Poppyland

by Raffaella Barker

  Stealing a glance at Grace, Ryder finds himself shed a layer of self-protection in order to get closer to her in his thoughts. All this and she isn’t even looking at him. Then she does, and back into his head comes the verse the vicar read earlier:

  ‘To see a world in a grain of sand,

  And Heaven in a wild flower . . .’

  And Ryder suddenly knows as he looks at Grace and she looks back at him, that this is what he has been yearning for. He winks at her and pulls himself together to concentrate on the service.

  ‘God is the creator of all things . . .’

  Grace

  Is this what it feels like? Is happiness this close all the time? This morning I read in the newspaper that there is no time that a New Yorker is further than eight metres from a rat. It used to be fourteen metres. Is happiness like a New York rat? Coming closer and closer? Was it there all the time like the moon is, even when we cannot see it? And if it is, why did no one say so? Life can be full of love and light or fear and darkness. All of it is lurking ready to pounce on us at any moment. So all the happiness we will ever experience is ready and waiting. We will not miss out.

  ‘Will you come for a walk with me?’ I jump almost out of my skin. Ryder’s voice in my ear is unexpected and though he whispers, it sounds like a stage whisper and I am sure that Mac’s Aunt Irene sitting under the lime tree nearby has heard him and can read my mind and sense the leaping excitement. Is it just circumstance that is making this meeting into a big deal? I don’t know, after all, people meet people and even fall in love with them every day. But this version of it is new to me.

  ‘Well?’ I still haven’t answered Ryder. He lies down on the grass next to me and closes his eyes. I have to move or I will touch him.

  ‘Irene, would you like another drink?’ I bounce up as though I have been scalded. And over my shoulder in a hurry as I am walking towards the table and the drinks, so it seems throwaway, I say airily to Ryder, ‘Oh yes, I’d love a walk. Let me just bring Irene a drink.’ I purposely don’t look at him. Actually, I can’t.

  Irene shakes her head. ‘Please don’t,’ she says, ‘I really don’t want any more.’

  ‘Great. Ready when you are.’ Ryder is grinning, I can hear the smile in his voice. I still can’t risk looking at him. Irene turns her piercing gaze on him; she has yellow eyes like a tiger and very unreal black-and-white-striped hair like Mac’s dad but more extreme. She’s Italian, but she could almost be an elderly Chinese warlord’s concubine.

  ‘And whom might you be?’ she asks. ‘Are you one of Mac’s boxing friends?’

  ‘Boxing?’ Ryder shakes his head. ‘Err, yes. I mean no. That’s not how I know Mac but I did box with him a bit. It was long ago. God, it was great, I should get back to it. Does Mac still do it?’

  Irene nods. Her topaz eyes are warm and lively. ‘Yes, though he does more coaching now. He takes a class once or twice a week. I sometimes watch the training.’

  I try to imagine anyone enjoying the salt-and-metal taste of blood in their mouth, the heat of swelling on their lip, the sense of outrage and pumping adrenaline all piling into every blow you take, and though I recoil, I am fascinated and excited too. Thinking of Ryder boxing turns me on. He is looking sheepish, but before I can ask him more, Lucy is there, holding out a small plate, smiling.

  ‘Now, Irene,’ she says, ‘will you let me give you some cake? I’ve got to take Grace and Ryder away, but look, here comes Mac instead.’

  She shoves me in the small of my back, muttering, ‘You go, quick! It’ll be fine.’ Lucy seems to know what is happening better than I do. Walking out of the garden I am burning with the conviction that everyone is staring at me. I might as well be naked, breathing is impossible, so is looking round to see if Ryder is with me. I am gloomily expecting that he isn’t, but I can’t turn back. Out of the gate and on the road I sigh, pause and dare to glance behind me.

  ‘Oh.’

  ‘Oh what?’ Ryder is walking towards me. My heart leaps, I am not sure if it is fear or excitement, and suddenly I blurt out, ‘Thank God you’re here.’

  His eyes are very clear, his gaze straight at me.

  ‘Where would you like to go?’ He is opening the passenger door of a car for me. I almost get in, then step back and away.

  ‘Aren’t we going for a walk?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Well, why are we getting into the car?’

