Tara

by Lesley Pearse

  'I want to go home tomorrow,' she said.

  Even as she said it she knew it was a bad idea to lie. He owed her umpteen days off anyway. But once it was out she made it worse by saying her gran was ill.

  'Oh, dear.' His big dark eyes softened with concern because he liked Mabel. 'Nothing serious, I hope?'

  'It's hard to say with Gran.' Tara was deliberately vague. 'Sometimes she makes a big fuss about nothing, other times she says nothing. But Mum thinks I ought to go.'

  'Well, one day won't be much good,' he frowned, for once thinking only of the distance and how tired Tara looked. Take a couple and don't worry about work, there's no rush for anything here.'

  He suggested she went that night, and once again she had to lie and claim Greg couldn't pick her up at Bristol and there would be no buses.

  Josh fanned himself with his hand. 'Well, let's just go over the road now and have a couple of drinks, they've got air-conditioning and you could do with a break. Besides, there's something I want to discuss with you.'

  She could see his pupils were tiny; there was no doubt his intake of speed was getting bigger every day.

  'Just a couple then.' She smiled wearily at him. 'I'll just go and wash my hands. Won't be a minute.'

  The pizza place he took her to hadn't been open long and, aside from being deliciously cool, it was quiet and pretty. They sat at a table by the window looking on to Kensington High Street and Josh ordered a bottle of sparkling white wine and two pizzas.

  She felt better already, with her hair brushed and the damp cheesecloth replaced by a green and white spotted mini dress. The prospect of a day at the seaside was exciting, and maybe she could even catch the last train home to Bristol afterwards to make up for telling Josh lies. Throngs of people were out in the street, most of them tourists. Tara noticed Josh's eyes were glued to Biba, as if begrudging each customer who went through the door.

  'You don't have to worry about them,' she said gently. "There's room for all of us.'

  'I heard they're buying Deny & Tom's.' He frowned.

  Tara had heard the rumour that they were planning to take over the huge department store, too.

  'If they do it'll be their funeral. It's too big, they'll never make a go of it. Don't worry so much about competition, Josh, we can learn by their mistakes. Anyway, what did you want to talk about?'

  Josh launched into his idea of producing a range of clothes with his label to be sold in department stores, as Mary Quant had done. Unlike most of his ideas to expand, this one sounded sensible because it involved no real outlay. He told her he'd recently bought the freehold of a warehouse in Fulham and explained that not only could he move all the stock stored at Church Street there, but run the wholesale business from it.

  'But would I be designing for this?' She was excited by the idea, as department stores would want better quality clothes than they churned out for the shops.

  'Of course. Who else? But I thought I'd get another machinist in to help you.' He flicked his long hair back from his face, and smiled warmly. 'I know you're doing too much, sometimes I worry that you'll leave me.'

  She saw a softness in his soft eyes that she hadn't seen since Christmas.

  'I'm not going anywhere,' she reassured him, filling up their glasses. 'But I do need help, Josh. I can't go on much longer the way I have been doing. I never get any time to myself, any fun.'

  'If I get someone experienced who could take over, does that mean you'd spend some time with me?' His voice was soft and sweet, but she heard the blackmail behind it and a dormant feeling of resentment was prodded into flames.

  'Do you ever think of anyone but yourself?' she snapped. 'I'm run ragged, at the beck and call of everyone. What on earth do you want to spend time with me for anyway, haven't you got enough girlfriends?'

  'Shush.' He grinned as two women turned round to look. 'You know I've only ever wanted you.'

  'You want me in your pocket more like,' she hissed, pushing her half-eaten pizza away in disgust. 'You think buying me this and a bottle of wine should be enough to keep me sweet for another few weeks while you pile work on to me.'

  'That's not it at all.' He caught hold of her hand and squeezed it. 'I want to share everything with you. I want you to be the one beside me.'

  Anger subsided, all she felt now was weariness.

  'Josh, it wouldn't work.' She sighed. 'Apart from fashion we've got nothing in common. You live in a glitzy world of parties, drug-taking and fast cars. That isn't my way.'

