by Sue Welfare
Sam stared deep into the ice nuggets, and the fairy lights and fireworks reflected there. He really needed another drink.
*
It was practically dark when Sadie, Hannah and Tucker got to Sadie’s house. There were lights on and music playing and people spilling out of the doorway into the garden and the lane beyond that. There were people hunched around a firepit on the lawn, sharing a cigarette, passing it backwards and forwards, and others drinking and laughing and dancing.
As Sadie opened the garden gate, a woman came running out of the house across the yard, giggling furiously and shrieking.
‘Don’t you dare, don’t you . . . You bastard,’ she yelled, hitching up her skirt and racing barefoot out onto the tangled grass, leaping over and ducking between the groups of people. She was being closely pursued by a man with dreadlocks, who was carrying a yellow plastic bucket in his hands, a cigarette clenched firmly between his teeth.
The woman swerved first left and now right to avoid him, before finally running for cover behind a little stand of old apple trees – not that it did her any good. The two of them feinted back and forth, bobbing and weaving, her shrieking and laughing, him grinning but determined. She kept it up, this game of trying to avoid him, but in the end the man was too quick for her. As the woman twisted the wrong way, he whooped triumphantly and threw the contents of the bucket over her. There wasn’t that much water in it but it was enough to soak her tee-shirt and make her scream in protest. And then all of sudden the roles were reversed and the woman was chasing the man, squealing like a banshee, till at the doorway he turned again and, grabbing hold of her, hot and panting and laughing, he kissed her hard, bending her over, kissing her mouth and her neck and her shoulders, looking for all the world as if he was trying to eat her alive.
‘I thought you said your mum was going out,’ said Tucker.
‘Me too,’ said Sadie, taking another swig from the bottle she was carrying.
*
Back at the marquee, people were slowly drifting back inside after the fireworks. While the guests had been outside the staff had cleared away more of the tables and set chairs around the sides of the marquee.
The band was playing. Jack and Rose had made straight for the dance floor, arm in arm, looking every inch like a couple in love, despite all the ups and downs of life together. As soon as people started to dance the band upped the tempo a notch, playing something summery and light.
Suzie smiled; her parents looked as if they were having a great time. Liz meanwhile was heading for the door. Suzie’s smile deepened as she noticed that Liz was carrying two glasses and had a bottle of champagne tucked under one arm. Probably her man was about to arrive or perhaps he was already there, Suzie thought, watching the way Liz was hurrying. She knew how Liz hated people to be late; she wouldn’t be best pleased that the new man had missed supper. But maybe she had finally got it right. She certainly looked like a woman on a mission.
Sam was nowhere in sight. Suzie let her gaze work around the inside of the marquee, moving from face to face and group to group as she tried to spot him in the crowd. He couldn’t be far away surely? Unless of course he had gone home or gone looking for Hannah. Maybe he was still outside. As she was about to go out, Suzie heard someone call her name and turned.
‘Suzie?’ It was Matt beckoning to her from the kitchen. ‘Have you got a minute?’
‘Hi, how’s it going?’ she said. ‘The food was absolutely fabulous, we’ve had nothing but compliments.’
‘Great, but actually it’s not the food I’m worried about. I’ve been trying to find you. Have you seen Sam recently?’
Suzie shook her head. ‘No, I’m looking for him now. Why, what’s the matter?’
Matt stepped closer so they wouldn’t be overheard. ‘Sam tried to lay me out.’
Suzie’s first reaction was to laugh. ‘You are joking. I know he’s had a couple but—’
‘But nothing,’ said Matt. ‘He’s had a lot more than a couple, Suzie. You really need to talk to him.’ He paused. ‘Sam thinks we’re having an affair. For God’s sake, find him and put him out of his misery, will you, before he does something he regrets?’
Suzie stared at him. ‘An affair? Are you serious?’
‘That’s what the man said.’ Matt pulled a face. ‘Oh come on. Don’t look like that. I’m hurt. I mean, why not? I’m not that bad, am I?’
Suzie smiled and shook her head.
‘And another thing . . .’ he hesitated.
