My Heart Goes Bang

by Keris Stainton

  ‘Hey,’ he said when she went up to the cash desk.

  Issey had an anniversary card to send to her parents. She had originally planned to go home for their anniversary, but she couldn’t really afford it. So. A card.

  ‘Hi,’ Issey said.

  Up close, he had really nice eyes. Blue. Very blue. And blond hair. Looked like natural blond hair – he was very fair-skinned, so maybe it was. It was nice anyway. It looked soft.

  He put the card in a small paper bag and leaned forward over the desk. ‘You’re very pretty,’ he said quietly.

  ‘Oh!’ Issey said. His cheeks had flushed pink and blotchy. ‘Thank you. You’re … you have lovely eyes. I was just thinking that.’

  The blush spread down his throat. Issey kind of wanted to reach out and see if it had made his skin hot to the touch.

  ‘That’s two forty-nine.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘For the card.’

  ‘Oh yeah. Sorry.’

  Issey handed over the fiver she’d already taken out of her purse.

  He opened the till and handed her the change and receipt.

  ‘I’d ask you out if I thought you’d say yes,’ he said.

  Issey smiled. He was so cute. ‘Yeah? I’d say yes if you asked me out.’

  He glanced towards the back of the shop and then grinned at Issey. ‘Would you like to go out with me?’

  ‘No,’ Issey said. His face fell. His mouth actually dropped open. ‘God, sorry,’ Issey said. ‘I’m joking – yes. Yes, I’d like to go out with you.’

  ‘Damn, that was cold,’ he said, but he was grinning.

  ‘Listen to this,’ Lou said after college, dropping onto the sofa next to Liane, who was watching yet another episode of Scandal. ‘And then we need to talk about your Shonda Rhimes obsession.’

  ‘We don’t,’ Liane said. ‘Shonda is a goddess. End of.’ She paused the TV and sat up, leaning against the arm of the sofa.

  ‘There’s a boy Ella likes –’

  ‘Oh yeah?’ Liane said, just as Ella said ‘Lou!’

  ‘Shush,’ Lou told Ella. ‘We need a second opinion.’

  Ella pulled a cushion up to her stomach and rolled her eyes at Lou. ‘Fine.’

  ‘OK, so Ella likes this boy,’ Lou repeated. ‘But she thinks he fancies me.’

  ‘Why does she think that?’

  ‘Because I saw him at Soul Cycle and he said hi. To me.’

  ‘And then asked you to peel off his lycra?’ Liane said, grinning over at Ella. ‘Offered you a sniff of his sweaty towel?’

  ‘Nope,’ Lou said. ‘He just said hi.’

  ‘Ella, do you think everyone who says hi to you fancies you? Because I’m sure I’ve said it a few times, and while I love you a lot –’

  ‘Shut up,’ Ella said. ‘I don’t think that. It’s just … it’s Lou.’

  ‘Aw,’ Lou said. ‘That’s bullshit though.’

  ‘Has he ever said hi to you, Els?’ Liane asked.

  Ella peered at her from over the top of the cushion. ‘Yeah.’

  ‘So then you’re even. You can fight over him.’

  ‘I’m not interested though,’ Lou said. ‘He’s not my type.’

  ‘Cos he’s the type to go to Soul Cycle?’ Liane said, nodding.

  Lou snorted. ‘No. He was sort of … bumbling and geeky.’

  ‘Ohhhhh,’ Ella wailed, flopping over and resting her head on the cushion.

  ‘What?’ Liane said.

  ‘Bumbling and geeky is Ella’s kryptonite. She loves a great gormless dork.’

  Liane laughed. ‘Yeah. I can see the appeal. There was a guy at school – he was on the football team, but he was absolutely shit. Like his legs were too long and he was always falling over. Like they were new and he hadn’t got used to them. I don’t know what it was about him, but I used to get the full-on horn watching him running around like a baby deer.’

  ‘You’d better stop talking about him, Li, Ella might start humping your leg.’

  ‘And on that note, I’m going to go and phone my mum,’ Ella said, throwing a cushion at Lou as she left.

  ‘Tell her hello from us,’ Lou called after her.

  Ella had been talking to her mum for about twenty minutes before either of them mentioned Arthur, her stepdad. Ella felt awful because it was the first thing she wanted to know. Or rather, she knew it should have been the first thing she asked. It was the most important thing. But if she asked about Arthur, the whole conversation would be about Arthur, she wouldn’t really get to talk properly to her mum, and also all the oxygen would be sucked out of the room. She couldn’t do it.