  'And you think you're great because you live like a nun,' he said sarcastically. 'Does it make you feel superior, sitting up all alone in your room while the rest of the world is having a good time?'

  She knew then he'd been keeping tabs on her. Once he would've suspected another man, but he knew her private life was barren because he'd been prying.

  'Stick your sodding pizza!' She stood up quickly. 'I'll put up with overwork, but I won't stand for anyone poking their nose into my private life.'

  As she ran to the door, Josh followed her, throwing a note down on to the table as he went. He caught her at the traffic lights outside Barker's department store, and grabbed her arm.

  'Calm down,' he said. 'I only know you're alone all the time because the girls in the shop tell me. I know you like me deep down, and I don't understand why you fight it.'

  Jimi Hendrix's 'Hey Joe' was blasting out from Kensington market just along the road. A gang of young lads all with shoulder-length hair, wearing nothing but love beads and ragged jeans, were lounging on the pavement listening to the music. Three girls in tie-dyed T-shirts and minuscule denim skirts on the other side of the street were about to dart through the traffic to meet them. Their long sun-tanned legs and obvious freedom snapped something inside her.

  'Has it ever occurred to you that trust might come into it?' She wanted to slap his smug face. 'Yes, I fancied you, but then I found out you sacked Angie because of me. I didn't like that, Josh, and it made me cautious. Since then you've done nothing to prove you can be trusted about anything. You get that photographer to follow me. You fuck girls in changing rooms, you take drugs until your eyes are like bloody great marbles, and yet you still think I should be there for you.'

  'Well, I'm sorry. I didn't know I was supposed to go into sackcloth and ashes when you turned me down at Christmas. But then you are secretive about everything.'

  'I'm not!' she retorted.

  'Oh, yes you are. Half your life is covered in dust-sheets. You didn't tell me what happened to your brother. Or what made you come to London in the first place. All the time on the farm I kept picking up hints of other things you hadn't told me. If you were to open up to me we might find we had a lot more in common than just fashion.'

  Tara dropped her eyes. 'Like I said, it's all about trust,' she whispered. 'Aside from Uncle George I've never met one man I could trust. You can't give that to people, Josh, they have to earn it.'

  'Can't we start again?' He took her hand and lifted her fingers to his lips. 'You're so beautiful, Tara, and I love you.'

  His lips felt beautiful against her fingers, his eyes deep pools of tenderness. She wanted to believe in him, to share her secrets and learn his, but first she needed evidence that he was sincere.

  'Find me some help,' she said softly. 'Stop taking drugs and slow down. Then maybe.'

  Chapter 24

  Tara saw Harry through the railings as she came up the steps from Bethnal Green Tube. He was leaning against the bonnet of a grey Consul at the end of Paradise Row. Even across the street, a distance of perhaps forty yards, he looked different. Not just his hair, though it was a surprise to see it touching his collar, but something else she couldn't quite put her finger on.

  He straightened up as he saw her and ran to meet her, jumping effortlessly over a small hedge on the strip of green between Paradise Row and Cambridge Heath Road.

  The sun was already hot and temperatures were forecast to sweep up into the high eighties by midday.

&nb
sp; 'Morning, sweetheart.' Harry flung his arms round her and spun her round as she reached the pavement. 'You're looking gorgeous!'

  'More accident than intent this early in the morning,' she said breathlessly. His short-sleeved white shirt smelled of Persil and his freshly shaven face faintly of Old Spice, just as it had when she was a child.

  In fact she had been up since before five, worrying because she'd lied to Josh about going home, because she was excited at seeing Harry and because she didn't know what to wear. It was going to be hot, so she wanted something cool. On the other hand he might want to take her somewhere in the evening and she couldn't change. She wanted to look casual, yet sexy at the same time.

  Finally she settled for a simple little turquoise mini dress with shoestring straps. It didn't crush easily, it had a little jacket she could roll up and stuff into her bag with her bikini and towel, and the colour looked wonderful against her hair!

  Despite the early start Bethnal Green was busy, traffic swarming every which way across the crossroads.

  'What do you think of my new motor?' Harry opened the door of the Consul. He had bought many cars over the years, but this one seemed a bit staid for him.

