Читать книгу The Lies Between Us - Marian Dillon - Страница 11

2

Eva

1987

The next morning, I get up late, around eleven.

I’ve been lying in bed thinking about Ed. This is something new to me, as I don’t think I’ve ever found my attention so absorbed by anyone I’ve been out with. Sometimes I’ve wondered if anyone ever would get my attention.

Contrary to what my mother thinks, I have had boyfriends – all part of the same group of friends, boys I’ve known for ages. Mostly it was just a few dates, although Robin Phipps lasted for five months on and off; I lost my virginity to him. It was at a party, on a pile of coats in the bedroom, a deliberate decision on my part to seduce him – out of curiosity and the desire to be able to join in conversations with girlfriends. Then a few times we had sex at his house when his parents were out. I enjoyed it, up to a point, but there was lots of fumbling and not too much in it for me. I still somehow feel as though I haven’t experienced sex, although technically I think I once had an orgasm. And I definitely never lay in bed thinking like this about Robin, only about the act itself.

I feel teased by Ed, that is, I want to know him better. And I have to admit to a certain feeling of lust; I have a sense that sex with him might be entirely different to sex with Robin.

I wonder if he will come back to the Albert. Maybe I’ll see you around, he said. It wasn’t hopeful, even though when I think about our conversation I feel we sort of connected, and that he was interested in me.

But then there was the walk back here, until there was no hiding the fact of who I am: the daughter of his friend’s boss, whose mother he had to practically fight off at their party before leaving at speed. If Ed has any sense he’ll stay well clear, I think gloomily.

Flinging back the covers I emerge from the warm huddle of my bed and go to the window. The weather has changed, and yesterday’s sun has been replaced by a damp and grey sky, the colour of old washing-up water. It’s windy too. Leaves are coming off the trees and blowing around the lawn, skittering in little whirls, like tiny dancers. It looks chilly, and uninviting, and I feel as leaden as the sky as I wonder what to do with the day ahead. Maybe I should go into town, to one of those temping agencies, and try to find a job. And I have said I’ll enrol on a computer course; there’s one starting soon at the local library, something called CLAIT. I’ve used the BBC computers at school to type up the odd essay, whenever I could get on one of the few available in the library. But this course is supposed to teach things like spreadsheets and databases. I’m not too sure what they are or how useful they’ll be, but everyone is saying it’s the way things are going, and that soon everything will be done on computers. So if I want to be employable I should start learning fast.

And, of course, there’s always work to be done for my English and history resits, which I have to hand in tomorrow at college. I could go to the library and work there.

After my shower, instead of my usual big, baggy sweatshirt and leggings I put on some clean jeans, with the Fair Isle sweater I had last Christmas. It looks cold enough for that today, and the jumper is smart enough for job-seeking. On the way out of my room I stop to look in the mirror, not concerned so much with my body, which I quite like (enough, but not too much, of boobs and hips), but with my face, which I’m never sure about. I run my fingers through my hair – dirty blonde Louise calls it – lifting it up off my face, then I brush the fringe more to one side and stare into my eyes, large and grey-blue, with long lashes. These are my best feature. My gaze skips over my nose, which I think is too fat at the bottom, although an old boyfriend did once tell me he found my nose sexy. When I get to my mouth I pout, to make it seem fuller, then relax it and smile, to see how I look when I’m not just staring. But the smile comes out as a fixed grin, the sort I always have on me in photos. I hope I look more normal when I really smile.

Downstairs in our newly refurbished kitchen – all oak and cream, with the huge Aga that apparently everyone has now – my mother is sitting at the breakfast bar with a coffee and cigarette on the go. She too has just got up; in fact this is early for her. She must have eased off on the drink last night. She’s wearing her brightly printed kimono, and her hair – which is naturally the same shade as mine, but currently dyed mahogony – is caught behind her head in a clip, with wisps hanging down at the front. She’s flicking through a recipe book. She does this a lot, and then makes one of the same old dinners she always makes; she just seems to like looking at the illustrations. Sometimes she even gets as far as buying some of the ingredients – herbs and spices and special sauces – but then hardly ever gets the essential meat or fish to actually make the dish. On the rare occasions she does, she gets all flustered and het up and swears the recipe must be wrong because it isn’t coming out right. The Aga, I think, is wasted.

‘Look at this, Eva. Guacamole.’ She pronounces it ‘goo-acamole’; I have to stop myself from correcting her, because my mother really doesn’t like it if she thinks I’m trying to show her up. ‘It’s made from avocado pears. You put it on chilli. Sounds lovely. I think I’ve got some of that tabasco sauce.’ Suddenly she stops, and stares into space. ‘Avocado,’ she says, with a distant look on her face. That’s all.

I make tea and toast, while my mother carries on looking through the book. I smother the toast with raspberry jam then lean against the sink to eat it. I’m thinking of nothing in particular, staring absently at my mother’s hair. The red is growing out slightly, and I can see the roots, which somehow seem less blonde than I remember. When did that happen, that my mother’s hair began to fade? Otherwise, I have to admit, she could actually pass for younger than she is. Her jawline is still firm, and her skin smooth. Thirty-nine she was, last birthday.

