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‘Are you hyped for Saturday night, then?’ asks Luke, as he puts his knife and fork together and pushes his plate away. He hasn’t eaten all his potatoes.
‘That depends on what we’re doing.’
‘We’re celebrating your birthday.’
‘Yeah, I know. But how?’
‘It’s a surprise,’ says Luke, then he winks at Monday. ‘Isn’t it, little mate?’
Monday blinks at him and kneads the carpet with his two pristinely white front paws.
‘A surprise …’ I repeat.
‘Yeah, a surprise!’
‘Putting an inflection on the end of the word doesn’t make it sound more appealing.’
‘Everyone likes surprises,’ Luke argues.
Not me. I don’t even put my MP3 player on ‘shuffle’. In fact, I like surprises even less than birthdays. Combined? No, thanks.
‘I’d prefer to know where we are going, Luke.’
His face crumples slightly but he pulls it back. ‘And the award for most ungrateful reaction to the news that someone has gone to the trouble of organising a nice treat goes to … Vivian Ward! Jesus, you can be such a witch sometimes. You’ll have a great time, I promise, not that you deserve it,’ he says, and pulls off his T-shirt over his head. ‘Now, I suggest you make some amends by getting your kit off.’
‘Why is that?’
‘Because I want to have some of that really bad nookie we’re so good at.’ He reaches into his pocket, fishes out a condom and Frisbees it into my lap.
‘Ok-aaaaay.’ I pick up the sealed plastic pouch faux-wearily and shove the trunk with my foot to get the leftover potatoes out of my line of vision. One of them has a large blob of mayonnaise next to it. ‘But please, let’s make sure it is a whole different level of unsatisfactory this time. Dull, perfunctory humping only. Do you mind if we have the TV on in the background?’
‘Nope, we’ll switch it on when we’ve finished … then we’ve got something to look forward to,’ says Luke, dexterously unbuckling his belt and jeans with his left hand. With the right he throws his T-shirt towards the doorway where it drops on Monday’s head, making him look like a furry-legged ghost. ‘Sorry, little mate, this is not for your eyes.’
I wriggle out of my skinny-leg trousers, which are almost identical to the ones that arrived today, and lie back on the sofa. ‘Let’s press on. Try to keep it under five minutes, yeah? Then we can actually enjoy what’s left of the evening.’
‘Got it.’ His jeans come off.
And then so are we. No awkwardness, no hesitation, no more admittedly fairly laboured sarcastic build-up, which I am well aware is only funny if you are us, just no-holds-barred, relentless shagging accompanied by some slightly feral grabbing, licking, sucking, biting and maybe a bit of light (non-scab forming) scratching. This is certainly not the Calvin Klein approved, black-and-white lurve-making that goes on in advertisement for Eternity. It’s full-on fucking; the purely-for-pleasure stuff my mother would warn me against as a child. Corinthians Chapter 6 Verse 18; Flee fornication. Every sin that a man doeth is without the body; but he that committeth fornication sinneth against his own body. There is no gentle whispering or delicate contemplation, just ecstatic yowling and frenzied gulps for breath. It’s been like this since the moment I met Luke; one knock-out session after another. The sort you might want to record for posterity … so on occasion, we have. When I watch the footage back, I am always amused – and rather impressed – by the assorted surfaces we manage to utilise.
Tonight, we end up on the new island unit in the kitchen, possibly the most uncomfortable material in the flat – no, Europe – but Luke likes it. Probably so he can give me a knowing smile whenever Adele is using it to assemble one of her authentic ethnic dishes, as if to say, We both know it’s not just cumin seeds that have been pummelled up there … It’s good. Really good … and when it’s over, we stay sprawled on the granite, the endorphins that are pelting round our bodies easing the pain in Luke’s spine and my cruciate ligaments. That’s when I look across at him – his unkempt hair in an (entirely unintentionally) sexy mess – and at that very moment I think about what a nice addition he is to my life right now.
Then I look over to the fridge and stare at the photograph stuck to the refrigerator of Adele and James grinning manically as they cradle an orphaned baby orang-utan in the Bornean rainforest. It reminds me that I must must must remember to remove her stone-coloured Max Mara tank top from its dry-cleaning cellophane, unpin the yellow ticket from the care label and replace it in her wardrobe. Ditto her LnA white V-neck tee. And grey Equipment shirt. (Adele’s closet is a haven of high-quality basics that I like to borrow – without asking – on a regular basis.) I also need to sweep up the fag butts on the patio, buy some Pantene shampoo and conditioner to put in the shower so she doesn’t think I’ve been caning her Aveda Colour Conserve, and then I need t—
‘Vivian?’
