The One Read online

went out dating again?"

  Damn! What was she trying to do to me? Is she trying to crush me every time she sees me? I sighed audibly, my shoulders sank. I suddenly realised I had been trying to maintain a pose of shoulders back, chest out, stomach in. Why? I wasn't interested in her, twice bitten and all that. She certainly wasn't interested in me, so why do we males pose like that? I haven't seen this woman in twenty years, the girl of my dreams who virtually squeezed every breath of life out of me and she wasn't content with just that, she wanted to heel me under the earth, to erase my very existence, to snuff out my actual essence. What the hell did I ever do to her other than worship the very ground she walked on?

  "Thirty-nine months." I said it very quietly. She had to lean forward, conspiratorially.

  "What?"

  "Three years, three months and about ten days or so."

  That shut her up. At bloody last! Fifteen-forty, new balls please, stopped the rot in my service game. Studying her face, she looked amazing, she was never 45 years old. She must bathe her skin in virgin ice crystals flown in daily from Mont Blanc; she was eleven out of ten, off the scale, simply beautiful. However, I could sense some cogs moving somewhere in her head.

  "Before dating or before sex?"

  "Both, same night," I said, "Well, after midnight actually, the second one of the two." 

  "Wow! I was going to boast how long I waited, but I don't think I will now."

  "That's just acting like kids isn't it? Like I showed you mine, you should at least flash me yours." It didn't look like she was going to answer. Ice Queen, I was right about the Mont Blanc ice, only she sits on a block of it rather than splash it on her physog.

  "OK, then, another tack,” I said, “When did you start seeing your husband?" Gotcha!

  "Oh, do we have to do this? We are too old and there's been too much water under the bridge for all this. Can't we just kiss cheeks and make out that we are old friends again and part on good terms, probably never to see each other ever again?"

  "Wriggle, wriggle, wriggle. You prevaricated in the restaurant twenty years ago, you are hedging in the coffee shop now. When we meet again, as two old pensioners, can we meet up in the launderette so I can at least sort out my week's washing while you prance round the mulberry bush one more time?"

  "Alright, alright. I'll tell you." she looked upwards, for divine inspiration, or intervention. "Give me strength." She looked at me directly, her eyes seemed softer, even prettier than they ever had.

  "I thought you'd be back next day, then after the weekend, almost certainly a week later. No-one was admitting they knew where you were. I realised that our friends were my friends, you didn't seem to have any of your own that I was aware of. It appeared as though your whole world was ... me. I never realised how much I had hurt you, hurt us, killed our relationship."

  She grabbed my right hand in both hers and squeezed me, as hard as Natalie had when David was born. A single tear formed in each eye and slowly rolled down her cheeks. I lifted my left hand and cupped her right cheek, which was soft as a child's and smooth as alabaster, wiping the tear away with my thumb, then wiped her left cheek with a gentle stroke of the back of my hand. She smiled sweetly and continued.

  "So I gave it a month, surely that was long enough to pay me back for my treatment of you, wasn't it? But no show. Then four months and your birthday, I sent you a card and a long letter and some flowers to your Mum's address. Then I sent Christmas cards to you both. You didn't send me one, nor did your mother, nor would she answer the phone and slammed the door in my face when I went round at New Year. Valentines Day I sent another card, then it was our sixth anniversary, ten months without seeing or hearing from you. Finally, it was a year since you walked out and I didn't have any hope left. I lost a lot of weight. It was summer and I lost the house, too. I couldn't keep up the payments on my own and I'd run out of savings. I sold the house and sent your mum a cheque. God! Did you get it? I know it was cashed -"

  "Yes, I got it. Mum did keep your cards and mail for me, I picked them up that summer passing through. I used the sixty-five thousand, along with my savings to put a deposit on my house. So, when did Mr Two-Carat come along?" I pointed to her lovely blue-white diamond.

  "About fourteen and a half months after you left, other than a new wardrobe I had blown the rest of the house money on a flat share with Alison, who you don't know, and my very best friend Lucy, who you probably do remember."

  "I remember Luce," I smiled. "She made the wearing of blue jeans and knotted tee-shirts an art form. Whatever happened to her?"

  "You don't want to know."

