Free Cathexis by Josie Clay Page B

involving breath holding and completing chores before the minute hand on the Ikea clock settled on nine, no ten, no eleven. I bought a large selection of alcohol I could ill afford. I discovered just one ring on the Creda Cavalier worked and there was no discernible increase in oven temperature after it had been on full blast for half an hour. Coq au vin in a pan then, tasty, easy and I could have the leftovers for my dinner tomorrow.
     
    Congratulating myself on having all my ducks in a line by 6pm, I poured a large glass of red wine. All the tests I'd completed indicated a very positive outcome. I pressed play on M8's compilation tape 'A little bit me, a little bit you'.
     
    I'd nothing to occupy my eyes so I went into my mind to visualise the evening ahead. It may begin with a torrid sex scene - unlikely, given her recent mood, but her capricious nature didn't preclude it. Cut to us talking and laughing, the candlelight describing her nodding curls and kindling her eyes as she scanned the room in approval. The mattress, dressed in a pristine white duvet cover and soft, downy pillows, would be on the floor next to us like a bride on her wedding night, anticipating a long awaited undressing.
     
    Snapped from my reverie by the sound of tyres crackling across gravel ...6.20, she's early I smiled and sped into the kitchen to look out of the third of the bay window allotted to me. It wasn't the Saab, but a little Nissan, from which my neighbour Howard Nelmes was unfolding his frame, his shirt untucked at the back. He offered up his briefcase by way of greeting as if he were the Chancellor of the Exchequer. I giggled and raised my glass in acknowledgement.
     
    I lingered at the sink a few minutes longer, pouring myself another glass, willing the Saab's nose to nudge into sight. I went back to the bed/living room and opened my Nancy tin. Printed on the lid, a photo of a blonde, curly haired little girl in a red cape, her hands on the wheel of a toy speed boat. There was a whippet on her lap which appeared to be at the end of its tether – the beginnings of a snarl playing around its muzzle. I wondered what had happened after the shutter click.
     
    Fishing out the locket and passing it over my head, I chose to look at the Nancy photos rather than the images inside. There were other tokens: a heavy silver necklace, not a chain, more like a very long worm, a leather plated bracelet intertwined with a gold chain, from which three orange amber ovals were suspended. Precious things in themselves, but I couldn't identify with such riches – their value lay in the gifter. I picked the red velvet bag and shook out a circle of dark hair, which puzzled me. Why would I need it when I had a whole head of hair in which to bury my face and coil around my fingers? Cut from underneath by her neck, it was silky and intimate. With it a small square of vellum. 'For my boy with the beautiful breasts, always Nancy x'.
     
    I pushed the Russian wedding ring with difficulty over a work-swollen digit. The gravel hissed again, prompting me to dart to the kitchen where I busied myself wringing out a tea towel, even though the washing up had been dried and put away hours ago.
     
    After some minutes, I picked up my keys, went out the flat and pushed open the big, half glazed communal front door ...no Saab. It was now 6.52 so pouring myself another glass of wine, I sat cross legged on the floor in the bed/living room. The tape clicked to a stop, making me jump. I laid red queen on black king, black seven on red eight. When it was clear I wasn't going to win,  I cunningly formed an eighth line with the melancholy jack of diamonds, allowing me a neat, but unsatisfying conclusion. I played again to rectify the situation.
     
    By 7.22, I'd finished the red and started on the white. Looking into myself to see if I could send my astral eye to Palladian Road, where I imagined Nancy dashing down the steps, one arm in her coat, the belt of it fluttering over