HOME | DD

Description
1. The Afternoon

Sun blazed, as it had for days; blue sky chased blue sky, each competing in a competition for the bluest, deepest and barest.  There was a feeling of infinity to this one, even before midday had troubled those basking outside the Slater’s Arms with Banks’ and ploughman’s.
She stood near the slightly rickety table, undermined by age, moss, rot, its integrity sagging toward an ignominious end as soggy firewood and woodlouse pied-a-terre.  She stood in the smiles of summer admiration, her black trousers as slender as her legs; low waisted, high temptation.  Eyes grazed along thighs that led one on, brushed slowly over the smoothness of a front panel that dipped, curving into deep shade.  Trousers snug enough to reveal dreams, loose enough to suggest the dreamt revelations; the tracing curves beneath, the thin underwear, softness desired.  Eyes caressed the waving detours, black arcing trajectory taking the gaze on gentle detours of the mind.  The imaginings enlivening nerves languid with sun, taking fingers on virtual tours, drifting between over the slipping fabric bias of firm thigh; the delicate elastic ridge, fingertip silhouette guideline taking the fervour of wishes over undulations, moistly through disrobing rumination.  He could almost hear the zip as he slid fanciful hands beneath waistbands...
Shifting on delicate legs, she oozed the fingertip desire of youth’s balanced disregard for yesterday, today, tomorrow.  With disregarding nonchalance she tucked her hair into the oblivion of his dreams and turned away.
In the inglenook shade of a summer pub’s silent interior, he found solace from the evidence of his obscurity, drifting as long as mid-summer through his possible pasts, the warm whimsy of pale regret and Indian summer moments rheuming his eyes.  With the glance of a door’s quiet thud, the waft of summer stillness came to lean lithely on the bar; futile scanning and swaying limbs searching for the errant barman, ignorant of the overtures his eyes played over pale vested skin.

