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Being Shelley
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Qarnita Loxton
Kwela Books
For Liam & Jesse
Valentine’s
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Be honest. Do I make you horny, baby? Do I?
Do I make you randy?
1
Wednesday, Valentine’s
‘Nice boards.’
Say what? I smelled him before I registered what the voice from somewhere to my left was saying, before I realised that the voice was speaking to me. I’ve always been a sucker for a good waft of something, but, damn, this smell was something else. It was the exact smell of the last December holiday I wanted but never had. Soft coconut mixed with island pina colada. Tucked in was the smell of something not on my eating plan, something sweet I couldn’t place. Not that I ever stick to an eating plan, but it reminded me of those vanilla-scented soy candles I’d sourced for the shop for Valentine’s Day – even the candle boxes smelled good enough to eat. Di hated them. I wasn’t surprised; she and I are as different as night and day, not just to look at but in every other way you could think. As friends, I thought we’d found the magical space of dusk.
Yes, that’s right, I thought – as in the past. Now that we have the shop together, I’m not so sure any more. We each used to bring something that didn’t exist elsewhere in our lives, so we annoyed and enjoyed each other in equal measure. Now it’s more annoying than enjoying. If we are the unlikeliest of friends, we are also the most unexpected co-owners of a coffee and décor shop. ‘Coffee & Cream’, we named it. The whole thing was my idea and, so far, it’s been working. Mostly. She’s the Coffee part (bitter, trained as a barista), the part everyone needs to make their days work. I’m the Cream (full fat, not trained for anything). But I am used to working hard (I worked hard when I was younger), and I know how to make a space look good.
I also know how to shop. I buy things you don’t need and you don’t know you want until you see them on our shelves. Things like vanilla-scented soy candles that melt down into warm oil to massage onto your skin. Di said warm wax anywhere on her body was too closely associated with ripping hair from its happy places; she couldn’t imagine why that would make anyone feel sexy. I’d rebelled – ‘Keep your nose in your own cappuccino,’ I’d said – and ordered twenty candles since they came in rose-gold glass containers and matched my Valentine’s store window. Di and I are not equal partners in the store – I had more money and she was going to put in more time to balance it out – but we treat each other as equals.
She’ll give me grief if she finds out that we’ve sold only three candles. ‘You waste money,’ is what she usually says. But my rebellion will be worth her moan since I used the candles to make the store window I wanted. It was based on a Harrods window I saw online. Everyone raved about it.
That’s what this guy smelled of.
Pina Colada Coconut Vanilla Dessert, with a hint of sugar and massage. And a touch of Rebellion.
‘Sorry, what?’ I turned towards him. I almost laughed – he was so hot it was ridiculous. The smell might have reminded me of those candles, but the packaging was infinitely rougher than rose gold. Think young Pirate of the Caribbean meets Zigzag surfer. Straight, even white teeth in his caramel-coloured skin. What was he? Coloured? Mixed race? Biracial? Trevor Noah? I don’t know. I don’t even know what words won’t piss off my friends any more.
Doesn’t matter to me. Fine, it matters in the way that I notice it, in the way that young people apparently don’t in the New South Africa. Do they not notice? It only mattered to me in that I would’ve found it disappointing to know that his skin became a pale shadow of itself without the sun. Didn’t matter to me in any other way. His skin was beautiful, edible almost. He had dark brown, beachy hair that straggled into a shag on his neck, skimming his shoulders, the long pieces in front hanging halfway into his face. I would give my hairdresser a complicated brief – lobbed with layers framing the face, styled with Sea Salt Spray for a beach look that bordered on dirty. He had probably just let his hair go wild and let actual sea water dry in it. But, like the devil, the hotness of him was all in the detail. Eyebrows so thick you’d swear they were microbladed on. Eyelashes I would pay good money for. Lips plumped out like the perfect swollen Cupid’s bow of a Botox ‘after’ picture. One of those barely-there beards cropped close to his face. Full tattoo sleeves of blackwork art on strong arms; I spotted a flower and an old-fashioned stopwatch in complicated swirls that ended in straight lines at his wrists. I could see the tattoos creep around his collarbone like a mayoral chain and the sleeveless grey muscle top he wore was loose enough that I could see abs through the armholes. They’d not been inked yet – negative space, maybe? Board shorts, with Billabong blazed down one side, were slung low on his hips. Strong legs, bare feet in Sanuk slops.
He was young.
Twenty years old? Twenty-four? God have mercy. It felt wrong thinking it, but he was hot. I’ll confess to it in a way that gets a woman cougar-shamed if she says anything out loud – he was reeediculously hot.
Obviously – that much detail – I’d stared far too long.
‘Nice boards,’ he said again, pointing at the two bodyboards I was clutching to my chest. My newly refilled C-cups were mashed up against the top of the boards, causing some not-unattractive spillage from my tank top when I looked down at them.
‘Oh … thanks,’ I said, as if I hadn’t noticed my own boobs. The cheek of the boy, I thought, but couldn’t help a little smile. Since I turned forty, being invisible was the new normal. I’d gawked at him in return, after all. I didn’t have a clue if the bodyboards were nice or not; I’d just grabbed a purple one and a green one from the stack close to the front as I’d walked into the surf shop. It was too confusing to look anywhere else – the place was piled to the ceiling with gear. I tried to release the boards from my chest while still keeping my grip. Too late, they started sliding down to the floor.
‘Need some help?’ The Pina Colada Coconut Vanilla Dessert came closer just as both boards slipped out of my hands. My palms were sweaty on the plastic board wrapping. Note to self: make an appointment with Lily to redo my hand Botox.
‘Fu— Flowers!’ I said, as he caught the purple board before it hit one of the clothing rails wedged around us. Why are surf shops always so full of stock that you can’t move properly? I felt stupid and proud of myself at the same time. Stupid for being teenager-sweaty around this ridiculous man-boy-child. Proud because I’d finally transformed ‘fuck’ into ‘flowers’ as Kari had been begging me to. I used to say she looks like Pocahontas, but Lily said that’s now considered racist so I don’t say it any more. Still, hell’s bells, she does look like Pocahontas, even if I can’t say it. Kari used to have a potty mouth, like no-one I’d ever met. Then she had Adam and became proper and restrained. I’d kicked against it, saying we were becoming too PC, until I heard my Stacey tell my sweet Harley to ‘fuck off’ when he tried to steal a fishfinger off her plate. MomLife. It flowers you up in so many unexpected ways.
What was that?
The Pina Colada Coconut Vanilla Dessert was speaking to me and I’d nearly missed it, carried away in my own head. I’ve got used to talking to myself.
