The Bedside Book

Adela stopped in the bedroom doorway because she had left a basket of clean washing on the bed.

Of all the things she had imagined going wrong, her own underwear sitting in a dignified pile between two towels had not featured.

“Give me a moment.”

She let go of Oswin’s hand and picked up the basket. Too quickly; a sock fell out. She bent, caught the basket on the bedpost and heard herself make the small, furious sound she usually reserved for a thread that would not go through a needle.

Oswin picked up the sock.

“Where do you want it?”

“In a house owned by somebody more accomplished.”

He put it in the basket. “I don’t know her.”

Adela set the washing on the chair and turned to him. He was still by the door, his expression warm and faintly amused, with no sign that ordinary evidence of her life had disappointed him.

“I was going to make this look better.”

“It looks like your room.”

It did. A book beside the lamp, the old quilt folded at the end of the bed, a square of fabric pinned above the dressing table because she liked the colour and had never found a use for it. She knew every worn edge. Until now she had not understood how different a room could feel when somebody she wanted stood inside it.

“It is my room,” she said.

“I was hoping. Otherwise this is a serious misunderstanding.”

She went back to him. Rested her hands at his waist and looked up.

“No misunderstanding.”

“Good.”

He bent to kiss her. Adela met him halfway, wanting none of the grace she had been attempting a moment ago. She wanted the warmth of him and the pleasure of making him forget to be funny. His hands came to her back; she felt his breath deepen as she drew him closer.

They stayed there for a while. The room did not need arranging. He did not need convincing. When she moved away to switch on the bedside lamp, he watched her as if the ordinary act of reaching across the bed had become interesting because she was the one doing it.

“What?” she said.

“I like being here.”

She left the lamp on and turned off the overhead light. Not darkness, not a disguise. Enough light to see his face.

“So do I.”

They sat on the edge of the bed to take off their shoes. Her lace had knotted. She worked at it while Oswin put his shoes beside the chest of drawers, then waited until she had finished before reaching for her hand.

She liked that he had not taken over. Later, perhaps, she would ask him to untie something and enjoy the asking. Tonight she needed to arrive here as herself, hands still capable, wanting company rather than assistance.

“Can I tell you something unflattering?” he asked.

“We’ve established a service for that.”

He looked down at their hands. “I’ve been trying to behave so well that you couldn’t find a reason to change your mind.”

Adela’s fingers tightened around his.

“That’s a lot of work.”

“Yes. Also stupid.”

“A bit.”

He smiled without looking up. She touched his cheek with her other hand and waited until he met her eyes.

“I don’t want you because you’ve passed an inspection.”

“Why, then?”

He was asking. She could see the effort it took not to put a joke after the question.

“Because you notice what I like and don’t make me grateful for it. Because you can tell a story in which you’re wrong. Because I haven’t wanted to leave any room you’ve been in this week.”

His mouth changed at that last part, the smile disappearing into something more exposed.

“Even when you sent me home?”

“Especially then. I wanted to ask you properly another day.”

He turned his face and kissed her palm.

“I want you,” he said. “Not the invitation. You.”

Adela leaned towards him before he had quite finished. Kissed him with her hand still against his face, and felt the last of his carefulness give way to an answer she could feel in the arm around her and the warm pressure of his mouth.

She had spent years interpreting what other people needed. Here he made it plain. He wanted her closer; he said so. She wanted him to take his time; she said that too. It was a relief so physical that she laughed in the middle of a kiss.

He drew back. “Have I done something?”

“Yes. Nothing wrong.”

“That’s not especially clear.”

“I’m happy. It’s making me peculiar.”

“I can manage peculiar.”

She moved into the circle of his arm again. His lips brushed her temple, then her cheek, stopping just short of her mouth until she turned to find him. There was a deliberate pleasure in being made to choose, to lean in, to let her wanting be visible. She answered it by drawing him down beside her on the bed.

Oswin supported his weight on one arm. With the other hand he touched the hair at her shoulder, smoothing a strand away from her face. She could see a faint uncertainty in him still, not reluctance, but the knowledge that they were entering a place neither could furnish in advance.

“Keep looking at me,” she said.

“I am.”

“I know. I like it.”

He kissed her then, slowly enough that she could stop thinking of the next thing. The cotton beneath her hand was cool; his neck was warm beneath the other. When she stroked the line of his shoulder, she felt him answer in a breath he did not disguise.

Adela had expected to be embarrassed by the sounds of pleasure, by the evidence that she could affect him and be affected. Instead his pleasure steadied her. She did not have to manufacture an evening he would praise. She could be present for the one they were making.

