Authors: Jane Lovering
ages. "Maybe later."
Later, and after many more glasses of wine, drunk to spite
the girls who'd obviously wanted rid of me, I forced entry into
my hallway. With the kind of thuggish enthusiasm typical to
those who've had a night out which has proved a little too
much for their systems to cope with, I collapsed through
doorways. I ended up facedown on my bed.
"That was fun," I said to the pillow. "Piers is nice to be
seen out with." A moment's contemplation later I mitigated
this with, "Bloody annoying person though. Buying all that
wine. Making me drink it. And his friends are so
rude
."
The pillow turned a cold, glittering eye on me. Grainger
was drawing my attention to the fact that he was currently
occupying this pillowcase and would I mind buggering off to
be maudlin elsewhere because he had some serious bits of
sleeping he wanted to catch up on.
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"You are looking very white still, Alys." Jacinta's voice
boomed around inside my head as I attempted to sort books
without bending down. "You must get in bed early tonight."
The shop bell jangled like tinfoil across my nerve endings and
she looked at me expectantly. "Is your turn."
"Oh, have pity on me, Jace, please." I groaned, resting my
forehead against the undisturbed coolness of the Jane Austen
section. "I couldn't sell anything if it was 'Buy a Book or Die'
day."
"Hmm." Jacinta, decidedly lacking in sympathy, muttered,
"It not pity you need, it man with big muscle."
Honestly. First all I needed was "new clothe", now it was
"man with big muscle". What was she going to prescribe
next? Liechtenstein?
My stomach gave a small lurch and I hastily started pulling
books from the shelf to distract myself. A rogue
Northanger
Abbey
needed a swift sort out before it tried to infiltrate Iain
Banks on the rack below.
"It is a man." Jacinta's voice from the other side of the
shelf made me jump, as did the sight of her face peering
through the recently made gap. She looked disturbingly like a
bird of prey when all her features were squeezed into the
book-sized space. "He wants you."
"Oh, if only." I sighed. "Why does he want me?"
"He is not saying. I say you are not feeling bright today
and that you have brought back your tea."
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"More information, Jacinta, than I think
anyone
needs. So
he didn't say who he was, or anything useful like that?"
"No. He is very pretty, you go see."
"But I don't know any...oh. Hello, Piers." I tried to become
unaware of Jace's looming, pouting presence as I confronted
Piers in front of the till. The thumping in my temples had
worsened suddenly, but he looked perfectly cool. "Um. Do
you want to buy a book?"
By now Jace had walked completely around Piers, giving
him the benefit of her Alpine-level cleavage and, for such a
large woman, her absurdly pert bottom. Over his shoulder
she was making lip-smacking faces in my direction.
"No, I wanted—just making sure you were okay. You
seemed kinda tanked last night and we didn't get to talk a
whole lot on the way back. Worried that my friends might
have, ah, upset you."
Jacinta was now giving me thumbs-up signs with both
hands and winking like a pantomime dame behind Piers's
back. "Well, as you can see"—I waved my arms in what was
meant to be a look-how-fine-I-am gesture, but came across
as though I was struggling to keep my balance—"I'm
completely all right. Super, in fact."
"Yeah, okay. Sure. Just thought I'd, well, you know." Piers
turned and almost collided with Jacinta who managed to
wobble most of her assets in her attempt to get out of his
way. "See ya."
As soon as the door had shut behind him, Jacinta was in
front of me, grasping me by both shoulders and squeezing
until my clavicles squeaked. "Alys, you have a man! And such
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a man. So—
lindo.
" She burst into a torrent of Spanish,
punctuated with occasional shakings of my limp form which
might, in my fragile state, have proved fatal if Simon hadn't
walked in at that moment.
"Now, now girls," he said evenly. "No need to fight."
"She has a man." Jacinta managed to make it sound
accusing and her eyebrows, usually neatly pencilled arches on
her brow line, became two brackets containing an outraged
frown. "She did not tell me of any man."
"It was Piers," I said wearily. "He's got some family crisis
and I offered to help, that's all. Nothing else."
"Piers? Alasdair's wife's boy?" Simon looked puzzled. "But
he's about twelve, isn't he?"
"Something like that." My head was banging now, my brain
felt like the last biscuit in the tin. "Look, sorry, Simon, but I
think I've got to go home. I feel absolutely rubbish at the
moment. Jace can cope, can't you?"
"If you say." Jacinta helped me find my jacket and held
open the shop door for me. "He is very big boy for twelve,"
she muttered in my ear as I left.
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I awoke some time later, in bed with a migranous
headache and Theo Wood looming pixelatedly in front of my
left eyeball.
Shit.
I'd meant to post him off to Isabelle Logan
last night. I hadn't accounted for getting rolling drunk and
forgetting. I'd already admitted his presence to Simon,
pretending that I'd taken him home by mistake, and had to
face Simon's upper-class tut at my carelessness. If things had
gone to plan, Theo would have plopped through Isabelle's
letterbox by now.
I unstuck Theo from my cheek and wiped as much drool
off his face as I could, before I groaned my way into a more
comfortable position. Why on earth had I drunk so much last
night? I turned onto my side and felt the bed dip as Grainger
landed alongside me. He walked the length of my body to
gurn
toothlessly into my face before settling himself against
my chest with a small purr of self-satisfaction and a smell like
old anchovies.
