you. Did you not receive it?’

  Frowning hard at the answering machine, Jen walked over to it and pressed ‘play’. Nothing happened.

  ‘Guard,’ Jen said, over and over; Polly finally realizing it was to the good Lord whom she petitioned, not some hitherto unknown function of her answering machine.

  ‘Volume,’ Jen shrugged in apology to Polly, turning it back up so that the last drifts of Polly’s message could be heard.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ Polly said, though for what she was unsure.

  ‘No problem,’ Jen said distractedly, her head pulled as if by some imaginary magnet in the approximate direction of the stairs. Polly watched Jen gulp as they heard the footfalls descend the short flight.

  ‘I won’t tell,’ Polly smiled in what she hoped was a conniving and sisterly way.

  Serves you right, Chip!

  ‘Look—’ Jen starts.

  ‘Ssh!’ Polly dismisses amicably.

  ‘Breakfa—’ says Max, entering the room, wearing boxer shorts and nothing else.

  Serves you right, Polly.

  TWENTY-THREE

  Now hold on a minute. Wait up. Hang about a bit. Steady on. What on earth? Whoah!

  Leave the three of them suspended in their agony. Catch up on the events in England. We’ve hardly seen Max these past weeks. We’ve been too caught up with Polly. Did we really stop and wonder whether she’d written much, to Max, to anyone? Weren’t we rather caught up in the tumble and sport that constituted Polly’s spring term? We thought of Max in passing. We wondered what on earth Polly was doing. But we were also compelled to bear close witness to all that she was to do. Even if it meant we too pushed Max just out of our field of vision for a while. It’s not just Polly who’s been turning a blind eye. Unashamedly – regrettably.

  Back track. Rewind.

  ‘Polly get off OK?’ Dominic asked Max when he returned from the
airport.

  ‘Fine,’ Max smiled wistfully. ‘She said “yes”.’

  ‘Yes?’ puzzled Dominic. ‘Want a beer?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Max.

  ‘She said “yes” to a beer?’

  Max gave his brother a withering look of profound pity and affection. ‘To marrying me, twat.’

  ‘Hadn’t she said “yes” already?’ Dominic questioned with an air of suspicion.

  ‘Just what I thought,’ Max laughed. ‘Anyway, it’s all official and sealed and just waiting to be signed now. Perhaps some time in the autumn.’

  ‘Feathering her bed, no doubt,’ Dominic said very quietly and not to Max, who heard nevertheless.

  ‘What did you say?’

  ‘Nothing.’

  ‘No, Dominic,’ Max persisted defensively, ‘what do you mean?’

  ‘Nothing. Honestly.’

  ‘Honesty? Well, tell me what you said then – I mean, I know what you said, but what are you implying?’

  ‘Look,’ said Dominic, trying to appear nonchalant and rifling somewhat pointlessly through the contents of their fridge to increase this impression, ‘I don’t know. It’s just – I don’t bloody know – but you’re my brother and, if she marries you, she’d better treat you a damn sight better than she has this last fortnight.’

  ‘What are you on about?’ Max asked, backing away slightly, feeling at once humiliated and also angry. ‘And how about your behaviour towards her? I don’t think I heard you ask about Vermont at all.’