Timothy Lea's Complete Confessions

“Why don’t I come and clean your windows?” I say as if I’ve just thought of it. “I could give them a Dettol rinse. It’s a speciality of mine, though you’d be amazed how few people ask for it.”

“I wouldn’t. Not at all. Yes, why don’t you, 42 Malplaquet Drive.”

I know it, it’s all walnut trees and concrete paths.

“What day would suit you?”

“Let me see. I play bridge on Wednesdays. Thursday? No, Friday? Yes, Friday. I’ll be there in the afternoon. Come round about half past two. Is that alright?”

“That’s fine.” I say. I know I should leave it there but I’m drunk and I’m a fool. “You have beautiful breasts,” I say.

George is coming over to us so she can’t say anything, but she blushes scarlet and digs her finger nails into the back of my hand so deep that I have blood blisters in the morning.

They start shouting last orders then, so I excuse myself and go back to the Public Bar. As is always the case on such occasions no one has missed me and they are still gabbling away to each other like it’s a public speaking contest. Only Elizabeth notices me and she has Sid looming over her so she’s probably looking around hopefully for anyone.

“Don’t forget,” Sid is saying when I come up to them, “I’m going to be angry if you do.” I half wonder what they’ve been on about but I don’t really give it much thought – not then anyway.

“What do you think of him?” I say to her on the way home.

“Think of who?”

“Sid of course.”

“Oh, he’s alright. Quite nice really. He’s a bit crude but he makes you laugh.”

“What were you talking about?”

“Oh, nothing special. You, quite a bit.” She laughs, “Not that you aren’t special of course.”

There’s a very handy doorway just there and I push her into it and have my hands up her skirt faster than the verger trying to replace a fallen bell clapper, but they’re not there for long.

“Not here!” she says, pushing me away from her, “You’ll have to wait till the weekend.”

But I don’t have to wait till the weekend. I look at the blisters on the back of my hand and I grit my teeth and wait for Friday afternoon. If it wasn’t for the scratch marks I’d have a nasty feeling that I’d dreamed it all, and as if it’s a bit difficult to revive my Saturday night certainty that something was on. I keep thinking that she was probably pissed too, and quite likely to run a mile, or call the police, if I show up at the house. More chance of the former, because a lot of birds talk themselves into all kinds of situations when they’re stoned and get the screaming abdabs the next morning when they realise what they might have let themselves in for.

Anyway, I’m an optimist and I’ve got nothing to lose, so on Friday I put on a clean pair of Jungle Briefs, douse Percy with after shave lotion and I’m off to find my fortune.

Number 42 is very like number 40 and not entirely dissimilar to number 38.

There’s a lot of white paint about, venetian blinds, a boat trailer and highly polished carriage lamps. The whole place looks like they’re expecting a visit from Ideal Home not the window cleaner.

I press the front door bell and listen to the chimes echo through the house. Eventually there’s the sound of someone coming and I see a ripple of movement through the frosted glass. A pause by the door, which is presumably so I can be examined through the spy hole, and then it opens.

“Oh,” says Mrs. Evans, and the surprise seems genuine. “Yes?”

“Window Cleaner. You asked me to call.”

“Oh, yes. Did I? Well, if I did, I did.”

“You asked me in the pub, last Saturday.’

“I’m not disputing it,” her voice is sharp, “I just didn’t recognise your face, that’s all.”

Her tone implies that all window cleaners look the same, like coons or chinks.

“You’d better get on with it. There’s a tap round the back of the house by the kitchen door. Careful with the flower beds, they’re full of bulbs that haven’t come up yet and mind the climbing roses. Don’t lean your ladder against them.”

Big deal. I don’t know why I bothered. Mrs. E. is obviously intent on cutting me right down to size, if she remembers me at all.

It’s a pity, because she’s wearing dark glasses and smelling like a pouf’s birthday party, and her tits are practically sitting up and begging.

Something about the old twin set and pearls always gets me going. I feel as if I’m part of England’s heritage: “Remember, Ambrose, the Duke must never know, but since his accident I have realised that he cannot give me the heir the line so desperately needs. So I have decided that, for the sake of the de Pommefrites, I must take you, who exemplify all that is finest in the English male, to my bed. Come, put on this blindfold and take my hand—”

I can just see it, can’t you? No? Oh well then. Neither can Mrs. E. so I wouldn’t worry about it too much.

