A Kind of Loving (35 page)

There's a flight of wooden stairs to the billiard saloon which
is on the corner of Cooperative Street across from the market place. If you're up there on a market day you see out across all
the tarpaulin roofs of the stalls to the glass roof of the covered
market-house. I rind Willy in his shirt-sleeves playing on one of
the four tables under the big shaded light.

'Howdo, Willy.'

'Ah, Vic, me old cock sparrer. How ist?'

'Pretty fair.'

Willy finishes chalking his cue and bends down to take his shot.
'Come for a game?' he says.

'No, I was looking for you. I've been up to your house. Your
mother said I might find you here.'

' Owt special on your mind?'

'No, I just thought I'd see what you were doing. I haven't
seen you for a while.'

'Right enough,' Willy says.

There's four or five other blokes in the room and I don't know
this lad Willy's playing with. They're playing snooker. Willy
makes his shot and sends balls clickety-clicking all over the place.

'I'll just show Fred here the way home an' then we'll adjourn
for ajar, eh?'

This lad called Fred gives a guffaw. 'Tha won't show me t'way
home wi' shots like that, Willy,' he says.

'Ah,' Willy says, dead-pan, 'it's not how good you are but
how much fun you get out of it. I get a lot more fun than tha
does, because tha plays to win an' I don't give a bugger either
way.'

I unfasten my raincoat and light a fag and sit down to wait for the game to finish. This lad trounces Willy and Willy grins and
winks at me as he puts his cue up in the rack.

'Right, now for that jar. Are you comin', Fred?'

I'm glad when Fred says no, he's stopping for another game,
because I want Willy on his own. We go downstairs and into
the Crown next door. It's a quiet night and we nearly have the
place to ourselves. We drink for a bit and talk about one thing
and the other before I get to the point.

'Willy, when you get yourself fixed up with a bird - you know,
on a sure thing - where d'you get your tackle from?'

'Oh, ho!' Willy says. 'That's it, is it?'

You have to lay it on thick for Willy so I say, 'I've got a bint
lined up an' she's all ready for it; only I don't want to take any risks.'

' How about letting me in on it,' Willy says. ' Share an' share
alike, y'know.'

'She's not a bag, Willy. She just likes me, that's all. I've been
working on it a bit now.'

' What's her name? Do I know her?'

'No, she doesn't live round here — Anyway, that's all I need
and I'm set up.'

'Lucky dog," Willy says.

'Where d'you get fixed up? Have you any on you now?'

'Smatter o' fact I'm right out at the moment. But you can
buy 'em. Just walk into a shop an' ask for 'em.'

'Which shop?'

'Oh, any chemist's. Doesn't your barber flog 'em?'

'I don't know.'

'A lot of em do.'

'Anyway, my barber's a pal of the Old Feller's.'

'Well there's plenty o' places.'

'Suppose you go into a chemist's and a bird comes to serve
you?'

'So what? She knows what they're for just like anybody
else.'

'I couldn't ask a bird, Willy. I'd be embarrassed.' I take a pull
at my pint. 'Look, Willy, if I give you the brass will you get some
forme?'

'But what's to stop you gettin' 'em for yourself? You've got to
do it sometime, haven't you?'

'I don't think I could do it, Willy. I'd be scared they might
ask my age or something.'

'Well, you're old enough.'

'Aye, but it'd be embarrassing.'

'Aw, there's nowt to it.'

I'm getting a bit suspicious the way Willy's hedging and begin
ning to wonder how much of him is just talk.

'Who was the first bint you ever had it with, Willy?'

'Oh, a bint you don't know.'

'When was the last time?'

'The other week.'

'Aye, in your flipping imagination, Willy, I know.'

'Why don't you mind your own bloody business?' Willy says.

I'm grinning as I reach for Willy's empty glass. 'C'mon, let's
have another.'

IV

'Did you get anything ... you know ...?' she says.

'No. I went downtown on Saturday but I couldn't bring
meself to go into a shop an' ask.'

'We'd better not... you know ... go so far, then, had we?'

'No, we won't go so far.'

I push her back on to my coat and kiss her, holding her to me
full length till I seem to be sinking into her, and I'm thinking
what a mug I am with it here for the asking for the first time
in my life and I'm letting a little thing like bashfulness stop
me.