‘Mmmm?’ I twist to face Luke. ‘Christ!’ His eyes are one centimetre away from mine. ‘You gave me a shock.’
‘Sorry.’ He pulls back a little awkwardly. ‘I was figuring out whether I should talk to you about something. Something quite … serious.’
‘Serious? Like what? You’ve acquired an STD …’
‘Ha! No, nothing like that.’
‘You’ve got a wife back home in Australia and she drives a “yoot”…’ I smile.
‘I don’t.’
‘You’ve been to prison?’
‘Would that be a turn-on?’
‘Possibly, if it was an act of selflessness that got you sent down – like Wentworth Miller in Prison Break. But if it was manslaught—’
He interrupts me. ‘What are your feelings about reproduction?’
‘Reprod …’ I tail off.
‘… uction. Reproduction.’ He visibly relaxes as he says the word a second time and stares directly at me.
I tense and look away. ‘The heavy wooden French furniture, you mean?’
‘Not that, Vivian. Human reproduction, as in the creation of another being. It’s something that I’ve been meaning to get your thoughts on for a while,’ he says, as if he were casually requesting my opinion on which actor has been the most convincing James Bond. ‘Well, not a while as in ages and ages, we’ve only been together for a year so it would be pretty scary if I had been thinking about it for too long. Don’t panic, I’m not some sort of psycho-sperminator who’s simply been biding his time for the right moment to impregnate you.’ Definitely not Pierce Brosnan – too self-conscious. Or Timothy Dalton – too self-righteous. ‘And even though I said it was a “serious” subject, it doesn’t mean I “seriously” want us to think about doing it right now, but it would be good to know your feelings about the subject, generally.’ I know this is controversial but I wasn’t mad about Sean Connery – too hairy, and I can’t even remember the name of the actor in On Her Majesty’s Secret Service. George someone? ‘I can tell you’re a bit surprised, but I’ve surprised myself by even wanting to approach the whole issue. I certainly didn’t think I’d be asking you about it tonight, but …’ Lazenby! George Lazenby, that was it. As for Daniel Craig – way too shaggable. Distractingly so, it’s impossible to concentrate on the plot. ‘… sometimes it’s hard to plan when you’re going to talk about the things in life that need the most planning, and you don’t get something that needs more planning than a … baby.’
ROGER MOORE! There’s your answer. He was the best 007. Yes, he was cheesy, but I like cheese. (The sentiment not the dairy product.) Plus, he made my favourite movie of the entire franchise …
Luke shakes his head at me. ‘Aren’t you going to say anything?’
‘Moonraker.’
CHAPTER THREE
‘Eh? Moon-what?’
Luke is confused. I go into the lounge and stand in the nude for a few seconds staring aimlessly round the room, before grabbing his grey hooded top and putting it on. It’s long enough to reach past my mid-thigh but I still feel weirdly bare, so I find my knickers and put them on too. When I return to the kitchen Luke is aimlessly opening and shutting cupboard doors.
He stops when he sees me and smiles, tentatively. ‘I’m guessing by that reaction you would have preferred it if I was actually diseased, hitched or an ex-con. I’ve caught you unawares, haven’t I? Maybe it would have been best to wait.’
‘Wait?’
‘Yeah, wait.’
Or rather … weight. Because that’s what you actually gain, isn’t it? As well as a child, I mean, you gain weight during the storing and development of the foetus. Even if you have the dollars to pay an illegitimate Miami surgeon to perform one of those sneaky Caesareans where Junior gets whipped out six weeks early to avoid Mom piling on the last trimester of bulk, for the other six and a half months hormones will send your taste buds loony tunes. Some women are lucky. They get savoury cravings along the lines of pickled onions or gherkins. (At least over-consumption can have a laxative effect.) Some not so, and spend the entire gestational period with their head in a catering-sized pot of peanut butter. Or maybe even that special variety – based on Satan’s own recipe – which comes with swirls of milk chocolate spread woven through it. After the expulsion of the fully formed anthropoid, the only way they are going to ‘ping’ back to their pre-baby size is to surround themselves with a crack team of nutritionists and exercise specialists like the top models do. Miranda Kerr’s were fucking efficient. When she stalked down the catwalk at Paris Fashion Week for Balenciaga eight weeks after giving birth, she didn’t even look as if she’d had a bowl of porridge, let alone a son.