‘Who was that that brought you home last night?’ The question shoots out of my mother, at the same time as she turns another page of the recipe book.

‘Jon,’ I lie smoothly, licking jam off my fingers.

My mother taps her cigarette on the ashtray then looks up at me.

‘No. That wasn’t Jon.’

It was her then, looking out of the window. ‘Okay, it wasn’t.’

‘So who was it?’

Usually when my mother is trying to get information from me about my friends, it’s in a silky, persuasive sort of voice, hoping that I will confide in her. I never do, just as I never brought friends home from school or invited them for sleepovers – especially after I went to All Saints, the private school my parents insisted I went to once they could afford it. It was hard to fit in there, and I chose to stay friends with people from my primary school – Louise and some others – although often it felt like I was tagging along, an outsider. So to ask a friend home became fraught with danger: with my old friends it was fear of being branded a snob, when they saw the size of our house; with the girls at All Saints I knew that one wrong move on my mother’s part would have been disastrous. It’s quite possible that she wouldn’t have touched a drop while they were here, that she would have been all smiley and chatty and laughed with them, and they wouldn’t have met her coming up the stairs with that glassy look in her eyes, the oone that comes after the final few drinks. But I never took that risk, and never relented in the face of my mother’s cajoling.

Today, though, she sounds almost angry. ‘Aren’t you going to tell me?’

I take a gulp of tea. ‘What does it matter?’

‘It matters. Let’s just say that.’

‘No. Let’s not just say that. Tell me why it matters who walked me home last night. And why you feel you have to spy on me.’

She snaps the recipe book shut. ‘I wasn’t spying. I couldn’t sleep, and I happened to hear voices and wondered if it was you, that’s all.’ I say nothing. ‘It was Steve’s friend, wasn’t it? Steve who works for your father.’

Still I keep quiet, feeling uneasy, as though guilty, with a dim sense that somehow I’ve crossed a line that until recently I hadn’t known was there; that I’ve trodden on my mother’s toes.

‘Well, your silence says it all.’

‘So? If it was?’

She stands up and begins clearing the breakfast bar, clattering pots and plates and banging cupboard doors. ‘It’s not a good idea,’ she says, pouring water into the sink. She adds washing-up liquid and swooshes the water until it bubbles up. ‘He’s too old for you.’

‘How would you know how old he is? He came here once.’ Although, as I picture her pinning him against the wall, I think she probably did get his entire life story.

‘He just happened to tell me; we were talking about big birthdays I suppose,’ my mother says, a little defensively. ‘She turns to look at me. ‘He said that next year he’ll be thirty. He’s ten years older than you.’

My gaze slides away from her as I chew slowly on a mouthful of toast. Ten years. Nearly thirty. Older than he looks, while I look older than I am.

‘And?’ I say.

‘It’s not right.’

I swallow my toast. ‘Not right?’

‘He’d be … taking advantage.’

‘What?’ I laugh. It’s such an old-fashioned phrase, and not one that suits my mother at all. ‘Like I’m some innocent.’ She doesn’t say anything, rattling plates and cups around in the bowl. ‘And anyway, you’re making a big assumption here. He walked me home, that’s all. I haven’t got engaged to him. He just happened to come in the pub and he remembered meeting me here.’ I put the last piece of toast into my mouth, look at my watch, then sling my plate into the bowl. ‘I’m going to get some work done, and then go into town, try a few agencies.’

As I walk out of the kitchen, my mother calls,

‘Are you seeing him again?’

I pause at the bottom of the stairs. On the few occasions that I’ve ever mentioned a boy’s name, my mother has asked that question with a little note of hope in her voice. This time, she is clearly not happy at the thought that Ed is interested in me.

‘I don’t know. Maybe.’

‘You should know he has history. You should know what you’re getting into.’

I walk back towards the kitchen. ‘What do you mean?’

‘He’s married, left his wife. And there’s a child, somewhere.’

I feel a jolt in my stomach. ‘A child?’

‘Yes. A little boy.’

‘Did he tell you that?’

My mother shakes her head. ‘It was something your father said.’ She’s watching my face. ‘He kept that quiet then.’

I’m suddenly annoyed. ‘I don’t see why you’re telling me all this. It’s nothing to do with you.’ I turn my back on my mother and stamp upstairs, where I start gathering books to take to the library. Halfway through, I stop to stare out of the window, watching a squirrel climb the washing-line pole to get at the bird feeder, and hearing my father’s voice: Damn squirrels, just bloody rats with a tail!

I’m thinking about Ed, having left his wife and child, and trying to work out if that means something or nothing to me. You’d think such a man would be a bit of a bastard, but I didn’t think I could say that about Ed. But then I suppose it’s like burglars. They don’t go round in a striped jumper, holding a bag with SWAG written on it, do they?

***

I have to wait two weeks for Ed to come back to the pub, this time on his own. It’s a Friday, near to closing time again, and the pub is heaving – a fug of heat and smoke and noise. I give him a quick smile as he queues at the bar; after he’s been served by Jon he stands at one end, rolling up. I feel him glance my way every so often, but I’m busy, and we don’t talk until after the bell has been rung and things slow down.

