Tess Stimson - The Adultery Club (27 page)

I was spending the summer with my parents in the

Rh6nes-Alpes, in a tiny village called La Palud, half an

hour north-east of Grenoble.

I awoke one morning to find my parents had gone

hiking, leaving me alone with my law books (whose

spines, I regret to say, had yet to be cracked; a state of

affairs presumably noted by my all-seeing mother). This

being Jean de Florette country - a simmering feud between

the villagers over the communal well had led to scythes

at dawn just a few weeks before our arrival - if you

wanted a reviving morning shower before turning to your

neglected studies, you had to make the short walk from

our remote mountain chalet to an impossibly photogenic

lake near by.

And so began the headiest ten days of my life.

The erotic imprint left by Kristene as she rose naked

from the lucent water, a modern-day siren, is such that

even now, nearly twentyfive years later, I grow hard at

the thought. Her skin glistened in the morning sunlight as

if she’d been dipped in syrup. I watched as she smoothed

back her wet hair from her face with the palms of her

hands, her back arched, presenting high, firm, raspberrynippled breasts to the sky. A burl of chestnut hair wisped

between long, endlessly long, brown legs.

When she saw me standing there, open-mouthed and

overcome, she simply smiled, winked, and dived gracefully

backwards into the water.

She was twenty-nine, her mood as pliant as her warm

and willing body. I’d shed my burdensome virginity at

seventeen to a girl my own age scarcely more experienced;

two years on I still knew less about the way a woman

worked than I did about a jet engine. Kristene rectified

my woeful ignorance. She guided my hands, my tongue,

my cock, my mind, with wanton, audacious confidence,

unashamedly taking as much pleasure as she gave.

It was clear from the beginning that our relationship,

which occupied no dimension other than the gloriously

physical, had no life outside this particular time and

space. I was being admitted to a sensual Eden for reasons

I neither knew nor cared to discover; soon, the door would

close again. So I greedily slaked my thirst whilst I could. I

returned to that lake day after day, gorging myself on her,

determined to wring every moment of pleasure from her

body in the hope that the memories would be enough to

sustain me when she was gone.

They were not. For years afterwards, sex with every

woman I bedded seemed as dry and stale as week-old

biscuits when you have tasted nectar.

I’d forgotten how Kristene made my body feel until I

met Sara. One remembers the taste of a strawberry: but

even the most vivid memory is but a faint, dull facsimile

compared to the sybaritic pleasure of biting into the

strawberry itself.

That one night with Sara has reawakened senses I’ve

not felt since those halcyon days by the lakeside when

I was a priapic nineteen-year-old. How to describe the

indescribable? Losing myself in her lush, ripe body, it was

as if I was all cock, every muscle and sinew of my body

throbbing with the heat of her. I felt her sweet wetness

down to the tips of my toes. For the first time in my life, I

actually lost my mind when I was inside a woman; even

Kristene hadn’t come close to this. I was conscious of

nothing else but the need to possess, and be possessed by,

her.

A need utterly at odds with the fact that despite everything

I still love my wife.

‘Not really on, is it, old man?’ Giles says. ‘With the best

will in the world. Not blaming you, of course, old chap,

seen the girl myself; hard for a fellow to resist, absolutely.

But the thing is, Nicholas, Mai’s a lovely woman.

Man would be a fool to lose her for a pretty face.’

I stare morosely into my pint. ‘She’s a wonderful

woman. I don’t deserve her.’

‘So what’s this all about then?’ .ilin nnyN kindly. ‘Not

like you. Always such a HvmiMt 1ťŤ

;

‘Not so sensible now, it would seem.’

He nods at the landlord. ‘Same again? Look, Nicholas,

we all make mistakes. Fellow’s got to be a saint sometimes

- the girls these days. Lot more forward than they used to

be. Had a bit of a brush myself a few months ago, matter

of fact. Girl on the seven-nineteen, always sits in the first

carriage behind the engine, same as me. Charming girl.

Works in advertising. Got chatting after a while, as you

do. Quite brightened up the journey, if I’m honest. Anyway,

next thing I know, she’s asking me to come with her

to a gallery opening.’

‘What did you say?’ I ask curiously.

‘Said no, of course,’ Giles says briskly. ‘Look, old chap.

Don’t mean to be a killjoy. But once you open that door well,

who knows where it’ll lead? I know I’m not every

girl’s cup of tea, never been an oil painting, I know that;

but Liz is rather fond, you know. Break her heart if she

found I’d been dipping my wick elsewhere. Thing is,

you and Mai have a good thing going. And there are your

girls to think of. Why take the risk?’

I’ve asked myself the same thing a thousand times.

Sleeping with her once, after the bombings, I could almost

explain away; danger makes us all do things we wouldn’t

normally. And perhaps that would have been it, if Sara

hadn’t produced the opera tickets - how magnificent, that

she should love Wagner! - and made it clear she was interested in a repeat performance, after all. If we hadn’t run into Liz and Giles, I would have taken her to bed

again. And this time, the only danger would have been of

my making.

‘Liz told Mai about last night, you know, Giles. Said

you’d run into me in London and given me a lift back.’

‘You were jolly lucky there, Nicholas. Jolly lucky.

Could’ve been very different if it’d been anyone else. But

Liz is a good woman. She takes things at face value. You’ll

be all right with her.’

I drain my pint and set it down. Giles is absolutely

right. Five minutes earlier, and Mai’s best friend would

have seen Sara all over me like a cheap suit. I should

never have let her touch me in public; it was pure bloody

recklessness. I should never have gone out with her again

at all.

Amare et sapere vix deo conceditur. The gods never let us love and be wise at the same time.