The sun was confused, blazing down with the enthusiasm of high summer drought, then taking umbrage and hiding behind skirts of cloud for days on end... Grass spiked her neck, sunbeams played I-spy through the leaves whilst he traced grass tickles over her palms.
In reality they were elsewhere, so much elsewhere as to be completely separate. Not a little bit apart, but the sort of apart that’s actually never been together in any way whatsoever.
In reality she was sat in the corner of a slightly gloomy room, an annoying streak of sunshine dazzling her wherever she moved her head. The plunk of pool balls punctuated her attempts to read. The plunk of daydreams punctuated good intent, and she looked out across the field to the woods and the rising Victorian folly on the hill with thoughts aplenty, thoughts abetted as she watched someone stroll across the courtyard...
She’d not been in this position before, every thinking feeling nerve was bursting in ongoing vibrant thought, of one thing, one person, one idea.  She pulled her top down, watching, unintentionally aloof from the others around the table. She always felt slightly distant, but then no one had ever really understood her. Twisting straws until they explode - the explosive plastic pop accompanied by dropped eye giggles, a sniffy young woman walked by with disdain and a look that’d set to decades of disapproval.
Days seemed to earnest, it was summer, but somehow the content didn’t match.  She didn’t want to talk about it, but actually there’s little else she do want to discuss.  Really, what’s the point, she asked herself.  All words are useless, an endless circling as bereft of resolution as these days are without those giggles and whispers, filled as they are with the fading memory of carefree smiles. Those days with skips and daft joy from dawn ‘til slumbering dreams are gone, and whilst the rawness has healed, there’s an emptiness afoot that I can’t shift. Nothing seemed so bad then, tumbling around the corner, problems were here and gone; there was anticipation and joy, mountains of anguish could be dissolved in a frivolous tumble of words over a sympathetic shoulder.
Her mind was elsewhere, as so often, and her friend’s frivolity passed her by in a haze of vacuity that went utterly unnoticed. She felt she often went unnoticed. She always went unnoticed, always had, through school, at home, now... hers was a life unique.  She’d been told this was a virtue, that she should revel in it, but it didn’t feel that way when there was no one to talk to, no one who understood her emotions or life. It just felt horribly lonely. So it was now that she laughed and chatted, perhaps even flirted, whilst leaving nothing of herself anywhere, that she kept locked away for a day. One day. They got up and left, sidling past the loud and confident, not noticing the men emerging from the door opposite, or the glance that lingered.
Close denim smiles and a pixie nose. How could you describe that arse? Snug? Delicious? You could do so in terms of what it’s not, but that’d be to do it an injustice. Pert. Fitted. An easy arse. Suffice to say, she was delightful, she walked off, unaware she’d left part of herself behind searing delectable thoughts through his mind, that in fact she was walking arm in arm in the opposite direction.
He strolled down the tree lined hill, accompanied by warm thoughts he shouldn’t have, took a detour, the usual one, and ended up with a large black coffee and his own company, watching the street pass oblivious from the window of Hysteria.
Noise washed through the room, the sewage of life swilling around like cold coffee. Doors banged, grinders roared and above all of that a tumult of dead voices competed with insipid background music. In the corner, wedged against a window in the hope of spotting his life passing by outside, he was oblivious to it all, just sat and stared twiddling with the tall mug, the hectic detritus of life’s banality treating him as a non-stick entity. His eyes scanned endlessly beyond the rain stained glass, seeking, hoping. He wouldn’t ever have characterised his watching as hope; hope was something he felt he’d left behind long since, one of those childish fripperies best shed early. He’d have seen polite disinterest in the common humanity he professed to dislike. He’d have laughed quietly, shaken his head sadly at your ineptitude in reading people had you suggested it. He’d have then gone home and retold the story, ‘… me! Hopeful?’ he’d exclaim to a quiet nodded agreement as tea was served. Yet he searched. Searched without aim or knowledge, but search he did as he sat everyday in the corner, annoyed beyond measure if someone had usurped his seat. He’d wait the full hour until six, two mugs of coffee, a nod a half smile probably on his way out. Every weekday. Forty nine weeks a year. Six years. Whatever it was he wasn’t looking for had never shown up.
Six hours later, he pulled up the inoffensive duvet around his ears and opened his book, annoyed that the page had been bent down. He wasn’t anal about books he thought, but why was there a need to bend the page in half? Surely just a little turn in the corner would be enough? The book bored him, books did that, they never seemed to say what they should. The words weren’t right, too ornate or too prosaic. He could discuss them, write about them, appreciate them, but rarely did they move him. An i-pod and some frustrated tossing later, he said goodbye to the day. Another day.
She sat opposite him.  That is, she sat on the other side of the café, stirring the frothy coffee with a little plastic stick and smiling plentifully.  Her friends joined her opening folders and looking serious about their work.  Where did this earnestness come from he wondered, rack his brains as hard as he could, he couldn’t remember working that hard when he was a student.  Or generally.  Surely it was the summer holidays anyway?  Oh dear, he had twenty minutes, and all he could think of was her legs stretching from chair to boots.
If only, he thought at that knee swivel, if only she’d had a short skirt instead. If only he had the chance to feel that backside, hands over tight jeans, pulling her as close as the skinny denim, stroking her back catching dreams on low slung hipsters, smooth tipped grazing of randomly rising top, the heat through thin t-shirt. How did she kiss? A tongued exploration, swiftly darting... or an eel dance? From sideways glances he saw himself lift the t-shirt, catch hint of nipple through the bra as slender as her, he kissed her shoulders where the bones say sensual. A flick of the button, soft sound of the zip, breaths nestling in neck hollows of desire. It doesn’t matter how often you rearrange your dress, tweak your bra straps you’re still fucking gorgeous. Mind wandering to slithering jeans, the revelation of pants, he imagined... what underwear would be revealed sliding between pale thighs... she stood, swung her bag up and left filled with forward glances.
That bloody woman.  He leant his head on his hands, rubbing at his temples; just how she’d managed to stay in her post as long as she had remained a mystery.  Perhaps there was someone higher up the food chain who was as lazy as she was, as incapable of doing anything that needed to be done.  Like either making her do her fucking job or getting the crone out.  Once again he found the careful list of tasks to do screwed up because he now had to do half her job as well, and naturally they were vital they were done now.  He closed the page, he’d have to deal with that later on, and instead opened the file she’d dumped.  The phone rang and he glanced at the display, Wagstaff.  Arrogant prick.  Could he ignore him?  Not  without being plagued throughout lunch and the afternoon, a deep breath and he lifted the receiver, recognising with widened eyes that today was another that was neither in his control nor easy.  He wondered again why he came in at all, there was nothing he couldn’t do here that he couldn’t do at home, except interact with people who loathed or felt nothing for, not even the bonus of loathing.  It was like being back at uni, surrounded by tabloid readers working their pathetic arses off to scrape a 2:2 and get a job as a trainee twat at messrs Idiot, Vindictive and Petty.  What happened to all of them?  He didn’t care enough to wonder.
Twenty past five, having finished the awful Barbara Drugett’s work, he stood, flicked closed his laptop, snatched seemingly randomly at papers strewn across the desk, wedged them in the pocket and dropped the ashtray in the drawer.  What they can’t see they can’t confiscate.  Outside the window streams of little grey men and charred women streamed over the canal bridge toward the station, shadows lengthened beneath the sentinel trees, unimpressed at their labour; far away Jane would be concocting some overcooked bland dish of her underactive imagination.  Closer was a green leather bench, an unfinished crossword and a pint of bitter.  Slamming the door deliberately behind him, all the better to annoy Barbara who hated sudden loud noises, he left, wondering why she hadn’t been caught in a mousetrap yet.
“Can I have another pint of Fosters please, and a diet coke?”  She watched the barman turn, glanced across the corner of the counter, smiled at his raised eyebrow, felt his amusement at the... what?  What was he amused by?  There were other things she felt, that made her feel uncomfortable, but she tucked these away for a rainy day.  He glanced away again, reaching into his bag, rifling papers with a frown, “doing anything nice this weekend?”  She wasn’t sure what forced her to speak, a strange spasm had taken her lips for their own devices.  He looked again at her, relieved to be rid of a fake ransacking of paperwork.
“Hmm, the dubious pleasure of a barbeque with friends tonight, if you can call it that.  Yourself?”  He smoothed a sheet of A4 and smiled,
“Much the same probably, home for the weekend, to be watched over by a disapproving mother. Fun.”  She glanced at him hitching her bag onto her shoulder and balanced the drinks, glass against glass, turning away,
“Well, enjoy that,” his gaze lingered.
“I’m sure I will, enjoy your barbeque,” she turned and the door swung to behind her with a delicate sigh.

