‘Well, you know. I’m sure attitudes will change.’
‘Really? I admire your optimism but I can’t imagine why you’d think that. For me it was a bit of a dalliance, a surprise really, like a holiday romance. But I know quite a few people who choose to live that life exclusively and I can assure you that society makes things very hard for them indeed.’
‘I’m sure it does,’ Stanton replied. ‘But personally I don’t believe a person chooses their sexual preferences at all. To me, it’s self-evident that they were born with them. And I feel very strongly that nobody should be discriminated against on the grounds of their sexuality.’
Bernadette leant across the table and took his hand.
‘Hugh, that’s … that’s a wonderful thing to say. An amazing thing to say. Where do you come up with this stuff? Nobody should be discriminated against on the grounds of their sexuality. Hang on while I write it down.’
She went back into the room.
It seemed to take her rather a long time to write down a single sentence and when she returned she was in her underwear.
‘Am I being awful?’ she asked. ‘It’s just that you’re so interesting I thought if we weren’t careful we might end up sitting out here talking all night and never … well, never go inside.’
Even in the moonlight he could see that once more she was blushing deeply but the funny thing was Stanton couldn’t actually see any more of her now than he had done before. Her underwear covered pretty much the same parts of her as had her ankle-length hobble skirt, apart from a slightly lower neckline and her bare arms. She was wearing a long white slip, gathered slightly at the waist and tapering in again towards the ankle. Curiously, despite the modesty of the garment Stanton found it incredibly erotic. Perhaps it was the moonlight on her bare white arms. When it came to the sensual power of glimpses of flesh, less could certainly be more. Something the lingerie designers of his century had long since forgotten.
He got up, took her hand and they went back inside the room together and turned out the lamps. Then with the moonlight streaming through the open balcony doors, he stepped towards her and lifted off her slip. The intensity of the moment was quite overpowering. Not only was it the first time he had been with anyone but Cassie in almost ten years but this woman was from another time.
1914. In the Vienna moonlight.
He stepped back from her while removing the stud from his starched collar.
She was completely naked save for her silk stockings which were secured above the knee not with suspenders but with garters.
That, however, was not what caught his attention. Nor was it her delightful bosom, larger than he expected but firm. Or the curve of her waist. Or the slight bulge of her belly. Deeply stirring though all those things were.
It was the pubic hair. There was just more of it than he’d expected. Sandy pale, full and curly. Even spreading a little beyond what would one day be known as the bikini line. He should have been expecting it. He knew about female pubic hair but he had never encountered it in its natural state. Cassie had waxed. All the girls he’d ever been with had either waxed or shaved, not necessarily the full Brazilian but certainly a major trim. He recalled the famous story of the poet Ruskin who it was said could not consummate his marriage because he was so shocked and disgusted by his wife’s pubic hair.
Stanton wasn’t shocked, he just wasn’t used to it, that was all.
In fact, he thought it looked lovely.
‘Well, are you going to take your shirt off or not?’ Bernadette enquired. ‘I’m beginning to feel a bit silly standing here.’
‘Sorry … yes,’ he said, beginning quickly to undress.
They collapsed together on the bed and began to make love.
For a few moments Stanton was consumed with a hungry passion as he gnawed and pawed at Bernadette’s squirming body. It had been well over a year since he’d had sex and this sudden cessation of the drought had brought every nerve in his being to a state of urgent arousal. She too had abandoned herself to primal instinct and wriggled and writhed against him in his embrace, plunging a hand down to grasp away at him.
‘Goodness,’ she gasped. ‘I have missed these.’
She was very different to Cassie, who had been more passive, happier to go with the flow. Like any couple who shared a bed exclusively with each other they’d fallen into habits together. Happily enough, but nonetheless he found the thrill of a new and unexplored body and a proactively different approach fiercely erotic.
And that nearly ruined the whole thing.
Thinking about Cassie.
Comparing Bernadette to her.
His wife. The undisputed love of his life and mother of his children. A surge of guilt swept over him. Almost as if Cassie were in the room and had caught him at it.
He could feel the passion dissipating even as Bernadette chewed hungrily at his mouth. That unwelcome thought. That distraction. A woman could fake it, ignore it till it went away, but with a man the evidence was on display.
In Bernadette’s hand.
‘Oh,’ she said, ‘did I do something wrong?’
This was absurd. He wanted this. He needed it. And he had every right to it. And the ridiculous thing was he knew Cassie would agree. Of course she would.
Cassie. Cassie. How could he get her to leave the room? To pop next door. Retire to the balcony.
He thought about Bernadette naked. About her revealing herself as she pulled her long slip up her body. Her shapely legs clad in white silk. He thought about her pubic hair. Lush and womanly. Strawberry blonde. Beautiful and actually – appropriate.
He put his hand down to touch her, it was so strange. He was used to things being smooth or stubbly depending on the level of maintenance. But this was soft. Warm and giving. Luxuriant. Fascinating. He wanted to plunge his whole being deep inside.
‘That’s better,’ Bernadette gasped. ‘Now we’re getting somewhere!’
Afterwards they lay together and finished off the wine and Bernadette smoked and snuggled in his arms.
‘That was very nice,’ she said, stretching a leg across his body.
‘Yes, yes it was,’ Stanton agreed.
‘You didn’t leave any … any seed in me, did you?’ she asked. ‘Bit late to ask really, but did you?’
‘I don’t think so. I tried to be careful,’ he replied. ‘I think it’s all over your tummy and the sheets.’
‘Good … better out than in, say I.’
Stanton thought how very strange an idea it would be if he did get a girl pregnant in this new version of the century. To have children in two separate dimensions of space and time was a mind-boggling thought. A thought which brought Tessa and Bill to mind, his children, who had been his whole life. Who were still his whole life.
Except that they were gone. And he was in bed with a woman who had died decades before they were born.
Bernadette must have sensed the progress of his thoughts.
‘You don’t feel guilty, do you?’ she asked. ‘About your wife, I mean … I’m sure she’d understand. Or is that presumptuous of me? Of course, I don’t know what she’d think, obviously. But she would understand, wouldn’t she? She wouldn’t want you to be alone all the time.’
‘Yes, I think she’d understand,’ Stanton said, ‘and no, I don’t feel guilty.’
She put her head on his shoulder and kissed his neck. He put his arm around her and they lay together for a while. By craning his chin hard against his chest he could just see her face in the moonlight. It was such a sweet, sweet face.
But now the pretty upturned nose wrinkled a little. She was puzzled.