From Biddy: You still coming?? Hurry! I want you inside me!

* * *

Later that evening I closed Biddy’s bedroom door. ‘Sorry about that, I just felt …’

Downton Abbey was blaring in the living room, Noel and Winford arguing, Cedric losing his shit.

‘Yeah, it was a bit awks,’ Biddy said.

‘It’s just … he was being so mean, all that stuff he was saying.’

‘Sadly, that’s just Win when he’s maggoted. When he’s sober, he’s –’

‘He couldn’t be nicer when he’s sober.’

‘Noel knows what he’s like with a drink. He avoids him too, he’s sick of it.’

We sat on her bed, started kissing. Barking. Winford shouting, ‘It’s all right for them with their poly shit.’

My left arm on Biddy’s back, my right hand stroking her neck, my mind on … Sarah. Fuck. Was she OK? Should I have left her alone? She’d be on the phone to Zac, or fucking Mick, or fucking Zac.

‘Zac said you’ve invited him to a pub quiz,’ I said.

‘Um, kind of,’ Biddy said. ‘He texted me on Monday to ask if we could hang out sometime. I told him I’d be going to a pub quiz with my workmates next week if he wanted to tag along.’

‘Right, because he said –’

She undid my jeans, pulled at the denim, started kissing me again, stopped, got up from the bed, stood over me, pulled harder.

I leant forwards, tried to help. ‘Hang on.’

‘You don’t think I can do it?’ She stood back, pulled her dress over her head. Soft skin in the lamplight, her lips still wet from kissing, her creamy scent everywhere in the room.

‘It’s just that I’m stronger.’

She laughed. ‘You really think so?’

Cedric barking, Sophie’s cough. Could I hear it, her cough? She was a kilometre and a half away, sleeping off the mushroom root and echinacea.

‘I’m just being honest,’ I said. ‘It’s the way we’re built.’

She kicked her dress away, pushed me back onto the mattress, straddled me, clamped my ribcage with her thighs, pinned my arms to the bed, behind my head. ‘Say yield.’

‘As if.’ I laughed, let myself relax, launched a surprise attack to throw her –

Fuck – no budging.

‘Say yield and I’ll let you go.’

Was she joking? ‘Yeah, sure, OK.’ I rammed her with my pelvis, buckaroo-style and – I wriggled, pushed, pulled.

‘Say yield.’

I … It wasn’t fair. I had two romantic relationships, two kids – I was sleep-deprived, a diminished human.

‘Oh no,’ I said, retching. ‘I’m going to throw up.’

‘Oh.’ She let go of my hands.

I flipped her from me, rolled deftly onto my stomach, got onto my knees, lurched onto her naked back – fuck, she smelt good – held her down on the mattress.

‘You jerk,’ she said, writhing.

‘Say yield.’

‘Never.’