Eyes opening, the waking dream crashed for Gemma and with a whack the
headache hit her; dropped from her inverted suspension into hard reality.
Into the room stepped Yacob, humming merrily, and she heard his weight move
around the room as she groaned and frowned at her hangover. His kind hand placed
a glass of water on her bedside table. He sat beside her on the bed, gently put
fingers amongst her hair, and smiled warmly: “Are you ready for breakfast, princess?”
Gemma, eyes barely open, groaned a little protest, and retreated under the
duvet. Yacob withdrew the hand.
A moment later she reappeared, too warm below, and began to summon the powers
of speech and manners. Yacob waited.
“Feeling hung-over?” he grinned.
Gemma sat up a little, “Mm,” and rummaged in the top drawer of
her bedside table, “paracetomol, could you get me some? Kitchen drawer
I think…”
“Of course.” Yacob almost leapt up and bounded downstairs to the
kitchen.
To herself: “Oh my God…hammered…why did I drink so much?”
and started feeling confusion and regret at the ill-remembered night before.
He returned quickly, passed her the packet, and she awkwardly swallowed two
with water, feeling his kind gaze most unwelcome.
Gasping after the water, she placed it on the table, and Yacob leaned in to
kiss her neck. She was not happy about this, and pushed him away after a few
seconds.
“Look, I think last night may have been a mistake. Can you not do that again please?” she told, rather than asked.
Yacob stopped and sat back a little, just beginning to feel the pang of rejection.
“I’m sorry,” she continued, “but I don’t remember
much of last night, least of all how we got here.”
“OK,” he said, getting slowly up and then dressing himself on the
other side of the room. He looked hurt.
She clambered out of bed wearing the duvet as a gown and shield, and stole
into the bathroom. Padding her face with hands wet from the cold tap, she began
to scold herself; losing virginity in what she right then felt was just a drunken night with some bloke she hardly knew was
a horrible mental prison sentence she’d now placed on herself.
A little nausea hiding at the back of her body revealed itself now, “Surprise!”
Standing still, she now favoured the toilet bowl over her intended shower cubicle,
and hurled gob-fulls of nasty, acidic alcohol sickness into the pan.
After a while, she found herself sobbing and shivering, sat on the edge of
the bath. It felt like she’d been in there for ages, and she wasn’t
sure if Yacob had left or not. She had not heard anything.
She’d given up trying to remember the night before, but now images flickered
into her mind; Yacob, his body on hers, sounds and sensations of pleasure…but these were confused now – a dark
room, candles, people in hooded robes? A strangely painted ceiling, biblical
images of torture and suffering…was she seeing the inside of a church?
And to one side, the dark silhouette of a man sat in a huge framed chair, perhaps
like a thrown, on hand resting palm down upon some sort of staff or cane, the other open, palm up, holding a single egg.
Gemma could not remember going anywhere like this. But so clear was the memory, she could not put it out of her head!
