Summer's Edge (9 page)

"What made you want to become a vet?"

Here’s where you were expected to trot out the "always loved animals" line but Alice didn’t, because that wasn’t the entire reason why. "I thought it would be interesting, having so many different kinds of animals to study and work with," she said. "And also be something that you could travel and work overseas with. There are vet jobs all over the world and the qualification here is recognised pretty much everywhere."

"You won’t miss your home town?"

"Do you?" she asked him.

"Sometimes. I like being on tour and working overseas but home is home."

"What’s it like, Sydney?"
 

"Just like the photographs show. Great beaches, lots of national parks. Loads to do whether you’re a tourist or a local. Definitely worth a visit," he said, looking at her again.

She got the message. He wanted her to come. He actually wanted to see her again in the future, even though it might be months away. Was that what he was waiting for, for her to finish school? If he could just say so it would help.

"There’s no way we’d travel as far as Australia and not go there. Unless we run out of money or something." She smiled at him. She saw that it disarmed him.

They continued to walk along the side of the cricket pitch. Alice picked up a few pieces of litter if she saw anything, there wasn’t much, and Mr Walker did too even though he wasn’t supposed to. Whether he was unaware of that or whether he just wanted to help her out she didn’t know.
 

But she was glad as it stopped it feeling like a punishment, they were just two people picking up litter. A team. She finally felt that he was acknowledging that they were on more familiar terms than everyone else.

"What was it like playing cricket? Did you always want to do it?"

"Was it my boyhood dream do you mean? Not initially. That was to be a train driver." He saw her eyes widen. "When I was about seven, anyway. After that I wanted to be a top business executive, wear sharp suits like my Uncle Rex and have an office at the top of my own tower. Then when I was about fourteen or fifteen I realised I could make a go of the cricket, or my coach did, and that seemed more appealing than numbers."

"You’re glad you chose that? No regrets?" She hoped it wasn’t a stupid question.

"None at all. I still read Economics at university, thinking it might come in useful if I changed my mind. Or this happened." He indicated his shoulder where the injury was. "So it still might. It’s healing well but you can’t keep playing forever."

"W G Grace played well into his sixties." Alice couldn’t remember how she knew this. Possibly Jules had told or there had been something about it at school once.

Mr Walker laughed. "He was a local boy wasn’t he? Times are a bit different now."

Alice didn’t think W G Grace, with his enormous Victorian beard, could fairly be described as a "boy" but she took his point.

"I’m doing Economics A-level. It’s the last of them."

"For veterinary science?"

"You only need two sciences. I couldn’t face Physics, and I thought it might be a back up option if I didn’t get into a veterinary degree. I could do business studies or something," she explained.

"Much like me then. I hope you get your first dream though."

They were approaching the pavilion now and all she could think of was the time he had kissed her in there. He had been so angry. She wondered if he was thinking about it as well.

He had fallen silent. Alice took a risk.

"Do we need to clear up inside the pavilion?" She knew full well it was an outdoor clean up only.

She saw him wavering. A muscle clenched in his jaw.

"Do you think we have something to clear up?" he asked her.

"I think that could be the case."

She was so nervous she was amazed she could speak. He was only just hovering over the edge. At any time he might change his mind, step back.

But he didn’t. He opened the door and ushered her in before him. Inside the light was dim as the shutters were drawn.

He stood before her, still on the brink but increasingly resigned.

"What do you want from me, Alice?"

The answer was so easy. She reached up around his neck and his arms went around her and his lips were on hers. Their mouths opened, his tongue intertwined with hers. It was sweet, sensuous.

She smelled his scent, she had grown to crave it. His skin, the faint soap or aftershave he used, the cotton of his shirt.

Her hands felt the nape of his neck, the shape of it, how it tapered to his collar. His hair was cropped so short she could feel the gradient from hair to skin.

"You," she said as he buried his face in her neck and her hair, breathing her in as well. "I want you."

