Moved (2 page)

“Less of the hopeless,
if you don't mind,” I snap.

“On second thoughts,
you're not just a hopeless romantic, you're plain hopeless. A
hopelessly romantic hopeless person...”

He's such an annoying
wit-mouth at times. Sharper than a razor. Not that he uses one very
often.

“Awwww, and I love you
too Mase. You really make me feel so good about myself. Now I'm not
only sexless, I'm doubly hopeless as well. Thanks a fucking lot!”
Then I mutter, “ass hole,” under my breath.

“You're welcome, any
time, you know that.”

I slap his ass and
laugh at him, an annoyed kind of laugh.

But I lighten up as I
look at his face.

He has the cheekiest
grin ever, plastered on it.

Sometimes I just love
him, whatever he says. Insults and all. In a friendly way, of
course.

We arrive outside our
main door and he lets us in, and then he bounds up the stairs to
the third floor, two at a time, like a rocket on speed. I chase
after him knowing it's a pointless exercise and I've already lost
the race. I arrive in the flat a little puffed and annoyed
again.

It's the old bathroom
game.

Since the electric
shower gave up the ghost last week, and based on the fact we can't
afford to get it repaired, we've both been fighting over the first
bath. Obviously no one wants second bath, do they? It's either bath
one with scum, or bath two with lukewarm water, if you're lucky.
The tiny hot water tank takes about two hours to warm up again
after it's been drained. God knows how old the boiler is. Probably
pre world war two, based on the ancient clanking sounds it makes,
when it summons the enthusiasm to fire itself up.

In any case the two
choices available to me on the bathing front don't float my yellow
plastic duck.

“Oh for God's sake.” I
shout, as he disappears in the bathroom with a Loaded magazine and
clicks the lock shut.

“I'll be real quick.
Pinkie promise,” comes the reply, and I hear the water start
running into the tub. He's whistling happily. The noise aggravates
me. He's really getting at me today. It's probably post traumatic
stress, after the lip butchering.

Mason told me he hates
baths. He's a shower boy through and through. But since our shower
committed suicide, he seems to be spending a helluva long time
soaking his ass for a bath hater. I've renamed him bath boy,
temporarily.

I'm not keen on them
either. I wish I could dry wash, because I can't stand being wet.
Unfortunately I don't like feeling grimy even more, so it's grin
and bear it. A quick three minutes scrubbing up is all I can be
bothered with, unless I'm washing my hair, and then it's a long and
painful four. Baths are pure torture for me. All that soaking and
swooshing hair under the water to rinse. I'm especially tortured by
second hand or cool ones.

I walk into the
kitchen, open the fridge, and pour myself a large glass of tomato
juice, slurping it down in a couple of quick glugs. I return to the
fridge. Here's not much in it. I grab a handful of ham and eat
that, plus the last Baby-Bel, mini Edam cheese. I grab a couple of
dry crackers from the cupboard next to the fridge. I peel the red
wax off the cheese and stand there, looking out of the window,
consuming it quickly and crunching the dry crackers in between my
cheesy bites.

It's a lovely early
August evening. We're having a heat wave at the moment. I can see
the little girls next door jumping on the trampoline in their
garden; their pony tails whipping up and down and their little
white Maltese terrier running around yapping at them.

Cute kids, cute dog...
Maybe... one day...

Still hungry, I grab a
carrot and munch that down as well. This is my dinner, I expect. I
can't be bothered to cook for myself. Ever. I'm not a great
cook.

My a la carte meal
complete, I go into the living room and put my iPod in the speaker
dock, selecting Tunnel Vision and pressing play. It's my favourite
track of JT's. I can't stop playing it over and over. The unclean
version. It's on and I turn it up nice and loud. Thankfully the
lady in the flat below is certified deaf and we can get away with
any amount of noise we like. I'm going to practise my new moves
while I wait for bath boy to reappear. I strip off my tight denim
shorts and black vest top. It's damn hot in the flat in the
afternoons, as it’s west facing it gets all the sun. I'm much more
comfortable and cooler like this, in my underwear. I do some
stretch warm ups. Then I drop into the side splits, and then face
forward, lying down on my elbows. I move into various poses on the
floor, trying out a little of our new routine which is based in the
times of Prohibition, and kind of Bonnie & Clyde in style. I'm
singing along, out of myself, and having a Justin Timberlake aural
orgasm as I writhe around.

