XIV
"Ducks in a row"
The following morning, as the radio news was telling us that the hot fine weather would finally break today, Wendy and I discussed the situation again, and she offered me some advice. "Get organised, James. Get your ducks in a row. [An interesting choice of phrase.] You can't just lurch from one unforeseen crisis to the next."
It was a sound suggestion. On the way to work I thought about how to implement it. I was very clear that I wanted to sort out the women I had got so far before I thought about capturing any more. It was a crying shame, though. I could see at least two highly fuckable young women in my carriage, but with great restraint I hung around the men and ugly women and got to work safely.
Once in my office I actually managed to get some work done before, as I had expected, there was a knock at the door.
Fran entered. She was transformed from the angry, frustrated woman that had left the office the night before. Her eyes sparkled, she was wreathed in smiles, she broke out at intervals in girlish giggles, and she somehow looked younger than her twenty-two years.
"'Morning Fran. You look well."
She flopped down in the chair and let her hair fall across her face. She blew some of it aside so I could see her expression, and giggled again.
"Oh, James," she sighed, and shot me a dazzling smile, "I feel
marvellous
. I knew it would be good but I never dreamt it would be like this. I feel ten times the person I was yesterday, I can't stop smiling and laughing, it's just wonderful. I'm so glad you chose me, darling. And as for last night -- well, I daren't even think about it, I just go all goose-pimply. Do you know it was ten o'clock before I could even get off the bed?"
I asked her to tell me more about this. These post-coital trances were a consequence of FUCK that I needed to understand.
"Well," she began after a pause to marshal her thoughts, "after we went to bed, er, made love, er --" She hesitated. "James," she inquired, "what do you like to call it?"