To lighten the mood and erase the conversation that has just taken place, I tell him I have theatre tickets for next week and I ask if would he like to come with me. I am resolutely convinced of my power to re-invent us as a fully functioning couple.
With scant interest, he asks what play it is, and I tell him it’s an Indian version of Midsummer Night’s Dream. He pulls a face like I’ve just poured a very hot curry down his trousers, and says his attention span is rather limited and the Bard, therefore, is not someone he can sit through.
While still desperate to repair the situation, I am becoming mildly exasperated. Surely it would be easier to just give up? I question my motives. Maybe it’s the challenge that drives me on. I’ve had men not wanting me before, but for some reason, I want this one more than I ever wanted any of them. And I do want to help him; I doubt he’s ever had someone who really cares about him like I do.
We continue our disjointed dialogue which winds blindly through a complex maze of dark passages and alleyways until it comes to a grinding halt somewhere north of nowhere. It’s like I’m talking Icelandic and he’s answering in Cantonese.
Reverting to my default setting of Jewish mother, I suggest we have something to eat. He admits to being hungry and seems surprised and grateful that I should offer to cook for him, like no-one’s ever done this before.
I try to get him to help me in the kitchen to create some sort of positive dynamic between us, but he doesn’t even know how to slice a mushroom, so I end up doing it all myself.
I rustle up a smoked salmon and avocado starter and make a risotto which he appears to enjoy. At least something has pleased him about tonight. The hostess, sadly… pas beaucoup…
Over dinner, he perks up a bit and talks about his teenage years and how he used to play in a band, but not once during the evening is there any of the lightness of spirit or humorous piquancy of the holiday passing between us.
And then it’s 10.30 p.m. and he says he has to go. He needs his sleep so he asks me to call him a taxi and the minute it arrives, he leaves.
I get a half-hearted hug at the door, do the washing-up and go to bed feeling melancholy and hopeless. The whole emotional investment of the past two weeks seems to be producing no return.
The Pet Shop Boys sing me sleep, their lyrics strangely appropriate to my darkening mood:
When I look back upon my life,
It’s always with a sense of shame
I’ve always been the one to blame…
Saturday, 7 June 2008
Monday, 2 June 2008
THE DAILY MALE - continues...02/06/08
‘I cannot allow myself to fall in love with you. I will get terribly hurt. And…’ he drops his voice so I can hardly hear him, ‘I cannot have sex without love…’
I take onboard what he’s saying, resenting the fact that it was fine for him to have ‘sex without love’ just a few days ago.
I suddenly decide to give him a proof copy of The Toyboy Diaries. Maybe it would work like homeopathy – treat the sickness with the sickness. I take one off the shelf and drop it into his lap.
‘Instead of imagining the worst, why don’t you read it?’ I suggest. ‘It’s nowhere near as bad as you may think, especially since most of it is made up!’
My nose grows by at least an inch and my tone is possibly half an octave harsher than usual. I’m still smarting from the No Sex Please – We’re Skittish comment. He recoils as he lifts the book gingerly off his lap and holds it at arm’s length as if it’s a ticking time bomb.
‘Please don’t throw things at me,’ he bleats ‘and don’t shout…’
I apologize, and consider that, should we ever by any remote chance get it together, I might have to temper everything I do around him: my voice, my mood, my personality, my behaviour. Christ! Do I really want to live like that?
He turns the book over frowning deeply as he reads the back cover. I stand there chewing my thumb, like a schoolgirl whose father is reading a letter from the Headmaster informing him that she’s been caught in the toilets giving the gym teacher a blow-job.
‘How can it possibly work out between you and me?’ he asks despairingly having scanned the best of the worst of my story. ‘You’ll always be looking over my shoulder for the next 19-year old!’
‘I will not!’ I cry defensively. ‘That affair happened twenty years ago and I’m so over all that now…’
How far can you bend the truth before it snaps?
I take onboard what he’s saying, resenting the fact that it was fine for him to have ‘sex without love’ just a few days ago.
