Dead Romantic

by Simon Brett

  Paul, on the other hand, would go home in a state of new turbulence, and, in the sweaty creases of his bed, graft the recent memory of Sharon’s lips on to the composite fantasy woman who directed the desperate movements of his hand.

  That evening they sat on the top of the bus as usual, and as usual Paul asked Sharon how work had gone, and she, as usual but with minor variations, told him how a Frenchman had come in and bought some hair lacquer that he thought was deodorant and how the store detective had stopped an old lady who tried to walk out with a jar of bath-salts.

  Then she asked him how his studying was going. She did this only out of politeness. At school her only concern had been how soon she could leave and get a job, but she was well brought up and she knew you had to show an interest.

  ‘All right, I think,’ Paul replied. ‘I’ve got this very good teacher.’

  The image of Madeleine, her red-gold hair loose and flowing, flashed across his mind, and he felt a pang of disloyalty for being with Sharon.

  ‘We’ve been working on Keats,’ he continued.

  ‘Oh yes?’ said Sharon.

  ‘Good stuff. Have you read any?’

  She shook her head. ‘Don’t think so. What’s he write?’

  ‘Well, he’s a Romantic, really.’

  ‘Oh.’ She grew animated. ‘I might have read some of his things then. I read a lot of that. Is he in Mills and Boon?’

  ‘No. No, he was a poet. Early nineteenth century. Died young.’

  ‘Oh.’ The animation was replaced by indifference. Paul was deeply embarrassed by her ignorance. He felt exposed, as if he were responsible for her, as if he would be judged by her.

  ‘Reading a good one at the moment,’ said Sharon. ‘It’s set on Crete. Sounds really nice. I’d like to go to Crete. They have wonderful sunsets there, apparently.’

  ‘Oh.’

  ‘You ever been there? Crete, or Greece?’

  Paul shook his head.

  ‘Girl I work with went to Corfu. Ipsos. Lovely she said it was. Really good discos they have. Every night. I like discos,’ she added wistfully.

  Well, it was worth trying. She had expressed her liking for discos to Paul before. She thought going to one might enliven their dates. She enjoyed dancing in public, showing off the steps she practised so assiduously in front of her bedroom mirror. But, from what he said, Paul didn’t seem to like discos. So far he had not risen to any of her suggestions.

  That evening’s met the same lack of response. Accepting this philosophically, Sharon went on with the plot of the book she was reading. ‘You see, what happens is this feller’s in Crete on business and he meets this English girl, Virginia, who’s out there working as a courier and he falls for her and they have this amazing evening where they just walk along the sand and talk and, you know, it really works, it’s the real thing. And he fixes to meet her the next evening, but when he gets to this restaurant where they fixed to meet – “taverna” they call it in the book – that’s Greek for restaurant, I think – anyway, he sees her dancing very close with this Greek. And he’s furious and goes off, but he doesn’t realise that this Greek is one of the owners of the company that Virginia works for and, you know, although it looks sexy, in fact they’re just being friendly. And the trouble is, he – this feller, the Englishman, Randall he’s called – he’s going back to England the next day, and so Virginia rushes off from this taverna place to try and find him and explain, but he’s checked out of his hotel and when she gets to the airport, she finds he’s taken an earlier flight and he’s gone.’

  She pronounced this with finality. ‘So what happens?’ asked Paul.

  ‘That’s as far as I’ve got,’ admitted Sharon. ‘But I know it’ll be all right. They’ll get together in the end.’

  ‘How do you know that?’

  ‘They always do.’

  ‘Doesn’t it make it a bit boring, knowing what’s going to happen?’

  Sharon looked at him curiously. He really did say the oddest things at times. ‘No, that’s what’s nice about it.’

  ‘Oh.’

  ‘Happy endings are nice. Does that feller you was talking about – Keats – do his poems have happy endings?’

  ‘Don’t think so, much. There’s a lot about death in his poems, death and love going together, Pleasure and Pain, you know.’

  Sharon shivered. ‘Don’t think I’d like it much. My Mum always says there’s enough nasty things in the world without people writing about them.’