I flug round the back of the house and start bashing the windows as if I intended to set a new world record. They’re all cleaner than a mermaid’s tit anyway, so I’m wasting my time in all directions. However, I can’t very well burst into tears and buzz off. I’m effectively hoisted with my own pederast as Sid would say.

In this situation I become careless, and from there it is a short step to becoming injured. I lean too far, the ladder slips and my hand goes clean through the bathroom window. It’s not a deep cut but there’s a lot of blood and it obviously needs binding up. There’s nothing for it but to report to Mrs. Evans. I shin down and rap on the back door which is opened almost before my hand has touched it. Mrs. E. is standing there with her purse in her hand and an expression not unlike that worn by the Duchess of Bloodshot when the first charabanc of the season arrives.

“How much—” she is starting to say when she notices my hand. “Don’t drip all over the mat,” she squeaks, “hold it over the flowerbed. Oh, dear, you haven’t been leaving a trail of blood round the side of the house, have you?”

“I didn’t bother to look,” I say. “If you can give me a rag I’ll go and wipe it up.”

“I’m sorry. But you know how I like to have everything just right.” So she does remember. “Blood is so terribly messy, isn’t it?”

“Yes it is, and I’m afraid there may be a bit more upstairs. I put my hand through the bathroom window.”

You can see that the news really distresses her and she can hardly wait to wrap a bandage round my wrist, before scooting off to see what the damage is. When she returns it is with one of the bathroom curtains over her arm.

“I’ll put this into soak,” she says, “It should be alright. Oh, dear,” she is looking down at my feet, “you should have taken your shoes off. You’ve left mud everywhere.”

There is a bit of exaggeration but on her highly bulled surfaces a gnat’s heavy breathing would show up. The whole place looks like a new set of doll’s house furniture. It’s so clean it’s unreal. When I think of Mrs. Chorlwood and her cats, my mind boggles.

“How is that bandage holding up, it’s not going to start leaking again is it?”

“No, I don’t think so.” She’s only worried about the floor, of course. “You’d better have a cup of tea, and then I can think about finding someone to mend that window. My husband is hopeless at that kind of thing.”

I tell her not to worry because I will do it and we have a cup of coffee because that is what she really wants and she is obviously a lady who is used to getting what she really wants.

I then take my shoes off and put on a pair of George’s slippers and go upstairs to measure the window. I’m not allowed to clean anything up because Mrs. E. knows I wouldn’t do it properly. The rest of the house is just like the kitchen. Everything spotlessly clean and nothing left lying about to break up the straight lines and smooth surfaces. In the bathroom even the shower hose is neatly coiled and there are no bars of soap or toothbrushes beside the wash basin. You feel it would upset everything if you had a piss.

Mrs. E. is down on her hands and knees winkling out bits of glass and just for a second our eyes brush against each other. Her breasts swell forward and I can feel Percy making an ugly rush in the same direction. Luckily I can control myself and scribble down the window dimensions on a sheet of newspaper before scooting off to get another piece of glass and some putty.

It is raining when I come back and I take great care to leave my shoes at the back door before padding upstairs. A few minutes with Mrs. Evans and you’ve got the message. There is no sign of her so I chip out the splinters of glass from the window frame and set to laying a bed of putty. I am so engrossed that the sound of water pouring into the bath sparks me off like an alarm clock ringing. I turn round and find Mrs. Evans standing there wearing a wide-sleeved, silk dressing gown and a pair of slippers. For a moment I think she’s going to hop into the bath but before I can get my pulse back to normal she’s dropped the blood stained curtain into soak and gone out. What a funny woman! She must be highly strung, or bonkers or something. Why the hell has she taken her clothes off?

I replace the window pane and go downstairs. Mrs. E. is finishing the washing up and I notice she even empties the sugar bowl back into the tin marked – wait for it – sugar, and then washes the bowl. How finniky can you get? I should think that if she ever has it away with her old man she must make him wear a surgical mask and put his cock in with a pair of forceps. I can see that she will be able to supply her own rubber gloves.

“Well, that’s that,” I say, “Sorry to cause you so much trouble, but it’s alright now. I don’t think I left any blood anywhere.” She ignores that and pulls her gloves off so that they make a loud smacking noise. Her index fingers flex like long, thin insects.

“Before you go, there is something I would like you to do for me. Can you fix light bulbs?”

“I can screw them into sockets.”