I suddenly decide to give him a proof copy of The Toyboy Diaries. Maybe it would work like homeopathy – treat the sickness with the sickness. I take one off the shelf and drop it into his lap.
‘Instead of imagining the worst, why don’t you read it?’ I suggest. ‘It’s nowhere near as bad as you may think, especially since most of it is made up!’
My nose grows by at least an inch and my tone is possibly half an octave harsher than usual. I’m still smarting from the No Sex Please – We’re Skittish comment. He recoils as he lifts the book gingerly off his lap and holds it at arm’s length as if it’s a ticking time bomb.
‘Please don’t throw things at me,’ he bleats ‘and don’t shout…’
I apologize, and consider that, should we ever by any remote chance get it together, I might have to temper everything I do around him: my voice, my mood, my personality, my behaviour. Christ! Do I really want to live like that?
He turns the book over frowning deeply as he reads the back cover. I stand there chewing my thumb, like a schoolgirl whose father is reading a letter from the Headmaster informing him that she’s been caught in the toilets giving the gym teacher a blow-job.
‘How can it possibly work out between you and me?’ he asks despairingly having scanned the best of the worst of my story. ‘You’ll always be looking over my shoulder for the next 19-year old!’
‘I will not!’ I cry defensively. ‘That affair happened twenty years ago and I’m so over all that now…’
How far can you bend the truth before it snaps?
Thursday, 22 May 2008
THE DAILY MALE - continues...23/5/08
Monday. I don’t hear from him all day. I leave him be, it’s his first day back at work, as it is mine. In spite of last night’s heavy and disturbing conversation, I am in denial, convinced he will reverse his decision, still on some kind of holiday high.
I have a stab at doing some work, make some phone calls and bring my girlfriends up to speed (mostly leaving out the Hot Frog fuck fest).
I think about CC constantly and after a thrashing night of inner torment, I text him.
Miss you a lot. Hope you are OK? : - ( xxx
Several hours pass and eventually he replies.
I have missed you terribly and slept little. I'm pretty sure I am not strong enough for this Xxx
With the imminent release of The Toyboy Diaries, there is a flurry of publicity out there and I cannot stop it. Like Diana’s sister said to her the night before The Royal Wedding: ‘You can’t back out now, Duch…your face is on the tea towels.’
I draft a reply:
Sweetheart, I am devastated and crying as I write. I understand your fears but please can we talk one more time? I couldn’t bear not to see you again. We have a chance for love. Is that not worth a shot? xxx
But I don’t send it.
In the evening, he phones me. He is very somber, his voice flat and monochrome. I somehow manage to persuade him to come over tomorrow night so we can talk face to face.
Wednesday. He calls me several times during the afternoon to tell me he’s running late. Every time I see his name on my screen I’m convinced he’s going to cancel. My two best girlfriends are au fait with the situation, and I have already placed bets with them as to what the evening holds in store. They try to keep my spirits up, but I know what I know. It’s a self-fulfilling prophesy. He’s coming over to tell me that he’s made his final decision. It is going to be over.
And so it comes to pass that he enters my doorway at 7.20 p.m. and slumps down in my tiny tub chair with such a badass body language, I can hardly believe it’s the same person. And no one ever sits in that chair anyway – unless the three-seater sofa has four people on it.
He is too far away from me for a start, and despite his stature of 6’2”, he seems to have imploded, shrunken in on himself as he hunches, withdrawn and anxious, unable or unwilling to make eye contact.
‘What can I do to take us back to last week?’ I plead gently.
He glances at me like he’s never seen me before and quickly looks away.
‘If you like toyboys so much’ he says, expelling the word from his mouth like a bitter taste, ‘what on earth are you interested in me for? I’m forty-six, for God’s sake, practically geriatric…’
‘You’re not!’ I argue. 'I…’
He shakes his head vigorously to show he will not listen.
‘But how would I trust you?’ he asks simply... and I have no answer to that.
I have a stab at doing some work, make some phone calls and bring my girlfriends up to speed (mostly leaving out the Hot Frog fuck fest).
I think about CC constantly and after a thrashing night of inner torment, I text him.
