Blind Carnival

A Question to Ask

They finished their dinner and moved to his sofa. Nina Simone is playing quietly in the background - vinyl on Audio Technica AT-LP120-USB, by the way. She's purposefully gone to the turning table and made a mental note of the brand. According to John, it's the best. She knows nothing about posh music listening - which she gleefully informed John of, pretending to be outraged by his 'pretentious tastes' - but she might put one into Gerome's living room, which he will use to slowly seduce his victim into a night of regrettable debauchery.

This new novel of hers is going absolutely brill now - for quite a telling reason. She sort of struggled with it last month, something felt off. But yesterday she introduced the second male character who will be the perfect competition to Gerome. Initially she planned to make Gerome see the light and give up his manwhore ways. Not that sleeping around is a flaw, she's all for sex positivity. It's his cruel scheming and manipulations that needed to be given up. He was supposed to grow as a person and stop trying to ruin her life. Readers love that. The reformed womanizer trope never grows old. He used to shag anything that walked, but now, Theresa's supposed to be all he wants. He was going to become a decent human being, and they would have glorious monogamous, hanky-panky. It never happens in real life. Also, in real life these two things have nothing to do with each other.

The thing is, now that she's tucked under the arm of the epitome of a 'nice guy,' she's starting to wonder why Theresa would even consider Gerome. His looks and his seductive abs simply can't distract a sane person from the fact that he's planning to forge her guardian's signature to allow her to legally marry him so that he can steal her trust fund.

"Are you writing in your head?"

John's soft voice shakes her out of her stupor. Oops, she apparently has been staring at the wall. She turns her face to him. He smiles and kisses the tip of her nose. It's so sweet, that if she wasn't all loved up, she'd probably say it's too much. And yet. Damn it, she needs to take this 'fancying a bloke way too early' situation under control.

"Yeah, sorry."

She gives him an apologetic smile back.

"Don't be. It's pretty fascinating. Your fingers move."

He picks up her hand. He's right, it sometimes looks as if she's playing an invisible piano when she narrates in her head. She has spacial cognition. She imagines a plot as a series of twists and turns, like some sort of barmy golden ribbons, and then she moves them in some sort of a mental space. Basically, she look like a berk. She gives him a suspicious look. It's hard to imagine anyone would enjoy watching that. He seems to, though.

She decides they both need a distraction from her constant mental narrative, and she stretches and catches his lips. That's much better. Bless the silence.

It's tender, sweet, and... surprisingly, asexual. His hand is on the back of her head, cradling it, another one is gently stroking her hip, but again, it's like he's petting a cat. Is it the nice large supper and two glasses of red wine he's had? The statistics of later life erectile dysfunction, or possibly erectile dissatisfaction, pop up in her head. As well as the consistent advice from psychologists and health specialists: with an older man, no wine, shag earlier during the day, and no distraction.

He chuckles into her lips.

"Should I leave you alone with your manwhore protagonist?"

She once again focuses on him.

"I wasn't writing..."

She feels blush spill on her cheekbones. Should she tell him she was wondering whether he's floppy and doesn't want to have monkey sex with her right now and if he would prefer to cuddle and go to sleep?