Strap yourself in for the ride

"What the bleedin 'ell is that?"

"It's my new lingerie babe, d'ya like ittt?"

"Where's the rest of it? It looks like mice have eaten bloody large chunks out of it."

"It's mean to be like that, it's sexy y'know, shows everything off!"

"Does it come with a pen?" 

"Why would it come with a pen?"

"So you can play noughts and crosses on it through the bloody great holes in the thing."

"God you're so funny… NOT!"

"You'd need a maths degree just to get the fucking thing on so you've got no fucking chance." 

"Oi shut up you tosspot."

"You can barely get a pair or jeans on and they've only got three holes." 

"Oh piss off you wanker."

"Fifty quid says you can't get it on in under five minutes."

"Done and when I take your money you can make love to your right hand later you git."

"Don't worry I'll be having a drink down the Lion with the boys on your money while you're calling mountain rescue to cut your free."

"God I hate you with a passion some days do you know that? Shake on it then."

There's no hesitation on his part as he shoots his hand out.

"Deal?"

"Deal."

"Fifty quid?"

"Fifty quid."

"Under five minutes?"

"Under five minutes."

"Fuck me is there an echo in this room?"

"Oi you cheeky bastard I'm just making sure we agree on the deal."

"We just shook on it didn't we?"

"Yeah but I don't trust you." 

"Charming thing when your own wife doesn't trust you in life. Fine." 

He reaches his hand into his back pocket, pulls out his wallet and opens it up.

"Right ten, twenty, thirty, fifty. Happy?" He says placing the notes on the bed beside them both. 

"Yep." 

He picks up an inlay card from the packaging where a young woman some fifteen years his wife's junior is posing in the same garment. Pointing to the picture "That's how you need to look in under five minutes but I'll let you off looking fifteen years younger and what …four…"

"Don't you dare finish that bloody sentence otherwise I'll be filing for divorce!" She lunges forward and grabs his nipple from under his t-shirt and twists it hard. He went to bat her hand away but as always he's too slow and it's now heading with the rest of her arm at breakneck speed to cover her chest from a revenge attack. He shakes his head and lets out a large puff of breath in faux annoyance. Secretly he's impressed how she always manages to accurately locate either one of his nipples and complete the punishment no matter what he's wearing; t-shirt, shirt, jumper, combination of all three. Must be love really. 

"Get your kit off then love and I'll set the timer on my phone for five minutes." She whips her t-shirt off first and throws it at his head. Then she flicks her slipper from her right foot at his groin but he's already turned his body 90 degrees to the right and lifted his leg up to protect himself in preparation. He might not be good at protecting his nipples from attack but after so many years of marriage she's an open book and nothing but predictable with her next lines of attack. This doesn't stop her from repeating the action with the left one mind you. She bends over to take her socks off giving him a vantage point which he responds to with a "phwoar," a sound last heard in a Carry on Film sometime in the late 1970s. She ignores him and the socks come off, followed by the leggings which put up a fight but she eventually wins by alternating her legs in a pincing motion which sees one leg trap the material and the other slowly start to free itself. Why she didn't just sit on the bed and do it with her hands he didn't know but he didn't want to help the logical part of her brain awaken in case by some minor miracle it left him fifty quid down in the next few minutes. Finally with both legs free, off came the knickers and one hand round her back sees her bra unhooked and she slides the straps off each shoulder and leans forward so it falls with the help of gravity to the floor. Placing one hand on hip and the other in the air, she lifts her knee up and goes "ta da!" like she's Debbie fucking McGee just stepped out of a box having appeared to been sawn in half or maybe it was more Dallas Cowboy cheerleader. Either / or would suffice as a description. She definitely wasn't as flexible or coordinated as either one which is why he was confident enough to have bet her the fifty quid in the first place. 

"3 minutes 37 seconds."

"Were you timing me you bastard?" His ferocious belly laugh is his only retort. He neither confirms or denies it. Unlike his wife right now he's at least leaving something to the imagination. He sets five minutes on the timer and holds his phone up to eye level so she can check. 

"You press the start button when you're ready and I'll put the phone on the dresser so you don't accuse me of cheating." 

"Deal."

"Jesus woman, let's not start that again."

She gives him one of those old fashioned glances where no words are needed. He's seen it a thousand and one times or more and knows exactly what it means. He stands with phone held aloft and she's about to press it when she realises she doesn't even know where the garment is now. 

"You sneaky fucking bastard!'"

For once he's wise to the hand about to launch at one of his nipples and quickly covers his chest area up so instead she slaps with the back of hand the top of the arm he's holding his phone in with such force that it makes him drop the phone onto the floor which thankfully unlike downstairs was still carpeted because he refused to get up in the morning and put his feet on cold floorboards or worse - into a pair of slippers. 

"You're a vicious fucking toad you know that right?"

"Well serves you bleeding right. You try growing up with four older brothers and then putting up with your shit every day for fifteen years."

He would have made a smart arse comment if his arm wasn't smarting so much from the slap. In fairness she did make a good point. He lifts the arm of the t-shirt to check on the damage and sees its already left a big red mark where her hand connected. 

"I could have you arrested for that. That's assault that is." 

"Keep talking and they'll be arresting me for bloody murder."

His arm still stinging he decides not to put that particular threat to the test and picks up his phone. She grabs the garment, he checks his phone which is still showing the timer despite the landing on the bedroom floor. 

"Right whenever you're ready," and he holds the phone in front of him. She goes to press the button but he pulls the phone away. 

"Fifty quid if I can film it?"

"Do you want to wake up still attached to your bollocks?"

He answers by holding the phone back out but this time at arms length and sticks his bum out and tucks his privates in well out of range of her foot for good measure. 

She presses the button...

***

Sat in the accident and emergency department of the local A&E waiting to be seen for a suspected broken arm he weighed up in his mind when exactly would be a good time to ask for the fifty quid and decided that now definitely wasn't going to be the best time so he tried to think about something else instead. The first thing that came to mind was the sight of her foot getting stuck in one of the straps in which she'd been in such a hurry to get her leg through what was probably a wrong hole anyway and win the fifty quid. She'd done it with such speed and force whilst still holding the top straps firmly that it kind of all just worked against her and she went down with a twist BANG onto her left arm. He took several deep breaths in through his nose and back out through the mouth to compose himself so as not to laugh out loud. After so many years of marriage she knows exactly what was going through his head at that exact moment. She leans over to him sat on the chair next to hers and whispers "Just remember - I will cut your bollocks off in the middle of the night if you tell any of the medical staff or anyone else for that matter how this happened. Do you understand?"

He thought briefly about saying something comical given he temporarily at least had the upper hand, but he knew his wife and wouldn't put anything past her. 

"Fucking good job you didn't take the fifty quid and let me film you," he whispers back knowing she was in no state to attack him at that very moment and chuckles to himself.

"Fucking knob head," she replies and for the first time began to see the funny side of it all. 

"Good thing is love, given all those harnesses on it they could make a sling out of it and save the NHS a few bob." This joke amuses himself greatly until she stamps down hard on his foot. He hadn't banked on that one as he winces in pain. Still if it was broken he was at the very least in the right place. Fuck knows how they'd drive home between the pair of them though.