This is a short story that just popped into my head. I tried to ignore it but it's holding on like a very stubborn terrier so guess I'm just going to have to put pen to paper...or rather fingers to laptop.
It was partly inspired by someone who I've only known for a short time but whom I now consider a sort of inspiration. This is for you b579. You know yourself. Thanks for reading my poems and sharing yours with me. Meant a whole lot to me.
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I stand looking outside the window and reminiscing. Thoughts fill my head as I remember my life. The good, the bad and the overwhelmingly marvellous. I smile as I go over fond memories and then I cry as I think of how it is now. Then it blurs into a state of the bittersweet. The past clashing with the present. It had been lovely. Not a nicely paved road, but a good journey nonetheless. But now it was over. I stare, my eyes bright and unblinking, yet I see nothing.
***
I was twenty three, he was fifty nine. People saw us walking down the road or going into the supermarket and either sniggered or looked away as quickly as they could. There were those who looked on steadfastly, ignoring us so blatantly that it seemed they had eyes in the back of their heads when they passed. But we did not care. Why should we? We were in love. But in hindsight I guess one could not really blame them. I mean, I was young and he was old; I was dressed in expensive couture and he was dressed in a simple t-shirt and jeans.
I was black and he was white.
***
My name is Tamara Nagosi. I am half Nigerian, half Ethiopian. With long wavy black hair, large almond shaped eyes and a very tall, lean stature; I guess you could say I was a beauty. You see, I grew up to be very spoilt. My father died when I was six and I guess his side of the family tried to over-compensate for his death. My mother, who grew up in a strict Nigeria, tried to raise me up the way she was raised. She was stern and smacked me when I misbehaved. Then I would throw the largest of tantrums and my grandmother would swoop me up in her arms and throw my mother an evil glare. I learnt how to play 'the game.' Act in a terrible way, push my mother into raising her hands to smack me and then get my grandmother's doting love and affection. This went on till I was ten and my mother decided she could not take it anymore. She left me with my grandmother and I was pleased. Ecstatic even; now I could get away with anything.
Of course, now that I'm older I understand how my mother had wanted to drill into me that crying to get whatever I wanted was not the answer. That just because I was fortunate enough to have been born into a wealthy family with doting grandparents did not mean I was above everybody. I had been a monster and no one, no one but her had seen the wrongness of my training. Now I wish that I had been better as I grew up without a mother; at the same time I wish she had been stronger and persevered.
***
I was twenty two and slightly drunk when I first saw him. At that time I had not spared him a glance. I had popped into the Starbucks on Hampstead for a much needed coffee. He was there, the only person there actually considering it was as early as 7 am. He was sat by the window, concentrating intently on what he was writing, oblivious to the dreary looking but, to me, wonderfully gray sky. His focus was solely on his notebook. At the time, I didn't care much about this man. All I wanted was my mocha with whipped cream. The perfect hangover cure.
As I grabbed my coffee, waving rather absently at the spotty boy behind the counter, ignoring the wide eyed look he gave me as I left the change from my twenty pound note on the counter for him. I don't think he had ever been tipped that much in his short existence as a 'coffee boy.'
I popped open my flip Nokia phone. It was the phone of the year. Now I laugh to myself as I see everyone with their Blackberry smartphones or IPhones. Forgetting the old Motorolas and Nokias.
I dialled my best friend's number, Alicia and soon was yapping away loudly as I gave her a detailed description of my night with an oil heir in his flat in Hampstead.
I was quickly cut short as I saw scoffed up trainers by my table legs. I glanced up to see the man staring at me furiously. He had the most intense green eyes and for a tenth of a second, all I could do was stare, captivated by his eyes.
Then I snapped out of it as his words crashed into me, 'I'm pretty sure the whole world would love to hear some more about how your man of the night treated your clitoris the way it should be treated, but some of us are a bit put off by your loud descriptions so if you could tone it down a little?'
I stared open-mouthed as he whirled back and marched to his chair, ignoring Alicia's squeaks coming from the phone. I had never been spoken to in such a rude manner in my entire life!
I snapped the phone shut, cutting Alicia off and stared at the man, still shocked. The coffee boy came round and asked, rather timidly, if I wanted him to send the other man out but I shook my head. A part of me wanted to march over to him and demand an apology for his rudeness, but another part, the larger part was intrigued by him. Someone had actually dared to talk to me like that? Especially when I had been surrounded by fawners all my life -- fascinating.
I did stand up in the end. And I did march over to him. But what came out of my smiling mouth was, 'I apologise for disrupting your concentration. Could I buy you a coffee as a proper apology?'
