2

Tuesday, 6.15 p.m.

Barbara had thoroughly enjoyed the movie and was sorry it had come to an end. She sat through the credits and was still sitting there when the lights came on, wondering where to go from the theater. She was just about to get up when a tall, attractive blonde woman sat down one seat away from her. Barbara immediately settled back into her own seat.

Very tasty, she thought, very tasty indeed. She waited to see if the woman was on her own or if there was a man with her who’d paused to buy popcorn or something. But when the intermission ended she was still on her own, to Barbara’s relief.

Throughout the intermission Barbara had kept her under discreet observation. Several times she’d been on the verge of speaking to her, but her usual shackles of anxiety held her back. She never could make the first move in these situations, no matter how much she wanted to. Her fear of rejection was too strong.

So instead she fantasized as to how such a conversation might go, what delights it might lead to—not just for that night but for other nights to come. She desperately needed to get involved with someone else. It would give her the necessary strength to break up with Shirley. Things couldn’t go on the way they were for much longer. Yet she couldn’t just leave Shirley unless there was someone else to go to. She couldn’t stand being alone. Even life with Shirley was better than being alone.

She glanced again at the blonde woman, admiring her fine profile. She looked a proud, strong-willed person. Barbara needed those qualities in a partner. Shirley had them, it was true, but she was also cruel. This woman wouldn’t be like that, she was sure.

By the time the lights dimmed, Barbara had decided to sit through the program again. After all, the main feature, a comedy starring Richard Pryor, was very funny and, who knows, something might develop.

During the coming attractions Barbara got up to go to the toilet. As she went past the blonde woman she prolonged the moment of contact with her knees for as long as she could, muttering a soft, “Sorry.” In her mind she had inflated that one word into a blatant invitation dripping with tonal suggestiveness, but the other woman said nothing.

On the way back, after some heart-racing moments of anticipation in the toilet, she deliberately stumbled as she passed by. Pretending to lose her balance she tipped towards the woman and for a delicious few seconds found herself embracing her. “I’m dreadfully sorry,” she said in a loud whisper as the woman took hold of her arm to assist her. “It’s quite all right,” said the woman in a cool, well-educated voice.

Barbara continued on to her own seat. She’d wanted to sit in one of the empty seats on either side of the woman but that would have been too obvious in such a sparsely populated cinema. So instead, as the film progressed, she kept giving the woman long, lingering glances in the hope that she would catch a reciprocal one. She could still feel the touch of the woman’s strong fingers on her upper arm where she’d briefly held her. . . .

But to Barbara’s intense disappointment the woman’s attention remained fixed firmly on the screen for the whole time. And when the lights came on she was up and gone before Barbara could even think.

Barbara watched her disappear through an exit and sighed. Then, smiling sadly to herself, she got up and slowly left the theater. The evening’s fun and fantasies, she realized, were over. She now faced the prospect of going back to Shirley. Normally that would be bad enough but tonight it would be doubly worse because not only was she late but she was also wearing Shirley’s red silk blouse without permission.

Shirley was absolutely impossible when it came to things like that. She was so possessive about her clothes and her belongings. And about Barbara, too.

Barbara’s steps slowed as she pictured the scene when she got home. Oh shit, she thought, it’s almost as bad as living with a man.

When she tried to open the front door to their Chiswick flat it stopped at the end of the safety chain. Damn, she thought, but then shouted as pleasantly as she could, “Shirley, darling! It’s me!”

Shirley’s voice came out of the hall. “Who’s that?”

“Me, of course!” answered Barbara, letting just a little irritation creep in.

“Who’s me?”

Barbara took a deep breath and forced herself to keep her tone light. “Come on, Shirl, stop playing games and let me in.”

Shirley came to the door and peered at her through the gap with an expression of mock surprise. “It is you. I could have sworn you were in bed. It’s where you should be.”

“Open the bloody door, Shirley.”

“You can’t imagine how concerned I was when I got back late and found you weren’t here. I almost called the police.” She gave a laugh that was brittle around the edges. Then she unchained the door.

“I’m sorry, Shirl,” said Barbara as she stepped inside. “I went to the movies . . .”

“When you go to the movies you always go to the late afternoon shows. It’s past nine o’clock—so where have you been?”

“It was a good movie so I sat through it again,” said Barbara, walking into the living room. She could feel herself blushing as she thought of the blonde woman. She could never hide anything from Shirley.

“That’s very unlike you, darling,” said Shirley sweetly. “And why are you blushing all of a sudden? I can’t see where my blouse ends and your neck begins.”

Barbara’s hand flew to her mouth as she remembered the blouse. “Oh, Shirl, I borrowed your . . .”

“Yes, I can see that, darling.” Shirley gave a light laugh. “Now are you going to tell me where you’ve been all this time? And who with? Before I get very angry with you, Barbara darling.”

“I wasn’t with anyone, I swear it!” protested Barbara anxiously. “I did sit through the movie again. It’s the new one with Richard Pryor and you know what a big fan I am of his. It’s the truth—you’ve got to believe me!”

