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Since there seems to be a revival of the Creative Discussion boards, I thought I'd post something. This is something that is a bit of an anomaly - it is not the kind of thing that I write at all. But it exists. I'm a bit disillusioned at the moment and wonder if I'm wasting my time on it. Any feedback would be much appreciated - I'm sorry to be posting a first draft, but I'm hoping that it isn't as bad as I think. Be as harsh as you need to be, and harsher again. It's the only way I'll learn

I would know her by the way she moved,

I would know her by the way she would only say 'I love you' in different languages.

And I would know her for certain by her eyes, which might promise me secrets, but never reveal them.

This is what Iseult told me, long before I met Her. I always took Iseult's advice, perhaps because of her innate trustworthiness, but more likely because of her name. It was a dusty, archaic name that spoke to me of the wisdom of a thousand books and epic sagas that told a greater truth than the truths I understood. It was an odd superstition of mine, and one in which I had to believe. Besides, women have, in my experience, always been far more aware of danger and those subliminal storms of desire, jealousy and anger that stir the human soul without a whisper appearing in the person's visage.

I knew all this, and yet, I mistook her warnings for a challenge, ignoring the advice which had followed her description of the woman who was to be my downfall:

"You will know Her and, if you trust me, you will do all you can to avoid Her. It's like the witch in the gingerbread house from those old stories - something that looks too good to be true usually is."

I couldn't hear the importance of these casual sentences. It wasn't as though Iseult imbued the word 'Her' with such power that the word sounded capitalised (that is my own addition, which, as I hope you will eventually agree, completely deserved, for better or worse). It wasn't even as though she looked at me in any particularly meaningful way as she said it. She must have known that seriousness and mystery would be the surest way to interest, and thus damn, me. On reflection, Her mere existence was probably enough to condemn my soul to eternal sorrow, but this does not make any difference to how I took Iseult's advice, or what was to occur much later.

However seriously I took Iseult's advice, I did not recognise Her immediately. You might think that this was the first and greatest of my follies, but I must remind you that Iseult's words had grown stale in my head in the six or so months it had taken Her to appear in my life. I might also add that I was expecting something a little more dramatic, but as it was, She entered my life carefully and unobtrusively.

It was at a funeral. Contrary to the way that a good story should run, it was not raining, nor was it cold or especially overcast. In fact, it was a charming day, which I believed to be completely wasted in going to the funeral of an acquaintance for whom I had barely cared while he was alive. I had been invited over the phone, though, by a hiccoughing and sniffling woman who had discovered her husband's address book and was dialing the numbers therein. Had it been a written or emailed invitation, I would certainly have declined most politely, or waited a few days and then replied, noting that the post had been slow, and what a shame I had missed the funeral of so honourable a man (an utter falsehood, because it seemed that even so distant an acquaintance as myself knew what his widow obviously did not - that young Miss X was not in fact an art student, but a married woman with whom he was having an affair). Phone calls are immensely intimate, and demand an immediate answer which, if the answer is negative, can be met with either hysterics (simply dealt with, because the woman is clearly mad and deserving of line disconnection) or disappointed sobbing (the worse of the two, designed to make the man declining the invitation feel like a complete reprobate). For a gentleman, however, there is only one answer, and that is 'yes,' made even easier by the fact that any resigned sighs or disinterested tones of voice are instantly registered in the mind of the distraught female as paralleling her own miseries, rather than a display of reluctance.

So there I was, wearing a plain black shirt and the trouser from my best black suit and feeling quite out of place amongst the old-fashioned, well-heeled men who wore their suits with graceful ease despite the heat. I gathered that they were his clients and associates, only there out of duty, as was I. The moment that the service was over, and his coffin had rolled along the conveyor belt and into the incinerator, they exited the small cemetery chapel hurriedly and moved towards the marquee where the wake was to be held, talking animatedly about their business deals and newly acquired artworks. Hoping to demonstrate a little more decorum, I waited, studiously mimicking a prayerful posture, before I followed a sniffling older woman, probably the deceased's sister or widow, out from the dingy little building and into the fresh spring day.

There was probably no reason for me to attend the wake; I had already been tearfully thanked for my presence by family members who had no idea of who I was and how tangential I was to their beloved's life. I think that it was simply because, by the end of the prayers, sermons, homilies and whatever else the priest had decided to spew forth, I had decided that a midday champagne was exactly what I needed. Secreting myself into a group of businessmen talking about the exciting increase in value that such a death would mean for their art collection - I have, in fact, heard that art collectors often select the works of older or sicker artists for precisely this reason - I smiled and nodded in the appropriate places, until I tired of the conversation and sought other company. I avoided a group of young women stood close to the drinks table, dressed quite immodestly for a funeral, drowning their sorrows and flirting with the hired waiters as they served the drinks, and, rather childishly, hid behind an obscenely large vase of lilies under the pretence of examining the petals as the family walked in, probably hoping to hear stories about their kinsman that they wouldn't have been able to deal with while he was alive. I know that I sound rather cynical, but I have not attended a funeral anywhere, where this was not the case. Wine, sorrow and loquaciousness have never been a particularly tasteful cocktail.

I was about to make my escape when a charming young woman in the corner of the room caught my eye. She was holding a champagne flute in one elegant hand, while her other was balanced on her hip. Clearly, the man with whom she was talking had not impressed her. She was younger than most people at the gathering, and I deemed her to be close to my own age. Her blonde hair was twisted up at the back of her head, and the back of her dress swooped down over her shoulder-blades. It was neither immodest, nor dowdy, and I had to respect the flair with which she dismissed her suitor, the cruel and flirtatious laugh that she used to greet her next victim. She turned sinuously, as though she had known the whole time that he had been standing there, waiting to introduce himself. In a moment, she had dismissed him, and was staring directly across to the tall vase of lilies, and me, the man who was foolish enough to reveal himself to be looking at Her.

You will know her by the way she moves...

I wish that I had remembered those words then, even as I wish that Iseult had warned me how enrapturing it would be. Even had I remembered the advice, I doubt that I would have cared. She was completely assured, Her eyes fixed on Her prey as She walked towards me. As a child, I used to watch snakes move, fascinated by the way they rolled inside their own skin in a sensuous writhe that was both measured and elegant. This was how She moved, Her muscles shifting beneath Her skin, the sheath of Her dress, the air that stood between us. I was no stranger to lust, but never had it risen so quickly within me. I quashed it, as she stopped in front of me, close enough for me to be able to smell her scent.