by Katy Lilley
‘Bloody fantastic,’ Bob said as he plonked the tray down. ‘You two, not old Tony there. Bless his cottons, at least he gets up and gives it a go. Remembered the sausages for you, Mais.’
Maisie laughed and kissed him on the cheek. ‘Great, but I’m still not singing any more tonight. Busy day tomorrow.’ It was going to be bittersweet, and she wanted to at least have enough voice to say her farewells. ‘I’ll need my strength and more.’
‘Pity. But I tell you, we’ll have you both every time,’ Bob added before he headed back behind the bar. ‘You’ve made the night.’
‘I’ll have you as soon as,’ Cam said sotto voce. ‘Whenever you fancy.’
You what? Maisie rolled his words over in her mind for a nano second. Sod it, she was fed up of being boring, prim and proper and conforming to Stanley’s ideas of what was acceptable and what wasn’t. The only way she’d really defied him was in her stripy hair and multi-coloured nails. Even if she had worn a hat more often than not when they were together.
Over and done with.
I don’t need to think of him, and his no can dos anymore. It dawned on her that she was beginning to see how controlling he had been.
She glanced at Cam over the rim of her glass as she took a sip.
‘How about now?’.
His eyes widened and he grinned. A ‘here I am, take me I’m yours, where’s the nearest bed’ sort of grin.
If she could bottle that and sell it, she’d be a millionaire in days. Her head was pleasantly fuzzy, her mind clear about what she had just suggested. Her body tingled when Cam glanced at her, and she thought with reckless abandon, it sounded a bloody brilliant idea. ‘Your place or mine?’ she added, to show him she understood what she’d said.
Cam finished his beer, stood up and held his hand out. ‘Mine. I’ve got everything we might need.’ He glanced toward Bob who was watching them with interest. ‘I’ll take great care of her, promise.’
Bob nodded. ‘If I didn’t think that, you’d not have her.’
Like I’m a slab of meat. Maisie mentally rolled her eyes. Men. But then, how good to know Bob looked out for her.
Hold on. Might need? I hope he means condoms, and nothing kinky.
‘Protection,’ Cam added in a low voice only she could hear. ‘I’m a great advocate of safe sex.’
‘Thank the Lord.’
His mouth twitched. ‘You could say that. Or the local chemist. Lucky for me, they have an offer on.’ He winked. ‘BOGOF. The deal, not you.’
Maisie spluttered. ‘You don’t half have a way with words.’
‘I hope I have a way with other things as well.’
She didn’t say, ‘so do I’, but she could have done.
****
Why was the room a different colour? She didn’t know she had a brown and cream duvet cover, surely hers was lemon and lime striped? Where was the window? Was she sleeping upside down? Maisie moved her head. Nope, definitely on a pillow right way up.
Why did she feel like someone had hit her with a hammer? Why was her mouth dry? And… Why do I think I’ve been very, very stupid?
Why do I keep asking myself why? Oh, sweet Fanny Adams, I didn’t? Maisie shut her eyes and opened them again with the upmost caution.
Oh hell, I did. My God, what was I thinking? Well, obviously I wasn’t. Sheesh, shoot and any other s’s going. What on earth do I do now?
The room was shades of cream and brown, not her own, brighter, colours. Her head was thumping because she hadn’t known when the third last drink should have been the last drink and her mouth felt like the bottom of a budgie’s cage for the same reason. As for stupid?
Define stupid.
Stupid thy name is Maisie. No contest.
Maisie slowly turned her head to see another head—and body—she wasn’t in the middle of a horror film—next to her. An only recently - as in a much too recently for comfort or sense - familiar head and body.
Hot, sexy, inventive—she blushed, who knew shower sex could be so sizzling—and considerate. Who knew how many times you could come in one session? And… oh hells bells.
Stupid defined.
Shit. What a sluttish way to go on. How could I? Argh…
Not a horror film, she was too honest to say any of the previous hours had been horrible, maybe just a nightmare?
Had she been taken and someone else put in her body? How else could she account for the fact that she, Maisie Bethune MacLean had spent an amazing night with an almost total stranger? Had stupendous sex—more than once and spent the night in his bed, his shower, on his stairs. And if her memory served her right, in his arms, legs entwined.
