Pip. Freya North

briskly back to his flat and continue their kissing there. It was late afternoon, after all. And, after all, he was on call that evening.

      The fact that his flat was even more noisy than before lunch put Pip at her ease. It lent a certain ambiguity to her sudden giggling – because the woman upstairs yelled ‘You’re a fucking pathetic bastard cunt!’ at much the same time as Caleb grunted involuntarily on lifting her T-shirt to feast his gaze on her breasts presented pertly in a broderie anglaise bra. And for similar reasons, Caleb hummed the theme of Grandstand drifting up from the flat below when Pip unbuttoned his jeans and eased them down his legs. Pip could bite her lip and raise her eyebrows as much for catching sight of the impressive bulge in his Calvins, as for hearing the woman upstairs yell ‘Fuck off and get out of my fucking life, you twatting tosser!’ By the time that Caleb and Pip were naked, the television had been turned off and the twatting tosser had obviously fucked off. Yet they stood, in stillness and silence on a Saturday tea-time, admiring each other’s nudity and their very good fortune. They were relaxed and raring to go.

      It had been a long time since Pip’s last sexual encounter. And that had been a nondescript and slightly perfunctory session with Mike, the sweet bloke she’d never been in love with, many months ago. She’d known Mike for quite a while. He had treated her to many dates before asking, with great reverence, if he might take her to bed. Caleb, by comparison, she hardly knew, yet she was happy for him to do all manner of things to her that afternoon. And she found she genuinely wanted to reciprocate. Not so much you scratch my back, I’ll scratch yours; but more, you do that flickery thing with your tongue tip on my clit and I’ll do something feathery with my lips against your balls. And look, we can do so simultaneously! Pip and Caleb silently congratulated themselves on bedding such capable, imaginative and exciting partners. Caleb attributed Pip’s athleticism and inventiveness to her grounding in acrobatics and skill as a performer. Pip credited Caleb’s consummate knowledge of her body and his gentle but confident handiness and finger work to his demanding medical training. He seemed to her to be an intelligent, considerate and mature person. Coupled with the fact that she found him immensely attractive, she was utterly at ease and their coupling was intense and enjoyable.

      Of course he used a condom.

      Pip was home by 7.30. She was physically tired and emotionally exhausted and wouldn’t have had the inclination to do the ironing anyway, had there been any. She watched whatever was on the television, smiling to herself that, in all probability, Caleb’s downstairs neighbour was watching the same programmes.

      ‘Ruth?’

      ‘Hi, Zac! What are you doing in on a Saturday night?’

      ‘Just catching up on stuff – making a few calls, paying a few bills, watching a few vids I’ve recorded recently,’ Zac said nonchalantly, if a little defensively.

      ‘I thought you’d be wining and dining and sixty-nining.’

      ‘Well, you have a dirty mind and my brother can only have married you for that, not for your looks,’ he sparred back.

      ‘Fuck off!’ Ruth laughed. ‘Well, it’s good to hear from you – do you want to speak to your bro? He’s burping pleasantly, having polished off a take-away curry.’

      ‘Jim always was the one with manners – I’ll have him in a mo’. I just wondered if you have the phone number of that clown girl who did Billy’s party?’

      ‘Merry Martha? Sure, hold on. Hang on. Ah. Here. She’s good – quite pricey, but the kids love her. Are you planning for Tom?’

      ‘Perhaps. Maybe. I just thought I’d give her a call and find out what’s what.’