A special treat – he loved it when his mother tipped the bubble bath stuff in, and it was like snow, only even frothier, even lighter; he could scoop great armfuls of it up. ‘Yes, Mummy.’ Standing over him, her white satin dressing gown open at the front. He could see her breasts poking through, with their big red nipples. He could see the line down the centre of her stomach where she had been cut open to let him be born. And the thick straw bush of hair below it. ‘Let me see, Tom-Tom darling. Let me make sure you’ve washed him really thoroughly.’ Nervous now. Scold or treat today? She leaned over him. One breast touched his cheek and rested cool against it. Her hands slipped below the froth, gripping a bar of Camay. He felt the hard slippery soap against the inside of his legs and it gave him a strange kind of excitement. ‘Good boy, darling, Tom-Tom, what a beautiful clean choo-choo.
