Master of the House. Justine Elyot

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СКАЧАТЬ of our meeting was wearing off, I thought more about Joss and how things were with him. The alcohol thing was sobering – so to speak – as was his general air of dejection and defeat. If he wasn’t careful, he might find that it was the tip of a steep decline. Within a few years, the beautiful young man with the world at his feet I had known and loved might be a puffy-faced and red-eyed waster.

      I shouldn’t care, but I did.

      I spent half a minute doodling on my notepad before I realised that the meeting was over.

      ‘Oh,’ I said, standing up to find only me and the editor still in the stuffy little room. ‘Right. Better get on then.’

      ‘Yes,’ she said, giving me a crooked look. ‘Sorry, Lucy, but … do you know what you’re covering today? You seem a bit … distant.’

      ‘It’s the heat,’ I told her. ‘Goes to my head sometimes. Would you mind …?’

      ‘Open day at the fire station,’ she said, a tad wearily. ‘Look, I know it’s not international politics here, but …’

      ‘It’s not that, I promise. I’m happy here. I love working for the Voice.’

      ‘Good. OK. Well, say hi to those hunky firefighters for me, won’t you? Everyone wanted this job. Don’t say I never do anything for you.’

      She winked and I smiled back.

      If only the hunky firefighters had the power to lure my mind away from Joss and his absurd proposition.

      With dull, mechanical attention I watched them go down their poles and wield their hoses, while in the forefront of my mind phrases like collared submissive and we were good together tormented me like an out-of-control earworm.

      I filed my copy then I went home and Googled ‘dominance and submission’ until the sun went down and my eyelids needed propping up.

      My dreams plaited themselves with my thoughts and I spent the night in a psychic shimmer of shiny black latex and gimp masks and riding crops. They became senselessly entwined, my waking thoughts continuing from my dreams and my dreams seeming more like waking thoughts until the early hours when Joss broke into them. He was with me, beside me, holding my hand, talking in gentle hypnotic tones about how it wouldn’t hurt when he whipped me, how it would feel more like a kiss. The kiss he gave me, so real, so warm, so much what I wanted and needed and couldn’t live without …

      I woke up in a sweat and nearly sobbed out loud when I found that he wasn’t there.

      Mum and Animal were sprawled on the living-room floor, last night’s full ashtrays and empty bottles all around them.

      I stepped over them, went downstairs to the yard and called Joss.

      ‘Lulu,’ he said, sounding sleepy and warm and in bed.

      ‘I’ll do it,’ I told him. ‘But I have conditions.’

      ‘Of course,’ he said, totally alert now. ‘Just name them. Are you free later? We should meet.’

      ‘Lunch?’

      ‘Lunch. The Trout?’

      ‘You’re paying.’

      He sighed. ‘All right.’

      ‘And I don’t necessarily mean for the meal.’

      ‘Woah,’ he said, and I hung up.

      The Trout was a picturesque black-and-white pub on the river, with a mill wheel and a popular garden. Narrowboats and cruisers drifted by while I waited for Joss at one of the white-painted wrought-iron tables with a bottle of Vimto.

      How many of those boating couples were happy? Any of them? All of them?

      They had taken that chance, given their hearts, and now they cut through the waters of life with such ease, leaving only the smallest of ripples in their wake.

      ‘Am I late?’

      He looked mouth-watering in a white linen shirt and trousers in a darker cream shade – perhaps a size bigger than they used to be, but a little extra weight suited him, gave him a more solid presence.

      ‘No, I was early,’ I said, sucking on my straw.

      ‘Oh, God, the ubiquitous Vimto,’ he said. ‘I’m going to get a beer – can I get you anything?’

      ‘No, you’re not,’ I said. ‘You can have a lemonade or a posh fizzy water or something. I won’t talk to you if you drink.’

      He looked tight-lipped and furious for a moment, then he shrugged.

      ‘Whatever you say,’ he said, then he stomped off to the bar.

      Oh, why did I have this awful backwash of emotion for a man who sulked and threw strops?

      His little fit of pique was forgotten, though, by the time he came back with a tall glass of something transparent and carbonated, and two laminated menus.

      ‘Give us a sip,’ I said, reaching for his glass.

      ‘I didn’t put vodka in it, if that’s what you’re thinking,’ he said, but he was lying. He had.

      I emptied it on to the grass while he swiped at it, growling, ‘For fuck’s sake, you’re not my mother,’ under his breath.

      ‘I know,’ I said. ‘My mother was the opposite. “Just have a drink, Luce, lighten up and have a drink.” But I spent more of my teenage years than I care to remember cleaning up her vomit and her spilled cans of cider from the floor of the van. So, y’know.’

      I bit my cheek and looked away.

      He sat down.

      ‘I know,’ he said, all quiet and sympathetic now.

      ‘I’ll get you another,’ I said, and took my empty bottle and his glass back to the bar with me.

      ‘That’s one of my conditions,’ I said, returning with two San Pellegrinos. ‘Sorry, I didn’t ask if you wanted ice and lemon, but you’ve got them.’

      ‘Fine. I’ll pretend it’s gin. What’s one of your conditions?’

      He took a sip of the water and grimaced.

      ‘You don’t drink when you’re with me.’

      ‘Lulu, I don’t need a saviour,’ he said.

      ‘Don’t flatter yourself. It’s not that I care about you. I just hate the company of stinking, slobbering drunks. OK?’

      ‘That hurt,’ he said, bringing out the big-gun puppy-dog eyes.

      I laughed.

      ‘Considering what you’ve got in store for me, that’s a bit rich,’ I remarked.

      His cartoon sad-face turned into СКАЧАТЬ