Leftovers

I decided to put this in its correct category.

Chapter 1

At the age of nearly 30 I would have preferred not to bring a stranger into my house to live on a semi-permanent basis but unfortunately it was a case of 'needs must'.

My ex-girlfriend (I would like to point out that she was not 'ex' at the time that we did the deed as that would have been too stupid for words) ... anyway, she and I had tied the knot about two years previously ... no, not marriage but a knot that is almost as difficult to untangle; a joint mortgage on a jointly owned flat in the western side of London and then we became 'ex' and it left us in a bit of a bind.

I won't bore you with the reasons why we became 'ex' other than to say that I really ought to have known that she didn't like toe-nail clippings left on the bathroom floor as we had been living together for some time before we bought the flat ... I was going to clean them up ... honestly.

Anyway, our parting of the ways meant that one of us had to take over the mortgage unless we sold to a third party. However, neither of us wanted to put commission into a shyster estate agent's pocket ... not forgetting the lawyer's fees and the stamp duty on the purchase of two new properties. I liked the flat, the location was good and I was happy to continue to live there ... so I bought her out and took on the whole mortgage myself.

Deep breath.

Go on, you can afford it.

Some weeks later ... NO YOU FUCKING CAN'T!

Hence my search for a house-mate. I'd used a local website specifying all the usual caveats; professional person, tidy (toe-nail clippings not allowed ... LOL), outgoing personality, GSOH ... it was just like the small-ads in the personal columns of yesteryear and I couldn't specify gender, race etc. In some ways it was exactly the same as 'Man seeking woman' or whatever as I wanted to get on with the person and not just have a cheque-paying dummy who was unable to talk in anything other than monosyllables.

To be honest, I wasn't actually looking for a girlfriend ... for the unspoken criteria was that they had to be female as I didn't want to be dragged into some booze-guzzling, sport-loving, macho bromance despite the fact that I like both booze and sport (in moderation). I want to be upfront here ... I was looking for a classy, good-looking woman with whom ... if the wind was right ... I might just fancy but, if not, we could at least get on.

So, I'd already 'interviewed' three prospective tenants and I'd been honest with them that there had to be a rapport between us; to which they had all readily agreed. So far only one of them has given me any cause to think twice and that was because her fake tits were so far out of her cleavage that I had trouble in thinking for a moment. However, it soon became apparent that her IQ was smaller than her bust-size and that was the end of that.

The fourth 'interviewee' turned out to be very different, only I didn't know exactly how different until much later.

Chapter 2

It was almost comical when I opened the door because, despite the fact it was at least 20°C outside, she was bundled up in a parka several sizes too large for her. It appeared to have belonged to her grandfather in the 1960's judging by the 'ban-the-bomb' logos, the biro tributes to The Who and recollections of the Brighton Mod run of 1965. I readjusted my gaze to her oval-shaped face which was dominated by huge glasses as she looked nervously at me. However, she spoke with certainty and conviction although her voice was hoarse.

"Hi ... you must be Darren, I'm Terri Madden. I hope I'm not late ... I don't like to leave a bad impression on first meeting."

I grinned and didn't even look at my watch because I had checked when the door-bell rang. She was bang on time ... a point to her in the scoring system as I'm punctilious about punctuality (and if we are doing alliterations, also about punctuation, but that wasn't on the score chart ... of course there was a score-chart!).

"Bang on time, Terri, thank you for respecting the possible waste of other people's time. Anyway, come in, can I take your coat, that looks like it has been well-loved ... was it your granddad's?"

I was trying to make small-talk but she looked at me like I was an idiot.

"No? Why do you ask? Oh, I see the logos and the writing ... no, I got it from a charity shop ... but I'm sure it belonged to somebody's granddad. I'll keep it on for the moment until I know how warm it is in the flat. I do feel the cold so I won't be coming to live here if you're miserly with the heating."

I was a little perplexed and also slightly intimidated.

"Umm ... Terri ... it is early-September so I haven't put the heating on yet but I would hope that the central heating system is sufficient for anyone's needs when the time comes. Come on through to the lounge can I get you a drink ... tea, coffee, water, beer or something?