‘I weakened,’ he says, when I go over. ‘I was going to walk to the pub up the road, see if the beer’s better, but it’s too wild out there.’

‘That’s what everyone’s saying. One man said it’s like a hurricane … but then he’d had a few.’

While I wash glasses and tidy the bar, Ed chats to a very drunken man who I think is probably trying to sell him something that fell off the back of a lorry, a man who’s well known in the pub. Occasionally the landlord will exercise his muscle and throw him out, just to let him know he’s got his number, but he keeps bouncing back. Now and then Ed looks across and gives me a wink and a grin, and each time I feel a muted flutter of excitement in my belly. If nothing else, I think, he’s not avoiding me, which if he had I would have quite understood; his friend’s boss’s nineteen-year-old daughter, whose own mother flirted so outrageously with him.

When I’ve finished for the night I fetch my coat and bag from the back, and he’s still there, waiting. The drunk has gone, and the last few punters are draining their glasses.

‘I was just thinking of going on somewhere,’ he says. ‘There’s the casino in town, they have a late bar. I sometimes go with Steve, I’m a member. You could be my guest.’

There’s no ‘if you like’, or ‘it’s just a thought’. This is what I want, do you want it too, is how I hear it.

‘Okay. Why not?’ I use the pub phone to ring home, so my father won’t wonder where I am. It rings for a long time, and then I’m thrown by a strange woman’s voice saying hello on the other end.

‘Who’s that?’

‘It’s Pam.’

‘Hi Pam.’ Whoever you are. ‘It’s Eva. Can you get my dad?’ There’s a long pause. In the background I can hear music and voices, and loud laughter.

‘I can’t see him, love, not sure where he is. Or your mum. I only picked up in case it was an emergency. Is it an emergency?’

‘No. Just tell him I’ll be late, or I might stay at a friend’s house. Tell him not to worry. Will you do that?’

‘Of course I will. You enjoy yourself, love. Ta-ta.’

Outside the wind is as fierce as everyone has said. It makes me stagger at first, and Ed catches my arm to steady me. There are people bent double as they walk into it, or blown along with the wind behind them, and when I try to talk to Ed I find my breath taken away from me, the words lost. I shake my head and give up.

Ed spots a taxi and hails it, and the driver is full of how the wind is still picking up, and that someone has said there’s a tornado on the way.

‘That’s crazy,’ Ed says. ‘We don’t have tornadoes here.’

‘We do now, mate.’

We stare out of the taxi windows, fascinated by the sight of things whirling through the air and skittering across pavements – litter, old newspapers and carrier bags, snapped-off branches from trees, an inside-out umbrella, empty bottles and cans that roll into gutters. On one road a metal dustbin slides right across in front of us – the driver swerves and brakes, and the bin clips the bumper and then bounces and clangs away behind us.

‘Fuck,’ he says, and then, ‘Sorry, duck. I thought that was going to launch itself through me windscreen for a minute.’

He drops us outside the casino. I’ve never been here; it’s a square white building, with a flashing red sign and a big open square in front of it. We lean into the wind to cross this, nearly blown off our feet by a couple of strong gusts, finally tumbling through the door. Once inside the hush is extraordinary, as though someone has wrapped up all the noise of the storm and thrown it away; everything is suddenly soft and calm and quiet. I stare around the plush reception area, thinking how out of place I must look in my work clothes, but the deep-pile carpet under my feet seems to welcome me anyway. The carpet is chequered red and black, and all around there are arrangements of red flowers – carnations and roses – in black glass vases. The staff are colour-schemed too; the doormen wear lounge suits, and at the desk a Chinese woman with sleek, black hair wears a scarlet dress with a sequined collar. The dress has big, Dallas-style shoulders and is stretched tight across her slight figure; everything about her is smooth and groomed. I look down at my rather crumpled self. True, I’m all in black, and at least I’ve got my sheer, lacy shirt on tonight, over a cami, short skirt and leggings. But there’s nothing sparkly about me, and my feet look clunky in Doc Martens rather than elegant in stilettos. Ed’s wearing chinos, and with his leather jacket he’s more in keeping.

‘I don’t think this was a good idea,’ I mutter. ‘I’m not dressed right.’

‘Don’t worry. You look fine. And you’re twenty-one by the way. This is a private club with old-fashioned rules.’

The woman gives me a careful look as Ed signs us both in, but she doesn’t ask for ID. Maybe she thinks I wouldn’t dare to turn up so casually dressed if I really was underage. Ed leads me through to the bar, which is raised above the gaming room to give a view of what’s going on. He finds seats, and goes to get a bottle of red wine. While he’s gone I look down curiously at the tables. I know nothing at all about gambling; the only thing I recognise is roulette, and that’s from watching Bond movies. There are several tables with cards, and I study one game just below where I’m sitting. Each player is dealt two cards, then everyone takes a look except the banker. As the banker works the table, some players take more cards and some refuse, each time with a slight nod or a motion of their hands. It’s clear they’re playing against the banker rather than each other, and they either win some chips or throw their hand in.

