Boys and Girls (18 page)

In the hall, by the delftware bowl that I'm really quite fond of, he appears to have left me a note. I wince to remember that when we were newly married, he used to quite regularly litter the house with pretty cream and deckled cards, notes of affection and secret allusion (my oh my, what time can do). But here we have on the mirror a lemon Post-it, annoyingly askew, I assume because he knows that I loathe them (the shade, the tacky backing). ‘Out this afternoon, but back in good time for
the Fabulous Feast. Wine in kitchen for your approval, ho ho. I assume that jackets will be worn?' Mm. Had he said it to my face, that last little barb, I doubtless would have countered with a withering rejoinder: ‘Well
yours
will be, Alan my sweet, in common with all of your rags – practically threadbare, not unlike yourself, my sugar.' Sour, you see? Yes – and wholly automatic.

So he's rather confounded me: having made him out to be practically a hermit, he now informs me he is out for the day. I wish I wondered where and why.

This bloody smoking ban – it's a right bloody pain, and I'm sick up to here with hearing all the positives from all the Green and eco-friendly sodding morons (because I don't give a fuck about my carbon footprint – just like to plant it with force on their collective backside). About the only place left I can light up a Havana is when I'm at peace in my deckchair, tracing the wheeling of a seagull, while my toes get toasty in the sand. And yeh I
know
the bloody air's so very much cleaner and sweeter wherever you go – but in a bar like this (where I am now, one of the seediest I know, and all the better for it) the air's not meant to be clean and sweet – well is it? It's meant to be rank and acrid – eye-stingingly blue and deep-down dirty. They don't serve food here – well, none you'd want to eat, certainly – and it's properly pubby in the worst sort of way – old carpet, old flyers, old bloke with the shakes who lives in the far corner: God, I just love it. No bloody music either. And right this minute, I'm halfway into my second large Scotch (so it might be the third – who's to give a damn?) and there's this fatly seductive Cohiba Robusto burning a hole in my inside pocket. I don't obviously mean literally – well Christ of course
not, what do you take me for? I'm not a bloody idiot. But I am aware of its suggestive bulge – my lips are aching for the mellow-scented tang of it. Oh dear me. Why is it I never seem able to do what I want? Why must this be? If it isn't Susan, it's the government. What a way to live, I ask you. And yes, this bar, it's got a couple of cracked paving stones out at the back and a small patch of mud – and the R on the sign, that fell off ages ago, so all of the regulars, among whom I am proud to number, extract a good deal of amusement from calling it the Bee Garden, but still though, you wouldn't want to be out there. It seems always to catch the wind, even if there isn't one – weird, that. And the patio heater, it'd have you broiled, you get too close. There used to be a large umbrella, but Dave behind the bar says some bugger's upped and nicked it. And it's starting to rain now, see? So that's the end of me old cigar.

And she's still looking over, you know – don't think it's just my wishful imagination that's hard at work here. She's been sitting on her own with an orange-coloured drink (could I suppose be orange, now I come to think of it) in the nearest thing this slummy and forgotten oasis could ever get to being a booth – a dark-stained caved-in plywood banquette, curved at its centre, and just clinging on to its sheeny, head-streaked and slashed, once rich crimson plush, burst along the domed and rickety edging of studs where the off-yellow foam is making for the open. On the round-topped table, the rim randomly channelled with scorch-black notches, an abiding memento of a million abandoned fags from the days back when, there is a small and rotting cactus in an old John Courage ashtray, thriftily pressed into fresh service, and also these two long-fingered and slender hands to the sides of the tumbler of orange, the attitude almost prayer-like, poised and
tender, as if to keep it from harm. And when I look across, the idle enquiry of my eyebrow is held for the merest moment, and then she quite hastily glances away. And then when I dare to look back, my breath is stopped by the sizzle of the instant as again our eyes are so briefly fused. Those hands of hers are nun-like – white and sepulchral – but the face I can tell is really very worldly. A heavy fringe, as she shyly hangs her head down, is pricking the tips of her lashes. Her air is of someone who is the sole possessor of a sweet and cheeky secret which, with seduction and a gentle insistent goading, she might be lusciously tempted to spill all over me.

