FORTY

It had been a good choice, those woods where he’d left Jessica in the night. The perfect place for that last hour or so they had been together. He was happy she had gone to sleep somewhere peaceful. He shook his head, adjusted the thought. Happy that it was where she had been laid to rest.

She had gone to sleep elsewhere, of course.

Places like that – natural, green, quiet – still felt a little strange, even after all this time. So different to where he had grown up, the places he had worked in before. He watched the local kids sneaking off into those woods sometimes, bags clinking with bottles, pockets full of condoms, and he was jealous because he couldn’t help but wish that his first few times had been somewhere like that, under trees rather than flyovers. Birds and things that smelled nice. Moss on a girl’s back instead of brick dust.

He remembered his first time, just like everyone else did. Forget that and you might as well cash in your chips. A week before his sixteenth birthday, a girl called Julia, who was a year younger than he was. They had been walking back to the bus from the cinema and it had been her idea to cut through a narrow alleyway. She’d known exactly what she was doing, of course she had, but it had been more than OK with him.

In a stinking doorway, the clatter of heels on concrete somewhere nearby; the usual unzippings and fumblings. It had all been over pretty quickly, but the girl had been OK about it, he knew he was remembering that right.

She’d been putting her lipstick back on and he’d asked her. She’d said ‘fine’ or ‘great’ or something.

He remembered asking her.

Obviously there would be people who thought what he was doing was because he felt inadequate; hating these girls deep down, because of being laughed at in the past or something. They could not have been wider of the mark. In fact, all the girls he’d ever been with had made a point of saying how well he’d treated them, how nicely. He’d asked all of them, more than once, and every girl had seemed happy. They’d all made it pretty clear that he was no slouch in the bedroom department either.

He smiled. His hand dropped to his groin.

Bedroom, bathroom, back seat, whatever.

Obviously, he knew that girls like Jessica and Poppy were far more likely to be impressed with the things he could do, because most of them didn’t have a lot to compare it to. No, if anything, it was the women his own age who tended to be more judgemental. Seen it all, done it all, blah blah. There hadn’t been too many complaints, but surely there wasn’t a bloke walking around who didn’t recognise the occasional look of mild disappointment. Couldn’t be too many who hadn’t been told it didn’t matter, when they knew very well that it did.

Younger girls were . . . kinder.

And he was kind to them in return, at the end. He was quick about it.

Poppy though. Sweet Pops . . .

It wasn’t his fault, not entirely, he had miscalculated, that was all. He hadn’t thought things would get so hectic, and he probably should have done. No, he definitely should have done. The end, if it hadn’t come already, would be anything but kind and he was living with the pain of that every day. Like an ulcer or something. Like cancer . . .

Cruelty did not sit easily.

It was not who he was.