***
Morning sunshine on a just about cat-swinging sized council flat bedroom.
His thoughts were fluffy and pink.
He opened his eyes and there she was.
That beautiful woman.
Kelly, he sighed to himself happily.
He had never realised what a beautiful name that was. He had always kind of associated it with, well, chavviness. Or at the nicest, Lorraine Kelly. Or that bloke with a beard from Stars intheir Eyes. Underrated programme that, he'd always thought. Matthew Kelly.
Ahhh. Kelly. Lovely lovely Kelly.
Kelly Young? Or double-barrelled maybe? Kelly Young- … Jesus, he suddenly realised. He didn't even know what her last name was!
Should he wake her up and ask her? Probs best not. No matter anyway, he'd make sure to nosey around her personal belongings a bit later and find out.
He looked at her thoughtfully. Sleeping like a log. No not a log. Sleeping like a baby.
Had he ever felt like this about a girl, nay, woman before?
What was this feeling? Ah, it was like a warm summer's day and sunshine on a winter's morning. Both of those things. At the same time.
What spell had she cast upon him, devil woman?
Was that an X-factor's Best Bits DVD lying suspiciously open on her vanity table over there?
And what was this unfamiliar thought passing through his mind? The thought that… Jesus… the thought that he was fully aware of a girl's hideous terrible tastes and… eff him… he was still looking over at her… and eff him again…he still wasn't feeling like he needed to get the hell out of there before she started getting ideas about love and weddings and babies…
In fact… he weirdly felt like it might be nice if she got those ideas.
He sighed again and put his nose next to hers. For a dirty chav she still smelled so clean of a morning. Like fresh laundry.
Ahh. He needed to piss, truth be told, but, oh, it was like that line in that Aerosmith song.
How did it go again. Oh yeah. "Don't want to clooose my eyes. Don't want to fall asleep." Everyone knew the one. He might have to borrow it from his stepsister's collection next time he went in there, he mused. Seriously.
Actually, he noticed, judging by the rest of her collection, it looked like Kelly might actually have it over there on her shelf now that he looked.
Eff him a third time, he thought, shaking his head. He had just spent the night with a girl who liked X Factor and Aerosmith. And he didn't have the urge to stab his own eyes out. In fact he was actually thinking of spending the night with her again. But in the morning. And like… going to the park with her …and holding hands and going to the zoo and cooing over penguins.
Right, he suddenly chided.
This had to stop.
…Or, he squeed, catching another glance at her and swooning, at least be put on hold while he located her loo, and then he'd hop straight back in and give her a big cuddle.
What made a cuddle big? He'd never really thought about it before. Oh well.
He hoped she'd wake up soon. He really wanted to take the piss out of her Forever Friends pyjamas.
Haha, he sighed happily, getting up carefully and climbing over her.
It was going to be so much fun.
They were going to be happy. So, so, so happy.
He padded across her carpet and realised how cold out here it was. Ooh you could freeze your mammaries off in temperatures like this.
Better grab Kelly's pink dressing gown off the back of the door, he decided. Hoho.
She was definitely going to call him a poof, he smiled, fondly. What a mild homophobe she was sometimes. But what an otherwise nice one. His very own homophobe.
He slinked it off the hook but stopped suddenly.
What was this?
A man's coat?
Nathan felt his heart stop still. A dirty great chaffing chav man's coat sat under his beautiful Kelly's beautiful soft pink gown.
Nononnononono, his fragile little heart sang. This wasn't how it was supposed to be, he thought, panicking.
Now wait, Nathan, said the other more sensible part of him. Don't be Mr. Judgey, he chastised himself.
He had known before that she was a fallen woman. It hurt, he conceded. It hurt like a thousand daggers to the heart to be reminded that she had ever been anyone else's, he wasn't going to lie. But he was a forgiving sort. They were in love, he told himself, confidently… joyously. Oh! Love! This was finally it!
The coat must have belonged to that Lee.
We all knew about him, thought Nathan, scowling a little. We'd all read her texts that time they were bored and she'd left her phone out on the side by mistake at the community centre. And they'd laughed. Pfft. That wasn't news. Ha, try again Kelly. Whatever.
Call that promiscuous? Trying to scare him off with dirty little secrets from the past?
Well he'd nearly bedded a granny. Beat that.
Right, he thought, shaking off the momentary lapse of confidence and getting back to the business of emptying his bladder. Next job, find the loo, chez Kelly.
He went into the hallway of the flat.
FUCK, thought Nathan, stopping in his tracks. What was this now?
That looked worryingly like a big hairy bloke standing at the open front door with an argy bargy look on his face.
First instincts told him that he wasn't her brother. He concluded that in light of the fact that this man was overwhelmingly Asian. So he guessed that ruled out father or other family member as well.
His second feeling was that, this not being a family member, why then was he looking quite so pissed off to see a skimpily attired man coming out of Kelly's room?
Nathan gulped.
As the large man came physically nearer and nearer, the delightful, recently discovered feeling of new love- what would Fleetwood Mac call it? BIG love- was replaced by something else.
Pain. Big big pain.
And not of the pink and fluffy feelings kind…