‘This is … quite a surprise, if you'll forgive me …'

She blinked up at him quite without expression as he stood over her table, his whisky in his hand. Green eyes, think … little hazel speckles …

‘Just having a drink,' she said, very flatly. But no, he decided – it wasn't quite that, flat, the voice, no it wasn't that. More faraway and wistful as if she had been sleeping, and now was unconvinced by wakefulness, though still barely caring either way.

‘Yes yes. It's just that … this bar. You know. Not exactly the in place, is it? Not what you'd call, um – “happening”. If you know what I mean. Young people, young women – don't come in here much, that's all.'

She shrugged and stared at her drink.

‘It's quiet. Don't get hassled. Usually.'

‘Ah right – sorry. Well I'll go then. Sorry. I didn't mean to be—'

‘No it's all right. I didn't mean that either. I don't mind. You can talk. You can sit if you want to. Won't be here long anyway.'

‘Oh well that's very, um – nice of you. Thanks. Can I ah – get you a …? Maybe?'

‘No thanks. Still got this. I don't drink much. I just like to sit here and think. Quiet, see?'

Alan was nodding over-vigorously as he crushed himself into the flayed and broken hammock of tatters; it was creaking quite angrily before it settled down.

‘Thinking, yeah. What
I
do, really. What are you – thinking about? Or don't you want to tell me? I'd quite understand. None of my, um …'

The girl laughed lightly. ‘Oh God – nothing deep, or anything. Just stuff. I'm Helen, by the way.'

‘Ah. The name's Bond. James Bond.'

‘Yeh yeh. What's your name really?'

‘Well it is
James
, as a matter of fact. Not Bond, though. Christ, you know – I've got this really good cigar in my pocket, and I so damn want to smoke it. Can't get it out of my mind.'

‘Oh yeh I know! I got ten Marlboro Lights this morning and I only just had a chance to light one up and then it started peeing down.'

‘Bugger, isn't it? Still – there it is, I suppose.'

‘I'm just on my way home, actually. Half day. I'll have a fag then. Do you want to …? I mean – you can come if you like. I don't mind. I love the smell of cigars. Makes me think of Christmas.'

Helen had stood up, and was gathering her coat about her. She took her mobile out of her slouchy bag, stared at it hard, and then dropped it back in. Alan was looking perfectly amazed. And then he said something.

‘Oh. And you like Christmas, do you?'

‘Love it. Doesn't everyone? Well look, James – I'm off now.
Live quite near. Don't want the drink. So you coming or not?'

He looked about him at nothing and no one, knocked back the last of the whisky, smacked his lips and nodded.

‘Yeh. Yeh I am.'

The rain now was hardly more than a heavy gusty drizzle, though none the less annoying for that. Alan was buttoning up quickly his shabby Harris tweed and he spattered on behind the skitter of her legs, aware that his hair was well along the way to becoming as frizzy as a scourer and that the knees of his trousers were clammy already. She'd said she lived quite near, and yes he supposed it was true – but while he shook off his sleeves as he stood inside the hallway, Alan could easily have wished that it had been a damn sight nearer. The floor was green linoleum and there was a bicycle jammed alongside, the wallpaper's patterning bruised and erased by the routine drag of its handlebars. He stepped across a thick and scattered slick of catalogues, their insistency muted by polythene. She said, ‘OK?', and he said, ‘Yeh.' Her legs then twinkled away and up into the shadows at the top of the staircase, and Alan's head was booming with only the thunder of his two invading feet banging on the treads as he doggedly followed behind her. Her room was at the top, small and angular, crouching low beneath the eaves, and extraordinarily welcoming with its large divan and a hurling of multicoloured throws, the floor close to seeming upholstered, so gorgeously strewn with outsize cushions. Helen snapped a switch by the doorway and a series of small and globular leaded glass lampshades glowed and were winking in scarlet and amber – purple, lime and golden-yellow. The rain was peppering hard the one tiny window, and Alan felt his limbs uncoiling, so at peace, and terribly relieved.

Helen batted at her fringe with those long white fingers and was screwing up her nose as she shrugged off her coat and stuffed it into a cupboard.

