“But how do you feed yourself? I am sure you do not do it healthily. I suppose you eat out of a fryingpan all the time.”
I told her I had once done a lot of frying but stopped when, one morning in a hurry, I discovered that raw eggs cracked into a cup slip down very easily, and uncooked bacon does not taste bad if sufficiently chewed.
63 THE MIRACLE
“But that is horrible! It is a miracle that you are alive. The human stomach employs far more energy digesting the albumen of a raw egg than the egg itself produces. When you eat a raw egg you are actually starving yourself. And chewing raw bacon will inevitably give you tapeworm. The flies lay their eggs under the rind. Frying is a poisonous way of preparing food but at least it kills the eggs of the flies.” I told her that I usually ate out. She sipped the coffee without enthusiasm and said, “I must make you a really good meal. Unluckily the house where I now live swarms with women and children, you would not be comfortable there. I will make up something in pots and bring them here to heat up. I will also bring some real coffee.”
I thanked her and said that since she was supplying the culinary skill I ought to provide the raw material, and I would certainly do so if she gave me an exact shopping list. She said, “No. I will work better if I shop also, you cannot possibly know the best places to buy things. But you may provide as much wine as you like, I will not complain of that.” We agreed upon a day and a time and at once she hurried away leaving my coffee almost untasted. But on the doormat she turned as if to tell me something and instead went quite still, saying nothing. So I kissed her. Then she broke away and ran downstairs without another word. I returned to the television set feeling excited and hopeful. In four minutes a complete stranger had made my hellish dull life worth living again.
That was a miracle. The miracles of Christ don’t interest me. I don’t care if they are true or false. The only miracles which matter to me were worked by women.
Weeks later I said to her, “What gave you the idea of visiting me that first time?”
“Helen suggested it.”
“Helen? Do you know Helen?”
“Did you not know we were friends?”
“No.”
64 MY LAST SIGHT OFHELEN
“But she and I taught in Bearsden Academy. I came here with two or three others for afternoon tea one Sunday. That was when I first met you. Have you forgotten?”
“Why did Helen suggest you visit me?”
“I met her in town by accident – we had not seen each other for two or three years, and went for a coffee and a chat. We were both a little lonely. I had just separated from Ulric and she was quarrelling with the young man she had left you for, so naturally we discussed sex in general and also in particular. Do you understand?”
“Yes.”
“Helen said she thought you would be a good man to seduce. So I came and did so.”
“Did she say why I would be good to seduce?”
“No. It was a casual remark made at the moment when we separated.”
I tried to cuddle Sontag then, I passionately wanted to hold her tight, feeling it would be like embracing Helen too. But that evening I had not tongued Sontag long enough to be allowed a cuddle. She got up and started briskly dressing, saying, “I am still quite fond of you but sex is not everything. It will be better if in future you wait till I phone you before we meet.”
A long time after that, when Sontag had definitely finished with me, I stood in a bus queue beside a gaunt, slightly eccentric old lady with an attractive figure. She looked at me with an air of inquiry and suddenly I recognised Helen. When we spoke she smiled and looked younger. I said,
“Thank you for sending Sontag to me.”
But she did not remember doing that. She said, “Have you married again?”
“No.”
She frowned and said, “Why not? You’re the sort of man who needs a wife. You would be very good to her if she was ordinary enough.”
This remark confused me. I said, “Are you married?”
“Oh no, I’m not the marrying type. I stayed with you for such a long time because I thought you needed me. Of course I was a bit of a coward in those days, terribly conventional.”
65 ENJOYING SUPERB DUNGAREES
Her bus arrived and she went away on it leaving me utterly confused. During our marriage I thought I only stayed with her because she needed me. And I too was a coward, and conventional. It took ten years together, and as many separate, to discover that Helen and I felt exactly the same way toward each other and what good did it do? What good did it do? What good did it do? Come on Jock it is time you entertained yourself again.