Like a can of warm Fosters he decided, leaning on the wall near the open patio doors. The swill of conversation slopped about him, disregarded in its irrelevance with the brush of a polite smile. These people were his friends, the accumulated wealth of his gregariousness, yet they annoyed the fuck out of him in their obsequious banality; he considered them effectively dead and frankly beneath him. A tangled knot of grey women picked at a poncy salad, cooing over the dressing whilst wafting wonders and woes of offspring over the organic rocket. Pockets of paunches loafed in casual pontification, clutching huge pitchers of sipped wine glasses, offering chipped opinions on matters of unending pointlessness.
One by one they were okay; two by two, tolerable, but en masse, in herds, they were quietly, stultifyingly ghastly. Death on legs. He flirted with his watch, no way of escape until at least two hours of tedium had elapsed, it was the rules. Jolting himself from the brickwork’s thrill, he seized a hotdog (in ciabatta) and appended himself to the edge of a conversation. Work. Whoopee. But then, would cars or football have been any better, and that was likely to be the choice.  The problem was Jane.  In her element, ‘but they’re our friends...’ she’d accuse if he complained, or showed the slightest indication of anything other than being completely enthralled.  After five years you’d think she’d know he sighed, smiling at something.  Car related he thought.  Probably.
He flicked on the computer; twelve offline, one online. His mum, who wasn’t actually there, she just hadn’t mastered the off switch yet. Not without help anyway. Four emails, two offering fantastic loans, two offering penis extensions. He opted to enliven his evening with endless games of solitaire. The thought of work flitted threateningly through his mind, but his mind kept turning away, thinking not of the array of cards or of the pressing need to work, but of her.

She’d finished the application, it was just after one, but the task had had benefits, it meant she’d been able to escape the clutches of her mother with ease.  What parent would ever argue with the need to complete an application form?  Her dad had lobbed a barbed missile across the sofa about leaving things to the last minute, attached to an incendiary comment about Laura actually spending time with her family, but he’d let her alone once she was outside of his eyesight.  It was the way of things.
Now it was done, being posted was another issue altogether, she wasn’t tired, and didn’t fancy the rigmarole of explaining why she was up after ten to either of them.  After all, might wake the sainted brother, poor dear.  Needs his strength to break stuff.  She snorted and checked her messages.  Nothing.  She wrapped the hair around her ears.  What?  R O B A D E L S T R O P.  She typed the name one fingered into the search box, chin in hand.  Fuckfuckfuck.  He had a profile.  Fuck.  What now?

Every nerve connected to one point, slowing, unwilling to finish, letting his mind dabble, imagining.  A mmm escaped tongue dampened lips as he thought, arms as tight as he stood.  Her noise, urgency, her lips, darting tongue; he remembered the brush of her breast in the pub, wondered if she’d noticed like he had.  How did she come?  Did she... he imagined she’d...  He felt the surge through his legs.  Oversensitive, he sat, balled the paper, threw it in the bin, did his trousers up.
The clock ticked in the early morning silence, images flickered through his mind, and little was emerging on the page in front of him.  A quick flick through the sleeping world of the internet he thought and he’d retire to bed, it was already too late, but he was bored enough not to go to sleep yet.  Too much head racing.  He checked one more time.  A message was there...

Her alarm woke her too early, and she lay duvet warm, reluctant waking dream thrummed behind closed lids. She turned, thought vaguely of smoothing away the bunched fabric of her night clothes, but was suddenly skin tinglingly aware of the bedspread brush on bare skin. She writhed softly, relishing the warmth of the duvet and the soft brush of it on her skin.  Stretching; shoulder blades flexing to elbows and spreading fingers, keeping shoulders beneath the covers, sight beneath closed lids, she patterned circles on the sheet, drawing slowly closer until it was her thighs she traced feathering figure of eights on.

“It’s hot!”
“It’s fucking coffee, what d’you expect? Muppet.” A head shake as the phone tried to vibrate its escape across the table.  Leaning on his cue, he watched Smoky miss the easy red and swear mildly. Grasping the chalk, he armoured the tip against the scarce concealed disapproval of the pub they’d invaded, bent, leg straight, cue flowing and thwacked with power, grace and imprecision.
“What brings you to the smoke then?” he fingered a packet of fags, “fucking smoking ban wankers.  I’d like the cunts to get cancer personally.  All those ASH fuckers.  Poetic justice for being dried up little arsewipes.”
Rob sipped blew on his coffee, “ahh, this and that I suppose, fancied a change.”
“You never fucking fancy a change mate, I doubt you ever change your keks.  Summat’s up if you’re here.”  He potted a double as Rob smiled faintly, disturbed at how he was seen.
Rob leant, sipped at the beer, pondered the complexity of words that needed to be expressed; the manner in which he might express his unseemly wishes losing his integrity, “there’s a girl...”
“Good on you mate,” Smoky slid another yellow in, “Jane’s a miserable tart,”  Rob ummed, “so, you knobbed her yet?”
“Good grief no, we talk and text, that’s it.”
“And that’s your great worry in life?  Mate, I worry ‘bout you sometimes.  What’s the point if you’re not getting your knob wet?”
“There’s more important things, like talking, having someone to make you smile.”
“Fucking makes me smile.  Your shot by the way.”
“We’re meeting tomorrow,” he missed the pot, “at the station.”
“How’s that relevant?  Good.  So you meet, get pissed, shag her.  Excellent work.”  Smoky grinned, “we’ll get you sorted before long eh?”  Rob decided it wasn’t worth the aggravation, tucked her away carefully and entered into the spirit of a long vacuous evening.

