A Friend of the Family (23 page)

He had another shower, attempted to do something with his bizarre hair, got dressed and headed downstairs towards the kitchen. It was just gone twelve and the house appeared to be empty. He poked around in the fridge, hoping for a sighting of a packet of bacon and maybe an egg or two, found nothing suitable so gave up and decided that he’d go into Crystal Palace later for a fry up. He took a cup of coffee into the living room and did a double take.

Ness was sitting in front of the TV, watching
Football Focus
and wearing a very short skirt.

‘Ness!’

‘Hello, Ned.’ She turned round and smiled at him, giving him a quick once up and down. ‘Rough night?’

Ned looked at her and for some reason felt an enormous blush exploding all over his body. She had her shoes off with one unfeasibly long leg tucked up underneath her. Her hair was all wild and unkempt and, even
though she wasn’t classically pretty, there was something unbelievably sexy about her – the way she looked at him as if he was a badly behaved schoolboy and she was the hot young biology teacher. Her eyes were green and twinkly. She looked like she’d be fantastic in bed, a really good laugh and a good listener, all wrapped up in one.

‘Er, yeah. You could say that.’ He looked around the room and behind him. ‘Is Tony here?’

‘No. Just little old me.’

‘Sorry, I didn’t realize you were here – I’d have offered to make you a coffee otherwise.’

‘S’ all right,’ she said, pointing at a mug in front of her, ‘Bernie already made me one.’

‘Where
is
Mum?’

‘Upstairs, getting ready.’

‘You two going out somewhere?’

‘Uh-huh – it’s the traditional day-after-pay-day shopping extravaganza. We’re off to Bromley.’

‘What, you do this every month?’

‘Yup. We both get paid on the same day every month, so we hit the town and burn holes in our credit cards.’

‘Cool,’ said Ned, who was the only member of his family apart from his dad who’d never really understood the appeal of retail therapy. Spending money just stressed him out. Probably because he never had any.

‘So – what were you up to last night, then?’

‘I was out with Gervase, actually.’

‘Really?’ She smiled at him in surprise. ‘And what sort of places does the mysterious Gervase go to?’Ned felt his blush ratchet itself up a few notches under her interested
gaze. She really was completely fucking gorgeous. She was wearing a sort of woollen cardigan thing with, apparently, nothing underneath it at all. Her breasts, from what he could ascertain without gawping, appeared to be of the small but perfectly formed variety and there was definitely more than a hint of perky nipple there.

‘Er, sorry?’ he blustered.

‘You and Gervase – where did you go?’

He told her about Robert Gordon and Bud and driving all the way to Wood Green in his Robin Reliant. He told her about the eight pints and the horse shit and showering in the middle of the night and she laughed out loud like it was the funniest thing she’d ever heard in her life. The more she laughed the more Ned embellished the story until eventually he became so animated that he completely forgot he had a hangover.

‘God,’ she said, wiping tears away from under her eyes, ‘that’s so funny. Where the hell did the horse shit come from?’

‘I have absolutely no idea. Maybe it fell out of an aeroplane. You know. With horses on it…’

She burst into hysterical laughter again and Ned smiled contentedly.

‘You two sound like you’re having fun,’ said Mum, walking into the living room with her coat on.

‘Bernie,’ said Ness getting to her feet and displaying the full vertiginous extent of her legs, ‘Ned fell into horse shit last night – out there.’ She pointed through the window at Beulah Hall, snorting with laughter. ‘Where d’you reckon it came from?’

Bernie looked out of the window in bemusement. ‘What – out on the road?’

‘Yes.’

‘I’ve got no idea,’ she said, starting to laugh. ‘But trust Ned to find it, eh?’

She ruffled his hair and he shrugged her off.

‘OK,’ she picked up her handbag, ‘let’s hit the shops.’

Ness pulled on a fawn-coloured coat that was the exact same shade as her hair and made her way to the broken mirror over the fireplace. Ned watched her as she examined her teeth and teased her hair, twisting it up suddenly into a top-knot and sticking something into it that made it stay there. She pulled some bits free so that they framed her face, adjusted her cardigan and her skirt with a wiggle and then picked up her handbag. Funny, thought Ned, but in a strange kind of way Ness seemed to
belong
here. She fitted the surroundings, with her unruly hair and slightly mismatched clothes. She had the same warmth as this house, the same sense of cosiness and welcome.

