Pregnant Pause

  

PREGNANT PAUSE

 

 

Lindy wanted to speak to me. We lived together but she still phoned me at my office to warn me to come home early because she wanted to have a talk.  We chatted every night, so I didn’t understand why this advance warning was required.

 

She called me from the lounge when I stepped into the flat. I turned left and took the three steps from the front door.  James Phillips and The Lurchers’ Sunny Skies album was playing. Lindy doted on this record, and I loathed it. I thought James Phillips was highly overrated and made music for people who like over-produced, over-arranged music with no tunes, po’ faced, earnest lyrics and no visceral excitement. Allegedly, he was a South African musical legend but in my books he was highly overrated.

 

Lindy was curled up on the couch, wore a bathrobe, was barefoot and her hair was up.  She might’ve just taken a bath.  

 

Surprisingly, she was neither smoking nor had a glass of wine at hand.

 

“Please sit down, Neels,” she said. “We have to talk.”

 

So serious and so formal.

 

I sat down on an easy chair. I wondered whether I should pour a drink for myself, even if Lindy apparently was too serious to drink right now.

 

“When I moved in, I thought we were just friends,” Lindy said. “I never thought we’d have sex.”

 

Too late now.

 

 

 

XXX

 

Lindy moved in about a week after Corrine and her boyfriend, who’d practically lived in my flat too, moved out. it hadn’t been a happy parting. Corrine hadn’t paid her share of the rent for three of the four months she’d been my flatmate and, to boot, had invited her boyfriend to stay with her for most of the time, on and off, which meant that I was paying the rent and other expenses for two other people who weren’t contributing at all. 

 

Frans gave me advance warning of Lindy’s intentions.

 

“I’ve given Lindy notice to move out,” he said. “She’s going to phone you to ask whether she can move into your second bedroom now that Corrine’s gone.”

 

I didn’t know how Lindy got the news so quickly. She and Corrine were friends but perhaps Frans had told her. 

 

Frans had put up Lindy when she ran away from her then boyfriend, Werner, but their relationship had become strained and he no longer had the tolerance.

 

“She walks around naked all the time,” he complained.  “She’s just flaunting it and she’s not giving me anything. I don’t like her attitude.”

 

Sure enough, Lindy phoned me the following day.

 

“I know your second bedroom is available,” she said. “I can pay you two months’ rent in advance.  I cook very well.”

 

Lindy had been retrenched just before and was obviously surviving on her redundancy pay-out. 

 

“I’m looking for a job,” she said. “I’m sure I’ll have one before the next rent’s due. You don’t have to worry about my share of the rent.”

 

“I’ll think about it,“ I said, “and I’ll tell you tomorrow.”

 

I did think about it. I’d managed to survive without Corrine’s share of the rent, but it would be beneficial to have someone contributing again, even if for only two months. Corrine  also left me with a significant phone bill; it appeared that she like spending hours on the phone when I wasn’t home, especially long-distance phone calls to her boyfriend during the times when he wasn’t at the flat. That bill was an economic burden I would’ve liked to mitigate.

 

I had no idea how well Lindy cooked and I didn’t care. 

 

There was the small matter of not being terribly at ease with Lindy generally and that I thought of her as a flake, but I could live with that if she paid rent. Chances were she’d not stay long. Lindy was known for being fickle and impulsive. 

 

“Okay, you can move in,” I said when I phoned Lindy the following day, “but there’s one condition. We share the rent, we share the electricity account and you pay for phone calls. I’ll pay the line rental but I hardly ever make phone calls from home.  I almost forgot. There’s another thing. Please don’t smoke inside the flat.”

 

“Cool beans,” Lindy said. 

 

XXX

 

Lindy didn’t have much stuff to move, mostly just grooming items, clothes, books and some records. Frans, who was very relieved to get rid of his flatmate so quickly, helped Lindy with great eagerness. 

 

Lindy was equally fed up with Frans. 

 

“He’s just a creep,” she said. “Always ogling and commenting.  ‘Accidentally’ walking into the room when I’m dressing and naked.  Gets moody and sulky because I’m not into him. He’s not God’s gift, is he, but he thinks I must sleep with him because I should be grateful he’s allowing me to live in his lounge.  He’s a dark cloud, you know, without a silver lining.”

 

XXX

 

I used the smaller of the two bedrooms, closest to the bathroom and comfortably compact. One of the reasons Corrine’s boyfriend could basically stay with her so much, probably, was that she had the much larger room.

 

I had a single bed in there, a small desk and chair and a chest of drawers. There was a large built-in cupboard that took most of Lindy’s stuff, the make-up and other personal items found a place on the desk and the books and records were piled up on the floor, though she soon took to leaving the records in the lounge at my hi-fi. 

 

She put up some Frank Frazetta fantasy posters with silly putty against the bedroom wall. Semi-naked women toting big swords. Not exactly my fantasy but I can appreciate a nude woman as much as the next guy can.

 

Lindy’s taste in fiction was heavily biased towards sci-fi (she professed to believe in time travel) and her musical taste leant towards the esoteric and the progressive, nothing like mine which was eclectic but strong on loud-fast and not particularly ethereal or cerebral.

 

XXX

 

Frans brought Lindy, and other friends, to my flat two years before.  He was going to cook butternut soup for a dinner before we all headed out to a party in Lakeside. Frans also brought his 17-year-old girlfriend, Annette, and his mate Ben’s date was another young girl, who happened to be renting a room from Frans at the time, and it seemed that Frans intended Lindy to  be my date for the evening.

 

“Why aren’t there any women in your paintings?” was Lindy’s first words after she was introduced. “Don’t you like women?”

 

Some of my paintings were hung against the lounge walls but most of them were standing around on the floor.  Two or three of them did feature women, in distorted sense according to the principles of surrealism which I espoused then but, I suppose, most of the images were of men though I’d not ever used the male image deliberately more than the female, or so I thought.

 

I liked women fine, though, perhaps more so than men, but I wasn’t necessarily comfortable with women like Lindy. She was brassier and more outspoken than I cared for, especially in someone I’d just met.

 

Lindy was small, interestingly pale, red headed and buxom, with large green eyes, not exactly beautiful but attractive because of her exuberant manner and flirtatious, openly sexual, attitude.  She wore a short, loose dress with short sleeves and a high round collar, and was clearly braless. It was an intriguing mixture of modesty and open sexuality  that didn’t work for me but I could appreciate that some men would jump at the chance to make Lindy’s acquaintance.