With scarce a word they ambled to town with coffee shop intent and complicity of hopes. Upstairs they curled on the sofa, his fingers grazing her thigh, her fingers entwining with his in a web of unspoken longings. Conversation wove soft in tangles like brambles, ensnaring their dreams and smiles. He finger traced her name in endless repetition on her palm and thigh, heart fluttering in disbelief. Outside people walked, they straggled and dashed, and nothing mattered.
Texts and dreams.  Dreams of texts.  He was to be seen skipping.  She sat in corners with a smile on her face that confused people.  Evenings of conversations.  Conversations through nights.  Nights on nights.  Days on days, texts on texts, words, giggles, smiles, silliness, hugs and every stolen moment.  Time thieves with grins on their faces.

Then there were them.

There seemed to be lots of them.

The night stole in, its soft curtaining comfort creeping around them, unwilling or unable to disturb their obsession.  He walked the dog with her in his ear before whiling the hours of evening away in the intimacy of distant computers; cavorting, whispering electronic dreams in an evolving language understood by two.  As the night eased on, and slowly, steadily others dropped to slumber unhindered by pleasure, the keyboard fell silent and on the kitchen floor, his phone’s battery expired, they shared nonsense until the birds felt the need to join in the warmth of a conversation that in its murmured mumbling tethered them through the miles of night.
Bleary texts yawned morning journeys, undertaken in bounces, leaky Converse, rain, work... naught to trouble the inveterately cheerful.  By the time the unearthly time of nine had been reached, both were softly melted into their comfortable corners, sharing dreams and furtive texts.
On the corner, near WH Smith and the croissant shop, he waited for her, all watch twitches and butterflies until he saw her smiles bounce toward him from ticket barrier.  A light kissing squeeze, and they were hand in hand into the street, the night as inviting in its possibility as they were.  Everywhere in the happiness of a warm evening were couples, in arms, in hands, smiles and hugs.  Cars parted and pavements approved.
They walked down the steps to the bar, the throbbing resonance of music lights bright in her ears, his hand hot in hers, every thought gone, consumed with his frivolous laughing smile and the recklessness of dark.  They dropped drinks on a table and danced, eye to eye to what they didn’t know, but as the heat rose, and eyes adjusted, she could only see him.  He looked only at her, their fingers brushing with the electricity of perpetual smiles.    Around them the surging and swaying cocooned them, they were together and safe in this place.   He felt her press against him, felt her warm breath nuzzle his neck, her hands on his hips.  They danced, their complicity shutting out the world, the worries, the stress; there was only their possibility.  No cares as they kissed, arms around each other, his hands shiver spiralling through her, her fingers through his long hair, moving together in unthinking dreams of forever.   Head tilted in kisses, and the unending smiles in between.  She wrapped her arms around the back of his neck and kissed him again, no thought whatever now of Them.  They were banished, and he pulled her from the crowd.  She followed his purple t-shirt as he led her to a table nook, grabbing jacket and drinks as they passed.  In sofa comfort of dark goose-bumps, kisses, straying hands and stripy t-shirts, she swung her legs over his, kissed him  urgently; she wished she’d worn a skirt.  They kissed in the dark and giggled in waves, fingers entwining as music drowned reality.
Upstairs, later, in another bar, the stretched hands across the stair top table, with the gushing enthusiasm of a late night, “... doesn’t matter.  However it happened, I love you.”
She smiled, squeezed his hand, “I know, but there are other things aren’t there.  One of us needs to think.”
“Thinking’s very overrated.”
“You know, stuff... but it’s hard.”

They caught the train back to hers, sat in the corner of the carriage, willing everyone to get off soon.  Shivers fired along her spine, looking straight into his eyes, all she could think of was him, her.  She’d sat through days thinking of him, now his gaze held her rigid, unable to move, her only thought of him as his hand closed on hers and she clenched her legs, only too aware of the electricity.  They leant against the wall by her back gate, warm in the cold night, in wreathes of tight hugs that would mean everything one day.
Inside, beneath her duvet, her black and white striped top lying on the floor with her skinny black jeans,  she flipped the send button, letting him know she’d had a fantastic evening.  She smiled a smile, hugged herself and wriggled.  She’d dashed through the house, snatching a bag of crisps and a drink on her way through, unwilling for anyone to tarnish her evening.  Now she bounced, with shivers of traversing joy, she longed to be kissed still; the phone buzzes under her pillow, she sighs a hello.
“I was thinking about thinking of you, and I had to phone.”