My phone suddenly
blares to life with its Big Ben ring-tone and I get up and turn the
iPod off to answer it.

“I was well into
that... Turn it on again,” Mason shouts from the bathroom.

“Tough. You'll have to
wait. I'm on the phone,” I shout back.

It's Sandy, my best
friend, who happens to be my hairdresser. “Hey Sand, how's things?”
I answer.

“Okay I guess. Coming
out tonight?”

“Might as well. Not
much else to do on my lonesome other than overdose on TV and drink
myself to sleep. Mason's seeing skinny Summer again tonight.”

“Oh really? I thought
that was all over and done with?” she asks in a highly disappointed
tone of voice.

“Apparently not,
although God knows why.
He must have a stick insect fetish
,”
I say loudly.

“I heard that,” he
shouts.

“Just a sec, Sand...”
I say to her.

I put my hand over the
phone and walk up to the bathroom door to shout back at him.

“Mase, she's way too
thin and you know it. Apart from the jugs or course, and they
definitely aren't real.”

“Yes they are. You're
just jealous 'cos you don't have any.”

“I'm not discussing
the size of my tits with you,” I shout very indignantly.

“There's no size to
discuss, is there?”

I'm starting to
blow.

“Well I've got news
for you, stud, your dick's on the small side of average.”

A blatant lie, but
whatever.

“Oh yeah? Wanna come
measure it”

I can't help but
splutter with laughter.

“No thank you, I'd
rather poke my eyes out than size up your dick.” I can't help but
see the situation in my head though. My head rushes with heat. I
blow out slowly.

I get back on the
phone and continue my conversation quietly.

“Sorry about that...
so... shall we meet at the bar... at eightish?”

“Okay, and get dressed
up, there's a party afterwards, if you fancy doing that?”

“You know me. Always
up for that. Anyone hot going?” I ask even more quietly.

She'll know who I mean
by 'anyone hot.’

He's Mason's best
pal...

Unfortunately
Jackson's very off limits. I've got Mason's message loud and clear.
But I'd like to look at and chat with him, that's all. There's no
harm in that, is there? It's a shame Mason doesn't lighten up,
because the way he's behaving has made his bestie become the
forbidden fruit. And we all know what happened to that, don't
we?

“I'm not sure about
Jackson, but Nathan and Grant, and some of Mason's other pals will
defo be there. Oh, and a couple of Ella’s friends, some guys her
new boyfriend knows...”

“Sounds cool. See you
there then. If I can ever get in the bathroom and get myself ready,
that is. Bath boy's taking another long swim.”

She makes a strange
little sound, like a strangled squeak, in my ear. “Oh please, don't
set me off, my mind and body are swimming his way, Olympic
speed...”

“I'd swim in the other
direction, if I were you. He’ll eat you alive. Have you seen Jaws?”
I snigger.

Cassandra is so hot
for Mason. I can see her catching fire in his presence. A swim
might be a good idea. It'll put out the flames.

He's really cool with
her, almost to the point of being frozen. I know exactly why as
well. It's because she's Sandy... and she's
my
best friend.
Besties are not to be played with. I'm sure if she wasn't, she'd be
toast by now. She’s blonde and right up his street, being somewhat
Barbie-esque.

“I'd better go, Bill's
calling me. I've got a late customer,” she says.

“Okay, see you later
then. Bye.”

I tap end call, toss
my phone in my bag, and turn the music back on, at the beginning,
for another, full on, writhe around.

I resume my erotic
poses and stretches on the floor.

Finally exhausting my
repertoire, I end up grabbing my mat and doing some yoga while I
wait... and wait...

The bathroom door
finally swings opens, a good twenty odd minutes later, and out he
strolls. I don't ask what the hell he's been up to in there with
his Loaded. I really don't want to know. And he'd probably tell
me.

He's surrounded by a
cloud of steam and a blast of gorgeous male perfume.

His hips are wrapped
in his “Eat Me” monogrammed black towel.