Miss you a lot. Hope you are OK? : - ( xxx
Several hours pass and eventually he replies.
I have missed you terribly and slept little. I'm pretty sure I am not strong enough for this Xxx
With the imminent release of The Toyboy Diaries, there is a flurry of publicity out there and I cannot stop it. Like Diana’s sister said to her the night before The Royal Wedding: ‘You can’t back out now, Duch…your face is on the tea towels.’
I draft a reply:
Sweetheart, I am devastated and crying as I write. I understand your fears but please can we talk one more time? I couldn’t bear not to see you again. We have a chance for love. Is that not worth a shot? xxx
But I don’t send it.
In the evening, he phones me. He is very somber, his voice flat and monochrome. I somehow manage to persuade him to come over tomorrow night so we can talk face to face.
Wednesday. He calls me several times during the afternoon to tell me he’s running late. Every time I see his name on my screen I’m convinced he’s going to cancel. My two best girlfriends are au fait with the situation, and I have already placed bets with them as to what the evening holds in store. They try to keep my spirits up, but I know what I know. It’s a self-fulfilling prophesy. He’s coming over to tell me that he’s made his final decision. It is going to be over.
And so it comes to pass that he enters my doorway at 7.20 p.m. and slumps down in my tiny tub chair with such a badass body language, I can hardly believe it’s the same person. And no one ever sits in that chair anyway – unless the three-seater sofa has four people on it.
He is too far away from me for a start, and despite his stature of 6’2”, he seems to have imploded, shrunken in on himself as he hunches, withdrawn and anxious, unable or unwilling to make eye contact.
‘What can I do to take us back to last week?’ I plead gently.
He glances at me like he’s never seen me before and quickly looks away.
‘If you like toyboys so much’ he says, expelling the word from his mouth like a bitter taste, ‘what on earth are you interested in me for? I’m forty-six, for God’s sake, practically geriatric…’
‘You’re not!’ I argue. 'I…’
He shakes his head vigorously to show he will not listen.
‘But how would I trust you?’ he asks simply... and I have no answer to that.
Sunday, 11 May 2008
THE DAILY MALE - continues...11/05/08
Over the next few hours, as he lies in the darkness of my womb-like room, the tall, upright, confident, accomplished, funny, genial holiday man disappears and in his place appears an ailing, timid, frightened, emotionally-disabled wreck. I don’t recognize him at all.
He talks about past love affairs which haven’t worked out, deep insecurities, low self-esteem in his work and personal life, hypochondria and as if this weren't enough, an overwhelming conviction that he will die young. A bundle of laughs it ain't...
The most incomprehensible thing he tells me, and what confuses me most of all, is that much as he says it would be easy to fall in love because he finds me ‘lovely, lovely, so very lovely...’ he is afraid in case he becomes addicted. Best case scenario, in my book...someone needs to become addicted but I surely don't want it to be me...(how little I knew at this point...)
He says he is not strong but I think he is actually very strong to make such a conscious and calculated decision. After all, if love was a choice, would any of us choose such exquisite torment?
Based on what I told him about myself that first night we sat talking in the bar, crowing as I am wont to do about conquests past and present, he probably thinks he knows me pretty well. He says he suspects my ability to be faithful as I joked to him on that first night when we exchanged confidences, that as a girlfriend I was probably ‘a very bad bet’.
In some perverse and obtuse way, I was daring him to fall for me even then. But he does not dare. He does not dare at all.
During those long hours as we lay talking in my bed, the daylight, denied by the tightly-closed curtains, turns to dusk, but much as I try, I cannot divert CC from his chosen path. I tell him my past is my past; that I’m ready and willing for a new beginning, that I would very much like it to be with him, but he is resolutely unconvinced.
His weakness is tangible, the depth of his dejection a living presence in my room. I can now smell with an animal’s instinct the scent of fear. In the context of us as a couple, I feel like I’m the alpha male now, as CC sobs silently more than once in my arms. And I know now, though not quite why, how truly damaged this poor man is.
And so my niggling suspicion of something not quite right comes home to roost - not, as I thought, because of his being in another relationship - but because he appears unable to sustain one even with himself.
