Foetal Attraction by Kathy Lette Page B

Gillian peered superciliously over the rims of her glasses, ‘what makes you think he won’t cheat on
you
?’
    ‘He says that because our sexuality is so enmeshed with our minds and our emotions, it’s a sensation in a different dimension,’ Maddy parroted. ‘He says that
our
monogamy is a prison in which the restrictions are so pleasurably profound that we won’t want to go over the wall.’
    Gillian’s eyes bulged and her recently resurrected turban pitched forward precariously. Recovering her head-dress and her composure she said, ‘Madeline, Rule One. How do you know when a married man is lying? His lips move. All English-men have adulterous leanings. It’s
de rigueur
. Duplicity is part of the way of life. It’s an English sport. On a par with cricket in the national consciousness … Believe me, monogamy in marriage is a rumour.’
    ‘She’s right, love,’ adjudicated a disembodied female voice from somewhere in the steam room.
    ‘All men are liars and that’s the truth,’ confirmed another.
    Flamboyant feather boas of steam coiled around Gillian’s neck. Maddy couldn’t believe that even in an organic face mask Gillian still managed to look chic. ‘Oh , the power. The power it gives them over their wives. The power of secrecy. As far as Alex is concerned, it’s the danger which gives the affair its intensity. He will stay married, my dear, believe me. He may espouse love, but men only have affairs to feel alive again. You, my dear, are little more than a pace-maker.’
    ‘Except cheaper,’ came another anonymous verdict.
    Maddy felt asphyxiated by seaweed fumes. What had been a pleasantly warm room was now turning into the Sahara at midday. She ripped at her aluminium cocoon and emerged from the chrysalis.
    ‘And how do we know there’s only one wife?’
    Ignoring her, Maddy executed a Helen Keller impersonation as she groped through the mist in the vague direction of the door.
    ‘Yes! Your Alex could be a regular Vigliotto.’ Although Maddy didn’t enquire, Gillian ploughed on with an explanation. ‘That Italian chappie who had one hundred and four marriages, simultaneously.’
    ‘The only simultaneous thing about
our
marriage will be our orgasms,’ Helen Keller haughtily announced as she skidded on wet tiles and tripped over a blob of green globules, chandeliered in ear-rings, which suggested in a loud cockney twang that she ‘close ya legs; ya breath smells’. It was the last thing Maddy heard before pitching arse over tit.
    But even an accidental belly-flop into the arctic plunge pool couldn’t quite cool her down. The truth was, Maddy was not hopelessly, but hope
fully
in love. Despite everything, she still worshiped the water he walked on.

Conan the Grammarian
    WHAT MADDY LIKED best about making love with Alex was the way he looked when he was about to come. He’d gaze off into space with the expression of someone who had just remembered where he’d left the missing car keys.
    ‘Well?’ she said, collapsing on to his sweaty chest.
    ‘Well what?’ he purred, his eyes half-shuttered.
    She entwined her fingers in the kiss curls of his chest hair. ‘Well, how did she react?’
    ‘Felicity’s reaction will depend upon whether she’s feeling rational and generous … or irrational and in easy reach of the hunting gun.’
    Maddy hoisted herself up on to her elbows. ‘You mean you didn’t tell her?’
    ‘Maddy, it’s hard to think about what to pack in a divorce settlement, when you’re in a place where the average life expectancy is 3.2 seconds. If that bloody civil war in Zaire continues, the silver-backed monkey will be extinct. Look at this.’ He rolled over to expose a minute graze on his right buttock. ‘If I’d been facing left instead of right, I’d now be talking to you in castrato.’
    ‘Yes, yes,’ Maddy said dismissively. ‘I saw the footage.’ Tugging her T-shirt down from around her tonsils, she dismounted and joggled herself into a pair of leggings.