Emma Donoghue Two-Book Bundle Read Free

office was still full of squabbles and cold coffee.
    He unzipped his trousers to start getting in the mood. Nothing stirring yet. All Very Quiet on the Western Front. Well, Sarah couldn’t expect some sort of McDonald’s-style service, could she?
Ready in Five Minutes or Your Money Back.
She wasn’t paying for this, Padraic reminded himself. He was doing her a great big favour. At least, he was trying to.
    He zipped up his trousers again; he didn’t like feeling watched. If he could only relax there would be no problem. There never was any problem. Well, never usually. Hardly ever. No more than the next man. And Carmel had such a knack …
    He wouldn’t think about Carmel. It was too weird. She was his wife, and here he was sitting on a very expensive toilet preparing to hand her best friend a jar of his semen. At the sheer perversity of the thought, he felt a little spark of life.
Good, good, keep it up, man. You’re about to have a wank,
he told himself salaciously,
in the all-new, design-award-winning Finbar’s Hotel. This is very postmodern altogether. That woman out there has flown halfway round the world for the Holy Grail of your little jarful. Think what the pope would say to that!
    This last taboo was almost too much for Padraic; he felt his confidence begin to drain away at the thought of the pontiff peering in the bathroom window.
    Dirty, think honest-to-god dirty thoughts.
Suddenly he couldn’t remember any. What did he used to think about when he was seventeen? It seemed an aeon ago.
    He knew he should have come armed. An hour ago he was standing at the Easons magazine counter, where the cashier had looked about twelve, and he’d lost his nerve and handed her an
Irish Independent
instead. Much good the
Irish Independent
would be to him in this hour of need. He’d flicked through it already and the most titillating thing in it was a picture of the president signing a memorial.
    This was ridiculous.
You’re not some Neanderthal; you were born in 1961.
Surely he didn’t need some airbrushed airhead to slaver over? Surely he could rely on the power of imagination?
    The door opened abruptly. Sarah, who had turned her armchair to face the window so as not to seem to be hovering in a predatory way, grinned over her shoulder. ‘That was quick!’
    Then she cursed herself for speaking too soon because Padraic was shaking his head as if he had something stuck in his ear. ‘Actually,’ he muttered, ‘I’m just going to stretch my legs. Won’t be a minute.’
    ‘Sure, sure, take your time.’
    His legs? Sarah sat there in the empty room and wondered what his legs had to do with anything. Blood flow to the pelvis? Or was it a euphemism for a panic attack? She peered into the bathroom; the jar was still on the sink, bone-dry.
    Five minutes later, it occurred to her that he had run home to Carmel.
    The phone rang eight times before her friend picked it up. ‘Sarah, my love! What country are you in?’
    ‘This one.’
    ‘Is my worser half with you?’
    ‘Well, he was. But he’s gone out.’
    ‘Out where?’
    Curled up on the duvet, Sarah shrugged off her heels. ‘I don’t know. Listen, if he turns up at home—’
    ‘Padraic wouldn’t do that to you.’
    There was a little silence. In the background, she could hear the
Holby City
theme on the television, and one of the boys chanting something, over and over. ‘Listen, Carmel, how did he seem this morning?’
    Her friend let out a short laugh. ‘How he always seems.’
    ‘No, but was he nervous? I mean, I’m nervous, and it’s worse for him.’
    ‘Maybe he was a bit,’ said Carmel consideringly. ‘But, I mean, how hard can it be?’
    Who started giggling first? ‘Today is just one long double entendre,’ said Sarah eventually.
    ‘How long?’
    ‘Long enough!’
    And then they were serious again. ‘Did you bully him into it, though, Carmel, really?’
    ‘Am I the kind of woman who bullies anyone?’
    This wasn’t the time for that