At midnight, with no further distance for us to travel, he gets up and leaves. My optimistic side thinks I may be able to draw him back, but the pessimist in me has its doubts. And so the scales slide again, for now I am the weaker and he the stronger.
An acerbic one-liner comes to mind:
You can’t make somebody love you. All you can do is stalk them and hope that eventually one day they’ll give in.
He talks about past love affairs which haven’t worked out, deep insecurities, low self-esteem in his work and personal life, hypochondria and as if this weren't enough, an overwhelming conviction that he will die young. A bundle of laughs it ain't...
The most incomprehensible thing he tells me, and what confuses me most of all, is that much as he says it would be easy to fall in love because he finds me ‘lovely, lovely, so very lovely...’ he is afraid in case he becomes addicted. Best case scenario, in my book...someone needs to become addicted but I surely don't want it to be me...(how little I knew at this point...)
He says he is not strong but I think he is actually very strong to make such a conscious and calculated decision. After all, if love was a choice, would any of us choose such exquisite torment?
Based on what I told him about myself that first night we sat talking in the bar, crowing as I am wont to do about conquests past and present, he probably thinks he knows me pretty well. He says he suspects my ability to be faithful as I joked to him on that first night when we exchanged confidences, that as a girlfriend I was probably ‘a very bad bet’.
In some perverse and obtuse way, I was daring him to fall for me even then. But he does not dare. He does not dare at all.
During those long hours as we lay talking in my bed, the daylight, denied by the tightly-closed curtains, turns to dusk, but much as I try, I cannot divert CC from his chosen path. I tell him my past is my past; that I’m ready and willing for a new beginning, that I would very much like it to be with him, but he is resolutely unconvinced.
His weakness is tangible, the depth of his dejection a living presence in my room. I can now smell with an animal’s instinct the scent of fear. In the context of us as a couple, I feel like I’m the alpha male now, as CC sobs silently more than once in my arms. And I know now, though not quite why, how truly damaged this poor man is.
And so my niggling suspicion of something not quite right comes home to roost - not, as I thought, because of his being in another relationship - but because he appears unable to sustain one even with himself.
At midnight, with no further distance for us to travel, he gets up and leaves. My optimistic side thinks I may be able to draw him back, but the pessimist in me has its doubts. And so the scales slide again, for now I am the weaker and he the stronger.
An acerbic one-liner comes to mind:
You can’t make somebody love you. All you can do is stalk them and hope that eventually one day they’ll give in.
Sunday, 27 April 2008
I'M BACK!
Hi Everyone,
Thanks for all your comments and for checking in even though there was nothing new to read. I'll remedy that now!
Since my last blog, I have acquired a new man in my life: the cutest, most darling little grandson. I love him to bits and I hope he grows to be a good boy and an even better man, unlike some we know...
Now, on with the story...
Thanks for all your comments and for checking in even though there was nothing new to read. I'll remedy that now!
Since my last blog, I have acquired a new man in my life: the cutest, most darling little grandson. I love him to bits and I hope he grows to be a good boy and an even better man, unlike some we know...
Now, on with the story...
THE DAILY MALE - continues...27/04/08
Sunday. After a hurried breakfast, we all pile bleary-eyed into the coach and leave the resort at the crack of dawn. The Club Med staff stands sleepily on the roadway waving us goodbye, waiting to greet the next contingent. Hot Frog is not among them. He’ll be getting his beauty sleep, girding his loins for next week’s willing influx.
As we wind down through the mountains, a terrible pain tears through me like I’ve ripped the ligaments around my heart. The euphoria which has driven me through the week crashes to sea level, and a hollow feeling of aloneness assails me. Mine is a life of short-lived loves and long-lived losses.
CC and I have barely acknowledged each other, and although he’s sitting across the aisle, all we’ve shared this morning is one fleeting look. I feel very detached from him. The carefree mood has broken, and that warning bell begins to ring again. I begin to explore what I’d previously denied. What if he’s in a relationship back home? He could even be married. Holiday romances very rarely travel, and although he’s mentioned wanting to see me again, I have no idea when or even if this will happen.
