The Underground in July: a succession of tin cans of tightly packed Mixed Rage and Disappointment, even at this hour on a Saturday evening. In the middle carriage, one particular morsel of broiled baffled anger. Angry because he's late, and late because he's angry.
Angry because a week ago a Saturday pizza jaunt with Evie meandered into an argument. He had referred to a friend of hers (who had turned up drunk, insulted a waitress, and played gooseberry for an hour) as 'a crude needy piss-artist'. This, Evie said, meant he thought she was Common, which was because he had no sense of fun, which in turn, when she thought about it, explained a lot of things. To change the subject, he had slid his hand up the back of her skirt, drawing his fingers up the inside of her thighs until his hand brushed a stray wisp of hair, then slid on upwards to round the cotton-cased bottom.
She had said: 'I thought you said you ought to go into the office this afternoon'.
He had pulled her onto his lap, sprung the clip on her bra with the free hand, and sunk his face into her neck. So far so good. He had slid a finger into the leg of her knickers, and grumbled that he couldn't concentrate on work now.
She had responded: 'Well don't ring me up all week whining about being stressed at work then. I need a cup of tea and a bath.'
And baths are sometimes for after sex, but never before. Even on a Saturday.
So, having persuaded himself he'd drunk just one too many with the pizza, he had gone home rather than to the office, and wanked until it hurt. On Sunday he had played cricket, and then gone to the pub. And at work on Monday he had been bollocked about his backlog.
Today at 3:30, after six days' silence she had rung and said, 'Are you coming over tonight? Cos we could go to the flicks. That Shakespeare thing you wanted to see is on at 6:30.'
He had agreed far too eagerly and then, in dread of another episode, lay on his bed glumly playing with himself; half wanting to get one off his chest so that he didn't want her, and half afraid to, in case she wanted him.
So at just gone 5pm, in a haze of curdled lust, he had started to look for clothes she might like him in, and panicking because the journey would take ninety minutes on a good day.
Late because he was angry, and angry because he is late.
This is not a good day. 'Routine engineering work' has made him later still (exactly how late, he is not sure). Once at her stop, elbowing through the shuffling mass to the escalator he digs out his phone to text 'sorry! Fucking tubes! Here now!' but finds she's beaten him to it.
'Wher th fuck r u? Bn wtg here nrly an hr. Going home. If u thght yr on a promise u cn thk agen.'
He stops. Where's 'here'? Cinema or station? Is it worth suggesting going to a pub instead? Or for a meal? That probably wouldn't...
'Make yer bloody mind up, wanker' says someone behind him, and he is swept onto the escalator. He tries to stop, gather his thoughts, text something.
'Fchin tube buggrrered. Pub.inste.a.d?'
The escalator spits him out at the top. At the station entrance, Evie's diminutive frame is silhouetted against the sunlight.
It's worse than he thought. She's chosen today to push the boat out. She's wearing what she calls the banshee dress that had turned his world upside down the first time he set eyes on her; the dress she had still been wearing three hours later when they fucked for the first time, standing up against a tree, with the sound of their picnicking friends just yards away behind a row of bushes in the park. He has only seen her in it twice since. It has had to be cleaned each time.
There are the boots, whose heels raked the backs of his legs as she came that first time. There are the matching skull-pattern ring and ear-rings he bought her the second time they went out, but none of the make-up he doesn't like.
She spins on her heel, red curls flying, beautiful pale nape and shoulders flickering through the high black lace collar. 'Evie!'
Someone behind him laughs: 'Oops! You're in trouble, son.'
The ticket gate won't read his card for one - two ('Fuck' sake mate! Get a fuckin' move on!') - three attempts, then springs open. He dodges clumsily out ('Bloody charming!... a 'Sorry' wouldn't hurt, y'know...') - she's vanished.
Which bloody way? If she's going home there's a short cut which she won't take on her own, he can catch up... and he starts to run. The bag with the book and the bottle of white wine in it bouncing and slipping on his shoulder, the canvas boating trousers (chosen for the easy-peel button fly that made her laugh) and the flat slip-off deck shoes are not helping. Some underpants would have stopped his bollocks swinging so painfully. By the time he cuts up that alley that she hates, into her road, he is half-erect, red, sweaty, breathless, his feet hurt, but he must be ahead: she can't run in those boots, however pissed off she is.
Plan A, turn right, double back towards the pub, catch her as she hits the corner, make a joke of it, cold beer...Bloody hell she's right across the road - how did she get there?
She's striding furiously; the curls over her ears and forehead are slightly sweat-flattened. The dress pressed by the breeze, moulded across her breasts and hips, and the slight curve of her belly. The lace pattern of the dress shows a black flash of the very expensive bra that she chose to go with the stockings. He remembers her making him sit and wait, in an agony of confusion, trying to hide his erection as she chose it.
As he runs to cross the road, her stride doesn't falter.
'Don't talk to me! Just don't say ANYTHING!'
'Evie...'
'DON'T!'
And she's passed. Does she mean it?
So, fuck it. So...what? Go home, ring Helen, and see if she wants to play? There's always a chance there, only she's a bit...and she'd probably ring Evie and tell her...and it's best part of two hours' journey back, and - anyway, no, bugger it, that'd just be - limp. God, Evie's arse is just wonderful. No. Other women may have arses, Evie has a backside. A bottom. With perfect, compact cheeks.
Walk briskly, don't run. This is bad enough, must not look desperate.
She turns into her gate, up to the front door. In the time it takes her to get the keys out, drop them, and sweep them back up, he's on her shoulder. She opens the door...and slams it hard against him as he follows. And then again. And again.
Say what? "Steady on, you'll break the glass"? No, that's wet, just push - but she's left it ajar and stamped off up stairs without a word. Don't call. Follow? Chase? Wait? Close the door? What a good little boy.
A high-heeled black suede calf-boot bounces off the banister and hits him in the chest. The second one misses by several inches.
Charge upstairs, two, three at a time, following the flash of red hair and black lace into the bedroom, slam the door open. Shocking how loud a crash it makes against the wooden bed-base. For a moment they're both brought up short. She's got her ratty old black jeans in her hands, staring straight at him mouth slightly open. Standing in that tiny bedroom strewn with clothes, she looks thrown; as if she's been caught burgling in fancy dress. He is the first to look away. Can't help noticing that Evie must be the only woman he knows who would leave her vibrator on the window-sill.
She starts wordlessly to life, cramming first one stockinged foot then the other into the trousers, wriggling them up under the dress, dragging at the fly. Before she can get her dignity back, he tries: 'Love, just calm down, you'll...'
'Don't talk to me like I'm fucking SIX!' she hisses, and forces her way past him out onto the landing.