  He shrugs and shuts the door again, reaching out his hand to me. ‘Automatic reflex of a town dweller, I guess. Come on, let’s walk to that church instead.’ He nods towards the sea and a round-towered church on the cliff. ‘Am I a proper town dweller?’ he says, almost to himself.

  ‘Where do you live?’

  ‘On a boat.’

  ‘I don’t remember that about you before, where is the boat?’

  ‘It’s in Little Venice, you should come and see it some time.’

  ‘I’d like that, thank you.’ We leave the road and climb up through a gap in the hedge until we are crossing heathland, the mossy grass springy and silent beneath our feet, gorse wafting a scent of coconut sun-oil I had forgotten about. It’s the smell of the Hawaiian Tropic stuff we used in my teens. I can’t even make a joke about it because my senses are on overload and speaking is becoming increasingly difficult. Ryder’s physical presence, his shoulder next to mine, his arm bumping me occasionally as we walk, the scent of him, renders me stupid with desire.

  Luckily he hasn’t noticed and is looking out to sea.

  ‘Look, they are trying to build a kind of dam in the sea; it’s supposed to stop the tide, but all I can think when I am told about it is that King Canute couldn’t do it, and neither can we.’

  ‘Why do they ignore something like that?’

  ‘Oh, it’s not a scientific fact and there’s no money in listening to folk stories.’

  ‘But it’s not a folk story. King Canute is history, isn’t he?’

  We reach a wall running around the churchyard where we pause, side by side. Ryder leans over and picks a buttercup growing just within the wall. He hands it me and I notice the scar running down from his thumb into his sleeve raised and white like a fine cord.

  ‘That’s the thing. You said it, sweetheart, he is history.’

  Without knowing what I am doing I catch his hand and run my fingertip down the scar.

  ‘Can you feel this?’ I ask, and he looks at my mouth when he answers, ‘Yes.’

  ‘But scars are meant to have no feeling.’

  ‘I know, but this one does.’

  The wind flies suddenly into my hair and I try to push it off my face. Ryder stops the movement of my hand with his. Clumsy with charged excitement, I stand on his foot. It’s a good ice breaker, we laugh and begin to walk up the path in the churchyard.

  ‘Another church?’ Ryder leans in the doorway, the sea is behind him, white horses riding the churning indigo waves. Anxious to clean up my mind I muddle up entering a spiritual place with having chaste thoughts, and eagerly push open the door into the church.

  ‘Let’s look round, this one is so pretty, I came here ages ago. It’s got pink walls.’

  Ryder

  ‘Good.’ Ryder follows her in, wondering if he will be smitten down by a thunder bolt if he puts his hand up Grace’s skirt in here. She walks into the middle of the church then moves towards a small table beyond the pews to read the printed leaflet about the church. He is behind her, pretending to look over her shoulder at what she is reading, but in fact he is breathing in the scent of her and looking at her skin.

  ‘So it was built when the Saxons were still here, and there is an ossified boy in a tomb somewhere over there.’ Grace looks up, biting her lip, turning her head. And he is there, so near her their breath mingles as their eyes meet, and both of them are saying yes.

  Ryder bends his face and kisses her, for a moment just his mouth on hers, then more, and his hands are finding her too, one on her waist, the other around the back of her head, then
his hands pull her against him and she is supple and her body melts to his and the heat between them burns, and he pushes her against the wall and she gasps. The rough sensation of plaster against soft skin is exciting. Grace tilts her head up and Ryder’s mouth runs over her collarbone, his hand warm against her skin but making her shiver.

  Grace pulls away, breathing hard, her pupils black and big with desire.

  ‘This is a church!’ she gasps, but she doesn’t look as though she wants him to stop. Ryder’s hand is on her thigh, under her skirt. He kisses the corner of her mouth.

  ‘You can’t kiss in church! I mean we can’t – you can’t kiss me here.’

  ‘Why not? They do when they’re getting married.’

  Grace laughs, her arms are around him, her body is soft yet taut, like the string on a violin, a breath of surrender floods from her and in the moment she is somehow infinitely closer to him without physically moving. ‘Yes, but not like this.’

  Ryder brushes her hair off her forehead, and looks at her.

  ‘No,’ he agrees, ‘not like this.’

  ‘Let’s go outside.’

