by Judy Waite
Two phrases ring like omens through her head.
This time.
Don't take chances.
Courtney watches the three girls play some sort of jumping competition, measuring their efforts with algae-coated sticks. She has never thought about having children. Her future has been about getting good qualifications, and leaving home. It's been about getting a job and staying independent. Beyond that, it was always fuzzy – but that doesn't mean there might not have been children in the fuzziness. Babies. Her babies.
'And there are other diseases too. Aids is the big one – and we're seeing a new increase in that. And then there's Herpes – Syphilis – all of these are incurable. If you end up with any of them, we can't help you. I'm going to give you a bag of condoms to take away, but if you think you need more, then come and see us again.'
The nurse had smiled, but Courtney couldn't force herself to smile back. She stared down at her hands. Took the carrier bag of condoms. Thanked the nurse without looking her in the eye. The bag was full. There must be at least fifty packets in there. Could the nurse tell, Courtney wondered? Could she see the truth?
She wants to give up working with Alix – this is a wake-up call, and she ought to get herself out of it. Only she's left Easi Shop – she hasn't even walked past it since Christmas Day – and she hasn't saved enough. They earn a lot, but Alix is always pulling them round the shops, making them spend spend spend. 'Speculate to accumulate,' she insists.
Courtney needs to stop the speculating now. She just has to accumulate. She has to have enough money to get away.
The three girls grow bored with their jumping competition. Two race down to the sea, shrieking when the waves slush in, daring the water to swamp their trainers.
The third one collects pebbles, putting them in a pile and patting them into shape. She finds straggles of seaweed and runs them round the top edge of her mound. A cone shell goes in the centre, pointing upwards.
'Let's play families,' Courtney hears her call. 'I've just made us all a cake.'
'I'll be the mum,' calls the tallest girl, running back up.
'No, I will.' The other girl joins her, crouching down and adding new pebbles to the mound. 'You have to be Dad because you're the biggest. Hayley can be our baby.'
'A waaaaaaaaaaaaaaa. A waaaaaaaaaaaaa,' wails Hayley, dramatically.
'Now stop that noise,' the tallest girl is talking in her gruffest man voice. 'If you don't shut it, I'll clout you one.'
Courtney drops her head in her hands, wishing she could block all the world away.
'Hey come on – don't.' It's a bloke's voice. Very soft.
Courtney scrunches her eyes tighter, pressing her knuckles against the lids. 'Go away.' The last thing she needs is the sympathy of male strangers.
She hears a creak on the bench next to her. Whoever it is has sat down.
She stays locked in the world inside her cupped hands. It feels strangely safe, a small warm pocket of black to lose herself in. Leave me alone. Leave me alone. She begins to cry and the crying grows and grows. It feels huge and ugly and giant sobs hack through her, as if the pain is trying to belch its way out.
'Here – use this.' There is a touch on her arm. A tissue being pushed in between her fingers.
After a moment, she takes it, pressing it up to her eyes. She blows her nose, but keeps her head dipped down. She must look awful. Awful. 'Sorry. I must look awful,' she mutters.
'Maybe. You haven't let me see your face yet.'
Courtney raises her head slowly, defiance hardening in her. Let him see her. Let him find the right things to say.
He grins, the smile spreading across his face. A smile bigger and wider than she's ever seen on anyone before.
What the hell has he got to smile like that about? 'At least you look happy,' she sniffs.
'Looks like I've got to try to be happy for both of us.' His eyes are a melting brown. His hair is done up in a hundred tiny banded plaits, all woven in with red and green and gold. There is a smudge of blue – possibly chalk dust – running down his left cheek. He's about her age.
She takes all this in, and then looks away.
'Want to talk?' he says.
She shakes her head. She notices he's propped an easel and a small wooden box in front of the carrier bag full of condoms.
'Walk then? Along the shore?'
'I look a mess. I'll scare small children.' She nods in the direction of the beach, but the girls have gone. An old man is there instead, scrunching across the shingle. One heavy-footed step crunches down on the pebble cake.