Shirley regarded her thoughtfully for a while, then seemed to accept her story because she smiled and said, “Oh let’s just forget all about it. Give us a kiss.”

Their lips touched, Barbara’s hesitantly but Shirley pressed hard with hers and then thrust her tongue fiercely into Barbara’s mouth. Barbara relaxed into the strength of Shirley’s passion, and thought that maybe she wasn’t so angry after all.

They parted. Barbara grinned, feeling a little foolish. “How was your day then?”

“So-so. I went to the doctors. Some good news, some bad.”

“Oh.” Barbara paused. She never knew how to handle bad news from doctors. “The good news?”

“I’m not pregnant.”

Barbara laughed. Whatever the bad news was it couldn’t be serious. “And the bad?”

“I’ve got an oral fungus infection.”

“Oh, you poor . . .” began Barbara and then her face curled up with disgust. She spat on the floor, wiping her mouth on the sleeve of Barbara’s blouse. “You bitch! What a dirty trick to play on me!”

Shirley grinned maliciously. “Serves you right. Teach you not to play around behind my back, and take my clothes without asking.”

Furious, Barbara cried, “Here’s what I think of your goddamn precious blouse . . . !” She grabbed the front of it with both hands and yanked hard. There was a ripping sound.

Barbara regretted the action as soon as she’d done it. “Oh, Shirl, I’m sorry . . .”

“You little bitch,” breathed Shirley hoarsely, her eyes bright with anger. Then suddenly she lunged at Barbara.

Barbara shrieked and tried to dodge out of her way but Shirley was too fast for her. The impact of their bodies knocked Barbara off-balance and she fell backward onto the floor. Shirley landed on top of her, forcing the air out of her lungs. Barbara struggled hard but Shirley had at least 15 pounds advantage over her and as usual Barbara was quickly reduced to complete helplessness.

Shirley sat straddling Barbara’s hips and succeeded in pinning both her arms to the floor, then she reached down and ripped open the red blouse the rest of the way. Barbara struggled even harder, bucking and twisting in a vain attempt to dislodge Shirley. She saw Shirley bend her head down towards her exposed breasts then screamed shrilly as she felt Shirley’s teeth bite into her left nipple.

“Oh, you bitch!” she yelled, drumming her heels on the floor as Shirley continued to bite hard into her nipple. “Stop it! Stop it!”

There came a loud thumping from the ceiling above them. It was so violent it made the lamp shade jiggle. Shirley immediately stopped biting her and sat up. In unison they shouted: “Go fuck yourself, you sexist scumbag!”

The thumping increased in volume then abruptly ceased. Their upstairs neighbor, a retired civil servant called Mr. Pickersgill, had made his point for the evening, as usual.

Barbara looked up into Shirley’s face which was flushed and damp with sweat. She was breathing hard and her eyes glittered with both excitement and the familiar look of desire. Barbara was feeling very aroused herself and once again she realized why she would find it hard ever to leave Shirley no matter what the provocation. The simple truth was that Shirley was one hell of a lover. No one could ever excite her as much as Shirley did. Certainly no one ever had in the past.

Shirley stood up and then pulled Barbara to her feet. Docilely, Barbara allowed herself to be led into the bedroom. She fell limply onto the bed, rolled onto her back and let Shirley finish undressing her. She enjoyed the roughness of her lover’s actions as first her jeans were yanked off and then the rest of her clothes. There was the sound of another rip while the red blouse was coming off but neither of them could have cared less.

When she was finally naked she spread her legs wide in eager anticipation. Shirley stood there for a time looking down at her and Barbara savored the thrill of being so completely exposed to Shirley’s hungry, cruel gaze.

Then Shirley was quickly getting out of her own clothes, revealing the long, white, muscular body that Barbara knew almost as well as her own. Of course, in some ways she knew it better than her own. . . .

Barbara closed her eyes as Shirley knelt on the bed between her splayed legs. Then she gasped with pleasure as she felt the warm wetness of Shirley’s tongue probing the lips of her vagina. The tip of the tongue then moved up to her clitoris and she gave a low, shuddering moan, arching her back as the first pulse of pure ecstasy throbbed through her body.

All thought of the attractive blonde woman in the movie theater had fled from her mind.

Much later, sated and exhausted, they fell asleep in each other’s arms. But during the night Barbara had a horrible dream that she was choking. She struggled into semiconsciousness but the choking sensation was still there. Her mouth and throat seemed to be filled with a soft, furry substance. She tried to come fully awake, to cry out, but found herself falling back into unconscious again—an unconsciousness that led to a much deeper oblivion than mere sleep.

When dawn arrived she was still lying there in Shirley’s arms. They were joined at their mouths by a pale yellow pulpy mass.

Neither of them was breathing. The venereal fungus which had grown at an accelerated rate throughout both their bodies during the night, and killing them in the process, was visible at their other orifices too. It grew between their legs to form furry yellow diapers and covered their ears like huge, fluffy ear muffs. And though they were both dead, the fungus grew on.