by Mel Sparke
Nick Stanton, the owner of the End-of-the-Line café, and Irene, one of the pensioners who helped out with a few shifts a week, pottered back and forth to the kitchen, tidying up in a leisurely fashion now that most of the customers had left.
Ollie had sloped off-with his Uncle Nick’s blessing-to spend the last chunk of his shift talking to the rest of his band, who were all occupying the window booth. Apart from the fact that there wasn’t enough work to keep all three of them occupied, Nick was happy to encourage band discussions; as The Loud’s manager, it pleased him to see the lads’ enthusiasm.
“Where are we not supposed to be looking?” Ollie hissed at Joe. “Surely you don’t mean Sunny.”
Having pulled up a stool at the end of the table when he joined them, Ollie had his back to the room. As far as he could remember, the only other table that was still occupied was one that Maya’s sister, Sunita, was huddled round with a couple of her mates. He couldn’t imagine that they’d be eyeing up him and his friends, or that Joe would make a big deal out of it.
“Who’s Sunny?” asked Andy, who’d joined the band last and knew the least about the background to Ollie’s crowd.
“Maya’s younger sister,” Billy, The Loud’s guitarist, explained.
“Ah…” nodded Andy. He’d met Maya-as well as Billy-when they’d joined the Downfield photography club the previous summer, and now that the connection had been pointed out, he could see the similarity between the two girls instantly.
“Shhh, they’ll hear!” Joe tried to quieten them down. “No-I didn’t mean Sunny; I meant one of those two girls sitting over by the jukebox…”
Matt, who’d never specialised in tact, stared straight over at the table Joe had indicated.
“You sure, Joe? They’re not looking now…” he shrugged.
“Yeah-they’re not looking now because you lot are all staring over at them,” hissed Joe, wishing he’d never mentioned anything in the first place. “But the one with the dark bob and the pierced nose has been ogling for the past ten minutes.”
“Which one of us do you think she fancies?” Billy grinned.
“Well not you, if she catches a whiff of that gear,” Ollie teased him, looking at his football top. “Don’t you ever get changed after your games?”
Billy lifted his arm and took a long whiff under his armpit.
“Ahhh…!” he exclaimed with a wide grin on his face.
“yeeeeeeeeuch!” the other lads all moaned.
“What?” asked Billy, pretending not to understand why they were offended. “Nothing wrong with a bit of sweat! Very macho, that is…”
“Well, I wouldn’t worry about your personal hygiene problem, Billy - it’s probably Matt she’s after,” said Ollie, nodding his head towards his undeniably good-looking mate.
Matt Ryan was tall with almost Mediterranean colouring-dark hair, brown eyes and olive skin. His powers of attraction in the town of Winstead were practically legendary and, in the past, he had been guilty of taking advantage of the fact that girls fell for him left, right and centre. But all that had changed when he met Gabrielle; she was the first girl he thought he could get ever get serious about. It was just a pity she hadn’t felt the same.
Since she’d finished with him at New Year, Matt had seemed a little dazed and confused when he was around any girls outside his group of friends.
“Not my type,” he said, checking out the staring girl unselfconsciously.
“Matt, your type used to be any type!” Ollie laughed.
Matt nodded, a rueful smile playing on his lips, as if to say that time seemed long, long ago.
“Nah, she’s not my type either,” said Andy with a straight face.
The lads erupted completely.
Andy never made a big deal about it, but everyone knew he was gay. At the regular weekly gigs the boys played at the Railway Tavern just along the road, it had become a running joke among them that he was a total heartbreaker without even trying. Plenty of girls in the audience stood gazing adoringly at him as he plucked his bass, completely unaware that the nice-looking, skinny boy they were checking out wouldn’t ever be interested in them as anything but friends, at best.
“You know, seriously, though,” said Billy, whose general enthusiasm helped him see opportunities everywhere, “we really should get some flyers printed up for our Thursday night spots. Then we could hand them out to girls like those two when we came across them; it could really help boost the numbers.”
