Over the years, men have left many stains on my bedding.
There was Terry Boy who deposited faint grey marks on the sheets. I held one smudged pillowcase up to the light and observed the strange patterns on it. And there were more, on the sheet, down where his lower leg would be…his freshly tattooed lower leg. Yes, Terry Boy was coming home, damp and stinging, fresh from the tattoo parlour, leaving inky imprints on my sheets.
I've also woken up next to Shug on bleary mornings after Club Noir. He'd get out of bed, having left streaks of black eyeliner on the pillow. I'd urged him not to buy the £3.99 Rimmel pencil. I advised to go for the expensive Bobbi Brown gel liner if he wanted something to withstand the heat of Club Noir but he was more at ease with something cheap, for one night only. Who knew a man's attitude to eyeliner would mirror his attitude to women?
So, I've had men soiling my bedding with tattoo ink and cheap make-up but never - until now - has a man soaked my pillow with tears.
One of the best things about The Proclaimer is that we can talk, for hours and endless hours, about anything. He's good at rambling and story-telling as he participates in a weekly geek group where they do role-playing games. It's nothing kinky, they just talk through scenarios where they're chased into caverns by silver dragons who breathe ice and then they'll roll a dice which might give them the power to summon killer bees to defeat the dragons, blah blah blah...
He says I'd fit in well with his geeks as I love story-telling. It's great to lie in bed and talk into the small hours, telling stories and exploring funny 'what if' situations.
We'll lie there, the clock showing 2.47am, and I'll turn to him and say 'so what would you do if there'd been a nuclear war, right, and there's just you and a bear left, right, but the bear has rabies, and he's also radioactive and all you've got is a rolling pin and this lilac parasol….'
One lazy Sunday we were having a lie-in: stacks of toast and cute cups of espresso with a pink sugar mouse balanced on the saucer. We were discussing post-holocaust survival and battling irradiated bears when the conversation took a darker turn.
I had read an essay recently by Martin Amis where he says his greatest fear in a nuclear war isn't the destruction or the fallout or the lack of anaesthetic when your leg goes streaky and green - it's having to find the strength to kill your wife and children.
'So what would you do?' I asked, biting the head off my sugared mouse. 'The bomb has dropped. Everything's gone. It's kinder to kill me, so how would you do it?'
I turned my back on him and snuggled deep into the duvet, delighting in this dark scenario.
He didn't answer, so I nudged his leg with my foot. 'Come on,' I asked, over my shoulder. 'There's been a nuclear war, so how would you kill me?'
Still no answer! He must have fallen asleep. Why do my men always fall asleep when I turn the conversation to radioactive bears?
I turned round. The Proclaimer wasn't asleep. He was wide awake and staring straight up at the ceiling, frowning and gulping and blinking hard.
'Er, are you OK?' I asked.
'I don't want to think about you hurt,' he said.
Oh God, he's crying.
I bounced out of bed. 'Want more sugar mice? Want a Pepsi Max? I'll get you a Pepsi Max.'
He started to throw the duvet off.
I threw my hands out at him. 'No, no you stay in bed!'
'Just going to the bathroom,' he said.
I relaxed. I didn't want him to get up if he was crying. I'd rather he stayed secured and isolated in the bedroom whilst I clatter diplomatically in the kitchen, giving him time to dry his eyes. Then, when I come back in with the drinks, he has recovered and the awkward situation is gone. I just don't know how to deal with crying men.
He pushed his knuckles in behind his glasses so I vanished into the kitchen. I knew if I sat on the bed with him we'd both end up crying. I'm in such a fragile state these days - still in recovery - and so I try to avoid strong emotion because if I allow myself to cry I'll howl and never stop.
So I went to the kitchen and poured him his drink. When I came back to the bedroom I put his Pepsi Max down, ruffled his hair, and climbed over him to get back into the warmth.
'Right' I said. 'So there's this radioactive bear…'
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