Perfect Day

meet hers. Whatever it is between them shifts from chance encounter towards something else.
    She looks down.
    ‘You haven’t got a coffee for yourself,’ she says, a little suspiciously, opening the door a fraction more.
    ‘I’ve already had one.’
    ‘ D’you want another?’
    ‘Great.’
    Neither of them moves.
    She pulls the door open, still hiding behind it in her towel.
    ‘Hello,’ he says, stepping into the room, looking around as if he’s never been here before.
    ‘Hello.’
    She closes the door behind him. He offers her a styrofoam cup with a lid on it. She takes it with the hand that’s not holding onto the towel, then loops round past him keeping as far away as possible. At the other end of the room, she flicks the switch on the kettle and turns on the radio to try to make things a bit more normal.
    The chirpy voice of Chris Tarrant fills the air. She wishes Marie would have it tuned to something else, like Classic FM. He’s not a Capital kind of guy. He sits down on the sofa by the door, long legs stretched out in front of him.
    ‘Why don’t you get dressed?’ he says. ‘I won’t look.’
    Still holding the towel around her, she crouches by the bed and pulls out her suitcase again.
    The black T-shirt, with the black skirt. They’re both clinging cotton. They won’t look right over the loose silk teddy, but she doesn’t want to be changing her underwear with him in the room.
    The kettle steams and switches itself off. She stands up, still wearing the towel, spoons Nescafé into a pink cup, then pours on hot water.
    ‘There’s no milk,’ she tells him. ‘No fridge, see. We used to keep one of those little half-pint cartons on the windowsill, but a pigeon knocked it off. We could hear all this shouting downstairs, and Marie’s pissing herself laughing and trying to get the bloody window up to have a better look, but it won’t move...’
    She rattles the window to demonstrate.
    ‘I like it black,’ he says.
    He gets up and walks across the room.
    He’s behind her.
    ‘My Love Won’t Cost a Thing’ blares out of the radio.
    His face moves closer to her neck.
    Kate freezes.
    He puts one arm each side of her and tries to heave the window up. It won’t budge.
    She’s gripping the towel so hard across her chest, her knuckles hurt.
    His arms drop back to his side.
    She turns round.
    ‘Here’s your coffee,’ she says, pointing at the steaming mug on the table.
    ‘I don’t know what I’m doing here,’ he says, stepping back.
    ‘Nor do I .’
    That didn’t come out like she wanted it to.
    Suddenly Kate can’t bear the music any more. She switches the radio off. The silence is almost more embarrassing than the song.
    ‘I shouldn’t have come,’ says Alexander.
    ‘No, it’s fine.’
    Her head is empty of all vocabulary.
    ‘I’ll think of something to say in a minute,’ she tells him.
    When he smiles it’s like you can’t imagine where the preoccupied person has gone.
    ‘I’d better be off,’ he says.
    ‘No, don’t go!’ she says, reaching out to grab his arm as he turns to leave. The damp towel drops to her feet.
    They both look at it. Then his eyes trail slowly up her body from her bare feet to the silk teddy to her shoulders, her face.
    ‘Jesus, you’re beautiful,’ he says.
    Did he really say that? She’s so busy trying to work out whether she heard it right, and if she should say something in return, that she almost forgets to experience the moment. She’s trembling so much inside, she can’t believe that her limbs appear perfectly still. She can feel her flesh puckering against the caress of gossamer silk lingerie and his gaze.
    She goes to pick up the towel, but he catches her hand, and stands holding it, an arm’s length away from her, as if she’s just curtsied and they’re about to begin a formal dance.
    ‘I don’t know what I’m doing here,’ he says again.
    ‘I don’t normally wear this kind of thing...’ she blurts out. Her voice comes out sounding offended.
    How ridiculous she must look to him, semi-naked in a tart’s apartment protesting innocence.
    ‘Why?’ he asks, nodding at her body.
    ‘I was just trying out what it’s like being a different person,’ she says.
    He thinks about that for a long time, pushing his hands back through his thick dark hair, looking round the room at the pink bath, the oppressive red and gold carpet, the tented bed. Then a little laugh comes out of his mouth, even though he’s not