But obviously I don’t say any of this to Luke. He wouldn’t understand what I was saying. Nor would I want him to try. Because then he may try to understand something else. Me. I clear my throat to buy myself some time to think. I am baffled as to why he would have even thought to approach this subject. At some point, I must have started behaving in a way that has triggered him to start seeing ‘us’ in a way that was not intended. This unnerves me, because none of the other ‘Men I’ve Been With’ have misread the signals. I am angry with myself. So, obviously, I channel the anger towards him.
‘Are you completely fucking unhinged, Luke?’
He doesn’t reply to my question. He shakes his head at me and stomps into the lounge. I follow him in and watch as he puts on his boxers inside-out, yanks on his jeans and buttons them up incorrectly, then puts on his T-shirt back to front.
‘And you reckon you could handle a nappy?’ I taunt.
‘Forget I even mentioned it, Vivian. We need to clean up. I’ll turn the sofa back round and you do the cushions. You’d better get a cloth too. There’s Dr Pepper all over the carpet,’ he mutters.
‘Don’t sulk, Luke. You can’t just blurt out that you want to get me knocked up—’
‘Knocked up? Nice choice of words.’
‘Whatever you want to call it … and then go off into a strop when I don’t immediately suggest we start stocking up on sterilisation equipment.’
‘That wasn’t what I was saying. You weren’t listening properly. It was only meant to be a discussion about the subject.’ He pushes the couch back on its legs and turns round. His face is fully crumpled. ‘Jesus, Vivian. You can be such a …’
‘… witch. We’ve already established that.’ I make a concerted effort to soften my voice. ‘Okay, I’m sorry, go from the beginning. What made you start thinking about all this?’
‘I suppose it was because your birthday is coming up.’
‘My birthday? Well, it was really sweet of you to consider the gift of life as a present option but vouchers for Space NK are fine … then I can get some decent eye cream. Adele doesn’t keep hers in the bathroom any more – so selfish, how am I meant to stand defiant in the war against puffiness and dark circles on my rubbish wages?’ I force a laugh, but Luke’s face remains crumpled. ‘Sorry, sorry, sorry … again. Go on, explain. I’m listening.’
He sits down on the sofa and sighs. ‘I suppose I’ve been thinking about you turning thirty-five.’ He shrugs. ‘If you wanted to have kids, then I figured now would be the time you would be starting to examine what’s involved. Clearly, you have a very thorough understanding of the initial phase …’ He manages a small smile. ‘But the rest of it can be more complicated, especially as you get older.’
‘Older?’ The word judders through me. ‘Cheers, Luke. That’s the second time today someone has brought up my advancing years. Roger was going on at me earlier for not having a pension plan. I had no idea that come Saturday I am an official shambles if I haven’t got the blue print for the rest of my time on earth signed off.’
‘I’m not saying that at all,’ he replies plainly. ‘I was thinking realistically. The fact is it does get more difficult and dangerous to have babies after thirty-five. It’s basic biology.’
‘That’s bollocks. Jennifer Lopez didn’t have hers until she was thirty-nine. Twins.’
‘They were probably IVF.’
‘Actually, they weren’t. Going down the in vitro route would have been entirely against J Lo’s strict beliefs. She’s publicly said as much. Fortunately for her, though, she didn’t have any ethical guidelines in place about accepting a whopping six-figure fee for supplying pictures of the tots to People magazine … ha!’
But this information does not throw Luke off track. He simply picks up where he left off.
‘Actually, irrespective of your current age, I sort of assumed you might have already thought about the whole parenting thing. Without getting too deep, it’s a pretty common thing for people who have difficult relationships with their own parents to want to create a more secure unit themselves.’ He pauses. ‘What with you not having that much contact with your mum, obv—’
‘I do have contact with her.’
‘I know, but not that much.’
‘She’s busy with the church and her catalogues and … stuff,’ I retort. ‘It doesn’t mean she doesn’t care about me or vice versa.’
