by Jenna Ellis
In my mind, someone I imagine to be Edward Parker comes to me, stepping in behind me in the shower. I call fantasy-guy ‘Edward’, but the truth is, the guy is fairly faceless – a mixture of my dance partner in the club and Scott, and the guy on the plane and just someone older and rich, all rolled into one. Even so, it feels illicitly thrilling to steal my boss’s imagined persona.
I imagine him naked behind me in the shower, soaping my breasts, our wet skin sliding together. I imagine pressing back against this thick cock. I think about how I feel for him to ease into me from behind. I watch us in my mind, as if I’m watching a film.
I feel my throat constrict. I see myself being pressed up against the wall in the steam, being filled up, as the shower jets send my nerve endings into overdrive.
The fantasy feels so real, but I yearn to be filled up. I grab the loofah with its smooth handle and ease it inside me, pushing it slowly in and out of me, as the water massages my clitoris.
‘Oh Edward,’ I mutter. ‘Oh yeah, that’s good.’
11
Half an hour later, after my sensational and unbelievably satisfying power-shower, I’m smothered in the free designer body cream I found, and I’m almost ready to explore with Gundred. I pull out my best jeans and a V-neck jumper and my pink ballet pumps from my case, before shoving my case in the closet. There’s plenty of hanging space and shelves, and I resolve to unpack my stuff later.
I reach into my washbag for my deodorant and perfume and see the photo of Scott. He’s naked in it, leaning back, with a smouldering ‘come to bed’ look in his eyes. I’ve had the photo for ages and it’s always turned me on, but now I look at it, thinking that he looks almost like a stranger. I’ve just had the most sensational wank with an entirely fictitious person that I named Edward, and now I feel confused as I look at Scott’s face. Should I feel guilty? Unfaithful even? Because I don’t. I’m still high on endorphins from fantasy-Edward.
I suddenly remember Scott’s bedsit and the grotty duvet. I put the photo back in the pocket of my case. I don’t want to think about home now; I’m too excited about being here.
Outside my room I get a bit lost. Corridors lead off in all directions, but eventually I find the grand staircase leading down.
‘I’d prefer it if you’d use the service lift,’ Gundred greets me, as I arrive downstairs in the hall. Can she tell, perhaps, that it took all my self-control not to slide down the bannister on my bum?
‘Oh, OK,’ I tell her.
The removal men have gone and Gundred looks exhausted.
‘I’ll quickly show you everything and then I’ll leave you to it,’ she says. Her tone, once again, makes me feel like I’m some sort of inconvenience. What is she? The housekeeper? The manager of this place? Just an agent for the Parkers? And where is she going? She’s not going to leave me alone here, is she? I see now that she has her bag over her shoulder. She’s not kidding. She really is about to leave.
I think of the friendly note from Mrs Parker upstairs and the lovely flowers, and try to calm down. There must be a plan.
Gundred pulls out a folded piece of paper from her bag and hands it to me. ‘First, and most importantly, you’ll need this.’
I look at the paper she’s given me. It’s a floor plan of the house. There are rooms shaded in blue and others in red.
‘This will help you get your bearings,’ she says. ‘The red rooms are off-limits.’
Off-limits? Why, I wonder?
‘Where are the kids?’ I ask, trying to take it all in. What the hell happens in the red rooms? ‘I mean, where are their bedrooms?’
‘The kids are still away at camp,’ she says. ‘They’ll be back in a week or so, but Mrs Parker wanted you to have some time to settle in first. Get acclimatized. As you can see, they haven’t finished moving in themselves, which has somewhat delayed their schedule.’
I’m totally flummoxed by this news, my mind racing. Why the rush to get me here, if the kids aren’t here? And what the hell am I going to do for a week without them? And how old are they, if they’re at camp? Not babies, then. Phew.
Come on, Sophie, I tell myself. You’re in five-star luxury. How hard can it be? When was the last time you actually had a break? Let alone a paid break?
‘OK,’ I say. ‘Can you tell me anything about them, though?’
‘Who?’
‘The kids,’ I tell her, confused.
