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very next day Carol went for her third driving lesson. Two days later for her fourth. At the end of the following week her instructor, a Turkish Cypriot, rasped his thumbnail along his moustache and confirmed what she already suspected. ‘Youse know, pretty lady, youse can take your test now I think.’ Carol felt exultation again, but not that dangerous thrusting exultation we touched on before; this was a more workaday sensation. It was combined for Carol with an acute awareness of a solid and mechanical species of causation in the world, of the form: push button A and B
will
happen.
    Now of course it would be absurd to suggest that Carol had not been aware of this in the past, but her apprehension of her own impact upon this stratum of the world had never before been so nakedly and enjoyably intuitive. Driving in the school’s Mini Metro; cutting anonion; completing a transaction in a shop, Carol felt empowered by all these simple acts, she felt her status as a potentially effective agent being pushed and moulded into shape by everything she did.
    However, along with this came a velcro wrenching as the little hooks of Carol’s will began to pull away from the little restraining loops of Carol’s conscience. And alone, naked from the waist down, she began to dance in front of the mirror. At first she just stood, lowered her jeans, or raised her skirt and struck a few attitudes, almost unconsciously. But it felt so good to acknowledge
it,
to see
it
now that
its
purpose was starting to be revealed, that soon she advanced to a proper terpsichorean promenade.
    It
was now large enough to waggle a little if she shifted from one foot to the other in a sort of soft-shoe shuffle; and indeed one waggle led to another,
its
tension increasing with each waggle.
    Carol stood in front of the full-length mirror that formed the cupboard door, regarding
its
incongruity: peeking out from her hair-bedraggled lips, devoid of the pouch that perhaps ought to accompany it. She sat down on the edge of the bed and the fingers of both her hands toyed with
it
.
It
was at least three, or even five centimetres long. A pinky-brown roll of flesh could be pulled back from its tip to reveal a little mushroom, in the centre of which was a dry eye. It was, Carol decided, a penis.
    * * *
    ‘To be a woman with a penis in our society—it isn’t an overwhelming distinction, is it? Well is it?’
The don was testy, I was clearly a pupil.
    ‘No, I suppose not.’
    ‘You suppose not. Why do you “suppose not”?’
The train clattered through a small station. I had a glimpse of an ornamental flowerbed; a fat porter; a swinging sign, and then darkness again.
    ‘Well, I suppose the increasing emancipation of women throughout this century has meant that they have—albeit in a rather metaphorical way—acquired some of the characteristics of men.’
    ‘Some of the sexual characteristics?’
The nasty edge was entering his voice again.
    ‘Perhaps.’
I tried to sound non-committal in a way that might please him, a facetious way. But he came back at me hard.
    ‘I think you’re being trite. That’s a mistake that young men always make with these issues. At times their entire overview of the sexual landscape seems merely an attempt to blot out the gynaecological
Massif Central
It’s a metaphorical penis that you’re talking about. I’m talking about a fucking literal penis, shit-for-brains, and “fucking” is very definitely the operative word here, because I’m talking about a cock that can fuck. I’m talking about a firm, springy, blood-filled sponge, with an enpurpled, engorged dome shooting spunk at you, shooting life at you: bullets of jism! God what a noble sight! I so, so, prefer the company of men, don’t you? I said don’t you?’
    ‘Oh, absolutely.’
    ‘Non-erotic male bonding, that’s the thing isn’t it; what our Ocker cousins call “mateyness”.’
    ‘Yes, yes, it’s true.’
    ‘The more non-erotic the better, wouldn’t you