Superb, telephoning, says firmly, “What I need to know is, if Max calls you tomorrow, will you make the right noises?”
“I suppose so.”
“Thank you mother,” says Superb and puts down the receiver. She rearranges herself on the bed then dials another number. She says, “Hullo Charlie. We’re all right. Mother will cover up for me. I’m leaving an hour from now.”
“Why not leave right away?”
“I’ve this husband, remember? We still eat together. That’s about all we do together.”
“How do you look?”
“Fresh and clean. I’ve had a shower, and washed my hair, and I’m wearing these new white denim dungarees bought just today, so don’t say I don’t love you.”
“What about the top?”
“Nothing special. A demure little blouse.”
“Bra?”
“Of course not. I know you don’t like them.”
“Terry, take off that blouse.”
“You bad mad boy!”
“Terry, when we meet tonight, I don’t want you wearing anything but those dungarees. Right?”
She must dress this way for three reasons.
1 The colliers’ sons, who played rough games my mother did not like, wore dungarees of the bib and brace type, so this garment has an exciting flavour of forbidden games which is enhanced by DUNG, the first syllable of the name.
2 The colliers’ sons’ dungarees were black to hide the dirt. Superb’s are white so that I can see clearly how dirty I make her.
66 EATING WITH MAX AGAIN
3 (a) If Charlie embraces her from the front he can put a hand under the braces to caress her shoulderblades and feel lingeringly down the spine to where my (no) his other hand has unfastened four buttons over a hip and slid inside to explore the two hills of her bum.
(b) If Charlie embraces her from behind I (no) he can put his hand under the bib to caress her breasts while my other hand has unfastened four buttons over her hip and slid inside to explore the hillock of her belly, feeling delicately down it to the rough mat and soft step before the sweet door of home.
A distant door slams and Superb says, “Charlie, Max has just come in, I’ll see you at six.”
She replaces the receiver and goes downstairs.
Max sits in the lounge staring at the blank television screen. She walks past him to the kitchen where the table is already set saying, “Come and get it.”
They sit eating. He pleads with her to stay with him this weekend. She refuses. He suddenly says, “Why dress like a whore?”
“Say that again, Max.”
“Why dress like a whore to visit your mother?”
She smiles sweetly and says, “What are you afraid of, Max?”
He glares at her. She rises, strolls to the garage door, turns, spreads her arms sideways and shakes her hips in a sexy little shimmy. She says, “Do whores really look like this?”
“They certainly do!”
She pouts, unfastens the bib of the dungarees, removes her blouse, drops it on a chair and refastens the stiff fabric over her nude breasts. Legs astride, hands on hips, she smiles at Max tauntingly and says, “Think I’ll get more customers like this?”
Why can he not spring upon her, force her to the floor and enjoy her thoroughly? Because we cannot rape someone we know well. I can’t, anyw
ay. Neither can Max. He has risen to his feet and stands dazzled, daunted by the bonny perfection of her challenge. All he can say is, “My GOD Terry you’re not going to drive to your mother’s house like that?”
“Why not Max? It’s a warm night. And I promise not to pick up any hitchhikers unless they’re very young, very handsome and very, very strong.
67 RED ROLLTOP TWOSEATER
She goes into the garage. He follows. As she lays her hand on the car door he embraces her from behind, folding his arms round her waist, pressing his face into the back of her neck. She sighs patiently and stands absolutely still. He whispers, “Terry, I’m sorry I said that, you look great, really great. Please stay with me this one weekend, Terry. I need you.”
She remains perfectly still until he releases her. She gets into the car saying, “Some other time, Max. Momma expects me.”
She drives off dressed exactly as her lover wants her, all nude and ready under the one-piece denim dungarees.
At six o’clock exactly (to hell with 18.00 hours, I hate digital clocks) she drives into a multi-storey car park knowing that Charlie has checked in two minutes earlier. She sees his car before docking her own in a nearby space. She recalls his last words on the phone: “I don’t want you wearing anything but those dungarees, right?”