“Good. There’s one gone in the coal cellar and I can’t replace it. If you can put a new one in I’ll hold the torch.”

“O.K.”

So we trip down some stairs beside the kitchen door and Mrs. E. bustles along in front of me her dressing gown brushing against the bannister. She’s got a good body on her, I have to admit that. Too much sand in the bottom half of the hour glass but you can’t be too choosey, except now perhaps, when it’s not on anyway.

She opens a door at the end of the passage and I can see coal glinting in the darkness.

“Dirty.” she says, but it seems to me that there’s more relish in her voice than distaste. Must be my imagination. She switches on the torch and I can see the light socket hanging down like a piece of black fur. The ceiling is low and its no problem reaching it but some joker has left the remains of the last bulb in the socket so I’m struggling again. Suddenly the torch starts to waver and I hear the rustle of clothing. I turn round to see what the trouble is and – there is Mrs. E. silhouetted in the doorway, stark bollock naked. It’s no accident either, because she advances towards me and I can see areas of soft flesh picked out in the back glow of the torch.

Funnily enough, my first reaction is one of fear because I’ve never felt the same about cellars since I saw ‘Pyscho’. My state of mind is not improved by Mrs. E. dropping to her knees and gripping one of my thighs with something like the intensity she showed when scratching me in the boozer. Maybe she’s got a carving knife concealed behind her back. Just to be on the safe side I sink down beside her and run my hands lightly over her body but all I come up with is a light bulb.

“Put it in,” she moans. This request opens so many possibilities that I’m at a bit of a loss as to what to do. Surely she doesn’t want to have it away here? Not the very clean Mrs. E. But maybe that’s it. Maybe, hygienically sealed away from the world, a very dirty lady has been trying to get out.

Her breath smells of toothpaste and there’s no better indication of a woman’s plans for you. I take the heavy fruit of her breasts in my hands and even in the darkness I can see she looks as if she’s been lying in black sand. Her nipples come up like champagne corks and she sinks back into the coal dust and starts unpopping my jeans.

I’m about to chuck the bulb away but she makes it clear she wants some light on the subject and when I’ve fixed things I find that red must be her favourite colour. The bulb gives off a soft pink glow so the cellar looks more like Father Christmas’s grotto than the remains of last years’ coal supply.

By now I reckon I must be dreaming the whole thing, and when she starts writhing in the coal dust I know I am.

“Come down here, come down here,” she begs. Some might refuse but Percy has become a bit of a handful and I know that in this mood it is pointless to try to control him. So, off with my jeans and down I go, and – oh! what fun takes place. Mrs. E. is a very selfish lover but you don’t mind when she is obviously enjoying herself so much. I mean, for a man, the pleasure has got to be in making someone else happy, hasn’t it? Otherwise we’d all get the problem off our tiny minds immediately and have a nice kip.

By the time we’re finished, we’re blacker than a bus conductor’s finger nails. If Al Jolson saw us he’d be on to his lawyers within seconds.

“Now what?” I say and it’s a fair question. Unless she’s got a shower in the coal cellar her lovely clean house is going to look like her old man is a chimney sweep who brings his work home with him.

“Over there,” she snaps, and it’s obvious she’s reverting to type faster than most. “In the corner you’ll find some plastic clothes bags. Put one on and hop up to the bathroom.”

So help me, she says it just like that. As if she’s telling you where to empty the waste bin. I think she’s joking but when I get over there it’s just as she says. A pile of bags with a sash round them saying ‘One dozen suit or costume containers. Keep away from children’ etc., etc. Feeling like a right Charlie I put one on and start shuffling upstairs. Something inside me makes me almost wish George would come in as I’m hopping past the front door. I think maybe it’s that there are only four bags left in the pile and I’m wondering who the other four blokes were.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

When I left Mrs. Evans’ place I was still feeling dirty. Not physically, you understand, because Mrs. E. had taken great care to see that there wasn’t a smidgeon of coal dust on me. There was a shower in the bathroom, a proper one with a frosted glass door and Mrs. E. had taken me inside it with a bottle of shampoo and – Well, you can imagine, can’t you? The lather; the warm, wet bodies rubbing against each other; the slippery fingers gliding everywhere. I was putty in her hands – no, not putty. I do myself a disservice when I say that. What I mean is, she had me again, just as she presumably had all the other blokes. I had played my part in her kinky games and when it was over I was patted on the head and sent on my way.