She looked squarely up at me with her pale blue eyes made huge by the thick lenses of her large glasses.

"Do you have any fresh orange juice? Not concentrated, but proper fresh orange juice?"

Caught slightly off-guard again by her forcefulness I could only stammer an apology.

"Umm ... no sorry ... pink grapefruit, yes, but orange, no. Something else?"

Her happy smile caught me off guard and I was grateful. Jesus, I felt like the supplicant here!

"PINK Grapefruit!"

I nodded and grinned with relief.

"Is there any other acceptable type?"

"No, there isn't. That would be lovely."

"Please come on through to the living area and I'll get the drinks and then give you a guided tour. After that we can get to know each other a bit to see if we're going to get along."

She looked at me with a penetrating gaze.

"If you don't mind, I'd like to do the tour afterwards. There is little point in me seeing the place if you and I are not compatible."

Once again, I was caught flat-footed by the way she seemed to be taking control of what was normally my process and I was starting to feel that this was not going to work out. I got the drinks and asked her to sit in one of the two-seat sofas in the combined kitchen-diner-lounge area and pulled the two pages of her profile off the coffee table. The movement was as much as a prop to give me something to do with my hands to hide the insecurity which had suddenly reared up from somewhere.

And I'm not an insecure person. This girl seemed to have got me out of sorts.

Between looking at the details I also tried to take discrete glances at her as she pulled a folder from her bag herself. She had very long ash-blonde hair parted in the middle which, to my male eye, looked natural. Her big glasses made it difficult to really form an impression of her face but I could see a fairly strong jaw with a generous mouth and full lower lip, a long, straight nose with a flare to her nostrils. I thought it was a handsome face rather than beautiful but then had to mentally correct myself that this was about personality not physical beauty.

She took a swig from her juice and looked at the glass appraisingly and smiled before clearing her throat. Her voice was still croaky.

"Good juice Darren, Waitrose?"

I grinned smugly. I'd won something in this battle that I hadn't realised I was fighting.

"No! Not shop-bought at all, I have a juicer. Nothing like freshly squeezed fruit juice first thing in the morning."

She gave a small smile of concession as she nodded her head in appreciation and made a note on her folder.

SHE'S MAKING FUCKING NOTES!

I was feeling well out of sorts and was about to start my spiel about my little binary quiz that I gave to all the prospective tenants when she beat me to it. She looked seriously at me and cleared her throat again. Her voice continued to sound like a rusty hinge.

"Now, Darren, I hope you don't mind but I have a little ... umm ... quiz that I like to give my prospective flat-mates which is meant to test our compatibility. I normally can tell within the first four or five questions whether it's going to work and then we can save a lot of each other's time."

I looked at her like an imbecile but my brain was working overtime.

Fuck me! That's almost word for word what I would have said.

I managed to croak out a response.

"Yeah, ok ... go ahead ... I have something similar."

She smiled with what I took to be condescension.

"Oh, really. How interesting. Maybe we can do some of your questions as well."

I was still off-balance and could only nod my agreement. My comment was snide and I regretted it instantly.

"Yeah, that would be appropriate ... it is my fucking flat!"

That last was uttered under my breath. I don't think she heard but if she did, she was either too thick-skinned to care or too scared to comment. I think I preferred the latter but given how in control she was I'm not sure I believed that to be true.

She cleared her throat again. She seemed to have a chest-infection or something as her voice was squeaky like an adolescent boy's.

"Ok, this is just a series of binary options. There is no right answer ... well unless you get a wrong one."

She seemed pleased with herself and giggled. I was surprised to find that I thought it was quite a pleasing sound.

"No, seriously. I'm just trying to measure you against me to see whether we are compatible. There is no great science behind it. You OK with that."

I tried to be relaxed about it despite the fact that I felt she was invading my mental space.

"Yeah, no worries. As I said, I do something similar."

She nodded her head again.

"Ok, first pairing ... spontaneous answer please ... no time to think ... 'Strictly' or 'Bake-off'?" (for the non-Brits these are two TV programmes involving dancing and baking)

"Bake-off!"