 

We had our soup and went to the party but I hardly spent any time in Lindy’s company other than in the group, and if Frans had tried to be a matchmaker, he’d failed.

 

Lindy was part of a social circle I was loosely connected to through Frans and I saw her around occasionally but not enough to build an actual friendship.

 

XXX

 

“Want to come to a poetry evening at Lindy’s?” Frans asked me about a month after the initial introduction to her.

 

He was a poet, I was a poet, both aspiring to be published, and it seemed that Lindy saw herself as a potential patron of the arts. I think she also dabbled in fantasy poetry.

 

“Lindy wants to start a literary salon,” Frans explained, “with you, me, her, and this guy called Daniel she recently met. He works for the City Council but thinks of himself as a poet first and foremost.”

Didn’t we all?

 

Lindy had a couple of rooms on the top storey of a magnificent old Victorian double storey in Observatory, that she shared with two other young women. If Lindy were quirky, these women were deeply strange. They word long, loose fitting dresses in shades of brown and beige, and kind of floated through the house with furrowed brows and pursed lips. Frans referred to them as the weird sisters but they not biologically related. 

 

The larger of Lindy’s two rooms was her lounge, with bare, polished Oregon pine floorboards, a balcony and a view over the suburb towards Table Mountain, and the smaller room was her bedroom.  Lindy was in her bedroom when Frans and I arrived and I never saw the inside of it, but the lounge was furnished in best bohemian fashion with old, decrepit, overstuffed chairs and couches from which one would probably never be able to get up once you sat down, and decorated  with drapes, scarves, weird statuettes, sci-fi and fantasy posters and other accoutrements. The scent of joss sticks hung heavy in the air. Too heavy. I felt as if I could be poisoned by the fumes.

 

About five minutes behind us a young man came upstairs. 

 

Frans introduced me to Daniel, short and stocky, with a razor cut hairstyle and  the thickest eyebrows I’d ever seen on a human.  He was quite at home there and immediately knocked on the bedroom door. Lindy opened, squealed when she saw him, pulled him inside and that was the last we saw of either of them that night. 

 

After perhaps 10 minutes I was sure Lindy and Daniel weren’t going to leave the room in a hurry, that there would be no poetry reading or appreciation there that night and that I was ready to go elsewhere. I can be a patient person but sometimes the patience runs thin, and I was beginning to think that this invitation from Lindy had been intended just to mess us around.

 

We didn’t bother knocking on the bedroom door to announce that we were leaving.

 

This was the first time I realised that one couldn’t always rely on Lindy’s promise, undertakings or schemes.

 

XXX

 

A month later Lindy and Daniel were married in a civil ceremony at the Magistrate’s Court. According to Frans, who was a witness at the ceremony, along with Annette, the  bride and groom had known each other for two months.  

 

After three months of marriage, the happy couple divorced. Lindy was the prime mover in this legal action, which Daniel didn’t oppose, though he apparently still carried a torch for her for years afterwards. Frans, a legal graduate though not a practising attorney,  assisted Lindy by drafting the summons and guided her through the process. Actually, I told him what to do and he relayed the information to Lindy.

 

Lindy’s complaint about the marriage was odd, to say the least.

 

Daniel read to her while she was having a bath after he returned from work, fattened her up with his food, and also locked her in their apartment while he was at work because he was insanely jealous.  For some reason, these things didn’t appeal to Lindy.

 

XXX

 

Lindy met Werner on the rebound, moved in with him, had issues with him too and then ran away to live with a guy called Gary, also part of the social circle I referred to before, and who owned a small house in the Killarney suburb beyond Milnerton. He was an electrician at ADS in Atlantis and was short, overweight, had long, lanky, unwashed hair and a scraggly beard and an unfortunate dress sense. 

 

I had lunch with Kate, then Ben’s new flame, who worked in town as well and with whom I’d struck up a good rapport.  We’d bonded over our shared love for Tintin and the fact that Flight 714 was both our first introduction to the world of Hergé.

 

“Have you seen Gary, lately?” Kate asked.  “The man’s been transformed.”

 

“He got religion?”

 

“`You joke but it’s almost like that. He came round to see Ben the other night, trying to flog his old LSD again, you know, the tabs he’d buried in his mom’s garden? He’s still marketing that shit, but anyway, he’s not the Gary I knew.”

 

“How so?”

 

“The man’s lost weight, he’s had a haircut, his beard is neat and he wears new clothes that actually fit him. He’s surprisingly handsome, once he’s cleaned up. The best part for him is that he’s fully coherent and actually articulate. Gone off his meds, the anti-depressants, and he says he feels alive for the first time in years. The man can smile and joke.” 

 

“Sounds like a good woman’s work to me.:

”You know? Can you guess who it is?”

 

“I hear Lindy is his housemate.”

 

“More than a housemate, mate, full on lovers.  Gary is in love. I don’t think it can last, not with someone like Lindy, but for the moment it’s doing Gary a power of good.’

 

“The comedown is going to be terrible when she moves on.”

 

Kate nodded.  She knew many Lindy stories.  Frans and Ben were mates too, and Frans was a fount of information on all and sundry in the social circle, and Lindy was someone who always had some drama that was too deliciously juicy not to share. 

 

 

 

 

 

XXX

 

 As always, Frans kept me up to date with Lindy’s marital status.

 

“Lindy and Gary got divorced last week,” he said, “ and now she’s sleeping on a spare bed in my lounge. She couldn’t take living with Gary anymore.”

 

That was rich, coming from Lindy, but she was probably not wrong.  I was curious to find out what the stated reason for the irretrievable break-up of the marriage would have been.

 

I took the liberty of searching the previous week’s High Court rolls for the Third Division, the motion court in which uncontested divorces were heard, of the case number of the matter. Once I found that, I went to Room 1 at the Court, where the files were kept and asked one of the assistant-registrars to draw the file for me.

 

Gary had been the plaintiff and in the particulars of claim he stated that he’d married Lindy under false pretences, because she’d pressurised him, falsely claiming that she was pregnant. Why this would compel him to marry her, he didn’t explain, but I guess Lindy must’ve exerted pressure on him. Anyhow, the relationship had probably not been sound and based om mutual love and affection in the first place. 