  "Thinking of taking up mini-cabbing?' she teased.

  'It goes.' He grinned. 'Besides, it was cheap!'

  'I thought you said only poofters wore their hair long?' She reached over to ruffle it as he started up the engine. It wasn't long by Chelsea standards, merely touching his shoulders, and it had been styled properly, not just left to grow anyhow. But East End men had remained rigidly smart, suited and booted regardless of what was happening elsewhere.

  'Short hair reminds me of prison.' He smiled round at her as he pulled out of Paradise Row. 'Just call it an upgrade of image!'

  'There's something different about you,' she said reflectively. 'Have you put on weight or something?'

  'A bit, what I lost while I was inside,' he said. 'I think what you mean is what Queenie calls my "working lad" face. I eat the right food. I work hard and I'm too tired to go out boozing. What you see is Mr Health and Vitality!'

  'It looks good.' Just looking at his hard thighs encased in blue denim made her feel strangely aroused. 'What about ladies?'

  He didn't reply immediately, just looked sideways at her with that delicious smirk which made his lips curl.

  'I've been saving myself,' he said eventually, reaching over and taking her hand. 'Saving my money, my body, my brain. I've worked a sixteen-hour day ever since I got the warehouse.'

  'And it's finished now?'

  'All but odds and ends. The carpets were fitted last week, but the tables and chairs haven't all come yet. You are going to come to opening night?'

  'Of course I am.' She liked his hand in hers. It was rough from all his hard work, but it felt good all the same. 'Are you having any celebrities?'

  'Dunno now Ronnie and Reggie are banged up.'

  'You weren't going to invite them?'

  'I'd have had to if they was at liberty,' he squeezed her hand. 'But don't look so horror-struck, Tara. The Krays policed our manor, they didn't do nothing to innocent people, remember, and they never did me no harm. In a way, they've done me a favour, people will be swarming to the East End now to get a whiff of the flavour.'

  Tara gulped. It was totally in character for Harry to stick up for old pals, but it was another reminder he couldn't break free of his roots.

  'Barbara Windsor's coming.' Harry smirked wickedly. 'David Bailey the photographer, Terence Stamp and Steve Marriott from the Small Faces.'

  'They aren't! Really?' Tara's eyes widened.

  'It's handy sometimes to have connections.' He smiled at her excitement. 'I'm sending Josh an invitation, too. I hope he might bring half of Annabel's. We've got more than enough local colour, but we are short of a few nobs.'

  'I'll make sure he comes,' Tara said. 'Miranda knows umpteen debutante-type girls, do you want some of those, too?'

  'The more the merrier.' Harry put his hand back on the wheel as the traffic increased. 'But let's forget about work for today, and just enjoy ourselves.'

  Tara hadn't been to Southend since she was four or five, but the moment they got out of the car and walked across to the promenade, memories came flooding back.

  At half past nine in the morning most of the holiday-makers were still tucking into big greasy breakfasts in the hundreds of little bed and breakfasts along the front. But the man selling beach-balls and buckets and spades was festooning them round his stall. A smell of frying bacon and sausages came from another and the cockles and whelk man was ladling them out on to little glass dishes in readiness.

  'I remember it being so packed I couldn't see anything but legs,' Tara giggled. 'I remember Dad putting me up on his shoulders and telling me not to drop my cornet on his hair!'

  'Looks like that family are expecting the same.' Harry pointed out a couple of big women staking out a huge patch of beach with towels and deckchairs, while their children ran straight down to the water's edge. 'But it don't get too busy in June, not mid-week.'

  The tide was in, and a couple of men were already swimming.

  1 wouldn't go that far.' Harry slid his arm round her as they leaned against the promenade rail to watch. 'I bet it's icy, with huge great turds in it!'

  'That's horrible.' She pushed him away playfully. 'I won't even have a paddle now.'

  The sea was calm, lapping softly on the shingle and patches of sand. A dozen seagulls scavenged over a dumped takeaway meal, a couple of dogs frolicked in and out of the water chasing balls. More and more families were arriving, arms weighed down with towels and picnics. Men carried prams over the beach, women screamed at children not to go in the sea until they'd taken off their shoes.

