by Clay, Josie
We ate the pizzas somewhat uncouthly, Nancy refilled our glasses and I tensed as her gaze played over me. She persistently thrust the conversation in my direction and picked up the strands of the 'don't shag the client' topic. I attempted to field her shots, but had to look to the window and take refuge in the rain, unable to cope with the barrage of charged volleys in a game that felt like target practice.
Clive's eyes followed as her body and then legs truncated incrementally up the stairs. So keen was he to impart something he emptied chewed pizza from his mouth into a napkin.
“Jesus, she wants you” he hissed.
“Don't be ridiculous” I countered. “She's just being nice”.
“No, she wants it ...from you. If you were a man, you'd see it”.
When Nancy reappeared by degrees she'd touched up her eye make-up and now resembled Isis.
“I'm going to leave you two to it” Clive said pointedly. He stood and stretched his balled fists above his head in a gesture of relaxed impartiality. Nancy looked at him as if controlling him remotely.
“Yes, I'd better go too” I stammered. “I've got that quote I should do”.
“No need, I'll do it”. His eyes twinkled mischievously and with that, he was off, shouting “Thank you” from the basement door.
Oh God, oh God, fearing I might pass out, mesmerised as she initiated the tractor beam.
“It's OK” she purred, “I won't eat you”. Her hands lovingly caressed the neck of the schnapps bottle.
“Errr, right” I said, choosing to bat away her implication. “I have to go, thanks for lunch, bye”. I wrangled on my leather jacket and dropped my helmet. She followed me along the corridor, still clutching the schnapps. Bursting outside, I turned on the steps.
“Are you quite sure, Minette?”. She swung the bottle enticingly. Her eyelashes beckoned like Mrs Bugs Bunny.
“Yes, thanks” I said, retreating into the rain. A cloud briefly darkened her face, but in an eye blink she was smiling, this time in comic regret.
“See you tomorrow” I said, with exaggerated nonchalance.
“You will indeed”. She blinked slowly.
I leapt on the Ducati like the Lone Ranger. 'Please start, please start'. I kicked down – it fired on my third frantic attempt and I popped a small, unintentional wheelie as I sped off.
Heart still knocking in my helmet, I stormed into the skunk fug. Remy, engaged in scales, weights, piles of weed and blocks of fudgy resin. 'Portishead' throbbed slower than my pulse and I paced the crusty, itchy carpet, attempting to stamp out the fear chemicals. She cocked her head quizzically and nodded at my request to build one.
Chapter 6
The next day had dawned with a sharp intake of breath and now we were at the other end of it, Nancy and I, in the humming gold-plated afternoon. Dirty globules blistering on the beer bottle from my hands. Today had gone well, a sense of order gradually hewn from the truculent space.
Reflecting on my journey this morning, outrunning the floods of traffic as if the Ducati and I were in another dimension. Like me, it did better in the summer, things were less daunting. My decision to dismiss her pass as a drunken anomaly had seemed a sound one until I'd pushed the key in the door and crept down the corridor.
“Who is that?” she whimpered in mock trepidation.
“A big rat” I replied, turning into the kitchen and finding her gaze. Clearly she'd arranged herself, showing me a different facet. Sat amid open books, pen poised over complex notes, hair pushed back in a loose bun from which kinky strands escaped eccentrically over her small round specs.
Unwittingly, Nancy had unleashed the concept of 'The Lady'. 'The Lady' was one of mine and M8's favourite diversions.
“I would like someone to get me”.
“Me too, I can picture her in my head”.
“Yes, she may be slightly older than me, but not like old or anything”.
“Yes, and she would be professional, like a photographer or something. I'm seeing Faye Dunaway in 'The eyes of Laura Mars' M8”.
“Yes, M8, good one. She would wear smart suits in the day and bashed up jeans and expensive, black, roomy jumpers on weekends and evenings”.
“Yes, and she would be constantly interested and amazed by me. She would seek out my views”.
“Yes, we'd spend entire evenings just talking and agitating brandy balloons” (Laughter).
“Yes, and she would wear glasses when she was doing brainy reading”.
“Yes, and she would put her hair up in a bun and perhaps stick a pencil through it”, giggling at our vision.
“The Lady” I said.
“Yes M8. The Lady”, M8 confirmed.
As it happened, Nancy was slightly older than me.
“Put me down now!”
Held aloft, my belly on Quincy's shoulder, rotating. He couldn't resist Motown and when 'Heatwave' by Martha and the Vandellas barked from our little transistor radio, he and I had broken into an enthusiastic and fairly passable jive. Nancy shot out, and levelling a camera at us, ferociously speed snapped, paparazzi style.
“Eyes and teeth” she commanded, “give me eyes and teeth”.
But typically, Quincy had got carried away and now here I was, seeing the garden from a new, precarious angle.
“Put me down, Quincy” I screamed, pummelling his back as if being carted off by a Viking. “Put me down now, you complete twat!”