 

Lindy’s version of events failed to mention any putative pregnancy and she glossed over the full extent of the issues. She also never explained why she agreed to marry Gary and I never asked because I didn’t really care to know the details.  It wasn’t a subject we ever discussed in minute detail.

 

According to Lindy, Gary was erratic in taking his medication, sometimes not taking it at all and then taking too much to make up for the shortfall, and this meant that his moods were erratic too and when he took too much, he was like a zombie.  Ultimately, it was too much for her to endure but she stayed on and, she claimed, hadn’t even known Gary was doing anything about it until she received the divorce summons, and demanded that she move out immediately, hence her seeking refuge with Frans, as a stopgap, which then also became a trial.

XXX

 

Frans and I had extended drinks after work and returned to his flat quite late so he could change clothes before we went out again to some club. Literally, within a minute after we were inside the flat, Lindy came home from wherever she’d been.

 

She was a bit drunk, considerable thinner than the last time I saw her and her hair was also much longer and hung loose. She wore one of her customary short, short sleeved dresses that revealed a lot of thigh but fully covered the rest of her body.

 

Frans went to his bedroom. I sat down on an easy chair next to a bed, presumably the bed on which Lindy slept, on which she flopped down on her back, at full stretch, her now bare feet closest to me. The seat of the rather decrepit chair was quite low and this meant that , from where I was siting, that Lindy’s crotch was just about eye level for me.  She shifted on the bed, stretching out and opening her legs a bit, so that the short dress rode up on her thighs. I couldn’t help but look straight down her crotch. Lindy wore no panties.  I’d heard that she never wore underwear, and though the lack of bra was often unavoidably apparent, I could obviously not tell the presence, or lack of,  panties.

 

There was just enough light to illustrate the lack of underwear and  yet it was just too dim for a clear view, other than a vision of wispy hair and a certain central plumpness around a partially open slit. 

 

I had no doubt that Lindy was treating me to a lovely little show.

 

Lindy was so close to me, all I had to do to touch her inner thigh was to lean slightly forward and reach out. I was almost about to do it, when Frans returned to the lounge.  Lindy abruptly sat upright, as if Frans had almost caught us in a compromising position, which was not far from the case. She caught my eye. I just looked at her without expression. Frans made loud noises about leaving immediately. I think he sensed that he’d interrupted something of significance.

 

We left Lindy sitting on the bed. I didn’t say anything to Frans about what he’d interrupted.

 

XXX

 

“Don’t get me wrong, Neels,” Lindy said, “I like you. You’re a nice guy, a good friend to have, but you’re not really my type. I can’t lie. I’m not in love with you.”

 

That’s okay. I’m not in love with you either. Where’s this going? Is she trying to tell me she’s moving out asap?

 

“Noted,” I said. “I won’t hold it against you.”

 

“We shouldn’t have had sex, Neels, it complicates things. All I wanted is just a flatmate at a time when I was down and needed  a friend, Neels. Frans just made it so unpleasant to live with him.”

 

Sometimes, no, at all times, I wish people would get to the point quicker. Just get it over, say it, get it done, move on. Give me the headline and then fill in the detail. Don’t first try to come at me the long way around.

 

Lindy must’ve seen or sensed my impatience with this, uh, foreplay.

 

“I’m pregnant, Neels,” she said. “I’ve missed two periods. I never miss periods. I’m as regular as a drum box.  I’m pregnant, that’s the only explanation.”

 

“Because you missed two periods? You haven’t done a pregnancy test?”

 

“I told you. I never miss my periods and I’m very regular. I’ve missed two. I’m pregnant. A woman knows, Neels, we know.”

 

I stared at Lindy. She looked me in the eye, then looked down and fidgeted with the belt on her robe. She looked at the ceiling, then at me again, then down again. She flushed.

“Well?” she said. “Aren’t you going to say anything?”

 

“Okay, you say you’re pregnant. I’ll believe you. You know your own body.  Why this big to-do about telling me, then?”

 

Lindy’s eyes went big with shock and she shivered a little. She sat up very straight, swung her legs down onto the floor and straightened her back again and gave me a steely look. Her lips  were pressed together.

 

“I would never have believed you’d act like this, Neels,” she said grimly. “I never took you for a bastard but I guess I was wrong. All men are bastards. Always shirking responsibilities one they’ve had their fun and must face up.”

 

I gave Lindy a look the mirrored her own. She lowered her eyes again, but lifted them to look at me.

 

“I’m pregnant, Neels,” she said. “Pregnant. Do you know what thar means? For me, for you, Neels, for us?”

 

It means that you’re going to have a child, not so?

 

“It means you’ve fucked someone else?”

 

Now Lindy was properly shocked. 

 

“I can’t believe you’ve said that! What kind of person do you think I am? I can’t believe you said such a mean thing to me. Are you calling me a slut, Neels, is that your way of hurting me and denying your responsibility? Shame on you, shame!”

 

By this time Lindy had jumped up and was leaning over me, eyes shooting daggers, hands balled into fists, rocking on the balls of her feet as if she were about to assault me.  I sat as far back in my chair as I could because I really didn’t want to be hit by Lindy.

 

“Okay, then explain this to me: how are you pregnant if you haven’t fucked someone else?”

 

XXX

 

“What can I cook for you?” Lindy asked, when I got home. Frans had helped her move in during the afternoon, because his civil service job had different hours to mine, and I gave him a key for access.

 

Lindy was settled in, her room as organised as it would ever be, playing one of her records on my turntable, reclining on the couch and  sipping red wine from one of my wine glasses. The bottle was on the coffee table. She  brought it. I hardly ever drank wine.

 

“You must get better wine glasses, Neels. These are ugly. Cheap-looking and ugly. ”

 

“I don’t drink wine. Scotch is my thing.”

 

“I didn’t see any scotch anywhere. You have no liquor on the premises at all. What kind of smooth bachelor is that?”

 

“I don’t drink much, not at home on my own, anyway. Hardly have guests over who drink either.”

 

“What a waste. What can I cook for you, Neels? We’ll have to get groceries. You’ve got nothing in the kitchen.  No drink, no  food. How do you live, Neels?”