These were days, unexpected days. He sat beneath the tree with the sunshine scorching his legs, he’d not been here in all the years he lived here, and now he found himself drawn back to the spot only days after discovering it. He’d driven past many times, but never turned the corner and visited, now he found his feet, car, waking thoughts, strained to return. He sat back rough barked with longing, watched the wood, the sky, the grass in its vivid ordinariness and amazing wonder. Here.
She climbed over the stile from the woodland, wishing she’d been here when the bluebells were out,

Description
1. The Afternoon

Sun blazed, as it had for days; blue sky chased blue sky, each competing in a competition for the bluest, deepest and barest.  There was a feeling of infinity to this one, even before midday had troubled those basking outside the Slater’s Arms with Banks’ and ploughman’s.
She stood near the slightly rickety table, undermined by age, moss, rot, its integrity sagging toward an ignominious end as soggy firewood and woodlouse pied-a-terre.  She stood in the smiles of summer admiration, her black trousers as slender as her legs; low waisted, high temptation.  Eyes grazed along thighs that led one on, brushed slowly over the smoothness of a front panel that dipped, curving into deep shade.  Trousers snug enough to reveal dreams, loose enough to suggest the dreamt revelations; the tracing curves beneath, the thin underwear, softness desired.  Eyes caressed the waving detours, black arcing trajectory taking the gaze on gentle detours of the mind.  The imaginings enlivening nerves languid with sun, taking fingers on virtual tours, drifting between over the slipping fabric bias of firm thigh; the delicate elastic ridge, fingertip silhouette guideline taking the fervour of wishes over undulations, moistly through disrobing rumination.  He could almost hear the zip as he slid fanciful hands beneath waistbands...
Shifting on delicate legs, she oozed the fingertip desire of youth’s balanced disregard for yesterday, today, tomorrow.  With disregarding nonchalance she tucked her hair into the oblivion of his dreams and turned away.
In the inglenook shade of a summer pub’s silent interior, he found solace from the evidence of his obscurity, drifting as long as mid-summer through his possible pasts, the warm whimsy of pale regret and Indian summer moments rheuming his eyes.  With the glance of a door’s quiet thud, the waft of summer stillness came to lean lithely on the bar; futile scanning and swaying limbs searching for the errant barman, ignorant of the overtures his eyes played over pale vested skin.