I closed my eyes and let myself drift off into a pleasing half
dream about Theo Wood in which he was reciting poetry to
me in a breathless, love-struck voice, but woke again with a
start of recognition at the sound of a key turning in the front
door. Theo's gentle exhalations of desire turned into
Grainger's fishy snores and the background sounds became
voices. Florence and one other, male and young.
"Mum's at work, so we've got hours," and his reply,
"Great! So, d'you want to do it in here then?"
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I lay, frozen, somewhere between embarrassment and
outrage. Okay, so Florence was sixteen, legally overage, but
even so. I really didn't think I could lie here and listen. But
how could I reveal my presence and ever be able to look my
daughter in the face again?
"I'll get my equipment unpacked." I heard the sound of a
lot of zipping and lifting, before some heavy items thunked
onto the living-room floor.
"Jesus, do you carry
all
those lenses all the time?" Oh,
thank God and the patron saint of mothers everywhere. "Shall
I sit over here? Is the light good enough?"
"Yeah, it's fine. I'll get the meter on you, just in case.
D'you want to change?"
"Nah, this'll be cool. Do a couple of shots, full length and a
portrait, that'll be fine."
I held my hand against my heart which was beginning to
slow down and tried to stifle a giggle of relief. Florence was
having her picture taken. She must have persuaded one of
the school camera club to do the honours. It was my birthday
in three weeks, so maybe this was intended to be my present.
Well, it would make a change from the usual half a pound of
Dairy Milk and a card bearing a joke which I didn't
understand.
He did seem to know his business, asking her to toss her
hair back off her face and pretend to be looking out of the
window. I wished I dared peep out at my daughter, posing
and teasing yet with such innocence in her laughter and
delight in her voice. It reminded me of listening to her playing
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with Alasdair when she was much smaller. I couldn't wait to
see the finished results.
When I heard her close the front door, I relaxed and
picked Theo back up off the covers. His face looked a little
bleary from my sleeping on him, but he still retained that
saturnine expression which hinted at dark passion, proved by
the words of his poetry. I plunged into his metaphors with
gusto—this was a man who had known
exactly
where to put
his alliteration for maximum effect.
I read on for a couple of hours, finishing the book, and
stared at the face of the poet as dusk seeped into the room.
Why couldn't I meet men like this? Where were they all, the
sensitive, artistic types with eyes which could pull the soul
from your body? How come the only men I met thought that
buying you two egg sandwiches and a Mars Bar made them
irresistible? Next door the telephone rang, I heard Florrie
answer and could only hope that she would have better luck
in her relationships than I had.
Hold out for one who's out of
the ordinary
, I breathed in a silent wish for her.
A man who
wants to be your friend first and your lover second. Someone
who knows you.
Florence came in, flooding the room with bright light and
energy. "It's Simon on the phone for you," she said, then,
"What? Why are you looking at me like that?"
"No reason." I wobbled to my feet, jet-lagged after an
unaccustomed afternoon away from the vertical. "Just
wondering what kind of man you'll end up with."
"Oh, that's easy." She danced into the kitchen and closed
the door, shouting "RICH" as she did so.
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"Hello, Simon."
"Alys. How are you feeling? Are you recovering?"
"I'm fine."
"Good. Good. Ah. So you'll be able to come back to work?
Only, I need a favour."
Florence had re-emerged from the kitchen and sprawled
herself across the sofa with a magazine, obviously listening.
"Simon, I'm not running any more consignments of crack
across town," I said, deadpan.
She simply raised an eyebrow and mouthed, "Oh,
Mother.
"
"I'm sorry?" Poor Simon was baffled.
"Never mind. What can I do for you?"
He had only assured Mrs. Logan that I would personally
deliver her book into her hands within the week. I breathed a
sigh of relief that I hadn't already posted it. Simon really went
for the personal touch.
"You know I can't travel, Alys," Simon said reasonably. "I'd
be having panic attacks before the train left the station. And
sending Jacinta wouldn't be fair."
"But what do I do about Florence? I can't just hop off for a
couple of days and leave her alone. She's got school. Exams,
that sort of thing. She needs me."
"No I bloody don't," came the loving reply from the sofa.
"I'll go and stay at Dad's."
"It's only for a couple of days. Train down, taxi to Mrs.
Logan's house, hand over the book. I'll pay your expenses.
Come on, Alys." He took a noticeably wheedling tone. "You
went to university in Devon, didn't you? Wouldn't you like to
go back and have a look round?"
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"I was at Exeter, yes. Briefly." I tried not to look at
Florence when I said this, but failed. She was sitting very still,
carefully not reacting. "Oh all right. I'll go."
"Thank you. I'm sorry to be asking, but it
is
due to your
carelessness that the book is at your flat."
"Yes, yes, all right, I get that. I did apologise. It must have
fallen into my bag from the pile on your table. I was going to
post it to her, but—"
Thankfully Simon's insuck of air prevented me from having
to admit that I'd been out on the lam with Piers. "
Post it?
A
valuable book like that? I'm surprised at you."
You'd have been a lot more surprised if you'd seen me last
night, I thought.
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All the taxis at the rank outside Exeter station told me that
they only did trips into the town and Charlton Hawsell might
have been Ulan Bator as far as they were concerned. So
farther onward travel was provided by a single-decker bus
which smelled of damp paper towels.