Chapter 4

Friday 24th June 1983

There was no last minute crisis at work, so I was able to arrive at Helen’s door punctually, expecting her to keep me waiting in true female fashion while she finished perfecting her look.

Personally I thought she could not improve much in my eyes: I was beginning to appreciate more the quiet, restrained beauty she possessed, which in my view was as much in her character and demeanour as in her looks.

I rang the bell and after only a moment or two, the door opened and there she was. That was the moment when I realised that every woman who has conscientiously prepared herself for a date will look ten times more beautiful than her usual look. How do they know how to do that – just a touch of make-up and a hair-do? I suppose mere males will never understand.

It certainly was something to do with the minimal use of make-up, the up-do hair, the dress which hugged every contour of her lithe body, the length, halfway up (or down) her thighs, which showed her legs were perfectly in proportion and so shapely, and the high heels.

Oh, and the sparkling necklace and matching earrings which drew attention to her décolletage and her firm swelling breasts. No part of all this was excessive, everything fitted and everything balanced. The woman had taste and style. Gorgeous!

All I could say was “Wow!” which drew a delighted and delightful smile and a faint blush to her cheeks.

“I could say the same of you!” she said. “Where are we going?”

“D’you know the Orange Tree?” I asked.

“Yes, but...”

She was horrified! Everyone knew it was cheap and rough, and had a terrible reputation both for food and service. Indeed much of its fame derived from the fact it managed to attract enough customers to stay open at all, while avoiding being closed down by the health department.

“Well...” (I paused for effect), “we’re going to John Dart’s Place.”

A gasp, then silence. It was a Michelin Star Restaurant.

“You know why I like that Restaurant?” I prodded.

“The food? The service?” she hazarded. She was impressed.

“They have a secure car park, so I can collect my car tomorrow morning! Wine can flow!”

“You’re really on form tonight,” she said with a hint of sarcasm and a chuckle. “Is it going to be like this all night?”

“It depends on whether you keep serving me up these feeds for my one liners.”

“Please then! No more?”

“OK. Truce.”

We commented on the traffic and the weather, by which time we had arrived and parked the car.

We were greeted at the door by a waiter, who we knew would have been delighted to take our coats should we have been wearing any, but as it was he had to be content with Helen’s lace wrap.

Conversation occurred between courses, since we dutifully concentrated on the exquisite food. Each course was carefully described by the waiter and a suitable wine provided to complement it.

“So David,” she said with a glint in her eye. “We missed each other twice. The first time you were in London and got back late – no fault of your own, but the second time you had a family crisis. Do you want to tell me about your family?”

I sighed. “Yes, I suppose you should know. First, if you will permit a little riddle? My mother is not my mother, and my brother Craig is not my brother. I also have a sister Gina who is not my sister. Explain.” I stared at her, awaiting her reply.

Her eyes widened in surprise, but I continued to stare at her blandly, as if my strange family situation was a common enough one and really needed no further elucidation. Mind you, she was worth staring at in thoughtful mode for the pleasure it brought alone!

“OK,” she sighed at length. “I give up. Tell me more about your family that isn’t your family.”

“Oh, they are my family,” I said. “They’re just not related to me.”

“David, stop it!” she said sharply. “You said ‘truce’ earlier!”

“Helen,” I said patiently. “Come on! Work it out! How can Brenda Collins be my mother, and yet be no relation to me?”

Helen looked thoughtful. Then her eyes lit up. “Your name is Evans! So she must be your step-mother and they are her children!”

“Nope! But closer.”

Helen thought some more. Then a smile of success.

“She adopted you!”

“Not quite, because then I would be David Collins, but you’re getting warmer!”

Helen’s eyes flashed. “She’s your foster mother! Your brother and sister are also fostered – or are they her natural children?”

“Well done!” I was genuinely impressed. “Craig and Gina have been with Brenda long-term like me.

“Craig has always had a temper and been in fights, though he’s always been nice enough at home. Nowadays it’s when he’s drunk. This time some bloke felt up Deborah, Craig’s girlfriend, which technically was a sexual assault, and Craig got into a fight with him, broke his nose and cracked two ribs.

