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Authors: Judy Astley
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colleagues and media reptiles to put other people’s messages across. It was time he had a messageof his own, something for those Out There to take notice of. His job had been the equivalent of a wall emulsioned in safe magnolia: simply a bland background for enhancement of someone else’s artwork. Somewhere, deep inside, he could feel the long-dormant stirrings of a creative impulse. It was time for it to come out.
Matt folded the paper, shoved it in the bin and went to take a good appraising look at himself in the long mirror in the bathroom. The old working day hadn’t really included much time for checking himself over properly. Last time he’d given his body a really good scrutiny he’d been sure he still didn’t look his age. People were always surprised if he let slip a clue to the truth, such as recalling being on an A-level field trip the day Jimi Hendrix died. His body was still in good slim shape, but would soon miss the lunchtime gym sessions that he’d been treating it to for the past few years. He must be careful not to let himself go, as his late mother would have put it – it would be too easy to get beerily fat, pig out on crisps and biscuits and become jowly. He’d let his hair grow a bit, he decided, running his fingers through it and feeling the relieved satisfaction that all men have when only two rather than two hundred strands come out. He wouldn’t let it get as long as Eddy’s – which bordered on a sparse and stringy version of the Heavy Metal look (presumably in memory of starrier times) – but something with less city precision about it, less fierce control would be good.
Briskly, for soon Jess would be home, Matthew showered. Wandering back into the bedroom, he stopped to look out of the window to see who was coming and going in the Grove below. Opposite, Angiewas climbing out of her Discovery wearing a silky blue ruffle-edged skirt that somehow got itself hiked up as she slid off the car seat, showing a lot of creamy upper thigh. Angie’s shoulder-length blond hair bounced and fluttered as she fussed around, rearranging the skirt and leaning forward to reveal, from Matt’s elevated point of view, the bonus of a good deal of breast pushing against a skimpy V-neck cardigan. As if she sixth-sensed an audience she looked around and then up, caught sight of him and waved, grinning. Matt waved back, distractedly dropping his towel. Angie’s grin broadened and she turned to go into her house. Surely she couldn’t see, from there, he trusted, that he’d been sporting a fine erection?
Claire and Natasha sat on the bench on the hockey-pitch side of the field. The school buildings looked pleasingly distant. Open space that big was rare in London schools and the field featured prominently in the prospectus, presenting an illusion of rus in urbe . It was therefore a source of constant disappointment to the staff that the pupils, collectively, tended to loathe any sport that required running about on grass and lost almost all their inter-school matches through sheer apathy. The grass was only really in full demand on summer break-times when the sight of five hundred girls with their skirts and shirts pulled up for maximum tan exposure caused many a local male to make a diversion for the chance to glance through the knotholes in the fence.
‘So when are you seeing him again?’ Claire was ever-anxious for details and Natasha was delighted to be able to provide them. Claire was one of those girls you wanted to be like . It wasn’t anything you could putyour finger on but she just seemed comfortable with herself.
‘He just said he’d be around, that I’d see him soon.’ It was hard to make this sound like a definite arrangement. Put like that, actually spoken, it sounded dismally vague, as if he’d met her, been unimpressed and gone off to find better luck somewhere else.
‘You could always go and see him , if he’s living down the allotments!’ Claire giggled. ‘Do you think he
Matt folded the paper, shoved it in the bin and went to take a good appraising look at himself in the long mirror in the bathroom. The old working day hadn’t really included much time for checking himself over properly. Last time he’d given his body a really good scrutiny he’d been sure he still didn’t look his age. People were always surprised if he let slip a clue to the truth, such as recalling being on an A-level field trip the day Jimi Hendrix died. His body was still in good slim shape, but would soon miss the lunchtime gym sessions that he’d been treating it to for the past few years. He must be careful not to let himself go, as his late mother would have put it – it would be too easy to get beerily fat, pig out on crisps and biscuits and become jowly. He’d let his hair grow a bit, he decided, running his fingers through it and feeling the relieved satisfaction that all men have when only two rather than two hundred strands come out. He wouldn’t let it get as long as Eddy’s – which bordered on a sparse and stringy version of the Heavy Metal look (presumably in memory of starrier times) – but something with less city precision about it, less fierce control would be good.
Briskly, for soon Jess would be home, Matthew showered. Wandering back into the bedroom, he stopped to look out of the window to see who was coming and going in the Grove below. Opposite, Angiewas climbing out of her Discovery wearing a silky blue ruffle-edged skirt that somehow got itself hiked up as she slid off the car seat, showing a lot of creamy upper thigh. Angie’s shoulder-length blond hair bounced and fluttered as she fussed around, rearranging the skirt and leaning forward to reveal, from Matt’s elevated point of view, the bonus of a good deal of breast pushing against a skimpy V-neck cardigan. As if she sixth-sensed an audience she looked around and then up, caught sight of him and waved, grinning. Matt waved back, distractedly dropping his towel. Angie’s grin broadened and she turned to go into her house. Surely she couldn’t see, from there, he trusted, that he’d been sporting a fine erection?
Claire and Natasha sat on the bench on the hockey-pitch side of the field. The school buildings looked pleasingly distant. Open space that big was rare in London schools and the field featured prominently in the prospectus, presenting an illusion of rus in urbe . It was therefore a source of constant disappointment to the staff that the pupils, collectively, tended to loathe any sport that required running about on grass and lost almost all their inter-school matches through sheer apathy. The grass was only really in full demand on summer break-times when the sight of five hundred girls with their skirts and shirts pulled up for maximum tan exposure caused many a local male to make a diversion for the chance to glance through the knotholes in the fence.
‘So when are you seeing him again?’ Claire was ever-anxious for details and Natasha was delighted to be able to provide them. Claire was one of those girls you wanted to be like . It wasn’t anything you could putyour finger on but she just seemed comfortable with herself.
‘He just said he’d be around, that I’d see him soon.’ It was hard to make this sound like a definite arrangement. Put like that, actually spoken, it sounded dismally vague, as if he’d met her, been unimpressed and gone off to find better luck somewhere else.
‘You could always go and see him , if he’s living down the allotments!’ Claire giggled. ‘Do you think he
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