‘What?’
‘Hannah’s friends, you know, the ones who crashed the party?’
Suzie nodded, feeling her heart sink. ‘What about them? What have they done?’
‘Nothing major. They grabbed a couple of bottles of booze and buggered off. I ran after them but . . .’
Suzie groaned. ‘But you couldn’t catch them?’
‘Unfortunately not, I’m not as quick as I used to be.’ Matt put his hand on her arm. ‘It’s all right, it was nothing really, just a couple of bottles of the first thing they came to by the looks of it. I mean, we’ve all done it, maybe not quite like that, but I thought you should know that Hannah went with them.’
Suzie stared at him. ‘Hannah stole booze?’
He shook his head. ‘No, it was the other two but she was there and she ran off with them.’
‘Oh, Matt,’ sighed Suzie. ‘It feels like my whole life is falling apart . . . What am I going to do?’
‘Go and talk to Sam.’
‘And what about Hannah?’
‘She’ll be fine; she’s just busy being a teenager.’
‘And Sam?’ she asked.
Matt laughed. ‘Midlife crisis? Second childhood? Go and talk to him. Set him straight before he comes back for me.’ He smiled. ‘I paid a lot of money for these veneers.’
*
Tucking the bottle of champagne up under her arm and taking a firm grip of the two glasses she had taken from one of the waitresses, Liz headed outside into the warm dark evening air. Sometimes you just have to strike while the iron is hot.
As she made her way into the shadows, she spotted Suzie over by the kitchen area deep in conversation with Matt, which as far as Liz was concerned was more or less perfect.
Outside people were wandering around the gardens, catching up with old friends, drinking and talking in low voices, while the music rolled out into the darkness, filling in the spaces between the words. The night air was heavy with the scent of roses and honeysuckle.
Liz made her way around the different groups, making small talk here, sharing a joke there, even signing a couple more autographs. All the time she was being adored by the hoi polloi, she kept an eye out for Sam. He had to be around somewhere. Eventually she found him sitting in the shadows on a bench by the summerhouse, well away from the rest of the revellers. He was leaning forward, apparently deep in thought with his head down, forearms resting on his thighs, hands cradling an empty glass.
‘Well, hello there, stranger,’ she said, her tone an artful mixture of concern and seduction. ‘Penny for them?’
He glanced up at her. ‘What do you want? Come over to gloat, have you?’
‘Oh, come off it, Sam. You know I’m not like that. I was just getting a bit of fresh air and catching up with people. It’s all bit airless in the marquee. Do you fancy some company?’
He glanced up at her. ‘Do I look like I want company?’
She decided to ignore that and sat down alongside him. ‘I brought champagne.’
‘Oh well, that’s good of you,’ he said. ‘What are we going to celebrate? The end of my marriage? Presumably you heard about me having it out with Matt?’
Liz stared at him, and felt her stomach lurch. So it was true?
‘Really? No . . . Oh, Sam. Are you serious? I’m so sorry . . . I didn’t think when I said . . .’ She grabbed back the breath and the words, stopping right on the very edge of the abyss before admitting she had simply been making mischief. Instead she said has
tily, ‘What did Suzie tell you? I mean, did she tell you she’s been seeing Matt?’
He stared at her. ‘I thought you knew all about it? She hasn’t said anything to me yet but that’s mainly because I haven’t spoken to her about it. I mean, what can I say? What can she say? I talked to Matt though. He denied anything was going on between them, but then again, he’s hardly going to own up, is he? Not even man enough to tell me straight out. Slimy bastard.’
Liz waited to see if there was any more and when it became obvious that there wasn’t, she handed him a champagne flute. ‘There you go,’ she said, topping up his glass. ‘How about we drink a toast to slimy bastards everywhere?’
Sam set his empty tumbler down on the grass and looked at her. ‘Did I miss something?’
‘My Mr Right.’
‘Slimy bastard?’
Liz nodded, surprised to feel her eyes prickle with tears. ‘Hole in one. Give that man a coconut.’
‘But I thought from what Suzie said that this was it,’ said Sam. ‘The big one – Mr Right. Wedding bells and all that jazz.’