“I went home to represent him in the magistrates’ court and try to stop him being committed for trial at the Crown Court in view of his previous convictions. He would have gone to gaol.”

“How did it go?”

“Community Service Order, conditional on getting anger management classes.”

“Wow! That really was a good result, wasn’t it?”

I basked in her admiration. “Oh, yes. The prospect of Crown Court frightened him badly, so perhaps there’s a chance for him. He is quietening down.”

“So, Brenda, your Mum who’s not your Mum?”

“As you correctly deduced, Brenda is my foster-mother. She’s a heroine! She’s fostered forty-odd children since she started (most of us are odd)! Her marriage broke up because she couldn’t have children herself, and she so wanted to be a mother. Back then as a single woman she couldn’t adopt a child, but she could foster. As a foster-parent she gets paid for each child she takes on for as long as they are in her care.”

“Forty! How does she fit everyone in?”

I laughed. “Not all at once! Most children are with her only a short time, overnight, days, weeks or months, some for as long as a year or two before they get adopted or go back to their real parents. I was different.”

“How so?”

“I only know what Mum told me. She took me on when I was five. I don’t remember much before that. I’ve a vague memory of being frightened, then being in a children’s home and getting slapped around by some big kid, and I think I was in a foster home for a short time. I have an impression it was a cold house and rather dark. Then I was back in a children’s home again.

“Anyway, Mum tells me I was very solemn and did not smile for over a year after she took me, nor indeed did I say very much. After that I thawed out a little but was afraid of visitors, afraid they’d take me away, so I would behave badly and scowl, she said. No one wanted to adopt me, which is exactly what I wanted. She laughs about it now.

“So I stayed with Mum for the rest of my childhood. Technically I left her care when I was eighteen because I was in full time education, otherwise she would not have got any money for me once I was sixteen, but I got a full grant and living allowance while at university, and could send her some money out of that.

“So now I’m her grown-up child, as is Craig and Gina. They are the only other full-term foster children. Craig and I have left home, and Gina is in her last year at school.”

“I’ll bet your Mum’s proud of you,” said Helen wistfully.

“I’m proud of her! She’s the most selfless person I know. Foster children are usually disturbed to some extent, as I was early on, even until I was in my early teens, and life can get violent. She seems to have the knack of calming children down – she’s had enough experience!

“She was very keen on our education. I remember her reading to me, though I don’t know how she found the time. I remember she would send me to the library every week. I was an avid reader, and loved school. She had a room set aside for doing homework and I used to escape there when life in the house got noisy.”

“So you did a law degree and got a First.”

“Yes. Enough about me, what about you? You come from Yorkshire?”

“My parents have lived in or near York since they were married. I grew up there, but it seems we have almost got something in common.” She smiled.

“Almost? I don’t follow.”

“When I was sixteen, Mum and Dad sat me down and told me they had adopted me as a baby. Apparently I was only a few weeks old. It came as a shock and I think I ran out of the room to my bedroom. My dad came after me and knocked at my door. I told him to leave me alone for a bit.

“I thought about it, and realised that they loved me just as much as if I’d been born to them, indeed they’d chosen me! So I went down and told them that they were and would always be my real parents, and that I didn’t want to hear anything more about the matter.

“So you see, we both have adoptive parents. I mean your mother has essentially adopted you, hasn’t she?”

“Yes, I suppose you’re right. I’ve certainly adopted her! So, a happy childhood?”

“Yes, I had a wonderful childhood, and I can only remember being happy. I had two or three really close girl friends from quite an early age, who stuck with me. I still meet them from time to time.”

The rest of the meal passed in conversation about our interests, which we were amazed to find coincided on many matters. We both loved music of all sorts, drama and opera.

We liked hiking, telling each other of our favourite hikes; reading and telling each other of our favourite genres. She was into historical romances, and often researched the historical background to the societies she read about, whereas I was into crime and spy novels.

We both were interested in social issues and politics, Helen being much more left wing than me. Plenty to argue about.