 

“I cook and eat what I buy when I buy it. I can’t remember when last I bought a week’s groceries, never mind a month’s groceries.”

 

“What a way to live. Unorganised. Well, what do you want? We’ll have to go the shop soon if you want to eat at a decent time.”

 

“Tell you what. In honour of you moving in, I’ll give you a break on the cooking for tonight. I’ll buy you a pizza, how’s that?”

 

We ate at the St Elmo’s outlet on Kloof Street where I drank a couple of beers and Lindy had more red wine. She was nicely sloshed when we got back home. It was only about nine.

 

“I’m going to brush my teeth, pee and go to bed,” Lindy said. “I’m drunk and tired from the move. Don’t come knocking at my bedroom door in the middle of the night.”

 

xxx

 

Over the next week, we established a routine. Lindy was job hunting and I got up earlier than she did and was gone before  she was up and about. This avoided congestion in the bathroom in the morning. 

 

On the nights when Lindy was going to cook, she phoned me during the afternoon to discuss dinner and told me what I needed to get on the way home, so she could start cooking as soon as I was there. 

 

That turned out to be only two nights in that first week of her residence. On the other days, she was out when I got home and returned much later.  Once again, our comings and goings didn’t coincide. I also returned home late  and either she was already in her room then, or came in when I was already in bed in mine.

 

Neither of us knocked on the other’s bedroom door in the middle of the night.

 

XXX

 

“I need a place to stay. You’ve just moved into a two-bedroom flat and I suppose you can use the extra money, so it makes sense that I become your flatmate, doesn’t it?”

 

Corrine knew that I left a relatively cheap rented house in Wynberg. under unfortunate circumstances, after a failed joint rental with Frans, for a much more expensive flat in Tamboerskloof. Corrine was moving out of the joint marital home she’d shared with her husband of maybe four months because the marriage wasn’t working for them.

 

I had a bit of a thing for Corrine, that I’d pushed aside because I met her when she was already involved with the guy she was going to marry, and when I heard that she was leaving him, I went onto high alert.  This could be a chance for me to win her heart. Not to mention mitigate my increased rental by fifty percent.

 

Corrine moved in.  I helped her get divorced.  All seemed to be happiness though I was initially discreet about declaring my intentions to allow her time to get over the failed marriage. Then, to my horror, the ex-husband popped up within less than a week after the final order of divorce was granted, reclaimed Kate and resumed the relationship. It seemed they had to destroy the marriage to save the relationship. He was more comfortable with having her as his girlfriend than as his wife.

 

Corrine had resigned from her previous job and never, while she lived in my flat, had  a popper, permanent job again and only did temp work, which meant, in her mind, that she was no longer obliged to pay her share of the rent and other expenses.

 

“How can you expect me to contribute to the rent when I’m unemployed?” Corrine asked as if I were the dumbest and most unreasonable person in the world.

 

Worse still, the boyfriend not only came around to visit often but soon seemed to live at the flat too. 

 

“I’m your flatmate, Neels,” Corrine snapped at me when I complained. ”I’m entitled to have my boyfriend over. You can’t dictate who I may or may not have here?”

 

The point was that neither of them were contributing to the expenses, yet both had the benefit of living in my flat.

 

It was an unhappy household to say the least. I ignored them as far as I could, and they avoided me.  After four months, I had a brief, fierce confrontation with Corrine and  we reached a mutual agreement that she and her boyfriend would leave at the end of the month. They may have been planning something like that anyway.

 

Frans knew of this situation and that it is how Lindy came to know of it.

 

XXX

 

The owner of the flat had renovated the kitchen but not the bathroom, probably too expensive, and it was comforting to have this  link with the period in the which the place was built, because probably had been changed since, yet at the same time the somewhat faded  quality of the fittings  was a tad depressing.

 

The cast iron, enamelled tub fitted snugly into one side of the room, with the original iron hot water cylinder overhanging the bath at the far end, above the taps, and there was a shower head over the bath too which I never used. I didn’t even know whether it worked. There was nothing to hang a shower curtain on, anyway.

 

The toilet was underneath the small window with frosted glass panes that opened onto the garden at the side of the block of flats, and the cast iron basin with a small, mirrored cabinet above it, was against the wall next to the toilet. The floor was patterned linoleum in dire need of replacement.

 

The walls were half tiled and by now what had once been simple white tiles, were  a ghostly type of off-white with minute hair cracks that could’ve been part of the design but were probably due to old age. 

 

I lay back in the tub, back against the cold iron, head just touching the tiled wall behind me, feet up against the other side of the tube, which was far too short for me, soaking in the lovely warm water.  It was well past midnight and I’d come in late after going to a rock gig in Observatory.

 

The flat was on the ground floor and I felt I could pretty much to in there what I wanted at any time of day or night because there was no downstairs neighbour to bother and  I didn’t share any abutting walls with the next-door neighbour on the same floor. I didn’t worry about the old woman upstairs. I doubted that she could hear anything going on downstairs.

 

I think I dozed off  in the comfortable warmth. The next thing I knew was Lindy rushing into the bathroom, pulling up her short dress, turning around and plonking herself down on the toilet and letting go of what sounded like a torrent of pee.

 

The bathroom door had been closed, but not locked, though I’d seen that Lindy wasn’t home and I did it just as a lazy precaution.

 

So, there we were. I was stretched out full length in the bath and Lindy was sitting on the toilet with her dress just about at waist level.  Her legs were slightly apart, and  opened wider when she wiped herself. I’d had the presence of mind to cover my genitals with my face cloth.

 

We looked at each other. Lindy was bleary eyed and obviously drunk.

 

“Look at you,” she said. “So modest to cover yourself. I’ve seen a dick before, you know. Ugly little appendages, nothing to be  disturbed about.  You have a penis. I have a vagina.  Body parts. Men and women all have them.”

 

She made it seem so banal.  I suppose it was banal. Frans was fond of quoting Henry Miller who said something like, the wonderful thing about all the women you see around you, is that every one of them has a cunt. It was a crude yet true statement and took romanticism right out of the equation.

 

“Show me yours and I’ll show you mine,” Lindy said. She chuckled and stood up, letting the dress drop down. Its hem was still about halfway between knee en crotch. “Did you ever play that game with the little girls in your neighbourhood?”

 

Lindy stood over me, bent down and felt the water.

