Sheer Abandon

by Penny Vincenzi

  “Ed,” she said laughing, “no way am I a politician.”

  “No, but I bet you will be,” he said. “More wine?”

  It was almost midnight when they left the restaurant.

  “It’s been such fun,” she said. “Thank you. Let me know about the job. And if you get it, I could certainly arrange for you to meet some MPs.”

  “You could? I’ll tell them that.”

  He got the job; Chad Lawrence agreed to see him, and arrange a tour of the House for him. “But there’s a price tag on this, Martha. You’ve got to join us.”

  “Oh, Chad, shut up.”

  “I won’t. Why should I help you get yourself a toy boy for nothing?”

  She did the tour with Ed, then said she would buy him dinner. “I owe you one.”

  They went to Shepherd’s, where she felt like an old hand, pointing out various politicians to him, telling him morsels of gossip. Almost against her will, she heard herself agreeing to see him again.

  “I’ll see if they’ll let you come into the office,” he said. “They’ve been interviewing young people about politics—that would interest you, wouldn’t it? You could see some of the tapes.”

  She spent a couple of hours there, talking to Ed’s colleagues, and liked them very much—a young, aggressive, feisty lot. She was intrigued by the creative mind, the way it said “Let’s try” and “Why not?” rather than “That’s not possible” and “We’d have to find a precedent.” She enjoyed the way they grabbed ideas out of the air and pushed them around, rather than looking at the facts and lining them neatly into shape. Ed had let her see some of the tapes of his political interviews and she was fascinated—if a little shocked—by the way they were put together, taking remarks out of context, editing out what they didn’t like.

  “That’s really rather dishonest,” she said, laughing, as they watched the rough tape of the first interview, and then the neatly clipped result.

  “That’s television for you,” said the producer, grinning. “Let’s go for a drink, shall we? Maybe we should interview you.”

  “Me! I thought this film was about young people.”

  “You are quite young,” he said. “For an MP, anyway.”

  “I’m not an MP,” she said. “I’m simply involved with this new party.”

  “We could say you were an MP, a new one.”

  “No, you couldn’t,” she said.

  “Well, let’s go for a drink anyway.”

  That was when she began to feel bad. She stood in a Wardour Street bar with Ed’s arm round her shoulders—she liked that, it was the first time he had touched her apart from some very brief goodbye kisses—chatting to them, and they were joined by a few more of his friends, all in the same business, and they thought it was odd, the relationship: she could see that. In their early to midtwenties, most of them, how could they relate to a woman who must seem to them already nearly middle-aged? And it wasn’t only her age that set her apart. They were just starting out on their careers, many of them not sure what they wanted ultimately to do, some of them still working for nothing, as runners, hoping to get proper jobs. How could they talk satisfactorily to a woman so successful that she was one of the highest earners in the country? Which they seemed to know she was. Clearly Ed had been talking about her.

  She hadn’t felt really bad until the cameraman left and one of them said, “Nice old buffer, isn’t he?” and she had thought that actually she was probably nearer to the old buffer in age than she was to Ed and his friends. Although it didn’t matter, it had made her feel vulnerable and uncertain; and she had realised, too, that this was going to happen over and over again, if she continued to see Ed.

  “Are you all right?” Ed’s face was concerned as he looked at Martha. They were in the Pizza Express in Covent Garden; it seemed to her to be full of twenty-year-olds.

  “Yes. Yes, of course. Just a bit tired.”

  “Well, that’s a first,” he said cheerfully. “You’re never tired. You told me you didn’t believe in being tired—”

  “That was very arrogant of me. And I can’t quite believe I said it.”

  “You did. On our first date. I was well impressed. Have you decided what you want to eat?”

  “Yes. The pollo. With no dressing.”

  “Frites?”

  “Oh, no thank you!”

  “No need to sound quite so horrified,” he said. “I’m offering you a few slivers of fried potato, not a plate of cow with foot-and-mouth.”