Everyone in jolly pieces at boss lady, tossed around like a sack of spuds and I couldn't help but laugh in outrage and sheer childlike whizziness. At last, he set me down gently on the half built patio, where I lay clutching my ribs in helpless stitches, dizzy and defenceless. Nancy seizing the opportunity, astride me mercilessly recording my downfall, her shaggy silhouette momentarily eclipsing the sun. Raising my hand in weak surrender.
“Please, enough” I gasped, her shadow stabilising. She capitulated and extended her hand. The music changed to 'I touch myself' by the Divinyls, piercing my vulnerability and blazing my cheeks. She hauled me up and batted the dust of my back as if I were a child.
Now everyone had gone. I walked the last of the monstrous York stone slabs from the pile, while she watched me from the kitchen. Bracing it with my toecaps, I lowered it, biceps popping into buns and the ropes on my forearms bunching as it fell into place with a satisfying wumph,. Eyeing the spirit level, I bashed the stone with a rubber mallet until it was well seated and true.
“The children are leaving tomorrow, they won't be under your feet for a while”. She studied the label on her beer bottle.
“Oh?” I said, rouching mine with a thumb nail.
“Todor is taking them to Marbella. He coaches there for the season, we go every summer”.
“Aren't you going?” Scooping up some sand and letting it escape through my fingers.
“I will at some point” she said . “But not yet, I've got too much to do here” she added, smiling at my boots as if they were kittens.
“It's a mystery”. Quincy scratched his head in cartoon bafflement. The transistor radio was nowhere to be found. Nancy said she wouldn't be surprised if Sasha had taken it on holiday; she'd found her with it last night under the duvet, 'listening to Martians'. I smiled at this vintage image; what a funny little girl.
By way of recompense, Nancy suggested she put the speakers on the window sill and turn them into the garden, inviting me to peruse her music collection. Hunched on a chair, my eyes travelling over the perspex spines.
“Oh my god” I said, “you like Astrid Apple (a folk singer, often overlooked in favour of Joni Mitchell, but superior in my opinion). Have you got Marabunta? It's my favourite”.
“Mine too” she said, “but I only have it on vinyl at home”.
As I bent forward to reach for 'Lie of the Land', my shoulder wormed in an agonising spasm. Jerking upright, I cried out.
“I can see it” Nancy gasped and gingerly touched her hand to it as if it were a writhing snake.
The cramp got hold of
my right side, I clawed at it uselessly.
“Youch!” I squealed.
“Wait” she said and placing her big hands on my trapezius, she squeezed with authority, kneading gently and increasing the pressure, gauging how much I could take, running the heel of her hand firmly along my possessed binding, ironing out the knots and kinks, generating hot friction flowers.
“Phew, thanks” I said. “That's much better”.
She continued her rubbing, holding my left shoulder in a gesture of restraint. I arched my back to see if it was safe and her hand travelled across my ribs, cupping my right breast, manipulating it briefly before returning to neutral territory. It took a second to sink in, but when it did, the snoozing captive deep in my hull rose up on its elbow in interest and my heart rolled in shock. A deep blush blooming my throat and mutinous organs rioted in conflict. The excitable southern regions roared 'yes!' while my fearful northerly heart screamed 'run!'
And so I did, back into the sunlight, where Quincy and the others looked up briefly and returned to their tasks.
It was shortly after I spotted her in the landing window, standing like a mannequin in a black, lacy bra. The render squelched obscenely as I added more water and stirred. Clive caught my eye; she didn't seem to care if the others saw her. She'd shown her hand; upping the ante, the prayer offered, the spell cast.
Chapter 7
The next day was Friday. Clive and I in 'Charlie's Chariots' kicking the tyres of a pea green VW Caddy pick-up. My old rakish Ducati proving increasingly unreliable. We had the van, but that was Clive's domain. I wanted my own wheels; it was love at first sight and I’d part with my meagre savings to have it. It moved me, the oversized tyres and pointless bull bar. It looked like a Tonka Toy, but it had a useful flat bed and stoic expression. Its pea greenness whimsical, I called him Fritz. He was a boy.
That afternoon, once the others had gone, Nancy steered a bottle of beer into my hand while she clamped the cordless phone between ear and shoulder. She spoke encouragingly to her children and in perfunctory tones to her husband. Again, the incomprehensible conversation pot-shot with my name. Nancy offered the phone as if showing it to me and I asked a question with my eyebrows.
“Here” she said, waggling it. I put it to my ear as if unaccustomed to the new fangled contraption.
“Hello?”
“Hello Minette, how are you?” said Todor.
“Fine, yourself?”
“Yes, we are all well and enjoying the sea”.
I fancied I could hear it in the background.
“I wondered if you might do me a great favour” he continued.
“Of course”.
“My wife” he began, “has a tendency to get bored when she is alone. Perhaps you could keep her entertained, maybe visit the cinema with her for example, go to see a play”. Amusement in his voice. Was he making fun of me? “You know, just keep her company”.
“I'll do my best” I said, handing him back. She said her goodbyes and grinned at me crazily.
“Well?”
I inspected my calluses. “Your husband wants us to go to the pictures”.
