The Butcher, the Baker, the Candlestick Maker

by Suzanne Portnoy

  The attraction between us had been instantaneous. He smiled at me and I smiled back – not the oh-shit! smile but the oooh, all right! smile. He called me as soon as he got home and said, ‘Are you free tonight?’

  We met up at the Electric, a members-only bar on Portobello Road a short walk from his house. Jack didn’t drink, didn’t smoke, didn’t take drugs, I learnt. The history he’d alluded to was a long tale of substance-abuse problems. Sounds like a lot of the guys I’ve dated, I thought, as he gave me the synopsis. Jack assured me that for him it really was history, not, as was the case with Daniel and some others, history in the making. He hadn’t touched drink or drugs in twenty years, he said, not since learning he’d contracted all three forms of hepatitis. He led an ultra-clean life now, stuck to a very strict diet – no sugar, no fats – and, following the year of hellish treatments that successfully got rid of the hepatitis, become something of a monk – well, a monk that fucked.

  I’d met guys before who didn’t drink or smoke or take drugs. But usually they hadn’t dropped all three. If they’d given up one, typically they stuck passionately to the other two, substituting one addiction only to focus on another. If their new vice wasn’t in the top three, then usually it was sex.

  Within two hours of our first one-on-one meeting, we were back at Jack’s place, where he gave me a guided tour of his house that ended in the bedroom.

  I stood in the doorway and pulled out a line from my personal inventory. ‘Don’t you think it’s time to kiss me?’ He did think it was time to kiss me, and more. Being a ‘new man’, Jack didn’t do the fuck-’n’-go. He didn’t do quickies at all, in fact. With him, sex was like a five-course meal or a very long symphony – or tantric, for that matter. He took things slowly.

  That first evening was like many that followed. Once I got into bed with him, it would be three hours before I got out of it. Jahnet would be proud of me, I thought. Sex with Jack was just like she’d taught me it should be. I felt very close to my new lover. I got into the rhythm and pleasure, the intimacy of being with him. And Jack just wanted to be with me. His bedroom was a world away from the swinging clubs and sex parties. When we made love, Jack was sensuous, and I felt my whole body respond to his.

  Except I couldn’t come.

  I put it down to nerves. This guy was ringing all my other bells, and perhaps I was scared. It was easy to come when I didn’t give a shit, but here was a contender, a man with whom I felt a real connection, and I didn’t want to fuck it up.

  We both jumped into the relationship with our feet pressed firmly on the accelerator. ‘I’d like a completely honest monogamous relationship,’ he said that first night, explaining that he couldn’t be intimate with more than one person at a time. ‘I’m looking for something deeply committed.’ Jack knew that I liked swinging, but admitted he wouldn’t have been able to handle my carrying on with other guys, even if I were honest and upfront about it.

  I promised to give it up. ‘I’m bored with it anyway,’ I said, both to him and to myself. I spent the next two days texting all the men in my phonebook. My fingers did twitch a bit as I sent the message to some of my favourite funboys. Still, the message was the same, and to the point: HI. I’VE MET SOMEONE. I WON’T BE AVAILABLE ANY MORE. TAKE CARE. SUZANNE. Sometimes before hitting Send I’d wonder if perhaps it was a bit premature to be agreeing to settle down, but I figured I could always pick up the habit again without too much bother. Send. Send. Send.

  My swinging partner, Greg, texted back. WELL, HE MUST BE SOME GUY IF HE’S GOT YOU TO GIVE UP SWINGING. ARE YOU SURE YOU CAN HANDLE BEING WITH JUST ONE MAN? I DON’T REALLY SEE YOU AS THE RELATIONSHIP TYPE.

  I did.

  On day two, after another three-hour fuck session, Jack looked into my eyes as I was leaving and said, ‘I asked the universe for what I wanted and it brought me you.’

  I’m really a sucker for lines like that. He looked like he believed it. My friends, however, looked like they thought I was nuts when I told them what Jack had said.

  ‘Take it slow,’ said my friend, Pat. ‘You don’t want to be seeing so much of him so early on in the relationship.’

  ‘I know, but he’s great. Really.’

  ‘You’ll be burnt out before you know it,’ she warned. ‘He’s fresh out of a relationship, so take it slow.’

