Unnatural Order. Liz Porter

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      ‘I know Kristina didn’t mean to knock the wine over,’ he said. ‘It made Oliver even less pleased with her than before. But I bet she’s not sorry that it went all over you.’

      ‘Except that she should have poured it over Oliver.’ Caroline filled the basin with another lot of cold water.

      ‘Come on, you’re not exactly innocent, my darling.’

      ‘Good heavens, I refused his offer of a guided tour of all the galleries.’

      ‘Yes, but you made it clear you’d see him in London.’

      ‘Well, why shouldn’t I exchange addresses with him? We live two suburbs away from one another. We might have a drink together some time.’ Probably several drinks, she thought. And bed? Perhaps. She was enjoying Oliver’s puppy-like habit of dropping nuggets of information about art and Portugal at her feet.

      Also, as a journalist, she had a great deal of respect for pure information, no matter how randomly collected.

      ‘And it’ll be nice to go to a gallery with someone who at least claims to be able to explain Jackson Pollock.

      ‘Claims would certainly be the word,’ said Karl. ‘He’ll spend hours memorising sections from his art history book, just so he can impress you.’

      ‘In fact he doesn’t impress me at all,’ said Caroline. ‘I just find him… decorative. And what are you smirking at?’

      Karl sat up. ‘Look, Caroline, I know you can fancy a man even when you don’t like him. I laugh because I am amused by the way you always spill water on the floor whenever you do anything at the basin. And you never notice. It’s your total inattention to practicalities. I’ve never seen anything like it.’

      Caroline looked down and noticed a small puddle of water on the carpet. She shrugged and turned the tap off.

      ‘I can just imagine what the kitchen looks like when you cook.’

      ‘What makes you think I cook?’

      ‘Never mind.’ Karl stretched out one arm and pulled at the zipper on her skirt.

      ‘When you come back to Germany with me I’ll cook for you.’

      Caroline lay against him on the bed, nuzzling her head under his arm. Pulling up his T-shirt, she rubbed her nose in the blond tufts of hair in his armpit.

      ‘Does that mean you might come back with me?’

      She ran her hand down his stomach and slid it under the waistband of his underpants.

      ‘You’re so predictable,’ she said, moving her hand around to squeeze the taut muscles of his buttocks.

      ‘Do you mean me,’ he said, ‘or him?’ He took her other hand and pushed it down the front of his jeans. ‘Both of you.’

      ‘So you will come?’

      ‘I’m thinking about it.’

      Caroline woke, alone, in a room glowing with sunlight. On Karl’s pillow was a battered book. Its front cover was missing and the back one was half torn away. She looked at the spine. The Collected Works of Byron.

      She laughed aloud as a note fell out of the book.

      ‘Good morning, sleeping beauty,’ it said. ‘Couldn’t sleep. Went for a walk and found a secondhand bookshop – and this. Look at the two pages where there are book marks – I think we should follow his travel hints.’

      Caroline opened the book at the first mark and found a passage marked in pencil.

      Lo! Cintra’s glorious Eden intervenes

       In variegated maze of mount and glen.

       Ah, me! What hand can pencil guide, or pen,

       To follow half on which the eye dilates

       Through views more dazzling unto mortal ken

       Than those whereof such things the Bard relates.

      At the second bookmark a passage was marked in red.

      The castled crags of Drachenfels

       Frowns o’er the wide and winding Rhine,

       Whose breast of waters broadly swells

       Between the banks which bear the vine;

      The door opened and Karl came in, holding a tray.

      ‘Childe Harold’s pilgrimage. What better tourist guide could you have?’ he said. ‘But before we leave to follow in his footsteps, here’s two cafe com leite.’

      Caroline jumped out of bed and took the tray, setting it down on the bedside table.

      He smiled down at her, his eyes sea-green.

      ‘Why do you continue to be so impossibly nice?’ She reached out and stroked his cheek. ‘You know that I have been feeling pressured by your… your seriousness. And instead of sulking that I wasn’t returning your feelings, you’ve just been so graceful and dignified about everything.’

      ‘I don’t know.’ Karl took her hand in his. ‘I just want you. I like to make you happy. And I thought, if it makes her happy not to talk about feelings, well I won’t.’

      He dropped her hand and slumped into a large armchair by the window.

      ‘But I don’t understand you. I like the way you’re different from the other women I’ve known. But you’re too different. When you make love with me, I think that you care about me. Yet other times, you’re so detached. So I’m trying not to think about it all. I don’t always succeed.’

      Caroline stared past him out the window.

      ‘Can’t we just pretend we’re having a nice holiday romance, and then at the end of the week, we’ll see how we feel?’ She walked into the bathroom and turned on the shower.

      ‘Anyway,’ she called over her shoulder, ‘you’ll probably hate me by then.’

      Shutting the bathroom door, she stepped into the shower recess. If only she could get away somewhere and assess her feelings. She had felt so close to Karl last night. In the semi-darkness of the fado performance she had studied his features with quiet relish.

      Next to him, Oliver had looked like a little boy showing off. So far, they even seemed to have some interests in common: books at least. And he touched her with such passion and such delicacy. Thinking about it made her thighs go weak.

      Would she miss Karl if she were back in London now? Probably. But she couldn’t imagine the feeling. And how would she feel if some female Oliver turned up and laid siege to his vanity? Furious. But even if they were well suited, what then? She could hardly go and live in Germany. And there would be no point in him moving to London. She didn’t know whether she wanted to stay there herself. She loved her working conditions at London Woman: high СКАЧАТЬ