The blue hairbrush

20 February 2005

I knew Jane from school, though not very well, as she was in a different class. For a while, she was the girlfriend of a pal of mine, and apart from that, I had never noticed her. After I left school, got a job and left home, I was out and about quite a bit, especially in the pubs in town. I must have bumped into her in a pub, and simply presumed that she was still going out with the same boy, with whom I had lost all contact on leaving school.

Jane was an extremely smiley, happy lass and made me feel that she was very pleased to have met up again. Over the course of a few weeks, we came across each other with increasing frequency. This would seem odd, were it to happen now, but back then, aged 18, it was quite common for someone to suddenly become part of the scene. I really liked her company and found myself increasingly wondering where the boyfriend was. Whenever I asked her where she had been socializing the last couple of years, she simply replied “youth club”. But, partly because she was spoken for, and partly because she was someone from way back, I never made a pass at her. Perhaps that’s why she chose me. For whatever reason, after we had become friends, she announced one day that she wanted me to meet someone.

I was only slightly puzzled by this, but it did not register as unusual in my mind. I suppose I had spent too many years among social misfits, druggies, hippies and hell’s angels, to notice this minor oddity. Jane may have thought that what she was doing was odd; I never found out. But she was happily asking if she and her friend, Rita, could come and meet me sometime, perhaps at my flat. I could see no problem with this, so we arranged to meet up at my place on Saturday afternoon.

Sure enough, bang on time, the doorbell sounded. I didn’t know what I should have been expecting, but nothing had prepared me for the shock of finding the two of them like this; Jane standing with a big grin on her face and in front of her, a girl of the same age, long straight hair, jeans and ordinary get-up, gently shaking, sat in a wheelchair.

While I stood in the doorway, time stood still and a thousand thoughts raced through my mind; should I tell them to push off and slam the door, or simply pretend not to find this unusual and invite them in, or something in between? I searched my memory for any trace or hint of Rita’s condition in the conversations I could recall with Jane. The only possible thing I could latch on to was her enigmatic response to some questions; “youth club”.

Of course, I invited them in and hoped to god my hesitation had not been too apparent. First novel thing; I didn’t need to offer Rita a seat. We all said our hellos, and I could feel their intense scrutiny of my initial reactions. Only now do I realize how clever Jane had been to get to know me first; not just to gauge whether and when to introduce me to her friend, but also because now she would be able to detect whether my behaviour with Rita was typical for me. I offered them coffee, which they both readily accepted, Jane asking me not to fill Rita’s mug more than half. I returned with the drinks, mind in turmoil, desperate to avoid a faux pas, and wondering how to even hand a drink to someone in a wheelchair whose hands, neck, legs, arms, all shook, gently but clearly. Jane was marvellous. She clearly knew what I was thinking and she deftly took Rita’s drink from me before I could even think about handing it to her myself. Jane placed the drink in Rita’s cupped hands, firmly but gently. As Jane detached from the mug, its contents began to slosh around. But Rita didn’t spill a drop while she sipped her hot coffee.

So there we were, the three of us, chatting our way to a more comfortable familiarity, each of us spreading the conversation evenly across the other two. Rita’s shake was constant, but neither vigorous nor shivery. There was nothing tense or jerky about her movements, and I soon got used to her perpetual waving. More difficult to get acclimatized to was her slight speech defect; it wasn’t much, but enough to require proper concentration. Still, she clearly found me very attentive as I listened carefully to avoid the embarrassment of having to ask her to repeat something. But Jane had this figured out, too. I didn’t notice at the time, but she cleverly jumped in with rejoinders designed to clarify and supplement, but in a very conversational way, so it was not obvious.

We joked, chatted about music and books we had read, and laughed a lot. It was great being with these two. They were so different from my usual sulky, self-indulgent mates who took themselves far too seriously. After a couple of hours, they decided it was time to go. We decided to do it again the following week, and I was finding this great fun. Over the next couple of months we met up a lot; sometimes at my place, sometimes in town. but never in a bigger crowd than the three of us. Jane always brought Rita and transported her around. At some point I raised the topic of my erstwhile school friend, and it turned out that Jane had finished with him a couple of years previously and she was surprised that I should have thought they might still be together.

I was naive not to realize what was going on, but the denouement was not long in coming. On one visit, Jane made some reason for leaving Rita and I together in my flat for a little while. I thought nothing of it and the two of us continued to chatter in the usual way. Rita often had a bright blue handled hairbrush in her lap. Today, she asked me to brush her hair. As I did so, she chatted away as usual. The chair was next to the bed; after all, this was a bed-sit. I barely noticed her moving from the chair to the bed. It was quite a normal place for my visitors to sit. As she leaned back, reclining, she turned the conversation to sex.

I was startled at this, feeling it graceless and inappropriate. I was stupid enough to think that for someone like me to have sex with someone like her, it could only be construed as me having taken advantage of her. She could not have been more than seven stone. She was slender, with beautiful hair, and she clearly wanted me. I wasn’t so stupid as to tell her that I thought I would be taking advantage. On reflection, that was probably the most stupid thing I could have done because, had I told her that this was what was on my mind, we could have dealt with it. I also neglected to tell her that I was worried about Jane coming back and interrupting us. That was how thick I was being; not realizing that Jane had engineered this. I don’t think either of them knew how desperate I was to get my sex life started; in fact, I had probably done my best to give the impression that I was already experienced, as for some reason, no male in my age group could ever admit to anyone that they had not had sex yet.

But instead of being honest, I dug myself deeper into my dishonesty. Poor Rita, she was desperate and clearly frustrated by her unfulfilled drives. She could not understand my hesitation, and I could only bluster and stumble through this embarrassment until Jane finally returned to take her home. Rita looked at me tearfully and said no-one wants a girl who shakes. I said it was not that simple, and that the shake was not what was wrong.

I realized after they left that I could probably get into this, and found that the prospect made me nervous and confused. But Rita was a nice girl, and she was adventurous. She was probably just what I needed. I found Rita’s hair brush on the sideboard, and was glad because the next time she came over, we could pick up where we left off, and make a little more progress. I got to the point of really looking forward to their next visit. In my mind, I thought through various ways that things might evolve. But they never came back. I kept the brush for years in case she came back. But I never saw or heard from either of them ever again.