‘Is that poker?’ I ask Ed when he comes back.

‘Blackjack. It’s what Steve plays. I’m more for roulette, if I’m in the mood.’

‘And are you?’ I ask, looking round the room, with its lowered voices and faces masked in concentration.

‘I don’t know. I think I just didn’t want to go back to the flat. I needed to do something, go somewhere.’

He drums his fingers on his thighs as he speaks. He seems jittery. I look at him, remembering what my mother told me, and wondering if, and when, he will tell me. But although he talks a lot about his work as a journalist – I picture him sitting in front of a typewriter, hands flying over the keys and only pausing to draw on a cigarette – and although he talks about his childhood in a suburb of Leeds – in a houseful of boys, the things they got up to sounding boisterous and fun and sometimes alarming – he gives away nothing of his recent life. He clearly loves his job, and is good at it, I realise, after I’ve been gently drawn into talking about myself. My childhood, my friends, my ambitions – he spools out questions and reels in the answers.

‘Was it a surprise to you,’ he asks, ‘when you didn’t get the grades you needed?’

I consider this. ‘A bit. I didn’t think I’d done that badly, although I knew I hadn’t worked hard enough.’

‘Too much having fun?’

This time I pause even longer. I’m sick of having to pretend; before I even speak I can feel the relief of saying out loud the things I’ve never said to anyone.

‘I didn’t want to be at home. Evenings are when my mother starts to drink. Well, to be honest, she can start any time. But evenings are when she gets argumentative with my father, and picks fights with him. And then me, if I get involved. And practically every weekend she throws one of her boozy parties and I can’t stand being around all that. It’s why I got a job where I’d be working evenings. The other nights I’d go to friends’ houses, or be out somewhere. So I never did that much revision, you see.’

I turn to look at the nearest roulette table, where a little coo of surprise has signalled someone’s good fortune, a man now grinning broadly as he scoops up a pile of chips. When I turn back Ed is watching me.

‘You’ve not had a good time of it,’ he says.

‘No. But then again, I’ve had a roof over my head and anything I asked for was mine, so it’s not all bad, is it?’ He shrugs. ‘Don’t feel sorry for me,’ I say. ‘I’m not telling you to make you feel sorry for me. It’s just how it’s been.’

‘So how do you manage now?’ Ed asks. ‘The work for your resits?’

‘I go to my classes, and to the library. I’m pretty sure I’ll get through this time. And then I’ll be off.’ Ed raises his glass to that.

We drink the wine and then go on to whisky, another first for me. It makes me grimace, and Ed laughs at my face. Every now and then he rolls us both a cigarette, but I leave mine half-smoked, not used to their strength after the Silk Cut I sometimes buy or cadge. I’m feeling pleasantly drunk now, and comfortable with Ed; it’s as though I’ve pulled him on, like an old sweater.

It’s one-thirty in the morning when we become aware of staff doing the rounds and having a word with everyone. It’s like a hurricane outside, they’re saying. All taxis are finishing for the night, and anyone who wants to get home is advised to get one of the last ones, leaving now. The casino is closing early, they say, and already I can see that the tables are packing up – cards being folded, the roulette wheel stilled, the coloured chips stacked and boxed.

We make our way to the foyer, which by now is crowded with people shrugging into their coats and peering anxiously though the glass doors. The floodlights that illuminate the casino now also pick out things flying horizontally through the air, some of them looking more lethal than earlier. Once, what looks like the swinging bit of a metal shop sign flies past the doors and crashes into the wall at the far side of the square. Suddenly I feel a trickle of alarm. It’s becoming clear that the few remaining taxis won’t be able to take everyone, and we’re at the back of the queue. Some people are muttering about walking home, but it’s at least three miles to my house, and I don’t think I can manage that in this storm. When I say this to Ed he says I can come back to his flat and that he’ll sleep on the sofa, but, apart from any doubts I might have about that, it’s almost as far.

‘I don’t fancy walking anywhere with all this stuff flying through the air. And trees. That’s what kills people, isn’t it … falling trees?’

He doesn’t say anything; he’s staring through the doors at the wild night. Then he looks back at the waiting crowd. ‘Hang on. I’ve got to get this.’

He goes to the desk and talks to the Chinese woman, who seems to argue briefly, but finally searches around and hands him a pen and a pad of paper. I watch then as Ed moves down the queue, asking them questions, nodding as they talk, and scribbling things down; I can guess what he’s doing, and it looks like most people are eager to tell their story. At one point he goes out to a waiting taxi and I see him quizzing the driver, who leans out the window and shouts excitedly, waving his arms around. When he comes back in Ed holds one hand up to me, fingers splayed wide. Five minutes. Then he crosses to the payphone, and joins that queue. I chew on my lip, tapping my foot nervously, while the minutes tick away. The taxis are thinning out alarmingly, and little by little the groups of people either leave in one of them, or decide to take their chances on foot. Should we do that? Maybe we’ll have to.

When Ed has phoned he comes and stands beside me, squeezing into the queue so that his arm is pressed against mine. That’s when I realise I’m shivering.

