"All I can say is that if women are supposed to prefer chocolate to sex, then I'm a bloody man!" said Sally.
No one in our office could think of anything to say in reply. She obviously wasn't. On the other hand, she doesn't have an imp sitting on her shoulder, as I do. The imp's name is Qina, and she whispers things in my ear.
Qina said: "Look at Celestine. She's pretending she didn't hear that. Look at her - you can only see her head, neck, and shoulders as she sits at her desk, with her back to you. OK so her hair is quite short, but that means you can see her neck. It's smooth like a polished newel-post. Her shoulders are broad, but broad in the way only a woman's can be. Her white blouse is fairly tight across them and - wait! - she's standing up, and you can see that blouse tapering down to her waist. Through it you can see the back and shoulder-straps of her bra, and that is such an intimate thing to consider. She was naked to the waist before she fastened that clasp - see, it's a slight bump in the centre of the back-strap!"
Belgian chocolate truffles, on the other hand, offer an intimacy I know only too well. It is possible to eat one at a single bite, but I prefer to take them between finger and thumb, holding them for just long enough for the dusting to begin to melt under the warmth of my fingertips. Then I introduce that dusting to my lips, and to the tip of my tongue, where it transforms instantly to liquid. I bite through the shell, which is barely harder than the truffle centre anyhow, and leaves a deposit on my teeth as I take half of this delicious confection into my mouth, let it melt, and let it slide like a newly-formed ingot down my throat. Then the other half. Then I lick the residue off my fingers and teeth and, realising that I have had my eyes shut all this time, I emerge into a renewed brightness. Intimacy and poetry all in one!
Qina said: "Look at Celestine. She's facing this way. She's smiling that open, honest smile at you. Her eyes are on you, and only you. She is looking at you, and you are all she sees. She feels the same way about you that you do about her. You love her. She loves you. Speak to her at tea-break, and this time make it more than 'Have we got any semi-skimmed milk left?'"
Tea-break, for me, means a cup of hot chocolate. Talk of semi-skimmed milk is irrelevant - the last time I mentioned it, it was simply something to say, a way of breaking an awkward silence between sips. Drinking chocolate was invented by the Aztecs, as a love-potion, as an aphrodisiac, but it is its own fulfilment! I take a teaspoon, and pick up a little heap, like a miniature Popocatapetl, and transfer it, without spilling any, to a thick, china mug. I trickle in enough full-cream milk to make a smooth paste out of the powder, and churn it with the spoon until it coats the bottom of the mug. Now I take a small, light pan, and pour in about half a pint of the same full-cream milk. Over a half-ring of electric heat, I bring the milk slowly to the boil, taking it off the cooker just before it rises up to spill over the pan and burn, and pour just enough into the mug, leaving a little in the pan for top-ups later. Then I whisk the mugful until the whole contents are creamy, and little bubbles form at the top; then I dust it with some more powder, so that brown stains form little continents on the surface. I bring the mug to my face, and before I touch it with my lips, I breathe in the vapours that rise from it, chocolate steam which fills my nasal passages and lungs. Then I am ready for my first taste. It scalds my mouth slightly, and the skin of the boiled milk attaches itself to my lip and has to be licked off, but the instant buzz is there. When the drink has cooled just enough, I let it run over my tongue and down my gullet in little gulps - chocolatl ..... axolotl ..... quetzalcoatl - like cooling lava running down a mountainside. And, yes, my eyes are closed in ecstasy; my hands are cupped appropriately around the mug. A slight sweat breaks out all over my body, and my cheeks burn!
"It's the twenty-fifth anniversary of my fist kiss," announces Sally. "It was Martin Ashworth. I had his name written on my geography jotter, until he discovered that he could get further with Maureen Evans, and chucked me!"
"Ah, les folies de la jeunesse!" said someone else.