Stella
Richard returns, once again, from Dubai.
He brings presents for both me and Rose, and seems genuinely pleased to see me.
I feel guilty about having seen Dom twice while he was away, and miserable that neither Dom nor I have made any kind of contact since our massive argument.
But I’m determined to put on a decent show for Richard, who has managed to ignore his jetlag to come over for dinner.
I make a risotto and we sit down at the table, him full of stories from his meetings, me keeping one eye on the clock to work out when we can go to bed.
Or rather, when I can go to bed, because he still hasn’t been upstairs at my house and despite having been dating for almost three months, we still haven’t gone any further than kissing.
Almost as if he’s read my mind, he puts down his fork. ‘I have a surprise for you.’
I try to look enthusiastic. I love surprises.
Surprises are my favourite thing. I just also can’t stop thinking about the fact that I’ve got to wash my hair, which either means washing it before I can get into bed tonight, or getting up extra early tomorrow and hoping that the clunking of the boiler doesn’t wake Rose.
The other day I tried bringing her into the bathroom while I was showering and she almost got the loo brush into her mouth before I noticed.
Suffice to say, no part of any system I try to put in place is working at all well so far.
‘That’s exciting,’ I say, trying to inject enthusiasm into my voice. ‘What is it?’
‘I booked us a holiday.’
A holiday? As in, a holiday for me and him and Rose?
We’d need multiple bedrooms, and he hasn’t even met Rose.
How am I going to get up with her for her middle-of-the-night feed (which I absolutely have to stop giving her at some point, but can’t face dropping right now)?
How on earth is a holiday going to work?
I must look as confused as I feel internally, because he explains. ‘I mean, I’ve booked us two nights away, at a hotel.’
This doesn’t really answer any of my questions. ‘That’s amazing,’ I say. ‘But Gavin only has Rose one night a week.’
Richard smiles. ‘I spoke to your mother and she agreed to come and look after Rose for the Wednesday night, so that we can have a proper break.’
I fix a smile on my face. This is a nice thing.
It’s thoughtful. It’s kind. It’s a way for us to have the kind of mini-break a normal couple without a complicated baby-and-ex-husband situation would be able to do.
If I were dating someone who had a child, I’d want to go away with just my partner sometimes.
Two nights does feel like such a long time, though. ‘I need to check if I can get the time off work,’ I say, haltingly. ‘I’ve only just gone back so they might think it’s a bit of a piss-take for me to take days off.’
‘I’m sure it’ll be fine,’ Richard says. ‘And you could always work from there if you need to. It’s a lovely place in the Cotswolds,’ he explains, getting out his phone.
He shows me the website for a hotel that I’ve seen various influencers on social media go to.
‘They’ll have great Wi-Fi and places to work if you need to.
Though I thought you could spend some time by the pool, get a few treatments, that sort of thing. ’
I won’t lie, the idea of lying on a massage table while someone pounds the knots out of my back and rubs me with a nice-smelling oil sounds like the kind of bliss I can hardly imagine. ‘This is so kind of you,’ I say. ‘Let me know what I owe you for the booking.’
He smiles and shakes his head as if the idea of me paying is so silly it’s not worth engaging with.
‘I’m excited to have a longer stretch of time together,’ he says.
‘I know I’ve been a little old-fashioned, insisting on taking things so slowly, but I’m entirely sure that it’s going to be worth it. ’
To my surprise, work is completely relaxed about me taking three days off only a few weeks after going back.
‘You need a bit of R and R,’ my boss says when I put the leave request in, half hoping that she would tell me that I can’t go. ‘You seem burnt out.’
I try not to engage with this, but she’s not wrong. My ideas are blunt, my skin is terrible and I’m exhausted all the time.
Similarly, I sort of hope Mum might back out, but no, she’s full steam ahead.
We don’t talk about the Calpol incident but she assures me over and over again that she will be careful, and so on the Wednesday morning I find myself packing the only pair of semi-sexy pyjamas that I own, and then going through the tagged photos at the hotel to work out what other, more stylish people have worn there and then trying to create copies of those outfits using my existing wardrobe, which is entirely made of clothes from M&S.
