Sugar Secrets…& Mistakes

by Mel Sparke

  “Don’t lecture me, Joey! We’ve had a really nice night – don’t spoil it,” said Cat petulantly, tucking her arm more firmly through his as they strolled homeward.

  “Well, don’t spoil it for me by blowing smoke in my face!” Joe responded.

  “You’re getting very bolshy these days, Joey!” teased Cat. “It wasn’t so long ago that you wouldn’t have said boo to a sparrow, let alone a goose! And now, here you are, bossing me about…”

  “Bossing you about?” he laughed. “Would I dare?”

  “But you do seem different, Joey – what’s changed?”

  “I dunno,” he shrugged, raising his eyebrows and shoving his hands deeper into his pockets.

  Joe did feel different, though and he did know why. After years wrapping himself up in knots about the break-up of his parents’ marriage, this summer he’d finally felt as though he’d come to terms with it. He was getting on a lot better with his dad and didn’t feel so suffocated by his mum. That was the difference and it felt good.

  “Anyway, enough about you, if you won’t tell me anything,” Cat flounced. “What about Kerry tonight? Didn’t she look amazing?”

  Joe’s heart lurched at the memory of how lovely Kerry had looked.

  “Mmm,” he muttered non-committally.

  “Although I could have done without all the mushy ‘I wuv yooo’ stuff Ollie was coming out with. Turned my stomach, that did.”

  Her comment only reminded Joe that not everything in his life was less complicated. Being crazy about your best friend’s girlfriend didn’t exactly rank high on the list of Great Situations To Be In.

  “Hey, I meant to say,” Cat continued, “I thought that compilation tape you made for Kerry was brilliant – but how did you manage to get it so right? How did you know that all those songs were her favourites?”

  Joe felt a little smile play at his lips. Cat liked to shock, but how shocked would she be if he came out with the truth?

  “Well, Cat, I know all Kerry’s favourite records because I make it my job to know everything about her.”

  “Why’s that?”

  “Because I’m totally and completely in love with her.”

  “You’re what?!!!”

  Joe smiled again as he ran the imaginary conversation in his head.

  “Oh, I just remembered some stuff she’d mentioned. You know how it is,” he said vaguely. “So, uh, how come you were so keen to leave with me? You’re never usually the first to leave a party…”

  Cat threw her cigarette into the gutter and blew out a grey funnel of smoke from her perfectly made-up lips.

  “Aw, Joey, I’ve got a lot on my mind tonight. Guess I just wasn’t in the mood,” she replied.

  Coughing as her cloud of smoke enveloped him, Joe managed to respond, “Er, anything you’d like to share with the class?”

  “Joey, darling,” she grinned at him, giving his arm a squeeze, “I think I’ll take a leaf out of your book on this one. I think I’ll keep it to myself for a bit.”

  “Come on, there’s one shot left – it’s a shame to waste it,” Maya cajoled the others as they stood shivering in their summer clothes in the cool evening air.

  On her instructions, Ollie and Kerry snuggled up – with their backs to the window of the Kamil Tandoori restaurant and the glances of the curious waiters inside – while Anna stood to their left, and Sonja and Matt posed to their right.

  “Son – budge up to Matt! I can’t get you all in!” Maya waved over at them, her face obscured by the camera.

  “C’mere, you!” said Matt, boisterously pulling Sonja in close to him.

  The heat from his body so close to hers burned through Sonja’s thin cotton dress.

  “Matt!” barked Maya, dropping her camera down. “What on earth have you got stuck to your lip? Is it a bit of nan bread you were saving for later?”

  “Huh? Where? Son – check it out for me!” said Matt, turning to Sonja.

  With one finger, Sonja reached up and brushed the bit of bread away from his lips, wondering for a fleeting moment what it would be like to kiss them…

  CHAPTER 3

  CAT’S CHANGE OF PLAN

  “…Oh, yes. Kiss were a brilliant band. They wore the most amazing black and white make-up – were never photographed without it. And the outfits! They’d come on stage in these enormous platform boots—”

  “Like the Spice Girls?”

  “Er, not quite. The lads from Kiss were a lot louder and rockier than the Spice Girls.”

  “What – Kiss were boys?”

