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“Treadwell.” Will held his arms out. It was a hug of warmth, crisps and forgiveness. “I got you something,” he said. “Well, found you something.” He took a small tissue-paper-wrapped object out of his pocket and handed it to me.
I gasped as the paper fell to the floor. “This is the stone I saw in that dream!” The pinkish purple stone was the same size, shape and colour as the one envisioned in the circle, the one that got placed in my heart by the golden lady. “Where did you find it?”
“Stone circle,” he said. “I went up there to see if I could get some choreographic inspiration, last term, you know. I saw a movement out of the side of my eye. It was a molehill, I think, beside the flat stone, earth all freshly pushed up. This was sitting on top of it, and I just knew it was for you.”
“How magical,” I said, gazing into the sparkly depths of the stone. “This is like the best present in the world. Thank you, Will.”
Justin returned with his present, which he also found to be quite meaningful. He pointed it at people and things now and then to emphasise words.
“I will put it in a pot and melt it down,” I warned, the fourth time the phallic chocolate was brandished in my direction.
“You’re not touching my beautiful penis,” he said, holding it protectively to his chest. “I’m going to use it to test the newbies’ responses. We’ll soon weed out the Justins from the Simones. So, how was Christmas at the castle?”
“Boring, latterly anyway.”
“What, precisely, has become boring?” asked Justin. “Is it bedroom related? Do you want me to speak to him, man to man, give him some pointers?”
My hand quelled the eagerly upturned confection, and I explained about Michelle and ‘the great work.’ It was a continuation of something Aleks and her had done in the past, which was an uncomfortable notion. “They had me doing the exercises to begin with in an attempt to involve me, but it was mind-numbing. She names injuries, then Aleks works out what exercise will help, which muscle groups need strengthening. They write it all down; they try it out; they do it again. So, I’ve explored everywhere outside, been up to the circle, and been swimming. I did all your washing,” I told Will. “Even ironed it. And today, I’ve been making beds and cooking.”
“What a good wife you’ll make me,” said Justin, “when the time comes.”
“What?”
He smiled. “I thought we could do that, if no one wants to have kids with us by the time we’re forty. I don’t know what age your eggs run out.” He waved a hand in the direction of my abdomen. “Don’t be frightened, Phi. We wouldn’t have to shag. There’s a lovely room with gay porn for me, and a syringe-wielding doctor for you. Don’t laugh; it’s a good plan.”
“It’s hugely flawed,” I said. “Even if I were ever to agree, my bits don’t work right, remember? I’m medicated to control them.”
“You would come off the pill obviously, duh.”
“Women with polycystic ovaries often have fertility problems. Some of them never manage to get pregnant. Given how badly I have it, that’s gonna be me.”
“I didn’t know that,” said Justin, looking genuinely forlorn. “This messes everything up. Oh, and that’s sad. You love your babies.”
“I can love other people’s babies. It doesn’t bother me.”
“Well, d’you know what might be fun?” he said with a wicked grin. “I could offer my sperm to Simone. I’ll sit her down, let her have a bite of my lovely chocolate penis here. What girl could refuse?”
“Can you wait till I’m there, so I can see that?” I requested. “But I have to go do my kitchen wenching now.”
“Get much wenching in yourself over the festive season?” he asked Will.
“No.”
“Well, don’t worry. There may be some comely maidens among the new crew.”
“I think they’re all only sixteen,” I said.
Justin nodded. “A three-year age difference. You’re right. That’s positively indecent.”
“She is right,” said Will. “But what you were saying about having kids? Who’d want to, anyway? I mean, what if something happened and you weren’t there? Anything could go on. Why bring them into the world in the first place?”
“That’s bleak,” said Justin. “Oh, I see.” He patted Will’s hand. “Slow swimmers? If you ever have the need, I can step up, or step in. I’m not sure of the correct terminology.”
“Justin, has something happened to your hormones over Christmas?” I asked, and then put on my apron.
Helping with lunch was both an interesting and worrying job. A dairy allergy here, excessive slimness and scarring acne there, and a ‘really don’t give a flying anything about anything’ attitude from a Goth girl with artistically impressive make-up and spiky black hair.
Aleks and Michelle came last in the queue. He smiled questioningly at me, took his food and sat down. Michelle was not so restrained. “You have trouble defining your role here, don’t you, Treadwell? One minute you’re trying to be a dancer, then you’re a nanny to babies, now a common dinner lady. Salad, no-fat dressing for me,” she ordered.
