I should clarify at this point that Ispent all my childhood and adolescence surrounded by women. In mygrandmother's house (also divorced since before ... was born), my mother, myyounger sister and I lived together. Surely being in contact with womenand their intimate subjects constantly, and from a very young age,contributed to this fascination, respect and even idolatry for femininity.When I was eleven years old, my mother, sister and I separated from mygrandmother and moved to a new house in. With Pete having had the snip a long time ago, I hadn’t even thought about it.Although I didn’t understand it at the time, the coming months were to demonstrate only too clearly that there were a lot of things I didn’t think about when ‘in heat’. This was a weakness I could and should have recognised in myself. If I had understood myself better then, I could perhaps have saved us all so much worry in the future but at the time I didn’t realise its significance.Ridiculously, I didn’t feel able. The Bishop is having an affair with a married woman – that's common knowledge – and so he won't reveal anything about the priest. The nun knows something – but she won’t say anything because the Bishop won't let her. And where the fuck is the priest? One of them must know – but they’re not saying!”Phil sighed sympathetically. “And the nutter ‘best friend’, with all this ‘curse’ rubbish - what the fuck?”“Well, at least the bimbo was willing to impart some information – even if it was a total. Then she picked up her robe to dry off her hands. “Oh, I knew it would,” my mother informed me as she dropped the robe. “Or at least I was always going to try.”With the heat off me I was capable of coherent thought, guilt sliding in. “You know this is wrong,” I said, a statement not a question.My mother gave a half-shrug. She grimaced and said, “Only if we let it be wrong,” she said, confronting me with her stare. “I told you, it’ nobody’s concern. Nobody’s business. You never said anything to.