‘Vivian, I make sure I see mine three or four times a week and she lives in another continent.’
‘That’s different, you Skype her. I’m not going to go to all the hassle of utilising visual communication technology to contact my mother when she lives the other side of Milton Keynes.’
‘And you never see your brother or sister.’
‘Because we don’t get on. Oh, and believe you me, if you’d seen any of my sister’s children when they were babies, you wouldn’t want to risk me having one. I’ve seen more attractive beasts carved into the stone of French cathedrals. I might carry the same genes.’
Luke laughs and I think he is about to drop the subject. But he doesn’t.
‘Okay, but there’s the issue of your father.’
‘What issue? There is no issue. I’ve told you he’s not around.’
‘And that’s where the discussion always ends. Why?’
I hold my hand up. My face feels hot and my neck is itching. ‘Right, the cod psychology stops here, Luke. We don’t need to talk about family stuff. It’s boring … and pointless.’
‘Not when they are the people who have shaped you.’
‘I shaped me!’ I snap. It’s definitely time to re-route this conversation. I flop down onto the sofa, put my head on Luke’s shoulder and change tack. ‘Look, I know I’m handling this chat quite badly, but you have to admit it was a bit of a curveball. Let’s face it, we’re hardly in a practical position to think about a, er …’
‘Baby,’ he says, putting his arm around me. ‘A baby. You won’t get pregnant by saying it.’
I smile, equally pleased he has been drawn away from the subject of my family and is loosening up. ‘Whatever you want to call it. How could we consider having one of those when we’ve only been seeing each other a year?’
‘I agree,’ he says simply. ‘It would be ridiculous, which was why I was only approaching the issue. It was you who went off on a tangent. Kids would obviously be some way down the road …’ Not if I’m driving! ‘… after we’ve lived together for a while.’
I feel uncomfortable again; as if I’m lying on the island unit, my joints pressed into the marble. ‘Where would we do that?’
‘Why not here?’
I burst out laughing. ‘Luke, hell would have to freeze over before Adele let you do that. In fact, hell would have to freeze over and then maybe a few years later sometime after an entire winter theme park with snowboarding facilities and an ice hotel had been built on top then maybe she would consider a trial period … as long as you didn’t bring your records, music equipment or cables.’
He tilts my head up towards him. ‘We could always get our own place – just you and me. It wouldn’t be as big as this place but—’
‘Monday would find downsizing hard,’ I interject quickly. ‘It wouldn’t be fair on Warren, either.’
‘Since when have you cared about Wozza? You called him “tragic” last week.’
‘He is. But he’s a tragedy who has done you a lot of favours recently. If you moved out he’d really struggle to fill your room. I doubt he’d get too many responses from an advert on Gumtree: AVAILABLE! Tomb-like space in dark basement flat on very rough road in Shepherds Bush (usually cordoned off by police) – must be okay with dark Berlin techno and basic communication with other tenant. General knowledge of hydroponics and GCSE chemistry Grade C or above a plus …’ I lean up and kiss Luke’s cheek. ‘You can laugh now. Go on, I know you want to.’
He doesn’t. Which makes me feel odd, because that’s why I thought both of us were here – to have a laugh – and now Luke isn’t laughing. But what is even odder is that I’m sorry that I am the reason he’s not. I genuinely am. More than I thought I would be.
CHAPTER FOUR
A full English breakfast is not something I would ever choose to make. There are too many individual components. Personally, I think that three is a more than sufficient number of items for any dish. But the following morning, I feel I ought to get up at the same ridiculous time Luke always has to (on week days) and do something he would consider a nice gesture. So I pop a Nurofen and cook.
Things appear to be fine between us. We potter about the kitchen bantering with each other as normal. He in his favourite T-shirt, the one with a picture of a large cartoon fish wearing a pair of headphones underneath the words, Cod is a DJ. Me wearing his boxer shorts and sweatshirt. As he grabs his car keys from the fishbowl, I attempt to pull him back in the flat by his rucksack.
‘Stay for a bit longer,’ I tell him. ‘Just for a few minutes … I’ll make it worth your while.’
