PANTOMIME

Written by Ben Tallon

It was the kind of Sunday when it all felt worse than it was. She had daddy issues. You could see it dripping from her jewellery display; death-mottled eyes assessing ways to end me when I told the wrong joke to the scenesters she ran with.

We hated everything about each other. 

Yet here we were, bucking and riding on the queen size, Egyptian cotton caught under my leg as I catastrophically slipped out and struggled to get it back in.

Eventually I thumbed in the pale slacky.

She was violently bored, so I set off for the finale but the thing was limp and nerves had taken over. Not good. I could sense her gearing up to question why she could no longer feel me down there when Beyoncé, her cock-a-doodle galloped in and lapped once at my arse. Everything on me stiffened in shock and she clawed at the pillow with a yelp, caught off guard by my accidental resurgence. Before I could scream at the animal, from the corner of my eye I saw not the hyperactive, overbred dog I was expecting, but the man on the pantomime posters in the city each Christmas, his pearly whites blinding me. Slightly balder, a little more wrinkled this year.

I closed my eyes and tried to shut out what I’d seen. When I opened them, he’d gone. It was the dog again, grinning, its head cocked to one side, hoping I’d come throw the saliva sodden, squeaky pig toy, face down by the door.