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Authors: Lynne Barrett-Lee
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There. Sorted. So. How do you know?’
‘Because he knew I was going to be forty next birthday.’
‘But you could have told him that, surely. It’s a big thing in your life.’
‘Oh, don’t you start. And I didn’t, for definite. I went through my old emails; every single one. The nearest I got was the fact that I mentioned it was going to be my birthday and that I hadn’t been to Nepal yet and so on.’
‘So he could have guessed forty then, couldn’t he? It’s the big birthday, after all.’
‘Ah, but I know he didn’t. When I challenged him he didn’t email me back for hours and hours. And then when I emailed him again and ranted at him and told him I hated him, he emailed back and said “You don’t hate me, really.” As if making a point, you know?’
‘Hmm, I suppose. But not necessarily.’
‘And now I’ve gone through the old emails again, little things strike me. Like him mentioning Cardiff. I never told him where I lived, ever.’
‘Hmm. Fairly conclusive then.’
‘Completely conclusive. He knows who I am. He knows all about me. And yet I don’t have the first clue who he is. God, this is awful! Awful! Perhaps it’s better if I don’t know. I’ll never be able to look anyone in the eye, ever again.’
Sunday. Still pm. Drag, drag, drag.
Phil arrived, on schedule, for lunch, clutching a bottle of red and a pot of chrysanthemums for me.
‘You always get your money’s worth with a pot mum,’ declared my father happily. ‘Cut that back, Charlotte, and it’ll flower again for you. You can even take cuttings and grow new ones with those.’
Oh, God. Oh, God. If you were a flower, I thought miserably, then what would you be? A lily? A briar rose? An orchid, perhaps? Charlie Simpson, of course, would be a small pot chrysanthemum; cheerful, no-nonsense, with big bile coloured blooms. Long lived, dependable, bright, undemanding; a flower so completely without pretension or attitude that only the most evil and foul tempered person could consider it anything but, well, jolly nice.
Phil, who had doubtless simply scooped up what was to hand in the Spar, and who, anyway, had probably not the remotest idea why a gift of a potted chrysanthemum would cause me anything but grateful delight (and why should he?) nodded cheerfully as he took off his raincoat.
‘Something smells good!’ he chirruped. I made off with the wine.
The trouble with Phil - the trouble with us - was that we had never reached a degree of closeness that would be sufficient for me to be able to say ‘I’m sorry, but I actually can’t stand chrysanthemums’ and so on, and now, six months on, it was too late to start. Which is why, I suddenly realised, with breathtaking conviction, one should never contemplate adult (sex-inclusive relationships) with people for whom we feel less than compulsive desire. It wasn’t that I didn’t fancy Phil. Indeed, the first couple of times we disrobed and got down to it, I recall it as being immensely enjoyable. But then I recall that for some weeks eight years back, I felt like that about playing Sonic The Hedgehog as well.
While Phil laid the table and Dad beat up a horseradish, I just sat and drank wine and felt stroppy and guilty and glared at the pot bloody yellow bloody mum.
But, then again, had they been lilies, just how would I have felt?
‘So,’ Phil announced, while my father doled out roast potatoes. ‘My trip’s all fixed up. I’m off Friday teatime. You going to go the Stablefords’ then?’
He addressed this to me, but it was my father who answered.
‘Looking forward to it, Phillip. It’ll be nice to get to know the locals, so to speak. And can’t have Charlie turning up on her own, now, can we? A girl needs an escort.’
Phil looked at me carefully, presumably to ascertain whether my father was making some sort of point here (which he was) and whether I was in agreement with it (which I wasn’t). I had never indicated the least irritation about him
‘Because he knew I was going to be forty next birthday.’
‘But you could have told him that, surely. It’s a big thing in your life.’
‘Oh, don’t you start. And I didn’t, for definite. I went through my old emails; every single one. The nearest I got was the fact that I mentioned it was going to be my birthday and that I hadn’t been to Nepal yet and so on.’
‘So he could have guessed forty then, couldn’t he? It’s the big birthday, after all.’
‘Ah, but I know he didn’t. When I challenged him he didn’t email me back for hours and hours. And then when I emailed him again and ranted at him and told him I hated him, he emailed back and said “You don’t hate me, really.” As if making a point, you know?’
‘Hmm, I suppose. But not necessarily.’
‘And now I’ve gone through the old emails again, little things strike me. Like him mentioning Cardiff. I never told him where I lived, ever.’
‘Hmm. Fairly conclusive then.’
‘Completely conclusive. He knows who I am. He knows all about me. And yet I don’t have the first clue who he is. God, this is awful! Awful! Perhaps it’s better if I don’t know. I’ll never be able to look anyone in the eye, ever again.’
Sunday. Still pm. Drag, drag, drag.
Phil arrived, on schedule, for lunch, clutching a bottle of red and a pot of chrysanthemums for me.
‘You always get your money’s worth with a pot mum,’ declared my father happily. ‘Cut that back, Charlotte, and it’ll flower again for you. You can even take cuttings and grow new ones with those.’
Oh, God. Oh, God. If you were a flower, I thought miserably, then what would you be? A lily? A briar rose? An orchid, perhaps? Charlie Simpson, of course, would be a small pot chrysanthemum; cheerful, no-nonsense, with big bile coloured blooms. Long lived, dependable, bright, undemanding; a flower so completely without pretension or attitude that only the most evil and foul tempered person could consider it anything but, well, jolly nice.
Phil, who had doubtless simply scooped up what was to hand in the Spar, and who, anyway, had probably not the remotest idea why a gift of a potted chrysanthemum would cause me anything but grateful delight (and why should he?) nodded cheerfully as he took off his raincoat.
‘Something smells good!’ he chirruped. I made off with the wine.
The trouble with Phil - the trouble with us - was that we had never reached a degree of closeness that would be sufficient for me to be able to say ‘I’m sorry, but I actually can’t stand chrysanthemums’ and so on, and now, six months on, it was too late to start. Which is why, I suddenly realised, with breathtaking conviction, one should never contemplate adult (sex-inclusive relationships) with people for whom we feel less than compulsive desire. It wasn’t that I didn’t fancy Phil. Indeed, the first couple of times we disrobed and got down to it, I recall it as being immensely enjoyable. But then I recall that for some weeks eight years back, I felt like that about playing Sonic The Hedgehog as well.
While Phil laid the table and Dad beat up a horseradish, I just sat and drank wine and felt stroppy and guilty and glared at the pot bloody yellow bloody mum.
But, then again, had they been lilies, just how would I have felt?
‘So,’ Phil announced, while my father doled out roast potatoes. ‘My trip’s all fixed up. I’m off Friday teatime. You going to go the Stablefords’ then?’
He addressed this to me, but it was my father who answered.
‘Looking forward to it, Phillip. It’ll be nice to get to know the locals, so to speak. And can’t have Charlie turning up on her own, now, can we? A girl needs an escort.’
Phil looked at me carefully, presumably to ascertain whether my father was making some sort of point here (which he was) and whether I was in agreement with it (which I wasn’t). I had never indicated the least irritation about him
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