‘Me too,’ said Liz.
‘And wasn’t he coming down to meet the family tonight?’ Sam continued, his expression implying he was having to search around for the thoughts.
‘Uh-huh, although the emphasis there should be on was. He rang while everyone was getting themselves settled in to tell me that he wouldn’t be coming after all because something had come up.’
‘Something important?’ asked Sam.
‘A twenty-two-year-old lingerie model.’
‘Ah,’ said Sam with a nod.
Liz smiled ruefully. ‘You know what they say, lucky at cards, unlucky in love.’
Sam frowned. He had obviously had a lot more to drink than Liz had first thought. ‘I didn’t know you played cards,’ he said.
‘It’s an old saying.’
Sam looked none the wiser. ‘About what?’ he asked, brain obviously taking a while to catch up. He took another swig of champagne.
‘About life,’ she said. ‘I’m lucky in life but not in love.’
Sam gave a miserable sigh. ‘Right. Not so long ago I used to think that I was lucky in both.’
This wasn’t exactly how Liz had imagined their conversation going. She moved in a little closer so they were sitting shoulder to shoulder. ‘I’m really sorry that things have turned out this way,’ she whispered, taking his hand. ‘You’re a very special man, you know that, don’t you?’
As their fingers touched Sam looked up at her. He looked surprised and slightly muddled, as if he couldn’t quite believe what was happening. He had such lovely eyes and he was so close now that she could feel his breath on her cheek. Liz swallowed hard, wondering what was going to happen next and if she had the nerve for it. After all, it was she who had started the ball rolling, and he was Suzie’s husband – but then hadn’t he just said that it was over between the two of them?
The problem was that, even as she thought it, Liz couldn’t quite believe it. Suzie wasn’t the type to be carrying on with anyone, particularly not Matt. He was way too smooth and gorgeous for someone like Suzie, surely? Although maybe that was it, maybe that was the attraction. Matt liked non-threatening women who didn’t hog the limelight or the bathroom mirror. You never could tell, and even if it was true about Matt and Suzie, how much worse would it be when people found out about Liz and Sam? After all these years. She smiled as her imagination dropped into overdrive. She could practically see the front of Heat magazine now:
‘“I always loved him but he was forbidden fruit,” Starmaker ’s top presenter tells us about her years of inner torment as she finally marries the man of her dreams.’ Or, ‘Sisters in tragic love triangle.’
Not quite true because she had never properly fancied Sam but it was good headline fodder – and people eventually got over those kind of things. Liz was imagining the repercussions and weighing up how awful Christmas would be versus the column inches she’d get and the news coverage, when she suddenly became aware that Sam was staring at her. She wondered if she had been speaking out loud. His eyes were a little glazed and very slightly out of focus but he was most definitely staring at her.
Was this a bridge too far, or was it fate that had finally brought them together after all these years? Liz considered the thought for a moment. A bit of cliché, all that ‘bridge too far’ and ‘fate’ stuff, and she would have to think about how to phrase it for the tabloids so that it didn’t sound sordid. She was thinking something along the lines of ‘igniting a fire that had been smouldering untended and unintended in the background for years’. Waiting or smouldering? And could you marry your own brother-in-law? Or did they consider that incest? It would probably be worth looking up . . .
She was still thinking when Sam leant in a little closer and, for one heart-stopping moment, Liz thought that he was going to kiss her.
Instead he belched quietly and then said, ‘Sorry about that. I was going to ask you how long have you known about this thing with Matt and Suzie? I don’t understand why you didn’t say something before. Why now? You know, I feel such a fool for not seeing it – is she going to leave me, Liz? Is that what this is about? Is she going? Is that why you said something?’
As he spoke a great big tear rolled down his cheek. ‘I know I haven’t been there for her just recently. And she’s needed me, what with the garden and the extra work and the girls and cooking supper and everything. What are the girls going to say – do they know? God, Liz, I really love her. I really, really do. Do you think it’s too late to get her back?’ He let out a thick miserable sob. ‘Oh God, what have I done?’
