A Bicycle Built for Sue

by Daisy Tate

  Today, of course, the move had an added bite.

  Today, Kevin’s nettly behaviour wasn’t about outranking Good Morning Britain or BBC Breakfast. It was about sticking one to Kath.

  Hell had no fury like Kevin scorned.

  She’d not warned him that her JustGiving page had cracked forty-five grand. He’d held the record on fundraising with the ice bucket challenge he’d done out on the Birmingham City pitch, but … for heaven’s sake! This wasn’t about him. It wasn’t about his ego, or his pride or the fact she’d finally pushed back and said no to his completely unreasonable request that she get plastic surgery. It was about her brother and the legacy she was trying to build for him. A man who’d devoted himself to a career in the military only to come back like a jigsaw puzzle missing a few crucial pieces, as if he’d literally lost bits of himself on each of his tours.

  Why did everything with Kev have to be so damn competitive? When had they stopped being a team?

  She watched as he truncated the autocue script teasing a feature on last-minute holiday insurance and bled it into what he liked to call ‘a splash of extemporaneous chat.’

  ‘Speaking of holiday insurance … I don’t know how many of you are lucky enough to have a wife willing to send you off on safari with the lads—’ Kev stopped, gave his head a little shake as if something brand new had just occurred to him and gave her a sidelong look. ‘Unless this is all some clever plan to get rid of me?’ He twisted round on the sofa and gave Kath one of those sly dog smiles of his. ‘Is that it, petal? Hoping the lions pounce at night? I’d like to see ’em make a meal out of this!’ He feigned a little Arnold Schwarzenegger muscle pose, squawked out his rendition of the opening notes of The Lion King then clapped his hands together between his knees and launched into ‘a surprise announcement.’ Kev, it appeared, had managed to bewitch Team GB’s women’s beach volleyball team to come along with him. All in a lead-up to the Commonwealth Games. Of course.

  Sly bastard. She hadn’t seen that coming. Cute, though, that he thought he could make her jealous.

  ‘How ‘bout that then for a treat, eh viewers? A bit of ba-da-bing, ba-da-BOOM!’ He mimed hitting a volleyball. ‘A perfect anecdote to the winter blues. Seeing our girls representing England enjoying some off-site ‘spring training.’

  He loved using air quotes, her Kev. Never in the right spot, mind, but inaccuracy had never been a huge deterrent to throwing them out there.

  It’s coming up to ‘half term.’

  There was no other name for it. The break in the academic year was actually called half term.

  Do what you can to join me on the beach in Cape Town as I give the girls a run for their money during ‘training.’

  That’s actually what it was, Kev. Training.

  Our Kath’s turning ‘fifty-three’ this year!

  She wasn’t, but that’s what they’d told everyone, so, perhaps in that case the air quotes had been merited, if not a bit of a giveaway.

  He finally met her eyes, no doubt to see if his little surprise had had the desired effect.

  ‘I have no doubt you’ll give them a run for their money, love,’ she cooed. ‘Ladies, be warned: the legs on this man! Pure muscle.’ She leant in to give him a kiss on the cheek, careful not to let his make-up smudge hers.

  Bless. He thought the idea of him surrounded by twelve fit young women would drive her spare. It would never once have occurred to him that, at fifty-three, he’d be just another leering man trying to score some cheap jokes at the expense of their hard work and athleticism. Not much of a feminist, her Kev.

  Kath smiled warmly as she read out the teaser for the next piece – a ninety-second taped bit on a therapy dog who had saved a woman from cracking her head open when she had an epileptic fit in the middle of a busy Sainbury’s. The dog would be coming into the studio next week. The woman, she’d just been told, proved too much of a health and safety risk.

  As the piece began to play, and the camera lights turned from red to black, she tilted her head up to Bridie (just smoothing out the edges, Kath) as Kev had his forehead dabbed by Dee (his latest make-up girl). Kath silently wondered how many of their viewers had noticed the chill that had crisped up their exchanges ever since she’d announced she was going on the LifeTime cycle ride whilst Kev headed off to South Africa.

  ‘Alright you two?’ Stacy asked the pair of them through their earpieces. Her bright tone suggested she knew precisely what was going on. Stacy noticed everything.

  ‘Great,’ Kath gave the thumbs up.

