Chloe

‘I’ve come to see Dr Noakes,’ announced Morwenna breezily, shivering slightly beneath her inappropriate silk shirt. ‘For my once-over,’ she explained, content that the phrase was sufficiently medical.

The receptionist, who was old, grey, unmarried and bitter, noticed Morwenna’s erect nipples with flagrant distaste before consulting the time sheet with eyebrows still raised.

It’s because I’m cold, stupid, thought Morwenna, crossing her arms over her breasts defensively. And just a little excited too, she conceded to herself with a clipped laugh out loud. The receptionist gave her a withering look and hissed ‘Dr Grey’ at her, with a jerk of her head to indicate the waiting room. As she flipped through a laughably out-of-date fishing magazine, Morwenna chanted ‘Why Dr Grey, why not Dr Noakes?’ to herself incessantly. After an anguished ten minutes, she forced her attention to the magazine and tried to learn something new.

Plenty more fish in the sea? For an old trout like me?

Later, with her personal MOT renewed, Morwenna was slicing onions, wondering if William would remember their dinner date. She realized with some satisfaction, and a little sadness too, that she was not all that bothered if he had forgotten. The doorbell rang out energetically.

‘Don’t tell me he’s early,’ she muttered.

Swiping the back of her hand across her forehead to brush aside a wisp of hair, Morwenna immediately wished she’d wiped her hands first. As the sting of the onions made her eyes smart, the doorbell rang again.

‘Coming,’ she called, ‘hold on a mo’.’

She opened the door, squinting hard through the blur of salt-water clinging to her right eye. Her left eye opened wide, startled but sparkling.

‘Dr Noakes!’

‘Merz Saxby!’

‘Gracious!’ said Morwenna, wiping an onioned hand over her good eye and suffering the consequences immediately. Blinking fast, she cried with some dread, ‘It’s my once-over! I was too late, wasn’t I? I haven’t passed my MOT!’ She sounded glib but was actually quite frightened. Why else would a doctor be at her door? After hours. Why else indeed?

Dr Noakes hopped lightly from foot to foot and slung his hands deep into the pockets of his well-cut navy blue coat. The collar was turned up against the chill evening and framed his face attractively.

‘It’s chilly, Merz Saxby!’

‘Er, yes! Dr Noakes,’ responded Morwenna easily, seeing through her salt-water haze that navy blue suited him very well. ‘Would you like to come in?’ she said, blinking hard, oily fat tears squeezing themselves out but managing to creep only to the start of her cheeks.

‘Yes. Would you like to call me Robert?’

‘Yes. Would you like to call me Morwenna?’

Morwenna offered tea or whisky and Robert plumped for the latter. Blotting her eyes carefully with kitchen roll, she waited for an explanation.

‘You were booked in with me,’ Robert explained, ‘for your once-over, but it was my decision to pass you on to Dr Grey. She’s a most excellent physician.’ Morwenna raised her eyebrows as if to say ‘And you’re not?’

‘But that wasn’t the reason for the referral – I’m a pretty dab doc myself!’ Morwenna’s smile of agreement put Robert at his ease, so the bush was not beaten about for a moment longer.

‘See, it would have been un-pro-fessional for me to have given you the once-over and, er, then to have asked you if you might like to have dinner with me.’

There!

Morwenna’s soul surged. ‘Oh?’ was all she could manage.

‘Would you?’

‘Yes!’ she said, a little too enthusiastically. ‘Would you?’

‘Would I what?’ asked Robert.

‘Why! Give me the once-over before dinner!’

When William remembered about dinner at Morwenna’s it was already eleven at night and he had finished two rounds of stilton-and-marmalade sandwiches. First he thought how it was too late to phone. Then he thought that Morwenna would have phoned to reprimand him anyway by now. He thought it strange that she hadn’t. Next he thought maybe she had forgotten as well. But he thought that odd as well. He thought for a while longer. But not about Morwenna – he thought no more of it. He went to bed, straight to sleep. Dreamless. He thought no more.

TWELVE

‘Shit Chlo!’ said Carl under his breath, ‘what an ass!’

Chloë spun on her heels and scrutinized her reflection in the glass-fronted mahogany sideboard which sat easily in the tack room next to the grandfather clock.

‘Woe!’ she wailed. ‘Is it the riding? All that squidging by jodhpur and squashing by saddle?’

Carl looked puzzled.

‘Is it very noticeable?’ pleaded Chloë, craning her neck and tucking up her pelvis. ‘How huge?’ She bit her lip. ‘Well-padded or downright unacceptable?’

‘You what?’ said Carl, none the wiser.

Chloë gave herself a hard pinch on the left buttock and batted doleful eyes at him. He broke into a wide smile and walked over to her. Turning her sideways on, he crouched until he was eye-level with her bottom. With a light but skilled hand, he glided over her buttocks; eyes half closed to assist his expert analysis. He stood up and turned her towards him. Putting his hands gently on her shoulders and not letting her eyes venture from his for a moment, he slid his hands down over her back to the base of her spine. Exerting a little more pressure, he traversed his hands over her buttocks and down to the tops of her thighs. To do so, he had to bend his knees slightly. To do so, he had to part his legs a little. This forced him to buck gently into her and, as a consequence, his groin was glued to hers. Keenly, he held on to the tops of her thighs, revelling in the base of her bottom resting lightly on top of his hands.

‘Shit Chlo,’ he said hoarsely, ‘all I said was that you have a great ass!’

Chloë laid her hands over his pectorals which she could feel and define well beneath the ample layers of wool that the Welsh February decreed. She could feel his erection pressing into her appendix, as was its wont. Having lowered her eyes demurely, she raised them again to his. And smiled.

‘I thought you meant –’ she faltered.

‘Daft cow!’ said Carl gently. Carl’s greatest compliments were his softly drawled insults.

‘You do know that my name is Chloë?’ said Chloë. ‘Klowee?’

Carl pulled his puzzled expression back down over his face, knowing the effect it would have on her. Chloë clenched her buttocks with delight, tapped him on the nose and gave his chin a quick pinch. Wilfully, she ran her tongue tip over her teeth, finishing with a flourish of a smile.

‘For some reason,’ she said, squeezing Carl’s buttocks which were firm and fitted her grasp very well, ‘you’ve taken to prefixing an abbreviation – a true perversion of its virgin state.’

Carl twisted his top lip and dipped his eyebrows simultaneously, shaking his head slowly, trying to fathom her out.

‘Shit Chlo, what are you on?’

‘See!’ laughed Chloë triumphantly. ‘Shiklo!’

She grabbed a pair of bridles and, humming gaily, turned to leave the tack room.

‘Chloë Cadwallader,’ enunciated Carl with care and conviction after her. Still humming, she turned towards him, the brave sun of a frosty February morning alighting on her face and throwing fire into her hair.

‘Yes?’

‘Chloë Cadwallader,’ he said even more slowly, chewing the vowels, sucking the consonants; rolling the syllables around his mouth and booming them over to her, ‘you’re one crazy bitch!’