The well sprung seat of the Saab so comfortable, I could have nodded off – probably a primal response to the terror that crouched in my guts. I'd raced to Finsbury Park, bathed and floored Fritz back to Palladian Road, fibbing to Remy that I was consoling my friend, Jasmine.
And now we were heading to Finchley to see 'The Thomas Crown Affair', hastening the progress to what Nancy had in mind. It was as if I were falling asleep each minute and then waking, having to re-remember what we were doing. My heart cyclically surged with the fact. Palms clammy and rough, I ran them over my clean jeans, inhaling the private upholstery. We stopped at lights, Nancy reached out and ruffled my hair. Unsure if I liked it, I frowned like a foolish boy. She paid for the tickets and gestured at the exorbitant refreshments.
“Have what you like” she said.
Thirsty, I opted for a vat of 7-Up which I placed by my boots. Dipping forward, she set it correctly in the seat arm. I never went to the pictures.
The cinema, mausoleum cold. Incarcerated in myself. She placed a hand on my thigh and withdrew it, in an act, I assumed of reassurance. The heat of it lingered like a spent firework. Rene Russo and Pierce Brosnan sailed, sexed and danced across the screen. They were beautiful people – unlike me, but I had my own internal blockbuster playing out, trapped in a prism of fear while my body efficiently went about its business, releasing preparatory hormones and making all manner of decisions on my behalf.
Attempting to calm myself, I tuned out the film and visited my internal gallery. Every picture or picture of a picture I'd ever seen as a child, captured forever, together with salient factoids. Not something I'd done deliberately, it just happened. My collection eclectic, I thought of 'Breton Village in the Snow' by Gauguin (1848-1903), and my heart slowed to a jog, but then remembered what a creepy old paedo he was, which spoilt it. So I looked at the picture next to it, a banana yellow Ford Cortina, GSL 1600, from when I played Trump cards in the playground with the boys. Miles per hour 93, four cylinders, 72 horsepower. It wasn't effortless any more though; I had to concentrate to make a moment indelible.
Driving back to Palladian Road in silence, gaining on her goal. I looked out the window into the electric city smear and fantasised I was a child, the street lights stretching my eyes, in awe of the grown-up beside me doing all the complex and manifold movements required to operate a car. An oppressive fatigue and now I was ancient – an octogenarian on a trip or being delivered to the hospice.
Ensconced on the sofa, she uncorked a bottle of red and we discussed the film.
“I still don't understand how he got that picture in the briefcase” I said. “It was too big”.
“I thought that” she said. “I think he must have broken it”.
The wine making no inroads, she fetched the schnapps, the magma like distillation snaked through my pipework and curled up in my stomach like a cat, purring out its purpose. Stretching and yawning submissively, I sprawled. If she didn't strike soon I would simply nod off.
“At last you're relaxing” she said, stroking my hair. I opened my eyes, her face inches from mine, surveying to see if I was ready; like a soufflé that might as easily collapse as rise. Moving close, she became a blur, just green jack-o-lanterns, serpentine glory and a pouting split cushion of flesh that pressed against my lips in the softest, most artful way I'd ever experienced. Tongue probing tentative. This time the dozing captive below didn't just sit up, but donned its reading glasses. We ran our hands over each other’s’ safe areas, my sandpaper skin snagging her silken lady clothes. Her tongue skilfully toyed with mine, intimating the heavenly havoc it could wreak elsewhere.
Both shaking like we were angry; it was a type of anger. We panted through our nostrils now, as I approached my field of expertise. She allowed me to push her back and assume the lead, but when my hand closed around her small breast, she froze as if hearing a burglar.
Searching her eyes, I understood and retreating placed my hands between my knees, chaste as church.
“I'm sorry” she sighed, her heart beat studding the words. Her chest rose and fell in passion or panic – I couldn't tell.
“I thought I could do it, but I can't”.
The truth is I was relieved, the lid on that can of worms closing.
“I just need to get it out of my system” she said, pulling a cushion to her body. “I'm sure it will pass”.
I concentrated on my steepled fingers as her thoughts moved onto the next place.
“Minette, it's not you, you did nothing wrong”.
“I know” I said. “I'm not a boy”.
Way over the limit, I took a cab home. Remy on the sofa, oblivious to a riotous chat show.
“I'll build one Minsk” she said.
Chapter 8
“Shit!” Up with a start, I'd already reviewed the previous evening's events in case I'd dreamt it. Adrenalin surged
as a slide show of Nancy played out in candid stills, progressing to the final shot, a flapping penalty notice on Fritz's windscreen. The clock by the bed blinked 8.15, this hadn't happened yet but it surely would, just like Nancy's notion; she didn’t seem to be the type to fall at the last hurdle, having got up such a head of steam.
I glanced at the Remy chrysalis. “I'm late for work” I lied, jumping into yesterday's telling pants and hoisting on my jeans. Tearing out of the flat and pelting at a pace towards Seven Sisters, unclear why I running when I could have caught a bus. Something propelled me, arms and legs pumped by an ulterior entity like the six million dollar man ('Gentlemen, we can rebuild him').