  On day three Jack rang me up and said, ‘Look, I know we’ve only just met and it’s probably too soon to be doing stuff like this, but would you and the boys like to come with me and my daughter on a holiday to Brazil in six weeks’ time?’ As I caught my breath, he rushed on. ‘All expenses paid. It’s just that, if I don’t book the flight now, they’ll be sold out.’

  ‘Sounds fabulous,’ I said in bed later that day after another bedroom marathon.

  On day four, another three hours of fucking. ‘You know, I was thinking,’ said Jack, ‘wouldn’t it be great if you could buy the house just next door so we could spend more time together without actually living together?’

  As I drove home, Bernadette rang. ‘Where were you last night? I tried to ring you.’

  ‘I was with Jack.’

  ‘Weren’t you with Jack the night before, too?’

  ‘Yup. And the night before that, too.’

  ‘Be careful,’ she warned. ‘So many nights in a row and you’ve only just met. Sounds obsessive to me.’

  Day five Jack sent a huge bouquet of flowers to my office. The night before, he had told me I had bad breath; this was his atonement. Louise looked at the flowers and rolled her eyes. ‘Watch out for the therapists.’

  The flowers were magnificent but, as I’d never been told I had bad breath before, I had become obsessed well before their arrival. Perhaps in an effort to take the edge off my obvious discomfort, Jack had theorised that my gut might be the culprit – irritable bowel syndrome, perhaps – thus nudging the issue out of the grooming and into the medical realm. I booked a colonic irrigation. I changed my diet, removing apples and broccoli and garlic from the menu. I bought acidophilus tablets to balance the pH of my stomach. I was permanently on edge, trying to smell my own breath and making sure I had a pack of Orbit Professional in my handbag at all times.

  Still, by day seven I was head over heels. And Jack’s seven-year-old daughter was in love with me, as I had two boys she could pretend were her big brothers, while in me a new shopping companion.

  Jack believed I was ‘the one’. And, as he rang so many of my bells, I was happy to be his one and only. He bought me a chocolate knee-length corduroy skirt when we went shopping in Portobello; he took me for oysters at Bibendum; he sent me loving text messages (CAN’T WAIT TO SLIP MYSELF INSIDE YOU!) and bouquets of flowers with sweet notes attached (I choose you!). One day, while walking through Portobello, he said, ‘I think you’re a girl who really needs to be treated well, and that’s what I want to do. I really want to make you feel special.’ I did feel special.

  Except, sometimes, in bed. I had my doubts we were truly compatible. Sex was problematic, or rather, having an orgasm was. I didn’t come until day six and, though that might seem speed of light among women who come once a year, I’ve always been able to come in a flash, from the first date. Days one, two, three, four and five, I tried every position from the Kama Sutra and nothing worked. Dutifully, I followed Jahnet’s advice and tried to focus on the pleasure, and, while making love with Jack was very pleasurable indeed, by our third session I just wanted to get there, the tantric way or any other.

  So I had three problems. One, I couldn’t come. Two, I’m a size queen. Three, I couldn’t tell a man whose penis was the national average that average didn’t work for me.

  Jack tried to compensate by going down on me, but sometimes a girl can sense if a guy’s heart really isn’t in it. I didn’t know how to climax without pushing the usual fantasy buttons in my brain. Physically, we just didn’t fit together. Finally, feeling unbelievably frustrated, I found a way to orgasm. It was called pornography. Our sixth time together, during ano
ther three-hour sesh, my heart and body were feeling fine but I knew that once again I wasn’t going to come.

  ‘Do you have any pornography?’ I asked.

  ‘Yeah, sure. What do you like?’

  ‘Gang bangs, double penetration, anal – that sort of thing.’

  Jack got up, put on a tape and fast-forwarded to a scene featuring two couples swapping and then the two guys doing one of the girls. I sat on Jack’s face, facing the TV. Three minutes later I came. I was embarrassed. ‘I’m really sorry,’ I said.

  ‘Don’t be. I want to do whatever it takes to make you happy.’

  ‘I know, Jack. But I wanted to stop watching porn. I wanted to stop getting off on gang bangs and all that shit. I just wanted to see if I could be intimate with you.’