‘What are your plans for the day, then?’ said Bernie, pulling her car keys out of her bag.

‘Dunno really. Going to get some breakfast up the road. Might get my hair cut…’

‘Oh, don’t get your hair cut,’ said Ness unexpectedly. ‘You’ve got lovely hair.’

Ned blushed and put a hand up to his hair. ‘Do you think so?’

Yes. It’s gorgeous. It’s funny, ‘cause I don’t usually
like long hair on men, but yours really suits you. Don’t get it cut.’

‘Er, OK,’ stammered Ned, ‘I won’t.’

‘You might want to think about losing the fungus, though,’ she said, suddenly lunging at his chin and rubbing her fingers across his beard. Ned was too shell-shocked to say anything.

‘Well, have a good day. And watch out for the horse shit.’ She grinned at him and left the room and Ned sat there feeling slightly dazed. He was all buzzy and sweaty and nervous. He fancied his brother’s girlfriend. He really did. God almighty – was it even
legal
to fancy your brother’s girlfriend?

His mum’s car horn sounded in the driveway and Ned went to the window. Ness was standing in the road waving at him and pointing at the pavement. Ned wondered what she was doing until she pinched her nose with her fingertips and waved away some imaginary smell. Then she tossed her head back and laughed and got into the passenger seat of Mum’s car. Ned watched the car reversing out of the driveway and on to Beulah Hill. He watched Ness sliding on her seatbelt, chatting with Mum, adjusting her hair with her fingertips, laughing. God. She was great. She had all that confidence and up-frontness he’d loved about Monica when he first met her, but without the dark side. You could tell that she had sunshine running through her soul – she didn’t appear to have a negative or cynical bone in her body. He wondered how old she was. He’d assumed she must be Tony’s age because she was going out with him, but
actually, in the daylight and out of context, she looked quite young – maybe late twenties. Maybe around his age…

Shit. He felt himself flushing red again. He was shocked at himself. He’d never fancied any of his brothers’ girlfriends in the past, not even the ravishing beauties Sean used to bring home. He’d always assumed that there was some sort of gene that actively prevented you from taking a sexual interest in someone a member of your family was involved with, that it was only strange people on the
Jerry Springer
show who wanted to have sex with people their relatives had already shagged.

How did it work, he wondered, fancying your brother’s girlfriend? And what happened if Tony and Ness split up – would he be allowed to go out with her then, or was that completely beyond the pale? God, what was he
thinking
?

He got to his feet and searched the house for Goldie. He eventually found him in the laundry room on a pile of clean sheets and dragged him to his feet.

‘Come on, mate. We’re going for a walk.’

Goldie wheezed and whistled and finally creaked himself upright, placidly allowing Ned to clip him to his lead.

Ned walked all the way into the village, relishing the fine drizzle that sprayed his skin and dampened his clothes. He walked incredibly fast, almost as if he was trying to sweat out his unclean feelings about Ness. He walked so fast, with his head so full of strange, alien thoughts, that for the first time since he got back from
Oz he completely forgot about Monica. She could have been riding piggy-back on his shoulders with a crop in her hand shouting, ‘Gee-up, pony-boy’, and he wouldn’t have noticed. His thoughts were all over the place, veering from imagining how he’d break the news to Mum that he was going out with Ness, to shaking hands with Tony and Tony saying, ‘Fair-dos, the best man won’, to him packing a bag and leaving Beulah Hill for ever, his family standing on the doorstep with stony-faces and folded arms, to having sex with Ness, to Ness having sex with Tony, to having babies with Ness, to whether his dick was the same size as Tony’s, to whether he’d be as good as him in bed.

He tied Goldie up outside the caff and wolfed down a full English breakfast and a mug of stewed tea, staring through the misted-up window at the street outside while he thought about the fact that Tony had a flash flat, a sports car and his own business versus the fact that Ned had nice hair, a flat stomach and a degree. He wondered what sort of flat Ness had and whether he’d like living in Beckenham or not. He even found himself thinking about train routes and how long it would take to get into town from Beckenham Junction and whether he could live without the number 68 bus.

He wiped his plate clean with a piece of toast, left the caff, untied Goldie and started the walk home.

And when he got home he went straight to the bathroom and shaved off his beard.