And before I know it I’m kissing Rose and squeezing her and trying to blink back tears as we get into the car.
She’s going to be with her childminder today, with my mum tonight, her childminder tomorrow and then with Gavin.
So realistically, tonight is the only time I’m actually missing with her.
And she’d be asleep then anyway. I repeat this inside my head as the car leaves London, pulling onto the motorway.
Then I think about what would happen if we died in a car crash and Gavin got full custody of Rose.
I’ve got a will, but suddenly I think I should probably make a book of things he’d need to know if he was going to look after her all the time, like how she likes it when I sing her songs from Cabaret, or how she wants her milk cold in the afternoon but warm at bedtime.
‘What are you thinking about?’ Richard asks.
He’s sitting across from me, a driver in the front to get us to the Cotswolds.
I’m starting to think that maybe Richard can’t drive, which is obviously totally fine but feels like the kind of thing we should have talked about.
Does he know that I failed my test four times before I passed? Probably not.
‘Nothing,’ I say, smiling. ‘Just how much I’m looking forward to this trip.’
‘Me too.’ He smiles.
The hotel is divine, even if I do keep sneaking into the bathroom to play videos of Rose on my phone.
Our room is a cottage on the property, a short walk from the main house where there are huge drawing rooms with squashy sofas to read books on, and surrounded by sloping lawns and blossom-heavy trees.
‘This is incredible,’ I say honestly as we’re unpacking.
He puts all of his clothes away into the wardrobe and I realise that I haven’t shared bedroom space with anyone since Gavin.
Usually I’d just leave my suitcase on the floor and pull out the stuff I need, but I sense Richard wouldn’t approve of that, so I unpack properly, my clothes looking very shabby and crumpled in the enormous wardrobe.
Just as I’ve finished unpacking my toiletries, Richard is behind me. I look up into the bathroom mirror and smile at him. ‘Hello,’ I say, bashful. I have a feeling I know where this is going.
‘Hello,’ he replies.
He takes my hand and guides me into the bedroom, and then lays me down on the bed. He kisses my neck, strokes my hair and runs his hand up my thigh. In an ideal world I’d really like to have showered because it’s been twelve hours since I’ve washed and I feel like I’ve got car smell on me.
He kisses me again and I giggle slightly, pulling away.
‘Are you okay?’ he asks.
‘Yes,’ I say, trying to smile.
Memories of the time Dom tried to touch my thigh come flooding back. The tears, the hotness in my chest, the way he wrapped his arms around me and let me sob into his chest. The solid softness of his body. I shouldn’t be thinking about Dom right now.
‘I’m just a bit nervous. It’s been a while,’ I say, dragging myself into the present.
Richard seems – weirdly – to really like hearing this.
He guides my hand to his crotch and invites me to feel how hard he is.
And in fairness, he’s very hard. ‘Wow,’ I say, in earnest. He strips his clothes off, then pulls my jumper over my head, unbuttons my jeans and yanks them off.
‘You’re so beautiful,’ he says, looking down at my body. ‘You can’t even tell.’
I think he might be making an oblique reference to my having had a baby, but I’m not going to press on that because I’m about to get laid for the first time since Gavin left and, at this point, I would have sex with pretty much anyone, so the prospect of this handsome, muscular guy is almost too good to be true.
‘Tell me again that you’re nervous,’ he says, kneeling between my legs.
‘I’m nervous,’ I say. ‘But I’m turned on too, I want you.’
He presses his finger to my lips, kissing me, his breath sharp with mint.
After a couple of minutes of kissing, his body hard against mine, he pushes me down onto the bed.
He puts on a condom, pulls my knickers to the side, pushes himself inside me and I whimper with pleasure at the feeling of finally being filled up, at the weight of him on top of me. ‘Yes,’ I whisper. ‘Yes.’