‘Are you okay?’ he asks, taking hold of my hand, closing his own around it. Suddenly I’m intensely aware of how much I like being with him.

‘Sure.’

‘I just had to phone this story in. It was too good to miss.’

I shrug. ‘That’s your job. Anyway, it wouldn’t have made any difference. Look.’

Outside the two last taxis are pulling away, leaving us and everyone ahead of us stranded. Ed frowns.

‘Where do your parents think you are?’

‘At a friend’s house.’

He nods. ‘Right, let’s be logical. The taxis have gone, and walking home in this doesn’t seem like an option. How about we brave it up to Castle Square and hope to get a cab from the rank up there? It’s not too far.’

I hesitate, reluctant to go out at all, but with no other plan in my head.

‘Okay. Let’s go for it,’ I say.

The first obstacle is getting the heavy door to open far enough against the wind, and then we are practically pushed through it by a burly doorman. After that standing upright is a challenge. It takes all my strength to put one foot in front of the other, and to not pull Ed over with me every time the wind changes direction and throws us backwards or sideways. With each gust all the breath seems to be sucked right out of me. When an empty pizza box slams into my head I yell out loud; I’d never have thought cardboard could hurt so much. After what seems like miles, but is probably no more than a few hundred yards, we reach the square – only to find it deserted, empty of anything, taxis or people.

‘What do we do now?’ I shout, and then jump a mile high as a deafening crash splinters the air. Behind us, the plate-glass window of a boutique lies in pieces on the ground and, as we watch, clothes are being whisked out as if by a giant hand, whirling around in the air like some bizarre fashion show. Finally, the mannequins themselves tumble onto the floor of the window. Some bits of glass still shiver in the frame, all jagged, like little icebergs, and suddenly I imagine them being sucked up, then flying through the air and slicing into my skin.

‘Ed! We need to get back inside. We should go back to the casino.’

I turn, but Ed grabs my arm. ‘No, this way!’ He pulls me in the opposite direction.

‘Where to?’

He doesn’t answer, just tugs me along with him, and as we turn the corner I see where he’s heading. Ahead of us is the Carlton Hotel, its big gilt letters above the old metal canopy the most welcome thing I think I’ve ever seen in my life. Another crash comes from up ahead, and this time the glass from a bus shelter lies in pieces on the ground, twinkling under a street lamp. And then, as we stare, the street lamp goes out, along with all the lights in the square. There’s no moon, and the night is inky black. I feel panic bubbling up in my chest. The town is being smashed up around us, every huge gust of wind is like an assault on my body, and now we can’t even see where we’re going. Ed pulls me to him and we make our way down the street, clamped together like a pair from a three-legged race. The dark is absolute and scary, and I can hardly see where we’re treading, but as we stumble towards the hotel a few dim lights come back on inside. Ed says something about a generator, but I say I don’t care if they’re burning the furniture as long as we can be inside in the warmth and light. We climb the steps, and with amazing luck the door is unlocked; I think if it hadn’t been I would have just sat down and howled. As it is, once inside, I stand in the semi-dark of the foyer, shaking uncontrollably.

This is Harborough, I think. Things like this don’t happen in Harborough. It’s crazy.

A woman comes through from a room behind reception, and when she speaks it’s in a clipped and measured tone, as though weather like this happens every day.

‘Can I help you?’

‘We need a room,’ I blurt out. ‘I mean, two rooms.’

‘We’re stranded,’ Ed says. ‘Do you have two single rooms?’

The woman, tight-lipped and cold-eyed, nods at the storm outside, through a window that trembles and rattles in its frame.

‘Everyone’s stranded. We’re booked up. Practically.’

‘What do you mean, practically?’

‘Just one room left. Honeymoon suite.’ A small smirk now tips the woman’s lips up at one side. ‘That’s all we’ve got.’

‘We’ll take it.’ I turn to Ed. ‘Won’t we?’

He blinks, and clears his throat. ‘If that’s okay with you … sis.’

For a moment I stare at him, then grin as I realise he’s trying to save me embarrassment. ‘Fine,’ I say. ‘We can afford it, can’t we?’ Looking back at the woman I catch a sly smile on her face. ‘My brother just won at the casino. Lucky for us.’

She narrows her eyes, not fooled for a moment, but not quite ill-mannered enough to say so. ‘Here’s the key, number thirty-three.’ With a sharp slap she places it on the counter. ‘Up those stairs, third floor.’ As we reach the stairs she calls after us. ‘Will you be wanting breakfast delivered to your room? It’s included in the rate. Or maybe you’ll be needing to get back home.’ She’s giving Ed a firm look as she says this.

‘No, breakfast please,’ Ed says. ‘Full English for both.’ He looks at me. ‘All right, sis?’

I nod, my lips clamped tightly together to stop myself from laughing. We climb three flights of thinly carpeted stairs, and when we reach the room and step inside, we just stand there, grinning at each other.

‘All right, bro?’ I say, and start to giggle, the relief of being safe making me giddy.

