For Chrissakes! she told the detective, Ive got nothing on me! And for once, she meant it.
Back home, Martha attacked her belly with a pair of nail scissors. But the zip wasnt merely jammed, it was meshing and merging and disappearing, fading like the tail end of a bruise. She was frazzled. She looked around for her cigarettes. She found her packet and opened it. The last couple had gone, and instead, inside, was a note.
Martha, [the note said] I have made good my escape, fully intact. I sewed a pillow into your belly. On the wall of your womb Ive etched and inked an indelible bar-code. Thanks for the fags.
Love, Baby.
But you cant do that! Martha yelled. You dont have the technology! She thought she heard a chuckle, behind her. She span around. On the floor, under the table, she saw a small lump of afterbirth, tied up into a neat parcel by an umbilical cord. She could smell a whiff of cigarette smoke. She thought she heard laughter, outside the door, down the hall. She listened intently, but heard nothing more.
G-String
Ever fallen out with somebody simply because they agreed with you? Well, this is exactly what happened to Gillian and her pudgy but reliable long-term date, Mr Kip.
They lived separately in Canvey Island. Mr Kip ran a small but flourishing insurance business there. Gillian worked for a car-hire firm in Grays Thurrock. She commuted daily.
Mr Kip he liked to be called that, an affectation, if you will was an ardent admirer of the great actress Katharine Hepburn. She was skinny and she was elegant and she was sparky and she was intelligent. Everything a girl should be. She was old now, too, Gillian couldnt help thinking, but naturally she didnt want to appear a spoilsport so she kept her lips sealed.
Gillian was thirty-four, a nervous size sixteen, had no cheekbones to speak of and hair which she tried to perm. God knows she tried. She was the goddess of frizz. She frizzed but she did not fizz. She was not fizzy like Katharine. At least, thats what Mr Kip told her.
Bloody typical, isnt it? When a man chooses to date a woman, long term, who resembles his purported heroine in no way whatsoever? Is it safe? Is it cruel? Is it downright simple-minded?
Gillian did her weekly shopping in Southend. They had everything you needed there. Of course there was the odd exception: fishing tackle, seaside mementos, insurance, underwear. These items she never failed to purchase in Canvey Island itself, just to support local industry.
A big night out was on the cards. Mr Kip kept telling her how big it would be. A local Rotary Club do, and Gillian was to be Mr Kips special partner, he was to escort her, in style. He was even taking the cloth off his beloved old Aston Martin for the night to drive them there and back. And hed never deigned to do that before. Previously hed only ever taken her places in his H-reg Citroën BX.
Mr Kip told Gillian that she was to buy a new frock for this special occasion. Something, he imagined, like that glorious dress Katharine Hepburn wore during the bar scene in her triumph, Bringing Up Baby.
Dutifully, Gillian bought an expensive dress in white chiffon which didnt at all suit her. Jeanie twenty-one with doe eyes, sunbed-brown and weighing in at ninety pounds told Gillian that the dress made her look like an egg-box. All lumpyhumpy. It was her underwear, Jeanie informed her If only! Gillian thought apparently it was much too visible under the dresss thin fabric. Jeanie and Gillian were conferring in The Lace Bouquet, the lingerie shop on Canvey High Street where Jeanie worked.
I tell you what, Jeanie offered, all in one lace bodysuit, right? Stretchy stuff. No bra. No knickers. Itll hold you in an everything. Jeanie held up the prospective item. Bodysuits, Gillian just knew, would not be Mr Kips idea of sophisticated. She shook her head. She looked down at her breasts. I think Ill need proper support, she said, grimacing.
Jeanie screwed up her eyes and chewed at the tip of her thumb. Bra and pants, huh?
I think so.
Although keen not to incur Jeanies wrath, Gillian picked out the kind of bra she always wore, in bright, new white, and a pair of matching briefs.
Jeanie ignored the bra. It was functional. Fair enough. But the briefs she held aloft and proclaimed, Passion killers.
Theyre tangas, Gillian said, defensively, proud of knowing the modern technical term for the cut-away pant. Theyre brief briefs.
Jeanie snorted. No one wears these things any more, Gillian. Theres enough material here to launch a sailboat.
Jeanie picked up something that resembled an obscenely elongated garter and proffered it to Gillian. Gillian took hold of the scrap.
Whats this?
G-string.
My God, girls wear these in Dave Lee Roth videos.
Whos that? Jeanie asked, sucking in her cheeks, insouciant.
They arent practical, Gillian said.
Jeanies eyes narrowed. These are truly modern knickers, she said. These are what everyone wears now. And Ill tell you for why. No visible pantie line!
Gillian didnt dare inform her that material was the whole point of a pantie. Wasnt it?
