DUVET SUNDAY

Episode 34 of the Lymp Duhdashian series

Khan and Olympia were stunned by the howling velocity of the wind but, far more than that, they were absolutely amazed by Dave’s skill at manoeuvring his SeaSwan to take the fullest advantage of it. Dave’s concentration was absolute and his incredible, almost instinctive, adjustments to the sails must have saved the destruction of his mast a thousand times as the wind hurtled the little ketch towards Africa.

“I think we will miss out on a visit to Cape Verde!” he shouted to Khan over the screaming wind. “In fact we will run far north of the entire west coat of Africa!” He gestured his Nullschool image, permanently displayed in his cockpit.

The prevailing wind was curving sharply northwards ahead and the speed was 40 miles per hour rising towards 65 miles per hour at its peak. Dave estimated that they could make landfall in Portugal or, if supplies lasted, ride the slower winds straight through to the English Channel. Khan gasped at the fortuitous change in the weather, but observed that the weather ahead was a fast warm wind with plentiful precipitation. “Get used to wearing the sou’westers?” he joked. He could not remember the last time he had felt dry - it might have been in Grenada!

Khan went down to the cabin to make a fresh batch of coffee for Olympia who was wide awake, but buried under the thick quilts. “Listen to that creaking!” Olympia whimpered unseen. “Is that normal?” and Khan laughed. “I guess so!” he replied, “Dave says we have stronger winds ahead plus rain storms, so be prepared!” Olympia’s tousled head popped out from the covers, “Stronger? How the fuck can it get stronger? We will take off surely!” and she extended a wobbling arm for her coffee.

“It is pretty wild, isn’t it?” yelled Khan over the mighty gusts and creaking ketch. Olympia smiled widely. This is adrenaline overload! She thought, unable to decide if what she felt was extreme excitement or abject fear. She decided it was both, simultaneously. It is such a bummer that you can’t photograph this. Maybe a video? And she decided to try that if she was still alive later.

—0—

Pru Dense was having a duvet Sunday. The squally rain trickling down her windows did not encourage her to get up, so she switched on her TV and watched the morning news broadcast dispassionately. Dreary politics, yada yada! She thought and popping ear buds in she scrolled her iPhone for some decent music.

Pru’s past slid briefly through to her consciousness with the lyrics and she flopped back onto the pillows. One lucky break wouldn’t go amiss! She thought, realising that it had been more than five years since her divorce. At 45 she doubted that she would be meeting Mr Right. She was never going to have the family she had always dreamed of. She was a career…. that was all. Her ex husband had made that fault abundantly clear when he waltzed out of her life with a much younger model. She had seen him only once since then and it had shaken her to the core. He looked so damned happy walking through Hampstead Heath pushing a pram. Thankfully, he had not noticed her, sitting reading a book, with her back against the trunk of a lovely weeping willow. How appropriate, she had thought at the time but glad of the low hanging branches providing cover.

Pru’s career was not all that she had hoped it would be. It weighed her down like an albatross around her neck. There was no end to the deadlines and expectations; few days when she felt the ecstasy of success. Now it was just a phoney act, a tedious grind that had her heading to the wine bar far too frequently lately.

Pru decided that doing kitchen chores was preferable to dwelling on her shortcomings. She shook herself, got up, dragged a fluffy jumper over her nightdress and slipped her feet into her battered old sheepskin slippers. Fuck it. She thought and resisted the urge to consult Plenty of Fish.

—0—

Frank was in the Knightsbridge kitchen cheerfully creating a breakfast extravaganza. He was naked, apart from his very brief, black and white checked chef’s apron and singing along with Queen’s Bohemian Rhapsody which was full blast on the radio.

Hitting the notes in his inimitable off-key fashion, he held a wooden spoon up as a mock microphone between stirring butter into his scrambled eggs and hopping from one leg to the other like a demented demon on acid. He was assembling the eggs, toast, bacon, sausages and grilled tomatoes artfully upon two warmed plates. He placed these, together with two mugs of steaming coffee and appropriate cutlery on the huge silver tray that he had found tucked in the back of the walk-in larder. It was obviously far too heavy for the housekeeper and had not seen the light of day for many a year. He had polished it back to its original mirror-like gleam and insisted upon serving everything he cooked on it from then on. Diamond remarked that she could see herself eating in its reflection. “Not a view I have ever enjoyed of myself before!” she had remarked, pulling silly faces and talking with her mouth full, just because she could.

Frank carefully balancing his precious cargo, returned to the bedroom on the first floor and congratulated himself for not dropping the whole lot on the endless stairs in that house. “Breakfast is served, Madam!” he announced with a flourish and pretended to trip in the doorway making Diamond squeal out. She was most relieved when he regained his composure only to fake another stumble as he reached the bed. “Pack it in!” she admonished, “It will actually happen one of these days if you keep tempting fate! Oh. My. God. What ARE you wearing?” and Frank placed the tray on the bed so that he could give Diamond a twirl of his short but sweet, checked apron.

“You have to admit that I do possess a certain amount of ‘je ne sais quoi’ don’t you?” he said, posing like Usain Bolt at a moment of victory. Diamond pursed her lips in feigned disgust, “You SO love yourself, don’t you? You great nitwit!” and began tucking into her breakfast. Frank lifted the hem of his apron up to wipe his fake tears and poor Diamond spat toast all over the duvet. “Did I really need to see that while I am eating? Frank? Really?”