I was gob-smacked that I could get an answer out coherently. That pairing was on my list, not at number one but high up.

She pursed her lips and nodded her head as she made a note on her folder.

"Ferrari or Jaguar?"

"Jaguar!"

Fuck me, this girl has been looking at my questions.

She smiled secretly and noted something down.

"Holcombe Beach or Brecon Beacons?" (these are two areas of natural beauty in the UK)

I grinned like a loon. She had to have caught sight of my questions ... otherwise this was just too uncanny for words.

"Holcombe Beach."

She looked up at me with a slightly puzzled look in her eyes before writing something on her dossier. Her voice was slightly less confident with the next question.

"Umm ... Sauvignon Blanc or IPA?" (IPA = India Pale Ale = beer)

Jesus, this is definitely spooky.

"IPA."

Her breathing seemed to have quickened and she was noticeably swallowing hard as the next question came quickly.

"Rugby or Soccer?"

"Rugby ... but only Union, not League"

She looked sharply at me with an intensified look of surprise and nodded profusely at my clarification. She took a deep breath. For me the decision was already made so I decided to troll the next answer.

"Ok ... next pairing ... David Attenborough or Kim Kardashian?"

I grinned.

"The great Ms. K ... how could it be anyone else?"

Her head came up and a look of absolute surprise and disbelief was pasted on her face. I waited a beat and grinned at her.

"You should see your face. It's big Dave, of course it is. I was just pulling your plonker."

She realised that I'd been taking the piss and her own smile transformed her face as she threw her pen at me. I remember thinking it was a lovely smile.

"You beast! I thought you were being serious. Nobody can seriously put that vacuous bimbo above one of the great communicators of our time. I should come over there and give you a big smack ... you were doing so well ... most people say Sauvignon Blanc and soccer but I don't like either."

She put her dossier on the coffee table and suddenly the confident persona was gone. She smiled shyly at me.

"Would you give me the guided tour now, please. I think, we'll get along well."

Note that she didn't ask for my opinion. Not that I would have disagreed.

Chapter 3

' we'll get along well.'

That proved to be the understatement of the year as it was quite remarkable how she slotted seamlessly into my life ... in reality it became 'our' life as we went from strangers to great buddies in a matter of days. Not fuck-buddies, but buddies nonetheless.

I had not envisaged that I would spend so much time with my house-mate at the start of the process. I had hoped for the odd shared meal, perhaps watching a favourite TV programme together or a trip to the pub on a Friday night if neither was doing something else ... hence the elaborate personality test to prove compatibility ... not that I ever got to use it on Terri! However, whether by design or accident we did much more than that and when we weren't working or sleeping, we were pretty much inseparable ... cooking meals together ... shopping (yes, shopping) ... going to the cinema ... walking in the countryside ... playing cards ... chatting about life ... politics ... the environment ... the world ... music ... our jobs ... the list of topics was endless and our points of agreement far outweighed those where we diverged. All-in-all, I could not have wished for a better person to share my home with. After all, I was sharing my life with her.

The early days were spent finding out about each other's back story although she seemed reluctant to talk too much about her childhood and school years and had no contact with her parents or family. She nervously dismissed the rift as being due to her parents' disapproval of her career choice although I found it difficult to understand why they would have a beef about her becoming a social worker looking after troubled children. She was younger than me by 6 years but was what my mother would have described as an 'old body' and certainly never acted like the young twenty-something that her age would have suggested.

When she got to take the parka off, I saw that she was reasonably tall (5' 8"ish) and thin with small boobs, a small bum and narrow hips ... not my normal type at all (short with curves) ... which was a positive as I was certainly thinking about her with my big brain rather than the little one. The glasses were for myopia and she was nearly blind without them but if I ever needed the small typeface on a product label deciphering, she was the go-to girl. She was looking to have laser surgery to correct her vision and was trying to save for it but, in her words ... other things were more important ... she never specified what.

