Ben had made an effort to lay the table out nicely for their modest meal while Marcie had been speaking to Vera. There had only been plain cheddar cheese in the fridge, but he had found jars of chutney and pickles, from his own old flat, which Marcie had recovered, as well as ones she’d had already. He’d also put the crackers, fruit and butter out, along with glasses of water and wineglasses, though these were empty for now. He’d made his toast and warmed his beans in a pan on the stove too, bringing them both to the table in Marcie’s toast rack and a nice bowl, just to give them the impression of being a little bit more civilised. He’d also lit the candelabra that they’d used in the bathroom to complete the refined dining experience.

“No problem,” Ben said, acknowledging Marcie’s thanks as he turned towards the table. She took to opportunity to get up from the sofa and move over to the hi-fi to put some music on, so Ben rose too, offering to pour them some wine. Marcie agreed, then held up a dark CD case from the Cocteau Twins for his approval, though he had to admit he wasn’t really familiar with them but trusted her judgement.

Once they’d dropped the blind, sat down and raised their glasses to say cheers whilst the ethereal music began rolling out of the speakers, Marcie reminded him of their chat in the car about finding their way into a new normal. Ben guessed they were already working that out, with the laundry and the Sunday night family phone calls. Marcie agreed, but went on to talk about their meals and their drinking. Ben was very happy to confirm that they wouldn’t drink wine every night, and that they could get into the habits of eating more vegetables and less fatty meals. He reminded her about the way that he needed to find his own new normal for his diet, now that he’d be dramatically cutting down his physical activity. He assured her that he wouldn’t become a calorie bore though, or do anything like start Weightwatchers, but they did talk briefly about finding a safe gym routine.

Then, with her empty plate still in front of her, Marcie suggested they get down to the really boring practicalities of their normal everyday concerns, checking her schedule at the university and planning specific meals for the next week. Ben was happy to help, and also said that he was happy to do a big shop tomorrow. He confirmed with Marcie that the nearest major supermarket was in Gosforth near the Regent Centre Metro stop, but she admitted she normally got everything in the local one on Acorn Road. She speculated that it was better not to keep popping in every day though to get whatever they’d just thought of in the moment, and Ben agreed.

So with the air of someone who was committed to doing the job properly, Marcie drew up their menu timetable for next week in a page from her Filofax, noting the evenings she’d be late back. She chatted with Ben about each other’s reliable recipes, then converted what they’d agreed into a shopping list. She offered to hand over some cash with it, but Ben held up his hand, saying he wanted to get it while she was still paying the mortgage and all the bills. They talked again about setting up a shared budget, but both agreed they could leave that particular excitement for later, perhaps as part of what they thought might become a regular Sunday evening planning session.

“I’m sorry to be boring,” Marcie concluded, sipping her wine as the dreamy music rolled on, the sensuous female vocals seeming unintelligible to Ben.

“It’s just the ordinary stuff, isn’t it?” Ben smiled contentedly, “We’re grounding ourselves in the everyday too. It is part of exploring that new normal, to go alongside our shared exploration of fantasy myth ideas, and our exciting open-minded experiments, you know, at a physical level.”

“Hmm, food, money, myths and fucking,” Marcie chuckled, “Is that what makes us human?”

“Aye, and looking after each other, keeping clean, keeping safe, making a nice home, being kind to each other if we get sick, meeting friends, helping each other to grow, to learn and develop, and maybe trying to make the world a slightly better place,” Ben added thoughtfully.

“Well that sounds like another of your lists right there!” Marcie teased, adding, “And speaking of getting clean, shall we tidy this lot away together, then maybe think about giving ourselves a scrub down? I don’t know about you, but I’m aware I’m still a bit slimy down below.”

Ben agreed to Marcie’s idea of tidying up their scratch supper, whilst avoiding any comment on the possible state of her vulva. His impulse was to return to the polite and safe way of being with her, as he had tried to do yesterday evening. Everything had felt so jittery then, after the fire and then their row. Though they’d done their best to heal the strife that the latter had caused, Marcie had been worried about slipping into a kind of mania, he remembered. Keeping afloat above the dark depths of the loss and uncertainty in their lives, as well as their primitive passionate feelings, had seemed important then. Now the modest course of action merely seemed the best way to keep playing out the new normality that they’d agreed to explore going forwards.