He finds a rhythm, an odd, bumpy one, and I remind myself internally that I’m used to Gavin and no one other than Gavin – the two men before Gavin were so long ago – and this is probably just as legitimate a way to have sex as what I’m used to.
He moves against me in the same bumpy manner for a few minutes before he starts to pant. ‘Good girl,’ he says. ‘You’re such a good girl.’
I wince slightly at the expression but it would be a bit rude to call him out for it when he’s about to come. Seconds later, he does.
‘My good girl,’ he whines into my ear. I try very hard to pretend that I haven’t heard it, hoping that the lack of reaction might send enough of a signal that he gets the message and never says it again.
He rolls off me. I start to slip my hand between my legs to finish myself off, like I did with Gavin when we were feeling lazy. He looks perplexed. ‘What are you doing?’
I smile. ‘I was going to. . . you know. Finish.’
‘You didn’t orgasm?’
I shake my head.
He looks aghast. ‘Are you sure?’
I can’t help laughing. ‘Yes, I’m sure. But it’s fine, most women don’t come from penetration alone. We can work on it later.’ I kiss him. ‘No biggie.’
I sort of expect him to come back to bed, to kiss me, possibly to initiate getting me off, to laugh the awkwardness away.
But instead he gets up and I hear the shower running, apparently not coming back and apparently very much not interested in finishing what I was about to start.
Any residual arousal I was feeling evaporates into embarrassment at him having seen me like that.
What was I thinking? Maybe what I was doing is weird?
Do other women not do that? Gavin and I always did it that way, but that doesn’t mean that it’s actually normal.
I bury my face in the pillow and let out an embarrassed whimper, wishing I could rewind and take that last part back.
After his shower, Richard returns with a towel around his waist, seemingly in a better frame of mind.
‘What shall we do now?’ I ask. I should finish the conversation about sex, I know that. But it’s too embarrassing. And it’s not like I actually want an orgasm at this point. ‘There’s a nice walk through the woods apparently?’
‘I’ve got a work call,’ he says apologetically. ‘Why don’t you go to the spa? I block-booked you some treatments.’
He doesn’t have to tell me twice. Within minutes, I’m down in the wine cellar, which serves as a spa, filling out a form to confirm that I’m not pregnant and haven’t been breastfeeding in months so I want the deepest deep-tissue massage a woman can get.
By the time we get to dinner, I’m feeling better.
I miss Rose, but knowing that she’s in bed (and my mum sending me a picture every half hour all day long) helps.
Plus, for the first time since my mat leave ended, I’m moving slowly and it feels blissful.
I put my swimming costume on at a glacial pace, enjoying the complete novelty of not rushing.
I wander back to our room, carrying my shoes, grass between my toes, and find Richard sitting at the desk, typing.
He’s concentrating so I wash the massage oil off my skin and double shampoo my hair.
I blow-dry it and get changed, and we walk over to the main house for dinner.
‘How was your work thing?’ I ask, as we sit down and look at the menu.
‘Oh, very dull,’ he says, smiling. ’I won’t bore you with it. What do you think you’ll have?’
I scan the menu, trying to decide. ‘Very hard to pick,’ I say.
‘I doubt any of it will be as good as anything you cook,’ he says, taking my hands. ‘That’s one of the things I love about you – you’re such a woman.’
I’m slightly bemused by this. ‘Thank you?’ I reply. ‘I think?’
He laughs. ‘I just mean, I’ve been out with quite a few girls who haven’t got the first idea how to cook, or run a home, and I think it’s wonderful that you’re so adept.’
‘Thanks,’ I say, once again very much unsure how to respond. I order a cocktail and he has a glass of wine, then we order our food and make small talk about the hotel and how our weeks have been. ‘Did you get up to anything interesting while I was away?’ he asks.
I swallow, deciding that this is probably the moment. ‘I’d meant to tell you, actually. I ended up seeing a friend.’
Richard’s head jerks slightly. ‘Who?’
‘Dominic.’