The dim glow of the street light could not do battle with the darkness, neither that beyond the front door nor that within my heart.
A number of bulging bin-bags sat at the open gate, together with carrier bags and boxes.
Jays car sat outside, engine running as he picked up one box and place it in the open boot. "Sorry," he said. "You won't need my record player."
"Jay, wait." I called. "Why? Why her?" I stared at Raven in the passenger seat, who stared back with sad, sympathetic eyes.
"Because she's prettier than you. Her tits are small and she's a better fuck."
"But, I've got nowhere to go."
"You've always got your parents' house."
"I can't go there. How am I going to get this stuff there?"
"Call a cab!"
He jumped in the car and started the engine. "No, don't! Jay."
He pulled away from the kerb. "Jay! Jay! Please! Jay!"
"What? What is it?"
My eyes flickered open and the familiar wallpaper blurred and steadied into focus.
"What is it, my love?" An arm came around me, holding me tight.
Feeling behind, I touched a manly thigh. I rolled over to look at the face of my darling Jay. I held him, kissed him.
"You alright? Bad dream?"
"Yes. Sorry. Did I wake you?"
"Not for the first time during the night."
"Just a nightmare." I leaned my head back so that his face came into focus. "Tell me you'll never leave me. You'll never run off with someone else."
"Oh, my gorgeous love! No. I could never."
"Not even if they look like Raven."
"Not even if they looked like Farrah Fawcett Majors!
"I love you Jay Parkinson." I kissed him, pulled away and asked probably the most annoying question a woman ever asked a man. "Do you love me?"
"I love you to the bathroom and back."
I punched him. He rolled out of bed, threw on a dressing gown and visited the bathroom.
"Tea?" he asked. I'd drifted back to sleep, so I had no idea how long he'd been back.
"You say the nicest things to me. Yes please. What the fuck time is it?"
"Almost twelve."
"Bloody hell! Mind you, we didn't go to sleep till about three."
"Indeed." Pompous! "Are you going to your mums today? It's just, I still feel stoned." He passed me a cup of tea.
"That was quick." I sat up.
"Already made when I asked you."
"No. Let's do something relaxing. Give us a chance to talk."
"Uh oh. I hate those words."
"Why? Guilty conscience?"
"Yes." Honest, at least.
"Honest, at least. I'm a little embarrassed about my behaviour last night."
"Me too." He agreed.
"You're embarrassed about my behaviour?"
"I meant me, idiot."
"I know." By this point, I had left the bed and grabbed my dressing gown.
"Though I did see quite a lot of it."
I replied with a sharp look. We ate some breakfast cereal in relative silence while listening to some soothing music. It wasn't an uncomfortable silence as Jay and I had grown accustomed to some quiet and relaxing times together. We didn't always need to fill the airwaves with inane chat.
"You know what we haven't done for along long time?" I said, at last.
"What?"
"Taken a nice soakey bath together."
"Mm. That sounds nice."
"Shall I run one?"
"Yes. Let's do that."
"I'll finally make some use of that posh bubble bath your mother bought me."
Although we all looked on Mallory as an old bat, she did have some surprisingly expensive features; though, in fairness, they may have been there when she bought the place. One of them took the shape of side filling bath, situated in the smallest of the bathrooms, across the landing from our flat. Oval with a central plug hole, such items are common place in the twenty-first century, but back in 1978, no one had ever seen such a thing. I filled the bath between flits to our room.
"We might have to streak across the landing," Jay said with a mischievous wink.
"Why?"
"Don't really want to take the dressing gowns in. They'll get wet in that tiny room."
"Fair point, but we've got two big towels."
"You have to spoil the fun, don't you?"
"Shut up and make us both a coffee." He did, and we took a step stool from the kitchen to rest them on.
Everyone knows that bath towels are not really bath sized. For some reason, proper sized towels are called 'bath sheets' or 'beach towels.' So Jay managed to wrap one around his skinny torso, but my arse peeked out from the towelling curtain, exposed to anyone who cared to come out of their room. No one did.
"I smelled you on her." We'd been enjoying the relaxed moments in the foam of the bath.
Jay sat up, frothy water spilling over the edge of the bath. He looked stunned, tilted his head and furrowed his brow. It wouldn't fool anyone.
"You said you never shagged anyone last night." Jay's furrowing brow lifted his eyebrows. "But I could smell you on her." Well, not really but all part of making him realise he couldn't get away with it. We both reached for our coffees.
"No idea..."
"Before you get entangled in a web of lies, you fucked Raven last night. Why am I so sure? Because I smelled your distinctive cum smell on her."
"Ah!"
"Yes! Ah! Explain!"
"Well, you did practically tell us to. 'Oh. Oh. Jay never got the tour of the house.' What about, 'I know you want to, she knows you want to, and you know you want to.' There were more hints."
"Don't blame me for you shagging someone else."
"We would never have done it if you hadn't thrown us together."
"Was she good?"
He drank his coffee while thinking. "Well, I was, apparently."
"I'm well aware how good you are, I want you to tell me about her."
"San! You don't want to do this."
"I do," I insisted. "You agreed to the rules. Full, blow by blow details. Oops. Pun not intended. Did you go down on her?"
"Of course. That's what I'm best at."
So the conversation continued for the next ten minutes or so. "By the way," I said after the question-and-answer session, "it's a dead giveaway when you don't want to have sex when we get home."
"Yes. But, well, the rules."
"Yes, the rules."
"Anyway, you. What was all that on the dance floor?"
"What?"
"Letting Peter bring you off like that. In front of everyone."
"Oh, God. I did, didn't I. Oh shit." I thought for a while, remembering, becoming embarrassed, then remembering some more. "What about you and that bint? You did the same to her."
"Only in retaliation!"
"So all the groping you did was my fault?"
"Don't be like that. We set out to have a competition."
"Neither of us expected it to go that far."
"No. We didn't. Well, I didn't. So last night? In bed?"
"What about it?"
"You started bragging about how many orgasms you'd had at the party and how many you'd caused."
"Oh, shit. Did I? I was probably exaggerating. How many did I say?"
"You said you had at least five and made at least six men ejaculate."
"I'm sure I didn't say that many." Jay nodded. "Oh, Christ. I don't remember."
"Tell me. Who was first?"
"I may have exaggerated a little."
"Okay." He drew this out. I couldn't be sure if it meant he didn't believe me or he did. "You said that. Start with the first."
"The first that made me cum was really weird. A voice. Deep, sexy, really sexy, really arousing, started..."