In Bed With Lord Byron

not?’
    ‘Because they’ll think I’m mad.’
    ‘But you
are
mad; surely, if they’re your friends, they’ve already worked this out.’
    Keep calm, I told myself, don’t let him know he’s getting to you or he’ll never stop.
    ‘I’m just going to say you’re George, all right? Look, just keep saying this rhyme in your head.’ I improvised wildly:
‘I’m not a famous poet, I
don’t like lovemaking / My name is George and I work in computing
.’
    ‘I don’t think I’d care to remember such a frightful piece of poetry. The scansion doesn’t work at all.’ Byron’s eyebrows knitted together in an elegant,
faintly disdainful frown. ‘Perhaps you ought to be dating Andrew Motion, not me.’
    ‘Well, since he’s a much better poet than you are, that might be a good idea,’ I replied, throwing the dishcloth at him.
    Byron simmered.
    In my despair, I couldn’t even face the kitchen. I decided to get ready first and then think about food. As a last resort, I figured that I could always order a takeaway,
but pride was holding me back. I knew that Anthony would know, and then he’d probably tell Kerry later, in some giggly postcoital chat, and then he’d probably tell her all about me
being a crap cook, and damn it, I wanted to prove I could compete.
    I spent two hours getting ready, and everything I tried on was assessed in comparison to how I imagined Kerry would look. My picture of her began to escalate in my mind until I felt she could be
no less beautiful than Aphrodite rising out of the ocean: hair aflame, face an oval of perfection, body a sea of curves. Suddenly all my faults glared out horribly: tiny breasts, massive hips,
thunder thighs. By the time I had finally decided on my little black dress, I was nearly hysterical with nerves. Twice I picked up my mobile and nearly called Anthony to pretend I was sick and
wanted to call it all off.
    I decided that a shot of Archers might help before tackling the cooking.
    As I stalked back into the kitchen, dress flaring, silver earrings jingling, Lord Byron looked up from
Now
magazine and let out a piercing wolf whistle. I jumped and glared, but felt
faintly cheered.
    I opened up the cookery book.
French onion soup is a simple recipe
, I read. The word ‘simple’ was always a dangerous one in recipes. For me, anyway.
    I looked at Byron and thought: what the heck. Promise now and barter later.
    ‘Byron,’ I said, fluttering my lashes, ‘I’ve been thinking about your, um, proposal, and I was thinking it was a good one. If you help me cook for you, I’ll, uh,
you know . . .’
    Byron grinned widely, threw the magazine aside and leapt to his feet, pulling me to his chest.
    ‘Later,’ I said. ‘We’ve only got an hour.’
    Byron, to his credit, was a great help. I can’t imagine that he’d done a lot of cooking back in 1813 when all that was considered woman’s work, but as time went on, he actually
got his teeth into it. I think it was rather a novelty for him to shut down the much-used cerebral part of his brain and channel his imagination into something earthy and practical. When a little
French onion soup splashed on to his cravat, he even ended up borrowing my apron with rubber ducks on. It made me feel strange. That was the apron Anthony wore when he’d cooked for me.
    Byron made the stock for the soup whilst I took care of the onion-chopping; then he helped me to locate a roasting tin at the back of my cupboard, covered with dust; we washed it and set the
chicken pieces in it – and to my surprise I found I could be a reasonable cook. I realised that the reason I was lousy was because cooking bored me and I tended to start wandering off and
checking my emails until I was disturbed by the smell of burning. A little focus made the world of difference. Soon the stove was bubbling and frothing with Brussels sprouts and broccoli, the
chicken pieces were sizzling away nicely and a tiramisu was sitting in the fridge (OK, I’d cheated and bought that straight from M&S, but I figured I was allowed a little leeway). Now all
I had to do was the gravy.
    As I started to crumble the Oxo cube, Byron came up behind me. He took my hair and twisted it into a tight coil and pinned it up with his fingers, leaning in until I felt his breath on my
skin.
    The doorbell rang.
    ‘Don’t answer it,’ he said, turning me round and kissing me.
    ‘I have to.’
    ‘Leave them out in the rain.’
    ‘
Byron!
’
    ‘What the hell have