Tremble (42 page)

I’m sitting beside the bed fully clothed, thinking what is wrong with this picture, when my wife drops to her knees and reaches for my fly.

Sometimes, when you’ve been with the one person for a very long time, you stop seeing them altogether. They blend in with the furniture, become an inanimate object that is entirely recognizable, entirely predictable. It becomes unimportant to hear them or see them clearly because you already know what they are going to say, where they are going to move to next. And you realize that a profound ennui has infiltrated every centimeter of your being and it will take a completely unexpected act to jolt yourself and your loved one out of such a predicament. I suspect that’s how Surrealism was created—which happens to be the subject of the lecture I attended today and is a direct, or perhaps I should say lateral cause of why I am now kneeling in front of my husband in my very good Yves Saint Laurent suit about to take his penis into my mouth.

I blame Magritte, or should it be Dali? Whichever, there is definitely something surreal about the sight of my husband’s erect member against the dark wool of the Paul Smith suit I made him buy that inspires me.

As you can tell by the objectivity of the thoughts running through my head, I’m not exactly emotionally engaged in the act of fellatio. Until, that is, the sound of Robert murmuring my name floats down in a loving, surprised, and—I’m rather embarrassed to admit—thankful tone. Encouraged, I quicken my pace, tightening my grip as Robert groans and moans my name over and over. His fingers are winding through my hair, but not in that
I have control, I will push your head down
way, but tenderly, as if his amazement has made even his fingertips shy. As if all his normal defenses have been breached by the audacity of my act.

And I love him then for his excitement. I love him for his vulnerability, for his cry as he buckles at the knees and shoots deep into my throat. I swallow with the panache of a whore and, in that same moment, find myself trying to banish the thought that yes, I can do it as well, maybe better, than her—the other woman, the
young blond
, the invisible third party who is always between us.

But then as I stand I see that Robert, this great bear of a man, has turned scarlet with awkwardness as he stutters an apology. He kisses me with the hunger of youth, with the greed of old love that flares up in gratitude. And to my own amazement I believe him. I believe that he loves me. But before I can say anything he has me down on the bed, my panties yanked off, as if he is seeing me for the first time, as if we are a couple of clumsy virgin teenagers racing against our own inexperience. And he parts me to look at me. To study me.

“Beautiful,” he whispers as I fight to stop the bubble of tears that is rising like a disastrous hiccup from somewhere below my heart-line. And his mouth is on me, his tongue tracing a quivering path across the inside of my thighs. Unbearably tantalizing, he teases me, circling around and around, his thumbs so gentle over my lips, over the tip of my clit, which feels as if it is unfurling and craning its little head up to reach him like the tendril of a plant, screaming touch me, touch me. His mouth is moving slowly to the center of my pleasure; parting my lips he blows for a second before flickering across the top of me, his tongue a hot probing rod now as he takes all of me between his lips, sucking, licking, pulling open my pleasure like a great secret shame until, clutching at his hair, I come screaming like never before.

And afterward, his cheek a burning weight against my thigh, I can feel both of us wondering…what now?

It’s exactly like the magazine illustration, only gray. Gray with a silver shimmer. Almost two-tone if you hold it up to the light. It has long sleeves and a collar open to the chest with three small pearl buttons to fasten it. The hair, now spun into a light wool, has the texture of cashmere but a little coarser. As I stroke it I imagine what people will think, what animal they might guess the wool came from—an Angora goat? Some obscure Tibetan sheep? A sheepdog? But they’ll never think of human. I bury my nose in the soft folds and breathe deeply. Robert’s scent has been almost eradicated, replaced by the faint scent of cheap soap. I imagine the tiny Russian woman at the sink, standing on a box to reach it, kneading all that hair with her minute hands. She’s done a great job. At last I have something tangible, something actually made from his body.

I ring work to tell them I’ll be in late, then I stretch the hair shirt out on the bed and wonder how it would look on him. Imagine his gray hair curling out at the collar, his fur that I love to sniff, to whirl around my fingers as I lay my head on his wide barrel of a chest, feeling safer than I ever do in the outside world. Daddy.