But Ed’s smile is fading. ‘Look,’ he says, ‘if you want, you can have the room, I’ll go downstairs and sleep on a sofa, or something.’

My stomach lurches. I’ve done the wrong thing. He’ll think I’m too pushy, even though it was Ed who came to the pub, Ed who suggested the casino, Ed who led us to safety in this hotel. ‘No, no, it’s fine. I mean, it’s just sharing a room, isn’t it?’

There’s a tiny pause, where I wonder if he’s thinking the same as me. Then suddenly I see what the wind has done to us, both of us, myself captured in the mirror behind Ed. ‘You look like you’ve had an electric shock! And I look like a crazy woman!’

He glances at himself, then back at me, and we explode into laughter, doubled up and helpless, until someone in the next room bangs on the wall.

But when the laughter subsides, and Ed moves to the window to look outside, I find I’m shivering. The room is cold, it’s true, but there’s something else, some mixture now of excitement and nerves, not helped by the foreign smell of the place; a harsh smell, of furniture polish or toilet cleaner. Better that than not having been cleaned, I think, and gaze around the chintzy room, with its flimsy four-poster bed and china figurines that twirl or posture on every surface. There are tasselled curtains at the window, which Ed is just closing, there are fringed cushions on the bed, invitingly plumped up, and there are little pink-shaded lamps on each table at the side. I find the switch for those on the back wall, and instantly the room seems cosier, friendlier, a haven from the wind that howls and shakes the old sash window until I think it might shatter like the one in the square.

‘Is that window safe?’

‘Should be. It’s got more give. It’ll just make a hell of a noise all night.’

I look back at Ed, to find him staring at me.

‘I know how this must look,’ he says. ‘It wasn’t meant to turn out like this.’ I’m about to joke that he must have seen the forecast and planned it all, but then I see that he is properly worried that he’s done the right thing, his eyes searching mine.

‘Don’t worry. We’re here. We’re safe.’

‘I’ll sleep in the bath,’ he says.

‘Don’t be stupid.’ I cross to where he stands. ‘Unless you really want to.’

When he doesn’t reply, and to make sure he knows I’m not just thinking of his comfort, I take his hands and kiss him on the mouth, slightly surprised at the risk I’m taking – of rejection, of getting it wrong. He returns the kiss, and I think there is some feeling in it; I haven’t got it that wrong. But afterwards he steps back a little. ‘This may sound ridiculously old-fashioned, but I don’t want to take advantage of you.’

I laugh. ‘That’s what -’ No, Eva, don’t bring your mother into this. ‘You won’t be,’ I say, serious now. ‘If we had two rooms I’d probably creep into yours. I’m not a virgin, Ed.’

He squeezes my hand. ‘That’s not the only consideration.’

‘What is then?’

‘You’re nineteen. I’m twenty-nine. Some might say I’m too old for you. Your parents, for one.’

I roll my eyes. ‘Let’s leave them out of it. My parents have nothing to do with this. I know my own mind.’

Ed stares at me gravely for several seconds. I think then that he will tell me about the divorce, and the ‘somewhere’ child, and that maybe he isn’t ready yet for another relationship. Stuff like that. But instead he pulls me to him, and kisses me sweetly. Then he tells me, straight out, that he doesn’t have any condoms. I find this reassuring in one sense – that he really hasn’t planned this – although worrying in another. AIDS is in the news constantly these days. Don’t take the risk, they say, be safe not sorry. I could though, take a chance …

‘I am on the Pill,’ I tell him, ‘but…’

‘I’ve not been with anyone,’ he says, ‘since I split with my wife, a few months ago.’ There, I’ve told you, now, his eyes are saying.

I give a tiny nod, and begin undoing the top button on my blouse. He takes off his belt, and unzips his fly. Slowly we undress, our mouths glued together, excitement building, then we fall onto the bed, its shiny satin cover momentarily cool on my bare flesh. Ed reaches down to caress me, gently at first and then more insistent, until I can hardly bear it. When he enters me his eyes are on mine, intent on each small movement; we are drinking each other in, that’s how it seems, the storm outside forgotten.

When we’re done Ed collapses slowly onto me, covering my face and neck with small, soft kisses, before rolling down onto the bed. He lies close to me, looping one arm over my stomach.

‘Eva.’ He says my name as if he’s just learning it, and looks up into my eyes; his own are flecked with gold in the lamplight. ‘You were lovely.’

I smile at him, a big, wide smile, my whole body still humming. ‘You too.’ Privately I’m saying thanks to the storm that stranded us here, that’s still howling outside.

Soon we make love again, this time a much longer affair, until finally we lie back, exhausted. Despite that, it seems impossible that I will sleep, what with the wind screaming like a banshee, and exhilaration pounding in my head.

But I do. A deep, dreamless sleep.