‘I saw you were drinking whisky. Was it whisky? Yeh? Well there's a bottle on the table there, if you want some. God I've just
got
to have that fag. Or there's some fizz in the fridge. Shall we have that? Make a party of it – it's such a rotten day.'

‘What a lovely idea. And the fridge is …?'

‘Oh – just move that screen thing. Yeh – just behind there. Sorry it's all a bit of a mess.'

Helen sucked deep on the Marlboro and whooshed out the smoke in a great big show (‘Oh
lovely
 …! Thank God'). Alan was stooping low in front of the bijou fridge which was covered in … there must be fifty or so of these magnets all over it, each of them bearing a single word in a galaxy of fonts and colours.

‘So you like words, do you Helen? Oh – Heidsieck. That's my favourite. How amazing …'

‘Hey? Oh, the fridge. Yeh – they're all from Shakespeare. You mix them about and try to make a poem. I'm not very good at it, though. I'd love to write. I can't think of anything better.'

‘Mm. It is good. I wouldn't be without it. Um – glasses, Helen …?'

‘What – you're a writer? Really? I don't believe it!'

‘Mm. Novelist, actually. Writing a novel. It's not
Dickens
, you know, but um … glasses?'

‘Oh yeh – sorry. The door under the … yeh. There. Got them? Great. So tell me about it, James – this novel you're writing. God I can't believe it – I actually know a novelist! Amazing. You want to sit here? I'll light the fire.'

Alan was easing the cork out of the champagne – it came away with the merest hiss of resentment (could it be a sigh of impatience at having been disrupted, he wondered quite joyously) and hurtled it foamily into quite the wrong glasses.

‘It's popping a bit …'

‘Popping, Helen …?'

‘The fire. Does that. Probably needs a, I don't know … clean, or something. I've always wanted a real fire – logs and everything. Pine cones. But gas is the nearest I can get up here. It's quite nice when it's got going, though. Cosy. Bit blue – never used to be blue like that, not when I got it. You see how around the coals it's all a bit blue …? Probably needs a …'

‘Mm. Clean, or something. You could be right. Not really my, um – thing, you know. Gas fires. Well cheers then, um. Helen.'

‘Well I wouldn't expect it. You're an artist. Can't wait to hear all about your novel, and everything.'

Alan now perched himself on the corner of the divan, quite close to Helen and the fireplace. It was softer than he had anticipated and he was very nearly tipped and rolled all the way off the thing, and so he squirmed himself back a bit, his shuffling bottom seeking out a purchase.

‘You seem … I mean if you don't mind my saying so, your views … you seem quite – old-fashioned. For one so young. I mean to say I don't think that's a
bad
thing, or anything. I love it, actually. Well obviously I do. It's just that it's – unusual. In one so young.'

Helen sipped champagne and nodded thoughtfully.

‘I think you must be right. My friends say that too. Well – I say friends … I haven't got loads of them, or anything. They're all my age, pretty much, but we don't seem to agree
on a lot. They're more into clothes and celebs and stuff. I like older people, really. They've got more to say. Know more. Why don't you light your cigar, James? Champagne's lovely. Haven't had it in ages.'

Alan placed his glass on the floor beside him and slid out of his pocket the stubby black-and-yellow tube – tugged it open and tapped out the Cohiba.

‘I've already cut the end. I had a feeling … I don't know – I just had a feeling there'd be somewhere today I'd be able to smoke it. You're sure you don't mind?'

‘Told you. Love it. Are they expensive, those things? Expect they are. Look it, anyway.'

Alan was applying a match, gently revolving the cigar and glancing occasionally at its smouldering tip.

‘Well in
this
country they cost an absolute fortune – wouldn't even tell you how much, it's just so embarrassing. But I got a whole load of them in Spain, you know, year or two back. Some ghastly holiday or other. Really cheap in Spain, couldn't tell you why.'

‘Oh God … that smell …! I really, really love it.'

‘Want a puff?'

Helen's eyes were bright in the firelight, wholly caught up in a dazzle of daring.

‘
Can
I? I've never smoked a cigar. Oh but look – I don't want to mess it up for you. Make it go all soggy.'