‘You might be right.’ He rubbed his chin. ‘Okay, I’ve got it.’ He clapped his hands together as a thought occurred, a ludicrous idea, fuelled no doubt by the pints he’d consumed in the Prince of Wales pub, while she had sipped shandy. ‘What if you shimmy up the drainpipe, I’ll go ahead and open the window on the landing, and you clamber in? Are you afraid of heights?’
‘No, I’m afraid of falling! There’s no way I’m doing that! What if the drainpipe came away from the wall, or what if the window didn’t open? I’d be stuck, and you’d have to call the fire brigade!’
‘You’re putting the kybosh on all my brilliant plans. So, what do you suggest?’ He pulled her to him and kissed her on the mouth, a hard and deliberate kiss that was full of promise. Her stomach folded with want.
‘I suggest you open the door, I’ll quickly run up to the landing, while you loiter and make a noise and chat to the landlady, andthen you come up and find me and we slip into your room and lock the door!’
‘That might work.’ He kissed her again. ‘I mean, it’s not as funny or as adventurous as the drainpipe suggestion, but it might work.’
Doing her best not to laugh out loud, Lilly stood with her hand clamped over her mouth, as Wilkie, as quietly as he was able, unlocked the front door. True to her word, she sprinted across the hallway, up to the first landing, and stood in a doorway, listening, as Wilkie coughed loudly and rattled the doorknob. As Lilly had suspected she would, the landlady appeared from the parlour.
‘Good evening, Mr Jones. Thought I heard the door. Trust you’ve had a lovely night?’
‘I have, thank you.’
‘Smashing. My husband and I are watching Parky, and you’re more than welcome to join us for a nightcap if you’d like?’
‘That is very kind, but it’s been a long week. I’m exhausted. My bed’s calling.’
‘I quite understand. Well, breakfast is in the dining room as usual from seven thirty to nine thirty.’
‘Thank you. See you in the morning.’
‘Yes, see you in the morning, Mr Jones.’
Lilly heard the parlour door close and watched as her lover tiptoed theatrically up the stairs. He reached for her hand, and with a feeling of triumph in her veins, she let him lead her across the square landing and into his room.
With the door locked behind them, she paid no attention to the detail, could not have told you anything about the burgundy flock wallpaper, scarcely noticed the old, wide, walnut wardrobe, nor the sink on the wall with a tooth mug and a glass shelf on which sat a rolled flannel and a bar of Imperial Leather in a small green tray of marbled plastic. Couldn’t have accurately described the darkvelvet drapes or the armchair in the corner on which Wilkie had piled his clothes – none of it.
Only able to focus on him, his mouth on hers, his hands tearing almost at her jeans and T-shirt in a desperate hurry to remove them, as the two stumbled, entwined, a jumble of arms and legs, on to the green, puffy, silky eiderdown that sat on top of the double bed. Compared to the narrow single bed of her childhood, this was a luxury!
Their union was this time without the tenderness or initial hesitancy that had wrapped their first encounter, but was instead mutually urgent, hurried, more mechanical certainly, but no less lovely for that. It was only as they slowed, and dawn threatened and birds sang to welcome the coming light, that Lilly found herself physically weary yet mentally wired as she lay back on the downy pillows and stared out of the sash window. It was a rare and lovely thing, to see this little corner of London on the other side of the river. Here there wasn’t the abundance of concrete, high rise and the smoke of industry that blighted the Vauxhall skyline. The Victorian lamppost right outside of the lodgings on this modest street in Chelsea reminded her ofMary Poppins, a film she had been to see with her mum when she was nine and it had hit the big screen. Not that she wanted to think about her mum right now.
Lilly knew she had never felt so happy, so content, as she did in that moment. Lying in a double bed with Wilkie’s naked, sleepy form by her side. Her body spent, warm and cosy beneath the sheets, and a feeling of pure contentment on her skin, aware that if she could stay like this for ever it would not be long enough. It was everything she had dreamed of and more.
‘I love you.’
Her voice was a whispery croak; her words had left her mouth without planning. It was a second or two before he said anything, seconds that felt like hours as each tick of the hand on the bedsideclock moved slower and louder. Her heart rate increased and what had been a moment of pure peace turned into a fraught period of fear. She silently willed him to respond, her naked bodybegginghim to respond!
Turning on to his side, Wilkie propped his head on his hand, his elbow firmly planted on the mattress.
His words were calmly yet resolutely delivered as he toyed with the end of her hair. ‘You don’t, my lovely young thing. You don’t love me.’
There it was again, that slightly patronising undertone that wasn’t present during sex, when there was parity in their connection, only in the aftermath. A voice of reason that she imagined he might reserve for his pupils.
‘But I do.’ She held her position, speaking plainly and willing him with every fibre of her being to admit to feeling the same.
‘No.’ He shook his head and sat up, propped against the headboard with his pillow cushioning his pale skin against the dark wood. His denial was a dagger that lodged in her breast, the pain just as real. Lilly closed her eyes, unable to look at the man who was negating her, confusing her, hurting her. ‘Look at me.’ He reached out and touched her cheek.
She opened her eyes, hating the tears that gathered, feeling that this emotional outburst only confirmed in his view that she was indeed a lovelyyoungthing.
‘You don’t love me, Elizabeth-Roberta.’
‘You don’t get to tell me how I feel, and you certainly don’tknowhow I feel!’ she insisted.
‘I do know that what is coursing through your body is a confusion of hormones and lust and infatuation and novelty and all that wonderful, wonderful stuff, but not love.’
‘How could you possibly know that, Wilkie?’ Her throat was hoarse with all it tried to contain.