How the hell did you go on after that? Maisie squinted at the clock and saw it was time she made a move. Last day of term loomed large, as did the need to get away and not have an embarrassing morning after the night before session. To say, I’ve never behaved like that before, was so trite and so predictable. However, in her case, also, so true.
But.
A big but. Why should he believe it? It might be the coward’s way out, but in this case, she was happy to be a coward and sneak away before her erstwhile bed companion woke up. She had no clue how to go on with a newly met lover, especially when you regretted your behaviour. It was so unlike her. She was usually of the ‘three months of knowing and then maybe’ brigade, not three hours give or take.
She edged out of the bed, searched the room to find her clothes and grinned as Cam rolled over and snored. Hopefully his snores would drown out her moving around.
One boot seemed to be missing its partner. She found it in the hall with her jacket. Her bra however was another thing. It seemed to have gone AWOL. With a mental shrug, Maisie forgot about it. It might be a favourite, but she’d rather sacrifice it than have the big, sorry got to go now, thanks for great sex, see you around, when you think that’s as likely as a snowball lasting in hell, sort of conversation.
She crept downstairs, rummaged in her handbag, found a pen and a scrap of paper and wrote a brief thank you, sorry had to go to get ready for work—she almost put school before she decided it might make him freak out about underage sex and so on—you were fast off and I couldn’t wake you, and signed it with a M.
Perhaps not a very nice thing to do, but it was done.
Maisie headed for the tube. It was going to be a long day.
Chapter Five
Going to school with a pounding headache, wasn’t the best thing to have but Maisie soldiered on. The wine induced headache was all her own fault. No one forced her to drink it, or later, to indulge in what she freely admitted was the best sex she’d had in ages. It was a wonder she wasn’t walking bow legged. She certainly had aches and pains in muscles she didn’t know she had. And she couldn’t care less.
However, it wasn’t just the last day of term, it was her last day at that school, with those colleagues, full stop, wave goodbye, unlikely to cross the threshold ever again. The staff were going to do cakes, nibbles and wine after school. She’d promised they would have a night out during the holidays but explained that she wanted to get away early the following morning. Before that, though there was the inevitable last day of term problems to get through. One of which was the usual sorting out of the lost property cupboard. How some things were never reclaimed or even missed by their owners, was a mystery she’d not ever managed to explain. However, with the exception of two odd shoes and a moth-eaten cuddly toy, Maisie got everything back to their owners and headed for wine and cakes in good humour. The following morning, she was going back to Devon with the first lot of things she could do without in Wimbledon and would need in Daps Cottage. She could see there would probably a few such journeys over the coming months.
An hour later as she opened her front door there was an ominous dripping noise. Maisie headed towards the sound and swore as she saw a large wet stain on her bathroom ceiling. It seemed a tile had worked loose, and the rain had decided it was a great thing to come inside. She found the phone nu
mber of the roofer who had redone it a year or so before, babbled gratefully when he’d said he would come the following morning, and put a basin under where she thought the worst drip was.
It didn’t make for a peaceful night.
Plus, it scuppered her plans to head back to Devon the next day with a carful of bits and bobs. What with school holidays now on and the weather set to be fine, she had no intention of going any time after 6 am, even if it was only the beginning of the great seaside or airport rush. Hours in a traffic jam was not her idea of pleasure. A day’s delay was on the cards. She’d better let Bryony know.
Bryony was upset but philosophical. ‘Better tomorrow than not at all,’ she said. ‘And I have a Daim cake ready in the freezer. Oh, and we’ve put a wee freezer in your new house as well. Just get here when you can, and we can have a nice long session of plotting.’
That was what Maisie was afraid of. She’d had a lot of Bryony’s plotting in the past and some of it was full on headache inducing. Please God, this wouldn’t be one of those sessions.
Thankful the rain had stopped, she got a reasonable night’s sleep with only a few nasty dreams about the roof caving in, and being told the house was un-saleable, unliveable in and had to be knocked down, which, in her dream for some reason the house building insurance didn’t cover and woke her up sweating. That meant she had to get up to check the leak was no worse and the basin didn’t need emptying. By the time the builder turned up just after eight, Maisie felt as if she’d run a marathon—backwards and barefoot.
