Mad About the Boy (Bridget Jones 3)

As we got close to the house I could see him looking all around, trying to place where we were, and what sort of place I lived in. I was so nervous when we got to the door. My hands were shaking as I put the key in the lock and couldn’t get it to open.

‘Let me do it,’ he said.

‘Come in,’ I said, in an absurdly formal voice, as if I was a 1970s cocktail hostess.

‘Shall I go somewhere till the babysitter goes?’ he whispered.

‘They’re not here,’ I whispered back.

‘You have two babysitters? And yet you’ve left the children alone?’

‘No,’ I giggled. ‘They’re with their godparents,’ I added, changing Daniel into ‘godparents’ in case Roxster somehow sensed that Daniel is a sexually available man, at least until you get to know him.

‘So we’ve got the house to ourselves!’ Roxster boomed. ‘Can I go and wash the sick off?’

I showed him to the loo halfway up the stairs, then rushed down to the kitchen basement, brushed my hair and put more blusher on, dimming the lights, realizing as I did that Roxster had never actually seen me in daylight.

Suddenly had vision of self as one of those older women who insist on spending their entire time indoors with the curtains drawn, lit only by firelight or candlelight, then completely miss their mouth with the lipstick whenever anyone comes round.

Then I had a terrible moment of guilt and panic about Mark. I felt like I was being unfaithful, like I was about to step off a cliff and like I was far, far away from everything that I knew and everything that was safe. I leaned over the sink, feeling as though I was going to be . . . well . . . fittingly, I suppose . . . sick, then suddenly I heard Roxster bursting out laughing. I turned.

Oh, shit! He was looking at Chloe’s chart.

Chloe had decided that Billy and Mabel would be far better in the mornings if they had a STRUCTURE, and so had drawn up a chart of what is supposed to happen, more or less moment-by-moment, when she takes them to school. This was absolutely fine, except it was ridiculously large, and one of the entries, which Roxster was now reading out, said:

7.55 a.m. to 8 a.m. Hugs and Kisses with Mummy!

‘Do you even know their names?’ he said. Then seeing my face, he laughed and held his hand out for me to smell.

‘They’re perfect,’ I said. ‘Vomit-free. Would you like a glass of . . .?’ but Roxster was already kissing me. He wasn’t rushing at it. He was gentle, almost tender, but in control.

‘Shall we go upstairs?’ he whispered. ‘I want hugs and kisses with Mummy.’

I started off being nervous, wondering if my bum looked fat from behind and below, but realized Roxster was focused, instead, on turning the lights off as we went. ‘Tsk tsk, what about the National Grid, Jonesey?’ Ah, the young people and their concern for the planet!

When I opened the door to the bedroom the room looked beautiful, just lit by the light from the landing and Roxster at least didn’t turn that one off. He stepped inside, pushing the door half closed behind him. He took off his shirt. I gasped. He looked like an advert. He looked like he’d been airbrushed with a six-pack. There was no one in the house, the lights were low, he was good, he was safe, he was gorgeous beyond belief. Then he said, ‘Come here, baby.’

DEFLOWERED

Saturday 2 February 2013

11.40 a.m. Roxster has just left because the kids are due back in twenty minutes with Daniel. Could not resist putting on Dinah Washington’s ‘Mad About the Boy’ and dancing moonily around the kitchen. I feel so happy and fantastic and as though nothing is a problem any more. I keep wandering around, picking things up and putting them down again in a daze. It is as if I have been bathed in something, like sunshine, or . . . milk, well, not milk. Moments from last night keep coming back to me: Roxster lying back on the bed, looking at me as I walked out of the bathroom in my slip. Removing the slip. Saying I looked better without the slip. Me watching Roxster’s beautiful face above me, lost in what we were doing, the slight gap between his front teeth. Then suddenly the very adult shock wave of the thrust, the unexpected shock and thrill after so, so long of feeling the fullness of him inside me, a moment’s pause to savour it, then starting to move and remembering the ecstasy two bodies can create together. It’s just amazing what bodies can do. And then, when I came, far too soon, Roxster watching my face with a horny, disbelieving expression, then feeling him starting to shake with laughter.

‘What?’ I said.

‘I was just wondering how long this was going to go on for.’

Roxster getting hold of my feet under the duvet and suddenly pulling me right down to the bottom of the bed and bursting out laughing. And then starting again at the bottom of the bed.

Me trying to pretend not to be having an orgasm in case he started laughing at me again.

Then finally, hours and hours later, stroking his thick, dark hair as he briefly rested on the pillow, taking in every detail of his perfect features, the fine lines, the brow, the nose, the jawline, the lips. Oh God, the fun, the closeness, the ecstasy of being touched after so long by someone so beautiful, so young and so good at it. Resting my head on his chest and talking in the darkness, and then Roxster taking my upper lip and lower lip and holding them together, saying, ‘Shhhhhhhh,’ and me trying to say through his fingers, ‘But I don’t bant to btop talking.’ And Roxster whispering kindly, like I was a child or a lunatic: ‘It’s not stopping talking, it’s more like saving up talking, till the morning.’

And then . . . Oh, shit – doorbell.

I opened the door, beaming. The kids looked wild, mad-haired, dirty-faced, but happy. D

aniel took one look at me and said, ‘Jones. It must have been a very good night indeed, you look twenty-five years younger. Will you jiggle on my knee and just quickly run through the details of the whole thing carefully and precisely while they watch SpongeBob SquarePants?’