Welcome, dear reader, to my entry for the 2015 Valentine's Day Story Contest.
By way of a warning, I have to say that this is a long story -- the competition rules do not permit splitting it into multiple parts, so please forgive me and I hope you find it worth reading all the way to the end. I would add that there is a long build-up before any sex, so please be patient.
As this is a Contest entry, please take the trouble to cast your vote at the end. Feedback is also always very welcome.
My thanks to Winterreisser for his diligent editing, encouragement and support and to Kat in her role as "Romance and Hotness Consultant".
Thanks also to the Anonymous improver of my Spanish (who provided 'La Gata' in place of 'El Gato') and to Andie's inner editor for a very insightful suggestion that I have incorporated. I've also updated it to correct errors.
I hope you enjoy the story.
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CHAPTER 1 -- Mystery
Tuesday 14 February
I turn the card over, looking for any clues on the back, but there is nothing there. I bite my lip, wondering. For the third year in a row, a Valentine's Day card has found its way into my handbag somewhere between leaving home and arriving at work.
The first year had been a surprise, and I wondered if my partner, Roy, had unexpectedly and uncharacteristically decided to put some effort into our almost non-existent love. However, when he again came home late -- very late -- from work, with no flowers, chocolates or even a kind word, I decided that the card sender wasn't him. So, at thirty-two I had a secret admirer: how intriguing! At least, I hoped I had, and that it wasn't a mistake and the card had been intended for someone else. The handwritten inscription read:
'To the darkly golden girlie
With the gorgeous dove grey eyes.
I see you each day early
But you do not know my sighs.'
'The darkly golden girlie with the gorgeous dove grey eyes' seemed to fit me; my eyes were grey and my once golden blonde hair had darkened considerably since the birth of my twin girls, Tina and Chloe, eight years earlier. Someone fancied me; what a thrill!
Last year I wondered whether the same might happen again. Okay, I'll be candid: I
hoped
it would happen again. Things had started to really deteriorate between Roy and me, going from bad to worse, and while I had made some effort to maintain the relationship, it was getting to the point where I was beginning to feel it wasn't worth the effort and it was simply inertia keeping us living together; that and the iron chains of a shared mortgage. My parents had never particularly liked him, not since the day we moved in together. That my parents had provided the deposit on the house and stood as guarantors for the mortgage probably didn't help us form an equal partnership in that first year, particularly as my parents made sure Roy knew how much we were beholden to them.
Letting myself become pregnant and the birth of our twin girls (not that twins were what I planned!) should have brought us closer, or so I'd thought, but the opposite had been true. I know many new parents fight: the combination of tiredness, stress and having your world turned upside down by one, or in our case, two tiny people taxes any relationship, but for us, it seemed to be a constant bickering.
By the time the girls were in school, our lives had settled into routines, with Mum picking up the childcare at each end of the day. However, no matter how settled and safe the routines seemed, Roy and I gradually drifted further apart. Worse still, Roy had less and less to do with the girls: out too early and home too late to see them during the week, golf and football at the weekends... I was their only real parent, with the help of my parents.
So on Valentine's Day last year, I resisted checking my handbag until I was in the office, my heart hammering as I opened the bag. Yes! A shiny red envelope, one that had not been there when I left the house that morning, was tucked against one side where someone had slid it in. With trembling fingers I took it out and opened the flap, glancing around to be sure no one was watching me. The card was a typical bright red with a cute cartoon teddy holding a heart on the front. The handwritten inscription inside was... unexpectedly intense:
'I don't know
if you feel a spark,
but I feel FIREWORKS
whenever I see you!'
I was certain that the handwriting was the same as last year's: rounded letters, with only a few joined up, and the dot on the letter 'i' was a tiny heart. The effect was youthful and feminine, quite girlie actually, but it must be someone determined that the handwriting would give no clue as to their identity.
And now this year, as I shake my head partly in amazement and partly in frustration. I had been keeping an eye out this time, tracking every bloke that came close enough to try to put the card into my bag, but the sneaky bugger had still managed it. I suppose, given the crush on the train and the jostling on the platform, it wouldn't have been impossible, despite my vigilance. Naturally, I had deliberately carried my bag as normally as I could, not wanting to scare the guy off from attempting the card delivery. I felt I needed the reassurance that I was still attractive after Roy had finally walked out at the beginning of January, having just managed to stick it out through Christmas and New Year "for the girls' sakes," apparently. They did miss him, a bit; I certainly didn't, and after just six short weeks, even Tina and Chloe seemed to be reasonably happy with just their Mum, along with Granny and Granddad, as their family.
I look at the card once more. It is pink and red, unsurprisingly, with a Hello Kitty holding a heart on the front saying, 'Hey there Pretty Girl, Will you be my Valentine?' I open it and re-read the inscription inside for the twentieth time:
'My beautiful, curvaceous,
golden-haired Ishtar,
always so seductive
in the swaying railway car.
Each day you lift my spirit,
should you sit or stand;
Oh, I wish that I could win
your love, your heart, your hand.'
I'd had to Google 'Ishtar' who, it turns out, was the Mesopotamian goddess of sexual love, fertility and, curiously, warfare. My admirer was certainly ramping up the intensity and passion, and had also told me that he was a fellow rail commuter -- and one who saw me regularly... hmmm.
I always board the third carriage of the train on the basis that it is reasonably close to the front of the train, and hence the exit at the London Victoria terminus, but also gives the possibility of obtaining a seat two or three days out of five. I'm not the only creature of habit when it comes to the daily commute, and there are perhaps a dozen fellow travellers whom I have come to recognise over the years. We never speak, of course, save in the extremities of snow, gales, signal failures or industrial action that can trigger the traditional British
'Blitz Spirit'
of bonhomie and comradery in the face of adversity. This means, naturally, that I know no names and instead, these regular characters have acquired nicknames, at least in my head.
There is
Makeup Woman,
who spends the whole journey on the process;
Loud iPod Guy;
Mr Umbrella
with his ridiculously outsize golfing umbrella, rain or shine;
Body Odour Boy;
Loud Tie Man;
Aging Hippy
with his CND badges and kipper ties;
Dimple Girl;
