my mouth.
‘Christ,’ she says, sitting down. She stares at her plate of food.
‘Toyourtaste?’ I ask, between chews.
She picks up her fork with her left hand and passes it to her right. She doesn’t touch the knife.
‘Oliver,’ she says, piercing the egg yolk – it bleeds over the edges of the burger and drips on to the plate, ‘why have you done all this?’
I hold my knife in the air as I take a few more chews. Swallowing is a bit of a struggle.
‘Because we are going to make love tonight,’ I say.
Jordana puts down her fork and places her hand on my wrist like a nurse to an old person.
‘No, Olly, we’re not.’
‘Where shall we go?’ I ask.
‘Oliver.’ She looks into my eyes as if she means it. ‘No.’
She moves her left hand towards the candle and passes her forefinger slowly through the flame. It blinks and ducks. I think she’s lying.
‘We could use the coffee table,’ I suggest.
The underside of her forefinger starts to darken; she pulls her finger back from the flame.
‘The airing cupboard?’ I suggest. ‘We can snuggle in among the beach towels.’
Jordana picks up a limp asparagus spear with her fingers.
‘Beneath the apple tree in the garden, like Adam and Eve?’
‘Oliver – fuck off.’ It suits Jordana to swear.
She dips the asparagus tip in a little egg yolk and simulates oral sex with it. She bites off the end and smiles.
‘Stay here,’ she says and as she speaks I can see a film of egg yolk on her teeth. She scrapes her chair back from the table, stands up and leaves the room.
She returns, holding my diary and my pen.
‘You need to get the beginning right,’ she says.
I cannot speak; I have just put a large glob of gelatinous mash in my mouth; I look slapped.
She pushes my plate out of the way and places my diary open at a blank page.
‘Tomorrow’s date,’ she says, handing me the pen.
I write the date in the top right-hand corner, while swallowing.
‘Go on,’ she says, standing over me.
‘What?’ I say, looking up at her.
‘Pretend that it’s the day after you lost your virginity,’ she says.
I write:
Word of the day: parthenologist – a specialist in the study of virgins or virginity.
Dear Diary,
Chips lost his in the toilets of Riley’s Snooker Club.
‘Cross that out,’ she says. ‘This is supposed to be about me.’
I put a line through.
‘Let me start things off for you,’ she says. ‘Jordana is…’ She stops.
Jordana is…
‘Go for it,’ she says.
… fully symmetrical. I can confirm that now.
‘Never,’ she says. ‘You got one more chance.’
I tear out the page and throw it at the wicker bin next to the dresser. It slips straight in. I take that as a good sign.
I have read that sometimes it is sexy if a man expresses his emotions:
20.5.97
Word of the day: Jordana
Oh Diary,
I love her. I love her. I love her so much. Jordana is the most amazing person I have ever met. I could eat her. I could drink her blood. She’s the only person I would allow to be shrunk to microscopic size and explore my body in a tiny submersible machine. She is wonderful and beautiful and sensitive and funny and sexy. She’s too good for me, she’s too good for anyone!
I stop for a moment, expecting her to interrupt me, tell me that she doesn’t buy it. But she stays silently watching. I carry on:
All I could do was let her know. I said: ‘I love you more than words. And I am a big fan of words.’ This was a cheesy thing to say but being in love with Jordana, I have discovered, tends to make me cheesy. I told her: ‘I will happily wait for ever for you.’
(I confess that I did think, if only for a moment, that waiting for ever would be a bit of a waste of our lithe and supple bodies but, nevertheless, I was willing to hold out.)
By some mad, intergalactic fortune, she said that she was ready. We made perfect, flawless love. We were no longer virgins. But it wasn’t like losing anything.
‘Okay, stop. Stop there.’
I look up at Jordana. She blinks. A moment passes where I’m wondering what she is thinking about and she’s wondering what I’m thinking about.
‘Alright,’ she says, slowly raising her index finger and pointing at the ceiling. ‘Your parents’ room.’
*
Jordana looks through a small drawer on top of my parents’ dressing table.
I am trying not to think about the food I prepared going cold and,