The sun was confused, blazing down with the enthusiasm of high summer drought, then taking umbrage and hiding behind skirts of cloud for days on end... Grass spiked her neck, sunbeams played I-spy through the leaves whilst he traced grass tickles over her palms.
In reality they were elsewhere, so much elsewhere as to be completely separate. Not a little bit apart, but the sort of apart that’s actually never been together in any way whatsoever.
In reality she was sat in the corner of a slightly gloomy room, an annoying streak of sunshine dazzling her wherever she moved her head. The plunk of pool balls punctuated her attempts to read. The plunk of daydreams punctuated good intent, and she looked out across the field to the woods and the rising Victorian folly on the hill with thoughts aplenty, thoughts abetted as she watched someone stroll across the courtyard...
She’d not been in this position before, every thinking feeling nerve was bursting in ongoing vibrant thought, of one thing, one person, one idea.  She pulled her top down, watching, unintentionally aloof from the others around the table. She always felt slightly distant, but then no one had ever really understood her. Twisting straws until they explode - the explosive plastic pop accompanied by dropped eye giggles, a sniffy young woman walked by with disdain and a look that’d set to decades of disapproval.
Days seemed to earnest, it was summer, but somehow the content didn’t match.  She didn’t want to talk about it, but actually there’s little else she do want to discuss.  Really, what’s the point, she asked herself.  All words are useless, an endless circling as bereft of resolution as these days are without those giggles and whispers, filled as they are with the fading memory of carefree smiles. Those days with skips and daft joy from dawn ‘til slumbering dreams are gone, and whilst the rawness has healed, there’s an emptiness afoot that I can’t shift. Nothing seemed so bad then, tumbling around the corner, problems were here and gone; there was anticipation and joy, mountains of anguish could be dissolved in a frivolous tumble of words over a sympathetic shoulder.
Her mind was elsewhere, as so often, and her friend’s frivolity passed her by in a haze of vacuity that went utterly unnoticed. She felt she often went unnoticed. She always went unnoticed, always had, through school, at home, now... hers was a life unique.  She’d been told this was a virtue, that she should revel in it, but it didn’t feel that way when there was no one to talk to, no one who understood her emotions or life. It just felt horribly lonely. So it was now that she laughed and chatted, perhaps even flirted, whilst leaving nothing of herself anywhere, that she kept locked away for a day. One day. They got up and left, sidling past the loud and confident, not noticing the men emerging from the door opposite, or the glance that lingered.
Close denim smiles and a pixie nose. How could you describe that arse? Snug? Delicious? You could do so in terms of what it’s not, but that’d be to do it an injustice. Pert. Fitted. An easy arse. Suffice to say, she was delightful, she walked off, unaware she’d left part of herself behind searing delectable thoughts through his mind, that in fact she was walking arm in arm in the opposite direction.
He strolled down the tree lined hill, accompanied by warm thoughts he shouldn’t have, took a detour, the usual one, and ended up with a large black coffee and his own company, watching the street pass oblivious from the window of Hysteria.
Noise washed through the room, the sewage of life swilling around like cold coffee. Doors banged, grinders roared and above all of that a tumult of dead voices competed with insipid background music. In the corner, wedged against a window in the hope of spotting his life passing by outside, he was oblivious to it all, just sat and stared twiddling with the tall mug, the hectic detritus of life’s banality treating him as a non-stick entity. His eyes scanned endlessly beyond the rain stained glass, seeking, hoping. He wouldn’t ever have characterised his watching as hope; hope was something he felt he’d left behind long since, one of those childish fripperies best shed early. He’d have seen polite disinterest in the common humanity he professed to dislike. He’d have laughed quietly, shaken his head sadly at your ineptitude in reading people had you suggested it. He’d have then gone home and retold the story, ‘… me! Hopeful?’ he’d exclaim to a quiet nodded agreement as tea was served. Yet he searched. Searched without aim or knowledge, but search he did as he sat everyday in the corner, annoyed beyond measure if someone had usurped his seat. He’d wait the full hour until six, two mugs of coffee, a nod a half smile probably on his way out. Every weekday. Forty nine weeks a year. Six years. Whatever it was he wasn’t looking for had never shown up.
Six hours later, he pulled up the inoffensive duvet around his ears and opened his book, annoyed that the page had been bent down. He wasn’t anal about books he thought, but why was there a need to bend the page in half? Surely just a little turn in the corner would be enough? The book bored him, books did that, they never seemed to say what they should. The words weren’t right, too ornate or too prosaic. He could discuss them, write about them, appreciate them, but rarely did they move him. An i-pod and some frustrated tossing later, he said goodbye to the day. Another day.
She sat opposite him.  That is, she sat on the other side of the café, stirring the frothy coffee with a little plastic stick and smiling plentifully.  Her friends joined her opening folders and looking serious about their work.  Where did this earnestness come from he wondered, rack his brains as hard as he could, he couldn’t remember working that hard when he was a student.  Or generally.  Surely it was the summer holidays anyway?  Oh dear, he had twenty minutes, and all he could think of was her legs stretching from chair to boots.
If only, he thought at that knee swivel, if only she’d had a short skirt instead. If only he had the chance to feel that backside, hands over tight jeans, pulling her as close as the skinny denim, stroking her back catching dreams on low slung hipsters, smooth tipped grazing of randomly rising top, the heat through thin t-shirt. How did she kiss? A tongued exploration, swiftly darting... or an eel dance? From sideways glances he saw himself lift the t-shirt, catch hint of nipple through the bra as slender as her, he kissed her shoulders where the bones say sensual. A flick of the button, soft sound of the zip, breaths nestling in neck hollows of desire. It doesn’t matter how often you rearrange your dress, tweak your bra straps you’re still fucking gorgeous. Mind wandering to slithering jeans, the revelation of pants, he imagined... what underwear would be revealed sliding between pale thighs... she stood, swung her bag up and left filled with forward glances.
That bloody woman.  He leant his head on his hands, rubbing at his temples; just how she’d managed to stay in her post as long as she had remained a mystery.  Perhaps there was someone higher up the food chain who was as lazy as she was, as incapable of doing anything that needed to be done.  Like either making her do her fucking job or getting the crone out.  Once again he found the careful list of tasks to do screwed up because he now had to do half her job as well, and naturally they were vital they were done now.  He closed the page, he’d have to deal with that later on, and instead opened the file she’d dumped.  The phone rang and he glanced at the display, Wagstaff.  Arrogant prick.  Could he ignore him?  Not  without being plagued throughout lunch and the afternoon, a deep breath and he lifted the receiver, recognising with widened eyes that today was another that was neither in his control nor easy.  He wondered again why he came in at all, there was nothing he couldn’t do here that he couldn’t do at home, except interact with people who loathed or felt nothing for, not even the bonus of loathing.  It was like being back at uni, surrounded by tabloid readers working their pathetic arses off to scrape a 2:2 and get a job as a trainee twat at messrs Idiot, Vindictive and Petty.  What happened to all of them?  He didn’t care enough to wonder.
Twenty past five, having finished the awful Barbara Drugett’s work, he stood, flicked closed his laptop, snatched seemingly randomly at papers strewn across the desk, wedged them in the pocket and dropped the ashtray in the drawer.  What they can’t see they can’t confiscate.  Outside the window streams of little grey men and charred women streamed over the canal bridge toward the station, shadows lengthened beneath the sentinel trees, unimpressed at their labour; far away Jane would be concocting some overcooked bland dish of her underactive imagination.  Closer was a green leather bench, an unfinished crossword and a pint of bitter.  Slamming the door deliberately behind him, all the better to annoy Barbara who hated sudden loud noises, he left, wondering why she hadn’t been caught in a mousetrap yet.
“Can I have another pint of Fosters please, and a diet coke?”  She watched the barman turn, glanced across the corner of the counter, smiled at his raised eyebrow, felt his amusement at the... what?  What was he amused by?  There were other things she felt, that made her feel uncomfortable, but she tucked these away for a rainy day.  He glanced away again, reaching into his bag, rifling papers with a frown, “doing anything nice this weekend?”  She wasn’t sure what forced her to speak, a strange spasm had taken her lips for their own devices.  He looked again at her, relieved to be rid of a fake ransacking of paperwork.
“Hmm, the dubious pleasure of a barbeque with friends tonight, if you can call it that.  Yourself?”  He smoothed a sheet of A4 and smiled,
“Much the same probably, home for the weekend, to be watched over by a disapproving mother. Fun.”  She glanced at him hitching her bag onto her shoulder and balanced the drinks, glass against glass, turning away,
“Well, enjoy that,” his gaze lingered.
“I’m sure I will, enjoy your barbeque,” she turned and the door swung to behind her with a delicate sigh.

