It’s the bedside telephone. Deep sleep blasted into small pieces. I fumble in the darkness, locate the bloody thing and manage to find the wit to say, “Hello?”
“Your wake-up call, Madam!”
The guy is sickeningly cheerful and I get the vibe that he’s expecting a response.
“Thank you,” I croak and he tells me to have a nice day, bless him. Beside me, you stir and run a finger across my shoulders. Your luminous watch is beside the telephone and it tells me it’s six-thirty-three.
“Reception?”
“Uh huh.” I slide back under the covers where it’s cosy and happy and just right. “I’ll bet they just love doing that. Hello, Madam, good morning and welcome to the world! I’ve been at my desk all night and it’s time you were awake too. It’s your wake-up call! And you can’t just tell him to bugger off. Well, I suppose you could, but it’s not very fair.”
“Never mind,” you whisper, your lips against my ear. “Gill and Piet will get it next.”
You wriggle off the bed behind me and a minute later come the sounds of running water and vigorous tooth scrubbing. When we woke up yesterday it was seven-thirty and the pale gold sun rays were seeking to push their way through a minute gap between the curtains, but it’s too dark still for that today. I can smile to myself now, remembering how you appeared in the bathroom doorway, dabbing at your mouth with a hand towel, semi-dressed in jeans only, and asking, “So how was the first night spent with your lover?”
Lover. My God, I’ve never had one of those before. Only a boyfriend. Poor Danny. He just hadn’t been qualified to gain that title.
I told you it was terrible, that I’d thought the earth was supposed to move and you kissed the top of my head and said we’d be in a sorry state as a species if it did move and also then you’d never get to make love to me. Well after the second night with my lover, and what he did to me, I know both of these things can and will happen.
“I have a confession to make,” I say, sitting up and speaking to the half-closed bathroom door.
“What’s that?” in a muffled voice. You put your face around the door with a toothbrush sticking out of it.
“I asked Gill yesterday to call the Wankie Safari Lodge and the Cutty Sark Hotel and try to change our room to one with a double bed. She said she thinks it’s been done. She was, shall we say, absolutely delighted.”
I’m still a virgin, but the countdown has begun.