She cocks her head on one side and then she smiles. I can’t tell if she’s amused by me or feels sympathetic. ‘The kids? Oh, well, there are two boys. Twins. Luther and Tobias. Haven’t I told you that already?’
‘No,’ I tell her. My tone is more petulant than I’d like.
She pauses. Then she seems to make a decision and, when she speaks next, her tone is reassuring. ‘Oh, well, I really wouldn’t worry about them. Just enjoy yourself this week. Believe me, you’ll be busy soon enough.’
Relief rushes through me. Twin boys. Luther and Tobias. Nice names. OK. I can deal with boys. I’m used to Ryan. I’m a lot more confident now that I know what I’m dealing with.
I’m picturing the boys in my head as Gundred shows me around, and start to realize how easy it might be to enjoy myself. It’s a busy, bustling home and I soon lose count of the number of corridors we walk down.
Don’t panic, I tell myself. This is just like the first day at a new school. You’ll soon know your way around like you’ve been living here all your life.
There’s a swimming pool downstairs, with the giant sauna and steam room. In the kitchen I meet Mrs Janey, the cook, and there are lots of other people coming and going, too. They seem to be busy, either cleaning or decorating. It’s hard to tell if they’re permanent staff like me, or not.
Permanent staff. The thought trips me up. Is that how I see myself already? As permanent? As part of all of this?
England seems a very long way away.
12
Once Gundred has gone, I take myself off back up to my room and unpack and then lie on the bed and call Dad, but I can hardly get a signal. We have a ridiculous conversation of echoing feedback and half-sentences. I think I manage to get across the gist of my call – that I’ve arrived and I’m OK.
‘Have fun. Love you,’ he shouts, before the line cuts out, and I smile, although I can picture his face: I know he’s missing me already.
It’s all been so much to take in and I haven’t slept for more than twenty minutes in nearly twenty-four hours. At first I amuse myself, trying to get comfortable on the waterbed, but there’s no denying it’s a ridiculous sensation. It’s like being swept away in a boat and, when I shut my eyes as an experiment, I’m asleep in seconds.
It’s dark in the room when I wake up and for a moment I have absolutely no idea where I am. I jolt upright, the waterbed lurching beneath me, and I yelp in shock.
I roll over cautiously and turn on the china lamp on the bedside table and yawn. A soft glow falls over the room and I get up and stretch and, as I do so, my stomach growls.
‘Hello,’ I call, as I retrace my steps along the dark corridor.
Ignoring Gundred’s instruction, I get to the staircase, peering over. The bottom floor below me is in darkness.
‘Hello?’ I call again. My voice echoes in the stairwell.
I can’t possibly be here alone, can I?
I run fast down the stairs and press all the lights on the panel at the bottom of the stairs. Now there’s light, I feel slightly better, but it’s still a bit freaky.
‘Hello?’ I call again. ‘Anyone? Anyone here?’
I stare down the corridor towards the kitchens. It’s dark beneath the doors. The silence is thick and conspiratorial.
I notice now that a row of uplighters has come on around the edge of the gallery room on my right, illuminating the walls. As I walk towards it, the glass door slides open and I walk inside.
Since I was here on my tour earlier, one of the large paintings that I saw being delivered has been hung on the wall. I real
ize, as I walk towards it, that it’s the one I saw on the tiny thumbprint picture on the Internet. It is of Marnie Parker.
The splodgy oil painting dominates the whole wall. It must be at least five or six yards wide and as many high. Marnie Parker is naked and lying on her side, her hand on the gentle swell of her belly. It’s an incredible painting – made more so by its sheer size. The oil paint is thick, like it has been trowelled on, but despite that, the more I look at it, the more detail I can see, like how the light falls on the upturn of her breast and nipple. I cock my head and gawp at it, but after a moment it feels illicit, like I’m prying. Her semi-closed eyes seem to stare right at me, challenging me. I look at the dark patch between her legs, then flush and deliberately turn away.
What kind of person poses for a painting like that, I wonder? Someone with a whole bucket-load of self-confidence, that’s for sure. Will Marnie Parker be an intimidating boss? What will it be like to meet her, now that I’ve already seen her nude? Will she be embarrassed, or will I?