"God, Alice…" she loved how he said her name, his accent, the rasp in his voice that betrayed his desire for her. His need. He’s fighting it, she thought, but he needs this as much as I do.

They knew they couldn’t stay in there for long, it would look suspicious if anyone saw them. Maddy might already be suspicious over Alice going off with him in the first place. She could always make something up about him wanting to talk about Becky and Brett or something. She started inventing a possible conversation in her head.

He was telling her again how wrong it was.

"I lack all self-control around you. It’s not a normal thing for me. I’ve usually got a better grip of myself. This really has to stop. I’d get sacked and it would be terrible for you. And you know I’m too old for you."

He was rejecting her once again.

"Let’s get back and we’ll just forget about this."

Two steps forward, one step back. She would have to be patient again. At least he wasn’t angry any more.

* * *

Back at home Alice didn’t bother telling her mother or Richard about the clean-up. She didn’t want to worry them. She figured if a note was sent home she would deal with it as and when that happened. Most likely it wouldn’t be, it would get overlooked amid everything else that was going on this term.

"I’ll cook tonight," she said, feeling she should make some kind of amends to the universe.

"Don’t worry about that. The Baystons have asked us over for a last minute supper. It’s ok if you need to revise though," her mother told her.

Alice was on the fence about going. She was revising all weekend anyway and could afford a couple of hours. The Baystons, old family friends, were nice people and she liked their dog. They also had a cat which was due to have kittens any day. On the other hand it would be glorious to get the house to herself for a while.

She was still flipping a mental coin when Richard arrived back from work.

"Has the Baystons’ cat had her kittens yet?" Alice asked.

"A few days ago I believe. Four, Sheila said."

That decided it. Four bundles of mewing fur would be preferable to brooding at home as she knew there was only one thing - one person - who would occupy her mind. Even though she saw plenty of kittens at the veterinary practice Alice never got tired of them.

"Do we have to dress up?" she asked her mother.

"No, just casual."

Alice went to get ready. She wondered what Mr Walker was doing that evening. She hoped he’d be sitting around at home kicking himself for rejecting her once again.

* * *

Dominic Bayston opened the door to them. Alice wasn’t expecting him to be there. He was a year older than her and was already at university. He must be home for the weekend. Years ago she had had a crush on him but it went unrequited and they were just friends now.

As expected her younger brothers went into raptures over the new kittens and Alice had to restrain them from stressing the tiny animals out by diverting their attention with a box of Dominic’s old Lego.

"Poor old Whisky isn’t getting much love," Dominic said, referring to the ageing beagle. Alice rubbed its tummy.

Dominic had an elder sister who was several years older than him and worked with horses in Ireland. She had got married a year ago. The Baystons were overjoyed to share the news that she was pregnant with their first grandchild.

Baby talk didn’t interest Alice or Dominic so they went into the games room after supper. Alice’s family couldn’t stay late because her brothers had to be put to bed, but the adults would probably chat for another half hour or so.

"How are A-levels going?" he asked.

"First ones are next week. I just can’t wait until they’re over and we get the longest summer holiday ever."

"And Fairmount, still okay?" Dominic had gone to a different school but she had known him since childhood.

"Same as ever. How’s Manchester?"

"It’s not so bad. Full on." He was reading engineering in the north of England. "You still planning to be a vet then?"

"Yes, or I’ll find out in August anyway when the results come out," Alice said. There was something else she wanted to ask him.

"You remember that girl at your school, Sally something? Had to leave because she got caught with a music teacher. What happened to them?"

"She moved in with him when she went to sixth form college, then it fizzled out after she went to university. He followed her up there and it was all a bit pathetic from what I heard," Dominic said.

It hadn’t wrecked her life then, Alice thought. The local newspaper had got hold of the story at the time and it had been a town scandal. Particularly as the music teacher had been married and had left his wife for the girl.

