Cleo

The Kiss

Nothing is more damply magical than a kitten’s kiss.

Cats kiss. Cleo did it all the time. It starts with a gentle head butt, a raising of the chin, a narrowing of the eyes, followed by a fleeting union of lips. Hormones are presumably exchanged. Nothing beyond that is asked, except perhaps a soothing stroke. A cat kiss is complete in itself.

Philip with one l was late. Too late to be even considered half-fashionable. He’d obviously forgotten that he’d asked me out to see some trashy play, or that I’d gone out of my way to arrange it for a weekend the kids were at Steve’s. I was that forgettable. Hot rashes of emotion prickled up and down the back of my Chinese jacket. My skin stuck to the unbreathable fabric, which was proving itself not even a distant cousin of any upmarket natural fiber. Insult flared to anger. I didn’t want to see him, anyway. What on earth would we have to talk about? To think I’d gone to the trouble of buying a new outfit.

If Philip with one l had the nerve to show up now I’d demonstrate Helen could be spelt with two ll’s. Nicole and Mary would have words to say about this at work on Monday. He’s not worth it. You’re too good for him. What a dick.

Darker thoughts nudged to mind as I sat on the bed and shook off one of the dressy sandals that matched the Chinese outfit perfectly. Maybe he had a genuine excuse for not turning up, like catching a glimpse of his own reflection in a shop window and smashing into a lamppost.

Truth was, I had no reason to like him enough to care. I was content orbiting kids and work every day. They were the center of my universe. Every week that we survived without sore throats, crises at school or disturbing mail in spidery backhanded writing from a deranged reader was a miracle. It didn’t matter if ninety percent of my remaining world consisted of black holes. The shrink was nuts suggesting all that one-night-stand rubbish. Boy, that woman had issues. I should’ve been shrinking her, not the other way around.

Cleo sprang onto the bed, made one of her squeaking noises and snuggled into my lap. I’m here, I’m here, she purred. Calm washed over me like baby shampoo. Hurt and outrage shrank until they weren’t much bigger than a pair of bubbles resting in the bathroom plughole. Kicking off the other sandal, I smiled (partly from relief—they were giving me blisters, anyway). The only damage was to my ego. There was nothing wrong with a night at home in front of the fire with Cleo after a long working week. In fact, it was downright welcome.

I carried Cleo down the hall. She watched expectantly while I crouched at the fireplace and arranged the kindling in an uncertain teepee. We were both startled by urgent hammering on the front door.

“I’ve been driving around the neighborhood for ages,” Philip said as soon as I opened the door. “I knocked on the door of 33 Albany Road. It’s the street parallel to this one. The woman there was confused. In fact so was I. It took me a while to work out you’re Ardmore Road…”

So. Not only was he too young and conservative—he wasn’t in danger of becoming the world’s next Mastermind, either. Just as I was starting to feel irritated, I noticed his face. His eyes were trailing up and down my Chinese suit with the look of someone witnessing the aftermath of mass terrorism.

“You don’t like it?” I said, suddenly. “I can change into something…more conventional, if you like.”

Philip didn’t object. I was profoundly, unspeakably insulted. Thrusting Cleo into his arms, I hurried back into the bedroom. On the other hand, I thought, changing into a brown skirt and cream blouse, maybe I should be relieved he was honest enough to imply he’d rather reenact a scenario from the Vietnam War than appear in public with me wearing the Asian rhapsody.

“Nice cat,” he said, as we headed out the door.

We were late for the play. Sitting in the shadows watching an appallingly amateurish version of Cat on a Hot Tin Roof I quietly assembled a list of why this was a ridiculous choice, even for a one-night stand: he was hardly out of high school; he couldn’t have made more screwed-up career choices if he’d tried (the army and banking?!); he had bad taste in plays; he was unable to appreciate my approach to fashion.

I wasn’t that shook on his clothes, come to think of it. His shoes were so shiny you could pluck your eyebrows in them. The striped shirt, the corduroy trousers, the carefully chosen leather belt. It was all straight out of some old fogey’s catalog.

Yet there was no doubt he looked good in that stuff. He smelled fresh as an alpine forest, compared to male journalists, who invariably reeked of booze, cigarettes and substances I preferred not to know about. His eyes flared like blue gas flames when he laughed at my jokes (possibly too loudly). One of my jokes was about the inadequate snobs who drive European cars. I’d been too traumatized by our dash to the theater to notice what sort of car he drove. The satirical twinkle when, after the show, he opened the passenger door of his elderly Audi, was nothing short of admirable.

He was obviously a very pleasant young man who probably wanted to download his love-life woes on a pair of understanding ears. There was no harm offering him friendship. I invited him inside for coffee.

“I’d like to,” he said. “But I don’t generally drink caffeine this late at night. Do you have any herb teas?”

While I knew a few people at work who drank herbal teas, I doubted they were the type he was talking about.

“Sorry, I only have black tea.”

