Jennie Ensor - The Girl in His Eyes

He’d fallen in love with a sweetly shy, girlish, tender-hearted twenty-four-year-old. He’d been something solid for her to cling to. In her gratitude and love, she’d dedicated herself to him – in those early years, at least. Her naivety had appealed to him, her foolish fears and fancies had amused him, her giggles had loosened the crust around his heart. He’d known from the start that she wouldn’t see there was another part of him, which needed more than she could offer. Hadn’t he even hoped, for a while, that she could crush this demon inside him, that marriage and a family would be enough – or at least would prevent him from placating the hunger for something more?

For a few years it seemed to work – or perhaps he just kidded himself it was. As Suzanne’s lure diminished, the resentment and hostility built up inside him. She came to embody the reason he could not satisfy his deepest desires. And these days…

He sighed, thinking back to last night’s sight of Suzanne’s bare backside before she draped her pyjamas over it. She was no longer young and curvy. Her breasts hung towards her thickened belly. Sometimes it was like going to bed with his mother, not his wife.

He rubbed his hands together and put them inside his jacket pockets. It was fucking freezing out here. But the ache of cold in his hands and feet wasn’t nearly as bad as the ache in his groin when he looked at Emma. The grinding, useless ache of wanting something you couldn’t have. He kicked the concrete bollard in front of him, scuffing the leather of his shoe. The craving was as strong as ever. He could no longer ignore it and pray it would go away.

He’d been drawn to young girls since he was a fresh-faced trader on the money markets, back in Canada. The ones just beginning to ripen, delighting in their newly-found femininity, sunning themselves in the park on hot days in the latest show-all fashions. Just looking. Casually, but carefully, so no one would notice. He’d had girlfriends his own age, but none had done much for him. Then Maxine swaggered into his life, that spoiled, rich kid desperate to get back at her parents. She’d told him she would be fifteen in two months and she needed to find out about sex because her parents were absurdly strict and didn’t like her even looking at boys. It was only when her parents found out about the late-afternoon sessions in his apartment, and threatened to call the cops, derail his career and generally make his life hell, that he found out she was actually thirteen.

He’d escaped to London and found Suzanne. He’d wanted a normal life, to have a wife and kids like other guys. He told himself he wasn’t going to turn into some saddo, sneaking off to do things in secret, perpetually looking over his shoulder for cops and deranged parents.

And then came Laura.

Laura was his adored little girl. He read her stories, and built her a doll’s house and a tree house. He took her to ballet and swimming lessons and he comforted her when she fell over or came home crying. He loved her as a father should love his daughter. Only, when he carried her on his shoulders and she would scream with excitement, or she looked at him with serious eyes as he read to her, he would imagine her freshness, her softness, her willingness to please.

He’d done everything he could to resist her.

After his wife had gone to bed, or while she was out for the evening, he feasted on clips of girls he’d downloaded from the internet, putting his sessions down to eBay or Amazon, or networking with ex-colleagues on LinkedIn. Occasionally, usually during business trips, he’d sought out girls in the flesh, girls who looked younger than they dressed and never gave their real age. He went to terraced houses in the back streets of cities, places far enough from home that he wouldn’t be recognised, where you could get girls of indeterminate age – runaways or illegals – with broken English, half of them on drugs, judging from their robotic responses. He never saw the same girl twice and he never told them his real name or anything about himself.

Only, it began to feel like he had a drug habit. The relief was always short-lived and spoiled by his desire, which came back stronger than before.

Then one day, he hadn’t been able to resist Laura. It had been easy, that slide down. It had felt quite natural, like stepping into a hot bath at the end of a long journey that had left you mentally and physically exhausted.

At first, he’d limited himself to kisses and caresses. The thought of going further had crossed his mind, of course. He’d resisted that temptation, mostly. Laura had been hard to resist, though. It was only when she began to show the first signs that she would soon reject him, maybe even out him to Suzanne, that he’d been able to stop. Otherwise, he might have gone all the way with her.

The thought of it had freaked him out. He’d vowed never again to let himself get hooked like that. He’d told himself that Laura would be the end of it. From now on, he would steer clear of girls: girls on the game, girls walking in parks, girls coming home from school, friends’ daughters, neighbours’ daughters, girls on the internet. He could never again take the risk of being found out, of being hounded by the police, or, heaven forbid, dragged before a court and locked up.

He’d not wavered, until now. Day by day, hour by hour, his will was eroding. Emma was awakening the same yearning inside him that Laura had. She was indefinable, contrary, quiet yet mischievous, fragile yet tough. Something in her called out to him, yet at the same time pushed him away.

He had to find a way out of this, before it was too late. He could go to prostitutes again, couldn’t he? He could get it up for some girl who’d already done it with so many guys, doing it with one more wouldn’t matter. A girl who would do whatever he wanted. He could save Emma from the demon inside him. That would be useless, however, he knew in his heart. There was one inescapable fact: the girls he could pay for were nothing compared to Emma.

Emma was the real thing. Not an image on his computer screen, or one of those dirty, desperate girls doped to the eyeballs, thinking only of her next fix as she passed herself from man to man. This girl was untouched by other men. And it wasn’t just that – he would get to know Emma gradually. He would find out how she ticked, get past her defences. With the right encouragement, she would come to him willingly, bit by bit.

He kicked the bollard again, harder. The jolt of the impact travelled up his leg. Suzanne would be out of her tree, he thought, if she knew one quarter of what he’d done, and Jane would probably piss herself. But fuck it, he wasn’t the only guy alive to have these feelings, so did thousands of other men, all of them hanging out for what society wouldn’t allow. How many guys gawped at internet porn behind their wife’s back? It was young flesh they wanted to see, not aunties with facelifts. Half the men in the country were turned on by a pretty, young thing in a school tie and a short skirt. The red-blooded ones, at least. Only most of them didn’t have the balls to do anything about it.

‘Hiya.’

Paul turned around. Emma was standing there in her denim jacket and jeans, shiny-lipped, hair in two cute bunches, sucking on another sweet. She loped ahead to the Porsche, which was glinting like new after yesterday’s visit to the car wash. She was impressed by it, he guessed, but didn’t think it cool to say so. Jane drove around in a zit of a car that no one would give a second glance. A pity it was still chilly February, or he could have taken the roof down and impressed her even more.

He climbed into the driver’s seat, checking his reflection in the rear-view mirror. He’d left a layer of stubble on his face this morning, especially for her. It gave him a touch of the rogue and would appeal to her. He’d also dug out his best sheepskin jacket and black Ralph Lauren sweater. Well, he could afford to take pride in his appearance. Emma was into fashion. She wouldn’t want some cheap scruff taking her out.