  So first she let her mum tell her about the Macmillan Cancer collection she’d done at Argos last weekend, and how the cat had got her paw caught in her new collar and hopped all round the house to find her, mewling pitifully. How the neighbours had moved out and the landlord had found a ‘weed factory’ in the loft, and how she’d got a manicure that was meant to change colour with her mood, but only seemed to change when she did the dishes. Only then did Ella ask, ‘How’s Arthur?’

  ‘You know,’ her mum said, even though Ella didn’t. ‘Pretty much the same.’

  ‘Have you had a hospital appointment?’

  ‘We got one, yes. But it’s a while off. Dylan’s sorting one out for us in London. Next week, I think.’

  ‘That’s good.’ Dylan sorting it meant Dylan’s PA sorting it and Dylan paying for it.

  ‘It is, yeah. And we’re just trying to … stay positive, really. He played golf last week, did I tell you?’

  ‘Yeah, you did,’ Ella said, rolling onto her stomach and pressing her forehead against her pillow. ‘That’s really good.’

  ‘It was. It cheered him up. He hates being shut up in the house all day.’

  ‘I could come home at the weekend?’ Ella said. ‘We could go for a drive. To Lytham, maybe?’

  ‘That sounds nice. But not this weekend. He needs to take it easy, I think. Rest up ready for London.’

  ‘Oh yeah,’ Ella said. ‘OK.’

  ‘I’ll let you know how we get on. You know. In London.’

  ‘God,’ Ella said. ‘Yeah. Of course.’

  ‘Do you think he’s OK?’ her mum said.

  ‘Arthur?’ Ella asked, confused.

  ‘No. Dylan. I know he’s busy, but I’ve spoken to him a few times lately and he’s sounded a bit … I don’t know, just not quite himself.’

  ‘I think he’s just busy,’ Ella said. ‘And worried about Arthur. But I can talk to him if you like?’

  ‘No. No, don’t worry. I’m sure he’s fine. Just busy, like you said.’ Down the phone, Ella recognised the sound of the back door opening and knew her mum was letting Dipsy the cat out. It made her feel homesick. She should try to get home this weekend. Maybe.

  ‘How’s everything with you?’ her mum asked.

  And they spent the next ten minutes talking about Ella’s course and her housemates and whether she was eating enough fruit or if her mum should buy her a NutriBullet with her Nectar card points. It was lovely.

  Chapter 13

  ‘So your mum’s got a gallery?’ Colette asked Liane as she restocked the cigarettes.

  ‘Not yet. But that’s the plan.’

  ‘So she was – what? – trying to get investors?’

  Liane nodded and then realised Colette couldn’t see her. ‘Yeah. And also I think just to get the word out? Get a bit of buzz going.’

  ‘Oh, aye. Like that new bar on Seal Street. They had men in short shorts handing out shots.’ Colette turned and leaned back on the counter, grinning at Liane.

  ‘Just like that, yeah,’ Liane said. ‘Only with no joy or fun. Or short shorts.’

  ‘Booze, though?’

  ‘Oh yeah.’

  Liane flashed back to an image of herself in the garden of the house she grew up in, some guy’s hands up her skirt, her head tipped back and banging on the trellis. She’d kept worrying that some of the flower heads would get kno
cked off, which was a really weird thing to have worried about. She hadn’t asked his age, but from the looks of him he was easily mid-forties, so she got to tick someone twice your age off the Fuck It List at least.

  If her mum had seen them – if the man mentioned it – Liane’s life would effectively be over. But last weekend, she’d drunk enough that she didn’t care. She didn’t feel great about it. But this was why she hadn’t wanted to go home.

  ‘So what’s she like?’ Colette said. ‘Your mum?’

  A customer came then and tried to use the automatic checkout, even though Colette and Liane were standing right there. They stopped talking and just watched and waited for the inevitable ‘unexpected item’ alert. Once the customer had left, Colette said, ‘So? Your mum?’

  ‘She’s … not like your mum.’

  Colette rolled her eyes. ‘God. Who is?’