 

“Move over,” she said. “I want to get in. I’m sweaty.”

 

She lifted her dress over her head, tossed in onto the floor and stepped into the tub. I’d scooted back, lifting my knees to my chest to make place for Lindy, who indeed wore no underclothes.

 

At this point Lindy was in one of her buxom periods. She fluctuated from being overweight to quite thin, and the various stages in-between, depending, I supposed, on her emotional state. Her good-sized, globular breasts had a small, pink nipples and she had  a small patch of pale red pubic hair  that suggested she took pains to keep it short.

 

Lindy sat down heavily in the water, reached for the face cloth that still covered my groin, applied soap to it and started washing herself. She straightened her legs as much as she comfortably could and grinned at me.

 

“Don’t worry, Neels,” she said. “Your modesty is safe with me. I won’t try playing with your little knob. We’re just two housemates having a bath together, no funny stuff.”

 

I admired her breasts. They were larger than appealed to me but they were full and quite splendid. I was reminded of the term “motorboating,” something I’d read about but hadn’t done or seen being done, and seemed that Lindy’s breasts would be ideal. Inevitably, an erection occurred. I tried closing my legs to hide the protuberance. 

 

Lindy laughed and pointed.

 

“Nice one,” she said, “Nice one. Are you happy to bath with me or is that a periscope?”

 

She didn’t try reaching for my cock, and I was at the same relieved and disappointed.

 

Lindy had finished her ablutions and got up out of the bath. As she turned away from me, I could admire her soft, white, round ass. The periscope wouldn’t retract.

 

“That was fun,” Lindy said. “We must do it again sometime. Bedtime for me now, very tired.”

 

She briskly dried herself, brushed her teeth and left the bathroom. I stayed in the bath for a few more minutes before  I got out.

 

Lindy’s bedroom door was closed.  I went to mine.

 

xxx

 

By the third week of her residency, Lindy’s late nights abruptly ceased. I didn’t ask and she didn’t tell, but my guess was that she’d been seeing someone and that it was over.  I still had no idea how she got through her days, other than, hopefully, job hunting, but now she was home when I got back around six o’ clock and she was in the kitchen preparing supper.

 

Lindy asked me for “housekeeping” money for groceries and cleaning products, which I gladly provided, as she undertook to clean the house and to cook and promised to contribute her share when she was gainfully employed. She hoped that this would be soon because she had a few good prospects, as receptionist or typist, and  was sure that her number would come up on one or more of them before the month end. according to her, she was in the extremely fortunate position that she could start immediately without having to work out a notice period, and many prospective employers liked that.

 

On the first two evenings that we ate supper together, I had prior engagements and left the flat as soon after the meal as I could. Lindy seemed disappointed that I wouldn’t stick around but that was her problem, I thought. We’d lived independent lives for so long that I didn’t think I would need to adapt mine to incorporate her.

 

On the third night I suggested that we go to a movie. We ate early because she started cooking so early and were usually done not long after seven o’clock.

 

This was our first night out together and it was mild fun. We saw an actually funny comedy, Lindy had popcorn and a Coke and afterwards she suggested we go to a   bar she knew for a night cap before returning home.

 

“I’m always on such a high when I go out, it’s a real downer to go home when I’m still buzzing,” Lindy said. “A drink just settles me down nicely and it’s nice to get back home a little tipsy and mellow.”

 

We got a small, round table in a semi-circular booth at the rear of the place, with a leather bench. The bar was furnished and decorated with dark wood, lots of leather, brass fittings and a general sense of a 19^th century gentleman’s club, or as how I would imagine it. It didn’t look cheap, and the drinks certainly weren’t.

 

I’d never been to this place. Lindy, it seemed, was a regular.  The barman hailed her when we walked inside.  She blew him an air kiss.

 

“I love this bar,” Lindy said. “I always feel as if I’m in a different world and a different time when I’m here.”

 

Lindy did believe in time travel, didn’t she?

“Feels quite comfortable and comforting,” I agreed.  “Looks, feels and smells like old money.  Luxury, splendid, luxury.”  

 

Lindy drank vodka and passion fruit. I drank scotch. We chatted about the movie, similar movies we’d seen and how we’d like to see more comedies made for adults with brains and good taste.

 

I got us a second round. It was a school night, but what the hell, the combination of the impressive surroundings, the general good feeling after the movie, the alcohol and Lindy’s enthusiastic chatter persuaded me to relax into the  moment. Tomorrow morning could deal with itself. 

 

Lindy adjusted herself on the bench and moved closer to me, thigh touching thigh. She was wearing  another of her short dresses. It occurred to me that I’d never seen her wearing anything else but dresses.  She had nice legs, so that might be it, or perhaps she just wanted to look sexy and feminine in an old-school way. Her thigh was warm. I could feel it even through the fabric of my jeans.

 

Lindy leant her head against my shoulder.

 

“It’s lovely to have this sense of peace,” she sighed. “You’re such a peaceful presence. No edge, no anxiety, no tension. Frans is one huge tower of turmoil and tension, angry tension. He never relaxes and it’s so tiring just to spend five minutes with him. I love it that you’re so much at ease, Neels.”

 

Scotch calms my fragile mind, baby.

 

“Frans is a difficult guy, absolutely,” I said. “I think anger is the only emotion he has or allows. I can deal with him but I can’t  get too deep with him and two or three hours at the time, max, is all I can deal with.”

 

“I think he wanted to fuck me, but I’d never sleep with him. He’s kind of gross, too, creepy. I think he’s into weird sex”

 

I’d never discussed Frans’ sexuality with him. He claimed to be fully heterosexual but I wasn’t sure that he wouldn’t kiss a boy if push came to shove, and I also wouldn’t be surprised if he were into kinky stuff, whether with women or men.  

 

“Aren’t we all,” I said. “Everyone has a yen for kinky.”

 

Lindy sat upright and gave me a quizzical look.

 

“Do tell,” she said. 

 

“Naah, I’m just talking big,” I said. “I’ve got no kinks, and if I do have and tell you about them, I’d have to kill you. But I’ll first bind you with sashes and torture you mentally.”

 

Lindy laughed and shook her head, and punched me lightly on the upper arm.

 

“I bet you are kinky,” she said. ”The quiet guys are the ones to watch out for. I have my little fantasies, you know, those things one does only in private, if you’re with someone  you trust. Someday I’ll show you mine and you can show me yours.”