I made arrangements to leave my car in the car park, and the restaurant called a taxi for us. Once seated in the vehicle Helen took my hand and held it, her thumb stroking the back of my hand. We shot each other smiles which at the very least said we enjoyed being with each other and I’m sure implied more.

At Helen’s house I paid off the taxi, telling Helen I would walk home. At ten o’clock it was still quite light.

We stood opposite each other in the porch gazing at each other and smiling. The feeling was contentment with a hint of lust.

“I’d invite you in,” she said, “but the place is even more of a pig-sty than usual with everyone packing to leave.”

I risked taking her hand, after all, she’d taken mine in the taxi. “Shall we do this again?” I asked.

“We don’t need to do an up-market restaurant every time,” she said, smiling into my eyes, “though I’m very grateful we did tonight. We could spend time together doing other things. I’d really like that.

“I’ll see you tomorrow anyway ‘cos I’ve not quite finished painting. I’d not realised that gloss paint takes longer to dry properly, so I couldn’t finish the walls as early as I’d thought.”

“Good, I’ll look forward to it.”

“So will I!” she said with some feeling, and pulling me to her, kissed me softly and at length. There was no way l was going to end the kiss, and when her tongue sought entrance, I reciprocated.

It clearly gave Helen permission to press herself against me: I felt her breasts and her mound, which provoked an inevitable reaction in me. I knew she could feel my growing keenness, but far from pulling away she ground herself against me, letting forth a little groan.

Eventually, and by now I was fully erect, she pulled away.

“Phew!” she gasped. “I’d better go before I completely lose control and drag you inside.”

“The house?” I asked with a grin I hoped was lascivious.

“That as well!” she returned brazenly and then gave me a sultry look from beneath her eyelashes. The girl had no reticence: straight as a die! With potential naughtiness!

“That’s almost an offer, and I couldn’t possibly refuse, so I’d better go.”

“I suppose so. You must know I’m not usually this forward on a first date.”

“If that’s the case, I can’t wait for the second date!”

“Down boy!” she said, looking pointedly at my bulging trousers. “See you tomorrow.”

“You talking to me, or him?” I asked with a wicked grin.

“That’s for me to know and you to find out – all in good time!”

We kissed again, nibbling at each other.

“‘Good night sweet prince!’ “ she quoted.

“Hey!” I complained. “You want me dead already?”

She looked surprised then realised.

“Oh hell!” she said. “I see what you mean. Hamlet had just taken poison hadn’t he? How about this instead?

“‘Good night, good night, parting is such sweet sorrow!’ “ she said gazing into my eyes, her hand dramatically on her delicious chest.

“Oh! Romeo and Juliet eh? Now can I remember? – ‘Sleep dwell upon thine eyes, peace in thy breast.’ “ I said, glancing down pointedly at the swell of said breast, both of them in fact.

“Wow, that’s good! How did you remember that?”

“We did it as a school play in my last year. I was Romeo’s understudy. Never got to kiss Juliet.”

“I think we’ll be going to a lot of plays together, and I think you already got to kiss this Juliet!”

“So I did! Good night.”

“Good night.”

There was another brief kiss, soft on the lips, and I walked away. When I looked back she was still standing on the step gazing after me. I waved, and she raised a hand in response before turning and entering the house.

In spite of my analytical nature which suited my profession as a lawyer, I did not think much at all as I returned home, made my usual cocoa and retired to bed.

What pervaded me was an excited feeling that I had found a woman who was as near perfectly on my wave-length as any I had ever met, along with a grudging admission to myself (never to them) that the women of the House were right. I wanted Helen badly. I fell asleep with a feeling of perfect peace and calm.

I could not permit myself a lie-in that Saturday, for it was my turn to buy the weekly consignment of groceries and household necessities: the ‘weekly shop’.

It was an easy if long-winded procedure. There was a master list of necessities with quantities needed for a week. All I had to do was to check how many of each item was still in stock and make appropriate deductions from the master list.

There was also the usual crop of post-it notes requesting basic things not on the list but which would be needed for what people would be cooking in the coming week, and there would always be personal and hygiene items for which the House would be reimbursed.