  “Sorry.” She smiled quickly. “I just don’t—don’t like chips.”

  “Like you don’t like cream or chocolate or pastry? Or salad dressing?”

  “Well, yes. Actually.”

  “Not because you’re on some rigid eating programme?”

  It wasn’t a good evening; she was edgy, not at her best. Conversation flagged. At about ten thirty, she said she must go. “I have so much to do tomorrow. It’s been great, Ed, honestly.”

  “No it hasn’t,” he said. “It’s been crap. Anyway, I’ll find you a cab.”

  “No need, I’ll call one.”

  “You’re very self-sufficient, aren’t you?” he said, his voice rather flat. “And very in control—”

  “Yes, I suppose I am. I’ve had to be.”

  “It’s a pity,” he said. “You should let go a bit.”

  “I don’t think so,” she said.

  “Fine. Well, go on then.”

  “Go on what?”

  “Getting the cab.”

  “Yes, all right.”

  He looked baffled, dejected. More than anything she wanted to explain, to say it was nothing to do with him, her disquiet; but the only solution was to end the whole thing, here and now. There was no future in it, in their relationship, it was a piece of absurd fantasy, vanity on her part.

  “Ed,” she said, and he looked at her, his blue eyes wary. “Ed, I really think—”

  “It’s OK,” he said. “I understand. I’m not what you want, am I? I don’t suit you. I shouldn’t have tried, even. So—best leave it. Pity. It could have been great. Well, for me anyway…”

  And what, she thought afterwards, what if she had just nodded, kissed him briefly on the cheek, and left? As she knew very clearly would be…sensible. Only she looked at him, staring down at the table, everything about him dejected, and she felt a terrible need to tell him that the fault was not his.

  “I would say it was the other way round, actually. Surely you can see that. You don’t need some bossy older woman, with a complicated life—”

  “Oh, for fuck’s sake,” he said, and there was real anger in his voice, “stop presenting yourself as some dried-up old schoolmarm. When you’re beautiful and clever and sexy—”

  “Sexy? Oh, Ed, I don’t think so,” she said, managing to smile.

  “Well, you think wrong. Anyway, you’re hardly the one to judge, are you? That’s my job.”

  She sat there staring at him, feeling suddenly very confused and…something else as well, a lick of desire, brief but horribly, dangerously strong, and it must have showed because he smiled, a slow, almost triumphant smile, and said, “Come on. Let’s go and get into an ordinary cab, one I can pay for, and I’ll take you home.” They sat in the back of a black cab, and all the way from Soho to Docklands he kissed her, slowly, gently at first, then harder, with a skill that she would not have expected, and she felt herself whirling into a confusion of hunger and pleasure and fear and a pure, flying excitement. And when the cab finally stopped, she wanted to ask him into her flat more than anything, and she might even have done so, so badly did she want him, but he said, “I’ll call you tomorrow. OK?” and she nodded, feebly, and said nothing.

  As he paid off the cab, he turned to her and smiled, his beautiful, heart-wrenching smile, and said, “You’re totally gorgeous, Martha. Totally. Bye now.”

  And he was gone, loping down the street, not looking back, exactly as he had done the night she met him, that long year ago.


  And so it began: she felt sometimes, not of her own volition, as if he had worked some sleight of hand while she wasn’t looking. It was ridiculous, such a totally unsuitable liaison, between this beautiful man, little more than a boy, and herself, a lot more than a girl; she didn’t have time and she didn’t want to get involved. But she went on and on wanting to see him. And seeing him. It was just that he made her feel so happy.

  She felt uncertain a lot of the time with him. It was part of his charm. Or rather the charm of what he did to her. She was used to being absolutely certain—of who she was, what she wanted, where she was going, what she was going to do. Ed questioned all of it.

  “Why?” he would say. “Why work on a Sunday, for God’s sake?”

  “Because there’s so much to do.”

  “Can’t it wait?”

