Fiction Friday 5 June 09

 This weeks task is to include:

“Don’t sit there,” she commanded. “That’s the cat’s chair.”

 Sorry if it is a bit long. Got carried away since I hadn’t written anything for a few weeks.

 

Andrea was giggling. I’m sure I’m not that funny to look at, even if we had just finished three bottles of wine between us at dinner. Now she had a fit of the giggles, and it was becoming infectious. My controlled smile was about to burst in to laughter and join her.

 The evening had started very properly. It was our third date and I was beginning to think this might actually work up in to a full-blown relationship. But I shouldn’t get ahead of myself. Tonight was going to be our first proper date in a restaurant, eating proper food. The last two times we met, it had been more casual. A meeting after work in a bar, both of us knowing that we had other commitments later on and we would have to curtail the evening at an early hour. Then we spent a Sunday afternoon in a park, soaking up the sun, people watching, making up funny stories about their lives as they walked past us, oblivious to the tags of serial killer, call girl, President of Moldova and many others that we made up for them.

 That was when I first heard her laugh. It started almost as though she is trying to hold in a sneeze, scrunching her face up, trying not to let it out. She seemed to have caught it in time and takes a breath. Then she looked at me smiling at her and she lost control. She started giggling and laughing, rolling about on the grass, trying to hide her face from the passers-by. But they all just smiled as well, probably wondering whether or not I had the gift of some fantastic wit that had set off this poor girl spasming with mirth, or perhaps she was laughing so much because I had just asked her to sleep with me. Who knows, it could have been either.

 Every time she seemed to bring her laughter down a notch, she would look at me and that would set her off full blast again. I didn’t know whether to be offended or to join in, but since I still fancied her despite the public display of mirth, I decided it was best to join in.

 And here we were again. In a nice Italian restaurant, just having finished our meal and sharing the last of the wine from the third bottle. I don’t know what started her off, but it was clear that she wasn’t going to stop anytime soon and I was on the verge of losing it too. The other diners were trying to ignore us, but sneakily looking over and getting annoyed that we were having so much fun. What right did we have to laugh in a restaurant? I called for the bill, and paid it as quickly as I could. Andrea was still in convulsions, but she couldn’t explain what she was laughing at. When we got outside, the fresh air seemed to have a miraculous effect. Just as quickly as she had started laughing, she stopped.

 “Wow, that was fun,” I said, trying to be careful not to start her off again.

 She smiled at me and took my arm as we walked towards the taxi rank. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I just can’t help myself sometimes and once I start I just can’t stop. Did it embarrass you?”

 “No, not at all. I think everyone in the restaurant thought I was a comic genius. It did me no harm at all.”

 “Good. So what do you want to do now?”

 “I dunno, what would you like to do?” I looked at my watch. Only 10 o’clock, the night was still relatively young.

 “ I want to go dancing, but I want to get changed first.”

 I stopped and pulled her in front of me, holding her at arms length so I could look her up and down.

 “Mmmm, shoes look lovely, those jeans, well they are so sexy, and your top, I can’t take my eyes off you. I can’t see anything I would want to change?”   I thought the flattery might stop her wanting to go home and spend another hour getting ready to go dancing.

 Instead of being blown over by my great lines of flattery, she put on a sulky face. “But I have to. I have a special outfit for dancing. I know you’ll love it,” she insisted. “Here’s a cab, it will only take us 10 minutes to get home and I promise I won’t take long.” She fluttered her eyelashes at me and I melted.

 “Of course, if it makes you happy, let’s go.”

 Once we were in the cab Andrea held my hand tightly. “This way you can get to meet my mother.”

 “Meet your mother?” I almost choked. I was not ready to meet the family yet, and I don’t think I would be making the best impression given the amount of wine consumed.

 “Yes, she’s adorable and she’ll love you, I know she will.”

