Page 8 of The Way We Are Now

‘…back for more. The thing is,’ she went on, holding and slowly moving her hand up and down a long glass, slick with Fairy Liquid, ‘I do enjoy the whole sex thing. Don’t you?’

‘Oy, d’you mind, that’s personal.’ I felt my face beneath my warm scarf redden. Not having a great deal of experience with men apart from a couple of fumbles in the sixth form and a three-month relationship I’d had with Roddy, the president of the university students’ union, in my first year here at Leeds, I wasn’t overly adept on that score.

‘And you can’t call your time with Roddy McClellan a proper relationship,’ Fliss went on. ‘He was more interested in getting students out on strike over grants and lecture hours than getting you in the sack. I think you only went out with him because of the kudos of having a political boyfriend. I mean, it’s not every day a first-year student manages to nab the president of the union.’

I nodded sadly, embarrassed, but not prepared to stand up and put in a good word for Roddy or the three months we’d been together. Roddy had spent too many of our dates surrounded by his political heavies, plotting to bring down the government and, particularly Margaret Thatcher, while consuming vast quantities of Tetley’s beer before heading for the nearest doner kebab seller in the city centre.

‘The thing is,’ I started, standing up from the skirting boards and rubbing at both my knees and my back, ‘Roddy and me…’ But I didn’t get any further as Yvonne was back, watching us from the doorway, arms folded.

‘You’re doing a lot of gossiping, you two,’ she said. ‘It’s cleaning we need, not putting the world to rights…’ She stopped talking, surveying the kitchen. ‘OK. OK, not bad. But don’t go overboard. There’s the lav and the bathroom to do as well, you know. As well as the shared lounge. Once you’ve mopped the floor…’ Yvonne thrust the mop and bucket in my direction. ‘Right, come on, you’ll definitely need your rubber gloves in the lav. And a strong stomach.’

She was right. Fliss paled as she pulled on industrial-issue black rubber gloves and, armed with a bottle of bleach and a disgusting – utterly repellently stomach-turning – toilet brush, went for it. I was left with the shower and basin, both plugholes a prehistoric landscape of hair and scum. I wondered if our bathroom up in Headingley was the same and resolved to have a good fettle around the plughole once we got back there. I was rather pleased with my efforts in this bathroom and, with Yvonne taking over the cleaning of the shared lounge, we were soon finished and instructed to move up the stairwell to the flat above.

‘What about this one?’ Fliss asked, nodding towards an adjacent door.

Yvonne perused her clipboard, shaking her head as she did so. ‘No, this one’s fine. The four in here keep the place pretty clean.’ She moved to the door on our left, took out her bunch of keys once more and opened the door. ‘To be fair, this one’s not bad either. Kitchen needs a bit of TLC but nothing like the one below. That lot downstairs are going to get such a bollocking, as well as a bill for leaving the place as they did. I shall take great pleasure in reporting them into the bargain. Right, I’m off to check a few more. I’ll leave you to it.’

‘Bet she’s off for a coffee.’ Fliss tutted. ‘I could murder one myself.’

‘We’ve not long to go now,’ I soothed. ‘We’re going to have to set off back in an hour if we don’t want to miss the start of lectures this afternoon.’ I glanced at my watch. ‘It’s eleven already.’

‘I’d be happy to miss this afternoon,’ Fliss said. ‘It’s the Modern American Novel and I’ve not read any of what’s on the list.’

‘I don’t know why you chose English lit,’ I said. ‘You don’t seem to be enjoying it much.’

‘I’m not. I’d rather be cleaning.’

‘What?’ I stared across at her. Fliss did come out with stuff that surprised me. The thing about calling her mum Tabitha for instance; she’d kept that to herself until recently. And now telling me she’d rather be cleaning than learning.

‘Forget it.’ Fliss seemed suddenly sad. ‘That makes me sound like a right weirdo, doesn’t it? It’s only because I’ve spent too much time trying to track down Theodore Mandeville rather than getting on with my coursework.’

‘Who’s Theodore Mandeville?’ There was always someone Fliss fancied and was in pursuit of. She seemed to go through men at a rate of knots, and I envied her ability to chat and charm and flirt with anyone of the opposite sex. She’d even been chatting up the postman this morning before we left. Men just loved Fliss, loved her mass of auburn hair, her stunning figure and her ability to make everyone she met, male or female, young and old, feel as if they were special. I suppose that’s the definition of charisma. Whatever she had, people loved her for it.

‘You know, the guy in the Wimpy Bar yesterday. Always surrounded by a posse of gorgeous men and glamorous girls. I’ve been trying to hunt him down for ages. I found out his name.’

‘Poor bloke.’ I laughed at that. ‘Come on, no one’s going to fancy you in those black rubber gloves.’

‘Ooh, I don’t know.’ Fliss pulled a lascivious face. ‘There are a lot of rubber fetishists around, you know.’

‘Are there? I don’t know any.’

‘Well, no.’ She grinned. ‘But you’re not looking for them, are you? We really need to educate you a little, Anna.’

‘What we need, Fliss, is to finish this flat. Come on, I’ll do the bathroom this time; you make a start on the kitchen. It doesn’t look too bad.’

I picked up bleach, loo rolls and cloths and headed for the bathroom on my right.

‘Bloody hell, sorry!’ I backed out immediately, my face flaming as my eyes met those of an incredibly attractive and very naked man, stepping out of the bath.

Fliss, it would seem, had run Theodore Mandeville to ground.

3

By five that afternoon, I was ensconced in the Brotherton Library, on the main campus of the university on Woodhouse Lane. I adored this place, loved everything about the 1930s neoclassical building with its art deco fittings and aura of peace and tranquillity. After my cleaning stint that morning, followed by a three-hour full-on lecture on ‘Justice, Conflict and Community’, it was bliss just to sit, take in the other students working late as I was, while researching an area of my degree I found totally fascinating.

My course allowed a one-year placement in our third year, and I was spending a lot of time preparing for the thing I wanted more than anything – to be placed with an MP in Westminster, but with options to work at a party headquarters, in a constituency office or other political organisation. But so did every other damned student on the course. Places were limited and there was a fierce rivalry amongst those of us who’d opted for this dream. Of course, as my dad had warned me, there’d always be those who got a place because of who they knew. If your uncle or your father’s business associate happened to know an MP, or your mother played golf and lunched with the wife of said MP, you were halfway there. Seeing as my mum couldn’t tell you where the nearest golf course was, and my dad, on account of his being a Polish Jew, would have been turned down flat by members of any club, I was going to have to fight particularly hard, and on my own merits, to secure a place in London in the summer.

Frank was sitting opposite me, head deep in his notes, his spidery handwriting flying across the page as he attempted to get to grips with the coursework. He’d looked up and across at me every couple of minutes, his grey eyes peering over his small old-fashioned spectacles, his breathing stertorous, needing to know I was still there.