50. Presents

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[RECAP: Someone made a surprise visit at midnight on Christmas Eve... but it wasn't Santa!]


Lois rang later. "Bloody Joel. Did he give you a Rampant Rocket as well? I had to pretend it was a microphone. What the hell was he thinking, with all my elderly relatives there?"

"I had to say it was curling tongs," Sera said. "Do you think you'll use yours?"

"The rate my love life's going, almost certainly," Lois said. "But don't you dare tell Joel. I'm going to tell him I gave it to Oxfam, I don't want him making buzzing noises and sniggering all the time."

Sera agreed. She could only imagine the glee with which Joel would have viewed their embarrassment on opening the presents.

"So what else did you get up to?" Lois asked. "No mistletoe and Mr Marek, I take it."

"No. Well, not exactly. He gave me a present. It's a painting."

Lois was surprised "A painting? What's it of?"

"A seascape," Sera told her.

"Oh. Given he painted you in the nude, I thought he might have painted himself naked, for you. I'd have liked to have seen that."

Sera had seen the flesh-and-blood reality of that and preferred it to any two-dimensional reproduction. "No naked bodies. Just a boat on the sea, but it's really beautiful."

"I wonder how he painted it and got it in the post without Vile Victoria seeing?"

Sera had also wondered the first part of this. "He didn't post it, he dropped it off."

"In person?"

Sera told Lois about the gravel thrown on her window and the midnight meeting.

Lois was impressed. "It's like Wuthering Heights or something. When Heathcliff comes to her window in the night."

English literature was not Lois's strong point. "It's the other way around, she comes to his window. And anyway I wasn't wearing a long white robe or something. I was in my pyjamas and dressing gown."

There was laughter. "Only you could ruin such a romantic scene like that. I would have fled outside in a silken negligée."

"Not at minus two degrees you wouldn't have."

"I would have just got him to warm me up. I take it there wasn't time for that?"

There had barely been time for more than their brief kiss, apparently.

Lois tried to console her. "He probably couldn't risk having your lipstick or scent all over his body."

"I'm not Marilyn Monroe. I don't go to bed with a full face of make-up wearing Chanel No. 5," Sera pointed out.

"Then I suspect he knew he couldn't control himself if he did. One brief kiss and all the suppressed passion he's been feeling all these weeks might have erupted. Any more than one brief kiss and he would have thrown you on the ground and lost all control. Then imagine what your neighbours would say."

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