Joe, the builder did a bit of tutting. 'Blimey Mais,’ he commented. They’d grown up two streets apart and went to the same schools. ‘This is a owsyerfather ain’t it? Bloody apprentice I had. He did two rows and cocked em up. You’re the fourth I’ve needed to fix. Bet you’re glad he ain’t with me now.’
‘Bet you are too,’ Maisie said as she handed him a large cup of tea strong enough to stand a spoon up in, with urgh, four sugars.
Joe guffawed. ‘You said it, doll. He’s doing the drains now and loves it. I tell yer, sometimes you’re best off alone and knowing what’s what.’ He emptied the mug in three large gulps and handed it back. ‘That hit the spot, ta. Right, I’ll get on with it. All this chatting won’t buy the baby a new bonnet.’
Maisie had forgotten his penchant for using all those sayings her mum and gran used. She washed the mugs up and started to do a bit of desultory housework to his hammering and not quite out of tune rendition of “If I had a hammer”, followed by “Our house,” and “The house that Jack built.” What would he sing when his repertoire of house related songs ran out?
Weather related ones? Maisie began to try and guess what he’d choose before he started. “It’s raining men”, of course. As well as, “Summer in the city” and then “Let it snow”. Please no, she thought; amused. Not yet anyway.
His cheerful attitude, plus his refusal to bill her, as it was his ex-apprentice’s fault, and his prompt actions meant that she was ready to head south by lunchtime. Now she had to decide if it was worth it, or whether to wait until early the next day. Which would be even busier. Maisie decided that afternoon might be the lesser of two evils. She loaded the car, locked up and shoved a note through her next-door neighbour’s letterbox, thanking her for keeping an eye on the house, and the cat. Mrs T would be at bingo with her best mate, an equally elderly gentleman called Ron. The woman was all go, and had activities planned most days of the week. However, she was a godsend, and if Maisie were honest, one reason she didn’t want to cut all her ties with her Wimbledon home. Mrs T had almost adopted her, and Maisie’s elderly tortoiseshell, Rumer, had decamped next door to her several months earlier. As the cat spent over half her time in Mrs T’s garden or kitchen and the elderly lady admitted she found Rumer a great companion, Maisie hadn’t the heart to chance things. She was now resigned to the fact she was cat-less. Which due to the animal’s age and Maisie’s pending move was probably not a bad thing.
A quick phone call to Bryony to say she was about to leave, a visit to the loo and Maisie was ready to set off. The drive out of the capital was full of the usual stop go queues, idiots weaving through the traffic and people who thought traffic lights didn’t apply to them.
However, it was an easier route out of town than from Bermondsey where she was brought up. Maisie supposed she should stop saying she lived in the city. Wimbledon was Wimbledon. Nevertheless, old habits die hard and if anyone asked her where she lived she automatically said London, before correcting herself.
Soon she’d have to say Devon and add Little Bristow. ‘Hello, I’m Maisie MacLean, and I live in Little Bristow.’ She rolled the sentence around her mind. It sounded okay. Weird after a lifetime of London and its surrounds, but okay. How long before it sounded normal? What was it that Bryony had said, you might be accepted as an incomer living there after ten or so years, but it would be fifty before you became a local, albeit one who wasn’t Bristow born and bred.
She’d gone a good twenty miles before she remembered she’d intended to get the locks changed. Ah well, Mrs T was around, she’d added a ps, Stanley and I are finished, to her note, and would send Mrs T a text asking her who she’d recommend to do the job.
The M25 was the normal nightmare she’d come to expect, but once she left it, the traffic, although heavy, thinned out enough for everyone to have enough space not to be too close to the car in front. If it stayed that way she’d be in Little Bristow in time for tea. Which reminded her she would need to pay a visit to Mrs Cherry’s shop the following day and stock Daps Cottage.
She nipped into the loos at a service station near Hinton—the result of the large coffee she poured into an insulated mug for the journey—bought a bar of chocolate for herself and some flowers for Bryony, sent her text to Mrs T, and got an ominous ‘I’ll keep my eyes open and my rolling pin handy,’ reply, and continued south.
