Page 10 of Before You Say Goodbye

“And my family will be wondering where I am. And Bluebell would just hate this.”

“OK,” she said. He opened the door and turned to face her, pulling her into a hug and then dropping her before she’d had a chance to hold him too close.

“It was really nice to meet you. I hope to see you again one day. Thanks for the tea. Bye, Autumn.”

And then he was gone. Autumn stared at the door, listening for his footsteps on her rickety old staircase, but there wasn’t a sound. He was still standing outside. She put their empty teacups on her dresser and stood a little longer. Silence. Enough men had come and gone from this apartment for her to know it was impossible for them to leave without making a noise. Why was he still standing there? She didn’t know what to do now. She knew she should let him go, but she didn’t want to. Clearly, he did not want to leave either.

Groaning at her lack of self-control, she marched to the door and opened it. Bowie was standing at the top of her staircase, his head in his hands. He peered at her from above his fingertips. In his eyes she saw embarrassment and relief.

“Whatever it is, stop thinking about it.” She held out her hand, her eyes pleading.

With one stride of his lanky legs, he was before her. He lifted her up and kissed her.

* * *

He tried to carry her into the bathroom, but she grabbed the wall and guided him to her bedroom, hoping she’d moved her dirty washing off the floor. As they toppled onto the bed, he was hard against her. She moaned. Every move he made was fraught with desperation. This was going to be good, she could tell. She freed herself from his grasp, reached to pull his T-shirt over hishead, but he stopped her, grabbing her hand and pinning it to the pillow.

“I have a scar,” he said. He froze and closed his eyes, in obvious embarrassment. Autumn didn’t know what to do, so she lay there, watching the part of his neck where his heartbeat was still expressing the extent of his desire, and waiting for him to elaborate.

“Excuse me?” she said, when he didn’t say anything further.

“I have a scar. On my stomach. Quite a big one, so I normally don’t take my T-shirt off when I have sex.”

She had no idea what she should say. Would he want her to reassure him? Probably.

“That’s fine. It’s OK. You don’t have to take it off.”

It wasn’t what she’d had in mind when she’d imagined them together, but her insides were aching for him and she’d take him half-dressed over not at all. He wet his lips, pressing them together. She panicked. Had she said the wrong thing? Did he think she’d be disgusted by his scar? She was quite sure she wouldn’t be. Should she tell him that? What if she saw it and was disgusted by it? Autumn didn’t think she had ever seen a real scar. Not a proper one.

“Or you can take your top off if you want to. I’m sure it will be fine. I don’t think I’ll find the scar disgusting or anything.”

Autumn felt him tense. That had definitely been the wrong thing to say. She scolded herself for being the most inadvertently uncouth person in the whole world. This was why she normally said virtually nothing at all. She was much cooler when she was acting aloof. Bowie released her wrist, but did not vacate the space between her legs. They were silent. Autumn, who had once traded sex acts for a safe place to sleep, marvelled at how difficult it had been to coax this bashful man into bed with her. She watched him blink at her, his head hovering a little way above hers, his hips still pinning hers against her mattress, hisT-shirt still raised half-mast, and felt a type of terror she’d never experienced before. She was frightened he might try to leave again.

Autumn had never been so frustrated. She’d never found herself so incapable of predicting an outcome. She had expected Bowie to cast himself upon her and burst like a volcano for two reasons. First, that’s what men usually did. Second, there’d been sexual tension raging between the two of them for several hours. She was eager to begin the inevitable and he’d thrown himself at her as though he was, too. But now, this.

She tried again. “I’m sure they’re fine. I don’t mind. Or care. I bet I wouldn’t have even noticed. If I had, I wouldn’t have said anything. I mean, I might have, but nothing bad.”

Bowie’s mouth twitched. She implored herself to shut up, but her mouth was moving again.

“I—”

“Stop, Autumn.” He laughed.

She was glad he found her conversational clumsiness funny. She relaxed a little, but he rolled off her and it made her feel empty. Bowie dragged the duvet over himself and sighed. She wanted to climb beneath it with him, but was afraid he was putting up a barrier between them and she didn’t want to push him if he wasn’t comfortable with what they were doing.

“Sorry,” he said.

“It’s OK.”

“It’s just that I don’t do this very often. Not with women like you.”

Women like her? She used her eyes to question him. He reached out to tuck a piece of her hair behind her ear.

“Look at you. You’re incredible. I bet you don’t have a single flaw.”

Autumn didn’t know what to say. She worked hard to look the way she did. She practised yoga and went to the gym.She was confident and comfortable with how she looked. She couldn’t really identify with someone who wasn’t and didn’t want to pretend that she could. She took his hand in hers.

“We don’t have to do this, Bowie.”

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