  The test of any relationship is usually a holiday, and we were on the motherfucker of all holidays, a hastily arranged trip to Bahrain we took six weeks after we met.

  I’d talked Jack out of the holiday in Brazil after he told me the place he had in mind was quite remote, two days from London, and involved every form of transport, including feet, to get to. He’d been a couple of times before and wanted to show me his dream place.

  ‘It’s an idyllic beach resort, Suzanne,’ he said. ‘Secluded, romantic and cheap.’

  ‘Yes, it does sound great – for a three-week break,’ I said. ‘But we’ve only got one week. Once we factor in the four days travelling, we’ve got only three days in paradise. And then there’s the jet lag.’ I suggested we go somewhere easier and closer to home.

  As he had booked another inspirational tree-hugging week for himself and was leaving for the California desert in a couple of days, Jack had little time to find an alternative for us. It was now three weeks after our initial discussion about a holiday together, and just three weeks to half-term. ‘Why don’t you call my brother-in-law?’ he suggested. ‘He’s an ex-airline pilot. He’s always coming up with cheap flights to exotic destinations.’

  ‘Has your brother-in-law heard of half-term?’ I said. So close to the student holiday, when half of England is on an aeroplane, I knew any place exotic was going to be booked up and the only holiday destinations still available would be the ones no one else wanted. Hence Brazil became Dubai, and at an exorbitant price. Then the brother-in-law rang to say he couldn’t find us a hotel room. We settled on Bahrain, the only alternative presented. I didn’t know much about the Gulf and, though it didn’t sound as desirable as Brazil, I wasn’t paying and was still loved up, and thought, How bad can it be? All the photos I’d ever seen of the place were desert shots, and to me desert equalled hot. The Hawar Resort’s online brochure described a state-of-the-art hotel on its own sandy beach, with the usual luxury facilities, plus three restaurants – all at the bargain price of £50 per room per night. Kids were free and so was the food.

  Being Jewish, once again I thought I’d scored the biggest bargain in the world. Jack’s going to be so proud of me, I thought, as I’ve saved him so much money. The idea of spending seven glorious days on the beach, six glorious nights shagging this man’s brain’s out – how could I not find a way to come? It all sounded so splendid.

  We had to spend the first night in downtown Bahrain, as the boats to our beach paradise didn’t leave till the next morning. As we checked into our hotel we passed a Wild West-themed bar full of American guys who worked on oil rigs, who’d come for an alcohol-fuelled weekend break and who I soon discovered got louder by the hour. We stayed in our rooms and watched satellite television.

  ‘Don’t worry, kids,’ I said. ‘There’s beach buggies and table tennis and paddle boats and jetskis at the resort.’ And room service and a gift shop and a mini bar for us, I thought, looking ahead.

  The next day, a minibus picked us up and drove an hour to the jetty, where we waited with a half-dozen other people. That should have been a warning right there. No other kids, just three Arab guys who didn’t look at us and two women wearing burkhas.

  ‘Are we just the leftovers?’ I whispered to Jack. ‘I hope the other children are already there.’

  He shrugged.

  Approaching the island, we saw a vast white monstrosity looming over the beach in isolation. No other buildings.

  As we exited the speedboat, I saw that the beach was empty, and then saw why. The sand was black and dirty and littered with rubbish, the water a murky colour that didn’t look safe to swim in. Not that we’d want to. I bent over and put my hand in and it was surprisingly cold.

  At least there were jetskis lined up on the shore, and I saw a large swimming pool, a seaside restaurant and a beach-buggy track. The only thing missing was people.

  ‘Are there other people coming?’ I asked the man standing at the reception desk.

  ‘Tomorrow,’ he said. ‘All coming tomorrow. Lots of people. Hotel almost full.’

  We weren’t convinced. ‘The Shining could have been filmed in this place,’ said Jack under his breath. Over the course of our stay we saw only a handful of people, none of whom looked particularly fun to hang out with.

  Suddenly I remembered I was in a Muslim country. The only staff were men, all dark-haired with moustaches and unstylish haircuts, and all staring at pasty blonde me when they didn’t think I was looking, as if I were the first Western woman they’d seen in a very long time. They were awkward and uncomfortable in my presence and didn’t quite know how to behave towards me. I let Jack do all the talking.