This wrong-foots me when I think of what we’ve shared, and the Grim Reaper escorts me all the way to Annecy.
As the coach rounds the lake however, I get a text from him, and like a broken bird with brand new wings, I flap and fly again.
So many parts of you I need to kiss… Oh. My. God. I couldn’t have written that better if I’d tried. My heart swells and a feeling like warm treacle spreads through my chest.
I SO needed that. I text back. Am feeling weirdly disconnected…xxx
I knew today would be hard for both of us… he replies and for the last two hours of this crazy journey, we send each other funny, tender, sexy messages of love and understanding.
Although we check-in together at Geneva Airport, we fail to get seats side by side. Just before takeoff, unable to stand the uncertainty any longer and terrified of a quick peck goodbye at Gatwick and him disappearing from my life forever, I phone him where he’s sitting somewhere behind me and ask if he will come home with me after we land.
If nothing else…to help carry my case upstairs? Xxx
OK he replies and I could not be happier.
Except for that tiny niggle which I’m trying to ignore...
As we wind down through the mountains, a terrible pain tears through me like I’ve ripped the ligaments around my heart. The euphoria which has driven me through the week crashes to sea level, and a hollow feeling of aloneness assails me. Mine is a life of short-lived loves and long-lived losses.
CC and I have barely acknowledged each other, and although he’s sitting across the aisle, all we’ve shared this morning is one fleeting look. I feel very detached from him. The carefree mood has broken, and that warning bell begins to ring again. I begin to explore what I’d previously denied. What if he’s in a relationship back home? He could even be married. Holiday romances very rarely travel, and although he’s mentioned wanting to see me again, I have no idea when or even if this will happen.
This wrong-foots me when I think of what we’ve shared, and the Grim Reaper escorts me all the way to Annecy.
As the coach rounds the lake however, I get a text from him, and like a broken bird with brand new wings, I flap and fly again.
So many parts of you I need to kiss… Oh. My. God. I couldn’t have written that better if I’d tried. My heart swells and a feeling like warm treacle spreads through my chest.
I SO needed that. I text back. Am feeling weirdly disconnected…xxx
I knew today would be hard for both of us… he replies and for the last two hours of this crazy journey, we send each other funny, tender, sexy messages of love and understanding.
Although we check-in together at Geneva Airport, we fail to get seats side by side. Just before takeoff, unable to stand the uncertainty any longer and terrified of a quick peck goodbye at Gatwick and him disappearing from my life forever, I phone him where he’s sitting somewhere behind me and ask if he will come home with me after we land.
If nothing else…to help carry my case upstairs? Xxx
OK he replies and I could not be happier.
Except for that tiny niggle which I’m trying to ignore...
Monday, 3 March 2008
THE DAILY MALE - continues...03/03/08
Later that night, having dined with the nonchalant confidence borne of a deliciously-naughty shared secret, CC and I slip away to his room and make love once again. I am bemused at how comfortable I feel with him, and I ignore the distant warning bell pealing intermittently in my subconscious. Despite the rose-tinted ski specs I have been wearing all week, somehow, somewhere, something tells me something about this man is not quite right.
Despite his outgoing humour, he has a quiet introversion about him, yet when we are making love, although he is vocal and convulsive in his climaxes, he withholds something he will not release. I can’t put my finger on it, and I do not want to delve too deeply while we are still in holiday mode.
Saturday. Our last day – most of which CC and I spend together. Hot Frog texts to invite me to his lair later that evening, and rather like a bride going out for one last shag before embracing a life of moral rectitude, I agree.
Realistically, after today, I may never see either of them again, so I’m stocking up my sex bank in case the market crashes.
Knowing we all have a hideously early start next morning, CC makes it easy for me to pursue my nefarious exploit by turning in straight after dinner. He does not invite me to his room and seems already somewhat withdrawn. The alarm bell peals a little louder but I’m on a mission so I ignore it.
