Chapter 8 - blast from the past

I was about to sit down to join David after having a little dance when suddenly I felt myself being picked up, and swung around. "Where have you been?" I heard someone say. It wasn't until my feet were both firmly back on the ground that I realised who had said it.
It was Simon.
I was as astonished as he was! I had not expected to see anyone there that I knew that night. It was a different generation who came here now and I no longer fit in.
He kissed me.
I took him back to where I was sitting and introduced him to David before I knew what was happening. We had a short chat, exchanged phone numbers, then he was gone.
David and I left soon after that. I had to explain to him who he was. He warned me not to get involved. Simon was bad news. Did I really want to go back over old ground? Did I really want to churn up the past?
I had not a very good sleep that night. I could not stop thinking about it. I did not want anything to do with the man, yet, I was curious. Why had he bothered to come up to me? Did he still have feelings for me? It simply didn't make any sense.
By the morning, when I spoke to David over breakfast, I had decided I was not going to bother. Simon would have me in an emotional turmoil... again! He was not worth it! I didn't trust him! What kind of relationship survived without trust?

David agreed with me. I had made the right decision. He said goodbye, wished me luck and left.

As soon as he had gone, I started to doubt my decision. Simon looked different. He was older, he'd matured in his body as well as his face, but he still had those enormous eyes with the ultra long lashes. I was still fascinated by him.
I'd just about decided that I would ring him later, after nine... but then, he rang me about eight.

We had another astonishing telephone conversation! At least I was comfortable this time! We spent a total of five hours talking on the phone!
Now he was local, we could have met up, had a meal and a drink in all that time!

He told me he had bought a house. His parents still lived in Oman, but they had sold up in Yorkshire and stayed with him, when they were in this country, which was not very often.
He still lived with the ginger girl. He called her Margaret. He said he loved her. He'd been with her for nearly seven years.
If he loved her that much why was he ringing me?
I filled him in with some of my history too.
He said he had given up on the music business. He said he was now a mountain guide in the Lake District.
What!
A mountain guide?!
I remembered him saying he was part of North Yorkshire search and rescue team. I had scoffed at him saying he was going training with them... maybe it had all been true!!
Things started fitting into place. Maybe he wasn't such a bad person after all!
After getting on with him so well in that five hour conversation, we had to meet up.

He warned me, he was about to go away. He was about to head to India for a month. His parents were footing the bill. He was going to go out and see them first in Oman, spend a week with them, then he was going to go to India for a month.
He was going to travel first class! Imagine him travelling first class! He would pretend he was a famous rock star as he passed all the peasants in economy. No one would expect someone dressed like him to travel first class!

I met up with him in town. We went directly to the bus stop to get a bus to his house. He hardly spoke, he seemed tense. I had a vague idea of where we were going. We passed the posh areas of town and entered an area of vast council estates. Walls were covered in graffiti, litter blew around the streets. There were heavy metal shutters on the shops.
Nevertheless, he lef me proudly to his house. As soon as he closed the door, he pulled the curtains so that no one could see us. Then he showed me around.
The rooms were spacious, I had to say. The living room wastage length of the house, with windows from and back. There was a formal dining room too. Upstairs there were four bedrooms and a bathroom.
I compared it to my two bedroomed upstairs flat, which was smaller, but it was in a slightly better area.
I deduced that Simon was not as well off as he would have people believe. Ex-council houses were good solid buildings, but they didn't fetch high prices.
I kept quiet about my thoughts. I think showing me round was just a rouse to get me upstairs into his bedroom.
It was not a huge bedroom. There was no double bed. A keyboard, computer and other musical paraphernalia were squashed in next to his bedside cabinet. On the wall was a vast ordinance survey map of the Lake District.
It did not occur to me until later, but this looked like a teenage boy's bedroom, not a grown man in his mid-twenties, where was the double bed he shared with his partner foe one? If it was a four bedroomed house and the other people who lived there were not there very often, why did he not have a bigger room? ...unless he did have a bigger room, as well! Maybe, he just used this as a den. Maybe he had brought me here to seduce me so that he did not have to worry too much about washing bed linen and stuff afterwards.
And yes, he did seduce me. I'd expected it. It was one of the most thrilling things about him!

Afterwards, we lay together for a while. Then we dressed, came downstairs, talked, made love on the fireside rug.
For some reason I was not as relaxed with him as I was on the phone with him. I think it was because I wanted to live up to his high expectations. I wanted to be the best girlfreind he'd ever had. I wanted to impress him and I did not think I was doing a very good job.

During the conversation, we talked a bit about food. Simon was one of those people who were not interested in it. He could not cook. He lived on bowls of special K with milk, or super noodles. I gathered ginger Maggie did not cook either.
He said when he went away, the hostel where he stayed would put him a packed lunch up. He was bloody sick of sausage rolls, quiches, pork pies and scotch eggs!
I realised that I had never been out for a meal with him. I'd seen him drink the odd pint, but he didn't get drunk. He didn't take weed or drugs. He didn't have a strict exersise regime, except for his hiking most weekdays. He ate, only because he had to when he was hungry.
As evening approached, he wanted to get a Chinese takeaway. But he did not want to leave the house in case he was seen.
I was a stranger in these parts, but I had to order and wait for the takeaway, then bring it back to the house.
It was certainly not romantic when he opened a giant jar of pound coins in the kitchen to pay for it all. In the end, I told him not to bother. I would pay for them because at least I knew I'd brought enough money!

I left soon after the meal, but not before arranging another meeting. This time he wanted me to make my way all the way to his house. I suggested he came my way. No one would know him there, he could relax, but he insisted on me going to his.
As soon as he arrived he pulled me in off the street and closed the curtains.
The visit played out very much like the first one. We made mad passionate love, talked, made love again. Then there was an almost identical takeaway scenario before I left to come home.

This time, however, he told me more about his Indian trip. He said he was hoping to make it up to Nepal and Everest base camp, but he was not sure because to go there you have to book up about ten years in advance and the trail was littered with the debris from previous expeditions.
I took what he said very lightly. He was not going to blag his way up to Everest, for goodness sake! You needed proper preparation and exauipment! He was not going to get up there, just because he'd taken a couple of people up Sca Fell Pike in the rain. Everest was in a different league!

Nevertheless, he said that depending on what he could do when he was out there, he did not know how long he was going to be. He might be six days, six weeks, or six months. But when he got back he would ring me.

What! Did he think I was going to be sitting around putting my life on hold, waiting for the phone to ring? He was badly mistaken!
Anyway, he would not ring.
He would move on, find someone else better than me to have an affair with. I was uncomfortable with all the secrecy.
No I would just go back to my old life. Get on with things.
He would not ring.