Just stumbled upon this and thought I would send it into the unknown for a little while before I did any more to it. I think I wrote it a couple of years ago, as a snapshot (think I had some idea of writing several little 'dinner scenes') and then added the first paragraph before Christmas, with the intention of making it into something a little more substantial. Not sure whether I prefer it as a snapshot to be alsongside other similar snapshots or.. oh well...comments gratefully received.
The Dinner Party[On the way to the restaurant we had stopped off to buy the gifts necessary for such an evening; the housewarming present for the housewarming we hadn’t managed to attend, the cards for the recently engaged and those not so recently engaged, celebrating yet another, dubiously entitled ‘engagement anniversary’. Typically, we hurried along, hands touching each time our steps became too close.]
After the initial joyous laughter and frivolity of meeting friends, not seen for a long time, and those left only a few hours before, the mood around the table had cooled. Things were starting to get uncomfortable; they had a habit of becoming so when people began talking of lost futures and hidden pasts. The conversation had turned to long-forgotten or hidden fantasies, a dangerous topic at the best of times but a potential demolition ball when mixed with a dubious solution of alcohol. Christopher looked mischievously at me, and his words slid out with only a hint of Merlot in his dulcet tones:
What about you then?As was my fashion, my face fell into the deadpan expression I had mastered during the competitions of wit and innuendo at University…
when I was younger, I used to dream of being the wife of a housemaster, living in an ivy-draped cottage at a boarding school in the country; making sweets for the younger boys; running a drama club and extra tuition sessions for the older, less adolescent teenage boys, caught in the throes of their escape from childhood, into the confusion of the realm of manhood; tea with the vicar on Sundays (despite my RC upbringing) and a supply of casseroles for the unmarried schoolmasters; perhaps becoming the older lover of a youthful master of English or Latin, just down from college, full of poetry and ideas about the world, needing to be reigned in and set free at the same time…
And now?
Naturally, my tone changed, becoming resigned and frank as the occasion dictated:
Well, I became the schoolteacher, the husband became the reliable and trustworthy, yet, unemployed idler (I mean this most affectionately, darling) that you see before you, and, of course, the cottage in the grounds, became the flat in Chiswick.And what about the affair?Well, if I were to have an affair now, it would probably be with an older man, one with experience of the world, a wise and yet romantic approach to life, a job (sorry again sweetheart), and at least a hint of silver in his hair…
Or no hair! interrupted Sarah .
At that moment a draft caught the candle in the sconce behind the table. The light of the flame seemed to dance and lick the smooth surface of Andrew’s head. We all stared at each other for a second and then convulsed into laughter once more