“Yeah - great idea!” Ollie enthused. “Wonder if we could get some done for the Valentine do we’re playing at Cat’s college on Saturday night?’
“We’d never get it organised in time,” Andy pointed out.
“Maybe, but Billy’s right - it could get more people into the Railway Tavern,” Ollie shrugged. “I’ll tell Nick about it when he comes back through from the kitchen. We could leave flyers on all the tables in here at nights and weekends, and just let people know about us…”
“Oh, yeah, great idea,” said Matt, with a touch of sarcasm in his voice. “Only how are you going to afford that? The pathetic fee you get from Derek at the Railway Tavern only just covers the cost of hiring the gear you use.”
“Well, thanks for that note of doom and gloom, Matt,” Ollie smiled wryly. “Anyway, you’re not even in the band-so what do you know?”
Matt knew he was being wound up, but he could give as good as he got.
“Hey, I’m only the guy who mixes your sound for nothing and ferries all your hire stuff to and from Central Sounds every week for nothing. But if you know someone else who’s willing to do the job, feel free to hire them instead…”
“There’s people queuing up, mate - just queuing up!” Ollie grinned.
“Right, you two - take it outside if you’re going to start a fight!’
Irene stood with her hands on her hips by their table, armed with a damp dishcloth and an indulgent smile for Ollie and his friends.
“Yes ma’am!” barked Ollie, shooting her a salute.
“Elbows up, lads - your table’s the last one I’ve got to wipe down,” she ordered brightly.
Five pairs of elbows immediately lifted into the air.
“Now, where are all your lovely lady friends today?” Irene chirruped as she wiped.
“They’re all at some New Age show up in the city,” said Ollie, arms aloft. “Didn’t Anna mention it to you this week?”
“Now maybe she did…” Irene replied. “New Age-that’s the trendy name for all that crystal ball gazing, isn’t it?”
“Um, kind of…” said Ollie, thinking how Anna would wince to hear her favourite subject being summed up like that.
“Ooh, I don’t know if I’d fancy that myself,” said Irene with a little shudder. “Heaven knows what strange things those girls are being told…”
The boys glanced at each other and had to struggle to stop themselves from sniggering - it was so surreal, listening to Irene tut-tutting over some imagined weird goings-on the girls were involved with, while they were all holding their hands in air as if they’d just surrendered.
“All done-you can relax again, boys,” said Irene and with one final sweep of her cloth she was off.
“Ooh, do you think the girls are involved in some black magic seance right now?” gasped Matt, holding his clenched hands under his chin in mock fear.
“Mmm, yeah, I think Irene’s got the wrong end of the stick there, hasn’t she?” said Ollie. “As far as I know, Kerry was just up for buying some smelly candles or something at this fair.”
“Aromatherapy stuff you mean,” said Andy, being more specific.
“Maybe we should have asked her to get some of that for your grotty dressing room at the Railway Tavern,” suggested Matt. “To take away that niff of sweaty bands and sour beer that’s always in there…”
“Don’t think anything’ll shift that-that’s years’ worth of pongs in there,” said Billy. “But what do you reckon? Do you think the girls will be g
etting into all that palm-reading stuff? All that ‘I see a tall, dark stranger’ gubbins?”
“Nobody’d better be saying that to Kerry or there’ll be trouble!” Ollie laughed. “Eh, Joe?”
Joe looked distracted.
“Joe-what’s up?” Ollie quizzed him.
“It’s that girl again. She’s definitely looking over…” said Joe, trying to work out why the staring girl seemed so familiar.
“Yeah?” said Ollie and made to turn in his chair.
Joe had given up hoping his friends would be subtle and didn’t even try to stop Ollie from gawping.
“You know something? It’s you she’s staring at, Ol,” Joe told his best friend.
Ollie felt a little peculiar as his eyes locked with the radar gaze of the girl sitting next to the jukebox.