'I know – coffee.' He touches her arm. 'There's the Bluebird café just over the main road there. Small. Dark corners. I'll tuck you in a quiet place where it's all shadowy and no one will ask you to do anything at all. Not even me.'
Courtney knows the Bluebird café, although she's never been in there. It's where all the oddballs go. 'It's sort of – I don't know. . . ' She struggles for the right word. '. . . "arty" in there, isn't it?'
'Is that bad?'
'No. 'Course not.' She never got on with the 'arty' crowd at school. They were always so vague. So random and erratic. So full of tedious enthusiasm.
'Good,' he says. 'Because "arty" is my middle name. It's how I earn an honest penny.
Pictures of tourists. Pastels. If I couldn't do that I'd have to empty bins for a living.'
She looks at him again, and it's not just his smile. It's as if the whole sun is shining out from behind his eyes. 'Your hair,' she sniffs. 'It must take forever.'
He grins again. 'You grow yours a bit longer and I'll teach you how to do it too.'
She stares at him now. There is something in what he's said – in the way he's saying it. It seems like he's holding out some sort of future to her.
He wants to know her long enough for her hair to grow. There is warmth in the idea. A warmth in her. As if whatever it is that is golden in him is washing out onto her. 'OK then, coffee,' she blows her nose hard into the tissue. 'But the corner has to be really really shadowy.'
* * *
'CAN YOU SPARE A MINUTE, FERN?' Rob Perry calls her back as she heads out through the English room door.
She turns to him. She hasn't really got a minute because Alix has organised a taxi to pick her up from the car park at four. This is the only way she would let Fern come into college at all. She's had to miss the last three special Wednesday lessons, because Alix keeps taking bookings. More and more bookings. More and more clients. Alix wants her to start doing Thursdays now, too.
'I'm worried about your work. You're slipping behind.' Rob Perry looks at her with troubled eyes.
Fern is sorry she's put trouble in his eyes. She struggles to dredge up excuses, and when she speaks it is words spilling out that she hasn't known were coming. 'It's my dad. He's quite ill, and Mum needs me to help when I can.'
She thinks of the lie like mud spreading through her. Surely Rob Perry will guess how disgusting she is? She stares down at her trainers, thinking that soon her feet will be squashed into white stilettos. Or maybe it'll be the cream ones with the tiny diamonds. Alix still always keeps her in white, or cream.
'I'm so sorry. I thought it must be something like that. Would it help to get your mum in and we could all talk it through together?'
'No!' Fern's head jolts up in panic. 'No. I just . . . she's worried enough, that's all.'
The mud thickens, dark and heavy. It weighs in her. How can she ever wash out a deceit like this?
Rob Perry's smile is caring. Hopeful. 'I could get you concessions, if you talk to me about it. Extra time in the exams. Maybe some extra tuition after college, too. I'd be willing to stay behind and work with you – if you think that would help.'
Fern's eyes sting.
'I'll do anything I can for you. It would be a tragedy if you didn't get into Art College.'
She has thought about this of course – she has known in some shadowy background way that she can't afford to miss English lessons –
and she can't afford not to get into Art College. Now, hearing it said aloud moves it out from the shadows and she is faced with it, staring at it. A tragedy that she has sculpted herself.
She looks up at Rob Perry and sees all the warmth of the world in his eyes.
She wonders if he can see all the scum of the world in hers. 'I'll talk to Mum,' she says, her voice thin and small. 'And I won't miss any more Wednesdays, I promise.'
* * *
Alix fastens her robe as she watches him dress. Trousers first. Then sweatshirt. Then socks. Guys who dress in that order are experienced. They know better than to hop around naked in their socks.
He calls himself Jack when he rings to book, but she knows it's not his real name. She never lets any of them tell her their real names. She doesn't care what he's called. It's not important. But she thinks of him as the guy with the gorgeous long-lashed eyes.
He is sitting, bent forward on the bed, knotting the laces on his trainers.
