“Not long till you can marry Fancy Nancy, then,” Chrissie said, when Jim rang her from France to tell her he’d received the decree nisi in the post and had applied for a decree absolute.
“Didn’t work out with her,” he said quickly.
“Oh . . . Sorry about that,” Chrissie said, not sounding sorry at all. “So you’re all on your lonesome in poor Stevie’s house?”
“Yup. But it’s good. I’m getting on with my music. Tommy’s coming over at Easter for a few days. And I’ve got Izzy next door. You remember Izzy?”
“Yeah . . . Blonde piece of work.” She sniggered. “Nice one, Jimmy.”
“Meaning?”
“Meaning Pascal used to say she’d fucked everyone with a pulse east of Marseille. What would that be in French now? La bicyclette de la ville?” Another disparaging cackle.
Jim remembered, yet again, why Chrissie irritated him so much. “She’s been a good friend,” he returned, against his better judgment, knowing he should just have shut the conversation down. Although what she’d said about Izzy was probably true—and Izzy would be the first to admit it—he felt suddenly protective toward his friend.
“I’m sure she has. Well, guard your virtue well, Jim-boy. If she’s not had you yet, it’s only a matter of time. Case of last man standing.” Which made his ex dissolve into yet more dirty laughter.
*
It was March, and Jim had spent the preceding months in a daze of disbelief. The whole structure of his life had tumbled about his ears. He felt completely crazy. He had written Nancy a heap of letters, which had ended up in the wood-burning stove. He had texted her a million messages, then deleted them. He’d composed emails, which were only saved as “drafts”; he’d called her landline and hung up when the answer-machine kicked in. He was disgusted with himself. You’ve just given up. You can’t even manage to be a committed stalker, he told himself, as he deleted yet another pleading text. And from Nancy there was just a deafening silence.
Izzy had been so wrong. Nancy wasn’t playing games. She hadn’t wanted him to jump on a plane and do a caveman act, dragging her by the hair back to his lair in France. She had wanted him to go away, leave her alone. He sat there in the darkening room, knowing he should put some wood in the stove but without the energy to get out of the armchair, feeling sorry for himself in the wake of Chrissie’s phone call, realizing what a pig’s breakfast he’d made of his relationships, feeling old and running on empty.
What have I got to lose? he asked himself a minute later, reading the text that had just come in from Izzy.
*
That night they got drunk together. Izzy had bought vodka at Duty Free on her flight back from Morocco, where she’d spent the previous week. Jim made supper—roast chicken and riced potatoes. He had taken to cooking for the first time in his life, testing myriad unfamiliar gadgets in his brother’s kitchen, such as the potato ricer, a crêpe pan, a Mouli, a tin egg poacher with holes in the bottom and a stalk to fix it to the edge of the pan, a rotating cheese grater—all of which were puzzling to his previous microwave existence and had to be explained to him by Madame Laverne, their purpose demonstrated. But it passed the time, shopping with his palm-leaf bag, trying out his French in the shops as he eyed the curious foodstuffs on display. And in the back of his mind, always, was the thought of sharing it all with Nancy.
“Okay,” Izzy said, getting up.
It was far into the night, the vodka long gone, the room a fug of Gitanes and wood-smoke, the lamps reflected in the glass balcony doors, giving the impression of an infinite space. Jim was restless, the emotionally charged voice of Souad Massi coming from the speaker, vibrating in his gut with an energy that seemed to speak directly to his misery, seemed to beg him to stop all this self-indulgent woe-is-me and do something for a change. He watched as Izzy came to stand in front of him as he lounged on the sofa, glass of wine balanced on the cushion, tilting dangerously to one side.
“Now is the time,” she said, swaying to the music, “to treat you to the dance of the seven veils.”
Jim laughed drunkenly. “Is that so? Not sure how a jumper and jeans is going to make that particularly possible.”
Ignoring him, Izzy raised her arms, twirling round slowly, her body undulating, head thrown back, hair floating around her face, eyes fixed on Jim at each turn.
“Pay attention. I’m Salome,” she whispered, as she drew the edges of her cream cable sweater sensuously up her body, revealing a pale pink vest-top beneath.
Jim, spellbound, just stared.
The sweater was thrown casually aside as Izzy continued to dance, the soft light from the lamp throwing shadows on her figure as she took hold of the hem of the vest, lifting it a few inches to reveal smooth, lightly tanned flesh, then dropping it again, pirouetting a couple of times before exposing a little more, until there was a fleeting glimpse of the curve of her small breasts. She was singing along with Souad Massi, her voice a light soprano, the words indistinguishable, the notes dissonant.
Drunk as he was, his senses were alert. He did nothing to stop Izzy, on her next pirouette, tossing aside the vest-top, laying bare her breasts—the soft-coral nipples bordered by a triangle of whiter skin against her otherwise tanned body. She was gyrating her stomach like a belly dancer now, her blue jeans unzipped, a line of black lacy knickers showing beneath her belly button. She held her hands behind her head, entangled in her thick blonde hair, her eyes never leaving Jim’s face as she moved closer to him, pushing his knees apart with her own, dancing more slowly now . . . slower and slower.
Jim made no effort to resist her advances as he lay there, mesmerized. But he was suddenly aware of a warning light going on in his booze-addled brain. A light signaling a thought that grew to a clamoring insistence. This is the line, Jim, it said, the definitive line. Step over it and you’ll be separated from Nancy forever.
Another voice—visceral, thoughtless and emanating from his genitals—countered, Fuck it, and why not? Nancy is lost to you anyway. But his head-voice was urgent and imperious. Cross the line just once and it’s over. No going back. No second chance.