XXX

 

We left the bar three drinks each to the good and would’ve probably had more if I wasn’t so concerned about driving drunk. For all I knew, I was already over the legal limit but three seemed a good number to call a day at.

 

“I’m going to have a bath,” Lindy said. “You can join me if you want to. It worked well the last time.”

 

I declined the invitation, she shrugged her shoulders, went to her room to undress before toddling off to the bathroom. I sat in the lounge for a bit, while she was doing her ablutions, mostly to get my mind together again. I was tipsy more than drunk and my head was fuzzier because of that than it usually was when I as drunk, when I was always more careful to behave appropriately and therefore felt more alert.

 

The chair I chose by lucky coincidence gave me a view down the passage towards the bathroom. Lindy emerged naked from her room and almost sashayed to the bathroom. I didn’t know whether she knew I could see exactly what she was doing but she couldn’t have been more deliberate if she tried.

 

Lindy left the bathroom door open. I resisted the temptation to offer to wash her back. She happily splashed and hummed until she was done. When she left the bathroom to go to her room, I was treated to some frontal nudity, nothing I hadn’t seen before but a bit more enticing because she was once again sashaying. This time she saw me watching her but said nothing.

 

It was my turn to bath. She’d left the hot water in the tub. This was a strangely intimate yet off kilter gesture. I’d’ve expected her to drain the bath so I could have clean water. Not that the water was filthy, mostly just soapy, nonetheless.

 

I undressed in my room and took my sleeping boxers with me to the bathroom. It was too late for a long soak, so I washed myself as quickly as possible and  pulled on the boxer shorts when I was dry, before I brushed my teeth. I was mildly disappointed that Lindy hadn’t come in there to pee.

Tonight, Lindy’s bedroom door was still open when I went to mine but I ignored it and got into bed, switched off the light and runed over onto my left side, facing away from the door,  in prime sleeping position.

 

Less than a minute later, Lindy slid into bed behind me. She was naked. I wouldn’t have thought otherwise. She wrapped her one arm around my shoulder, pressed her soft breasts against my back and pressed her middle into my lower back.

 

“Tonight’s not the night for sleeping alone, Neels,” Lindy whispered, “but that’s all we’re going to do, okay?  We’ll spoon and we’ll sleep. Happy dreams.”

 

I hoped she would accidentally run her hand across my groin, where my cock was stirring, but she didn’t. instead, she wriggled a bit, obviously to find a comfortable position, kiss me neck softly, relaxed and audibly fell asleep.

 

Nice for her. I was awake for a long time, luxuriating in the feel of her body against mine and listening to her breathing.   She smelt of cigarette smoke and liquor.  I couldn’t decide whether it was vaguely appealing or vaguely unpleasant.

 

XXX

 

When I woke up, Lindy was sleeping on her right-hand side,  almost at the opposite edge of the bed.

 

I got up, performed my ablutions and dressed for work while Lindy slept, and I left the flat when I was done. She still hadn’t stirred.

 

Later that morning Lindy phoned me at my office.

 

“Let’s meet for lunch,” she said. “I’m in town and I’ll be done by one o’ clock. The Wimpy in St George’s Mall? We can sit outside.”

 

Lindy was already at a table when I arrived. She wore a formal looking pale blue blouse that was just tight enough to suggest that she had good breasts but in a discreet fashion, a navy-blue knee length skirt, stockings and pumps. Her hair was up in a bun. I’d never seen her in this kind of outfit before. Super secretary deluxe.

 

“Is this your kinky look?” I said. “Ready to take some dic … tation. Bending over at the filing cabinet in a tight skirt. At your service, sir.”

 

Lindy laughed.  She loosened her hair and shook her head to allow it to fall naturally around her head.

 

“I went to an interview,” she said, “and I think I got the job. Receptionist at Telkom. The guy who interviewed me was very impressed by my CV and my boobs. I unbuttoned the top button of the blouse especially.  Men are easy.  Anyhow, they want me to start next Monday. The salary isn’t bad.”

 

This would mean she could start paying rental again from the end of the following month. This news cheered me up no end.

 

“Good for you,” I said. “Back to the nine to five grind, eh?”

 

“Half past eight to half past four,” she said. “Forty-five minutes for lunch.”

 

“It’s probably the kind of place where you have to clock in strictly on time but then you can leave strictly on time too.”

 

“I’m counting on it.”

 

We had cheeseburgers, fries and milkshakes.  There was idle chit chat, no mention of the previous night, and a brief discussion of what Lindy intended cooking for supper. After our lunch she was going to wander around the CBD for a bit before heading home.  The last days of her life of leisure. Soon, both of us would be working for a living.

 

 

 

XXX

 

After supper Lindy stepped out onto the balcony for a smoke. 

 

The balcony looked out over a small bit of garden, mostly lawn bordered by flower beds and a couple of small trees on the far corners.  It was neat, tidy and, I suppose, quite attractive in a miniature way. The only person who ever used the garden was the old woman upstairs who liked sunning herself on the lawn on warm days.  

 

I joined Lindy but stood a little apart from her to avoid the direct contact with her cigarette smoke. Most of the people in my circle of friends smoked, so it didn’t particularly bother me that Lindy did as long as there wasn’t a direct impact. 

 

We didn’t speak at first.  We looked at the garden and Lindy puffed away. She smoked the cigarette down to the filter, killed it on the balcony railing and put the stub in some kind of tin thing she held in her hand.

 

“So,” she said, “so, where are we going with this thing?”

 

“This thing?”

 

“Don’t be obtuse, Neels, you know what thing I’m talking about.”

 

“Not the character from The Fantastic Four?” 

 

Lindy failed to be amused this time. 

 

“No use, is it?” she said. “No use with you. This morning you left without saying goodbye to me. That’s not very nice.”

 

“Eh? You were asleep. I didn’t want to disturb you.”

 

“You could’ve woken me for a quick goodbye. I could’ve slept again, you know. We shared a bed. Does that mean nothing to you?”

 

“Last hight you expressly told me there would be no hanky panky. I respected that.”

 

Lindy slapped her forehead. She glared at me, turned around and walked back into the lounge.

 

“I think I’m going out, Neels, I was going to stay in with you but now I think I want to go out with someone who has some life in him.”

