One Final Night Read Online Free

before it hits you. It is both sublime and addictive, and it was only down to him that I ever knew it.
    So there I was, up that hill getting fucked in broad daylight, with the lunching rowers not a hundred metres below us and only the height of the meadow flowers and those few grams of sodden cotton shoved into my mouth to prevent our detection. It was an apt place to be, up a hill. I liked to compare new relationships to an expedition up a hillside. You know it will be tough but you set out in great heart, determined to enjoy the whole trip although you cannot wait to be at the top. The thrill of what the summit will bring makes the first part so much more enjoyable, you hardly notice it. You don’t see any of the pits or rough patches. It gets tougher higher up, but the goal of the summit drives you on. If you are prepared enough, if you have packed your rucksack sensibly, you can avoid tumbling all the way back down.
    At the top is everything. You get to sit in serenity and take in the view. You get to see the river twisting all the way down the valley. Everything was worth it. I cannot, cannot see the point in just stopping halfway. Why set off without meaning to go the whole distance? Of course, he was and is the definitive halfway merchant. I’m sure he would say something along the lines of, ‘It’s a nice day, let’s see how far we can get. Don’t worry about packing a rucksack, it’s just wasting time!’
    Or he would ask the point of going up there at all.
    ‘Why go all the way up there to look at the river,’ he might say, ‘when you could be down at the water’s edge with the rest of us, and we could all dip our feet together? Who do you think is having more fun – you up there or us down here?’
    Or I guess he could shoot down my whole, now rather strained, “love is the hilltop” metaphor simply by asking what we do once we are up there. Can one sit for ever, happy that the one splendid view is all you will ever need, or will you always, at some time or another, simply have to roll back down again, taking all the bumps along the way? Although it sometimes seemed like it, I never was more than halfway up with him. I would have gone higher if I could, all the way to the top. Looking back, he never made it apparent that he was reluctant to join me. He could have had anyone he wanted, but instead he deflected the constant flirtatious advances in deference to me, and that made me fizzle. He never treated me as his plaything. He would happily spend whole afternoons or evenings with us chatting away, watching films, listening to music.
    However, it struck me one time that we never met for anything other than sex. No matter what we did, how many cafés and museums and galleries we went through in a day, we would always end up coupling. I knew that on meeting him, sex was at the top of the agenda. Our rendezvous could be dressed up any way you liked, but it was still just about him getting inside me. All the meals, the operas, they were all just foreplay. Did I ever resent this? No, strangely – but don’t ask me why. Probably because I craved him as much or more as he did me.
    So one afternoon we were stood in the walled garden taking refreshment. A smart gentleman was shown in by Patrick – reasonably handsome, if a little portly. He was engaging enough, although I closed my eyes to soak up the sun as they spoke a little of politics, and the potential for the harvest, since the lack of rain was beginning to starve the grapes upon the vines. Then I noticed my man was talking to me. His voice had not changed. He had addressed me as an aside from the conversation, as if to keep me engaged and not bored. Yet the words he had said were, ‘Darling, why don’t you go down on your knees for me?’
    It was not an enquiry but a suggestion. I blinked aghast at him, but there could be no doubting the meaning. He then continued his former conversation, lighting the two of them cigarettes. It was like he had