  ‘Never better,’ Kev said, giving his hands a brisk rub.

  Dave signaled them in from the epilepsy dog segment and the light on camera three lit up red. Kath swiveled to the right and looked down the lens. ‘That’s about all we have time for, folks. Once again I’d like to thank everyone who has donated to LifeTime already and would invite you all to join me on my new Instagram account … details below, if you want to get any snaps of my training sessions.’ She pointed her fingers downwards knowing their producer would pop the details up on the screen as she recited them from memory. She threw Kev a cheeky smile. ‘Kev’s already seen a few pictures of me trying to get fit for the ride. I’m sure it’s nothing compared to what’ll be coming your way from Cape Town, but with a few more of my PT sessions whipping me into shape, perhaps one day I’ll be able to take on the Men’s Volleyball Team!’

  ‘That’s right, Kath,’ Kev pulled her in for a strangely painful half hug. ‘A girl can dream.’

  Two hours later, Kath was still steaming. Normally her workouts deflated her increasingly frequent spikes of ‘emotional turbulence’. The menopause expert Kev had insisted she visit never called anything by its actual name opting, instead, to give each distressing, awkward and increasingly difficult ‘phase’ she was going through a pastel-coloured hue. Sometimes she wished the woman would come out with it and call a spade a spade. She wasn’t going through emotional turbulence. She was having a marital crisis and a hormone overhaul.

  Kath swung the kettle bell one final time then released it with a light ‘whooof!’

  ‘That was brilliant, Katherine.’

  As she met Fola’s eyes for the first time in the hour-long session, the prickly remains of her anger left her. She loved his voice. The way he said her full name, his voice rounding over the vowels as if they were each a piece of precious, perfectly ripe fruit. Better than Kev’s Liverpudlian accent anyway, or her own, media-softened Newcastle twang.

  She put the kettle bell on the rack, watching him in the mirror as he tidied up after one of the other trainers who always left sweat soaked mats and weights lying around after his sessions. That trainer had a book and YouTube following. Seized by an urgent need to know whether what she was feeling was real or not, she whirled round and asked, ‘How do you fancy coming along on a bike ride as a support rider and physio? It’s for charity.’

  Chapter Twenty

  ‘Hey roomie!’ Raven dropped her two large duffel bags with an involuntary grunt and gave Sue an uncomfortable wave. There was a blossoming of droplets along her ebony hairline that Sue was fairly certain had come from exertion rather than the rain she’d just scuttled through to get into the large foyer of the call centre. Raven huffed out a couple of steadying breaths then grinned, ‘Ready for our first sleep over? I’ve brought my own pillow.’ She threw her thumbs up, but, Sue noticed, there was a slight tremor to her smile.

  Sue’s eyes dropped to the large, drenched duffel bags then back to Raven. ‘Ummm …’

  Raven’s casually ironic air evaporated, revealing a deep, permeating aura of anxiety. Make-up aside, it felt like looking in the mirror.

  ‘You said today was cool, right?’

  ‘Today?’ Sue repeated, her eyes doing a strange blinky thing as her mind fuzzed with the increasingly familiar static. She knew this was going to happen. She’d agreed to it. Not less than twelve or so hours earlier. So, why was she acting as if it had come out of the blue?

  Ra
ven’s smile faltered, then quickly, as if an idea had struck, she dug into her shoulder bag. The retro flight bag reminded Sue of a bag her mother had once had from British Airways. When she threw it out a few years back she’d told Sue she’d brought it on their honeymoon even though they’d taken the ferry and not the plane (too expensive) across to Ireland where they’d spent three damp days in Waterford trying not to break any crystal, before getting back onto the ferry whereupon she’d become terrifically seasick (she’d discovered she was pregnant with Dean shortly thereafter) and vowed never to travel by sea again. The day after they’d returned, her mother took a job as a checkout clerk at Asda (which she still had) and her father went back to his job at the council (which he still had) and they’d not travelled by anything but car or train since, bar Bev’s trip to Orlando which, according to Bev, didn’t count as Katie and Dean had paid for it. She’d thrown out the bag without so much as a second glance. Her fault, her mother said, for mistaking a man with a reliable job for one with ambition.