“She’s probably mistaken me for Damon Albarn,” he joked, turning back to his friends. “Happens all the time.”
But joking apart, Ollie felt a shiver up his spine. It felt as if those dark eyes were boring a hole in his back.
CHAPTER 3
BILLY GETS HIS HOPES UP
“Hey, Billy boy-what do you reckon to this?”
Nick slapped a pink piece of paper on the Formica table top, flopped down on to the seat opposite and waited for a response.
Billy looked at the A5 sheet and didn’t know what to say. There was an old-fashioned drawing on it, of what Billy guessed was supposed to be a Bunny Girl, beside black printed words which read: ‘Pretty Ladies-the Escort Agency for the discerning gentleman. Discretion guaranteed. Phone today on…’
Billy was stumped. Maybe Nick-with his ponytail ‘n’ bald spot combo, and penchant for old rock T-shirts-wasn’t every girl’s idea of a dream date, but he never seemed to have any difficulty turning on the charm and chatting up women in the Railway Tavern, when he wasn’t busy watching his protégés play. So why did he need to get involved in something as seedy as an escort agency?
“Nick-call for you!” Anna shouted across the café, holding the receiver of the wall phone up in the air.
‘“Scuse,” said Nick, grabbing up the pink slip of paper and striding off.
Billy sank into the seat with relief. He’d broken out into a sweat wondering what to say that wasn’t along the lines of, “What are you-a dirty old man?”
But he wasn’t out of trouble yet; Nick could finish his call and be back over just as quickly, and there was still no sign of Ollie. Billy wished like crazy that he hadn’t decided to take a detour to come and meet Ollie after he’d finished his shift. He should have just made his way straight to The Swan, as he did every Tuesday evening, ready for the band rehearsal in the back room of Ollie’s folks’ pub.
He tried to catch Anna’s eye-to ask her if Ollie was nearly through in the kitchen-when he was saved by the arrival of Kerry and Sonja.
“What are you doing here? Isn’t it your practice night tonight?” asked Sonja, slipping in beside him and pinching a crisp from his open packet.
“Yeah, it is,” nodded Billy, offering the packet to Kerry. “I’m just waiting for Ollie. I thought I’d come by for him since I was visiting a mate round the corner.”
Billy wondered if he should tell the girls about what Nick had shown him, but he decided to save it for Ollie. Nick was his uncle, after all.
“Here’s Ollie now,” Kerry found herself smiling as she watched him bound through from the doorway that led to the kitchen. It was always the same when she caught sight of her boyfriend, no matter how long they’d been going out. That strange sense of shyness and bliss all rolled into one tingly, happy feeling that bubbled up inside her.
“Hey, gorgeous,” said Ollie, before burrowing his face into the dark reddish curls that hid Kerry’s neck, half kissing, half tickling her.
“Get off!” she giggled, pushing him gently away.
“Come on, Sonja-your turn!” he joked, leaning over as if he was about to give her the same treatment.
“Don’t you dare!” yelped Sonja, holding her friend at arm’s length.
As he laughingly watched the two of them tussling, Billy’s eyes were suddenly drawn beyond them, to the dark-haired girl with the pierced nose who was sitting by the jukebox with her mate. And just like Sunday-as Joe had pointed out-her eyes seemed glued to Ollie.
Weird, thought Billy, though he was still more agitated by Nick’s sudden interest in the escort agency.
“Have the girls told you about their amazing psychic readings on Sunday?” Ollie distracted him by asking, now that the play fight was over.
“No,” Billy shook his head.
“Don’t worry-you haven’t missed out on much,” grinned Sonja. “The only amazing thing about them was how bad they all were.”
“Yeah?” said Billy, without much surprise. He didn’t believe in all that spiritual stuff anyway. He liked things straightforward, simple and up front.
“Well, they weren’t all bad,” Kerry reminded her best friend. “Maya’s was pretty amazing!”
“How come?” Billy quizzed her, now intrigued.
