Ocean Of Need

3 Good Girl

April 1st

You put a canvas on the easel and arrange your paints and brushes, while I make coffee. By the time it's brewed you're set up, and ready to paint.

I unpack the rickety old typewriter that I like to type my poems on, and set it on the desk. My lips still singing from your kiss.

When I'm settled, you say, 'I'm going to paint you while you write your poetry, Amber. You don't have to pose. Just do your thing. I want to catch the essence of you.'

As you paint and I pretend to write, we talk about art and writing and what inspires us and how much better artists and writers are than anyone else in the world, as we laugh ironically, fully aware of how much Freya's gift of this room means to both of us. A place to work unhindered.

You set up a small speaker next to your easel, 'Can you work with music on, Amber?'

'Lovely, yes please,' I say, and hope it's nothing too heavy or repetitive.

Paradise Circus starts up, and I relax into my chair. 'This I can work to,' I say, and you smile. We settle down to work, and somehow the time passes in the same comfortable way that it does when I work alone.

My stomach is rumbling so it must be lunchtime. The kitchen isn't a kitchen as such. It's a large marble counter top that runs along one side of the room, with a stove set in it, and a small fridge. Freya kindly arranged for her housekeeper to stock the cupboards with beautiful deli food. Unfortunately, unless it's finger bites, I have no idea what to do with it. I check out the fridge, pull out eggs, milk, butter and tomatoes.

'Hey, Macallan, I'm going to make an omellete. Would you like one?'

'Sure,' you smile.

American's don't say please and thank you in the way we do. This is something I've had to come to terms with. The lack of formality, along with the lack of praise. It's not something I like, but it's not my culture either, so I let it slide.

There's a sturdy wooden dining table at the side of the room, surrounded by four chairs. 'Do you want to stop for lunch, or have it at your easel?' I ask.

'Let's stop,' you say and put your paint brush down. 'Can I help?'

I hand you knives and forks, and you lay the table as I rustle up an omelette on the stove. Then bring it to the table and set it down in front of you.

'You are such a Good Girl. Thank you, Amber.'

Oh. That takes me by surprise. My cheeks heat up and before I realise what I'm saying, I say, 'How did you know?'

You raise a brow and say, 'How do I know what, Miss Amber?'

But I'm tongue tied now, blushing. Not sure if you're saying what I thought you were saying. Maybe you are just being polite. I walk back to the stove.

You laugh behind me, 'Amber? Are you blushing? That is adorable.'

My back to you, I crack another two eggs into the pan, wishing I could disappear into a kitchen cupboard. I busy my hands while I get my thoughts in line.

I know now, that Freya is right about you. I take my omelette and sit opposite you. 'Do you go by any other names? Other than Macallan?'

You look me dead in the eye, and say, 'Usually Sir, sometimes Daddy. What would you meet your needs?'

The air crackles around us. I've been here before, this is the moment the game starts. 'Sir,' I say, and look down at my plate.

'And you, Amber? Do you have another name? Baby Girl? Princess? Something like this?'

'I have other names,' I mutter, my eyes still on my plate. 'Darker ones. But I think we can find those together.'

'Good Girl,' you say, and I hear the surprise in your voice.

I don't tell you that I don't know what the darker names are yet. I just know that I don't want to be a Baby Girl anymore. I just think that maybe there are other names for me. I lift my eyes to you and say, 'Sometimes I'm a girl I can play that game. But with you I want to be a woman too.'

'Oh, I like that, Miss Amber. I like that a lot.'

I don't tell you I already have a Daddy, back in London. Or that he'll come for me one day, when he can. If he can.

We eat our omelettes in a comfortable silence, which should be uncomfortable for two people who hardly know each other. Then we go back to our work. You paint me, and I write poetry about you. About the heat builds in the room, and in my body.

We work for hours. Towards the end of the afternoon, you clean your paintbrushes and set them in a jar by the sink, then turn to me and say, 'I have an ache for you already, Amber. I miss you.'

'But you haven't left yet. How can you miss me?'

You pull me up from my chair, push my hair from my face and say, 'I think I will always ache for you, even when I'm with you.' Then you kiss me so hard I think my knees will buckle, and then you leave, to go wherever it is you go. And I stay, and feel a tiny ache in the core of me. The very beginning of something unknown.

It's as I'm leaving that I remember you were painting me. I walk around the easel, feeling guilty, should I wait for you to show me?

I stare at the girl in the painting who looks like a woman. She sits at her typewriter, in a faded yellow sun-dress. She looks different to me, and I just can't work out what the unfamiliar thing of her is.