  “Well, of course! Top blokes. One of the best bands I ever worked with.”

  “But they were boys and they all wore makeup?”

  “Yeah, well, lots of bands have worn make-up: like Sweet and the Glitter Band in the 70s. And in the ‘80s all the New Romantic bands wore makeup, and even in the ‘90s you’ve got bands like Placebo. I remember—”

  “But boys wearing make-up? I thought just ladies and girls wore it! Like Catrina – she wears make-up.”

  Nick Stanton nodded in agreement. “I suppose it is mostly ladies and girls who wear it, but some of the bands I used to work with—”

  “Catrina wears lots of make-up. I think she looks like a—”

  “Hey, Lewis! You’re not bugging Nick I hope?” Kerry called across the café, losing the expression of amusement she’d been wearing as she observed her little brother’s conversation with the ponytailed older man.

  “I’d better rescue your Uncle Nick from his babysitting duties,” she said hurriedly to Ollie, leaving him standing behind the café counter where they’d been idly chatting. Of course, what Kerry really wanted to do was stop Lewis in his tracks before he went any further with this conversation.

  “Room for one more?” she asked almost breathlessly, sliding into the red banquette beside her brother.

  Lewis looked daggers at his sister. He’d obviously been enjoying his man-to-man conversation with Nick, Ollie’s uncle and the owner of the End-of-the-Line café. Nick, for his part, seemed a little disappointed to have to curtail telling all his old rock’n’roll stories to a captive audience. Even if that captive audience was only six years old.

  “Well, guess I’d better get back to work,” Nick sighed, easing himself out of the booth. Lewis watched in fascination as Nick’s beer belly squashed against the table.

  “Thanks for being patient with him, Nick,” Kerry smiled at the café owner, knowing that he was just as glad for an excuse to sit down and take it easy as Kerry had been to have a few minutes alone with Ollie. Lewis adored Ollie and Kerry wouldn’t have got a word in edgeways if Nick hadn’t offered to keep her little brother company for a while.

  “Pleasure,” Nick replied, rubbing at the dark stubble on his chin. “Bring him through to the record shop when I’m there and I’ll dig out a copy of a Kiss album so he can see what they look like. OK, Lewis?”

  “Cool!” Lewis responded with his favourite word of the moment, feeling full of self-importance.

  He watched as his friend Nick ambled off towards the kitchen, his cowboy boots clattering loudly on the tiled floor.

  “You all right, Lew? Do you want another drink or something?” Kerry asked, happy to pacify her brother now that she knew the danger was over. “We won’t stay for too long – I just want to see my friends for a while. And Maya might bring Ravi along.”

  “Cool! Could I have another Fanta, please? And a packet of Quavers? And some money for the jukebox?” Lewis asked, wide-eyed and innocent, and not above taking advantage of his sister’s generosity.

  “Right, here’s some change…”

  Kerry scrambled in her pockets and clattered a few coins on the table top. She didn’t suppose Lewis would recognise too many of the records on the ancient jukebox, but at least it stopped him from being bored while they hung around and waited for the others.

  “Can I get you something, Madam?” Ollie joked as Lewis barged past him.

  “More Fanta and mor
e Quavers for His Lordship, please,” Kerry smiled up at him.

  “Nick was fine looking after him, you know – you didn’t have to drag him away. It’s not like we’re busy today.”

  “I know,” shrugged Kerry, unwilling to admit why she’d interrupted them. Quickly, she changed the subject. “Wonder where everyone is? I thought they all said they’d be here by around two.”

  Above an old Abba track that had sprung from the jukebox, a piercing shout interrupted them.

  “KERRY KERRYKERRY!! Look – crossing the road! It’s CATRINA THE CLOWN!”

  Kerry glared over at her loud little brother, only half aware, in her embarrassment, of the guffaw of laughter coming from the kitchen.

  Nick tolerated Cat because of her friendship with his nephew, but he didn’t have much time for her, not after the grief she’d caused him in the past. He’d dated her mother briefly at the start of the summer and, out of jealousy and spitefulness, Cat had insinuated to her friends that she was the one Nick was really after. Right now it sounded as if he’d quite enjoyed hearing Lewis’s tactless comment.

