I followed Martina into the living room of her small basement flat.
"Take a seat," she said. "Be with you in mo."
She flung her gym bag in the corner and disappeared though a bead curtain into the next room, apparently the bedroom. I caught a glimpse of an unmade bed, clothes on the floor. The living room was no better: books, magazines and clothes lay about on every available surface. There was a tennis racket lying on a rug in front of the fireplace, and a line of socks and knickers drying on the radiator.
"Sorry the place is such a dump," she said. "I'm a total slut when it comes to housework."
"Not at all. I love what you've done with the place."
"Ha! Sarky bastard!"
Through the bead curtain, I noticed a dark coloured garment suddenly flung onto the pile on the floor. Martina, hidden around the corner, was apparently getting changed. I peered intently at the strip of fabric she had discarded. Had the lovely Martina taken off her yoga pants? A mental image of her standing bare-legged in the corner of the room, while she browsed the wardrobe for something to wear, sprang into my mind, and a shiver of excitement ran through me.
"Where's your lav?" I asked.
"On the right."
The door to the other part of the flat was immediately next to the bedroom door, but as I made my way out, I resisted the urge to take a sideways glance. Nevertheless, my heart was beating with excitement.
The bathroom lay out the back of the flat, where a window opened into a small garden, and then the backs of the houses behind. The glass of the window was not frosted and there was only a thin pair of net curtains to pull across. Not much privacy, I thought, as I untied my shorts, and lowered my boxers to pee. Anyone in the upper floors behind would be able to see into the room where Martina got undressed every day, where she bathed and showered. But maybe that kind of thing didn't bother girls like Martina.
There was a bustle of activity from the kitchen next door.
"I'm making coffee. How do you take it, Nick?"
"Black no sugar."
"Alright. But be warned, I make really strong coffee alright?"
"That's the way I like it," I said. Emerging from the bathroom, I found Martina busying herself amid the chaos of the kitchen, and I leaned against the counter to watch her.
"It makes me really hyper," she said, turning her wide smile and her shining brown eyes to me. "So if I start babbling on just tell me to shut up, okay? I'm a total maniac on coffee."