Just after five she crossed the bridge over the river and drove up the hill to cover the last few miles to Little Bristow before she changed direction to access the lane to Cliff Cottage. She passed her new home and noticed some nice person—probably Dario or Ronnie Herron, the youth who helped him with odd jobs when needed - had mown the lawn. The lad, Maisie remembered, who had done his best to put the fear of God into Bryony when she’d first moved into the village as he’d thought, wrongly, she’d bought a house on land earmarked for social housing. She hadn’t, it hadn’t, and Ronnie had been penitent ever since.
Dario had been true to his word and the worst of the ruts in the lane had been smoothed out. She changed gear, turned into Dario and Bryony’s driveway, switched off the engine and sighed.
Journey almost over. Tomorrow was soon enough to sort her new home out.
And spill the beans to Bryony. Stanley-less and shagged someone else.
Scandalous.
Bryony came out of the house as Maisie switched the car off. She took one look at Maisie’s face and stopped abruptly. ‘What’s happened?’
Maisie got out of the car and burst into tears. ‘Stanley and I have split up and now I’ve slept with someone else. After about three hours of acquaintance, and a couple of glasses of wine. I wasn’t even drunk.’ She paused and rolled her eyes. ‘Well, not a lot.’
Bryony raised her eyebrows at the same time as she hugged Maisie. ‘Really?’
‘No, not really.’ Sometimes it was crap having a friend who knew you so well. ‘I lied. It was a lot, but it was mitigating circumstances and I did know what I was doing. Eyes wide open. Bloody Stanley. Even so, three hours. I’m a slut.’
Bryony cuddled her and steered her into the kitchen. Dario looked up from where he was wiping Theo’s hands, and silently took himself and his daughter out of the room.
‘Sit.’ Bryony pushed Maisie onto a chair and handed her a wad of kitchen roll. ‘Blow. Maisie MacLean, listen up and listen well. So, some random bloke. You fancied him, he fancied you. He slept with you? You slept with him. Or not slept as the case may be.’
‘Well, duh.’ There hadn’t been a lot of actual sleep involved.
‘Did you enjoy it? Was it good sex?
‘Hell, yeah. Stupendous.’
‘Qed. Nuff sed. You are not a slut for sleeping with someone else. That’s only when you’ve never seen them before and don’t know their name.’
‘I’d never seen him before,’ Maisie stuttered from under the kitchen roll. ‘But I did know his name.’ His first name at least. ‘And Bob the landlord vouched for him.’
‘There you are then,’ Bryony said robustly. ‘Perfectly understandable. You show me a woman whose never had a one night stand when the circumstances warranted it.’
‘You.’
‘Ha, ha wrong I did. And it was great. Didn’t want to repeat it but it was what was needed at the time. No, I won’t say who it is, no you don’t know him, and no I really didn’t want to repeat it. Er, you did practice safe sex I hope,’ Bryony added with a hint of anxiety.
Maisie blew her nose and nodded. ‘Of course, we did. I’m not that daft. He took care of that.’ Which was just as well, as she remembered she’d forgotten to take her pill that night. Well, not so much forgotten as not had it with her. ‘I just fancied the pants of him, he remembered the sensible stuff and took precautions.’ She thought. Although the second time in the shower she was somewhat hazy about.
‘A proper conscientious, responsible sort of a bloke. Well, to fancy you that’s a given. But he’s got it right. Sorted. Now fill me in about what happened with Stanley.’
Maisie gulped. She knew in her heart Bryony was correct, but she still found it difficult to reconcile her night of hot sex with her usually more cautious self.
Enough already.
‘How do you know he fancied me?’ she said with a wobbly grin. ‘He might just have fancied sex.’
‘You’d’ve known and given him the heave ho. Right enough already. Stanley now, please.’
‘Ah, Stanley.’ Maisie considered how to explain succinctly and not have to stop Bryony finding him and making a castrato of him. ‘Evidently his idea of exclusive doesn’t match mine. He was supposed to be on a course in Runcorn.’ She smiled wryly. ‘Not the local park.’