I rang the bell at the flats entrance and she told me to come up to flat 3. I tried not to run up the stair, and when I got there, the flat door was ...jar. She was half standing behind the door, just her head looking round, that mischievous smile on her full lips. I paused to kiss her, just a peck on the lips, but even that was so cool, so expressive of the afternoon to come. My first impression of her was of a gentle but seductive perfume, unlike the cloying choking fug of the salesgirls in. 'But it grated irritatingly against Ken's entire vision of himself. His entire life had been predicated on flying under the radar. Being inconspicuous, not being noticed, not standing out as being special. Fitting in. "Maybe that way, people won't look at me closely, and then they won't be able to see what a terrible, messed-up person I am," he thought to himself."Maybe I can go with a sack over my head," Ken thought sourly. "Wouldn't that be attractive?"Meanwhile, the renovation plans hurtled. Sex had not yet entered its secondary phase.“I will miss Dave this weekend” she thought remembering that he was going away on a golfing trip with the ‘lads’. “A piss up more like,” chuckling to herself. She knew the coach was leaving at 10:30 am and she wondered whether she should go down there and wave him goodbye. “Better not” she thought “I might embarrass him in front of his friends.”By nine o’clock Alice was fully awake, she donned the matching night-wrap to her black see-through satin. I’ve promised to help him and his wife with this and she had the baby, then she lost her job and they’re having a tough time. It’s just time to step up to the plate and go to the bank to see what has to be done . . .’ She trailed off then and apologized to him for unloading her grief onto him. ‘Not unloading, dear! Friends help friends that way,’ he said. ‘Thank you, Foster,’ she said, ‘You are such a caring person.’ ‘And you’re going to hurt me now?’ he said grinning. ‘Exactly!’ she said.