Kathleen

1964

We went on like that for weeks, me and Rick. I never knew when the next date would be. I tried so hard to be the sort of person I thought he would like, although the gaps in my knowledge were sometimes excruciating, like when he asked if I liked avocado, and I said what you mean the colour, and he said no, the pear. I looked at him gone out and he just shook with laughter. Then there was the time he said he’d got two tickets for the Rep to see a production of Look Back in Anger. He said something about the playwright being an angry young man and I said, how do you know? This time he shook his head in mock disbelief. ‘Don’t you know anything?’ he asked. I was so hurt I stalked off down the corridor. Much to my relief he called me back, said sorry, and promised I’d like the play. The only thing I was ever sure of was that Rick fancied me like mad. The second time we went out, he pulled me into a shop doorway on the way home, and we had a long, hot kissing session. By the time we’d finished my neck was aching from being pressed up against the corner of the doorway, but it was something I was prepared to put up with for the lovely, warm ache between my thighs. Rick didn’t touch me there, not that night, but I thought that I’d like it if he did; all my fears about ‘doing it’ with a boy were dissolving. Of course, I’m not going to go that far, I said to myself, but I was relieved to find I might want to. After that we always found a dark corner somewhere on the way home. I could see now that Rick had a winning combination. He’d keep me in suspense for days, not knowing when we might go out again, and then get me all worked up in the quiet dark of the doorway. I still thought of myself as a ‘nice girl’, but I let Rick’s hands rove until I was squirming and ready to explode, sighing when he stopped. He would laugh then, and give me a small, soft kiss. He knew what he was doing.

One night, when I was getting really steamed up, and I could feel him hard against me, he nibbled my ear and said, ‘We can’t go on like this, can we?’

‘What do you mean?’ I said.

His hand was up my skirt, fingers slipping inside my knickers. ‘You know what I mean.’

I saw my chance, and moved his hand away. ‘Not while it’s like this,’ I said. ‘Not when no one even knows we go out together.’ Rick had only been to my house once, calling for me one night when I’d insisted that my parents wanted to meet him, and getting away as quickly as possible before they had a chance to ask anything much. I’d never been to his. ‘Anyone would think you were ashamed of me.’

In the dark I sensed him thinking, weighing up what I’d said. I started to panic then, that he’d just turn and walk. But at last he said,

‘We’ll put that right then, shall we? Why don’t you come round on Saturday, meet my folks?’

‘Are you serious?’ I said.

‘Of course. Come for tea. Six o’clock all right?’

I just nodded, sure that if I spoke it would come out as a squeak. He told me the address and what bus to get. We fixed a time, then he gave me a long, hard kiss.

‘See you Saturday,’ he grinned, as he left.

Well, I walked home on air.

I got myself ready so carefully that day. Hair, make-up, new dress that I’d just hemmed up the day before, ladder-less stockings… all perfect. The last thing was to dab on some cologne, and then I ran downstairs, flung a cardigan round my shoulders, and shouted goodbye as I rushed off.

‘Make sure he walks you to the bus stop, later,’ my mother called, before I slammed the door. ‘And mind your Ps and Qs.’ She hadn’t said that to me since I was about twelve, but she knew where Rick lived, she’d got the measure of his family.

It was April, a mild, breezy sort of day. I caught the number twenty-one bus from the bottom of my road, and I sat up on the top deck, feeling slightly queasy. I was so nervous, it wasn’t like butterflies in my stomach, more like a bag of cats, all squirming around. I kept finding myself sucking in air and then having to let it out in a long, slow breath. I needed this evening to go right; I needed to not show myself up in front of his parents, not to say the wrong thing or show my ignorance. By now I had an image in my head of two rather grand people who lived in style, who bought brand-new cars and ate out at the drop of a hat. I was petrified of being somehow less than what was required.

‘Don’t be silly,’ I told myself. ‘He wouldn’t have asked you if he thought you’d let him down.’

Rick met me off the bus, as planned.

‘You look nice,’ he said, and put his arm around my waist. I thought then I was going to die and go to Heaven, walking along with my boyfriend, on my way to meet his parents. This was surely going to be the seal on our relationship.

We turned a corner onto Highbury Avenue, where every house was different – mock-tudor, red-brick, whitewashed, pebble-dashed – each one about three times the size of mine, and all of them nestling in their own grounds. It was so quiet; there was just the sound of a wood-pigeon cooing above us in one of the large conifers that stretched up to the sky everywhere you looked. I thought of Rick in our dolls-house terrace, with its handkerchief of grass at the front.

‘Here we are.’

He stopped, pointed. At the end of the drive stood a large house with latticed windows and gable ends, looking like something out of a movie – a Hollywood version of England. The sun reflected off the windows as we walked towards it, and gravel crunched beneath our feet. Rick unlocked the door and held it open.

‘Come on then, come in.’

The entrance hall was about as big as our front room. I stepped inside, onto polished floorboards and soft rugs. Rick took me into what he called the sitting room, a wood-panelled room with two sofas and a creamy, deep-pile carpet. It looked out over a garden whose end was hidden, but obviously some way off. By this point, before I’d even seen the leather three-piece suite in the lounge, the modern fitted kitchen, and the downstairs toilet with its quiet flush, I had gone very quiet. All my preparations for this evening seemed totally inadequate, because now I knew I couldn’t possibly live up to anyone who lived here.