That attitude led both Ben’s outward behaviour and his words as he put the things from their meal away and then began to dry up the dishes that Marcie had started washing at the sink. Yet it also guided his inner thoughts to some extent. His imagination still played with the crude idea of Marcie’s vagina oozing her former wet arousal across the soft fabric of the very same knickers that he had held to his face earlier, and still conjured images of how she’d look as she ran the shower’s steaming flow through her soapy pubic hair. However, each time such thoughts arose, his mind deliberately moved on quickly, letting them pass without dwelling on them. He vaguely hoped that this may help him to see the wider picture of the shared lives that they were forging, yet he also recognised that he may have simply been finding it easier to not get caught up in such intimate visualisations as his sexual appetites were already so well sated.

Confirming that Marcie was happy to help him finish the wine, Ben emptied what was left in the bottle into their glasses. He’d thought that she may be keen to sit on the sofa to read, as he remembered that was her habit after her evening meal. He was ready to look at his mind map book and his sketched ideas for the backyard again for his part. However Marcie asked him straight away if he wanted to have a bath like last night’s. Ben felt it would be selfish to repeat exactly what they’d done, so he suggested ways to simplify or vary things, whilst also asking her about her routines. When she queried what he meant, he risked asking directly if she needed to shave in the bath, as she’d previously hinted she did. Marcie unselfconsciously admitted that her armpits were probably due some attention, but thought her legs weren’t too stubbly yet, challenging Ben to contradict her. He vigorously denied that he’d noticed anything at all, then she laughed at the awkward and unwarranted guilt that her teasing had prompted in him.

Then, once they’d agreed that Ben would bathe quickly before Marcie got into the bathtub in the water that he’d run, he bravely volunteered to try reading aloud to her as she took her time to soak and relax. He apologised straight away that it couldn’t be the nice experience that she’d given him, as he would be far less fluent with the words. However Marcie was very enthusiastic and encouraging, reassuring him that no matter how slowly he read or how many mistakes he made, it would still be lovely for her to hear. She also pointed out that the practice would only help him to get better and more confident with the written word. Then she confirmed that he wanted to continue reading about Narnia, with a slightly amused expression as if she were challenging him. Ben guessed she may have been imagining listening to him read Tracy Cox’s sex tips out loud, but thinking once again of keeping things safely polite, he merely confirmed that he had expected to keep following the children’s adventures.

Once they’d decided on their plan, they both promptly started arranging things. Ben found the old book to take through the bathroom with the candelabra, which he carried anxiously and carefully to avoid dripping wax, going back to collect their wineglasses, putting them down on the far edge of the bath. Meanwhile Marcie went to the bedroom to get a clean nightdress, saying she’d pick up the extra candles and get the room ready for the night too. Ben thought it seemed dark in the bathroom with just the candlelight, but he guessed his eyes would become accustomed to it as he laid the book on the laundry basket, passed water, then got undressed, before stepping over to the bath.

When Marcie eased her way into the bathroom, Ben swung the open shower panel in a little to let her push around the door while he crouched beside the bathtub, running the water hot over a little bubble-bath. She ran her hand across his bare shoulders, commenting again on the delight of finding a naked satyr in her bathroom. Ben apologetically admitted that Roddie wasn’t performing very well at that moment, being too small and sleepy to really help him play that role. Marcie reassured him that he was not to worry at all, as Vixen was feeling a little worn out too after everything that they’d been getting up to. Yet as the bath filled under Ben drifting hands, he was pleased to feel a kind of mental arousal at least as Marcie lifted her loose blouse over her head, revealing her round breasts, cupped in the pale blue satin cups of her bra.

With the bath now deep enough for a business-like wash, Ben cautiously eased his cold feet into the water even as the taps were still running, feeling them tingle with the heat. Squatting first, he scooped foamy water with his cupped hands to pour over his head, face, neck and shoulders, blowing out noisily from his mouth as he did so. He splashed his genitals and anus too, then rubbed up a lather in his hands to soap them up, popping his foreskin back, and only then sinking into the water to rinse himself down. Once sitting, he soaped up his face, torso and feet, before raising his knees and lying back to immerse his body as best he could under the rising water, sloshing it all over his body, lathering and rinsing his armpits once more. Then he sat up again, splashing his face down for a final time, before rising from the bath, dripping water onto his towel as he stepped out, barely two minutes after he’d got in.

As he briskly towelled himself down, Ben smiled at Marcie, now naked herself and perched on the toilet seat with her own towel over her knees. He saw how her arms were crossed in her lap, leaving her heavy breasts exposed, their shadowy areolae seeming dark in the candlelight. He again thought of how she perfectly embodied the casually posed expression of fascinating femininity that artists had striven to capture throughout history. He saw her now as if she were in a relaxed cosmopolitan studio though, a muse to the intelligentsia in decadent prewar Paris or Berlin perhaps, rather than ancient Greece or Rome.