  Colette’s mum came into the shop every week. She brought Colette a dish of food – she called it leftovers, but Colette strongly suspected she made it especially – and talked them through pretty much every step of her week since she’d last been in: which neighbours she’d chatted to, what she’d watched on TV, everything she’d eaten, whether or not she’d been able to ‘go’ that day. (The first time she came in, Liane had innocently asked ‘Go where?’ and Colette and her mum had almost peed themselves laughing.)

  ‘She doesn’t act like a mum,’ Liane said now. ‘I mean, obviously I don’t have anyone to compare her with. But she doesn’t act like mums on TV. Or my friends’ mums. She kind of treats me like an irritating employee.’

  ‘Fuck,’ Colette said simply. ‘I’m sorry. Has she always been like that?’

  ‘She’s never really been affectionate …’ Was that true? Liane tried to think back to the last time her mum hugged or kissed her beyond a perfunctory air kiss whenever they met, and she couldn’t remember. ‘There’s photos of me sitting on her knee and stuff when I was little, but that’s all really. For Mum, it’s all about appearance. And achievement. She’s got worse since Dad left though. Definitely.’

  ‘Isn’t that your boyfriend?’ Colette said, nodding at a guy standing in front of the beer fridge.

  ‘Not my boyfriend,’ Liane said. It was Alfie though, she was pretty sure.

  ‘Nice little arse,’ Colette muttered, just as the guy turned round.

  His eyes actually lit up when he saw Liane. They definitely did. She saw it. No question. He was happy to see her.

  ‘Hey,’ she said, holding onto the edge of the counter. ‘How did the Phish Food go down?’

  ‘Yep,’ he said, nodding. ‘Very popular choice. I’ve been back for more, but you weren’t here.’

  He’d noticed, Liane thought. He’d noticed she wasn’t there.

  ‘Oh yeah,’ she said. ‘I went home for the weekend.’

  Alfie was standing next to the trolley with the reductions on it and he turned a pack of yum yums around to look at the price before putting them in his basket.

  ‘Yeah?’ he said, looking around absentmindedly before focussing on her again. ‘Where’s home?’

  ‘Richmond,’ she said. ‘Surrey. How about you?’

  ‘Here, actually. Well, Crosby. But I live in town now.’

  ‘Cool,’ Liane said. ‘Me too. Bold Street.’

  He stepped up to the counter then. ‘Yeah? I work there. In Bean? The coffee shop?’

  ‘Oh, yeah!’ Liane said. ‘I’ve been in there! I’ve never seen you.’ I would’ve noticed, she wanted to add, but couldn’t.

  ‘Well, next time you come in, coffee’s on the house,’ he said. ‘I mean, as long as I’m there.’ He grinned and Liane stared at his dimples. They were huge.

  ‘You are so in there,’ Colette said as soon as Alfie had gone.

  ‘He’s just being polite,’ Liane said, but she was still staring at the door.

  ‘What did he get?’ Colette said.

  ‘Um … beer. Yum yums.’ Liane hadn’t been paying attention, she’d just scanned the stuff and bagged it up.

  ‘Tomatoes, burgers, bread rolls,’ Colette said. She’d lifted the flap on the till and was reading the receipt. ‘Paracetamol, cheese … No condoms, that’s good.’

  ‘I would’ve noticed if he’d bought condoms.’

  ‘I don’t know. You looked pretty out of it.’

  ‘Did I?’ Liane shrieked.

  ‘Calm down, love. Not like he’d’ve noticed. But, yeah, you looked pretty smitten.’

  ‘Shit,’ Liane said.

  ‘That’s a good thing,’ Colette bumped her with her shoulder. ‘You want him to know you’re up for it, right? For whatever he’s offering?’

  ‘He’s really cute.’

  ‘He is, yeah. You need to go to that coffee place tomorrow.’

  ‘Tomorrow? Do you think?’

  ‘Yep. Get it while it’s hot. And before someone else sweeps in.’

  Liane nodded. She could go and get a coffee in the morning. That would be fine.

  Chapter 14

  ‘That girl is living the life I want,’ Lou said, as a girl went past on a bike. She was wearing a fake fur coat and a beret and had a bowling bag over her shoulder.

  ‘What’s wrong with your life?’ Ella asked Lou.

  Lou shrugged. ‘No, you’re right. It’s fine. It’s just … I always think about different lives I could have. Don’t you?’

  ‘Not really,’ Ella lied. ‘I think you have to live the life you have.’

