Was he the hottest catch in town? Or was he something else? It was 2006. I was twenty, he was thirty-two. Wonderfully tall, ash blonde hair coiled in a man bun before anyone had a man bun, a kind of Roman face, nose sculpted like the finest stone, and a great big oatmeal-coloured woolly jumper. An artist, a carpenter, often seen with his long legs astride a rusty bicycle, or crossed in front of him outside a cafe, smoking liquorice rollies, reading poetry in hardback, and drinking black, black coffee. I bequeathed him with the name ‘Ponytail Man’ because I’ve had a habit of naming men I am attracted to since I first laid eyes on ‘Bread Boy’ restocking the Warburton’s I wasn’t allowed to eat at Tesco in 1999 and because, well, it was a given.
It was my friend Lisa* who gave him my number after I confided my crush to her. “His name is Danny.*” she told me in a text message “And I’ve just given him your number because he happens to be standing in front of me at the bar, what luck.” Before I had a chance to burst into flames of mortification another message came through from Danny “Come to the pub for a game of Scrabble this Friday?” I was alarmed at the speed of it all, though pleased that the feeling was mutual, and that he liked Scrabble, even though I wasn't sure he actually knew who I was, as I had only ever seen him from afar.
He didn’t seem to be put off at being thrashed across the tiles, too distracted to spell words properly as he stared over the Scrabble board at me, chin in his hand, marble-eyes peering into mine as he sipped his red wine. He walked me home and when I went to draw the curtains of my old attic room, he was still in the lamplight peering up at me with a giddy smile on his face. He seemed nice, albeit a touch earnest, and he quickly arranged a second meet advising me to bring my walking boots. When I told him I didn't have any, he asked around until he found a pair I could borrow, and so off we stomped to No Man’s Orchard in the hills above Canterbury on a mellow autumn’s eve. I don’t recall now what we spoke about, just the low murmur of his voice as he implored after me, yet answered for me before I had a chance to, telling me with great praise who he thought I was.
As the light dwindled as it does in September when you’re still not quite used to it, we parked ourselves under the gnarled, ancient apple trees. From his bag he pulled a lantern, a gas lamp, some bacon, a small pan, thick bread already layered with blue cheese and chutney, and a flask of hot mulled wine, as if he had done this a fair few times before. “I made everything myself.” he said and began to cook over the flames. The air filled with the scent of sizzling bacon fat mixed with the damp, fallen apples around us, and a hint of rain. By the time we finished eating, it began to drizzle, so he pulled me to him. He smelled of wood and wool. I had to admit that it was quite romantic and I wrote a poem about it at the time.
Under the apple tree they lay
Curled up cosy like caterpillars
Wound up like worms
Cloaked by the gentle hue of
The lanterns he’d lit
Like they were trusted old friends
Watching over them
In the quiet orchard
Dusk gave way to night
And the wind grumbled on by
As the clouds rolled
And wrung out misty tears
On the breeze
Like a sigh of relief blowing
Through the quiet orchard
They whispered so softly
Like children sharing sworn secrets
That the crooked trees creaked their branches
Stretching to capture their words
Creating gnarled shadows on his face
As they touched
In the quiet orchard
On the way home, we discussed how to return me safely to mine and he concluded that 7:30pm was dangerously late and that I ought to stay at his. I agreed because I had been wearing someone else’s shoes and my feet were sore, and because young women of my generation were still conditioned enough to put someone else’s feelings before their own. Maybe it’s the same now? It’s how the lines of consent are so complex. How was he to know that I would prefer not to stay over so soon when I’m halfheartedly saying yes and that that’s the only answer he was going to take?
