Jason and the grandmother began to discuss the architecture of the Royal Pavilion, looking up and pointing at the chandelier as they did. Rob glanced at me. He didn”t raise his eyebrows or roll his eyes, and neither did I, but there was something humorous and familiar and relieved in the look we gave each other, as if neither of us could believe that we were standing here listening to Jason and his grandmother deep in conversation about the shape of lotus blossoms. His mother must have noticed what passed between us, because when I looked at her again, she had a gentle, knowing expression on her face.
“Right, well we must be getting along now,” she said.
Rob's father immediately shuffled up beside her, eager to get away as soon as possible.
“Come on, Ma,” she continued, taking the grandmother's arm. “We don't want to miss lunch, do we.” The grandmother looked confused for a minute, but let Rob's mother lead her away.
“Off we go. Nice to meet you, Susannah.” As she spoke, Rob's mother was already steering the family down the corridor.
Rob gave an audible sigh of relief as they walked away, and turned to me.
“See you, then.”
“See you.” I tried not to heave a sigh of relief too as he followed them.
As they disappeared round the corner, the grandmother turned and waved at Jason, who waved back at her.
“Nice old dear,” he said, as we made our way towards the stairs. Then he stopped for a moment and looked at me, his head tilted to one side.
“Was that your little hippie boy, then?”
“Don't be ridiculous.”
I slowed down for a moment and then walked on. “He's just a bloke on the course. I hardly know him.”
Jason fell into step beside me.
“Really?” There was a hint of sarcasm in his voice.
“Yes, really.” We began to climb the stairs.
“Well, he looked a bit gone on you.”
I decided that attack was the best form of defense.
“Well, maybe he is,” I said. “Some people are, you know. There are probably loads of guys on campus who are madly in love with me. You're not the only pebble on the beach, matey.”
Jason laughed. We reached the top of the stairs and walked down the corridor towards the bedrooms.
Jason put his arm round me and squeezed my shoulder.
“OK, Susie. Point taken.” As he spoke, he was sliding his hand under my jacket, into the top of my jeans.
“Get off,” I said. “For God's sake.” I giggled and pushed him away.
We stopped in front of one of the state bedrooms in Queen Victoria's apartments. It was cordoned off from the corridor by a red rope. The floor was covered in a richly decorated carpet and there was a beautiful, delicately patterned wallpaper on the walls, of birds with long beaks sitting on bamboo branches and flying between blossoming bushes. In the middle of the room was a huge four-poster bed, hung with opulent dark green silk curtains and a yellow silk bedcover, turned back to show striped green and white sheets. I wondered for a moment what it would be like if Jason pulled me onto the bed then and there, and we drew the curtains around us and made love in the dark, not making a sound, being careful not to disturb the draperies, with all the people filing past us and pointing at the decor of the room and Queen Victoria's bed in the middle of it.
“Wow,” said Jason, disturbing my reverie.
He let go of me and leaned over the rope. “Just look at that wallpaper.”
He stepped forward as far as the rope would let him go, to take a closer look.
“It's hand-painted, you can tell.”
He had forgotten about me already.
“I just don't know if he fancies me anymore, Cass.”
Cassie sighed, stubbed out her cigarette, and lit another one.
“Well, you've got Rob, haven't you? What does it matter? Just stay with Jason and get your kicks with Rob, or someone else, that's what I'd do.”
“Has this ever happened to you?” I asked.
Cass looked thoughtful. “What, a bloke not fancying me? I can't remember, actually.”
She was lying, just to make me feel better.
“I bet it hasn't,” I said.
“Well, maybe not. But I don't see the problem. If a guy doesn't want to screw you, there are plenty of others who do. Just find someone you like and get on with it, Susannah.”
“The problem is, I kind of like Rob better, though.”
I could hear a whine creeping into my voice. “But I can't seem to leave Jason, I don't know why.”