Like a can of warm Fosters he decided, leaning on the wall near the open patio doors. The swill of conversation slopped about him, disregarded in its irrelevance with the brush of a polite smile. These people were his friends, the accumulated wealth of his gregariousness, yet they annoyed the fuck out of him in their obsequious banality; he considered them effectively dead and frankly beneath him. A tangled knot of grey women picked at a poncy salad, cooing over the dressing whilst wafting wonders and woes of offspring over the organic rocket. Pockets of paunches loafed in casual pontification, clutching huge pitchers of sipped wine glasses, offering chipped opinions on matters of unending pointlessness.
One by one they were okay; two by two, tolerable, but en masse, in herds, they were quietly, stultifyingly ghastly. Death on legs. He flirted with his watch, no way of escape until at least two hours of tedium had elapsed, it was the rules. Jolting himself from the brickwork’s thrill, he seized a hotdog (in ciabatta) and appended himself to the edge of a conversation. Work. Whoopee. But then, would cars or football have been any better, and that was likely to be the choice.  The problem was Jane.  In her element, ‘but they’re our friends...’ she’d accuse if he complained, or showed the slightest indication of anything other than being completely enthralled.  After five years you’d think she’d know he sighed, smiling at something.  Car related he thought.  Probably.
He flicked on the computer; twelve offline, one online. His mum, who wasn’t actually there, she just hadn’t mastered the off switch yet. Not without help anyway. Four emails, two offering fantastic loans, two offering penis extensions. He opted to enliven his evening with endless games of solitaire. The thought of work flitted threateningly through his mind, but his mind kept turning away, thinking not of the array of cards or of the pressing need to work, but of her.

She’d finished the application, it was just after one, but the task had had benefits, it meant she’d been able to escape the clutches of her mother with ease.  What parent would ever argue with the need to complete an application form?  Her dad had lobbed a barbed missile across the sofa about leaving things to the last minute, attached to an incendiary comment about Laura actually spending time with her family, but he’d let her alone once she was outside of his eyesight.  It was the way of things.
Now it was done, being posted was another issue altogether, she wasn’t tired, and didn’t fancy the rigmarole of explaining why she was up after ten to either of them.  After all, might wake the sainted brother, poor dear.  Needs his strength to break stuff.  She snorted and checked her messages.  Nothing.  She wrapped the hair around her ears.  What?  R O B A D E L S T R O P.  She typed the name one fingered into the search box, chin in hand.  Fuckfuckfuck.  He had a profile.  Fuck.  What now?

Every nerve connected to one point, slowing, unwilling to finish, letting his mind dabble, imagining.  A mmm escaped tongue dampened lips as he thought, arms as tight as he stood.  Her noise, urgency, her lips, darting tongue; he remembered the brush of her breast in the pub, wondered if she’d noticed like he had.  How did she come?  Did she... he imagined she’d...  He felt the surge through his legs.  Oversensitive, he sat, balled the paper, threw it in the bin, did his trousers up.
The clock ticked in the early morning silence, images flickered through his mind, and little was emerging on the page in front of him.  A quick flick through the sleeping world of the internet he thought and he’d retire to bed, it was already too late, but he was bored enough not to go to sleep yet.  Too much head racing.  He checked one more time.  A message was there...

Her alarm woke her too early, and she lay duvet warm, reluctant waking dream thrummed behind closed lids. She turned, thought vaguely of smoothing away the bunched fabric of her night clothes, but was suddenly skin tinglingly aware of the bedspread brush on bare skin. She writhed softly, relishing the warmth of the duvet and the soft brush of it on her skin.  Stretching; shoulder blades flexing to elbows and spreading fingers, keeping shoulders beneath the covers, sight beneath closed lids, she patterned circles on the sheet, drawing slowly closer until it was her thighs she traced feathering figure of eights on.

“It’s hot!”
“It’s fucking coffee, what d’you expect? Muppet.” A head shake as the phone tried to vibrate its escape across the table.  Leaning on his cue, he watched Smoky miss the easy red and swear mildly. Grasping the chalk, he armoured the tip against the scarce concealed disapproval of the pub they’d invaded, bent, leg straight, cue flowing and thwacked with power, grace and imprecision.
“What brings you to the smoke then?” he fingered a packet of fags, “fucking smoking ban wankers.  I’d like the cunts to get cancer personally.  All those ASH fuckers.  Poetic justice for being dried up little arsewipes.”
Rob sipped blew on his coffee, “ahh, this and that I suppose, fancied a change.”
“You never fucking fancy a change mate, I doubt you ever change your keks.  Summat’s up if you’re here.”  He potted a double as Rob smiled faintly, disturbed at how he was seen.
Rob leant, sipped at the beer, pondered the complexity of words that needed to be expressed; the manner in which he might express his unseemly wishes losing his integrity, “there’s a girl...”
“Good on you mate,” Smoky slid another yellow in, “Jane’s a miserable tart,”  Rob ummed, “so, you knobbed her yet?”
“Good grief no, we talk and text, that’s it.”
“And that’s your great worry in life?  Mate, I worry ‘bout you sometimes.  What’s the point if you’re not getting your knob wet?”
“There’s more important things, like talking, having someone to make you smile.”
“Fucking makes me smile.  Your shot by the way.”
“We’re meeting tomorrow,” he missed the pot, “at the station.”
“How’s that relevant?  Good.  So you meet, get pissed, shag her.  Excellent work.”  Smoky grinned, “we’ll get you sorted before long eh?”  Rob decided it wasn’t worth the aggravation, tucked her away carefully and entered into the spirit of a long vacuous evening.