Of course up to then I’d never been in such a spacious house, and maybe it wasn’t quite as large as I’m painting it. And the difference between us, me and Rick, I know now it wasn’t such a gulf as it seemed. But back then… I stood at that window in a state of awe.

‘Are you all right?’ Rick asked. ‘You’ve gone quiet. Do you want a drink?’

He walked over to a corner cabinet and began pulling bottles out. ‘Sherry? Vermouth? Whisky? What do you fancy?’

It wasn’t just me that was quiet. The house was too. It breathed silence.

‘Where is everyone?’

‘Oh, I forgot to tell you. My parents have gone to a charity ball. I’d forgotten when I asked you over. Sorry, but you won’t get to meet them tonight, they’ll be back late. You’ll have to come another time.’

My insides unknotted, very slightly. At least I wouldn’t have to make polite conversation now, and I wasn’t going to be judged today. ‘So there’s no one around?’

I knew his older brother was in the army, on a commission.

‘Nope. We can have a quiet evening in. And a bit of privacy.’

So now I knew. I wasn’t that gullible.

I sipped my drink, a Dry Martini, while Rick selected records to put on his parents big old gramophone, which looked like a sideboard till you opened the lid. He kept changing them, playing just one song from each and then moving on to something else. He kept that up until there was a pile of records on the floor, all out of their sleeves. ‘You’ll like this one,’ he’d say, each time. There were a few I’d heard – Connie Francis, the Springfields, Dean Martin – but now and then he’d lob a little jazzy number on. I didn’t really appreciate those. It wasn’t jazz like Acker Bilk who you saw on telly; they were names I’d never heard of and I couldn’t pick out the melody in half of them. I didn’t say I didn’t like them, but I think he could tell. By now I was sure I was flushed from the refills he poured every time my glass was empty. I hadn’t eaten, and the alcohol was rushing through my veins and invading my head, making me feel as though I was moving and talking faster than usual. Eventually I plucked up the courage to say,

‘Who’s going to cook us some tea then, if your mum’s out?’

‘Me,’ he said. ‘What would madam like?’

I giggled. ‘What have you got?’

We went into the kitchen and searched through the cupboards, ending up with a tin of meatballs and a pack of spaghetti. This, spaghetti, was something I had just persuaded my mother to buy, to vary our diet of meat and two veg, so I was pleased to be able to impress Rick in knowing how to cook it. The only problem was it was very messy to eat, so while Rick twirled it in a spoon with some success I chose to cut it up into small strands, and eat it that way. Rick laughed at me, but I didn’t mind. I was feeling far more sure of myself than usual, after all the Martinis and the bottle of red wine that he’d fished out of the pantry. The awe I’d felt earlier was shrinking by the glassful.

After we’d eaten Rick gave me a tour of the house, which was all as lovely as downstairs. When we got to his bedroom he pushed the door open, and I saw a very plain room, with regency-striped walls and a narrow, single bed, covered with a candlewick spread. There was a record player on the floor, and more LPs.

‘You like your music,’ I said.

‘Yeah. I’d like to have been a singer.’

‘Never too late,’ I said, and he started crooning loudly – ‘Who’s Sorry Now?’, or something like that. I pulled a face and put my hands over my ears.

‘Okay, okay, now I see why you aren’t,’ I laughed, and he suddenly stopped, put his arms round my waist and drew me to him. His face went all serious, and as I stared into his gold-brown eyes my whole body tensed. I waited.

‘You are gorgeous, do you know that?’

He kissed me, and it was different to before. Or maybe it just felt that way because I knew what was coming next. He didn’t waste time, undoing the zip on the back of my dress and unhooking my bra, then caressing my breasts and guiding my hands to his fly. Excitement caught in my throat.

‘Come on,’ he said. He pulled my dress right down, so that I stood there in my slip, then I stepped out of the dress and we tottered towards the bed. We more or less fell onto it, but as he began to run his hand up my leg I suddenly felt a little bit of panic. I wanted this to happen more than anything, I wanted him more than anything, and in my drunken state it seemed as though it would be a proof of his feelings for me. But all of that was pitted against my upbringing and the sort of talk I heard at work when the men had forgotten you were there – about girls who were ‘slags’, who ‘gave it out’.

‘Rick… wait.’ I put my hand on his.

He groaned. ‘What?’

‘You will still… I mean you don’t think I’m…’

He kissed my neck and his hand continued upwards.

‘I don’t think anything. I can’t think. You’re driving me mad, girl.’

‘But what about –’

‘I’ll be careful,’ he said, as his hand found its target. ‘Don’t worry.’

And I was lost.

It seems crazy now, from a distance of thirty years, to think that I would trust him. His parents were never there – he only asked me round when they were guaranteed to be out, with mine fondly believing I was having a nice family tea. Each time, we drank too much and played his records and then went up to his bedroom. We did use contraception. Mostly. Apart from that first time. And the day he didn’t have any. And then again when he said, please let me, it’s better without, I’ll pull out in time.

Nothing changed otherwise. I was still left wondering when we’d see each other again, and more and more it was just to go to his house for sex. At work he never openly acknowledged that I was his girlfriend.

Call me stupid. I have.