Easy As Falling Off A Bike
by Angharad
part: 350!

I felt on edge that evening, while I was cooking the dinner and later, when eating it. The conversation with Stella kept reverberating in my head. I felt annoyed with myself, what did it matter if she was gay? Who was I to judge anyone?

Was I judging her? Was she winding me up? I really didn’t know but I did know that come bed time she would turn the screw a little tighter. I didn’t know how I would react, which worried me. Would I have the nerve to call her bluff, if she started something? I had no idea.

When I thought about it, I actually knew very little about sex or relationships for that matter. Until I met Stella and Simon, I didn’t have any idea of sex, other than male or female or in the sense of genetics X and Y chromosomes. If you recall, I was under the impression that I was asexual, until my nascent desires were awakened by the garage mechanic, the rough Kevin. Hmmm thinking about him still did something to me, forbidden fruits I suppose.

Thinking about Stella, did absolutely nothing. I’d seen her naked and in her lingerie and even before I been converted from an out-ie to an in-ie, I had no sexual feelings for her or any other woman.

I suppose, I’d have been quite content to continue my life without any passion until it all got stirred up and I discovered that I was actually attractive to men as a female, and to Simon in particular. He grew on me, I wasn’t at all sure about him at first.

I nearly laughed out loud when I thought about my first encounter with him at their house and I ended up lying on top of him having poured a glass of wine all over him. It was however, much later when I discovered it was more fun for him to be lying on top of me–enough of this, I think you catch my drift. Now back to Stella and how to deal with her games.

Perhaps I should have felt pleased that she felt well enough to indulge in her practical jokes and mind games, and on one level, I did. It was the rest of the time I felt uncomfortable with them. I don’t get much fun out of playing such games, they make me feel embarrassed. However, I do retaliate now and again to prove I’m not defenceless, as I did earlier. Unlike her, I don’t enjoy it at all.

Tom was in fine fettle and his accounts of exam papers he’d marked had Stella laughing much of the evening. I did when I listened, but I was rapt in my own little world listening to my internal dialogue. I noticed Stella looking at me occasionally and smiling. I would smile back and I hoped I wasn’t giving off the wrong signals, one of the problems of suddenly developing a role in months rather than decades.

I cleared the table and loaded the dishwasher. Stella brought stuff out to the kitchen–“Are you deliberately avoiding me?” she asked.

“Not particularly, why?”

“I thought I might have shown symptoms of leprosy.”

“I hadn’t noticed if you had,” I said in as matter of fact tone, as I could. I was trying to avoid showing how animated the whole thing was making me.

“Do dormice catch it?” she asked.

“What?” I asked completely missing the joke she was attempting to make.

“Leprosy,” she said almost in a punitive tone, as if trying to berate me for not listening, but my mind was wandering.

“As far as I know, none have been seen walking round with little bells calling ‘unclean’, but that could have changed since I last looked in the journals.

“Do you take everything I say at face value?” she looked irritated.

“Usually, why? Isn’t it meant to be, then?” I showed my naivete .

“Oh, Cathy, do me a favour.”

“What’s that?”

“Cheer up, I’m not going to eat yo–perhaps I should rephrase that! Oh you know what I mean, dammit.”

“Do I?” I said and left her in the kitchen.

Back in the dining room, Tom, who’d had two pints of Guinness, was waxing lyrical about previous students. “Never had one as good nor as pretty as young Cathy, mind you….”

I felt like telling him to shut up, except he was a nice old man, who’d had slightly too much to drink and who was saying nice things about me. So why on earth, was I so irritated by it? I didn’t know, so escaped up stairs after pecking him on the cheek and wishing him good night.

I was undressed and in my pyjamas in a few seconds flat, they were about the safest night wear I had. Blue with little, yellow teddy bears all over them. They were also winceyette so hardly sexy by any stretch of the imagination. By the time Stella appeared, I was in bed having cleaned my teeth and applied a face pack.

She walked into the bedroom and did a double take. “Good grief, Cathy, have you hurt your face, because it’s in plaster of Paris?”
“No,” I said hardly moving my lips, this thing was very stiff and I hoped I wouldn’t have to wear it all night; “Gut I was getting some spots on the gridge of my dose.”

She heard what I said and processed it. “You lying toad! I have more spots than you, your complexion is amazingly clear. You’ve done this to avoid any more piss-taking by me, haven’t you?”

“Gourse dot,” I said defensively.

“You are a very poor liar, even through that gunk on your face, I can see you’re blushing. Jee whiz, why are you wearing jammies, you never wear them. Where did you get them, a charity shop? Now go and wash that stuff off your face and then we can have a little cuddle and maybe, who knows what…”

“It’s subbosed to ge there all dight,” I lied.

“I don’t believe you,” she waltzed into the bathroom and rummaged around in the bin emerging two minutes later with the instructions. “Apply to clean dry skin, then leave for twenty minutes before removing the mask. You may need to apply a moisturiser.”

“I suspect that twenty minutes has elapsed since you concreted your face, has it not?”

“Dunno, didn’t look at the clog.”

She laughed at me, “Cathy, you can’t possibly see how ridiculous you look, now go and wash it off before you do yourself some damage. It will dry your skin terribly.

Reluctantly, I left the relative safety of my bed and went into the bathroom, of course, Stella wolf whistled at my pyjamas. I washed off the face pack, it was horrible and my face was quite sore by the time I’d finished getting the stuff off. I applied a rich moisturiser to my skin afterwards. Then I stood there, a sense of dread hanging over me like some sword of Damocles.

“What’s taking so long, Cathy?” was called from the other side of the bathroom door.

I stood there and trembled.