She reaches out and touches his arm. 'Thanks for coming.'
He looks round at her and grins. 'Thanks for having me.'
She grins back. She has slipped into this ritual of talk with him. She has other rituals with other guys and it's curious, the way it happens – the way it's so easy to do the little jokes and phrases with different 'regs', making it seem, just in that bit of time in the Love Nest, that they're real lovers. Partners. Couples who go to the cinema and have meals together and hold hands and dream.
'Can I ask a question?' This isn't part of the normal 'real lovers' game. Questions are taboo – but this guy has been five times now, and she doesn't understand why. It's not like that with all of them – sometimes she can see exactly why – but not him. She leans back on the bed, her head on the pillow. 'Why DO you come? Come here at all, I mean? You're gorgeous. You must get loads of offers.'
She wonders, as she says this, whether she's just talking herself out of a slice of next week's takings. She could offend him. She might be forcing him into a really uncomfortable spot.
He starts working his jaw, chewing at the inside of his mouth, and she can see he is struggling.
'I'm so sorry. If you don't want to . . . ' she begins.
But he shakes his head. 'It's because you feel safe,' he blurts at last, and his beautiful long-lashed eyes look sad.
'Safe?' She had expected exciting, daring, risky, naughty. Never 'safe'. 'I don't get you?'
'With you . . . ' He seems to be picking through words. '. . .with you, it won't go wrong.'
'What won't go wrong?'
'Girlfriends. Being in relationships. Heavy things like that go wrong.' He stands up abruptly. 'That's why.'
She stands with him and lets him hug her – they are back in their 'lovers' game now. She wonders who it was that hurt him so much. She can't imagine it, can't imagine feeling things like that. Surely he doesn't have to get involved – he could just run before anyone gets too close? 'I'm sorry,' she whispers, pressing her head against his chest. 'Sorry that someone gave you a crap time.'
He hugs her tighter – a real crushing embrace. 'Thanks for caring,' he whispers.
She draws away slightly, smiling up at him. 'I haven't put you off me, have I?' Opening the door, she herds him out, following him downstairs as she talks. 'You didn't mind me asking?'
'I'll be back next week,' he gives her one last hug in the hall, kissing the top of her head. 'Promise.'
She waves and blows a kiss as he heads down the path. She's not sure if he's got a car or not – a lot of the guys choose not to park anywhere near the house – and she watches as he crosses the road and walks briskly away. She thinks, as she finally steps back inside, that it's a criminal waste to let yourself get hooked into one person – especially someone who is going to hurt you.
'Alix?' Fern appears in the hallway.
Alix turns to her. Fern has that silly wide-eyed face on, like a kid opening Christmas presents. 'Everything OK?'
'There's been a phone call – from your mum's boyfriend. Carlos.'
'What did he want?' Alix grows cold. She wants to push past Fern and get a drink or check her email or watch telly or order in pizza. She wants to do anything rather than hear what it is that is making Fern shine out a smile like someone who's about to tell her she's won the lottery. 'It's your mum. She's had the baby. Carlos wants you to ring him back.'
* * *
They meet on the same scraggy bit of beach a week later.
Courtney is scared, remembering how golden he had seemed. How much she's thought and thought and thought about him all week. Elroy. They'd swapped names and held hands in the Bluebird café.
What if she's got it wrong? Built him up? Dreamed him?
But when she sees him, sitting waiting on the bench, her knees almost physically give way. 'Hi.'
'You came.' He seems stupidly pleased, as if he is almost bewildered by it – by the fact that she has bothered. 'What d'you want to do?'
She shrugs, stands smiling at him, as stupidly pleased as he is. 'Anything really.'
And anything is really what she means. Being with him is like being in a sort of magical other world, away from everyone and everything else.
He stands up and hugs her, and although she doesn't want to, she feels herself shrink slightly. Straight away he loosens the grip, as if he can sense that she's panicking.
'Come on then, let's go down here. Find a little piece of peace.' His fingers twine through hers as he leads her onto the scraggy bit of beach. As they reach the shingle his arm slips round her shoulders, but it's a light touch and she manages to stay calm. To behave like someone who is normal.