  In the churchyard the soft air feels blissful, a breeze wafts fragrance through it, and all of it adds to the surreal reality. Grace sits down on a bank beneath the hedge, Ryder comes and lies beside her, throwing his arm over his face against the hazy heat of the sun. Grace turns over on to her side, and props her arm on the ground, her head on her arm. He breathes in her excitement and it mingles with his own, and he wonders how he can possibly be falling in love with this woman whom he hardly knows. It feels like love, but what does he know? Anyway, whatever it is, he likes it, and he’s not trying to escape from it.

  ‘What are we doing?’ Grace is fidgeting next to him.

  Ryder opens one eye, props himself up for a moment, then lies flat and shuts it again. ‘Lying in the sun in a graveyard.’

  ‘I can’t believe I finally got to meet you again after all.’

  One eyebrow goes up. ‘Can’t you? I can’t believe the opposite. How can we have missed meeting one another for the past five years?’ He is so close she can feel his ribs rising as she breathes. ‘I left you my number but you never called.’

  She looks straight at him, ‘I never got your number,’ she says. He looks surprised and comes closer, rolling over, pulling her under him.

  ‘That explains it,’ he says, ‘and we’ve got a lot of catching up to do. I need to know you.’ Grace looks at him looking at her and her mouth is red. The connection between them is warm and potent, like a silken bath, but then Grace frowns, sits up and clutches her arms around her knees.

  ‘I think it’s all going to go wrong. The sky will fall on our heads, you know the sort of thing.’

  ‘Do you think so?’ says Ryder. His hands are stroking her back, his eyes have flecks like crystals in the iris, and Grace is reflected in the black of the eye in the middle. He can see himself reflected back in her eyes, warped and in double on the curve of her corneas.

  ‘Don’t forget there could be a tidal wave as well. There is something called the Coriolis force which determines the direction the wind moves in.’

  He is stroking her arm now, tracing down to her wrist, linking his finger and thumb around it. She lies back down. ‘In the northern hemisphere, the Coriolis force causes deflection to the right, so I guess a tidal wave could come here from the Atlantic. It would probably lose most of its momentum coming into the Channel, but you never know. Actually, a tidal wave doesn’t really happen in shallow water like this, so probably you’re right, it will be the sky falling on our heads.’

  Ryder realises that he sounds as if he is making it up. ‘Sorry, you don’t really need to hear me boring on, I need to get out more.’

  Grace’s eyes are closed, she smiles and murmurs, ‘No, it’s nice, I like it. It makes me feel safe – something to do with you knowing all that stuff even though none of it is in our hands.’ Speaking of hands, Ryder can’t keep his off her. Of the five senses, his sense of touch is eclipsing all the others by miles at this moment, and his fingers are magnets to which every nerve ending in his body is drawn as he traces around her belly button. All his focus is on the hot electric energy which begins where they are touching one another, and darts deep inside him. Grace is clearly oblivious lying with her eyes closed beside him. He drops his hand down beside her, reaches for hers and is still. Grace’s eyes open and both of them stare at the clouds, wisps of pale smoke in the sun-bleached sky. Surely love is meant to be all the clichés? Agony and ecstasy, despair and liquid joy. Not eating, not sleeping and obsessing wildly on a cliff top? Just now, though, holding hands, lying still and quiet, doesn’t feel like any of that. It just feels real. Can love be real? Ryder has never allowed a thought of love into his head or his heart at this stage with anyone. They have only just met, it’s not likely that they will meet again because why would she want to? So what is the point of any thought of love? This is surely desire, naked, straightforward lust. Nothing more. But also, nothing less. It seems for ever since Ryder last made love with anyone, let alone someone he wanted as much as he wants Grace.

  To distract himself he dredges up some more local information, wondering as he opens his mouth how he thinks he is going to get away with being so boring, but comforting himself with the thought that at least it’s less desperate than jumping on her in the churchyard.

  ‘And the cliffs will be eaten away so there will be less of here. In fact, here will move over there.’ Ryder gestures vaguely to the west.

  Grace grins. ‘Oh. Are you still talking?’ Her face is close to his, her breath against his collarbone, she smells of warmth and flowers and possibility in the sea air, but with a kick of musk that jolts inward and flashes sex like a beacon in his mind.

  He opens one eye. ‘Are you still listening?’