“Well, it's obvious, isn't it? Jason's a much better deal than Rob. You're doing the right thing. Just accept it and shut up about it.”
“Sorry. I'm sorry, I'll stop going on about it. But the thing is …”
Cassie interrupted me. “Look, Faye Dunaway's just walked in. She's checking her pigeonhole.”
We were sitting by the window in the European Common Room, eating the cheese biscuits they sold at the coffee bar. I'd had about five packets already for lunch.
“D'you think she'll come over and say hello to us?” I asked.
“I doubt it. She'll probably get straight down to the library with her reading list.”
Faye Dunaway was the most beautiful girl on campus. She had a perfectly made-up face, long legs, and straight, shiny fair hair. She never spoke to anyone. She was rumored to be a high-ranking diplomat's daughter, but no one really knew anything about her. She only came into campus to get her books and go to tutorials, and then disappeared again.
“Ooh look, there's Myron. He's just come in behind her.”
We started giggling like a couple of schoolgirls.
“Oh, he's seen her.”
“Look at him, he's gone all red in the face. He's probably wet himself.”
Cassie, Faye Dunaway, and I had been in Maurice Myron's tutorial in our first year. I'd seen his name written up on the wall of the ladies' toilet the day I arrived at Sussex. He'd been top of a list headed “Most sexist tutors on campus.” Naive as I was, I'd thought that sexist meant “sexy,” and when I was assigned to his tutorial, I'd been intrigued to meet him. But when he'd opened the door and ushered me in, I'd been taken aback. I'd spent the whole of the first tutorial looking at him and wondering how anyone could find this man in the slightest bit sexy. It wasn't that he was bad looking, although he was going bald and his skin was a bit leathery and his teeth were blackened from tobacco. It was just his manner: condescending, arrogant, yet somehow horribly unctuous, lecherous, and eager to please. After the tutorial, Cassie had invited me for coffee in the common room, and I'd told her about Myron's name on the list in the toilets, and she'd laughed and explained what sexist meant, and that was how we'd become friends.
“Turn round, Suse. Let's look as though we're talking about periods. Otherwise he'll come over here.”
“OK.” I turned my back to them. “What's happening now?”
“He's seen her. He's going over. She's pretending she hasn't seen him … He's asking her if she wants a coffee, I think. But she's not having any of it. Or is she … No. No, she's not going for it. He's slinking off now, back to the counter … God, he's looking our way, put your head down …”
Cassie and I bent our heads forward as if we were deep in discussion, holding our breath, and trying to suppress our laughter.
“Let me know when the coast is clear,” I said.
“He's getting his coffee … yup, he's on his way out. You can come up for air now.”
“That was a close one.” I turned my head round. “I'm surprised he didn't come over here when he saw us. I thought he fancied the pants off you.”
“Well he doesn't anymore,” said Cass, sitting back. “Not since I broke his sink.”
“His sink?”
“Yes. I went to see him at the start of the first year because I wanted to change from Religious Studies to Philosophy. I'd only done Religious Studies to please my parents and get into Sussex, and the minute I got here, I w
as going to change. So I went and asked Myron about it, and he invited me round to his flat one evening to discuss it.”
“You must have been mad.”
“Well, I really wanted to get on the course. Anyway, I went round there, and he kept plying me with vodka. In the end I got so drunk I went into the bathroom and threw up in his sink, and then I tried to unblock it, and somehow while I was doing that it came unhinged from the wall, but I didn”t tell him, I just went out and said I wasn't feeling well and could he get me a taxi home.”
“Did he try to jump on you or anything?”
“I don't think so, but I was so pissed I probably wouldn't have noticed. Anyway, he let me on the course after that, and nothing more was said.”
I was surprised she hadn't told me before. It was strange to think that when Cassie arrived at Sussex, only a year ago, she'd been as green as I was.
“D'you know what he put on my report at the end of the first term?” I said.
“What?”
“She is an elegant presence in the tutorial.”