“There was no need to be so quick,” she said gently as she returned his gaze.

“I know,” Ben responded, coming back to the moment as he wrapped his towel around his waist. He turned back to the bathtub to pour a more bubble-bath under the taps as he shyly explained, “But I didn’t want to keep my dryad queen waiting, while her bathwater cooled, and the bubbles disappeared.”

“I guess I’d be more of a nymph or a naiad if I’m in the water rather than up a tree,” Marcie mused as she rose and once again brushed Ben’s shoulders whilst he still knelt, stirring the bathwater.

He could not resist turning toward her naked body, putting his wet hands flat to her belly and hip, planting a soft kiss on the warm skin of her abdomen. Then he looked up past the mounds of her breasts with their soft nipples to look into her wide dark eyes with genuine adoration as she ruffled his hair. She’d giggled, but now she said, “Oh Ben, I really do need to get clean. It feels as if we could tease each other and wind ourselves up again, but there’s no need for that tonight. Do you agree?”

“Aye,” Ben said, kissing her belly once more, then rising to his feet and cheekily drying his hands on her towel before pressing a brief kiss to her lips too. He explained his earlier thought, “You are a beautiful vision to me, of shining womanhood. You excite me, we’re hungry for each other, I think, but just in our minds now, because we’ve sated those appetites for today, for our bodies, it feels like. It’s okay to let Roddie and Vixen rest for now, while the inner fires of our sexual engines just smoulder, in our hearts as well as our bodies. Meanwhile, I can try reading to you, while you do your regular Sunday night bath thing, and we make our new normal, all modest and polite.”

“Well, not too modest,” Marcie said as she stepped into the bath, holding Ben’s hand in a ladylike way, “I wouldn’t carry on like this with anyone else, getting my boobies out in front of them while I listened to their sensuously sonorous voice.”

“I’m glad to hear it, I guess,” Ben responded, leaving it at that rather than getting back into their discussion of their feelings about exhibitionism. As Marcie lowered herself into the bathwater and leant back with a sigh of contentment, he felt something of that same relaxed happiness as he took his wineglass and sat down on the toilet lid, drying his hands again to be on the safe side, before opening her precious book at its special bookmark.

Though Ben had half expected to see Marcie begin splashing about as she washed herself and shaved her armpits, she seemed content to just let her body soak for the time being. He saw her reach for her wine to take a sip, so he followed her example. Then he cautiously began reading, using Amber’s old postcard to keep his place, just as Marcie had shown him. As he picked up the story of the children’s worries about food and their pursuit of the robin in the winter sun, his halting reading became a little easier. Though he still made mistakes, often going back to repeat phrases once he’d got the sense of it right, Marcie listened patiently. He noticed - and appreciated - that she didn’t once interrupt to correct him, even though she must have recognised his errors even before he did.

It was slow progress, but as he finished his wine, he was beginning to find a voice for each of the children. He almost felt that he was speaking for Edmund as the younger boy started questioning the others’ assumptions about sides, and which they ought to be picking. Ben felt the uncomfortably conflicted Edmund had a point, lost on their own in a strange wood. However he also guessed that to the author, these sorts of sceptics questions were an unhelpful waste of time to those of true faith. Then he read Lucy’s line when she said, “I think it’s a nice beaver,” at which point he glanced up to catch Marcie’s expression. Her dark eyebrows were raised in a parody of shocked surprise, even as she smirked, and then they both laughed together.

“Poor Clive Staples, or Jack as he was known,” Marcie said thoughtfully, “He must have been pretty naive about slang terms for women’s pudenda. I’m quite sure that term for our lady parts was already well established by the time of the Second World War.”

“So why did he choose the beaver as a character?” Ben wondered aloud.

“Well maybe it was because they are monogamous animals, mating for life,” Marcie reflected, draining her own wine. Then, as she began washing herself properly with the soapy shower puff, she went on, “And proverbially hard working too. ‘As busy as a beaver,’ if you’d credit it. Those are both good Christian values, and it could be argued they’re sound ethical practices for any other culture too, I’m sure.”

“But why not an animal that children would know better?” Ben persisted, “We talked about horses and rabbits, but perhaps other pets, or a farm animal, like the Billy Goats Gruff, even a fox or a badger. It’s more likely that kids would know them.”

