Authors: Jane Lovering
Slightly Foxed (11 page)
peevish." Also depressed at the awfulness of my flat. Even if
Leo did seem to run his own home in a cross between junkie-
chic and Oxfam, it was still furnished in the eccentric way of
someone who could buy better, but wasn't bothered. My place
was furnished but only just. I couldn't afford a lifestyle. I
couldn't even afford lifestyle magazines.
"I go make tea. I must adjust my makeup." Jace shimmied
off towards the cubbyhole, leaving me making faces at myself
in the shiny surface of the desk.
There was a pile of literary magazines propped up to
display their artfully designed covers next to the till and I
glanced over them. "
Slightly Foxed
. That's me to a tee that is.
More than
slightly,
more like bloody
completely
foxed.
Probably hedgehogged as well. Wouldn't be surprised." I
pulled another series of huffy faces. When the bell clattered, I
hardly even bothered to look up.
"Wind'll change y'know."
90
Slightly Foxed
by Jane Lovering
I glanced in the direction of the doorway. It was the
postman, bearing our usual bundle of mail and a large
wrapped parcel.
"That looks exciting," I said, in an ironic way.
"Now, now. It's not for you anyway. It's for Jacinta. She
about?"
Curiosity overcame me. "No, sorry, she's"—I lowered my
voice, although I knew Jace couldn't hear anything behind the
curtain—"gone home. Women's troubles, you know."
"'Nuff said." He handed me the wedge of brown and buff
envelopes in one hand, and I signed for the parcel with the
other.
I waited until he'd stepped back into the street before I
gave the package a good scrutinising. Okay, it was wrong of
me but, well. I spilled the beans to Jace about every detail of
my
life whilst she didn't seem to see anything wrong in
keeping secrets from me.
The parcel was soft. Squashy. I turned it every which way,
but there was no clue to the contents. It was addressed by
hand in bold biro and covered in what looked like enough
stamps to mail an elephant. I shook it and was just about to
"accidentally" tear one corner when Jace emerged, newly
made-up.
"This is for you."
Her eyes went round and she let out a little squeal. "Oh,
this is very
very
good. In time for my weekend too!"
I waited expectantly for her to tear off the wrapping.
Instead she shoved the whole thing into her capacious bag. I
opened my mouth to ask but closed it again. If she'd wanted
91
Slightly Foxed
by Jane Lovering
me to know she'd have told me, wouldn't she? I huffed off
into the darkest reaches of Biography where I sat on Stephen
Fry. Jace obviously thought this all stemmed from my
morning whinge and left me to get on with it. Although, to
her credit, occasional emergency cups of tea were left at the
entrance next to consolatory piles of biscuits for the rest of
the day, as if she were feeding the Minotaur in its lair.
I began cleaning and tidying the flat. At least with Florence
away, areas that I tidied stayed more or less that way. The
bathroom I couldn't do much about. Cracked tiles and damp
walls were still very much in evidence. I went shopping and
laid in supplies from the discounted shelves where they sold
those items nearly out of date, what Florence always referred
to as the "botulism counter". Dips and mousses, finger foods
which would taste their best eaten in bed. Oh dreadful
thought, perhaps he wouldn't want to come back here at all.
But, that kiss—that had promised such a lot.
I bought a new duvet set for the bed, crisp Egyptian cotton
in classy off-white. Calm tranquillity in my bed was not quite
what I was aiming for though. How did I conjure up torrid sex
with a tiny hint of long-lasting passion? Unfortunately the
years of single parenthood had given me such a complex
about spending money on myself that I was almost overcome
with guilt at the whole expense. I had to bite my fingers to
prevent myself from taking the bed set back to the shop. In
the end I bought (in the charity shop, to assuage my mother-
guilt) a throw in glowing red velvet and made some scatter
cushions from some old curtains, although my sewing
technique was not the best and the stitches were so large
92
Slightly Foxed
by Jane Lovering
that the cushions looked like accident victims. With the hint-
of-yellow walls and light blue woodwork, the pine dressing
table and bedhead, the throw made the bed stand out
throbbingly, like a boil on a suntanned bum. It was, to put it
mildly,
obvious
.
Ah well
, I thought, standing back to admire my efforts,
better obvious than diffident
. I mean, look at Simon. I bet he
hadn't had sex since 1989. With anyone. Of either gender. I
bet
his
bedroom was wall-to-wall beige and he could only find
the bed by running his hands over the carpet.
Urgh. I shook myself out of this unhealthy preoccupation
with my boss's sleeping arrangements. (Maybe he didn't have
a bed at all. Maybe he rolled himself in sacking and lay on a
stone floor. He looked the type.)
"You come to my home on Tuesday," Jacinta advised on
Monday. "Before you go to the station, I will make you up."
Which certainly made sense since Jace lived midway
between Webbe's and the station. So after work on Tuesday
the two of us made our rather giggly way to Jace's tiny
house. It was a one-bedroomed terrace, so tall and thin that
on first seeing Jacinta at home, I'd assumed that she could
only turn round by going outside. Jacinta opened a bottle of
wine. "How many birthday cards are you getting today?" she
asked while I struggled into the green dress.
"Um. Well. Simon's never remembered my birthday,
Florence has already given me my card, the book group gave
me a joint card yesterday, so did Piers, oddly enough. So—
one."
"One? And what about the card I am giving you?"
93
Slightly Foxed
by Jane Lovering
"That was the one."
"Ah, Alys." Jace sighed and drained her glass in one
mouthful. "You need a good man."
"Perhaps today I'll actually go about getting one." Another
spark of anticipation fizzed inside me and I gave a beaming
smile.