  “No, it can’t. The client wants it first thing.”

  “And he’ll leave, will he, go to some other poncey firm, if he gets it second thing?”

  “No, of course not.”

  “Well, then. Don’t go to work. Come out with me instead. We’ll have fun.”

  Or: “Why? Why don’t you eat more?”

  “Because I don’t want to get fat.”

  “Martha, you’re so not fat. So not anywhere near it. Anyway, why does it matter?”

  “Because I like being thin.”

  “But you’d still be thin, you’ve got a long way to go. Would you die, or something, if you went up a size?”

  “No, of course not.”

  “Well, then. Have some frites. They’re really good.”

  That had been the night she had first gone to bed with him; determined to resist, she had allowed him to argue himself into her bed.

  “I just don’t think it’s a good idea.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because—well, because this isn’t a very sensible relationship.”

  “Relationships shouldn’t be sensible. They should be good. Anyway, why isn’t it sensible?”

  “Well—because—oh, Ed, you know. You’re twenty-three, I’m—”

  “You’re beautiful and interesting and I want to have sex with you. What’s me being twenty-three got to do with it?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Well, then. Let’s go.”

  As she lay in bed and watched him undressing, looked at his beautiful boy’s body, she felt a stab of terror. Suppose she was a disappointment? Almost certainly he had only known young girls. Suppose, in spite of all her care and attention, her body was beginning to look less good. Suppose—She felt taut, tense with fear, almost told him to go away, to leave her to herself.

  But, “You are so beautiful,” he said, sliding in beside her, pulling back the cover, studying her, “you are just so, so beautiful…”

  And gently, slowly, very tenderly, he was somehow all over her, everywhere, kissing her breasts, stroking her stomach, moulding her buttocks. Then he was in her, infinitely gentle, desperately slow, and then, then she wanted him terribly, and she was going to meet him, rising, falling, pushing, thrusting herself on him, and the great tangled waves of need grew higher and higher, and she thought she would never get there, reach the crest. She was struggling, fighting, desperate: and then she was there and she rode it, shouting with joy, and on and on she went, for what seemed a long time, swooping and flying, and then slowly and almost reluctantly she let it go, released it, and fell down sweetly into peace.

  Afterwards, lying beside him, her body finally relaxed, fractured with pleasure, more than she could ever remember, smiling at him, half surprised at herself, half delighted, she wondered how she could ever have thought it might not be a good idea.

  But it did frighten her—a lot. She was frightened of giving too much of herself away, of losing her iron control on her life, of ceasing to function in her own, ordered, Martha-like way. Yes, she would think, as she lay restless and anxious in the small hours, she’d enjoy it for just a few weeks and then end it, before she made a fool of herself, before her life was too disrupted. He must see it couldn’t go on forever, that he really needed someone much nearer to his own age. As she did.

  But she wouldn’t do it just yet. She was too happy.

  It was absurd, how well they got on. How easily they talked, how much they managed to enjoy the same things, how seldom it seemed to matter that she was ten years older than he was. She even shared her smaller insecurities with him; she had never done that before.

  “I hate my nose. It’s too big. Too much.”

  “It’s a fine nose. You can smell with it, can’t you? It lets the bogeys out.”

  “My boobs are so pathetic.”

  “They are not pathetic.”

  “They are. They’re so small.”

  “They’re not too small to kiss. They give your bra something to do.”

  The sex became more wonderful as she became less afraid. He was all the things she might have expected, inventive, tireless, sensuous, but others that she had not: tender, careful, infinitely patient. He would spend a long time arousing her, kissing, talking, easing her into excitement; she told him how lovely that was, how much she appreciated it.

  “What about all your other lovers?” he said, grinning. “Didn’t they do that for you?”

  “Ed, I haven’t had many other lovers,” she said truthfully and then regretted it. She tried not to do that: to talk about anything personal. Apart from him, apart from them.

  “Why not?”

  “I—just haven’t. Didn’t want to. Didn’t—”

  “Have time?”