It began to dawn on me that I wasn’t screwing anybody. All these birds were screwing me. When I thought about it, most of the birds I’d been with had made me fit in with their plans. Their fantasies, or whatever, never changed; only the man who took part in them, and he could have been anyone.

Nothing wrong with that except that it was getting more and more complicated and I was never doing things my way. Having it away in the coal cellar was the last straw. A few more like Mrs. E. and I’d probably only be able to do it standing in a bowl of custard with a rose behind my ear. I could see it affecting my relationship with Elizabeth. Nice, simple girl like that, it would break her heart if she knew what I was getting up to. Imagine, on your wedding night having to say, ‘I’m sorry, love, but you’ll have to hang upside down from the lamp bracket before I can do anything – oh, and don’t forget to put on your riding boots.’ I mean, it would put the mockers on everything, wouldn’t it?

I think that was the moment I made my resolve to give up all the frigging about and settle down.

“It’s got to stop.” I can remember saying the words out loud so that an old lady at the bus stop almost jumped out of her skin and I got embarrassed and tried to cycle on and cracked the back window of the van in front with my ladder. The bloke was very nasty about it and I was still thinking about some of the things he had called me when I got home.

When I arrive, Mum is rolling out pastry in the kitchen, and she looks at me with that ‘I’ve-got-something-to-tell-you’ expression on her face.

“Lady left a note for you,” she says.

“Who was it?”

“I don’t know. She didn’t stop. I just saw her walking away.” Nobody in the world is faster off the mark than Mum when she hears somebody near the front door, and she has eyes that can see through curtains two inches thick.

“She looked like one of those hippies to me. Got some kind of leather cowgirl costume on and a ton of beads.”

“Well, I’d better read the note, hadn’t I?”

“She went off with a black man on a motor bike.” Mum speaks the words as if she expects to be struck down for blasphemy. She doesn’t go and see a lot of Sidney Poitier movies, does Mum.

“I reckon it must be Sandy. My friend Miss Rachel Devroon to you. She has a lot of time for Spades. She says they are much more exciting lovers than white men.”

“Oh! Timmy!”

I have said that strictly for Mum’s benefit and the reaction is exactly as anticipated.

“How can you say such a thing? I hope you aren’t being silly, are you? You don’t want to get into bad company again. Remember what happened last time.”

“No. O.K. Mum, you’ve made your point. Now where is this letter?” Eventually I get it off her and, as I expected, it is from Sandy. ‘Superthrash. Tonite. Ten till then. Now is the time for all good pokes to come to the aid of the party. So please do. Luv, Sandy.’ Of course it’s typical, isn’t it? I’ve no sooner decided to give it all up and live happily ever after than a bloody great load of temptation lands in my lap. I haven’t seen Sandy for weeks and now she comes bouncing back into my life. I hold the letter up to my nostrils and breathe in memories. Mum looks worried.

“She looked a bit old for you, dear,” she says.

“Don’t worry about that, Mum, we’re just good friends.” I’ve never been to one of her parties though she’s talked about some of the things that have gone on at them. Just this once couldn’t do any harm could it? I mean, I’m giving up my wicked ways and turning over a new leaf, so starting tomorrow won’t make any difference. Just to going to this party will serve as an innoculation against any more depravity.

Well, in no time at all I’ve talked myself into it and decided to do something about Elizabeth the next day. I could take her of course, but somehow I don’t think it’s going to be her scene.

I’m dead right there because I can hear the noise before I even get to the street and the sound waves are coming at you like a coloured hangover.

There are cars parked down both sides of the road and there’s everything from puce landrovers to minis painted like unwound marbles. A group of spades are noshing fish and chips outside the front entrance and there is one guy already stoned out of his mind and doing an old-fashioned waltz on the front lawn – by himself, of course.

You can see where the party is, because through the window it looks like an aquarium chock full of people with a few more slid in sideways along the top to fill in the spaces. Sometimes you feel confident that an evening is going to be different and I have a lot of faith in this one.

I bound up the stairs and go in with the kind of upper class twit I normally meet when he leans out of his sports car and asks me how to get to Dulwich. He is all cuff and silk choker, with shiny black shoes with a gold chain across the instep, and it’s obvious that the dolly who is lumbered with him can’t love him half as much as he does.