"Well." She looked me over appreciatively and smoothed
some wrinkles out of the dress as she did so. "You are
certainly going to grab some eyes. You are lovely woman,
Alys. Lovely." Jacinta gave a small sniff and wiped her eyes
with the back of her hand. "Now, are we going to make you a
face?"
By the time the wine was finished, we had indeed made
me a face. I barely recognised myself in the mirror. "Good
God," I said, impressed. She had been spending so long over
applying my makeup that I had begun to wonder if I would
emerge looking like a drag queen. But, in the best traditions
of makeup artists everywhere, Jace had made me look as
though I were wearing none at all. "I look—pretty."
"Stand up and go around," she ordered and I obliged,
feeling the green skirt flare away from my thighs as I twirled.
My hair, which Jace had pinned into a casually tumbled style,
flowed around my face. I was impressed. My hair normally
made me look somewhere between an auburn poodle and a
seventies footballer, but right now it was coming in just to the
left of Nicole Kidman. "Beautiful." Jace quickly sliced away
another tear. "You look so certain of yourself."
"Right now," I said, pouting at myself in the mirror, "I
could proposition Johnny Depp."
94
Slightly Foxed
by Jane Lovering
"Then let us hope he is not at the station. You would not
be wishing for punching and fighting."
I felt out of place standing on York station at seven thirty.
Around me milled a crowd of returning commuters, all
wearing workaday suits and office-dishevelled hair, whilst I
stood like a misplaced ageing ingenue, overglamorous and
hyped to distraction. I watched the Arrivals board, the seven
forty-five which Leo would be on was running ten minutes
late, so I bought myself a coffee. I had to ditch most of it on
account of my bladder being overwrought with nerves. In the
Ladies, I sprayed on more perfume, then worried I would
smell too pungent.
As I crouched at the sink trying to wash off the worst of
the excess, the creeping self-doubt began. Was I cut out to
be a girlfriend anyway? Shouldn't I be at home, baking cakes
for my daughter, whilst she crayoned in the next room? All
right, maybe sixteen was bit old for crayoning—perhaps I
could bake while she revised, calling out the odd question
about the causes of the First World War, or the structure of
the ear?
I fished a handful of paper towels from the dispenser and
dabbed at myself where the water had splashed over my
dress, and thought of Florence's reaction the only time I'd
tried to help her with her homework. She'd fixed me with a
baleful glance from an overmascaraed eye, corrected my
Latin pronunciation and told me she was going round to a
friend's house to revise. Where it was quieter, apparently.
By the time I emerged, the Exeter train was being
announced on Platform Three. I placed myself casually, but
95
Slightly Foxed
by Jane Lovering
with my heart thundering, against a pillar. It would give me
maximum time to make an impact particularly if he thought I
wasn't there.
In the event, it was he who wasn't there. I watched every
passenger from the seven forty-five off the train, and every
passenger from the eight twenty-nine, and from the nine oh-
six. Leo was none of them. By twenty past nine I was so
blasted with misery that I got a taxi home and as soon as the
front door enclosed me into the safety of my flat, I started to
weep.
When the phone rang I wanted to ignore it. But eventually
maternal instinct took over. What if it was Florrie? It was Leo.
"Alys! Thank God you're there at last."
"Mmmm. I am," I said, somewhat coolly.
"Only I've been trying to get you since ten o'clock this
morning. I'm so, so sorry I couldn't make it. Believe me, I
would have if I could, but I've had a mare go into premature
labour here. The vet's just left, poor old girl's absolutely
exhausted. I really cannot apologise enough, Alys."
"I'm sorry you couldn't come too." I tried not to sound
forlorn. "But I know how animals are. Unpredictable."
"Yeah, so, look. Um. I know this might be difficult for you
and everything." To his credit he really did sound quite
distraught. "Happy birthday by the way. There's an all-day
screening of
The
Lord of the Rings
trilogy at the Odeon in
Exeter on Friday and I wondered—if you could get here and
everything—if you'd like to go. With me, obviously. We could
have dinner afterwards and..."
96
Slightly Foxed
by Jane Lovering
Oh, please Leo, don't bother with the "and". My
imagination was already working on
that
.
"I'd love to," I said, now enormously cheered. He hadn't
rejected me. We parted telephonic company after an
exchange of pleasantries and normal small talk, and I put his
picture back up on the bedroom wall; it was only slightly
creased from where I'd jumped on his face.
97
Slightly Foxed
by Jane Lovering
When I walked into Webbe's next morning, Simon was
pricing up some new books and placing them on a stand.
"Good morning." He put down his pencil and looked at me
critically. "And how are you feeling today?"
For one horrible second I thought he was making some
kind of ironic reference to his having overworked Jace and I
chronically over the last few days. Then she appeared over
his left shoulder and started making boggle-eye faces at me.
"Oh, I'm fine."
"Only Jacinta said that you might not be in today. Says
that you were feeling really rough yesterday."
"I..." I hesitated, uncertain as to the nature of my
supposed complaint, until I saw Jace making hand cupped to
mouth and heaving gestures. "It was something I ate. Much
better now. Up all night though. Terrible. And once I stopped
being sick, it started coming out the other end," I added
smoothly so as not to waste his sympathy just in case I felt
like sloping off work early.
Simon's face registered a mixture of concern and
repulsion. He began to back away. "Well, if you feel at all—
you know—today, you get off home." Jacinta was making
obscene gestures and rolling her eyes towards the door, and
it dawned on me what this was all about. She thought I'd
have such a sex-soaked night I'd be unable to get in to work.