Billy had a soft spot for Maya; had even asked her out on a date when he’d first known her, but it hadn’t worked out. Maya didn’t seem to see him as anything more than friend material. But while he wasn’t holding his breath or losing sleep over it, Billy-a born optimist-often wondered if she’d change her mind at any point in the future. He certainly wouldn’t complain if she did.
“It was really accurate about her family and her personality and everything…”
“Yeah, but skip to the interesting part, Kez!” urged Sonja.
“Well,” said Kerry, her hazel eyes widening behind her wire-rimmed specs. “She was told that there’s going to be a new chapter in her life-a big change - and it’s all to do with love…”
“Really?” said Billy, raising his eyebrows.
Maybe, he thought to himself, just maybe I shouldn’t be so cynical about all this psychic stuff after all…
CHAPTER 4
UNEXPECTED INVITATIONS
“Here-let me.”
Billy reached over with his muscular arms and grabbed the developing fluid out of Maya’s hands.
“Thanks,” said Maya, though she’d easily have managed to move the big plastic container from the table herself.
Now that it and various other miscellaneous objects had been cleared off the surface, Maya could open the flat cardboard box with her name scrawled on it, take out the prints she’d blown up the previous Wednesday, spread them out and take a good long look.
“I didn’t see these last week-they’re great,” Billy commented, appearing by her side again.
“Thanks,” Maya repeated. “I don’t know about that one though…”
She tapped her finger beside one black and white shot of an old lady feeding bread to the swans on the river.
“I think I should maybe have another go at printing it. I think I can get better definition on it.”
“Looks pretty good to me just the way it is,” said Billy.
“Thanks,” Maya found herself saying for a third time.
What’s with Billy? she wondered. She’d caught him staring at her loads of times since she’d arrived at photography club tonight.
Andy shuffled up beside them, brushing his black hair back with his hand, and looked closely at the print.
“Nah, Maya’s right-she probably could get more contrast on that one,” he nodded.
“True - and it’s worth doing,” chipped in another voice. “It’s a great composition.”
Maya could have sworn she heard Billy sigh; as if first Andy and now Alex McKay-the photography club tutor-contradicting his opinion was a real pain.
It has to be that, Maya reassured herself, unwilling to consider the possibility that Billy’s sudden over-the-top attentions could have a more ominous meaning. But then a thought occured to her. She’d called in to the End on the way to photography club, where her ear had been bent non-stop by Cat. Her friend seemed totally obsessed by
Maya’s love prediction and had sat rattling off a list of potential boyfriends for her, working her way through most of the boys at St Marks and beyond.
What if… just what if Cat had been playing Cupid for Billy, all on account of that stupid reading?
It was one explanation for Billy’s sudden doe-eyed attention - if he’d been encouraged by the meddling Ms Osgood.
It would be right up Cat’s street to try and orchestrate something, Maya frowned to herself, only dimly aware of the three heads around her, studying her prints. She did it with Rudi, so I don’t see why she wouldn’t try it again…
Cat had tried to throw Maya and the Dutch boy together a couple of times; first at the Christmas Eve party at Enigma, when she’d told him Maya fancied him and encouraged him to spring a snog on her out of the blue. If that wasn’t bad enough, Cat had also egged the poor lad on to ask for a request for Maya at the Railway Tavern one night. Maya’s heart sank at the memory of Ollie booming down the microphone for all the pub to hear, dedicating a song to her, “with lots of love from Rudi”.
Now, if Cat was playing the same trick with Billy, getting him all stirred up about something that wasn’t going to happen, Maya would really be angry with her. She’d got over all that awkwardness last summer, having to let Billy know that all they could be was friends. It had worked out really well since then: seeing Billy once a week at the photography club, and plenty of other times too, since he’d joined The Loud and started to hang out at the café more. It was important to Maya that their relationship-as mates-was understood and comfortable.
If Cat risks that for the sake of matchmaking, I’ll kill her, Maya vowed, unaware that Alex had asked her something.
“Well, Maya?”