‘Really? How would you go about doing that?’ He turns round and prises my fingers from his bag. ‘Actually, don’t answer that. I’ve got to pick up Kevvo en route and I’d prefer to do that without a hard-on. I mean, he is a fellow Aussie and, admittedly, we have got a lot closer recently, but …’
I laugh. ‘You always used to stay when I asked you.’
‘That was an isolated period of a few weeks, before I got a job. I can’t be late … it’s not fair on the others. When we all put in the effort we get more done.’
I roll my eyes at him and push him out into the corridor. ‘Tsk, no one ever got anywhere by having a strong work ethic and a dedicated sense of teamwork, Luke. You should remember that.’
Smiling, he rolls his eyes back at me, then backs off down towards the front door. ‘Play a blinder at your audition. Shall I come round later?’
‘Nah, Adele will be back. I ought to spend the evening with her and feign interest in her endless camcorder footage of imposing mountainous terrain.’
‘Well, look after yourself and don’t get into any more fights.’ He bends down to stroke Monday who has wandered out into the hallway and is doing that feline slalom thing; twisting in and out of Luke’s legs. ‘Make sure you have a productive day, little mate,’ laughs Luke. But when he stands up his expression is serious.
I feel that marble surface digging into my joints again. ‘What’s the matter?’
‘About last night …’
‘Last night?’
‘Yeah, last night. I’ve been thinking … about what happened.’
‘What about it?’
‘I think you should know something. Something very important—’
‘Which is?’ My voice goes up a nervous octave as I interrupt him.
Luke repositions his rucksack, but doesn’t stop staring at me; his mouth is fixed in a sombre straight line. I swallow hard. I really can’t be doing with another heavy conversation.
‘I think I … well, I’ve got a bad feeling about something.’
‘A bad feeling about what, Luke?’
He pauses, then suddenly, grins. ‘I may have thrown away that condom in a cutlery drawer … not the bin. That new kitchen set-up is a total mind-fuck.’
I burst out laughing.
I am still laughing as I dispose of the offending article in the actual waste unit … along with the breakfast leftovers. I squirt these remains with washing-up liquid and then finish my necessary chores throughout the flat. In the background, I can hear an American actress being interviewed on some morning TV show, talking openly about how she doesn’t let Hollywood’s obsession with size double zero concern her – yeah, right, treadmill face! Then I do my Barry’s Boot Camp DVD and collapse on the sofa. Monday is already on there enjoying a snooze, clearly not having had enough quality shut-eye during the twenty odd hours he slept yesterday. I lie down next to him and scroll through a load of programmes I’ve stored for viewing. I plump for the last series of 90210. The opening scene on the beach in the first episode is entirely stolen by AnnaLynne McCord’s ribcage. It is so prominent I wonder if it has hired its own publicist during the down time between seasons. My mobile bleeps. I don’t recognise the number.
‘Hello?’
‘Vivian Ward? Barb Silver …’ She sounds a bit like Streisand. ‘Publicist. I represent Maximilian Fry. I got your number from the manager at Burn’s. I’m assuming you’ve seen what’s happened?’
‘Er, no.’ I try to sound slightly irritated, as though getting calls from tough-talking industry players is a regular part of my daily routine.
‘You haven’t been online yet this morning?’ she asks, aghast. ‘Freakin’ hell, it’s half past nine! Silver’s Golden Rule Number Twenty-six: Get down with your day before the day gets you down …’
I turn down the volume on the television.
‘So listen, kiddo,’ she continues, ‘Clint Parks has conjured up a load of bull in his column about what happened last night … that Maxy got mad and lashed out like a crazy person.’
‘Which is what happened.’
‘Ha! Details, details. Anyway, there’s no doubt Parks will try to eek the most he can out of this non-story so he’ll probably come waving his grubby chequebook at you. You’re a sensible girl, though … am I right?’
No, not really, but selling a story to the press about a celebrity who had come into Burn’s would immediately result in me getting the sack. In fact, once word had travelled no private members’ club would ever employ me again. I could even end up employed by a chain of ‘lifestyle’ bars – collecting empty pint glasses and clearing up piles of pistachio shells as privately educated ex-school boys grapple each other whilst singing faintly racist/homophobic/misogynistic songs in front of giant screens beaming live sport. Shudder.
‘You don’t have to worry about me talking to anyone. It’s not my style, Ms Silver,’ I say toadily. ‘I know the score with these situations. Besides, I also do some acting myself.’