The Single Mums' Secrets - Janet Hoggarth Page 0,13
grabbed his phone from the breakfast bar and slouched onto the sofa in order to scroll through Twitter, catching up on the latest sport news. An alert pinged on his phone reminding him about his AA meeting tomorrow night and, on Friday after work, he had his sexual health therapy session with Barbara.
It wasn’t like he’d permanently suffered erectile dysfunction. His right hand had been his best friend over the past year while he’d navigated his newly sober existence. It was the addition of another person that generally threw a spanner in the works. In the recent past, Carl had never managed sober sex, suffering countless deflated liaisons.
He believed his affliction was actually what had saved his and Ali’s friendship. He now recognised that if he’d managed to pull off a whole night of wild sex with her at the Mews summer party, they may well have blundered into a doomed relationship too soon after he’d finally sobered up. It was evident how well-suited Ali and Nick were and he was glad they’d found each other. Carl and Ali were cut from the same cloth with the propensity to go down in a blaze of glory.
No, he’d realised after the wet slap in the face with Ali that he needed to sort out his uncooperative penis. Sex, drinking and partying were so muddled up together that he needed help untangling the knotty mess. And that was where Barbara came in.
‘How do you feel before you know you’re going to have sex with a woman you find attractive?’ That had been her opening gambit six months ago when he’d finally clambered his way up the NHS waiting list.
‘Excited, nervous, dread.’
‘Tell me about the dread.’
‘I don’t have my friend with me, giving me a helping hand.’
‘Ah, alcohol.’
‘Exactly.’
He’d had to relearn his sexual responses without its convivial lubrication. He wasn’t even sure he was cured after six months; it was an ongoing journey. Barbara suggested the only way he would really know was if he practised. Though who with – he was single? It wasn’t hard for him to meet women; he worked in a female-dominated industry. He scrubbed up OK, but his shag and leave days were behind him. He was after a more meaningful connection, like his marriage to Janey. However, therapy had shone a light on that relationship, made him deliberately pick it apart like the delicate innards of a watch, knocking Janey off her lofty pedestal. He’d been forced to face that their marriage hadn’t been perfect, no matter how much he smoothed over the darker details he’d initially rather not talk about.
‘Canonising a dead partner can prevent you from accepting anyone else. Subconsciously you may have been protecting yourself from getting hurt.’
‘So I have been cock-blocking myself from having sex with other women?’
Barbara had burst out laughing, much against her code of conduct, but Carl’s candid manner invited it.
‘In a way, yes.’
*
Carl abandoned Twitter’s sports news and lay his phone down on the sofa. He glanced out through the front window and noticed the light on in Christa’s bedroom at the top of the house. He thought about her on her own and wondered if she really regretted what had happened…
That night as he’d closed the dishwasher after his one-year anniversary party, something shifted within him. He’d glanced up at Christa and all he could think of as he caught her eye in the lamplight, was how ethereally sexy she looked. The delicate silver scar barely visible on her chin somehow added to her allure. But it was more than that. She healed people, was super intelligent, well read, amusing, kind – not your average one-night stand. And she looked as if she were inviting him to bend her backwards over the sofa and rip her clothes off.
He felt the predictable twinge in his crotch, the familiar yet terrifying stirrings. He thought about child poverty, drowning puppies, Susan Boyle; this was so out of the blue he wasn’t sure he was ready. Had he even read the signs correctly? Maybe he was imagining it. Oh fuck, oh fuck, she’d got up from the breakfast bar. Shit sticks. She was standing in front of him, her breathing short and rapid, like she couldn’t suck enough air into her lungs. He could feel his jeans tighten across his erection as it searched for an easy escape route. Don’t look down, don’t look down.
She looked down, then looked up immediately, her eyes wide, clearly impressed.