  She blushes, meets his eye then glances away. Ryder strokes the hair off her forehead and his voice runs over her. ‘Anything can happen, and we will have no warning. It’s like love, appearing out of nowhere and slicing right through everything that went before.’ He turns over, he is nearer, he can’t help it. She slides back from him; disappointment leaps like a jumping fish inside him.

  ‘Oh my God,’ says Grace under her breath, and suddenly she is close again. Ryder is still. Grace puts her hands on his chest, the base of her palm on his sternum not far from his beating heart. ‘I can feel your heart,’ she whispers.

  It is impossible not to respond to her. Ryder tries, but when her hand is on his chest and she is just above him, he strokes her hair and rolls her over so she is flat on the grass and he is kissing her, his body so near hers that he is aware she is trembling, and he pulls her towards him and it is irresistible.

  This is so much more of a result than Ryder was anticipating. Well, of course he wasn’t anticipating any sort of a result, so this is great. But it’s more than great, this is the beginning. Isn’t it? Grace is lying on top of him now, the weight of her making him aware of the earth beneath the grass underneath him. He needs to pee and he has a hard on. But practical matters aside, he is elated and excited and fearful. Be careful what you wish for, he thinks wryly, rolling her over and off him and standing up.

  A familiar voice inside him is suggesting it’s time to get out before it gets messy. It’s too intense with this girl. He wants to interrupt the flow because it is so delicious, and he cannot believe it will last. He cannot bear it to end. He stands up. She is lying on the grass, Ryder is standing facing away, wondering where he can go to pee. The hedge is straggly with a few gaps. He pushes through one of them as a cloud moves over the sun.

  Grace has her arms around her knees when he returns to her.

  ‘It’s cold,’ she says.

  ‘I’ll keep you warm, and the sun will be out again in a moment.’ He lies down next to her and pulls her on top of him.

  She laughs and wriggles. ‘Am I too heavy? I must be squashing you.’

  He shakes his head. Actually, he feels a
panic of exposure – she is so close, he can hide nothing. There is a moment when he fights this internally, then he breathes out, grinning because of the weight of her on top of him dropping with his deep breath, and says, ‘This may sound odd, Grace, but I mean it. I have thought about you so much since we met in Denmark. I want to be with you, to get to know you.’

  Ryder has never wanted to say this to anyone before. Not wanting to say it has never stopped him, though. He has, of course, said versions of it and so much more. How many times has the average guy said, ‘I love you’ without meaning it? Or meant it when he says it for that moment, post-sex, caught up in a tangle of sheets and hot skin and desires. There is a spell which weaves impenetrably around the desire to please and be pleased which can never be sated. Now, though, Ryder hears himself and it is as if he is on the other side of a glass window. The tenderness within him, behind the language, is new, he feels as if he is stepping out into thin air. No rope, no platform, no protection, just a drop to the depths of his feelings, previously unplumbed. Not a place he wants to go. His thoughts move from unplumbed depths of feelings, to the bottom of the ocean. The mountains beneath the sea that form a jagged edge around the coastline of America. The canyon, twenty miles wide and unfathomable that lies beyond those mountains. The unknown is always more exciting than the known, and the sea bed in that canyon is unknown. His feelings for Grace are unknown. Jesus Christ, he’s back on the subject he thought he was escaping from. But under the sea, at its deepest point, it is unknown to anyone on earth. It is a mystery, a reality no one has experienced. It is the best thing and the worst thing about it.

  Grace

  We stroll back towards the village and the house and I don’t know how long we have been out, but the light has changed to a rich evening gold and around us trees hum with the whir of swallows’ wings swooping past after a fly and the bittersweet tune of a blackbird, liquid and intense. I am panicking. What do you say when a man you want actually wants you too? Is it allowed to be easy? A dream coming true is hard to handle, and I am caught up with desire – desire for love as much as desire for sex. My past experience screams ‘No!’ at me. ‘No, don’t trust it, you cannot have what you want.’ But I don’t have to believe that any more. We get back to the garden, and all the guests have departed, and empty chairs sit around in congenial groups, a pair of shoes lolling under one, a semi-clad Barbie doll beneath another. I am strung out and nervous, and I feel trapped. Mac comes out of the house and says, ‘Who’s here for supper?’