With scarce a word they ambled to town with coffee shop intent and complicity of hopes. Upstairs they curled on the sofa, his fingers grazing her thigh, her fingers entwining with his in a web of unspoken longings. Conversation wove soft in tangles like brambles, ensnaring their dreams and smiles. He finger traced her name in endless repetition on her palm and thigh, heart fluttering in disbelief. Outside people walked, they straggled and dashed, and nothing mattered.
Texts and dreams.  Dreams of texts.  He was to be seen skipping.  She sat in corners with a smile on her face that confused people.  Evenings of conversations.  Conversations through nights.  Nights on nights.  Days on days, texts on texts, words, giggles, smiles, silliness, hugs and every stolen moment.  Time thieves with grins on their faces.

Then there were them.

There seemed to be lots of them.

The night stole in, its soft curtaining comfort creeping around them, unwilling or unable to disturb their obsession.  He walked the dog with her in his ear before whiling the hours of evening away in the intimacy of distant computers; cavorting, whispering electronic dreams in an evolving language understood by two.  As the night eased on, and slowly, steadily others dropped to slumber unhindered by pleasure, the keyboard fell silent and on the kitchen floor, his phone’s battery expired, they shared nonsense until the birds felt the need to join in the warmth of a conversation that in its murmured mumbling tethered them through the miles of night.
Bleary texts yawned morning journeys, undertaken in bounces, leaky Converse, rain, work... naught to trouble the inveterately cheerful.  By the time the unearthly time of nine had been reached, both were softly melted into their comfortable corners, sharing dreams and furtive texts.
On the corner, near WH Smith and the croissant shop, he waited for her, all watch twitches and butterflies until he saw her smiles bounce toward him from ticket barrier.  A light kissing squeeze, and they were hand in hand into the street, the night as inviting in its possibility as they were.  Everywhere in the happiness of a warm evening were couples, in arms, in hands, smiles and hugs.  Cars parted and pavements approved.
They walked down the steps to the bar, the throbbing resonance of music lights bright in her ears, his hand hot in hers, every thought gone, consumed with his frivolous laughing smile and the recklessness of dark.  They dropped drinks on a table and danced, eye to eye to what they didn’t know, but as the heat rose, and eyes adjusted, she could only see him.  He looked only at her, their fingers brushing with the electricity of perpetual smiles.    Around them the surging and swaying cocooned them, they were together and safe in this place.   He felt her press against him, felt her warm breath nuzzle his neck, her hands on his hips.  They danced, their complicity shutting out the world, the worries, the stress; there was only their possibility.  No cares as they kissed, arms around each other, his hands shiver spiralling through her, her fingers through his long hair, moving together in unthinking dreams of forever.   Head tilted in kisses, and the unending smiles in between.  She wrapped her arms around the back of his neck and kissed him again, no thought whatever now of Them.  They were banished, and he pulled her from the crowd.  She followed his purple t-shirt as he led her to a table nook, grabbing jacket and drinks as they passed.  In sofa comfort of dark goose-bumps, kisses, straying hands and stripy t-shirts, she swung her legs over his, kissed him  urgently; she wished she’d worn a skirt.  They kissed in the dark and giggled in waves, fingers entwining as music drowned reality.
Upstairs, later, in another bar, the stretched hands across the stair top table, with the gushing enthusiasm of a late night, “... doesn’t matter.  However it happened, I love you.”
She smiled, squeezed his hand, “I know, but there are other things aren’t there.  One of us needs to think.”
“Thinking’s very overrated.”
“You know, stuff... but it’s hard.”

They caught the train back to hers, sat in the corner of the carriage, willing everyone to get off soon.  Shivers fired along her spine, looking straight into his eyes, all she could think of was him, her.  She’d sat through days thinking of him, now his gaze held her rigid, unable to move, her only thought of him as his hand closed on hers and she clenched her legs, only too aware of the electricity.  They leant against the wall by her back gate, warm in the cold night, in wreathes of tight hugs that would mean everything one day.
Inside, beneath her duvet, her black and white striped top lying on the floor with her skinny black jeans,  she flipped the send button, letting him know she’d had a fantastic evening.  She smiled a smile, hugged herself and wriggled.  She’d dashed through the house, snatching a bag of crisps and a drink on her way through, unwilling for anyone to tarnish her evening.  Now she bounced, with shivers of traversing joy, she longed to be kissed still; the phone buzzes under her pillow, she sighs a hello.
“I was thinking about thinking of you, and I had to phone.”

These were days, unexpected days. He sat beneath the tree with the sunshine scorching his legs, he’d not been here in all the years he lived here, and now he found himself drawn back to the spot only days after discovering it. He’d driven past many times, but never turned the corner and visited, now he found his feet, car, waking thoughts, strained to return. He sat back rough barked with longing, watched the wood, the sky, the grass in its vivid ordinariness and amazing wonder. Here.
She climbed over the stile from the woodland, wishing she’d been here when the bluebells were out,