The man looked up. I saw him scrunch his nose a little as if he was trying to place who I was. This caused a little irritation in me. Could he have forgotten who he berated so suddenly? Only later did he tell me that his heart had been galloping when he heard my footsteps coming to him. He had thought I was going to yell or even hit him. We had laughed at this confession.
He shook his head curtly, his wavy brown hair, with a little grey interspersed evenly within it, shaking softly as well.
I was taken aback. I had been told I was pretty -- and I believed it. I was spoilt yes, fawned over yes, probably lied to, but my beauty was one thing I knew for sure was real. I had eyes too, of course.
I could not believe that he had not taken me up on my offer. Was he that appalled by me? I looked at him coolly, coldly even.
'Well, forgive me for being more of a disturbance. Good luck with your writing.' I turned and smartly left the cafe, thinking to myself that it was a good thing I lived far away in Sloane's Square. There was no way I'd be visiting that Starbucks ever again.
***
Two days later, I was there. It had been raining heavily and it was a cold, windy 7.15 am, but I did not care. I had tried to put that man out of my mind but I could not. At first it had been intrigue, then exasperation, and finally arousal. He had stirred something in me. I had never been instantly attracted to anybody. Not whilst sober anyway. My life was a whirlwind of partying and socialising and I always ended up in someone's bed, or in my bed with someone else. But never when sober. This was definitely a first.
It was not even that he was handsome. He was rather ordinary. With his longer than average hair which had grey bits in it, and his alright build and height. But it was the little things that mattered. His eyes. His voice. The authority and lack of adulation. I did not care that he was probably old enough to be my father, and maybe poor due to his lackadaisical dressing; no. I had not even thought to check his wedding finger. He was certainly old enough to be married. None of that. I just wanted to see him again.
I took a deep breath and pushed open the door, shaking the rain off my umbrella as I did so. I smiled nicely at the same spotty coffee boy whose eyes widened with delight as his face turned red. I looked around, as carelessly as I could, and to my dismay, saw that the only other people there where two middle-aged women drinking and chatting away companionably. I thought briefly of all the effort I had put into my appearance -- my carefully tousled and subtly highlighted hair, my 'natural' makeup highlighting my pronounced cheekbones, my simple looking Pringle of Scotland cashmere jumper tucked rather shabbily into high-waisted Christian Dior trousers. I wrinkled my nose glumly and ordered a large hot chocolate. I needed consolation.
I sat down and slurped my chocolate drink, not caring about the table manners that had been drilled into me by my strict tutors at finishing school. Who cared? As I slurped down the last dregs from my mug, chasing a tiny chocolate piece with my tongue, the door opened and I saw him walk in. I dropped the mug abruptly and tried to surreptitiously wipe my nose; I could feel moisture there and hoped I'd taken care of it.
I saw him glance at me out of the corner of his eye and then he turned from where he had been going and came over to a table next to me.
I tried to smile coolly at him but I think I failed miserably as my face ached trying to accommodate a large grin that it was not accustomed to.
He stared at me for a second, then leaned over to ask me, his voice a husky whisper, 'What are you doing here?'
I looked at him, taken aback a little. I replied as disdainfully as I could, 'What does one normally do in a cafe, dance?'
He smiled with an arched brow. Then he turned to his notebook and began to write.
I sat there for twenty minutes with an empty cup but he never looked up at me.
I got up, resignedly and walked out to my car, telling myself that it was all pointless.
For the next two weeks, we repeated the same scenario: drink, be asked what I was doing there, reply with varying sarcastic comments, sit and stare, then walk out.
The third week I decided enough was enough. He sat down next to me and opened his mouth to ask the same question he had been asking but I beat him to it.
I asked, my heart pounding, 'What do you think I'm doing here?'
He looked at me, surprised for a second. Then he smiled widely and leaned back against his seat, folding his arms across his chest.
I used the opportunity to look at his left ring finger. Bare. I crossed my fingers inwardly.
Then he uttered the words I guess I'd been waiting for subconsciously.
'I live five minutes away from here.'
Score.
I stood up, legs trembling for a second as I put on my coat and walked out of the cafe after him. It was dark outside. The December weather bitterly cold. I thanked all the Powers that Be that I had forgotten where I had left my car keys from the night before. Somewhere in my room most likely. I had taken a taxi instead so no pressure from wondering where to have parked the car now that I was walking silently next to him as he walked, or rather strolled comfortably to his house.
We had barely gotten into the rather dinky flat before he pushed my against the door and ground his lips against mine. Kissing me with no restraint. I clung to him as I parted my lips to let his tongue in. I had never been kissed so relentlessly. So surely. As I got fully into the kiss, sucking his tongue into my mouth and even biting it, he let out a harsh groan and let go of me. It was so abrupt I sank back hard against the door and hit my head soundly.