“You're joking?”
“No, honestly.”
“You never mentioned it before.”
“Well, I was embarrassed about it,” I said. “It made me feel stupid. As though I'd been sitting there batting my eyelashes all term instead of trying to get to grips with Schopenhauer's concept of the will.”
We munched on our cheese biscuits, going over the indignities of that first term in Myron's tutorial, until Cassie said she had to get going.
“I've got a rehearsal,” she said. “I'm a backing singer in this new band this guy's formed on campus.”
“Oh really? What's it called?”
“Tripe Face Boogie.”
“Sounds awful. Can I join?”
“Yeah, course. Come down with me and we'll ask Paul.”
“Only joking, Cass. I'm not much of a singer. And I've got to meet Rob, anyway, in a minute.”
“Well, we'll be in the crypt if you change your mind.”
“OK. See you, then. Good luck.”
“Ciao, baby.”
Cassie stubbed her cigarette out, stood up, tossed her head, and walked off to join the band.
chapter 13
ROB AND I WERE LYING NAKED in Queen Victoria's bed, in the dark with the green silk curtains drawn all around us. Above us, golden tassels hung down from each of the corners of the four-poster bed. There was a quiet hum of voices outside us. We knew we couldn't make any noise or disturb the draperies. My heart was beating hard and I could feel that his was, too.
“Be quiet,” I said. “Don't make a sound.”
The green and white striped linen sheets were damp and crumpled and our bodies against each other were slick with sweat. His hair was sticking to my face.
“Keep still,” I said. “You'll make the bed creak. And don't kick the curtains.”
We started off slowly, moving gently, obeying my orders.
“No,” he whispered, his mouth close to my ear.
I was biting his earlobe to stop myself from crying out.
“Don't do that,” he said. He stopped moving. “You'll make me come.”
“Sorry.”
“Think of something that will stop me.” There was a note of panic in his voice.
“Umm …” I couldn't think of anything.
“Get on with it. Quick.”
“Dennis?”
Rob let out a sigh of relief. “OK. Keep going?”
“Harold Wilson.”
He started moving again. “Go on.”
“How about … Angela Rippon.”
“Oh …” His face contorted in agony.
“For God's sake, you don't fancy Angela Rippon, do you?” I was hissing in his ear.
“Ahh … Don't move.”
I clicked my tongue in annoyance. That seemed to do the trick.
“Bad choice,” said Rob, calming down.
“But what about the way she rolls her ‘r’s when she says guerrillas?”
He wasn't listening. He was moving off again, slowly but surely. Before long, we were both clinging onto each other, trying not to cry out.
This time, the distraction came from outside.
“Hand-painted, you say?”
“Yes, every single bird, every single tree, every single blossom, in the whole room.”
“Gracious.”
“Incredible, isn't it?”
We stopped to listen. It was Jason and Rob's grandmother discussing the wallpaper.
“This is awful,” said Rob into my ear. “I can't hold on anymore.”
“Let me get on top of you, then.”
“You can't, you'll kick the curtain.”
“Just do as I say.”
I quietly maneuvered us around until I was sitting on top of him. I braced one of my arms against the bedpost, and began to move slowly up and down. The golden tassel shook.
“Oh no, this is worse.” Rob was whimpering now.
“Shh. Listen,” I said. “That'll help.”
Outside, we could hear Jason and the grandmother amid the hum of voices.
“Queen Victoria didn't really like it,” Jason was saying. “She complained that she couldn't see the sea out of the bedroom window.”
“Some people are never satisfied,” Rob's grandmother replied.
We giggled. I went on moving, this time squeezing my eyes shut. I thought of Jason standing there outside the bed, cordoned off, and me in here with Rob, fucking in the darkness.
“Hold me tight round the waist. Quick,” I whispered.
I let myself fall forwards onto him.
“Harder. Much harder.”
He gripped me as tight as he could and I came, burrowing my head into his neck, my hair covering his face.