“Still with me?” he murmured.

She opened her eyes. “Very much.”

She drew his hand to her waist and held it there until he understood she was showing him where she wanted him. His thumb moved over the fabric, light at first, and she leaned into his touch.

They spoke when they needed to. A question about comfort, a request to come closer, a laughing complaint about the quilt caught beneath them. No sentence was too ordinary to say. No pause spoiled what came after it.

At one point Adela closed her eyes and realised she had begun listening for a phone that had not rung. The habit arrived without warning, that readiness to leave pleasure because somebody might need her more urgently.

She caught Oswin’s hand.

“Just a moment.”

He stilled. “Of course.”

She lay beside him, breathing, feeling the bed beneath her and his fingers loose in hers. He did not withdraw into an injured silence. He waited with her, his face near enough to see without lifting her head.

“Do you want to stop?”

“For a moment. Not because of you.”

“It could be because of me. You’d still get to stop.”

The plainness of that undid the last of her urge to apologise. She put her cheek against his shoulder and stayed there until the imaginary phone fell silent.

“I keep thinking I ought to be somewhere else,” she said. “Then I remember I chose here.”

“I can wait while you remember.”

He said it lightly enough not to turn patience into a gift she would owe him for. Adela traced the edge of his collar with one finger. Looked up at him, and this time her smile came without effort.

“Here,” she said. “Definitely here.”

She kissed him first. He answered, and when he drew her closer again there was no hurry to recover lost time. Nothing had been lost. They had found one more way to stay.

The night became a succession of small, wanted discoveries. His unsteady laugh when she surprised him with a kiss. The place beside his jaw she returned to because he seemed to forget everything else when she did. His hand finding hers again after every change, as if closeness could be both unfamiliar and certain.

Later, when they lay together beneath the sheet, Adela could feel the warmth he had left in the room. Her hair was tangled. One pillow had reached the floor. There was nothing in her that wanted to get up and make the scene respectable.

Oswin lay on his side facing her, one hand between them.

“What are you thinking?” he asked.

“That I’m going to leave the washing there all night.”

He looked towards the chair. “Reckless.”

“You have no idea.”

He smiled. She moved close enough to kiss it, a gentle kiss now, familiar in a way that made her chest ache.

“Stay on this side,” she said when she settled back. “I like waking towards the window.”

“Then I get you looking at me on the way.”

“That’s a rather serious interpretation of a sleeping arrangement.”

“I’m allowed one.”

She found his hand beneath the sheet and kept it until they both grew drowsy. Before sleep, she heard him ask whether the alarm was set. Such an ordinary question from a man in her bed. She answered no, and felt him relax beside her.

· · ·Scene break

In the morning Oswin was awake before she was, sitting against the pillows with the book from her bedside table.

“That’s about curtain headings,” she said.

“I know more than I did twenty minutes ago.”

Adela rolled onto her back and looked at him. The daylight was unkind to neither of them. He looked rumpled and pleased, and she loved that she had been present for both causes.

“Was there nothing else you could do?”

“I considered sorting your washing. Thought you might make me leave.”

“Correct.”

He put down the book when she reached for him. Kissed her forehead, then her mouth when she tilted her face up. Morning made the intimacy different: less suspense, more discovery that he was still there and still wanted to be.

At nine they went downstairs. He made tea while she searched for the bread knife. It was in the drawer where she kept it. This pleased him more than it should have.

“Not a word,” she said.

“I’ve said nothing.”

“You’re remembering my gloves.”

“Only fondly.”

She took butter out of the fridge and stood for a moment with the door open. Sunday. At this time she would ordinarily be checking the weather for Rhoswen’s walk, wondering whether to bring the scarf the older woman always forgot.

She closed the fridge.

Oswin had seen the pause. He did not fill it.

“It’s strange,” she said.

“This morning?”

“Having nowhere I have to be.”

“We could stay in.”

She considered it. An entire Sunday inside with him was a tempting idea. But she did not want their first morning together to become a place to hide from the empty hour.

“I’d like to go out later. Not the usual walk. Perhaps up past the allotments.”

“I’ve never been that way.”

“Neither have I. I keep meaning to.”

He put two mugs on the table. “Then we’ll probably get lost.”

“It’s Merewick. We’ll reach a fence eventually.”

They ate toast without making any further plans. There were crumbs on his side of the table and a little butter on the cuff of her dressing gown. Her phone stayed quiet on the shelf. Adela missed Rhoswen, and wanted another kiss, and went on eating breakfast with the man who had stayed.