  “What did Lewis say?” asked Ollie.

  The bell above the café door tinkled as Cat walked in, and Kerry hoped frantically that both Lewis and Ollie would shut up. She didn’t really want to explain to the world – and Cat – what her kid brother called her.

  “Hi, guys!” trilled Catrina, slithering into the seat opposite Kerry. “What’s new?”

  Kerry flicked her eyes up towards Ollie and saw the wicked grin on his face. He had obviously realised what Lewis had shouted and, unfortunately, Cat’s liberal application from her make-up box kind of proved Lewis’s point.

  “Um, the streak in your hair – it’s, uh, it’s nice,” waffled Kerry, saying the first thing that came into her head.

  Raising her heavily mascara’d eyelashes upwards. Cat tried to focus in on the chunk of hair that had been ruby red the night before at the restaurant.

  “Mmm. It’s supposed to wash out, but when I dried my hair this morning it had just faded to pink. Quite like it though. I decided to make it my theme colour for the day.”

  Kerry was suddenly aware of Lewis’s presence at her side. He stood seriously and silently staring at the confection of pink that was Cat.

  “Recognise the lipstick?” Cat asked, leaning forward and pouting her candy coloured lips at Kerry.

  “Em, no,” she flustered, noting that this close up it was easy to see where the layers of foundation smothering Cat’s face met her real, unadorned skin halfway down her neck. “Should I recognise it?”

  “Yeah – I bought it at your shop a couple of weeks back. Special offer? Remember?”

  The vision of the basket full of loud and unsellable coloured lipsticks and eyeshadows popped into Kerry’s mind. It had been Kerry’s boss’s idea to finally get rid of the old stock at the chemist’s.

  “Oh, yes,” she nodded. “Lewis, why don’t you go up to the counter with OIlie and help him get our order together?”

  “So, Kerry,” said Cat, adjusting the straps of her pink vest top and unaware of OIlie winking as he led Lewis off. “Enjoying your two weeks’ holiday before term starts?”

  “Sort of. I mean, after working the whole summer, it’s nice to have a break, but I wish OIlie had some time off too.”

  “Well, don’t feel like you’ve missed out,” yawned Cat, slowly tapping her taloned pink nails on the Formica surface. “None of us has been away anywhere exciting this summer, have we?”

  “OIlie was speaking about that last night after you and Joe left, actually,” said Kerry, trying not to get wound up by the fact that, out of the corner of her eye, she could see Lewis whispering in Ollie’s ear. “He was saying that we should have a day trip to the seaside a couple of weeks on Saturday.”

  “Nice idea,” Cat enthused. “But why can’t we do it sooner?”

  ‘“Cause OIlie wants time to charm Irene and Dorothy into covering, so him and Anna can both take the day off,” Kerry began to explain. “And it would also be something to look forward to – you know, after the gloom of starting back at St Mark’s that week.”

  “Well, not all of us…” drawled Cat.

  “What to you mean?” asked Kerry, confused.

  “I’m not going back. I’ve finished with school.”

  CHAPTER 4

  CLEAR AS MUD

  Lewis and Ravi, Maya’s little brother, had been offloaded to a neighbouring table and were now having a who-can-stuff-the-most-Jaffa-cakes-in-their-mouths competition. The only other people in the End-of-the-Line café at half past two on this Wednesday afternoon were OIlie and the rest of the gang.

  All of them (apart from Kerry and OIlie who’d heard Cat’s pronouncement already) sat with their mouths hanging open in surprise.

  After a moment’s stunned silence, Sonja was the first to speak. “Cat, when did you decide all this?”

  “This morning. I rang to accept the college’s offer of a place just before I came along here,” Cat explained brightly, loving the sensation of having all eyes on her.

  “But you never said anything!” Sonja continued. “Where did all this spring from?”

  “Well, like I told Kerry and Ollie, Winstead College of FE had an ad in the paper last week for late applications…”

  “Was that the thing you said you were thinking about last night?” Joe interrupted, remembering Cat’s unusually reflective mood as they walked home from Kerry’s night out.

  “Uh-huh. I went to the college and saw them on Friday, then got a letter yesterday to say the place was mine, if I wanted it. I just had to decide overnight if I did.”

