‘You’ve done it before. I mean, you’ve been with someone?’

A muscle twitched in his face. ‘No one like you. No one that I’ve really loved. I want to know what it’s like with the woman I truly love.’

Moved, she reached up and stroked his face.

‘Just give me a bit more time,’ she said.

She knew, with every week that passed, that she must soon give in. Their time together now always ended up the same, with each of them naked to the waist, touching, arousing each other and then pulling away with a sense of things remaining unfinished, and though Simon was patient with her, she could tell he was frustrated. She had some idea, also, from a chance remark Ann made, that it was bad for men not to have their desire satisfied. Ann, she imagined, must be satisfying Gordon’s desires quite freely. And Katie had some idea that if men were kept from sexual release, it actually injured them.

This time, when Simon leaned round and looked at her with such a wretchedness of desire, she knew she couldn’t say no. They had the house to themselves and she could not hold back from him any longer.

‘I do want you,’ she whispered. ‘Really I do.’

He was working his fingers inside her blouse, his eyes glazing with desire.

‘Will you let me this time, my darling? I’m just burning for you – I don’t think I can wait much longer.’

She followed him upstairs, led by the hand, feeling her legs turn weak with anticipation of what was about to happen. She had never seen a naked man, or been naked herself in front of anyone, not even her mother, for many years now.

Inside the room there was an awkwardness of removing clothes, which seemed to go on for a long time. Stripped to the waist, Simon turned to her. His upper body was familiar, lovely to her, with the V of dark hair on his chest. Otherwise he was smooth to her touch.

‘I’ve got some French letters. We don’t want to get you into any trouble.’

When they were both naked, he held her close. Feeling him hard against her, his penis like a strange branch coming out from him, the smells of their bodies, she wanted reassurance.

‘Do you love me?’ she asked, looking up, round-eyed.

‘Oh, my darling, of course I do!’ He reached down and kissed each of her breasts in turn. ‘Oh, lie back for me, will you – quickly, there’s a girl. I need you so much.’

The eiderdown was cold under her back. She waited as Simon sat with his back to her. She heard him curse quietly, and a horrible smell of rubber crept to her and she realized he was putting the French letter on. Then his warmth came down on top of her, his body thrusting hurriedly between her legs, and in those seconds before he managed to get inside her she thought: Oh my God, oh Jesus and Mary, what am I doing? And it was painful and intensely strange, and soon delicious as well and there was no going back. It was soon over, though. Simon seemed lost in his own feelings, and when he climaxed she held him, soothing him and stroking his back as he gasped and then was calm. That she could give someone such pleasure!