CHAPTER 26
Eric was already up, as I struggled to get myself into some state of mind that would let me join humanity on a roughly equal footing. Ginny was awake, looking at me.

“Rough one last night, mate. You feel a little better this morning?”

“Some. The thing is, I can remember the dreams, because they are always the same, but last night…the baby had my face, the mother had my face, the paramedics, they all had my face. I am cracking up, Ginny”

She hugged me closer. “No, my love, those are healing pains.”

Eric came in just then, in T-shirt and boxer shorts, the tan lines sharp on his thighs. He put the tray of cups down and gave me a one-armed hug.

“Better?”

“Yes. Thanks. I don’t normally, you know, blokes…sorry, Eric”

He sighed. “I don’t know how we all missed it n you, Annie. The more you relax, the more obvious it is what you are, and I can look back and see it there as well. That worries me”

“I’ve already got you into bed…”

“Stop trying to change the subject. I am being absolutely serious here. If a banjo player can spot it, so can a copper. You show out to the wrong arsehole, and you are meat, fucking hamburger. That beard blocked a lot of the leakage, but it’s gone….hang on, are you getting it removed properly now?”

“Yes. Steph showed me somewhere”

“Ah.” A long pause. “ I should have realised, but she looks good. Is it something in the fucking water over there, or what?”

I had to laugh. “Believe it or not, one of her colleagues is married to another girl like her, and she comes from bloody Fishguard!”

Eric gave Ginny a look, and then turned back to me. “That’s ‘another girl like you’, Anne Price”

I concentrated on my tea. I had to get the words out, and looking at my friends made it harder.

“It is never going to be easy, is it? Until we have the word from the blood man, I’m in limbo, but do either of you really think I can pass as a normal woman?”

Ginny snorted in her usual manner. “Come clubbing with me and Kate, and tell me what is fucking ‘normal’! Look, we have time, we have money, we can haz experumence”

“Ginny…”

“Yes, Eric?”

“How can such a bad-ass psycho dyke like that website so much?”

“Cause it has big-eyed ickul kittons, an’ I is a gurl”

“Oh for fuck’s sake, Annie, how the hell do you cope with her?”

I could feel that my smile was rather bleak. “I wasn’t coping without her, mate, was I? Bugger this, day off, weather OK, shall we just go out somewhere? Ride out to Grinstead? I’ll give Dennis a shout”

Ginny nodded. “Let’s go west instead. Do a loop round, call in at Steph’s for a cuppa….no, hang on, let’s give her a shout and see if they want to ride out and meet us for lunch. Fox Revived or Rising Sun? If we spin out past Box Hill by the border path, cuppa at Ryka’s, some of the hills by Bookham----ooh, ooh, the hamster ranch!”

Eric laughed. “A takeaway for the cats?”

The pillow hit him square in the face. Dennis met us by the front door, looking quite tasty in his lycra, and Steph and Geoff joined us at Hookwood just before the first of the irritating little climbs. We passed the Fox at the top of the long downhill into Leigh and then started through the maze of lanes towards Dorking and then the cycle path to Box Hill. Ryka’s was its usual frantic self, full of bikers and wannabes in leather and denim, clutching burgers and cokes, and then a busy main road uphill brought us into Bookham, where it got hillier after our little spin past the Ranch.

I was feeling it, but nothing like I had on the zombie ride. My weight had been slashed, my fitness was on the up again, and if I had been without my problems it would have been a superb day. Geoff and Steph were, of course, cruising, as were Ginny and Eric, so I was pleased to notice that Den was a bit slower. I ended up behind him on some of the climbs, which wasn’t exactly unpleasant, and each time I stared at his arse I realised what an aberration my marriage had been. Sal was right, I was straight, and that thought led me into the sort of musing that comes with a long ride. More than ever, I knew who I was, but I still had no idea how to deal with it.

40 odd miles had flown away as we swang back through Newdigate and finally up to the Sun in Charlwood. The Woodruffs had the pub as their local, so would leave us after the meal, and then it would only be eight miles or so home. We took over a couple of tables in the car park cum beer garden, and soon Den was at the bar with Eric and Geoff for the drinks as we girls sorted through the menu.

That was how it felt, the ‘being myself at home’ that I had agreed. Just one of the girls…shit, one a lesbian, two born male, not quite a conventional coven, but there we were. Drinks arrived, Eric passing me mine, and Dennis had to ask the question.

“So, then, Eric, are you and Adam here, you know…?”

There was absolute silence, and poor Dennis forgot all his court experience and tried to fill it with words.

“Look, I know that Adam’s like into lads and all, but it’s not a problem, really”

Geoff was shaking his head slowly. “Oh how I remember that conversation….how was it you stopped it, love?”

Steph was smiling, radiantly. “A bloody good snog, if I remember rightly, my love”

Eric sighed, and gave me a questioning look. I had thought long and hard about this, we had discussed it, but it was still a huge step. I was in the back of the car again, someone else driving, but this time they were at least asking me for permission. I nodded to Eric.

“There is only one gay person here today, and she’s the mad one into knives and crossbows and zombies and shit”

“Aye, but, isn’t Adam----no, no. You are taking the piss, Eric. Aren’t you?”

“Nope. Meet Anne, Annie to her friends. Are you a friend”

Den was shaking his head as if trying to dislodge a fly. “Fucking hell, marra, I came down here for a quiet life, and you, well, fuck.”

He sat for a while in silence of his own, occasionally shooting me a little glance, then spoke.

“You’ve got an awful lot of shit behind you, pal, and you are going to have a lot more ahead. Your sort of thing doesn’t sit that easy with me, but what I said before stands. Just don’t think I’m going to be snogging you.”

He paused again. “Not with tongues, anyway”

There was more silence, as we all tried to guess which way he was leaning.

“Look, I have no idea what you are going to do, but I am not going to drop you just because you don’t want your cock any more, OK? I can’t put it any simpler than that. No wonder you never gave Ruth one. She fancied you rotten, you know, before you got fat. She told me…”

“Den, I never did want my cock. And when exactly…oh, I see, you prefer them tall and fit, but even when they are not, when they are whimpering at your feet, well, it would be rude to refuse, aye?”

He grinned, almost back to his old self. “Well, yeah. I might just change my criteria, Adam, Annie, pal, she’s dirty, is our Ruth!”

He smiled happily, and then it vanished, like sun behind cloud. “That, Sergeant Price, was deliberate. You have given me something I could use to ruin your life. I’ve given you something back. That makes us even, that ties us together. The last place, I stopped trusting people cause half of them were bent. I want to trust you, but you can understand me when I say I am a bit slow to give that out these days. All I am saying is that you can trust me, OK?”

“I think I get you. We do have a shedload of baggage between us, haven’t we?”

“Well, kid, at least we all know who we are and where we’re coming from; now all we need is some map of what’s ahead. Sod it, let’s get some food in. Before Ginny says it, no chips, AnnEEE”

That emphasis. Friend. I let out a long breath, looking round the group. Eric sat quietly throughout, apart from giving his food order, until Den went up with Geoff to place them.

“Are you OK, Annie?”

“Scared…really scared now. I still can’t see which way he’s turning”

“Yeah, well, I think he’s going to be sound. That was horse trading, but it was also bonding. He’s given you a weapon against him. I suppose that it’s all he has left to show he’s not going to hurt you. He is far more fucked up than you realised”

He put his hand on my shoulder and gave it a squeeze.

“Steady as she goes, girl”