 How many times have I heard that? It is like signing the death warrant for the relationship. She wants to get her mother’s approval before we get serious. I could see my chances of seeing Andrea on an ongoing basis disappearing down the plug hole. Girlfriend’s mothers and I seem to bring out the worst in each other. No matter how hard I try, I always seem to say the wrong thing, or knock over the priceless vase that has been passed down from generation to generation as I back away from an overbearing potential future mother-in-law trying to give me a kiss. I was getting a bad feeling about this.

 I spent the rest of the cab ride doing deep breathing exercises. Trying to relax and sober up as much as I could. Andrea was chatting away merrily, not recognising that the one word answers I was grunting back were getting shorter and shorter as my stressed out larynx closed up the closer we got to her house.

 All too quickly, the cab stopped outside an apartment block.

 “Here we are,” she said as she jumped out.

 I tried to speak but could only croak. “Maybe I should wait in the taxi if you can rush in and get changed. It will be so difficult to get another one at this time of night, we shouldn’t let this one go.”

 I thought that was a moment of genius, a great excuse not to go in to meet the mother. But Andrea was having none of it. She grabbed me by the hand and physically pulled me out the door. “Don’t be silly, there are plenty of taxis.” She gave me a peck on the cheek and handed the fare to the driver. “Come on, I promise I won’t be long.”

 We went in to lobby of the apartment block and made our way to the lifts. The lobby was very well kept, with lots of marble panels on the walls, mahogany railings and a beautifully tiled floor. Obviously Andrea or her family has some money to be able to live in a place like this, and I started to think that maybe meeting the mother wasn’t such a bad thing. I would be on my best behaviour.

 In the lift, Andrea pulled me close and kissed me full on the lips. I was so taken aback I didn’t have time to react before the doors opened and we stepped out on to the landing. Andrea searched in her handbag for the keys.

 “Oh, did I mention that my mother is blind?” she said almost as an aside.

 Suddenly the keys appeared and the door to the apartment was opened, before I chance to close my mouth after my jaw dropping to the floor. Andrea breezed in merrily, shouting “Muumm, I’m home, and I’ve brought someone to meet you.”

 I stood in the doorway, now paralysed with fear, anxiety, stress and probably just about staving off a heart attack as my pulse rate shot through the roof. Andrea turned to me and waved me in. I tried to move my feet, but they had more sense and wanted to stay exactly where they were.

 “Oh come on, don’t be shy!”

 She came back and grabbed me by the hand and for the second time that evening pulled me forcibly through a door. She led me through to a large sitting room that took my breath away. Three of the four walls were adorned with what looked like original oil paintings, some of which I recognised from my old art appreciation classes as school. There was at least one Van Gough, and a Rembrandt if I was not mistaken. The fourth side of the room was a large picture window with spectacular views of the city, lights sparkling as far as the eye could see.

 There was very little furniture in the room, perhaps because they had spent all their money on the art, but more likely to make it easier for Andrea’s mother to move around.

 And there she was, the matriarch sitting upright in a wingback chesterfield leather chair facing the window, which seemed a bit pointless since she couldn’t see out it.

 She picked up a walking stick that was leaning against the chair and pointed it straight at me.

 “Who is this you’ve brought this time? I hope he is nicer than the one who came last night.”

 Andrea quickly went over and took her mother’s hand. “Oh you silly billy, I didn’t have anyone round last night, that was Eric, your son! And he is perfectly nice. This is George. He is nice and sweet and funny and he’s going to take me dancing. I’m just going to get changed. Be right back.”

 She beckoned me over to her mother’s chair. “George, this is my mother, Agnes. Say hello.”

 “Hello Agnes,” I said, stupidly holding out my hand for her to shake.

 “Oh dear, he is like the others,” said Agnes. “I am blind, not stupid, so take your hand away.”

 “But how do you know I had my hand out?” I protested.

 “Everyone does the first time they meet me.”

 I hadn’t noticed Andrea slip away. It was just me and her mother, and I hadn’t made a good first impression.