  Paul couldn’t think of anything to say to that. There was a silence. Then, for something to do, he reached out impulsively and took her hand. She did not seem to mind and gave his a reassuring squeeze. Greatly daring, he leant across and brushed his lips against hers. They were warm and seemed possibly to open slightly at the contact. He was instantly aroused, though, in a sitting posture, this did not cause him problems.

  He looked into her clear blue eyes, blank as boiled sweets. ‘You’ve got nice eyes,’ he said.

  ‘Thank you.’ She gave his hand a friendly squeeze.

  Emboldened, he continued, ‘In fact, all of you’s nice. ‘You’re just nice.’

  ‘So are you,’ said Sharon, to be polite.

  He leant across and placed his large lips on hers, which parted slightly and pressed back with some enthusiasm. Sharon did not mind being kissed in public. In fact, in many ways she felt safer being kissed in public than when she was alone with a feller. On the top of a bus there was no danger of anything going too far, so she was prepared to be responsive.

  Paul misread the reason for her warmth. He felt suddenly ecstatic, uplifted. She really fancies me, he thought. She’s really panting for me. She wants me. Right, tonight’s the night. We won’t go to the cinema, we’ll just have a few drinks, get her a bit tanked up, then back to her place, I’ll ask to come in for a coffee, and then we’ll do it, quick, before her Mum and Dad get back from the pub. The restaurant part keeps going after closing-time, they’re never back till after midnight, I’ve got plenty of time. She wants it, too, no question about that. God, the time I’ve wasted. Should have got in there straight away.

  He drew back from the kiss, smiled and leant forward for another little peck. She smiled back, a nice, safe, domestic smile. He looked out of the window. ‘Hey, we’re there!’

  He grabbed her hand and they scampered down the stairs, both feeling good, full of youth. On the pavement, he put his arm round her shoulder and planted a little kiss on her cheek.

  ‘You are nice,’ he repeated, incapable of further invention.

  ‘So are you,’ she repeated, polite again.

  Relief flooded through him. It was going to be all right. She fancied him.

  Pulling her by the hand, he ran down towards the pub. Sharon, who thought he was behaving a bit oddly but couldn’t see that there was any harm in it, ran along with him.

  The euphoria lasted into the pub. Paul felt in charge, felt for the first time for ages that he was dictating events rather than being dictated to. ‘Don’t think we’ll go to the flicks,’ he said authoritatively. ‘Just have a few drinks.’

  ‘All right.’ Sharon was disappointed. There was a Shirley MacLaine picture on at the ABC ONE that her friend at work had said was frightfully sad, and Sharon had really quite fancied seeing that. But on a date it should really be the feller’s decision, she supposed, so she’d better go along with what he said.

  ‘Then maybe back to your place for a coffee,’ Paul continued, atypically brave.

  ‘All right.’ Sharon acquiesced to that idea too, but she was aware of the warning sign. Still, she’d been lucky with Paul so far and, if he did try anything on, she felt confident she could handle it. She’d dealt with much more persistent boys in the past. And it was only to be expected. Paul had been slower than most, but there came a time when all of them, for reasons she recognised but did not fully understand, seemed to want a bit of a cuddle on the sofa. She would just ensure that it wasn’t more than a cuddle.
r />   ‘So what are you drinking?’

  ‘I’ll have a bitter lemon, thank you, Paul.’

  ‘Oh, come on. Have a gin in it.’

  Another warning sign. ‘A bitter lemon, thank you, Paul,’ she repeated, with some asperity. ‘On its own.’

  He couldn’t argue further. She went to find a seat in one of the booths along the walls, while he ordered the drinks. He got her bitter lemon and, rather than his usual light ale, a whisky for himself. He didn’t like the taste much, but he thought he might need a bit of bolstering that evening. When it was put down on the counter, the whisky looked very small, so he asked for a double. That still looked small, so he drowned it in water. He was surprised how much it cost.

  ‘What’s that you’re drinking?’ Sharon asked suspiciously as he sat down.

  ‘Whisky,’ he replied with some bravado.

  ‘I see,’ she said, recognising a third warning sign. But she did not stop him from taking her hand.

  ‘You’re nice,’ he said, still stuck for a development of the compliment.