Dominic was stroking the new-mother cat. It looked large, sleek and exhausted. "I only came down to see Bessie’s brood but don’t tell my parents. They like to think I’m homesick."

"They are sweet. Will you keep one?"

"I’d love to but it wouldn’t really work in a flat. Mum’s got them all promised to various women in her ladies’ group. The kids move out, they get a cat."

Alice thought of all the unwanted kittens they ended up with at the veterinary practice and wondered if there was a way to link supply with this demand.

"How’s your friend?" Dominic asked.

He meant Becky not Jules because he used to have a thing for her.

"She’s good. Still planning to do physio. She’s going out with an Australian cricketer who’s playing for Gloucestershire." Alice thought she had better mention it in case Dominic had wanted to give her a call.

"Nice for her." He didn’t sound resentful, he must have moved on.

"Do you think you’ll come back here, once you graduate? Do you think most people will?" Alice asked him.

"Not with what I’m doing, there won’t be the jobs here," Dominic said. "But others might. I wouldn’t mind staying up in Manchester, it’s pretty great. Lots on and cheaper than London."

That was the thing about everyone going away to universities in other towns and cities. It broke ties. Alice couldn’t imagine not being near her family but she also struggled to imagine herself running a local practice like Jo. She knew she wanted to travel. She would face a choice some day.

PART II

Boundaries

Into such a sudden zest

Of summertime joys

Epithalamion

Gerard Manley Hopkins

Alice went over to Becky’s house on Saturday morning to start their revision session. Gloucestershire were still away playing in Yorkshire so Becky couldn’t see Brett anyway. Alice was surprised how quickly their relationship had cemented. It seemed like they had been going out for months, not just a few weeks.

They were in Becky’s parents’ kitchen as there was a large table by the window they could spread all their notes out on. Alice was finding it hard to focus on cell division and membranes and transport.

"I don’t think they’ll ask us about this," Becky was saying about a particular topic, "because apparently they did last year. It was in our mocks if you remember. They always change it every year."

Alice thought back to a few years ago when she couldn’t have imagined in a million years choosing Biology. When she was younger she had dreamed of working in an ice cream factory, then being a florist, and at one point being an air hostess. Her parents had tolerated all these fantasies knowing that eventually, like pretty much everyone else at Fairmount, she would be steered into a traditional and conventional profession.

"Do you remember when we first did this back in Junior School?" she asked Becky.

It had been far more simplified then and had disappointed them all, as they had assumed that "Asexual Reproduction" must be something to do with sex. Discovering it was all about amoeba had been an enormous let-down. An even worse disappointment lay in store with the next chapter in their "Biology 11-13" textbook, titled "Sexual Reproduction". This turned out to be about flowers.

It wasn’t until the following year that their class had finally reached the long-awaited, highly anticipated section on Human Reproduction. Of course by then they knew everything about it anyway, or thought they did.

Alice remembered the staid biology teacher hurriedly reading through the entire chapter in a dry monotone, pausing once or twice to ask "any questions?" and then immediately resuming before anyone had the chance to put their hand up. If he wanted to bore them off ever having sex he had made a good effort.

"It was with Mr Coleman, wasn’t it? It was awful. I vowed that day I was never going to have sex ever, because it sounded so dull and mechanical and I couldn’t get his voice out of my mind," Becky said.

"I imagine Brett’s relieved you didn’t keep that resolution," Alice said. Becky hadn’t directly revealed whether she and Brett had gone all the way yet, but Alice assumed they must have done.

"He was actually surprised I’d waited this long."

"What was it like?" Alice asked.

"Honestly? The first couple of times it was pretty awful. I hated it the first time but I didn’t tell him. It just hurt so much and I hadn’t a clue what I was doing," Becky said.

"Do you think he realised?"

"I hope not."

"So it got better?"

"Yes, definitely. It’s great now. And I’m glad I got it out of the way," Becky told her.