“Maybe they’d be more common in children’s books that were more for our generation, like Watership Down or The Animals of Farthing Wood,” Marcie reflected, moving onto her armpits with foam and a razor now, as Ben noticed without comment, “Badger sounds like he’s out of The Wind in the Willows though, which perhaps Lewis wanted to distance himself from. I can imagine an ardent Christian medievalist having some issues with the saccharine tone of that folksy Edwardian yarn, especially in its joyfully pagan scene with the benevolent god Pan. But I think he admired other authors from the previous generation, like Edith Nesbit, and she had a phoenix and an ancient sand creature in her stories, who granted wishes as if they were djinni or fairies.”

“I don’t know her stories,” Ben admitted, before remarking, “But those are fantasy creatures, right? A beaver is different. It’s like saying I’m making friends with, I don’t know, a polecat.”

“Well, maybe you should try that,” Marcie said teasingly, “I’m sure you’d find him very playful. You could keep him down your trousers! But we’ve interrupted your wonderfully careful and thoughtful reading, and I’m finished here now, so why don’t we park the story there so you can get ready for bed while I get out and into my nightie?”

Ben agreed, folding the book closed and setting it carefully aside with a sigh, then standing to stretch. He watched Marcie as he tensed his calves and thighs, then braced his arms, rolling his neck and shoulders. Her naked body glistened in the candlelight as she rose from the bath, her dripping mole-dappled skin glowing pink where she had been immersed in the hot water. He saw her chest and stomach glossy with the clinging bathwater, her breasts hanging down and swinging as she reached for her towel, her sopping-wet pubic hair matted and plastered to her vulva as she stepped out. Despite his earlier observations about his sated absence of arousal, he was aware that his libido was involuntarily stirring again now, warm blood flowing to softly swell his penis.

Yet, once he’d caught Marcie’s eyes to exchange smiles of unspoken contentment in a lingering moment, he shook out his arms and stepped towards the bathroom basin, turning away from her as she got on with drying herself down. As he took in the slow puffs of his brown inhaler then started brushing his teeth, Ben remembered Marcie’s words, that though they could wind their bodies up to an energetic passion once again if they wanted, there’s no need. He knew his current contentment was rooted in the blazing passion of the physical intimacy that they’d already shared that day, but deeper than that, he felt sure of his trust in their new love’s deeper enduring warmth.

Then Marcie was standing at his side, joining him in his routine at the basin, her clean dry body draped in her white nightdress. She gave him a playful nudge with her hip, encouraging him to make space for her as she reached for her own toothbrush. As she stood close, Ben inhaled deeply through his nostrils, and thought he caught a hint of her washed skin’s soapy fragrance over his toothpaste’s strong peppermint. But then he was done, rinsing his mouth out and ready to leave the bathroom. He told Marcie he’d get some fresh water to take through to the bedroom, noticing how her eyebrows flicked up and her cheeks beside her nose creased as she tried to indicate her agreement with a smile, even whilst her mouth was still filled with foam around her vigorously moving toothbrush.

Ben pulled off his towel and hung it up, affecting a casual nonchalance as he exposed his softly lengthened penis to Marcie. He picked up the wineglasses to drop them by the kitchen sink, standing naked in the kitchen before the closed blind as he filled a pair of clean glasses with cold water. He cast his eyes around the shadowy living room as he padded slowly through it, vaguely imaging what other emotional, intimate and mundane things he and Marcie might get up to in that cosy space, on the soft sofa or the coarser rug, beneath that totemic image of the lovers. He felt a potent glow of satisfaction in the recognition that this was now truly his space too, even as he edged around his bike in the corridor and into Marcie’s bedroom, navigating by the light of the one lamp that she’d left on which spilt around the half-open door. As he stepped into the room to see their shared bed, he inhaled the now familiar scent of her soft den as he put the glasses down. He felt utterly uninhibited, wearing nothing but Marcie’s pendant charm, hidden from the street behind the thick curtains. There was a sure confidence flowing through his clean and pleasantly fatigued body, a profound sense of assurance in his ability to play the archetypal role of the virile lover, exclusively for Marcie, together in this private space, weaving and fusing his life to hers.

Ben relished the sensation of the slightly rough fresh sheets brushing against his bare skin as he slipped under the duvet. Stretching out on his back, he felt a kind of relief to be letting the firm mattress take his weight. Once again, he deliberately tensed his muscles - from his toes through his calves, thighs and buttocks, through his abdomen and shoulders, down his arms to his fingertips - then, after a moment held in tension, he released them, breathing deeply. The relaxing effect of the simple exercise amplified his sense of calm equanimity, even as it triggered a faint glow of gently pulsing arousal in his scrotum and softly swollen penis. Yet Ben was quite aware that he and Marcie would not have sex again tonight, so his tired thoughts drifted on above these pleasant physical sensations.