  "No?"

  "Don't go there."

  "What if I wanted to, if I was a free agent, for example." I grinned mischievously, "Just supposing."

  Lesley sighed. "Four children, four different fathers, none of whom pay support and...," she paused, "... The only way she can get through doors is like a crab would."

  She looked at me with her mouth set and tilted her head to one side as if to say I told you that you wouldn't want to know but you wouldn't take no for an answer, happy now? Well, Lesley didn't know how my own situation was about to go tits-up, so I was keeping my options open. Lucy, now, you never know she might be as desperate as I was about to become.

  "So you were sharing a flat with Luce and Ali, what then?"

  "What then? Luce was temping as a receptionist and her office were having a picnic for staff and families, and Luce dragged me along as a guest. I met Hubby there and we sort off ... clicked."

  "So, date followed and then sex?"

  "No, sex first, date later." Lesley actually blushed. "In fact, we hardly dated at all, just met for sex, great sex and lots of it. We were both so busy with work that we mainly just met for sex. I know that sounds really bad but I hadn't had any in a long time. Fifteen months was fifteen cycles when I was at my most fertile and I wasn't having what I really missed. You were gone for good. I was horny and he was devastatingly handsome, still is, and dynamite in the bedroom, still ... much too much information."

  The damned Mont Blanc ice she was sitting on must have run down the drain, her face was so red. Damn, why is it that women look even sexier when they are embarrassed and losing a little control over their emotions, than when they are playing ice cool and are holding everything together? Or is it just me that feels that way?

  "Was he your only other lover?"

  Why do I torture myself even asking? No, impossible, every man in this room, everyone who has walked past us has almost walked into something because they were looking at Lesley. Health and Safety should make her carry around a fluorescent warning sign. She can't have restricted herself to just two lovers, especially after dumping me so she could play the field, surely.

  She nodded. Damn again. I know that women can't be trusted, ever, from bitter bloody experience ... but I believed her. I really didn't feel any better, knowing she was married to mister bloody perfect lover.

  "So," Lesley resumed, "What have you been doing with yourself lately?"

  I smiled. So much to say and so much not to. She didn't say "since", so I guessed I could limit myself to a quick sketch, leaving out all the important details. Or I could throw it all back at her, of course.

  "Well, as I've got in the coffees, perhaps you could give me an update first?"

  She regarded me, trying to read what I was thinking, or hiding, and why I was playing with her? A slow enigmatic smile formed on her full red lips. She was made up to perfection, not heavily so, enough to darken and perhaps lengthen her eyelashes from the light brown natural that I remembered, her lips glossy red, her cheeks smooth and matt, no doubt from some subtle proprietary foundation preparation. Her dark red hair full and thick, brushed away from her open forehead and tied in a neat bun at the back of her head, a few stray hairs like delicate whispers softening her delicious outline. She looked stunning.

  "I'm an investment broker, advising on life insurance, ISAs, income tax and investment portfolios.
I cover this immediate area for the Lotto. I've just met a lovely old couple here in their hotel suite this morning, who have won the jackpot and I left some proposals for them to consider." Lesley paused, with a smile on her face recalling the recent meeting, no doubt.

  "Go on," I encouraged.

  "I live over by West Park," her voice lifting as if questioning whether I was aware of the exclusive executive-type homes in that area; it was a long way from where I live. "We have one girl, Belinda, who is at college studying catering, she wants to be a pastry chef, perhaps own her own shop. Either that or do three-day eventing!" She smiled, at the recollection of her daughter.

  I imagined what Belinda was like, she could have been our daughter in another life, as beautiful as Lesley is, I'm sure. As she must've been at least 18 to be in college, it seemed that Lesley didn't wait long to set about finding 'the one'. It took me three years before I even started dating anyone, by then Lesley was the mother of a toddler.

  Still bearing that sweet smile on her lovely face, Lesley softly asked, "What about you?"

  I think I snorted, unintentionally. That wasn't a good start. Why should I resent her perfect life, fulfilling well-paid job, great home, probably driving around in a top of the range BMW or Lexus, stunning ambitious daughter, lucky bloody lucky husband and looking sensational herself to boot. It wasn't fair, was it? But nobody ever promised me