Sylvia was sixteen and a half when she got pregnant. It had happened at the Jamiesons' twenty-first party, at least that was what she told her parents. True, it might have. She'd named Roy Patterson as the father. Again, it just might have been, and to be fair to him he hadn't cut and run, had stood like a man and owned up to it. Except that the odds were that it was Eric Atkinson who had put her in the family way.
The Jamiesons had gone away for the weekend which was why the party turned out the way it had. By 10.30 there were couples snogging all over the place from,the conservatory up to the sixth bedroom. Slow smoochy music from the stereo and if you were a boy you grabbed the nearest girl and tried your luck, and if it was out you tried another. Sylvia reckoned Sue Ballon was the first one to get laid because she was always boasting about having it off with somebody and judging by the way she was squealing and giggling it wasn't just one of the lads having a bit of finger on the Chesterfield.
Anyway, that was none of Sylvia's business and it wasn't long before Roy Patterson was doing his best to have a feel at her under the guise of doing a very slow samba, a new version that you had to be slightly drunk even to contemplate. A circuitous tour of the corridors, up the stairs, and then they found themselves in Jerry Jamieson's bedroom; the bed was empty, still warm, and there was a damp patch on the bottom sheet.
By this time Sylvia was wanting it very badly, still remembering the loss of her virginity only ten days ago (with Billy Farr) and desperate to relive the experience all over again. Roy was almost too drunk to get aroused properly and she had to give him a helping hand. Then he fumbled and dropped his French letters on the floor and it took him five minutes on his hands and knees with his trousers round his ankles, striking endless matches and threatening to set the pile carpet on fire, before he finally found them.
She told him not to bother with one, even tried to roll it off him when she got really randy but he was adamant. Damn him! That was why it hadn't been such a good screw, that and the fact that he couldn't keep his hard-on.
So later, her appetite already whetted, Sylvia had gone in search of another screw, and stumbling about in the darkened house that now resembled a Soho brothel she had found Eric. Good old Ek!
He had confessed years later that a bird had gone cold on him and he was off to find a nice quiet place to jerk off and sod the birds! Sylvia had taken him upstairs and on the way they had passed a still-drunk Roy who had dropped something else and was striking matches again.
Eric had thought his luck was in when she told him not to bother using anything, didn't even ask if the time of the month was OK. God, he'd really pounded her that night, managed it twice, and it had been four in the morning when she'd got home. Her mother was up waiting for her. Girls who stop out till this time end up pregnant before very long! Not with Roy Patterson though. His name threw a better light on the scene; she didn't mention Eric.
Roy had stood by her but the baby had been adopted so it was really academic. She didn't want to go out with him again, just biding her time to produce Eric out of the conjurer's hat. Come back Eric, I need you.
Those early days had been really good. They could have kept them going if they had both worked at it. She could see his face now as clearly as though it was only yesterday, that cheeky smile, a quip when you expected a lazy draw!. A good lover, the best she had ever had. Jon Quinn didn't amount to much, he fucked when he was in the mood but mostly he was too tired at nights to do anything other than fall fast asleep the moment he got into bed. Oh, Eric, I wish you were here, we missed out on such a lot. We were damned fools, both of us.
She saw his face again; she had to look hard to make sure it really was him because he'd grown a beard, his hair was long and matted and his features were much more squat. But it was Eric all right, the old flame of desire lighting up his eyes the way they used to. She closed her eyes. Opened them again.
He was stilt there, head and squat shoulders framed in the window like a 3-D painting, nose flattened against the glass. That was when she screamed and almost fainted, recoiled against the table, knocked over a jar of beetroot so that it ran blood-red across the scrubbed pine.
Her mind boomeranged, came back and hit her with stunning force. Realisation, so wonderful and yet so awful. Staring back at an empty window, only half-praying that it had been a trick of the mind; hearing the door click open, thud back against the wall.
Eric, I need you, but God I'm scared to hell!
He was in the kitchen. She could hear his stertorous breathing, smell him, a kind of indoor canine odour like a dog that has been curled up on its mat for most of the day. She closed her eyes, wanted to remember him as he had been that night of the Jamiesons' twenty-first party. You don't need to use anything, Eric, I'll be OK. Maybe we could invite Alan round again one evening. Or perhaps we could go look up the Joneses again.
She felt her eyes opening, couldn't stop them. It wasn't a shock because she knew what to expect, braced herself for it. He was kneeling over her, his face only inches from hers so that she smelled his breath. Spring onions, you've been pinching from Jon's garden at night, haven't you? Oh Christ, that's really funny. You always loved onions, Ek, even when we were courting. If I close my eyes I can go right back there only I can't get them shut.
She read a lot in his eyes, things that his brain was incapable of transmitting into words. Half-memories, recognition. He was struggling with it all but it was too much for him so he had to resort to a language he knew. Fingers explored her clothing, unfamiliar with how a blouse and skirt came off.
I'll help you, Ek. She fumbled, her fingers shaking so much that the buttons twisted in their holes and she tore at them in her frustration. You don't have to use anything, I'll be OK. If anything goes wrong we'll blame Roy Patter-son again, OK?
He couldn't wait, was helping her to tear off her remaining garments, grunting his delight as he fingered her, hurt her, but she did not cry out. Oh God, it was too wonderful to be true. You've been searching for me all these months, Eric. How did you find me here . . .?
Guilt; he'd known all along, guessed where she went to get screwed whilst he was away peddling his wares. She dropped her gaze, spread her legs wide, edged back on the hard quarries of the kitchen floor but they had the softness of a French quilt. I didn't want to come here, Eric, please believe me. Can't things be as they once were between us?
He wanted her from behind, lifted her bodily, turned her over, pulled her up into a kneeling position. His thrust took her by surprise, threw her forward so that she hit her head hard on the table leg. Blackness and pain, then he was in her, shuddering her whole body with the lust of weeks of waiting. Mind-blowing, an erotic dream, soaring her to unbelievable heights and then leaving her writhing on the floor. Her strength was gone, her groping arms dropping back down. Don't leave me, Eric, I need you. Take me with you wherever you're going. Don't leave me!
And in those few moments of silence they both heard the sound of approaching footsteps, studded working boots on the yard outside scraping on pebbles. And in that moment Eric Atkinson was a beast of the wild again, primitive man obeying the strongest instinct of all—survival.
One bound took him to the open door. Sylvia glimpsed him from the rear, unfamiliar now, the hairy flesh rippling with muscle, short legs bracing him for the rush to freedom.
'Eric . . . don't leave me, please.'
He ran, low and fast, a direct course for the gap in the straggling hawthorn hedge. Aware of the man he had watched for so long from the hills above, the pale hairless features and strange colourful clothing, the stick he carried that made loud bangs and dropped birds dead in flight.