  This time she didn’t reciprocate, but that didn’t worry him. His confidence was overweeningly high. It was going to work. He would just be firm and it would happen.

  There was silence between them. Silence never worried Sharon. In fact, very little worried Sharon. There were things in life which she recognised to be annoyances, but she knew how to deal with them.

  Into their silence came conversation from the invisible occupants of the adjoining booth. A man’s voice. ‘Yes, it is sad, but one learns to accept it. One learns to accept everything, I suppose, after a time. I suppose that’s what happened with my marriage. I’ve just accepted that there’s something that used to be in my life and is no longer there. Nothing good seems to last.’

  A woman’s voice. ‘ “Joy, whose hand is ever at his lips, Bidding adieu.” ’

  Paul was electrified. Sharon winced at the involuntary squeeze he gave to her hand. ‘What’s the matter?’

  But he only had ears for the conversation behind him. He took a gulp of the watery whisky.

  ‘Yes,’ said the man’s voice. ‘Love can die. Or be killed by external circumstances.’

  ‘Or’, said Madeleine’s voice, thick with emotion, ‘the one you love can die, and the love itself can stay alive.’

  ‘And never be transferred to someone else?’

  ‘It would take a long time. And maybe it would not be the same love.’

  ‘No. Maybe not.’ But the man’s voice sounded happy rather than sad.

  They sank into their own silence. ‘What is the matter with you?’ asked Sharon, breaking the other silence.

  ‘Nothing. I just think. . . You’d really like to see that movie, wouldn’t you?’

  ‘Well, yes, but if you’d rather

  ‘Let’s go.’ Paul rose abruptly. ‘We’ll just get there if we. . .’

  His voice trailed away as he heard Madeleine’s saying, ‘I’ll get us another drink. No, really, it is my turn.’

  There was no escape. He stood transfixed as she rounded the corner of the booth. She looked to him more beautiful than ever, the wonderful hair loose, a heightened flush on the cheeks beneath those violet-blue eyes.

  ‘Paul. Hello. What a surprise.’

  He mouthed hopelessly.

  ‘Aren’t you going to introduce me to your friend?’

  ‘We, er, were just going.’

  Madeleine looked at him quizzically, demanding a response.

  ‘Yes. Right. This is Sharon. Sharon Wilkinson. Sharon – Miss Severn, my, er . . . my teacher.’

  ‘Pleased to meet you,’ said Sharon, with a common little nod.

  ‘Where are you two off to?’ Madeleine didn’t mean it to sound patronising, but it made Paul feel about eleven. He looked at Sharon and, by comparison with the older woman, she seemed gawky, unformed, vulgar.

  ‘Flicks,’ Sharon replied. ‘Shirley MacLaine movie. Supposed to be dead romantic.’

  ‘Oh. Well, have a good evening.’ With a little smile, Madeleine moved across to the bar.

  ‘Thank you,’ said Paul.

  ‘Nice to meet you,’ Sharon called out politely.

  Crimson with shame, Paul scuttled out of the pub. Bewildered and disowned, Sharon followed.

  ‘I think it was all right,’ said Madeleine as she handed Bernard his drink.

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘That was one of my Garrettway students. I don’t think he saw you, though.’

  ‘Well, why shouldn’t he . . . ?’

  ‘Your wife,’ Madeleine murmured conspiratorially. ‘We don’t want anything to get back to her. If it gets round Garrettway, Mrs Franklin’s such a frightful gossip. . .’

  Bernard Hopkins felt obscurely pleased. Madeleine’s desire for secrecy meant that she saw the meeting as more than just two colleagues having a drink, implied perhaps that she felt a little for him of what he was feeling for her. There was complicity, contact. He felt happy.

  As he walked from the pub to his Turk in the Metropole Hotel, Bernard’s thoughts were more complex. The happiness was still there, but it was overshadowed by fears. He shouldn’t have talked to Madeleine so much about his wife. He should have kept that part of his life out of it.

  There had been other women, other failures which he did not like to dwell on. But for none of them had he felt like this. Surely with Madeleine it would work. The feeling he had for her was so strong, he felt a sense of rightness. Madeleine would make him feel like a normal man again.