 

XXX

 

Lindy came home very late and made just enough noise to wake me up but not enough to be seriously disturbing and I drifted off back to sleep quickly enough.

 

Linday slept in her own bed.

 

XXX

 

This pattern was repeated over the next few days, except for the difference that Lindy  stopped cooking and wasn’t home when I returned. I did my thing and went out sometimes and stayed home on other nights.  Supper was more basic than Lindy had cooked, as it’s always been with me when I cook, yet I didn’t starve.

 

On Friday night I went clubbing for a change and stumbled  into the flat at about five o’clock, a bit drunk but mostly just tired. I sat in the lounge in the dark for a while, not yet ready to go to bed, and I pondered whether I had the will power to take a bath before turning in.

 

Lindy came in about ten minutes after me and also came into the lounge and flopped face down on the couch. She was crying.

 

“Hey,” I said, “what’s the matter?”

 

Lindy almost jumped to her feet from a supine position without making a sound, except for breathing heavily, apparently trying to stop the tears. She stood swaying unsteadily for a moment and then sat down again. The sobs returned as she did so. She leant her back against the back of the couch, palms flat on her things, and I couldn’t help but notice, even in the dark to which I’d become accustomed by then, that her thighs were mostly bare and that she was barefoot.

 

Lindy kept crying. I wondered whether I should go over to hold and comfort her, and say soothing words, or whether it was better to allow her to get her crying done before we delved into the whys and wherefores of her situation.

 

It seemed the decent thing to do, to go to her. When I sat down next to Lindy, she immediately turned to me, hugged me fiercely and buried her head in my neck, which was soon quite wet. She sobbed louder than ever. I held her and rubbed her back, caressed her hair and mumbled non-specifics to make her feel better.

 

It took a while but eventually Lindy stopped crying, sniffed, released her grip on me and sat back. I moved a little away from her too. 

 

“Don’t switch on the light, Neels,” Lindy said. “I look terrible, Make-up smeared, red eyes, just too awful. It’s better if we talk in the dark. It makes me feel more comfortable.” 

 

“Sure. What happened?”

 

“The very short version, Neels, is that men are bastards and have no manners and treat women like shit.”

 

“The long version?”

 

“My friend and I went to Escapade for drinks and afterwards we went to Volcano to dance. This guy hit on us at Escapade but we didn’t talk to him much. He bought us drinks we didn’t ask for and we thought it wouldn’t be polite to refuse, so we thanked him, drank them and left.  That was it, Neels, we were nice to him but never led him on or anything. We weren’t interested. Anyway, so at Volcano we’re having a good time, and the next thing I know this guy is there as well. His name is Garth. He told us before, at Escapade when he was trying to hit on us. So, we get to chatting again, what else can you do, and he buys us more drinks and I must admit, Neels, by this time we were too drunk to be smart about it and let him buy the drinks. My friend went off, met some other people, and left me alone with Garth who must’ve thought he was in for the win. He started touching me, at first only that thing where you touch someone’s arm to get their attention, then he was trying to kiss me and leaning in to touch my boobs, ran his hand up my thigh. I told him to stop, Neels, and he wouldn’t. I told him again to stop, and I was very firm, and now he was really trying harder to basically violate me, in the middle of a club. I shouted at him to stop, got up and walked away. I walked away, Neels, I walked away to show him I wasn’t interested in him. He followed me, tried to pull me back. People saw this, the whole club saw it, but nobody did anything. I  ran downstairs into the street and he followed me and I realised it was a mistake to be outside with him and I ran  back up to the club. All this time he’s following me and he’s saying terrible things about me, like I’m a slut, a whore, a piece of shit, things like that. He must’ve been on drugs or something. At one point he pushed me from behind and I fell, and I almost thought he was going to kick me. Nobody did anything to stop him or to help me, Neels, no-one.  Not for a long time. Then some bouncer arrived and told him to leave me alone and made him leave the club. I looked for my friend but she was gone. Probably picked up some guy and went home with him. I was too scared to go outside in case Garth was still hanging around out there. When I saw a couple of people who looked as if they were leaving, I begged them to give me a lift home.  I had to ask a few people before someone was kind to me and dropped me here.”

 

Lindy took a deep breath, shuddered, slumped and cried softly again.

 

“I’m not a slut, Neels, I’m not. I like people and I’m friendly with people and I talk easily to strangers but I don’t sleep around, Neels. People think because I like going out and partying that I’m an easy girl who sleeps with anyone. I can’t say it hasn’t happened that I’m drunk and have sex with someone I shouldn’t have, but I don’t sleep around like a slut. Do you think I’m a slut, Neels?”

 

I hardly know you, Lindy, and, frankly, I don’t really care with how many men you’ve slept. That’s your life, baby.

 

“I don’t think you’re a slut.  Fuck what other people think. You know you, that’s all that matters. Anyway, you’re okay here, nothing happened. It’s okay now. ”

 

Lindy had stopped sniffling.  She stood up and stretched and yawned.

 

“I’m tired now, Neels, so sleepy,” she said. “Shall we go to bed?”

 

We took turns to brush our teeth and wash our faces at the basin the bathroom and, without discussing it, both went to my bedroom, undressed on either side of the bed and got into it. Lindy was naked and it seemed unwarranted to put on my sleep shorts.

 

“Hold me, Neels, just hold me,” Lindy whispered sleepily as she turned to me. “Hold me until I fall asleep.”

 

I held her. Her body was warm, her breasts were soft against me and  she smelt of cigarettes and alcohol. She just lay there, made no move, didn’t kiss me in my neck again and didn’t run her hands over my back. She’d hardly settled in before she fell asleep.  We lay entwined like that for a long time. Although it wasn’t very comfortable for me, I didn’t want to let go.  There was a definite stirring in my loins but it was more of a comforting horniness than a desperate lust and my cock just gently pressed against Lindy’s belly. She was oblivious.

 

I let go of Lindy when my left arm was starting to fall asleep, turned over on my side and lay quietly until I too fell asleeop. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

XXX

 

 

“Weren’t you on the pill? I though all women are on the pill.”

 

“I was but I ran out and just couldn’t get it together to get more. I’m sorry, it just sort of slipped my mind all the time.”

 

“You were happy to run the risk?”