Oh hell, Gillian thought, shifting on Mr Kips Aston Martins leather seats, maybe I shouldve worn it in for a few days first. It felt like her G-string was making headway from between her buttocks up into her throat. She felt like a leg of lamb, trussed up with cheese wire. Now she knew how a horse felt when offered a new bit and bridle for the first time.
Wearing hairspray? Mr Kip asked, out of the blue.
What?
If you are, he said, ever careful, then dont lean your head back on to the seat. Its real leather and you may leave a stain.
Gillian bit her lip and stopped wriggling.
Hope it doesnt rain, Mr Kip added, keeping his hand on the gearstick in a very male way, the wipers arent quite one hundred per cent.
Oh, the G-string was a modern thing, but it looked so horrid! Gillian wanted to be a modern girl but when she espied her rear-end engulfing the slither of string like a piece of dental floss entering the gap between two great white molars, her heart sank down into her strappy sandals. It tormented her. Like the pain of an old bunion, it quite took off her social edge.
When Mr Kip didnt remark favourably on her new dress; when, in fact, he drew a comparison between Gillian and the cone-shaped upstanding white napkins on the fancily made-up Rotary tables, she almost didnt try to smile. He drank claret. He smoked a cigar and tipped ash on her. He didnt introduce her to any of his Rotary friends. Normally, Gillian might have grimaced on through. But tonight she was a modern girl in torment and this kind of behaviour quite simply would not do.
Of course she didnt actually say anything. Mr Kip finally noticed Gillians distress during liqueurs.
Whats got into you?
Headache, Gillian grumbled, fighting to keep her hands on her lap.
Two hours later, Mr Kip deigned to drive them home. It was raining. Gillian fastened her seatbelt. Mr Kip switched on the windscreen wipers. They drove in silence. Then all of a sudden, wheeeuwoing! One of the wipers flew off the windscreen and into a ditch. Mr Kip stopped the car. He reversed. He clambered out to look for the wiper, but because he wore glasses, drops of rain impaired his vision.
It was a quiet road. What the hell. Mr Kip told Gillian to get out and look for it.
In my white dress? Gillian asked, quite taken aback.
Fifteen minutes later, damp, mussed, muddy, Gillian finally located the wiper. Mr Kip fixed it back on, but when he turned the relevant switch on the dash, neither of the wipers moved. He cursed like crazy.
Well, thats that, he said, and glared at Gillian like it was her fault completely. They sat and sat. It kept right on raining.
Finally Gillian couldnt stand it a minute longer. Give me your tie, she ordered. Mr Kip grumbled but did as shed asked. Gillian clambered out of the car and attached the tie to one of the wipers.
OK, she said, trailing the rest of the tie in through Mr Kips window. Now we need something else. Are you wearing a belt?
Mr Kip shook his head.
Something long and thin, Gillian said, like a rope.
Mr Kip couldnt think of anything.
Shut your eyes, Gillian said. Mr Kip shut his eyes, but after a moment, naturally, he peeped.
And what a sight! Gillian laboriously freeing herself from some panties which looked as bare and sparse and confoundedly stringy as a pirates eye patch.
Good gracious! Mr Kip exclaimed. You could at least have worn some French knickers or cami-knickers or something proper. Those are preposterous!
Gillian turned on him. Ive really had it with you, Colin, she snarled, with your silly, affected, old-fashioned car and clothes and everything.
From her bag Gillian drew out her Swiss Army Knife and applied it with gusto to the plentiful elastic on her G-string. Then she tied one end to the second wiper and pulled the rest around and through her window. Right, she said, start up the engine.
Colin Kip did as he was told. Gillian manipulated the wipers manually; left, right, left, right. All superior and rhythmical and practical and dour-faced.
Mr Kip was very impressed. He couldnt help himself. After several minutes of driving in silence he took his hand off the gearstick and slid it on to Gillians lap.
Watch it, Gillian said harshly. Dont you dare provoke me, Colin. I havent put my Swiss Army Knife away yet.
She felt the pressure of his hand leave her thigh. She was knickerless. She was victorious. She was a truly modern female.
The Three Button Trick
Jack had won Carries heart with that old three button trick.
At the genesis of every winter, Jack would bring out his sturdy but ancient grey duffel coat and massage the toggles gently with the tips of his fingers. Hed pick off any fluff or threads from its rough fabric, brush it down vigorously with the flat of his hand and then gradually ease his way into it. One arm, two arms, shift it on to his shoulders, balance it right the tips of the sleeves both perfectly level with each wrist then straighten the collar.
Finally, the toggles. The most important part. Hed do them one-handed, pretending, even to himself, some kind of casualness, a studied if fallacious preoccupation, his eyes unfocused, imagining, for example, how it felt when he was a small boy learning to tell the time. His father had shown him: ten past, quarter past, see the little hand? See the big hand? But he hadnt learned. It simply didnt click.