The house was unusually quiet without the children. Even when they were asleep I was aware of their shifting blankets and dream-laden sighs. I kicked my shoes off and clattered through the kitchen cupboards, searching for a pair of cups that matched.

“Interesting cat,” I heard from the other room. “She’s almost like a person.”

Carrying the tray with two tea bags cunningly concealed in a teapot and the cracked cup on my side I was surprised at the vignette in the living room. A purring Cleo wound herself through Philip’s legs, leapt onto his knees, climbed his shirt and applied neat licks over his chin. Never before had Cleo warmed so affectionately to a stranger.

“Sorry, I’ll put her away,” I said.

“No, she’s fine,” he said, tenderly running his hand over the mound of her spine. “You’re a good cat, aren’t you? So tell me about the kids.”

I stiffened. He had just blundered into No Go Territory. Of course I’d made no secret of the fact I had kids. They were as much part of me as my hands and feet. I couldn’t have hidden their existence even if I’d wanted to. Everything about the house screamed “Kids!” The living room was ankle deep in Lego bricks. Lydia’s fauvist playgroup artwork was taped to the kitchen cupboards. Rob’s school bag lay like a drunk on the floor outside his room.

The kids were the core of my life, so precious I’d tear my heart out for them. He had no right to ask about them. They had nothing to do with a potential one-night stand who was rapidly losing any chance of becoming one.

“So tell me about your life,” I replied. “Ever been married?”

He went blank, as if I was asking if he’d ever dressed up in fishnet stockings and lip-synched to Judy Garland.

“No.”

“Kids?”

He shook his head, his smile vaguely bewildered.

“So you’re having girlfriend trouble?”

Cleo, having finished with his chin, moved on to his ears.

“No, apart from the fact I don’t have one. How about some music?”

Music? He wanted to be interrogated to music? Without waiting for an answer he sifted through my record collection and put on my latest purchase and current favorite, Ella Fitzgerald and Louis Armstrong singing “Can’t We Be Friends?”

Philip obviously had some kind of problem. Why else would he be here? I was going to have to muster all my journalistic skills to get him to unravel his woes, so he could pack up, go home and let us both get some sleep.

“Would you like to dance?” he asked.

“What?! Here?”

“Why not?”

Now it was getting silly. Still, if I danced with him he might be satisfied and go home. Standing up, I put my damp, flustered hand in his cool, dry one and lurched painfully over the Lego bricks. If I’d known the room would be transformed into a ballroom I’d have put the kids’ toys away and kept my shoes on.

As Ella’s liquid voice wrapped the room in a haze of sensuality I noticed his excellent sense of rhythm (years of marching on parade grounds probably had something to do with it). And his body, as it brushed offhandedly against mine, seemed to be encased in some kind of metal suit. Until I realized the curves were too well formed to be metal. They were made of a material totally unfamiliar to me—lean muscle.

“So how old are the kids?” he asked.

Oh no. What was it with him and the kids?

“Nearly three and twelve.”

Painfully, patiently, he dragged their names out of me, what they liked to do at weekends and how they handled having parents who were separated. I changed the subject, and we danced in silence for a while. He did have an exceptional body—but either he was clumsy, or he was deliberately moving closer. With the shrink’s words ringing in my ears, I didn’t flinch when he lowered his godlike head and pressed his lips onto mine.

The room whirled in a kaleidoscope of toys, cups and saucers against apricot-colored walls. Cleo looked on approvingly as I savored the magical kiss. Soft, damp and luscious. It was perfect, beyond perfect. Too perfect!

I stopped swaying to the music and straightened my spine. No, dammit! This wasn’t how things were meant to happen. The whole point of the night was that I was supposed to be running the show. This man-boy had no right to schmooze with Cleo and then ask me to dance. As for all that probing about the kids…

He froze, too. At least he was sensitive enough to notice my mood had changed.

“Shall we go to the bedroom?” he said softly.

For several moments, possibly six months or twelve hundred years, I couldn’t summon up a response. She the unshockable was—there was no other word for it—shocked.

“It’s not that I don’t like you…” I said, stepping backwards.

He tensed like a cardboard cutout doll.

“In fact, I’d probably sleep with you if I didn’t like you. At least that’s what my shrink says I should be doing…”

He was starting to look almost as horrified as he’d been at the sight of the Chinese pantsuit.

“The thing is, I like you too much to sleep with you…”

He stood stunned, like he’d wandered into a friendly camp and was suddenly under enemy fire. It was beginning to dawn on me that probably no woman in the multidimensional universe had ever turned down the opportunity to exchange bodily fluids with such a suntanned Adonis.

“It’s getting incredibly…late…and I don’t know about you, but I’m bushed by the end of the week.”

“Can I call you sometime?” he asked icily, as he gathered up his jacket and I escorted him to the door with Cleo in our wake.

“No. I mean, yes. Yes. Definitely. Um. Good night.”

I closed the door softly but firmly. Cleo flicked her tail at me and stalked down the hall.