An excited little smile comes to her face. “Right,” she whispers, and slips off her shoes before leaving the car. A feeling of cold gritty concrete underfoot, a feeling of fear as she quickly crosses a cold space to the red rolltop twoseater. Car parks are inhuman places, bleak warehouses for machines, a setting for any kind of evil. But Charlie opens the door to her, she slides into what she thinks is safety, the door closes, they kiss. His hands touch her briefly all over. She whispers, “I’m exactly like you told me to be.”
“Good,” he says, withdrawing a moment.
“Where are you taking me?”
“Nowhere yet.”
He reaches across the car, snapping shades down over all the windows. A dim red light above the windscreen makes her suntanned skin look warm negro, the dungarees look pink. The two seats are upholstered in thick fleece with very high backs which he folds down flat. I suppose the gearlever between the seats can be unscrewed or folded down so that he can take her in his arms, unbutton, undo her etcetera. Will I imagine their lovemaking in detail? Certainly not.
68 GREANT ENJOYMENT
Thousands of people must enjoy imagining what mouths, hands and pricks do to other mouths, breasts and cunts because long descriptions of this activity fill magazines sold on station bookstalls. It strikes me as innocent stuff but no fun at all, mere sliding anatomy. Yes yes yes the greatest and most essential good in the world is two people feeling safe enough, at home enough, to give and take delight in each other’s bodies without haste, worry or greed. Once I could enjoy such lovemaking for over an hour, it led to sleep from which I emerged into more of it. I grew so thin and lean that when I went home one weekend my mother asked if I had taken up football? When I said I had not she looked at me closely then said, “Aye well. Just you be very careful,” and we dropped the matter. So I cannot read these descriptions without feeling completely separated from what I most enjoyed. In this bed in Selkirk or Peebles I only find entertainment in sexual dramas between selfish bitches and sneaky plotters, between lustful bullies and their slaves. But it will not bore or overexcite me to imagine that Charlie, in his smart red rolltop woo-grotto, makes love to Superb like I made love to Helen in the two years after we married. During the last fortnight of a magnificent summer – a summer more rich and strange than any millionaire, president or king ever enjoyed – I loved her shyly, wonderingly, without ever once touching her. I was unable to believe she cared a damn for me. But after she came to my closet, after the threats, tears, hypocrisy, the false smiles and falser speeches we lay side by side in a bed legalised and blessed by the Church, I was still almost unable to touch her. Sometimes I placed an arm across her shoulders feeling a lonely pity for us both. We were victims of a complicated trick which nobody had planned. But I could not, would not make love until she indicated that she wanted it, and then I roused myself by caressing her as if she were the slave of a completely selfish lust, and I entered her vindictively with a penis which I thought of as a truncheon or redhot poker. Let Superb be so sick of her husband’s timid caresses that Charlie’s hard truncheon and redhot poker technique is exactly what she wants. He applies it hard to her twice and afterward, dozing in his arms, she murmurs, “Mmm I needed that, honey. You’re so good, you know.”
69 HELEN’S DISCOVERY
Helen seemed to enjoy that sort of lovemaking. It was over quickly but she held me tight afterward when I allowed her to. Sometimes the coitus made me feel so vigorous and hopeful that I had to rise, dress and go for a walk through the dark streets wondering how to improve this life of mine. Should I leave her? Should I emigrate? Could I not find a woman to love who would respect me and whom I could respect? Sometimes after a difficult day the lovemaking pleasantly exhausted me and I lay in her arms feeling that life was not a bad business. One evening I came home and saw on the living-room table a pile of photographic bondage magazines, Hogtie, Harlots in Harness, Knotty, that kind of thing. Perhaps I blushed. Certainly my face went hot. Helen said, “These were in your desk. I wasn’t spying, I was looking for a spare envelope. If you wanted to hide them you should have locked the drawer.”
I said, “Yes, I suppose I should.”
“Why did you buy them?”
“They help me.”
“With what?”