I have to admit it's
kinda cute.

“Yum... I'm starving,
when can I start eating?” I joke, smacking my lips noisily.

He'd make a nice meal
in his present state. Clean shaven, hair all sticky-up and fluffy
where it's been towel dried in a mad frenzy, and his skin's a
little pink from the superheated bath.

He gives me a pair of
raised eyebrows as his eyes flick over me, sitting cross-legged on
the yoga mat, in my bright red undies. His gaze finally comes to
rest on my modest tits.

I guess he's noticing
I'm a woman at the moment, even if I don't meet the Barbie
standard.

“Just dive in whenever
you like,” he says, in his slow characteristic drawl, his mouth
turning into a wide grin.

We often indulge in
chummy flirt sessions. Sometimes they're quite hilarious and at
other times not so. In fact we regularly end up throwing things at
each other.

“Oh, can I? What's on
the menu?”

“I don't know. What
d'ya fancy?” His eyes flash wide in amusement and he refastens his
towel with a quick re-wrap, a little lower and more loosely, I
notice.

He's really flirty
tonight. Enjoying it way too much.

I'll knock that smug
smile off his handsome face.

“Hmm, something hot
and spicy and big. Something to shut me up,” I suggest with a
snigger. “Pepperoni pizza would be nice.”

“Pizza, eh... aww
sorry, I'm all outta that. But if you need shutting up I've got
something much better,” he chuckles.

“Hang on a sec. I need
to get a plate and my knife and fork... and my ruler... Don't want
to cut off more than I can chew, do I?” I joke, getting to my feet
and whipping his towel from him with a quick swipe.

He laughs loudly, with
a touch of surprise. Then, unconcerned he's in the buff, he grabs
the towel back from me, and flicks me in the face with it.. He
slings it over his shoulder and strolls off to his room to get
tarted up and ready for a hot roll in the sack with Summer, the
stickie.

I look at his
retreating nakedness aesthetically for a few seconds. He's got a
really beautiful slim and sculpted body. Perfectly proportioned
tight muscles that move fluidly under his skin. He is graceful, but
at the same time, very masculine. A sleek male panther. His usual
standard of unkempt and brooding dark looks only adds to his
appeal, providing a little rough and tough to the beauty
underneath. A kind of scruffy gloss on top.

I know Mason very
well. Both in the mental and physical sense.

Inside and out, and
back to front. I spend a lot of time lying on various parts of him.
And of course, I live with him. I guess if anyone's gonna know him
really well, it's me.

But despite his
obvious, physical attractions, which I'm constantly aware of, he's
not my type.

For two important
reasons.

One of those is me and
the other is him.

I'm much more serious
about life, and about my relationships, and very careful about the
men I get involved with. I've been so badly hurt in the past, I
hardly date anymore.

Although I'm still
quite young, at twenty five, I know exactly what I want and need. I
have a seven point checklist. Exclusivity, a real connection, the
possibility of future permanence, love, passion, honesty and trust.
It's a tall order, I know that. But these things are very important
to me.

I'm not settling for
anything less. That's what I tell myself, anyway. But who knows, I
might have to lower my standards down the line, or I could become
an old maid with a cat for company.

Mason's a born player
and heart breaker. And, as I don't want to get my heart broken, I
won't let him in mine, or even let him touch it with his fingertip,
just in case it's extra fragile somehow.

I was tempted by him
in the beginning. Because there's definitely a lot of chemistry
between us.

On the stage it gives
us an edge. It's almost an essential. The type of material we do
needs a strong connection to make it work. A living pulse flowing
between the leads. And we have that in spades. I'm high on him and
he's high on me. We both admit we turn each other on. But when the
music stops and we're alone, the heat dissipates and we're very
hands off. Although we fool around a lot, like friends do, it's
light hearted and purely for fun.

Mason put me straight
on how things were going to go down between us, from the very
beginning.

In one of our
earliest, honest, getting to know you chats, he revealed that he
doesn't intend to settle down and have a conventional family life,
ever. Which I want to do, eventually. Of course, being honest, as
we were, I told him that. He's adamant he won't change his mind,
and neither will I. So, as far as this rather important life choice
is concerned, we are incompatible.