 I looked around for somewhere else to sit. There was only one other chair in the room, right across the other side from where mother was sitting. I thought that might be a good option, get some distance between us.

 I decided to make some small talk to cover my retreat towards the seat.

 “You have some very impressive artwork in here.”

 Agnes harrumphed. “Fat lot of good it does for me. Never seen a bloody thing of them. They could be fakes for all I know. I have to trust that the children have bought wisely. It’s their inheritance after all, but they have probably been hoodwinked and some dodgy character has run off with the money. You’re not here to steal them are you?”

 I was taken aback by the accusation. “Of course not, I didn’t even know you had them until I walked in the room.”

 “So you don’t know my daughter very well yet?”  She was not one for small talk then.

 “Well, we’ve met up a few times and we like each other.”

 I was moving closer to the chair, hoping to take the weight off my wobbly legs.

 “Don’t sit on that chair,” Agnes boomed her command at me from across the room. “That’s the cat’s chair.”

 Bloody hell, how did she know I was going to sit on it? And I couldn’t see a cat anywhere, certainly not sitting on the seat.

 “S-s-s-sorry,” I stuttered.

 Then a door opened and Andrea stood there, backlit by the light coming from behind her. “I’m ready now.”

 I stood staring at this transformed character in front of me. Only a few minutes ago, my lovely Andrea had left the room dressed in jeans and a nice knitted top. Now she was dressed all in black. She had on biker boots with six-inch soles and heels, black skintight trousers, a tight basque top, and her blonde hair had been replaced with a jet black wig. In her right hand was a whip straight out of an Indiana Jones movie. In her left hand was a black riding crop that she flicked menacingly against her thigh.

 Astonished by what was standing before me I took a step backwards, not realising how close I was to the chair. The sight of Andrea as a dominatrix made me forget the command from her mother not to sit there. My knees gave way and I flopped back in to the chair.

 As my backside hit the leather an almighty screech filled the room, followed immediately by Andrea and her mother simultaneously screaming at me. “You’ve sat on the cat!”

 My immediate reaction was to stand back up, and I looked at the chair but there was no cat there. Then there was a crack right beside my ear as Andrea had unleashed her whip and was undoubtedly about to do me some damage if she could find her target.

 I found my voice and shouted back “But there is no cat here!”

 Just as I protested my innocence, a large ginger cat appeared from behind the chair, looking dazed having just been sat upon. “Where the hell did you come from?”

 Andrea had recoiled the whip by now and was lining up to take another shot at me.

 “How can you be so cruel?” she screamed at me. “Leo’s bed is inside the chair. Mother told you not to sit on it but you ignored her and now you must be punished.”

 She drew back her arm and expertly flicked the whip at me again. She had done this before.

 Her mother had joined in with encouragement. “Get him Andrea. Don’t let the cat hater out of here without a few lashes!”

 The whip snaked towards me in a flash, but I was just far enough away for it not to make a proper connection, but it still got my leg and it stung like hell.

 Time to get out of here. I ran for the door, and slammed it shut behind me just before the whip slapped against it, the awful sound of splintering wood giving me the extra adrenaline rush to get out as fast as humanly possible.

 No time to wait for the lift. I ran down the stairs and out on to the street. I didn’t dare look back in case the mad whip woman was coming after me.

 After a few blocks I was out of breath and wheezing. I stopped, doubled up and leaned against the wall. Slowly my breathing normalised and I stopped seeing stars in front of my eyes.

 I noticed a few people looking at me as though I was a criminal on the run. I just smiled at them limply and gave them a pathetic wave to let them know I was all right.

 A young couple were coming down the street towards me. They held each other tight and were laughing together. As they walked past me, the young man looked at me while his girlfriend laughed out loud.

 “You better watch the gigglers,” I told him. “They’re never what they seem.”

 He looked at me as though I was some madman, swore and walked on. I smiled to myself and burst out laughing. I knew I should never have gone to meet the mother.