'We'll just sit here for a while, down beside the sea wall. Keep out of the wind.' He isn't trying to kiss her or grope her and even the way he holds her has a sense of quiet about it. It is as if there is no need to hurry anything. It is as if he knows she might need time, and space.
He slips off his jacket and lays it on the shingle. 'My lady. Be seated.'
'You'll get cold,' she tries to protest. 'The wind's still batting in, even down here.'
'Sit!' He makes his voice mock stern but he can't keep the smile from his eyes and the look he is giving her is so sweet and so tender that she is suddenly overwhelmed by the whole idea of him, and she has to turn away. 'OK,' she says, trying to stop her voice from wobbling. 'I'll sit.'
She edges as far along the jacket as she can – making a place for him – but she sits upright, hugging her knees. He drops down next to her, his own legs stretched out and relaxed. She can feel the pressure of his thigh against hers, a warmth washing out from him. She wants to relax, to rest her head against his shoulder. She wants him to hold her hand again.
'It's a magic place here, isn't it? Brings you closer to your soul,' he says.
Courtney tries to imagine being close to her soul, but nothing will come. She's not sure that she's got one.
The sea swills in, then rolls out again.
The sky is gunmetal. A few gulls circle and call. A boat dips and bobs. The sun pours out rays from behind the grey clouds, and they stretch to touch the horizon like beams in a child's painting.
'This stone . . . ' Elroy has run his fingers through the pebbles and lifted one out, holding it in front of her. '. . . it looks boring at first, doesn't it? But look at the colours. The tiny speckles, splattered like ink blots. That little knot there – just on the side. I could get lost in it – just looking at it. Stones are amazing.'
Courtney takes the stone from him, holds it on her palm. She can't see what he can see. She can't make it be amazing.
She looks up at him, wondering if she should pretend, but he touches her cheek and the brush of his fingers is electric and his eyes are touched with warmth and honesty and everything pure and she knows that she never wants to pretend about anything to him. Not even about stones.
And that, she thinks, is amazing enough for her.
* * *
THE VILLA SPRAWLS on the side of a hill. It is painted wh
ite. Vibrant pink flowers splash colour across the garden. Alix doesn't want to admit it, but it all looks fantastic.
'I take your bags. You go on in.' Carlos, who put her in the back of his black Mercedes for the journey from the airport, and who spent the drive talking in Italian on his mobile phone, leaves her at the front door. It springs open before Alix gets the chance to knock and Mum is suddenly there underneath the arch, hugging her and chattering about how wonderful it is that she's come and how Aaron arrived on the late flight last night.
Alix can't feel the hug and she doesn't return it, but she kisses the air beside Mum's cheek and hopes that will do.
Mum's hair has grown and she's wearing it loose, which Alix thinks ages her – and she's put on weight. Alix is scratched by the idea of Mum gaining weight like this. So what if she's just given birth? She doesn't have to let herself go.
The baby isn't in evidence.
'Where is she? I can't wait to see her.' Alix takes in the cool elegant living space with its polished wood floor and engraved, elaborate furniture. She wants to get this first introduction over with. She's already practised what she's going to say. Oh, isn't she beautiful. Congratulations. Look at her tiny hands.
Although she won't be beautiful, of course.
She'll be old walnut wizened and scrunched, the way newborn babies always are.
'She's upstairs, but she's due to wake. Don't you want a drink first? Or a look round.'
'No. Honestly.' Get it over with. Get it over with.
'Come on, then.' Mum beams a smile at her. 'I can't wait for you to see my little Carla.'
Alix follows Mum, who walks painfully up the polished wood stairs to the landing. Apparently it was a difficult birth, but Alix switched off when she was force-fed with all the details. 'In here,' Mum whispers, pushing open a dark oak door.
Alix expects Mum to go bustling in, scooping up My Little Carla and oohing and aaaahing and making irritating coochy coochy noises.