“You’re looking drool-making, darling,” he lisps, and for a moment I think he’s talking to himself because he’s certainly not looking at the bird.

“Let’s just take a little looksee and if it’s not us we can slope off to my place for drinkypoos.”

“Super!” says the bird who looks the kind of blonde old English Sheep Dog who can’t say anything else, except perhaps “dishy” when describing people like the upper class berk to her friends.

Luckily Sandy appears before they can really get up my nostrils and leads me to a table which is an alcoholic’s dream. She is wearing a silver suit which fits her like a skin below the waist but on top turns into an open waistcoat so you can shake hands with her boobs if you want to. I do want to, but I content myself with giving her nipples a friendly squeeze.

“Where’s the boyfriend?”

“Oh, he had to go back to Nigeria. He’s king or something. Now, who can I introduce you to?”

“You don’t have to bother. I’ll get amongst it when I’ve finished my drink. Who are those people over by the window?” There are three middle-aged couples sipping what looks like sherry and smiling nervously at each other.

“They’re some of my neighbours. I always invite them as a kind of tip off. The smart ones take the hint and stay with friends for the night, but they obviously haven’t got the message. It doesn’t matter because once they’ve been here they can hardly kick up a fuss about the noise. It wouldn’t be British. Oh, look, there’s Amanda. You remember Amanda, don’t you?”

“Yes, of course.”

So I re-meet Amanda who looks a hell of a sight better with her clothes on, and am introduced to her husband, Sebastian. He is a pleasant enough cove but only capable of talking about rugger which limits our conversation a bit as I don’t know a scrum from a line out and couldn’t care less about either. Not that this worries Sebastian who goes rambling on about building a new clubhouse for the Old Shithousians or someone until I’m getting glassy-eyed. Luckily, a wave of dancing breaks out at this moment and I seize Amanda and plunge into the middle of it. She is a good girl to be with because she’s built like a padded bumper car and soaks up most of the punishment that is being dished out. Some of those spades really cut loose when they’re dancing and the amount of black tit shaking about would fill a couple of hammocks.

It’s about this time that I notice a lot more flesh than I was seeing earlier in the evening and realise that there are a lot of birds following Sandy’s lead. One fantastic dolly with an Afro hairstyle, blue lips and luminous eye make-up has tassels on her tits and could save you buying an electric fan the way she whirls them around.

Not everybody is dancing though. In one of the bedrooms there is a small group of pot smokers passing round a joint and a couple who have just found they are very much in love and are proving it to anyone who cares to watch.

I snake off for a slash because I can sense that Amanda is getting a bit fruity and I don’t fancy it. Also, husband Sebastian is making going-home noises and I can see that a big row is looming up. I want Sandy, but she is being the good hostess and helping people to vomit or find their coats, according to need, so there is nothing for me there. “Later, darling, later,” she breathes.

Frankly, the way things are going, I’m not certain there is going to be a later. I can definitely feel the walls moving when I lean against them and some of the dancing can only be described as screwing to music. The whole scene has gone up as if it had been soaked in petrol and set fire to and when that happens the flames can be pretty high but they don’t last long.

Things aren’t helped by a gang of skinheads who resent the spade influence at the party – and anybody except themselves having a good time – and are pelting the front entrance with milk bottles. This kind of activity is not slow to stir a response and soon the party divides itself into groups. Sebastian at last begins to enjoy himself and leads a party of idiots on to the balcony to hurl bottles at the skinheads; the pot smokers go on smoking pot; a few mainliners are linking arms in the lav and sharing a love fix; and the rest of us are trying to screw each other. This latter pursuit is helped by the fact that nearly all the lights are off and even the most faint-hearted start stripping down to their birthday suits. It is at this moment that Sandy makes a spectacular entrance stark naked except for her minge cosy into which she has woven some luminous coloured wool. This merry little device catches the fancy of everyone and in no time we are all sitting on the floor weaving patterns in each other’s pubic hairs. Sounds ridiculous, doesn’t it? But it’s amazing how something as bloody stupid as that can seem like the most amusing thing in the world when you are pissed. Of course none of the patterns ever got finished because with all the touching up that is going on people’s enthusiasm soon gets syphoned away into other pursuits. I am a bit disappointed because I am doing a lovely white Star of David in this black bird’s fuzz when she suddenly makes it impossible for me to continue. Not that I am complaining, mind you, and none of the other writhing couples around us seem unduly upset either.