Notwithstanding how well we got on together I found her to be a bit of an enigma. She did not appear to be vain and self-absorbed but in my view she wore more make-up than I thought she needed (or I liked) ... not that I ever told her ... and I certainly didn't comment on the strange taste in lingerie (B cup lacy bras and boy-short knickers) which I noticed from the odd garment left in the washing machine.

One evening we were sitting at the dining table after dinner and talking about where we had grown up and why we had gravitated to London. We came from the same part of the country although I was brought up in a small village and she in a large town. Despite this she had found life in London difficult as she had few friends to speak off despite having lived there for two years.

"Why is that? You and I get on like a house on fire. You're an attractive girl, personable and a good listener ... and a talker ... so should have no problem making friends."

She looked embarrassed and peered through her long hair at me. Something I noticed she did when she was feeling uncomfortable which also made her voice even more squeaky than normal.

"It's funny, but I've never got on as well with anyone as I do with you. I'm actually quite a shy and reserved person but I find it easy to be myself around you."

I smiled warmly at her.

"Right back atcha! I'm in a much happier place than I ever was with my ex in terms of being able to speak my mind and know I won't be judged."

She smiled gratefully and looked thoughtful.

"Yeah, I know what you mean about being judged. My previous ... umm ... flat-mate ... he was horribly judgemental. I hope it doesn't happen to us."

I tried to make light of it.

"Hey, no sweat. People fall out over the smallest things but so long as we talk about any little issues it stops them becoming major grievances. A bit of honest communication is all that's required."

She pursed her lips and sadly shook her head.

"Don't be so sure ... too much honesty can get you into trouble. Trust me on that!"

I could see that the topic was troubling her but thought I'd probe a bit further.

"Oh, is that from personal experience? A relationship gone wrong from too much honesty rather flies in the face of all the received wisdom about how to maintain one."

She snorted in disagreement but looked more upset than angry.

"I've never had a long-term relationship ... maybe due to the fact of being too honest."

She gazed at me with a look that was part-sorrow, part-embarrassment, part-guilt.

"I'm sorry, no offence to you as you're a great guy, but I've recently changed my attitude and keep some things to myself that I might have been more open about in the past."

She obviously had some skeletons in the closet and I decided I wasn't going to inquire further. I reached my hands across the table to take hold of both of hers and squeezed them as I locked my gaze with her unhappy eyes.

"Hey, no worries Terri, sweetie. If you ever feel that talking about some of that stuff would help then I'm always here for you. I hope that I can be non-judgemental."

I tried a teasing grin.

"In the meantime, I can introduce you to some of my mates ... they're good people and you might hit it off with one."

She glared at me but I missed the smiling curve to her lips.

"Are you bored with my company already? Trying to palm me off with one of your mates just so you can get shot of your needy flat-mate."

As so often I was on the back foot with her and stumbled through my denial as a blush rose on my face.

"What? No! I was just saying ... of course I'm not trying to get shot of you ... oh, you bugger!"

She giggled when it was obvious that I had worked out that she had wound me up but then looked serious and squeezed my hands in return.

"Believe me Darren, you are the one person I would trust to talk to about ... stuff ..."

She trailed off and looked away before turning back to face me with a serious expression.

"... but not yet. OK?"

I smiled supportively and nodded.

"No worries, hon. Whenever you're ready."

Chapter 4

I tried to work out what that 'stuff' might be and concluded that she could be gay and had a bad reaction from her family and friends when she came out. It would explain the split from her parents, the reticence to talk to someone she was living with and might explain why her previous flat-mate had been 'horribly judgemental'.

However, it was inevitable that with two people living in such close proximity some of the veil of secrecy would be lifted accidentally. Sure enough, about two months' after Terri moved in something happened that should have given me a bit of a clue to the 'stuff' she wasn't willing to talk about. I put the fact that I did not twig straight away down to the fact that I was half-asleep at the time.

I woke about 5.30 in the morning badly needing a piss and not wanting to wake up too much (I didn't need to be up for another hour) I left the lights off as I blindly stumbled my way to the bathroom and pushed the door open. Two sounds made me aware that there was somebody already there ... a squeak of surprise and the sound of urine under pressure hitting the porcelain.