 

“It slipped my mind, I’m sorry, so sue me. Not everyone gets pregnant just because they’re not on birth control, you know.”

 

“Enough people do. Always when they don’t want to.” 

 

“I don’t know how many times you want me to say I’m sorry. Saying sorry doesn’t change the situation. I’m pregnant and that’s that, and you can forget about it being somebody else, Neels. I’ve not had sex with anyone else since I started sleeping with you.”

XXX

 

That following weekend was funny. 

 

Lindy and I had various reasons to be in and out of the flat going our separate ways. We saw each other on the odd occasions we were home at the same time, and exchanged a few words, but the interactions were brief and non-committal. Both of us avoided talking about what had happened that Friday night, to Lindy and our conversation afterwards.

 

On Saturday evening we went out separately and came home at  different times and slept in our own beds. Presumably nothing unpleasant happened to Lindy again.

 

On Sunday both of us slept late. I was up first, pulled  on a T-shirt and went to sit in the lounge with my wake up coffee. Not long after, Lindy emerged from her room, went to the bathroom and the kitchen, and then also came to the lounge with her coffee. 

 

She wore a loose satin robe that wasn’t quite tied at the front and it flapped open as she walked, though she quickly pulled it to her body again. Evidently, she was naked  underneath.  Lindy curled up on the couch, took a sip of coffee, lit a cigarette and stared at me. 

 

I stared at Lindy.  It was titillating to know, despite the covering of the robe, that she was quite naked.  I shouldn’t have thought that. My cock slowly, uh, inflated. I shifted on my chair and crossed my legs.

 

“I’ve been thinking, Neels,” Lindy said. “We can’t live together like this and not have sex. Sooner or later, it’s going to happen. Maybe when we’re both drunk, I don’t know, Neels, but I know it’s going to happen. Why don’t we do it now, and get it over with?”

 

Lindy took a long gulp of her coffee, a deep drag of her cigarette, put the mug and cigarette down and stood up. She shrugged off the robe and tossed it to the side and stood there, with her right hip cocked, arms akimbo and smiling.

 

My cock jumped to attention, my throat went dry and felt the rush of nervous excitement. I was tense more than I was aroused. No women had ever issued such a direction invitation.

 

“No strings,” Lindy said, “no obligations, Neels, it’s not try before you buy. I’m not in love with you. I’m just horny. I want to have sex and just lie in bed with someone nice for a bit and be relaxed and comfy. Just be nice to me.”

 

Lindy took a couple of steps towards me and offered me her hand. I took it and stood up. She turned to the lounge door, pulled me behind her and within a few steps we were at my bedroom.

 

She got into bed first while I undressed. Now I was fully aroused and not so tense, and my cock was pulsing. I thought I’d cum as soon as I embraced Lindy or kissed her.

 

“Be nice to me, Neels,” Lindy said. “Be gentle and nice, and afterwards I want you to hold me for a long time. I don’t mean be gentle when you fuck me because I want you to fuck me hard, but I want you to be gentle and nice all the same. I want to cuddle afterwards, Neels, cuddle properly.  Don’t get up and walk away once you’ve fucked me. I can get someone else to do that. today I want to be held.”

 

XXX

 

And so Lindy and I became lovers.

 

The relationship was no more significant than that. I never thought of her as my girlfriend and I doubt that the she thought  of me as her boyfriend. We lived together but never shared a bedroom in the official sense and by and large we did our own thing. There was never a deep infatuation of the type that compels the couple to spend as much time in each other’s company as possible.  We went out separately as often as we went out together and we had sex when our paths crossed at home, or we’d been out together, and sometimes Lindy slept in my bed, sometimes she went back to her own.  As far as I knew,  she had no other guys but I didn’t really worry about it and I didn’t really care if she had sex with other men, as long as  she kept it to herself and still fucked me.

 

 I had no girlfriend. The modus vivendi with Lindy suited me fine.  

 

XXX

 

“I don’t want to be that guy but I will be that guy? Are you sure you’re pregnant?”

 

Lindy stared at me.

 

“A woman knows, Neels, I know my body. I haven’t had my period and I’m clockwork. I’m pregnant. D’you think I’m trying to pull a prank?”

I stared at Lindy.

 

“Okay, If I believe you that you’re pregnant, you are lying about sleeping with someone else.”

 

“I didn’t!”

 

Lindy was crying now. It was the first time I saw the living embodiment of the expression ‘crying ugly’ and Lindy’s racking sobs rocked her body where she was now curled up on the couch, head down, arms around her knees.

 

I was perfectly calm and cold inside. It was as if I were looking at the scene from a distance and had no direct, personal involvement in it.  Lindy’s distress had no impact on me. If there ever was doubt that I might not love her, this scenario proved the point. There was no love, hardly affection. We’d had a living arrangement, that included sex when convenient, and no more.

 

I waited until Lindy had stopped sobbing. For the first time in a while I noticed that the whining voice of James Phillips was still whining over the overproduced jazz rock fusion of what would be his final studio album. Some people wept when Phillips died; I was pleased. Not about his death, just about the assurance of no further James Phillips musical product.

“You know I had cancer three years ago?”

 

“Yes, I do, Neels, I know it was terrible thing,” Lindy sniffed.

 

“I went through six sessions of chemotherapy. Before the first one, the doctors suggested I should save some sperm in case the chemo affected my fertility. I never thought I’d want children and I wasn’t going to wank into a plastic cup, so I didn’t. There’s no sperm on ice from me.”

 

Lindy sat upright again and looked at me with deep suspicion.

 

“So, the thing is, Lindy, the reason the doctors wanted me to provide sperm for the future is that chemotherapy can make men sterile, and I had a lot of chemotherapy. Six sessions’ worth of it.”

 

I paused for dramatic effect. Lindy was still just looking at me. She looked like someone who suddenly wanted a cigarette and a drink, despite her condition.

 

“I’m sterile, Lindy, I can’t father children anymore. Not from fucking and not from artificial insemination.  I have no live sperm anymore. If you are pregnant, it’s not my kid, to quote Michael Jackson. If you are pregnant, you’ve had sex with someone else.”

 

XXX

 

Lindy went out that night and didn’t return. When I came home from work the following evening, her set of keys were lying on the floor just inside the front door and the second bedroom and bathroom had been cleared of her stuff.