I decided not to mention masturbation. Helen wanted sex only two or three times a week, I needed it more often. I said, “They help me with you.”
“How can they?”
“They help me to come. Ejaculate.” After a long pause she said flatly, “You don’t love me.”
“I love you more than anybody else I know.”
“But when we make love you have to imagine doing horrible things to me.”
“Only for fun.”
“I need a cup of tea.”
She left the room. I took the magazines out to the midden and buried them under old bottles and potato peelings knowing she could see me from the kitchen window. Later, when I bought new ones, I did keep the desk drawer carefully locked. But after that day we did not make love again till nine years passed away. Why? She had liked my lovemaking till then, I certainly had not forced it on her. Perhaps she was shocked to discover that my brisk truncheon was more than a tame animal she summoned to serve her.Perhaps she had fantasies of totally dominating me. Certainly she hated feeling subordinate. So do I.
70 SUPERB PUNISHMENT OVEREXCITEMENT
I hate feeling subordinate so Superb, comfortably truncheoned, lies in a lazy dwam while Charlie sits up, places a rug over her and raises the back of his seat saying, “There’s no need for you to move.”
“Where are you taking me?”
“A quiet little place in the country.”
“My bag is still in the other car.”
“Leave it. This quiet little place has everything a woman can possibly want.”
“It sounds like heaven.”
He drives off and Superb falls asleep. I suppose a bossy woman can relax with a man of the same type if she thinks she can get rid of him whenever she likes.
She wakes when the car stops. The rug is gently removed and Charlie leans down to kiss her. He says, “We’re here.”
“I don’t want to move.”
“Lie on your front.”
“Why?”
“I’ve a surprise for you. A present.”
She turns over. She feels him grip her right arm and something cold is clicked round it above the elbow, then her left arm is pulled hard back and with another click she discovers that her elbows have been handcuffed behind her. She cries, “Hey that hurts, Charlie!” and starts struggling on to her knees but his hands, suddenly rough, force her face down into the fleece again pressing hard on her
shoulders as he kneels astride her. Where are the dungarees? In a tangle round an ankle, she is otherwise naked. “Charlie,” she gasps, “what are you trying to do?”
His answer makes her forget the pain in her elbows.
“Listen Terry. Listen hard or you won’t understand a thing. We’re in the basement of an organisation which will pay me big money for bringing you here. But before I hand you over I’m going to give you something extra special to remember me by.”
And his hands cruelly grasp her buttocks and DANGER OVEREXCITEMENT DANGER OVEREXCITEMENT, THINK OTHER THINGS QUICK WHAT? ANYTHING, THESE I HAVE LOVED THE ROUGH MALE KISS OF BLANKETS, GOOD STRONG THICK STUPEFYING INCENSE SMOKE and jellies soother than the creamy curd.
71 OVEREXCITMENT CLASSROOM DETOUR
Whan that Aprille with his shoures soote sharked up a list of lawless resolutes where wealth accumulates and men decay bird thou never wert. I am an idiot.
“You require an exercise to focus your mind. I have no favourites in this class. Go to the blackboard, pick up the chalk and write out three simple words which I will dictate to you. For each mis-spelled word you will receive a stroke from my famous Lochgelly. Are you ready? Station. Passion. Cushion.”
I was not a very bad speller, these words did not usually bother me. I wrote,
STATION PAS
and stuck there. Passion suddenly seemed highly unlikely. I compromised and wrote,
PASTION
A girl giggled. In Hislop’s class the girls were expected to giggle at certain times, especially the attractive girls. I now knew I was going to get one of the belt at least and the word cushion, fully formed in my mind’s eye, suddenly seemed altogether incredible. I wrote CU and could go no further. Hislop sighed and sat down at his desk with elbows on lid and face in hands like a weary and defeated man. He said, “Was it for this the clay grew tall? Perhaps one of you ladies, Heather Sinclair, will show him how to spell cushion.”
1982 Janine Page 9
