Me, Paul, Lucy became friends. More than that, we became close. Paul’s presence as a sexual being disappeared for me completely – the gap as vacant as the one left by Carmel.‘You look thin,’ Lucy said one night at the weekly meals that had become our habit. The pink petal of her face floated in the steam rising from her bowl of risotto.‘I’m alright.’She stood and walked around the table and pushed the spoon into the closed tunnel of my fist and patted my shoulder.‘There, eat,’ she said. I did – for her. Each week was a blessed touch of civilisation, she did everything properly: home cooking, silver cutlery, napkins.‘Lovely food.’ Paul smiled across the table at her.She’d become a mother to us both. I wondered sometimes how she could stand it, whether she’d stick around. I hated thinking of the nights I’d spent eviscerating her around the kitchen table with my friends, my mouth stitching bitter shapes as I talked. The wall-to-wall cream carpets, I’d cackled.