We curled up on the living room floor and listened to music, though he told me that Natalie Merchant was infinitely superior to Sandy Denny, even though he had never listened to her, and he reeled off a list of albums ‘for my homework’. I drifted into the other room to admire a large sculpture he’d cast of a woman’s body and he came up behind me and softly asked “Shall we away to bed?”. I told him that we could indeed ‘away to bed’ but that I didn’t want to have sex with him. He cut me off with a kiss and a soothing “Of course, of course. We can just hold each other.” which I didn’t quite believe, and yet hold me he did. All 6ft5 of him wrapped around me like a cobra, the heat of his dead weight rising up unbearably against me. I couldn’t escape his stronghold, instead sweating profusely and waiting for the sun to rise.
Around 7am the radio kicked in and I half-listened to the murmurs willing him to wake up. Breathing steamily into my ear, he whispered seductively “Would you care to take a shower with me?” I shook my head in decline and he bounded out of bed with the energy of the well-rested. I was so tired and sticky and, curiously to me at the time, a touch weepy. I just wanted to go home and I was annoyed with myself that I had stayed. At this point he came skipping back into the room, stark bollock naked, his balls slapping against his thighs, with his man bun uncoiled into thin wisps that clung to his chest. I don’t know how to explain it kindly but in the light of the morning, and with his hair falling about him in that way, it was as if his power had left him, and he seemed to me a caricature. I shut my eyes tightly in the hope that I could unsee what had so deeply turned me even further off, and that he might cover up, but when I opened one eye again to check, he had taken a wide stance to stoop over his handmade wooden trunk to retrieve a towel, so instead I was greeted with a view up his asshole inches from my face, his sphincter, I swear, winking with glee.
While I was showering, I wondered if I was being too harsh to have developed the ick with this man. I looked around me at the beautiful bathroom that he had made himself, thought about some of the nicer moments we’d shared, and decided that I should probably give it all a little longer before I made a decision.
I made my way downstairs to find that he had made me a cup of tea and another really good sandwich ‘for the road’. As we sat on the sofa, I was still feeling awfully tired and quiet, and he went from finishing my sentences as he had the night before, to making up answers entirely in a strained, high pitched voice that he clearly thought mimicked my own. “I don’t care much for what you’re saying, Danny, she says” - or - “Isn’t it a beautiful day, Danny? she says.” I wasn't sure how to respond to this curious aggression so I just sipped my tea and smiled.
He looked deeply into my eyes again and he said quite seriously “You have the most exquisite elbows.” and pushed himself onto me with so much of his great weight that we slid from the sofa onto the floor. He seemed to think it was whimsical but I landed on the rim of the cup, which somehow didn’t break, but was pushing forcibly into my arm under his body. This time, I spoke sharply "Danny.” “Danny, get off, you’re hurting me.” which he took as a signal to press a hard kiss against my lips. I surrendered awkwardly because the cup appeared to be pretty sturdy and it seemed very well to be the safest way to escape unscathed. He eventually climbed off and helped me up, full of a strange pride, and still completely oblivious to my now evident pain. I stood there rubbing my arm and twisted my wrist to survey the damage. The skin wasn’t broken but there was a deep white gash under it which, frankly, looked like an exquisitely drawn vulva. I’m writing this 18 years later and it’s still there. That beauty was the talk of the Christmas party 2006. It was oddly, impressively gorgeous.
Anyway, he was dreadfully sorry about it, and had fallen quite quiet in his remorse, so I took this as my chance to give him a quick kiss and a hug goodbye. As we withdrew from each other, he looked deeply into my eyes and tittered with a lusty little giggle. I left unsure of my feelings still. On the one hand, there were some really cool things about him, but why did I feel so icked out, and like I wasn’t being seen despite his intense attention? What’s more, the memory of his butthole glaring at me was hard to erase, cropping up in my memory when I least expected it to, and the vulva art on my arm was throbbing with a dull pain.
