Playing James by Sarah Mason Read Free Book Online Page A

nights together as a sort of a solace. A tribute to the start of the working week. We have a bottle of wine, maybe some ice cream. Sometimes we watch a video, sometimes we just talk. Ben is normally at rugby practice on Monday nights and Alastair is always working (but that's not just Monday nights).
    Lizzie is fine after the condom incident. In fact, we both had pretty much forgotten about it by the next morning, although one tub of Ben & Jerry's ice cream and numerous videos on Thursday evening did help. There was still no sign of Alastair over the entire weekend although Lizzie did claim he had been called away to an important meeting in London. It does make me wonder how serious he is about her. I am completely prejudiced though because who wouldn't want to be with Lizzie? It is a mystery to me why he spends so much time working and lets her loose in my debauched company. She is mad about him and I am hoping this is just a natural cooling-off of the relationship on his side, which always happens after the initial can't-keep-my-hands-off-you phase.
    As I buzz Lizzie in, I swing my head around the front door of my flat and wait for her to climb the stairs. She appears a couple of seconds later, grasping a bottle of wine in one hand and two Kinder eggs in the other. Her long dark hair hangs in a gleaming sheet on to her shoulders and her D-cup breasts jig about as she jogs up on her long, gazelle-like legs to the top step. Lizzie has an extra cup size on me which I would be very glad of, but she complains about it a lot. Do you know the test where you're supposed to be able to clasp a pencil underneath your breasts? Well, Lizzie grumbles that she can not only clasp several pencils but also a ruler, a protractor and a large rubber too.
    'Hello!' She gives me an exuberant kiss on the cheek. 'How are you?'
    'Fine, how are you? Feeling OK now? Did Alastair get back on Sunday?'
    She nods. I have only met Alastair a couple of times, which is a little strange in itself, but he is working so much he doesn't see Lizzie very often, let alone me. He is good-looking in a studious kind of way and wears a pair of those very trendy wire glasses.
    'Have I said how sorry I am about that?'
    I grin. 'Yes. I believe you have mentioned it. But I'll let you say it one more time if you want to. I like the way it rolls off your tongue.'
    'Sony.'
    I take the wine off her and lead the way into the lounge. She flops down on one of the sofas while I go through to the kitchen for glasses and the corkscrew.
    She shouts through, 'How was your first day?'
    I reappear and start to open the wine. 'OK, apart from the fact that the first person I met down at the police station was that police officer from the hospital.'
    'The really nasty one?'
    'Yep!'
    'Did he recognise you?'
    'Immediately, but the new head of PR was nice so at least the day wasn't terrible.'
    I splosh the wine into the glasses and Lizzie and I happily take a slurp.
    'So, did you see Alastair at work?' I ask.
    Lizzie works with computers. Hmmm, yes, very bright. But then she says she doesn't understand them either, she just bandies a few well-heeled words like 'bytes' and 'hard drive' around and no one seems to notice she is more at home in French Connection than a computer software company. Alastair was senior to her when she started there. She ignored him for months, presuming he was just the usual spoddy geek who ends up working in a computer company. But then they started to work together on a project and she said there was something about him that made her start to fancy him. And not just fancy him but
really
fancy him.
    'Oh, boring. Alastair didn't speak to me once all day, he was in a stuffy old distributor meeting for most of it. God, what a difference from the start of our relationship! Do you remember it, Hol? He used to drag me into stationery cupboards. Now he only just manages to drag himself away from work.'
    I do remember it well. I practically lived it with her. They finally