  ‘What’s this for?’ Sue stared at the bills Raven had just pressed into her hand.

  ‘Rent,’ Raven clarified, as if she were regularly in the habit of plunging into her bag and handing people money. ‘It’s still alright to move in today, right?’

  ‘Yes, of course.’ Sue over-egged her smile. It was something her mother always chided her for. Appearing to be delighted when she was, in actual fact, completely mortified. Ironic, considering her mother was the most frequent recipient of the smile. Well. Maybe it was a tie with Katie. ‘It’s wonderful. Perfect. Moving in today is exactly what I was hoping for.’

  ‘Phew,’ Raven feigned swiping the sweat off of her brow, leaving a few crinkles of concern behind.

  Sugar.

  For some reason, Sue hadn’t foreseen this. Raven actually moving in.

  ‘Alright there, girls?’ The jolly chap who did ‘security’ (read: sat at the front desk, drank coffee and cadged any and all cake/biscuits that came in) bustled in out of the rain, took one look at the large duffel bags pretty much blocking the reception area and reached for them. ‘Anywhere I can help move these big boys?’ He gave them one of those knowing winks. ‘Health and safety, girls. I would’ve thought you 111’ers would know all about that.’ He pointedly placed a bright yellow Caution triangle in the centre of the entryway as if the two of them were the hazard that needed to be circumnavigated.

  Sugar, crumbs and duck bums as Gaz would say.

  There was no chance she’d be able to whizz home and make it seem as if she’d spent even a minute whirling round the house like Kirsty Allsop, zhushing this and fluffing that, quirking a throw pillow into a jaunty angle on top of an artfully arranged (but seemingly casual) collection of other throw pillows all in anticipation of Raven’s arrival. She’d not ironed any sheets. Bought a small bouquet of seasonal flowers. Made a warming pot of stew or even a Victoria sponge. She’d done absolutely nothing to prepare for a visitor, let alone a housemate. She hadn’t expected anyone to actually want to move in. Putting up the notice had felt more of a symbolic move. A sign that, despite every outward appearance that she was ignoring the fact her life had changed irrevocably, she was trying to move forward. And pay the mortgage.

  ‘You said it was alright—’ Raven’s voice was edged with the same panic Sue’s was.

  ‘Yes, I—of course it’s alright.’ Sue reached out to give her a reassuring pat at exactly the moment Raven crisscrossed her arms over her chest, her hands overlapping at her throat where … was that a skull pendant she wearing?

  The entryway was getting busier. A steady stream of people shaking the sleety rain off of their coats, following Colin’s instructions (the security man had put his badge on now) about where to leave their sodden brollies. People going through their daily routine without so much as a thought that one day, it might all change forever.

  What had she been thinking? Asking someone to move in.

  Her stomach churned as she tried to imbue herself with the power to explain this had all been a horrible mistake.

  She didn’t have room in her house.

  She didn’t need a flatmate.

  She just wanted to be able to pay her mortgage, was all.

  ‘Sue? I’m not really getting the vibe that you want me to move in.’

  Sue goldfished for a moment, lightheaded with indecision. This was worse than the time she’d smoked one of Katie’s menthol cigarettes, only to throw up all over Katie, and that had been pretty bad. Worse, even, than the time she and Gary had gone to Portugal with the lads and their wives and she’d been the only one gullible enough to be tricked into eating snails. She should’ve known they weren’t cockles, but she hadn’t grown up by the sea, had she? Or the time she’d worn her swimsuit inside out. Those times had, of course, eventually become funny. Gaz had a knack for it. Getting her to laugh at moments that had filled her with mortification. It was one of the reasons she’d been attracted to him. Watching him josh around with his friends in the school corridors. Propping up the side of the newsagent’s with his foot and his back as he and his mates cracked one another up. He’d leap up from his post to open the door for the old women or mums with children. She’d liked that, too. He’d been a teen, and then a man, completely at ease with himself. Or so she’d thought.

  Last night, just as she’d done every night since the funeral, she’d walked up the stairs, stood outside Gary’s office, fully intending to go inside and make up the small twin bed for Raven. Instead, she put her hand up, watched her trembling fingers bounce and jig closer and closer to the door handle.