Shit! Did I just call Robert daddy? I twist the word around in my mind and change it to a Marilyn Monroe sexy sort of daddy. Daddy Sophisticate who picks you up in the BMW. Daddy Sophisticate who drives you to the Aria awards because you are his little girl ripe with cleavage and dripping in diamonds. Daddy Sophisticate who yanks your pants down and puts you across his knee to spank you ever so lightly. Yum. I’m wet between the legs.

Now I’m lying on top of the hair shirt. Close up I can see the forest of intricately woven hairs, each one plucked from a session of lovemaking, each one a chronicle of whispered promises—all of them broken. One loose thread sticks up like a deserting soldier. Without thinking I pull it out.

The accident happened suddenly, out of the blue. I was driving the Mercedes when the steering wheel jumped out of my hands and turned
itself toward the oncoming traffic. Luckily it was in Paddington late on a Monday morning and everyone else seemed to be at work or looking at real estate, so all that happened was I slammed into the side of a Volvo in the oncoming lane that was traveling at about 15k. I think I must have passed out after that, because all I remember is coming to slumped over the steering wheel with a sharp pain shooting through my midriff. There was a tapping sound, and as my mind cleared the face of the Volvo driver—a young Greek incongruously wearing a fireman’s uniform—came into focus as he knocked on the car window. I managed to unlock the door for him before the screaming siren announced the ambulance’s arrival.

A shattered pelvis and one broken leg. Strangely, the Mercedes wasn’t damaged much at all.

Robert was furious. I can only surmise it was a mixture of guilt and fear that somehow he might have been responsible for what he seemed to view as suicidal behavior.

“Are you sure you didn’t fall asleep at the wheel?”

“Robert, it was eleven in the morning!”

“Well, there has to be some rational reason. Mercedes are virtually accident-proof.”

“But not wife-proof evidently.”

“Georgina, I’m sorry you broke your pelvis and I’m sorry about the leg, but it isn’t my fault. I’m just concerned that there might be some unconscious…”

What a coward. He begins a sentence he can’t finish. I deliberately let him struggle for a few more seconds.

“You think I want to kill myself?”

“I didn’t say that. It’s just that you’re coming up to that time of life…”

“Robert, I’m forty-two! I’m a good ten years off menopause.”

“Well, would you like to provide another reason why a perfectly healthy woman in full control of her faculties swings into oncoming traffic in broad daylight?”

“I told you, I don’t know. It was like the steering wheel was operating independently.”

What could I say? It was the truth. Muttering something about losing his no-claims bonus he walked out, leaving a dozen roses and a box of candied fruit as consolation beside the bed. I hate candied fruit.

I lie back on the pillows now, gazing at the harness that holds my leg and pelvis in place. What
did
happen? Am I really suffering from some kind of unconscious self-destructiveness? But as I reconstruct the accident the memory of the steering wheel swinging around by itself as if powered by some invisible external force becomes increasingly clear.

I’m still lying on the bed with one hand on the hair shirt, the other between my thighs, when my mobile rings. I must have fallen asleep. Bleary-eyed I check the incoming number. Robert.

“Hey, babe, listen—I can’t see you tonight, something’s come up. Georgina’s had an accident.”

“That’s terrible.” Beat. Always play the sympathetic ear. Never display malice. “Is she okay?”

“She’ll live, but it’s ugly—a broken pelvis and one busted leg. Weird thing is the car seems comparatively unscathed, although you should see the other guy’s. It’s gonna cost me my policy and some.”

“What happened?”

“She swerved into the opposite lane for no apparent reason. Crazy bitch.”

“What time?”

“About eleven this morning. Why?”

“No reason. Robert…listen, I’m really sorry about the other morning. I had no right to question your judgment on Play 360. I’ve been thinking and you’re totally right about them.”

Silence. I know he’s melting at the other end of the line. Fluffing up with self-justification. I love it when he gets like that, all bristly like a tomcat.

“It’s okay, baby. But next time just agree with me, okay?”

“From now on always. Hey, know what I’d do if you were lying right next to me this very moment…”

The great thing about phone sex is that you can be anyone, have anyone’s body, fake the best orgasm you’ve ever had and the sheets stay clean. Plus you can embellish your lover’s penis with a few extra inches and he need never know. The bad thing is that after you’ve put the phone down you suddenly feel very foolish and more than a little desperate.

Then I glance up at the clock and realize that I pulled the hair out of the shirt the very same moment Georgina swerved into the opposite lane. Suddenly I don’t feel so desperate after all.