And after it's just like it always is, as though I'm finished with
it and I'll never look twice at a bint again. Only times like this,
when I'm seeing things more clear than I can any other time, I
feel it's like being let out of prison must be, when you think you've got a clear field in front of you and all the good things
to enjoy without having something else nagging at you like it is
when I can't read a book or listen to music or enjoy a picture for thinking about her and touching her and her touching me.
To get really free, though, I have to get right away from her
because while I'm still with her I've got that feeling that I'm
just about the rottenest devil alive for treating her this way. I reckon people sometimes are just like animals, just like randy
dogs having a go in the street and not giving a cuss for all the traffic belting up and down round them. Only dogs have some
sense: when they finish they just walk away, and people have to
talk. And I don't want to talk to Ingrid; I want to get up and
walk away, free, and not have to stick around and listen to her
yatter about something and nothing and say yes and no and I
think this and I think the other when I don't think anything at all
except I want to get away where I can enjoy being rid of her
and wanting bints at all. Only, the thing is, I'm not rid of wanting
bints except in that way. There is another way, and with a real
bint, the sort I've always wanted, it would be this way and I'd want to stay with her and talk and laugh and maybe touch her,
but tender like and soft. And when I think about that it comes
on in a deep ache as I wonder if I'll ever find her.

I sit up and look round. I can see the grass sloping away to the
path, and the pale line of the path and the bandstand just to be
made out in the trees, and I feel suddenly so awfully lonely that
I'm scared and I say the first thing that comes into my head, which
is: 'Turned a bit cold, hasn't it?'

She's still lying there on the coat and I wonder what's keeping her so quiet when she usually has so much to say.

'Like to walk a bit?' I've got to be on the move. I can't stay
here any longer.

She says nothing but just lies with her face partly turned away
from me.

'You okay?' I ask her after a bit of this and she mumbles something that I take to be 'yes'.

'Let's walk a bit. I'm turning cold.'

She says something I don't catch and I say, 'Beg pardon.'

'I think something's gone wrong, Vic,' she says.

I catch this all right, and no mistake. My heart sort of slips
sideways and there's panic like big bats flying about inside me. 'How d'you mean "wrong"?' I know very well what she means
but I'm hoping I'm mistaken, just the same.

She says in a quiet voice that I know means she's dead serious,
'Something that should have happened hasn't.'

'How d'you mean it hasn't happened?' My voice is a bit rough
because I can't control it properly and it's either that or letting
her see how scared I am.

'You know what I mean.'

'Well, how long?'

'Ten days.'

'Ten days... That's nothing, is it?'

'It is with me. I'm like clockwork usually.'

'Not this time, anyway.' I'm surprised the way my voice sounds
now. Here I am all chewed up and panicky inside and the way it
comes out you'd think I hadn't a care in the world. 'C'mon,' I say, 'let's walk.'

'It's never happened before, Vic,' she says, still not moving.

' Look, how can any thing have gone wrong? How can it?'

'You know very well it can.'

'Look, people try for ages before it comes off. My sister's been trying for months and there's not a sign yet. I'm not even sure we did it properly... I don't have to go into all the details.
You know.'

She sits up now but her head's hanging down and she's pulling
her hanky about with her fingers. 'All I know is I'm ten days
overdue and it's never happened before ... I'm scared, Vic.'

So am I. Oh, brother, am I scared! I feel like getting up and running like mad across the park, putting as much distance
between me and her as I can. As if that would do any good. But
still, I've got to get away from her, on my own, so's I can think this thing out without having to put a show on for her benefit.
Oh, Christ, what have I got myself into!

'You're scared about nothing. C'mon, let's walk.'

'I wish I'd your confidence.'

You wouldn't want it if you could see it, old girl, I think.
'All you've got to do is stop worrying. You're probably
stopping it happening by worrying about it. It's a vicious circle
... C'mon, let's go.' If I have to ask her once more I'll shout
it.

She stands up and tidies her clothes. I pick my mac up and
shake it and think about the number of times I've done the same
thing just here. I don't know when I'm well-off, that's my trouble.
There I was, happy as a lark, free as you like, and I have to go
and get myself into a mess like this. And I didn't even enjoy it, really. Well never again. If this turns out all right it's the finish.
And I mean that. It's the end.

Down at the gate I say to her, 'Now stop worrying about it.
By the time I see you again everything'll be okay.'

' I hope so,' she says in a dull voice.' What will we do if it isn't,
though?'

God, I can't think about that!

'I tell you it will be, so stop worrying.'

I've a feeling she'd like to hang about a bit longer because she doesn't want to go home with it on her mind. Maybe she's scared of giving the game away. Not like me.
I
should go in for amateur dramatics or something. I never knew I was such a good actor.