  Shellshock, her mother had said over and over in a stage whisper when she’d stayed with them in the weeks leading up to the funeral. P-T-S-DEE. That’s what they call it now. Her mother loved a good armchair diagnosis. Particularly when it was a psychological trauma. She was always calling out to the police detectives on the crime shows she devoured, ‘It’ll be a mother issue with that lad. Can’t let go of the apron strings.’ Or, ‘Most likely scarred by a kiddy fiddler, she was. Or, ‘Parents must’ve let her run circles round them as a child. Never knew boundaries.’

  The only boundary Sue had ever crossed was marrying Gary. Her mother had disapproved. Her father, who had never seen anything wrong with marrying a tradesman – particularly one who had his own father’s business to build upon and expand as Gary did – had never openly objected; but her mother had never missed an opportunity. He’ll always smell of someone else’s ‘business’, Suey. You’ll be washing filthy coveralls until the day you die. Or, Sue’s favourite, At least he’ll know whose shit smells of roses.

  It had never once occurred to Sue that she might be right. A raw, painful ache twisted the oxygen out of her lungs. Her mother wasn’t right. She didn’t know the whole story. No one did. Not even her.

  Which was why, instead of cleaning out Gary’s office and preparing for the flatmate she knew would be coming, she’d stared and stared at the handle to his office willing herself to take hold of it and twist until, eventually, shaking from the exhaustion of her already overstretched imagination, she took the few short steps to her own room, laid down on the bed and fallen into a deep, dreamless sleep.

  This morning when she’d woken up she’d gone through the motions. Alarm off, make the bed, shower, dress, blow dry her hair, then down to the kitchen for a cup of tea. The routine was built into her like breathing. It just happened. It had felt like any other day apart from the fact her husband was still dead, the joint bank account was still mysteriously empty and she had a housemate she’d never properly met moving in without knowing which way she took her tea.

  But the mortgage was due shortly and she wouldn’t ask her parents for help (or Katie and Dean for that matter). Not after the fiasco with the refused debit cards and the crematorium. She knew her father wouldn’t press for the money, but she also knew (because he’d told her) that the money had been earmarked for taking her mother on a forty-fifth wedding anniversary cruise round the Medit
erranean this November coming in lieu of a sapphire which she would, by her own admission, inevitably lose. He’d need to be putting a deposit down sharpish if it was anything like the cruise Katie and Dean had taken the children on last year. Booked in a matter of minutes. The entire ship. Some five thousand passengers – snap! – planning their holidays months in advance, completely secure in the knowledge that their loved ones would be there.

  Forty-five years. Imagine.

  Sue would never have a forty-fifth wedding anniversary. Not with Gary anyway. Marrying someone else and constructing an entire, brand-new life seemed completely inconceivable. Particularly if a forty-fifth wedding anniversary was the aim. At her age … well. Forty-two wasn’t that old, but to court, get engaged, marry and live another forty-five years? Right now, getting through the day felt like a triumph.

  She wondered if that was how Gary had felt. Exhausted. Too worn out from it all to wait and see if a bit of toad-in-the-hole might perk him up. The community support officer who’d called in to her parents a couple of times said sometimes, when a person had made the decision to kill themselves, they waited until they believed their loved one was happy. She’d been watching Neighbours, which made her happy. Singing along with the theme song, which made her happy. Making her husband his favourite dish. Or maybe least-favourite dish. She’d asked his pillow at least a thousand times which it was and it never answered back. Not when she asked it nicely, cried into it or even the time she punched it. It awed her … the scope of things she didn’t know. Wouldn’t know unless, of course, she went into his office and went hunting for clues.

  ‘Can I, ummm …’ Raven looked over her shoulder as an ever-increasing stream of employees lumbered in, shoulders hunkered down as if the winter weather bore actual heft. ‘Is there any chance I could cadge a lift to yours after? You have a car, right?’

  ‘Yes, I—’ She did have a car. A tidy little red two-door sports Ka that Gaz playfully called the basic model runaround. It was full of clothes she’d cleared out of their once over-full wardrobe the day after the funeral. Her one burst of activity. In early January, she’d unsuccessfully tried to get Gary to downsize his Marvel t-shirt collection so, the day after she’d watched her husband’s casket disappear behind a red curtain, she’d weeded out clothes she was unlikely to wear instead.