Liz stared at him in amazement and before she could help herself said, ‘Never mind about what you’ve done, Sam, what has Suzie done?’
He looked up at her words, his eyes ever so slightly crossed. ‘Exactly. What has she done? I mean, what has she definitely, definitely done? I’ve been sitting here thinking about it. What do I know for certain ? I’m not talking about the things that my mind is making up just because I want to be the one up here on the moral high ground but the real things. You tell me – what has she done, Liz ?’
Liz hesitated. Sam really was an awful lot drunker than he looked.
‘Maybe Matt was telling the truth, you know?’ he continued, his words crashing randomly into each other. ‘Maybe there really isn’t anything going on between the two of them. I don’t know that much about Matt but he always seemed like a reasonable sort of guy really – bit of a wanker maybe, but not a wife stealer if you know what I mean. Maybe I’m reading this all wrong. You know, in all the years I’ve been with Suzie I’ve never thought for one single solitary moment, not ever, that she was the sort of woman who would cheat on me. Not once . . . so why now? What do you think, Liz? What do you think? You’re her sister, for God’s sake. I need to think . . .’
Liz stayed schtum. She was slightly concerned by the journey his alcohol-fuelled brain was making. She wondered how long it would be before Sam came full circle and realised that the seeds of doubt that he had been so carefully tending were the ones that she had planted.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Hannah had come to the conclusion that all the weird people who lived in Moongate Lane and possibly the whole of Crowbridge were at Sadie’s mum’s party. It certainly looked like it. The place was packed with people with dreads and tattoos and piercings. She squeezed her way between the party-goers in the little yard outside the door and in through the tiny crowded kitchen, all the while staying as close as she could to Sadie and Tucker, trying hard not to catch anyone’s eye.
The party had obviously been going on for some time. There were empty glasses, bottles and cans all over the work-tops, in the sink and on the windowsills. The detritus of drinking was mixed with takeaway cartons, empty crisp packets, odd bowls of nibbles, and a pudding basin half full of dried-up pasta salad standing alongside an open pizza box. Someone had ground a dog end into one of the remaining slices. Sadie
tore off a piece furthest away from the cigarette butt and, stuffing it into her mouth, waved them through.
‘Come on,’ she called over the thumping beat of the music. ‘We’ll go upstairs to my room, out of the way of this lot.’
Hannah took a last look back at the open door, regretting having come back to the cottage, and wishing that there was some way she could just slip away and go home. She hesitated just long enough for Sadie to notice.
‘Are you coming upstairs or not?’ Sadie shouted, taking a swig out of the bottle she was carrying.
Hannah nodded.
Sadie grinned. ‘Come on then. Move yourself. Tucker, grab that bowl of peanuts, will you?’ Both of them did as they were told.
Framed in the doorway behind Sadie was a large man leaning over a much younger, smaller woman. He had a mass of grey curly hair and a scrubby beard. His arm was resting against the wall above the young woman so that she was pinned there like one of the butterflies Hannah had once seen in a museum. The girl was small and blonde, with short spiky hair, and was wearing a minidress, cut thigh-high to reveal slender, suntanned legs. The man’s tee-shirt barely covered his hairy milk-white belly and there was a damp circle of sweat under his armpit. The girl looked drunk, pale and uncomfortable, the man proprietorial and predatory.
As Hannah followed Sadie towards the stairs, the man looked up and grinned at her. ‘Well, hello there, sweet thing, and where did you spring from?’ he said, all eyes. He licked his lips. ‘Do I know you? Haven’t we met somewhere before?’
The miniskirted girl seized the chance to slip away.
The man stepped closer. Hannah felt like a rabbit trapped in the headlights. His smile widened wolfishly. ‘No need to be shy there, honey. I don’t bite. So what’s your name then?’
Hannah stared at him, dry-mouthed, pulse thumping in her ears. She didn’t want to tell him her name.
‘Fuck off, Dexter,’ snapped Sadie, grabbing her arm before Hannah could speak. ‘She’s with me. I’ve warned you before, you creep, don’t letch my friends. All right?’ There was a real threat in her voice.