  “But why? What are you taking a beauty therapy course for? What do you plan to do with it?” questioned Sonja. She had to hand it to her cousin – Cat had well and truly managed to surprise her this time. Matt, Maya and Joe looked just as gobsmacked.

  “I’m going to be… an actress!”

  A hush fell around the table. Everyone’s brains were whirring madly as the friends (including Kerry and Ollie who hadn’t heard this snippet of information before) tried to make sense of what Cat had just said.

  “Whoa – wait a minute!” said Matt. “You’ve just told us that you’ve enrolled for a beauty course at college. Where does acting fit in?”

  “Well, the thing is, I know I want to work in TV or film—”

  “Cat!” Maya burst in. “Why aren’t you going for a drama qualification, if acting’s suddenly the thing you want to do?”

  “It isn’t a sudden thing! I’ve always thought I’d be a good actress!” Cat said, petulantly sticking out her pink bottom lip. “And anyway, I’m trying to explain, if you’ll let me!”

  Maya rolled her eyes. “This I’ve got to hear…”

  “It’s like this,” Cat began, slapping her manicured hands palms down on the table for emphasis. “I could stay on at St Mark’s and do A levels and apply to drama school – but they all try and get you into theatre and Shakespeare and stuff, and I’m just not interested in that.”

  “That’s like saying you want to be a vet but you’re not interested in animals!” OIlie tried to reason.

  “Don’t be silly,” Cat retorted. “Do you think all the actors in Sunset Beach or Home and Away did Shakespeare?”

  Even Maya was stuck for an answer to the skewed wisdom of what Cat had just said.

  “So from what I’ve read, contacts are what really counts.”

  “Cat, I’m lost,” said OIlie, speaking for all of them. “What are you on about?”

  Cat sighed dramatically. “Think about it: what am I good at?”

  The others all stared at Cat, uncertain of what to say. Flirting, showing off, manipulating and lying were just a few of the less flattering but accurate characteristics that sprang to mind.

  “Well?” she asked, looking round expectantly at her friends. “Isn’t it obvious?”

  They watched blankly as she pointed to her face.

  “Make-up!” Joe blurte
d out suddenly, realising what she was trying to signal to them.

  “Exactly!” Cat nodded at him. “I’m good at make-up.”

  Sonja grimaced inwardly as she remembered the make-over Cat had given her a couple of weeks before; Sonja had felt like the victim of an explosion in a glitter factory.

  “So my way of thinking is this: I do a beauty course; become a make-up artist down in London; work on TV and film stuff; make contacts; get offered acting work!”

  Kerry instinctively felt that Ollie and Matt were on the brink of either laughing or saying something that they thought would be hilariously funny but Cat wouldn’t.

  “What does your mum say about you changing your mind so late in the day?” she asked quickly as a means of deflection. Cat’s mum Sylvia was a pretty frightening prospect to all the friends – even Sonja, who was related to her. Sylvia Osgood was a self-made, high-flying, short-tempered business woman, who had little time for half-baked ideas or crazy notions.

  “Um…”

  “Cat…” Maya started dubiously. “What do you mean ‘urn’? Isn’t your mum flipping out at you? What does she think about all of this? Does she agree that it’s the best route into acting?”

  Cat just fumbled with the daisy clasp on her pink, fun-fur handbag and batted her eyelashes furiously. It was pretty obvious to the others that Cat hadn’t yet let her mother in on her little secret…

  CHAPTER 5

  JUST ME AND YOU (AND EVERYBODY ELSE)

  Matt walked in the room and immediately felt a mixture of awe and intimidation. He always felt like this when he came across the females of the Harvey family gathered together.

  Especially when they wolf-whistled at him.

  “Don’t do that, Karin dear, it’s so vulgar,” said the fortysomething woman dressed casually in a denim shirt and jeans, who was sitting chopping vegetables at the kitchen table.

  “Aww, he loves it – don’t you, Matt?” grinned Sonja’s big sister Karin, stretching out in her high-backed, wooden chair and running her hands through her hair.

  “Just ignore her, Matt. It’s lovely to see you!” crooned Sonja’s mother in her husky, slightly Swedish-accented voice.