  Lou reached out and pinched her cheek. ‘And that is why I love you.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘You’re so … straightforward.’ Lou tore open a sachet and emptied the sugar into her latte.

  ‘Oh my god,’ Ella said, veering away from Lou’s hand. ‘That means boring.’

  ‘No! You’re not boring. I love you. You’re sensible. Steady. Smart.’

  ‘Ugh,’ Ella said. ‘I’m nineteen. I shouldn’t be any of those things.’

  ‘Like, if it wasn’t for me, you’d be at home drinking latte from a sachet instead of out here in the world throwing caution and £2.59 to the wind.’

  Ella stuck her tongue out at her, before lifting her latte and taking a sip. Ella did think that paying for a drink they could make at home was a waste. But she’d started telling herself the drink was free and she was paying for the experience of sitting in a cafe with her friend and people-watching. It helped. The cute guy behind the counter didn’t hurt either – she’d seen Lou eyeing him earlier.

  ‘Is there a barista on the list?’ Ella asked, jerking her head back towards the counter.

  Lou grinned. ‘Can’t remember. But he’s cute, isn’t he? Dimples.’

  ‘Ask him out.’

  Lou shook her head, her long earrings jangling. ‘Nah.’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘He looks too nice.’

  ‘Oh god,’ Ella said. ‘I don’t understand you. I thought you got that out of your system with Kyle.’

  Lou slurped some coffee, shaking her head. ‘Stop trying to change the subject. We were talking about you.’ She tapped Ella’s coffee cup with a teaspoon. ‘You’re happy, aren’t you? You don’t want to be different. You don’t want to be wild. You can do shorthand, for fuck’s sake!’

  Ella looked down at the table where her notebook and pen from that morning’s lecture were laid out. ‘It’s useful!’

  ‘I know it is. That’s what I’m saying. I come out of lectures and I can’t read my notes. Or I lose them. Or I forget my laptop. You come out of lectures with perfectly ordered notes that are actually helpful.’

  ‘Wow,’ Ella said. ‘Hot.’

  Lou grinned at her. ‘Do you want me to Rizzo you, is that what you’re saying? You’re Sandra Dee and you want the leather kecks and the cig and the “Tell me about it … stud”.’

  ‘No,’ Ella said. ‘God, no.’ She picked up her pen and doodled a 3D box in the corner of the page. ‘Maybe … a bit.’

  ‘Your hair?’

  ‘What’s wrong wi
th my hair?!’

  ‘Nothing’s wrong with it. It’s lovely. It’s just a bit …’

  ‘Boring.’

  ‘I think you’d look great with brighter hair, is all I’m saying. Maybe pink? You mentioned that before. And the Christmas party’s coming up. Bookshop Boy might be there …’

  ‘Oh god.’ Ella twisted her mouth to the side as she tried to picture herself with pink hair. ‘What about lavender? Like yours?’

  Lou had decided the silver was too high-maintenance and had gone lavender the week before.

  ‘You want us to go around together with matching hair?’

  ‘Oh yeah,’ Ella said. ‘Maybe not.’

  ‘Pink then,’ Ella said. ‘But not, like, baby pink. Brighter.’

  ‘Like this?’ Lou said, holding up her beanie that had been resting on top of her bag on the table. ‘Raspberry?’

  ‘Yeah,’ Ella said. ‘Raspberry. Would that look good, do you think?’

  ‘I think it’ll look gorgeous,’ Lou said. ‘Come and get it done tonight – I’m working ’til nine.’

  Liane walked in and did a double take at Ella and Lou before walking over to join them.

  ‘We were just admiring the barista,’ Lou told her, nodding in the direction of the counter.

  ‘That’s why I’m here, actually,’ Liane said. She gestured at Lou’s coffee. ‘Can I? I’m gasping.’

  ‘I’ll get you one,’ Ella said, shoving her chair back. ‘Unless you …?’

  Liane shook her head. ‘That’s not him. And don’t worry, I can go.’

  ‘You’re fine,’ Ella said, heading over to the counter.

  ‘How is she always so nice?’ Liane asked Lou.

  ‘No idea,’ Lou said. ‘She makes me sick.’ She slid her coffee back and took a quick sip before pushing it back to Liane. ‘So. How’s things with you?’

  ‘Confusing,’ Liane said, scrunching her face up. ‘Do you ever think …’ She shook her head. ‘This is going to make me sound insane.’