  ‘Where’s the restaurant?’ he enquired.

  ‘Only one restaurant open. Rest closed,’ said a man with a moustache and unstylish haircut. He pointed to a place that looked more like a café. ‘Over there.’

  The food looked like leftovers from the British Airways flight we took to get there. It came out in large metal trays and had obviously been preheated, not prepared specially for us. The centre of each tray was cold and the outer edge of the dish merely warm.

  But eating was as fun as it got there, at least until the fourth day, when we stopped doing even that. The country was suffering from a rare cold spell. I had expected twenty-seven degrees; it was closer to seven. I wore my sexy dresses – each earmarked for its own special day – all at once, one over the other. The layered look. I felt camouflaged like the burkha babes I’d seen on the jetty, who’d then disappeared.

  I didn’t get the sense that other guests had disappeared. I got the sense none ever existed.

  ‘Tomorrow,’ said the concierge each time we asked. ‘All coming tomorrow. Lots of people. Hotel almost full.’

  ‘Mum, what are we expected to do now?’ Alfred and Martin asked by the hour. ‘There’s no kids here, Mummmmm. There’s nothing to doooooooooo.’

  The unheated pool was too cold, but the kids did put on a couple of sweaters and jetskied two or three times until the thrill was gone. Mostly, we played endless rounds of table tennis.

  Jack and I tried to make the best of what was obviously a really bad situation. I couldn’t help thinking back to my first holiday with David and how, had he been here, he would have handled it. ‘When we get back to London, I want you to demand a full refund for this holiday,’ I could picture him saying. ‘Where the fuck did you find this place, anyway?’

  On day four, Valentine’s Day, Jack said, ‘I can’t take it any more. I can’t eat the food one more day. This is my first proper holiday in four years.’

  That was news to me. I felt even worse than I’d been feeling from the day we arrived, and that was saying something.

  ‘I want to eat good food in a nice hotel,’ he continued. ‘I want to be with people who are wearing something other than tracksuits and burkhas. I want to swim in a warm pool. I want to sleep on Egyptian-cotton sheets. We’ve got to get out of here.’

  ‘If only,’ I said. ‘Perhaps we can nick the jetskis and escape off the island.’

  Jack wasn’t laughing. ‘I’ve got an idea!’ he said suddenly, his eyes staring into the distance. ‘Why don’t you ring up the Ritz Carlton in Bahrain? Say you�
��re organising a conference there for next year and want to check out the hotel as a possible venue – and by the way, you’re travelling with your family. Might they give any sort of discount off the rack rate?’

  Sounded fabulous, except for the part about making it all happen. ‘I don’t see why you can’t do it yourself,’ I said. ‘You are, after all, a private detective. You make a living out of getting stuff out of people.’

  ‘Mostly information,’ he said. He thought a lie might work better coming from a woman. I did as I was told, and miraculously the conference manager bought the story. We got two nights, discounted 75 per cent. Suzanne saves the day, I thought. Hurrah!

  The Ritz was a five-star dream. We found our paradise at last. We got the Egyptian-cotton sheets, the heated pool, the gorgeous food.

  But it was not enough to save the relationship. Shortly after we returned to London, Jack took off for the Midlands for another inspirational tree-hugging weekend. When he didn’t call me on the drive back home, as he usually did, I became concerned. It had been snowing hard that day and the snow had stuck and turned to ice, something rare for England. The radio stations broadcast travel advisories. I rang his mobile and the call went straight to his answering machine. I rang his home and it did the same. I went to bed feeling anxious and upset. The next day, I tried his office and got him.

  ‘What happened to you?’ I said. ‘I thought I was going to hear from you last night. I tried to ring you and there was no answer.’

  ‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘I was on the phone to Stephanie for three hours.’ Stephanie was the ex. This was the first time Jack had mentioned speaking to her since I’d met him. He had assured me their break-up had been final, and I believed him, given she’d punched him and fractured one of his ribs the last time they’d been together. Sounded pretty final to me. ‘She rang me up and we stayed up talking. She said some things that wound me up and really touched a nerve. I should have called you up, though. Sorry.’

  After that call, Jack became more and more distant.