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CHAPTERTWENTY-ONE
Feeling excited, scared and totally out of control, Owen let Sally lead him upstairs and into her bedroom. He’d only been in there once before, when he’d made tea and toast that morning. The room then had been dishevelled, the bedclothes heaped, crumpled, and Sally, as he had never seen her before–hair all over the place, no make-up, a bruise on her cheekbone under her left eye. Now, like Sally herself, the room was neat. A cosy rosy glow from the small bedside lamps, the shimmer of peach from the pink satin throw. A slight smell of perfume, feminine. No hint of Chas… it was as if he had never been in that room. Never hit his wife. Never even existed. Sally, shapely in a fitted shift dress, full makeup and no sign of a bruise, closed the door behind them and leant against it, waiting perhaps for him to say something, do something.
He looked over her head at the closed door. He wanted to stay, give her what she wanted, but he knew he should leave. ‘This is wrong,’ he said.
‘Is it?’ She moved to stand closer to him and slipped her hands under his t-shirt.
Her hands were cool. He shivered at her touch.
She spread her fingertips, reaching up, feeling her way across his chest, her small fingers tangling his chest hair.
‘Chas is facing life imprisonment for what he’s done,’ she said. ‘I’ll be a single woman for a good long time, and you’re a single man. You are, aren’t you?’
He nodded.
‘The kiss downstairs in the kitchen–you wanted more, didn’t you?’
‘Yes.’
‘So did I.’
She coaxed him into the centre of the room. Owen closed his eyes, as if not seeing her would make the whole situation vanish. He heard her zip slowly swish as she pulled it down and, frowning, he opened his eyes again.
‘George won’t be home with Millie until gone midnight. He told me she’s taking him to the Mass at St Luke’s.’
‘But you’re George’s mum.’
Her eyes grew wide, and Owen thought she might be silently laughing at him. ‘I know, lovie,’ she said. ‘But I’m still a woman.’
‘But the age…’
‘Difference? Am I very wrinkled and ancient?’
‘No… I just meant…’
‘Not ugly, then?’
‘No, not at all. You’re beautiful. I didn’t mean…’
Not letting him finish, she asked, ‘Do you think when people pass a certain age, all natural desires simply stop?’
Owen shook his head. ‘No. I…’ he fell silent and stared at her. Truth: She was attractive. The age difference didn’t matter. He was aroused. Mightily so and right then, he wanted nothing more than to lose himself inside someone else’s body. Truth: It didn’t matter who. Truth: He was a bastard for thinking like that. He should leave her. Better for both of them.
As if he had spoken, given his answer, and she would not accept it, she drew him to the bed and pulled him to sit beside her.
‘Do you know how long it is since I had sex with a real man instead of a lump of lard?’ she asked.
Owen shook his head, surprised to be shocked by the question, though he had to agree that the description of Chas was spot on accurate.
‘Over twenty years,’ she said, letting her dress slip from her shoulders and curling her stocking-clad legs beneath her. She leant into Owen. ‘Before George’s dad.’
‘I–I worked that out.’
She smiled. ‘Good at maths too.’ The dress fell off her other shoulder, revealing the top curve of her breasts and the edge of some expensive looking black lingerie.
Owen sighed, torn between what was right and wrong. She’d told him that he lived by a list of self-imposed rules. That was true. She’d also told him to ignore one… perhaps he could ignore another.
Sally touched his face, her fingertips drifting towards his lips. ‘Owen, my beautiful young man, you must learn to live again. Please, come out of your zombie state. Your mother’s end was her own doing and your feelings or lack of them are natural.’ She ran the back of her fingers down Owen’s chest. ‘He was the one,’ she said, suddenly changing subject so that Owen was jolted into catching up as she added. ‘The man I should have spent my life with.’