I packed my bags to head home for Christmas, relieved to have some time and space to consider it all. On Boxing Day, however, I had eight missed calls on my phone from Danny. I rang him back to see if he was ok. He was loading things into his car boot. “Oh are you going somewhere nice?” I asked, and he replied “Actually, I’m going to need your postcode because I’ve got a brand new pair of walking boots in your size and I want to wish you and your family a Merry Christmas in person.” I panicked at this suggestion as we were about to leave to go elsewhere ourselves and because I didn’t want to see him, let alone introduce him to my family after two dates. I told him we had somewhere to be but he kept insisting that he would just swing by wherever we were for a couple of minutes even though it was at least a four hour round trip. I don’t remember how I got out of it but I managed to put him off with the reassurance that I would see him the very first night that I was back.
And see him I did. I had been apprehensive about it, but we had quite a nice, unremarkable evening together eating curry, so much so that I wondered again how I really felt about it all. The following day I went to work a triple shift at the pub from 9am to 11pm. Upon returning to the house that I shared with four random girls, they all stuck their heads around their bedroom doors looking curiously bemused and a little romanced. “A tall man in a nice sweater came by. He knew you were at work but wanted to be let into your bedroom.” I asked “Did you let him?!” and they answered as if it were the most natural thing in the world that of course they had. I went up to my room to find a handwritten letter and a red rose on my bed. I asked Sidney my goldfish what he thought of it all and he swam up to give the tip of my finger a kiss without a remark, so I popped the rose into his tank and he settled in to listen to the letter as I read it out loud to him.
“…I want to get to know you, to understand your passions, how and what you think about the world and those within it. So I do feel justified when my smile drops when I learn that I am to spend another day only thinking about seeing you…”
I had that weepy, helpless feeling again, only this time it was the final straw for me. This man hadn't really attempted to get to know me at all, and here he was imposing himself upon me when I had simply been to work for the day under the guise of romance. I pulled out two sheets of writing paper and set to work articulating how, as a young girl of twenty years old, I needed the space and time to find out more about myself before getting involved in a relationship that I was increasingly finding no place within.
The following morning, I mused with my friend Sara* over a cup of a tea how on earth I could deliver it without him coming to the door, as I suspected he might not let me go all that easily. She suggested that as her mother was coming to collect her with the car, why not have them drive me round there as a getaway vehicle. As I creaked open the letterbox, I heard distant, tentative footsteps. Twirling on my toes, I flew into the car and we drove away just as the door handle began to turn.
To his credit, the letter Danny sent to me in reply was kind and respectful, even if he did misquote Salman Rushdie over how ‘journeys that are shared are the journeys truly fulfilled’, and I felt an immediate sense of relief and release. I saw him a few weeks later by the cathedral and when I answered his “How are you?” with a “Yes, everything is good thanks.” he cocked his hand to one side and quipped in that strained, girlish voice again “I’m content leading the ever-unchallenging life, Danny, she says.” and then smirked at me with contempt.
As fortune might have it, I didn’t see Danny for years after that, apart from a blur of his long limbs cycling past me on the high street, and I learned that he had found love with another young lady - an artist named Kimberley* with gorgeous, cropped auburn hair, who was even younger than I was at the time Danny and I had been dating.
When we finally did cross paths again, he was sitting outside the cafe, smoking his liquorice rollies, drinking that black, black coffee and frowning at his journal. He looked tired, his knotted ponytail sagging, and it felt natural to pull up a chair next to him and ask him how he was. “Oh, I’m terrible.” he said “Kimberley and I have broken up.” I expressed my sympathies and asked if he wanted to talk about it and he replied “I’m a very strange man, Sally. A tortured romantic, if you will. I fall in love so intensely, so fast, and as soon as they like me back, I completely lose interest. Kimberley says I’m incredibly cruel. In fact, she called me narcissist.”
“Are you a narcissist?” I asked.
“Oh yes, completely and utterly. I’m a total narcissist.” Danny replied.
And that’s how I found out who he really was all those years later, because he told me so himself.
*Names have been changed for privacy.
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I enjoyed reading that. Your angst was palpable. He wasn't the first of your narcissists, I believe but he had some self perception which the others hadn't? Sensitive writing.
(Can you implore after someone?)