“I love you,” he said.
He turned to kiss me on the mouth, but I turned away.
“Have you come?” I asked.
“No.”
I said nothing, but maneuvered myself back underneath him.
“OK,” I said when I was in position. “Go.”
Rob launched himself at me, and suddenly he was in me, on me, all over me, biting my neck and grunting in my ear. I brought my legs up and locked them round his waist, willing him further into me, digging my fingers into his flesh as he moved faster and faster on top of me, until he cried out. This time I let him.
As he lay on top of me, I shut my eyes. Relief flooded my body. I remembered that night in the Concorde with him, when we were dancing and I thought I saw a light shining down on me, and felt a warm breeze running through my hair. Everything will be all right, I thought. It's going to be all right.
When I opened my eyes again, I was in Cassie's room on campus with Rob lying jammed up against me in the single bed. We had met up at the Falmer Bar, and then we'd gone to the Meeting House for a quiet chat, and then one thing had led to another, and I'd ended up bringing him here, to Cassie's room. I'd wanted it to be quick, but somehow we'd got carried away, and then I'd started fantasizing about Queen Victoria's bed in the Royal Pavilion, and somehow the whole thing had taken up practically the whole afternoon. By now, it was getting dark.
“That was fantastic,” he said. “The best fuck I've ever had.”
“Well, you haven't had that many,” I said.
Rob laughed.
“How was it for you?”
“Far out,” I said.
“No, seriously. How was it?”
“It was great. Really good. Honestly.”
“Was it the best orgasm you've ever had?”
“For God's sake, Rob, it's not a competition.”
“No, but was it?”
I thought about it. “Yes, it probably was, I suppose.”
Rob looked disappointed. “You don't sound very sure.”
“Well, I don't keep a league table, you know. Although if you want, I can start one.”
Rob laughed again, but then he grew serious. “Was it better than …”
I
knew what he was getting at. “Yes, it was.”
“Really?”
“Yes, really.” There was a note of impatience in my voice.
“He didn't look like I thought he would.”
“Didn't he?”
“No, kind of older. Straighter. More of a man of the world.”
There was a silence.
“Your mother seemed nice,” I said, changing the subject.
“Is he better than me in bed, Susannah?” he said, changing it back.
I couldn't avoid the question.
“No,” I said. I was telling the truth, at least about my current sex life with Jason.
“He's more experienced, maybe … but I like it better with you.”
Rob smiled.
“I'm sorry,” he said. “I don't mean to be nosy. It's just that when we … you know, you always seem … I don't know, far away. Not quite here, with me.”
“I was with you, Rob.” I didn't tell him I had been with him in Queen Victoria's bed, and that Jason and his grandmother had been within earshot, discussing the wallpaper. I didn't want him to think I was a pervert.
“I sometimes wonder if you're thinking about …”
“No. Really, I'm not.” It was true, I hadn't been in the bed with Jason. He had just been a bystander.
Rob sighed.
“You somehow seem, I don't know … miles away. Cut off from everything.”
I didn't reply.
“And it's not just when we're in bed,” he went on. “It's all the time.”
“What do you mean, all the time?”
“I don't know. Whatever's going on, you always seem … sort of disconnected.”
Disconnected. The word made me think of a robot whose wiring had come loose. Was that how I seemed to him, to everyone? I'd tried to be normal, but people could see that I wasn't. They knew I was weird, that my brain was faulty. They knew about the dreams, about the screaming myself awake in the mornings. They knew I was like Dennis.
“Well, why do you want to go out with me then? If I'm so disconnected?”
Rob ignored my question. “What's wrong, Susannah? Can't you tell me?”
“Oh not this again,” I said, my anger rising. “I've told you, there's nothing …”
I stopped and then, to my surprise, I began to cry. Rob put his arms around me and held me close, stroking my hair as I sobbed into his chest.
A Girl's Guide to Modern European Philosophy Page 12