He knew that not everything was right for the world. He remained aware of the uncertainty that clouded his future path, as well as the unappealing demands of his list of administrative duties, yet these concerns seemed muted. Balanced against them was a profound certainty, deeply rooted in the marrow of bones, that he would face all that with Marcie at his side. He just knew that her presence would let him see the world with joy, her strength would give him the energy to achieve whatever he set his heart to, and their shared love would carry them through anything that the world threw at them, together. He also knew to the core of his being that they would remain safe and sound in the inviolable haven of their own private magical realm of bliss. Lying in her bed, naked and at ease, at the end of the most intense and upsetting week that he could remember, he knew too that he’d come home. He found his attention drawn to his breathing, becoming more aware of the rise and fall of his chest and belly. As his focus deepened, he deliberately lengthened his breath, relishing the ease with which the air flowed through his lungs, filling his whole body, it seemed.

Marcie slipped into the room almost silently just a few moments later. He rolled over to look at her as she came around to what had become her side of the bed. The mole-freckled skin of her bare arms and face seemed to radiate a honeyed warmth, its rich colour glowing like sun-soaked wood against the pure white of her nightdress. He looked at the way her thick dark hair was pulled back into her plait from her lustrous forehead. He took in the sight of her proud nose, the strong line of her jaw and her broad lips, creasing her cheeks where they twitched into a smile. And he looked into her wide brown eyes, clear of makeup and sparking beneath her glasses and her heavy eyebrows, gazing at him with love just as he gazed at her. As she smiled down at him, she said, “Are you not asleep yet, my weary lion?”

“No, just relaxing, breathing, my queen of the night,” he replied. Then he drew a deep breath as if to demonstrate that as he threw the duvet back to invite her to lie next to him, coincidentally revealing his naked torso and hips to her. She didn’t hesitate to get into bed, easing herself down against his body. He wanted to share the way that he’d felt just a moment earlier, but all he could say, in a low murmuring voice, was, “I love you. I’m so happy to be here with you, in our shared home. We can do anything, together.”

“I know,” Marcie said in her own seductively low tone as she wriggled against him, with both of them wrapping an arm around the other’s waist and hips now. She delicately pecked his lips with hers, then went on, “I love you too. We can indeed do everything that your heart desires, together. And do your desires run to pumping, spurting, messy, sweaty, breathlessly orgasmic sex tonight?”

“Honestly, that was not in my plans, for once,” Ben admitted with a chuckle, even as he felt his arousal sleepily stirring, “Genuinely though, I’d love to try, to leave us both gasping for air again, if you want.”

“No, I’m happy just as we are, cuddling. We’ve both done quite well for that today already, I’d say,” Marcie said with a teasing smile, “I’m a lucky girl, glad to help my big strong boy enjoy his healthy masculine expression. But we’re both tired now, aren’t we? And the future is wide open with that wonderful fresh air now, isn’t it? So we can be sure of being able to fill our heaving lungs whenever we want, with the help of your medicine and the beating wings of our angelic love. But shall we just turn the lights out for now?”

“Aye, let’s” Ben agreed, then pressed his lips to softly and tenderly hers, cradling her head in his hands, before she rolled over to remove and fold her glasses. Ben rolled away to click the bedside light off, and in the darkness she embraced him again, making spoons with her behind him for once. He felt the warmth of her body pressing against his back and his buttocks through the thin cotton of her nightdress, aware of the pressure of her hips and her breasts. Then he felt her hand running down his abdomen, even while his own hands were just tucked up by his chin, ready for sleep. He felt a thrill of excitement as he felt her brush and then briefly grasp his softly swollen penis in her small fragile grip, but she didn’t linger there. He felt almost as if she’d just wanted to check it was there, then she rested her palm flat on his stomach, at the fringe of his pubic hair below his bellybutton.

“Well, this is a first for us too,” he murmured in his profound contentment, “Coming to bed, then going to sleep, without making love.” He felt his penis gently stretch and grow beside her hand in a relaxed and unforced way in delayed response to her touch, but knew its pressure would ebb soon.

“Hmm, we’re making love all the time now. You’ve penetrated my furry portal. You’ve found our secret enchanted kingdom, where you are oh so welcome. You’re reigning over my fertile land now, for good,” Marcie said in a dreamily distant voice, and Ben knew that what she said was true.