  “Well, obviously,” she said, laughing, glad to be able to turn it into a joke.

  “Did you—love anyone? Ever?”

  “Once, yes, I did.”

  “And?”

  “And it ended.”

  “Why?”

  “He was married,” she said quickly, “and I don’t want to talk about it.”

  “OK.” He always respected that if she spelt it out.

  Martha was happier than she could ever remember, and knowing that it couldn’t last made it sweeter still.

  For just three weeks, she felt very, very happy.

  And then it was Valentine’s Day.

  It started out quite well: A posy of red roses the night before, some sex at midnight—“I was hoping I could make you come as the clock struck, but I think I failed, let’s see, yes, it’s 12:13, damn”—and he rang her just before her six o’clock alarm call, to say Happy Valentine’s Day: “That was the hardest part, waking up before you.”

  They were going out to dinner at the Pont de la Tour—her treat, she said—and had agreed to meet at eight, but at seven thirty he called and said he’d been held up doing some important editing and would she come down to Soho instead. Slightly irritated—while reminding herself this was what she did to him all the time—she cancelled the table and got a cab to a Thai restaurant in Old Compton Street, which he said would remind them both of their travels. He wasn’t there when she arrived, but a table had been booked and there was a bottle of white wine on ice beside it; she sat down, ordered some water instead, and waited. For twenty minutes she waited, and there was no phone call, no sign of him; she was about to walk out when one of the boys who worked with him came in, breathless, and said Ed would be just another ten minutes, his phone had died, he was really sorry and could she please hang on? Martha thanked him for coming, but after fifteen minutes, she couldn’t stand it any longer, got up, and stalked round to Wardour Street to the building where he worked. She pushed the entry-phone bell, and announced herself.

  “Come on up,” said a voice and she went up the rather scruffy stairs and into the minuscule space that called itself reception.

  There was nobody there; she had just started walking along the corridor when she heard a voice coming out of one of the offices. And heard her name.

  “She was in a right state, Ms. Martha was.” It was the boy who had come round to the restaurant. “Don’t rate his chances much toni
ght. She practically smacked my hand just now. Not pleased.”

  “Yeah? Maybe that’s how their relationship works—maybe she dresses up in leather and whips him.”

  “Nah. Anyway, it’s not a relationship, not really. How could it be? I reckon, now he’s won his bet, it’ll be all over in next to no time…”

  Martha took a deep breath, walked on, and pushed open the door of the editing room. Ed sat staring at a screen, scrolling images backwards and forwards.

  “Fuck off,” he said without looking round. “Can’t you see I’m busy?”

  “Yes,” she said, “actually. I can. And I won’t be interrupting you any longer, Ed, not tonight, not ever. I’m so glad I helped you win your bet. Now why don’t you fuck off yourself.”

  She walked out of the building, got into a taxi, and went back to her apartment. And refused to answer any of the twenty-two calls he made before he gave up and, she imagined, shrugged his shoulders, and went out to have fun with some people his own age.

  Chapter 10

  “Shall we get a Chinese? Mum’s left me some money.”

  “You’re so lucky, Sarah,” said Kate wistfully. “No one nagging at you all the time to do your homework and tidy your room, or turn your music down. And you can eat whenever you like. We have to sit down every night, all four of us round the table, and make polite conversation, it’s gross. Dad calls it communicating. God! He doesn’t know what the word means.”

  “Yeah, well, it’s all right here in some ways,” said Sarah. “Sometimes it’s not so good. Like I have to look after the little ones a lot. Mum’s never here, not in the evenings.”

  “Where does she go?”

  “Oh—out. After she’s finished at the pub. Drinking. Clubbing.”

  “Clubbing! At her age?”

  “I know. It’s pathetic. And then she stays over at Jerry’s place quite often.”

  “What, the guy with the motorbike?”

  “Yeah, he’s her boyfriend. Didn’t you realise?”