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“You think this, but no, everything ends, is unexpected. There.” He pointed to the backdrop of scenery. It was confusing.
I stepped back and inclined my head to the side trying to work it out, then gave up. “It’s beautiful. There’s no point trying to understand it,” I mused as I stared out over the painted stage.
“This is the first thing I thought when I came home yesterday. She would like this, and I wanted to show it to you. Is very odd.”
“Why is that odd?”
“Because I am not so good at sharing my toys. Usually. Now, I promise you hot chocolate. But you must guess where the kitchen is.”
I looked round. “Presumably not out there.” A balcony lay beyond the large windows. “So it must be back through…” I indicated the door to the hall.
“No.”
There were no other visible doors. “Not the books? Do I have to press the right one, because that could take a long time?” I walked along and pushed the shelves in several places until a block in the middle gave way and swung inwards. “It’s very dark in there.”
He leant past me and switched on the light, revealing a small but well-applianced kitchen.
“Oh, and there I was expecting a dungeon,” I said. “This is very disappointing.”
“There is a dungeon in the castle,” he said.
My look was blank.
“The school in Scotland,” he explained. “The biggest studio is below ground level. We call it the dungeon.”
“Creepy,” I said, suppressing a shudder. “Where’s your bathroom, or is there a secret entrance to that too?”
“Is first door across hall. Look around everywhere else if you like.”
I found the bathroom quickly and discovered that it was dominated by a gargantuan marble bath. It was impossible to look at anything else in the room. I descended the five white and grey steps into what could have been a small swimming pool, and the phrase ‘out of my depth’ repeated. Was it a sex bath? It could play host to an orgy. Justin had read things, and said things, and hinted at more. Why did he have to do that?
Twitchy and nervous, I returned to the big studio, strongly resolved to leave as soon as possible. Aleks was in the tiny kitchen, looking all domestic and innocent and sprinkling something chocolaty on top of frothy drinks.
“Ooh, what’s that?” I asked, sex bath forgotten.
“Hot chocolate. I make this, you cuddle me. This is right, no?”
“No.” Laughter danced through my words. “That was hypothetical. It involved you as a small child, remember?”
“He is still in here.” He put a hand on his heart. “And no one holds him. Except you, other day.”
Out on the balcony, I laid my mug down on the table to better take in the panoramic view of London. Spread out below us, the city sparkled and shone as if announcing the glittery arrival of a special event or holiday.
Aleks stood behind and pointed out landmarks and colourfully lit buildings in the distance: the Gherkin, St. Paul’s Cathedral and some places that I didn’t know. I was aware of two things, two temperatures: the cool balustrade pressing my abdomen and the warmth of his body, close but not touching. It would have been nice to be touching, to be familiar enough to lean back against him and look up into his face. But I could be polite and appropriate sometimes.
“I’ve never seen the city look quite like this before. It’s beautiful.”
“Very beautiful,” he echoed. “Malphia, your hair. If this clip comes out, it all come down?”
“It should do.”
He unclipped the hair slide, and it bounced off the side of the balustrade and down to the dark street far below. I laughed, but he was crestfallen.
“I have lose the ability to be clever in any way. Between us maybe there should be only truth.”
“And what is the truth?” I asked.
“I want to kiss you.”
