I first noticed him as soon as I entered the store. He was standing in the fruit and veg section, squeezing the honeydew melons to find a good firm one. It was late into the evening -- past ten o'clock -- and there was hardly anyone else in the shop. I was only there because my bloody in-laws had called half an hour earlier: they'd be down from Dundee tomorrow on their way to Heathrow Airport, 20 miles from our home. If I'd taken the call I'd have made an excuse, telling them we couldn't possibly put them up at such short notice; but it was Rob who answered the phone. So instead of curling up in my bed with a cup of hot chocolate and my new Kathy Reichs thriller, I'd slammed into the car and driven down to the Tesco 24-hour superstore to stock up the fridge. Leaving my husband and my three year old son back home. I was pissed off with Rob -- unreasonably so, it's not his fault his parents are thoughtless, inconsiderate bastards -- but maybe that explains what happened. I can't think of anything else that does.
The man was quite striking looking. He was a god six inches taller than me, over six feet, with a trim, well-toned frame. His brown hair was cut unfashionably short; I vaguely wondered if he was a police officer or a soldier. He was dressed quite simply, plain blue shirt with the top two buttons undone, exposing a few tufts of hair, and blue jeans, but the clothes looked nicely cut, expensive. Top of the range Nikes on his feet, that kind with the sort of rubber springs built into the heel. I guessed he was in his late 20s -- I'm 35 by the way. At first I could only see him in profile -- high cheekbones, strong jaw, seven o'clock shadow -- but when the front wheels of my trolley went the wrong way I swore, and his head swivelled towards me. His eyes were the deepest brown, almost black, and seemed incredibly intense. As they fixed on me I felt a jolt in my belly and my breath caught in my throat. That had never happened to me before, and I didn't quite understand it. He held my stare for a couple of seconds, then turned back to the fruit.
I grabbed a bag of boiling potatoes and some carrots and moved on. For a couple of minutes I forgot all about him as I concentrated on the shopping list in my head. Then, as I passed one of the cross-aisles between two blocks of shelves, I just happened to glance along it -- and he was standing in the next aisle, looking back at me. I registered it, but no more. Took a couple of items off the next shelf, and moved on. At the next cross-aisle, there he was again, eyes fixed on me, face expressionless. With a gasp of surprise, I dragged my trolley back, behind the cover of the shelves I'd just finished with. Silly cow, I told myself, it's nothing, just a coincidence. Why would a good looking you've never met be following you round the store, an older woman a couple of stones overweight, tired and looking it, and with unwashed blonde hair piled on top of her head in a careless bun? It was hardly surprising he was going the same direction as me: he'd obviously arrived in the shop just before me, and people do shop along an aisle, from front to back.
Aware of my heart rate pounding, I walked back across the cross-aisle and casually glanced down it -- oh shit, he was still there! Wire basket dangling from his hand, just one melon in it -- he hadn't bought anything else. Was it my imagination, or did his thick eyebrows twitch as he looked at me, in acknowledgement, or recognition -- or invitation?
Ducking into the shadow of the next block of shelves, I leant against them, feeling my face flush and pressing a hand to my racing heart, like some histrionic Jane Austen heroine. What should I do? Approach a member of the shop security staff and look like a fool when the guy said I was a nutter? Give him a withering look then just ignore him? Stomp up to him and confront him? I've read that most sex pests are cowards. I glanced down; why the hell hadn't I changed out of my short denim skirt before I came out to the shop? In my head I could hear some perverted prick of a judge: "in that tiny skirt, showing off her long legs, out on her own so late at night, she was virtually asking to be raped". Oh fuck, in my annoyance at Rob's parents I had parked in the first space I came to, right at the far end of the large car park, not near the shop in the arc lights, like any woman with a brain would have done!
At that moment he appeared round the shelves, probably wondering where I'd got to and if he'd lost me. He almost went head first over my trolley, but swerved smoothly round it and carried on down the aisle without so much as glancing at me. That was when I could have changed things, of course. With his back to me I could easily have wheeled back up to the checkout, paid for my purchases and dashed out of there. I actually told myself that was what I was going to do: I'd bought enough to feed Jack and May, and I could always nip out during my lunch hour the next day and top up. Why, then, was I turning my trolley in the other direction, and hesitantly following him, deeper into the shop?
He had stopped at the back wall, in front of the freezer cabinet. I pushed my trolley to one side and stood alongside him, maybe a foot away, my bare knees pressed against the cool wall of the cabinet. We both stared vacantly into the cabinet, not exchanging a glance, a word; my circulating blood roared in my ears, and I could scarcely breathe. Slowly I leaned forwards from the waist, slightly across him, reaching for a pack of frozen peas. As my fingers contacted the cold bag, his arm moved lazily, his hand resting gently but firmly on mine. I turned my head towards him, and his black eyes met mine. Try as I might, I couldn't look away, couldn't break the almost physical contact between his eyes and mine. We stood like that for, I don't know, seconds, hours, my fingers beginning to turn white from contact with the frozen pea bag, his big, warm hand laying across mine, our eyes locked. My breath was coming in short, shallow bursts, like a terrified rabbit, and I could feel my face flushing and my nipples twitching into gradual hardness. That was the moment when I knew, when I think we both knew: this total stranger wanted to have me; and I was going to let him.
He withdrew his hand and, some time later, turned his eyes from mine and sauntered away, back up the shop. The next few minutes were like a game: watching each other down the cross aisles, standing facing each other across two feet of boxed cakes, still not a word exchanged between us. And all the time, somewhere in my head, I kept asking myself, what the fuck was I doing? I love Rob. We've been married six years, and we have a good sex life. In all that time it had never occurred to me to even think about what it would be like to have an affair with another man. Yet, here I was, staring at an attractive man I'd seen for the first time barely ten minutes before, a man whose eyes seemed to be able to sear into my soul, and thinking about whether I was going to let him screw me; whether I was capable of stopping him from doing so.