Lost in the Amazon

As she sat there with James, she was sheltering from the world. Though it was 30 degrees, she hugged her bag to her for warmth and protection and stared ahead.
The race they’d run, across town, just to get here. It had been unbelievable, reckless of him, to drag her in front of fast moving cars and trams. And then he’d gotten lost and they had to settle on the steps of the French Embassy, and she was wondering what the hell she was doing here, in this strange country, where she didn’t speak the language, with an idiot called James who couldn’t read a map.
It was then that the Amazonian strode past. In every way, Lorraine could never hope to compete with this huge woman, who strode past on eye-catching red slip-ons.
Lorraine’s eyes flowed up from the shoes, up the muscular legs of this giant woman, to the thigh-high point where her dress ended. At this point she was almost upon her and Lorraine could now sweep easily across the model-like features of this woman.
It made her sick to be cowering in front of this specimen; this woman who couldn’t even raise her face to look another person in the eyes. No, better to stare in front of her to ensure her step was as perfect as her physique.
Lorraine noticed James was looking intently as the woman strode away. She was ready to get very angry, until James said: “Bloody hell, was that a bloke in a dress or what?”
Lorraine’s shoulders lifted up to her neck and she beamed again. She put her arms around her boyfriend and kissed his cheek so that it smacked. He looked at her like she was a little bit mad and smirked.
“Okay then,” he said. “I think I know where I’m going now.”

James, Wilberforce and the adult world

James watched the flock, pecking and honking in the grass. He rested his young arms on the old fence and made tentative steps towards whistling. He hoped to train his puppy, a recent gift whom he'd named Wilberforce, to be a sheepdog and thought he'd train him using the lazy white geese that lived in the meadow.
In honesty, James had a strong dislike for the geese. They always hissed at him when he ran by on the way to help with the milking, and one (he nicknamed him Goliath) had bitten him on the hand when he was very young and trying to feed them. He paid little attention to the attempts of Wilberforce to herd the birds. He just settled back to practice his whistling and watch the small dog terrorising the flapping, feather-shedding, creatures.
Like the repeat of a rifle shot, the snarl of the dog and the rampant honks of the geese suddenly reached a shocking pitch. James was on high alert now and sprinted into the melee of scattering birds and yelping puppy.
Wilberforce whined and cowered before his master as the voice of James' mother called out in concern from the farmhouse. There at the boy's feet lay the slain Goliath, it's neck bloody and broken.
A sense of satisfaction fought with a sense of impending doom. His father would be striding now, black boots menacing, across the field towards the house. James regarded the sniffling dog below him and couldn't be angry. He felt an extraordinary kinship with him then and knelt down next to the body of the goose, awaiting the fearful arrival of the adult world.