  'I learned to swim here,' Harry admitted. 'It was just after the War and there was still barbed wire everywhere and warnings about landmines. Dad held me under the belly and suddenly I realised he'd let go and I was swimming alone.'

  'Dad swam the day we came here.' Tara had a mental picture of her father dripping wet, in woolly trunks. Paul was just a baby in a pram and they had to put it in the guard's van on the train. 'I can remember him kissing Mum while they were lying on the beach. I had one of those elasticated swimming costumes, when you came out the water you had to pull out the legs to let the water out!'

  Tara's memories of Southend were all golden ones. Maybe it was smaller and shabbier, but it was every bit as colourful, noisy and exciting. Dozens of candy-striped stalls clustered together. She could see the fair in the distance, the skeleton-like track of the Wild Mouse rising above the brightly coloured awnings of the other rides. The big wheel was still just now, but tonight it would be a blaze of bright lights and music.

  'Mum and Dad were happy the last time we came here,' she said. 'That fortune-teller over there told Mum she was going to move to the country. I can remember them talking about it. Dad even pushed Paul in the pram and we stayed until it was dark to go to the fair.'

  'Well, she did end up in the country.' Harry smiled, touching her cheek gently. 'D'you want to go in there and find out what's in store for us?'

  'She won't have got her crystal ball warmed up yet.' Tara laughed, aware he was making her heart race and tingles run down her spine. 'But I'll settle for an ice cream!'

  'I don't like these as much as wafers,' Harry licked his cornet reflectively as they sat on a bench. 'I like to squeeze them and lick all the way round, then carry on squeezing and licking till there's nothing left inside.'

  Tara giggled. It sounded very sensual and each time she looked at him, with his eyes half closed, dark eyelashes fanning his cheeks and that red pointed tongue slipping in and out, she had a strong feeling he wasn't only thinking of ice cream.

  Even the people looked the same as she remembered, as if time had stood still. The promenade was filling up now and there was no-one in sight even vaguely in touch with 1968. Enormously fat women in flowery, full-skirted dresses waddled along, with their big handbags h
anging from plump white arms that would be fiery red by the time they went home. Younger women pushed prams, many in tight skirts, their hair backcombed and sprayed stiff. Many of the men were wearing three-piece suits, despite the heat. There were old men in Panama hats and beige summer jackets and children in those same elasticated swimsuits she remembered, wearing plimsolls with the toes cut out to go in the sea.

  A child's roundabout was playing 'The teddy bears' picnic'. From a cafe across the road Elvis was belting out 'Return to Sender' and from somewhere behind them a piano was tinkling out 'If you were the only girl in the world'.

  So many smells! Hot dogs and onions, candyfloss and peppermint rock, seaweed, fish and chips, vinegar and coffee. She heard bangs from the rifle range, barkers shouting out from the hoopla stalls, waving goldfish in little plastic bags. Every seat was taken on the bingo stall, by fat ladies whose bottoms squelched over the small stools, blue-rinsed heads bent over their cards as they listened to the caller, pencils poised.

  They walked to the end of the promenade. Harry had won a hideous black gorilla on the rifle range. They'd eaten candyfloss and shrimps, then lay on the beach dozing in the sun.

  Harry stripped down to black swimming trunks; she wore a pink and white spotted bikini she'd only ever had the courage to wear sunbathing at the farm.

  The shop seemed just a distant memory. No sewing machine thundering, no thumping music from the shop below. Just hot sun searing into her skin, the sound of waves on pebbles, children's laughter, and the fairground music in the distance.

  Tara was half asleep, lying on her side, when she felt his fingers lightly caressing her back. She opened her eyes and found Harry leaning on one elbow looking down at her.

  'Bored already?' she asked.

  'It's nearly one.' He smiled, moving closer to her, maintaining the stroking on her back. 'I've just woken up and I'm starving. Shall we find a pub and get some grub?'

  He made no attempt to move and his fingers were sending ripples of pleasure up and down her spine. Lying here next to him wearing only a bikini made her feel very vulnerable, but also very aware of his masculinity.