Me probably. She’s had the painting hung on her wall, I remind myself. She obviously doesn’t care who sees it. Not even the removal men. Let alone her young boys.
The parquet floor shines ahead of me. There must be fifty feet or more of clear space. There’s not a blemish on it. The lighting in the room makes it intimate – despite its size. It’s like a stage.
I remember earlier on, when I first saw this room, I wanted to do a sock-slide across it. I put my hand on my shoulder and rotate my arm. It clicks. I need to move my body.
I take off my pumps and, glancing around me to check that I really am alone, I tiptoe back over to the corner of the room, where I came in. I glance into the corridor. Nobody is there.
I haven’t really planned this, but somehow I can’t help it. It’s just feels rude not to. With a quick run-up sprint, I cartwheel across the diagonal of the room. It feels astonishing – at once thrilling and shocking. I’m so out of practice that I’m panting by the time I come to a stop. But God, it’s fun. I laugh out loud.
Revelling in the sheer space, I do a few twirls back the other way, a couple of arabesques, and all at once my dancing days come flooding back and I’m like a kid in class again. I wonder if I can still jeté, I think, rucking up my jeans onto my thighs.
I run back to the corner and check again that I’m still alone. Remembering how I used to pretend I was Darcey Bussell, I focus on the far corner, then take a run up and spring like a gazelle into the air and land like a hippo. I turn and jeté again, trying for a softer landing this time. Then I try once more, and in no time I’ve crossed the room.
I come to a stop and lean forward, my hands on my knees, panting. Christ, it’s been a long time since I did that.
Which is when I hear a sound like a whip, but it’s actually one slow handclap. Followed by another.
13
It scares the shit out of me.
I yelp and turn to see that it’s him: Edward Parker.
Of that I have no doubt. He’s standing in the corner, leaning up against the door, like he’s been there for ages watching me. He’s wearing a cool grey suit with a collarless linen shirt.
Panicking, I try and control my breath. I know my cheeks are pulsing with embarrassment. Where the hell did he come from?
He looks different in the flesh. And very different from my fantasy shower-Edward. For a start, he’s taller than I imagined and he’s younger, too.
‘Oh, I . . . I’m so sorry,’ I gulp. ‘I . . . I . . .’
I have no words.
I have totally and utterly fucked up.
Only then, as he pushes nonchalantly off the wall and walks toward me, do I see that rather than being stern, an amused smile is dancing on his lips. He has a dimple in his cheek.
‘You must be Miss Henshaw,’ he says. A smile plays on his lips.
Who the hell else would I be?
‘Yes. Hi. I’m Sophie,’ I blurt, as he reaches me in the centre of the room. I shake his hand.
‘You’re making yourself at home already, I see.’
‘I’m so sorry. I . . . I . . . turned on the lights and I saw the picture and I couldn’t help coming in to see it and then—’
I try and explain, but my words stall on my lips as I find myself swallowed into his eyes. He’s not wearing glasses and he’s staring at me so intently, I feel suddenly naked. His eyes are an extraordinary shade of light green, with speckled brown bits in his irises. He seems entirely without shame as he stares at me and won’t let me look away. Heat rises in me. I know my throat has gone dry.
What can I tell him? I’m jetéing across his perfect parquet sprung floor because it’s the most space I’ve had to myself in my entire life? That something about this room – maybe this house – made me want to dance? That I’ve never been somewhere so clean, or perfect, or posh?
I can’t say any of that. It sounds too naff.
He breaks his stare suddenly and looks towards the painting.
‘It’s a beauty, isn’t it?’
His voice is deep. Not too accented. The way he says it makes me feel as if I’ve already proffered this opinion and he’s agreeing with me. The room, for him, is clearly about the painting, and not about me at all.
‘I’m interested that you were drawn to it. What do you like about it, Miss Henshaw?’
I’m still slightly out of breath. I stand next to him and face the painting. He smells incredible, I notice. A deep, musky, spicy scent that is overwhelmingly masculine. A proper grown-up man’s smell. Sexy. The kind of smell that speaks of a man with a fast car, expensive taste, oh yes, and a fuck-off great big oil painting of his beautiful wife.