The thing is, one night with Sara wasn’t enough. Nowhere near enough.

I know this thing has to end, and soon; the stakes are

too high. I could lose everything I care about. Christ

Almighty, I deal with marital train wrecks every day of

the week. I had a client in my office just last Friday, been

married two years and nine months. Wife had a couple

of miscarriages, and the bloody fool ended up in bed with his secretary. He’s now looking at giving his wife his house and a rather nasty slice of the next few years

of his life; and that’s a best-case scenario, if we pull the

right judge. Meanwhile, the secretary has taken one look

at the interim maintenance order and made for the hills.

I have to get Sara out of my system, once and for all.

But denying myself only seems to feed the fever. Perhaps

if she stops being forbidden fruit, if I let this thing run its natural course, it’ll burn itself out. I’m sure of it.

Valentine’s Dny. l,iss than a month away. I’ll give

myself till Valentine’s Day, the day associated with love

and romance the world over; and then I’ll put an end to

it. We’ll have a final passionate liaison, and then bid each

other a regretful, but amicable, farewell.

Somehow, putting a time limit on the affair eases my

excruciating guilt. I’ve already broken my vows; the damage

is already done. A few weeks longer, that’s all I ask.

I’m not leading Sara on under false pretences. She’s a

young girl with everything going for her. It’s not like she’s

in this for the long haul. She’s a smart woman; she knows

I’m not a good bet for the future. And at her age, she’s

probably not even thinking about the future anyway.

She’s enjoying this for what it is: fun, good conversation,

and bloody fantastic sex.

I send her half a florist’s stock on Monday by way of

an apology for our ruined evening; and then a boxed set

of the Wagner she loves so much the next day. I haven’t been caught up in such a romantic rush for years; on Wednesday I surprise myself by tracking down a rare outof-print book of poetry - a revelation, that, to discover a

dozen well-thumbed volumes of First World War poets

on her book shelves; I had expected airport bricks of the

type Mai favours - whilst Thursday’s gift is inspired by a

comment from one of my female clients.

‘La Perla!’ the woman says furiously, as she storms

towards my office waving what turns out to be an

American Express credit card statement. ‘I was married

to the bastard twenty-seven years, and he never bought me bloody La Perla!’

Google divulges the nature of this particular feminine

Holy Grail; unfortunately, I’m left to fend for myself when

it comes to the delicate matter of making the actual pur

chase. I have no idea what size to buy Sara; cupping my

hands in a broadly indicative mime elicits more hilarity

than helpfulness. However, eventually we establish the

parameters of my quest by dint of a rather unseemly comparison

with several shop assistants’ embonpoint; soon I am

left to choose between a coffee-and-cream all-in-one lace

confection, and an enticing plum brassiere and panties set

so flimsy it looks as if it will barely last the anticipated

five-minute interlude between revelation and removal.

I buy both: one for now, and one for Valentine’s Day.

It will be my farewell gift to her; a memento of one last

spectacular night together before we say goodbye.

Into the folds of the coffee-coloured silk, I slip a

Claridge’s key card. And it is at Claridge’s that our affair

moves up a gear, the day after I give her my final gift: a

silver Tiffany bracelet I know she covets.

Valentine’s Day creeps ever closer as, over the course

of the next few weeks, we meet up at the hotel again and

again. I daren’t risk a late night more than once or twice

a week, but there is the occasional afternoon tryst, when a

client cancels; almost more passionate for its spontaneity.

It’s costing me a fortune (my credit cards are near their

limits; thankfully the firm’s profit share at the end of the

financial year in April will clear them before Mai notices)

but with the recklessness that characterizes this whole

liaison, I find I don’t care. It’ll be over soon. When I run

out of credit, I will simply pay cash.

I can’t tell Sara that I already plan to end our affair,

that would be unkind; but I am careful, very careful, not

to offer her more than I can give. Beyond the pleasure

our loverrwiking affords mo, I like her; very much. The last

thing in the world 1 want to do is hurt her.

But none the less, there is a moment, the day before

Valentine’s Day, when I almost slip.

I’m about to leave for the last train home after another

wonderful evening with her when Sara takes it upon

herself to treat me to one of her mind-blowing blow-jobs.

I should leave - I’m late already - but oh, God, it’s as if

she has a dozen tongues, all conspiring to drive me out of

my mind. Train times and anxious wives mean nothing.

Promises, lies, love and truth - nothing matters but the

woman on her knees in front of me. Hot, warm, wet … Jesus Christ Almighty.

I let her take me to the brink, then abruptly pull away

from her. More than anything, I want to drive her to lose

control the way she does me; I want her writhing on the

bed frantic for my touch. I taste her hot sweat when I kiss

her skin, my mouth moving from breasts to belly-button

to her strangely naked mound. It’s like the whole of her

body is an erogenous zone as she squirms erotically

beneath me. I hold back, carefully controlling the pace,

deliberately refusing to let her breathy little cries spur me

faster.

Finally, when I know I’ve got her where I want her, I

tongue her where she’s aching to be touched.

After she comes, I slide up the bed and rest my cheek

on her belly, relishing its soft, cushiony feel. A relaxed

warmth seeps through me as her heartbeat thuds, slowing

now, a little above my ear. Unbidden, words float to the

surface. ‘I love—’

I want to bite my tongue off. Good God, the blood

rush to my cock must have caused a severe lack of its

flow to my brain.

In the here and now I love her, certainly. But a woman

reads far more into those three overused words than a

man often means her to hear.

‘I love to be here I amend hastily. ‘I feel safe, safer

than anywhere else in the world.’

She’s quick to hide it; but not quick enough. I see