  But he must go very gently, very slowly, very carefully. Make plans. This one was too good to mess up.

  Paul and Sharon’s evening, which had begun so promisingly, turned into disaster. He didn’t speak to her on the way to the cinema, he didn’t touch her during the film, and he didn’t speak to her on the bus back.

  Finally, when he deposited her on her doorstep, she fixed her blank blue eyes on his. ‘Paul, what’s the matter? What have I done?’

  ‘Nothing,’ he said. ‘You haven’t done anything.’ He let out a rasp of laughter and walked away.

  Sharon was more puzzled than hurt. Her self-esteem was very durable. She had a bath, got into her crisp little nightdress and into her crisp little bed and read about how Randall and Virginia finally re-met, sorted out the confusions of Crete, and faced the rest of their lives together.

  Paul walked home in fury. How could he ever think of another woman while Madeleine was alive? He felt destroyed, guilty about the lust he had felt for Sharon, desolate for being away from Madeleine, anguished at his hopeless youth and inexperience.

  And furious at the man who had been with her. He had not looked into the booth, but he had heard the assignation being made that morning. His rival was the new tutor at Garrettway.

  Two things he wanted to do with desperate urgency.

  The first was to rid himself of the terrible handicap of his virginity.

  The second was to kill the man who was after Madeleine Severn.

  As he passed a tree, he swung his arm at it and smashed his right hand in a karate chop against the rough bark.

  The shock went through his entire body. He held up the crippled hand in the street light. The skin was broken and, even as he looked at it, he could see the fleshy pad of his palm begin to swell.

  And the pain he felt gave him pleasure.

  Chapter 7

  He knew now what had to be done and, having made the decision, he felt calmer. It was ridiculous that he had left it so long. All his contemporaries, he knew from what they had said, had disposed of this insignificant rite years before. And yet for him it had always seemed so difficult, such a big deal. Well, maybe if love were involved, it would be a big deal. That was the main argument for making it a simple, clinical, financial transaction, paying for his passport into the real adult world.

  So it had to be a prostitute. On some nameless tart he would finally unload the insupportable encumbrance of his virginity. Just as a dry run, just to prove
that he could do it, that technically everything worked. It would be easier with no emotion involved. And then, after the anonymous initiation, he would be ready for the real thing, ready for Madeleine.

  To his mind, a prostitute meant London. He had seen the scribbled names on bell pushes when he walked round Soho, the felt-penned phone numbers scrawled on coinboxes at Victoria Station. No doubt similar services were available in Brighton, but he didn’t know where to start looking for them. Besides, it had to be secret. There were people in Brighton who might recognise him. And a trip to London, bracketed by the train journeys, would put the episode outside his normal life, an important, a necessary act, but one of which he could forget the details, one that he could quickly push to the back of his mind.

  It was a course he had contemplated before, but never with this determination.

  The house was empty as he made his preparations. Obviously he needed some disguise. Not only would it prevent recognition, it would also give him a role, distance him from the act, as if what was being done was being done by someone else.

  In the loft there were two suitcases full of his father’s clothes. After his father died, his mother had emptied the wardrobe into these cases, intending at some later date to sort them through to sell or give to charity. But the second part of the plan had never been achieved. As she slowly recovered from the shock of bereavement, she had felt less and less willing to stir up painful thoughts, and so the clothes had stayed hidden away, unsorted.

  Her son had looked through them before, when contemplating other acts of secrecy, so he was able to go straight to what he wanted. He had even tried some of the garments on and found, to his surprise, that now his frame had filled out a little, they fitted remarkably well. Or maybe it was just that his father was larger in his memory than he had been in reality.

  In his mind he had preselected the brown herring-bone sports jacket and dark grey flannel trousers which he had worn before. Their cut was a bit dated, but not so much as to be conspicuous. Plenty of people still walked around in clothes like that, people to whom no one in the street would give a second glance, and that was exactly the kind of anonymity he sought. He took the garments out of the suitcase and looked at them. They remained ideal for his purpose. Around them still clung a hint of the nicotine smell of his dead father, something that he found both unnerving and strangely comforting.