‘I like, er . . . the, um, size?’ I offer. I cringe inwardly. I feel ridiculous for saying something so pathetic. The painting is clearly a masterpiece and must be worth a fortune. And this man – my new boss – is a world-renowned aficionado, for God’s sake. It has many other qualities, other than just its size, obviously. Both good and bad, I realize. Like, for example, that it’s a fairly inappropriate thing to hang in a house where young boys live. But they’ve grown up with an art-curator dad and a designer mother, I remind myself. Meaning that they’re probably totally used to it, right?
‘Ah, yes. You mean the way the proportions are all spot-on?’
‘Yeah. And the light,’ I hazard. He stares at me intently, waiting for more. This is a man who clearly doesn’t entertain small talk. I glance again at the picture, desperately trying to summon up the most intelligent remark I can. ‘And that sense that the artist has captured the essence of a woman. If that makes sense?’
‘It makes total sense,’ he says, and I know I’ve passed some sort of test. ‘It’s both brazen and vulnerable,’ he says. ‘Out there, and yet private. That’s what I like about it, too.’
‘Yeah, well, I like it that she looks comfortable in her own skin,’ I add, wondering whether it comes across as astute and flattering, or whether it’s too much.
‘And, of course she was pregnant at the time, making her curves even more sensual,’ he says wistfully. He says it as if it’s a fact, but it feels conspiratorial. Like we’re bitching about her behind her back, although, ironically, we’re looking at her front. ‘And she was then – and still is – so delightfully, as you say, comfortable in her own skin. She’s not a scrap of a girl, but a woman. But of course artists have known for centuries that those are the only real women to paint.’
I’m humbled by his passion both for his wife and for the art itself. I feel stupid, too. Because, standing next to the painting, I don’t feel anything like a real woman. And I suddenly want to be one very much.
‘I’m embarrassed to say that I don’t know much about art,’ I tell him. The least I owe him is the truth.
‘Is that so? Then perhaps I will teach you,’ he says, smiling down at me. His eyes make me feel flustered and breathless.
He turns back and stares at the painting as if he’s drinking it in and, in the silence, I can
’t help but sneak a peek at his profile. He really does have perfect skin. It’s all I can do not to touch his cheek, to check he’s real.
‘Are you hungry, Miss Henshaw?’ he asks. His eyes don’t leave the painting. He knows I’m staring at him.
14
A few minutes later, and I’m sitting at the kitchen bar. Through a glass section of the floor I can see the swimming pool below lit up in green. The staff who filled the kitchen earlier have all gone and it’s just him and me. I have no idea where his wife is and it somehow feels wrong to ask. If he wants me to know, he’ll tell me, I guess. I’ve never met anyone like him before. He’s making me feel like I need to be on the edge of my seat. I can’t stop staring at him.
Is it because I know he’s rich and successful, I wonder, that makes him have this aura? Tiff saw one of the Man. United footballers in a bar once, and she said that from the other side of the room you could tell he was famous, that he was wealthier than everyone else in the bar put together. But Edward Parker hasn’t just got status, or wealth, like a footballer. That’s obvious. No, he’s got something else that sets him apart. Something I can’t put my finger on. The magnetic thing that famous actors have.
I’m shocked by how good-looking he is. Not in a conventional way, but in a groomed, confident way. We were talking about the picture and how his wife is so comfortable in her skin, but he has the same thing, I now realize. Just the way his designer clothes fall around his body; his chunky designer watch and perfectly tanned hands. He could be a model. Seriously. He looks like the kind of guy they’d choose for a sexy older-man aftershave campaign, although he’s not poncy or effeminate. He looks like what he is . . . a real man.
And as I watch him, I realize that I’ve never actually met a proper real man before. Not up close, like this. I mean, there’s Dad, but he’s scruffy and skint and sad. And Scott is a boy, by comparison. There was Mr Walters, who I thought was a man at first, but then really didn’t turn out to be that manly at all. There have been men I’ve seen, on the peripheries of my life: Mum’s rich uncle John, who lives somewhere in Spain; Lance, the guy who owned the bar I used to waitress in – but that’s it. I’ve never actually chatted to someone who is, by the way he looks and the fact he’s in this house, a multimillionaire. It’s quite overwhelming.