A Terrifying Proposal

Because Ness was going shopping with Bernie in Bromley on Saturday, and because they were having dinner at Rob and Trisha’s that night, Tony said he’d pick her up from Beulah Hill at seven.

Mum’s car wasn’t in the drive when he got there so he assumed that they were still lost in retail nirvana somewhere and let himself in with his keys.

He headed straight for the fridge, like he always did when he came home, and had a poke about. Packets of ham, pots of cream, fresh fruit, five different types of cheese, leftover cake. Yummy. He resisted the temptation to make himself an enormous cheese-and-mayonnaise sandwich with the thick-sliced loaf sitting in the breadbin and just nibbled on a handful of grapes instead.

He picked up Dad’s
Guardian
and had a quick wander around the house, another thing he always did. Jesus, he had no idea how they lived like this. And it got worse the older they got. He worried about them, actually – they were still young now, still had all their faculties; but what would happen to them when they were older, when Ned wasn’t at home any more to keep an eye on
them? Their house was quirky now, eccentric – things got piled up and hoarded, washing-up got ignored, hoovering was a monthly event, if the carpet was lucky. But it was still warm, homely and relatively clean. That might not always be the case. There was a fine line between clutter and squalor. What would happen when it got unsavoury and unhygienic – what would happen to Mum and Dad then? God, they’d end up like those loons you saw on documentaries who had rats the size of cocker spaniels living in their mattresses and their neighbours would call the council on them. Jesus, they’d become a
health hazard.

Tony put these niggling little concerns to the back of his mind and headed into the living room. Where he found Gervase stretched out on the sofa, fully clothed, slack-jawed and snoring voluminously with Goldie lying across his legs, drooling.

Delightful, thought Tony, just absolutely delightful.

‘Goldie!’ he snapped, striding into the room. ‘Get down off there!’ He tapped the dog on the haunches with the
Guardian
until he finally heaved his stinking old carcass off the furniture and flopped on to the floor.

Gervase stirred slightly and made a disturbing snorty noise.

‘Tony,’ he said, raising himself up on to his elbow and reaching for his fags. ‘Sorry, mate. Didn’t hear you coming in. I was out for the count.’ He snorted, wiped his nose with the back of his hand and lit a cigarette.

‘Yes,’ said Tony, ‘I noticed.’

‘Wasn’t intending to fall asleep like that. Last thing I
remember I was watching the racing,’ he indicated the TV, which was now showing
Stars In Their Eyes.
‘Bit of a heavy night last night.’ He swung round on the sofa, reached for the remote and switched off the TV. ‘Fucking hate that cunt,’ he said by way of explanation. ‘So. Come to see your mum, have you? I think she’s out shopping.’

‘Yes. I know. She’s out with Ness. I’ve come to pick her up.’

‘That’s nice,’ said Gervase, inhaling and smoothing the top of his flat-top with the palm of his hand. ‘Taking her somewhere nice?’

‘Who?’

‘Ness.’

‘No. Not really. Just to a friend’s for dinner.’

‘Well – that’s nice, isn’t it? Dinner at a friend’s? I’d like that.’

Tony started, thinking for a moment that Gervase was trying to get himself an invite, and then relaxed when he realized that he wasn’t.

‘So. Tony. How are you?’

‘Good. I’m good.’

There was a brief silence during which Tony felt the pull of social convention forcing him to ask Gervase how he was.

‘You?’

‘Me? I’m fantastic. Specially now I’ve had a bit of a nap. You’re looking trim.’ Gervase eyed him up and down.

‘Really?’ Tony patted his belly. ‘Do you think so?’

Gervase squinted at him.’ Yeah. Definitely. Especially round here –’ he squeezed his own cheeks – ‘around the chops. You been on a diet?’

Buoyed by this unexpected compliment, Tony relaxed a little and flopped into the armchair opposite Gervase. ‘No. Not a diet exactly. Just been watching what I eat. You know.’

Gervase nodded at him encouragingly.

‘But I am, er…’ Tony paused, wondering why he was about to say this to Gervase, but saying it anyway, ‘I’m joining a slimming club, actually.’

‘Oh yeah?’

‘Yeah. First class on Monday.’

‘Yeah? I’ve heard they work, those slimming clubs. Good on yer.’ Gervase threw him one of his stiff, awkward smiles and Tony felt disproportionately pleased.