CBF and I go back to our room after dinner to finish packing, and I tell her I’ll be popping out for an hour or so. She is so weakened by her bout of sickness, she can barely manage to raise one eyebrow. I’m sure she’s wondering who I’m off to shag this time but is probably past caring. She’s had a lousy week and now she just wants to get home.
I kiss her goodnight, set the alarm for 5 a.m. and on the stroke of midnight, climb the back stairs for the last time up to Hot Frog’s apartment. As if observing myself from a distance, I am disappointed by my weakness of character. Why could I not have just said 'No'? I am devaluing what I feel for CC and mixed in with a misguided feeling of smugness, there lingers the acrid odour of self-disgust.
Hot Frog greets me warmly immediately showing off his new-found kissing technique. The sex is nowhere near as exciting as the first time, and I can’t wait to get out of there. I wish I’d never come tonight. In fact, I didn’t come tonight. But when it’s time to say goodbye, he hugs me tightly and says: ‘It was such a pleajure meeting you. Stay exactly as you are. Tu es magnifique!’ and I go off down the back stairs smiling.
I am still en vacances after all…when all things are permissible…
DEAR FAITHFUL READERS,
I MAY BE SUSPENDING MY BLOG FOR A WHILE AS I WORK ON THE FINAL EDIT OF 'THE DAILY MALE' PRIOR TO IT GOING TO MY PUBLISHERS.
THANK YOU ALL SO MUCH FOR READING AND COMMENTING AND PLEASE FEEL FREE TO SEND ME ANY MESSAGES YOU WISH.
KEEP POPPING IN AS I SHALL POST UP SOME MORE EXPLOITS AS AND WHEN THEY OCCUR!
BEST WISHES,
WENDY
Despite his outgoing humour, he has a quiet introversion about him, yet when we are making love, although he is vocal and convulsive in his climaxes, he withholds something he will not release. I can’t put my finger on it, and I do not want to delve too deeply while we are still in holiday mode.
Saturday. Our last day – most of which CC and I spend together. Hot Frog texts to invite me to his lair later that evening, and rather like a bride going out for one last shag before embracing a life of moral rectitude, I agree.
Realistically, after today, I may never see either of them again, so I’m stocking up my sex bank in case the market crashes.
Knowing we all have a hideously early start next morning, CC makes it easy for me to pursue my nefarious exploit by turning in straight after dinner. He does not invite me to his room and seems already somewhat withdrawn. The alarm bell peals a little louder but I’m on a mission so I ignore it.
CBF and I go back to our room after dinner to finish packing, and I tell her I’ll be popping out for an hour or so. She is so weakened by her bout of sickness, she can barely manage to raise one eyebrow. I’m sure she’s wondering who I’m off to shag this time but is probably past caring. She’s had a lousy week and now she just wants to get home.
I kiss her goodnight, set the alarm for 5 a.m. and on the stroke of midnight, climb the back stairs for the last time up to Hot Frog’s apartment. As if observing myself from a distance, I am disappointed by my weakness of character. Why could I not have just said 'No'? I am devaluing what I feel for CC and mixed in with a misguided feeling of smugness, there lingers the acrid odour of self-disgust.
Hot Frog greets me warmly immediately showing off his new-found kissing technique. The sex is nowhere near as exciting as the first time, and I can’t wait to get out of there. I wish I’d never come tonight. In fact, I didn’t come tonight. But when it’s time to say goodbye, he hugs me tightly and says: ‘It was such a pleajure meeting you. Stay exactly as you are. Tu es magnifique!’ and I go off down the back stairs smiling.
I am still en vacances after all…when all things are permissible…
DEAR FAITHFUL READERS,
I MAY BE SUSPENDING MY BLOG FOR A WHILE AS I WORK ON THE FINAL EDIT OF 'THE DAILY MALE' PRIOR TO IT GOING TO MY PUBLISHERS.
THANK YOU ALL SO MUCH FOR READING AND COMMENTING AND PLEASE FEEL FREE TO SEND ME ANY MESSAGES YOU WISH.
KEEP POPPING IN AS I SHALL POST UP SOME MORE EXPLOITS AS AND WHEN THEY OCCUR!
BEST WISHES,
WENDY
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