Just Between Us (18 page)

She belonged with him, and nothing, not even the vast differences in their backgrounds, would keep them apart. She was intelligent and spirited, she could learn how to live in this new world, a world far removed from her hard-working background. Money was the only difference. Money and the insulation it brought.

Despite her fears, she’d managed to fit in. The people she’d met all thought she was one of them. Only Adele had looked at her with dislike. Well, she could handle Adele. With her darling Hugh by her side, Rose could handle anything…

‘Is everything all right, ladies?’ asked the waiter.

Rose looked up at him, abruptly wrenched from memories of her nineteen-year-old self. ‘Fine,’ she said. ‘Everything’s fine.’

‘We could do with more tea,’ Adele pointed out. She looked at her sister-in-law for confirmation.

Poor old Adele, Rose thought with a rush of pity. Adele had grown up thinking she had a wonderful, gilded life ahead of her, yet somehow, this fairytale existence hadn’t materialised. No retinue of suitors had lined up to marry the self-satisfied Miss Miller. Colin had been the only one who’d been interested and Adele, in her hubris, had seen him off. Now, she was lonely and disappointed because the promise of a lovely life hadn’t been fulfilled.

All those years ago, Rose had imagined that her disapproving sister-in-law would be the only fly in the ointment. If only Rose had known then that Adele was harmless and unhappy, and that Hugh was perfectly capable of being the fly all by himself.

Kenny had control of the yoga book. He sat on Holly’s couch like a sultan, reading slowly and ordering his subjects with princely brusqueness. It was a cold Sunday afternoon in February and the residents of Windmill Terrace were bored and trying to amuse themselves. To cheer them all up, Holly had suggested trying out her Christmas present from Stella. As Stella was always so calm thanks to her yoga, Holly asked her to recommend a book for novices. Stella had said classes were the way to go for a beginner but had given her a book anyway. After a while spent attempting to work out the moves from the book, Holly reckoned that only a very patient expert could teach her and Joan.

‘Now, when you’ve faced your right leg, inhale and extend your left arm over your head. Reach up and…’ Kenny quickly flicked to the next page, ‘oh yes, don’t let your head drop. You’re supposed to be one fluid line. Now,
bend
forward from your hips.’

Holly and Joan, barefoot and clad in sweatpants and sloppy sweatshirts, did their best to bend.

‘And twist,’ Kenny added as an afterthought.

‘Twist?’ shrieked Joan as she reached the point of no return. ‘This can’t be good for you.’

‘Bend
more
,’ ordered Kenny. ‘Your left hand is supposed to reach the floor.’

‘I thought it was up above my head?’ Joan was getting cross now as she tried to swap arms.

‘Can we breathe?’ gasped Holly.

‘You’re a right pair of morons,’ said Kenny, irritated. ‘I told you how to do the breathing in the first place. That’s the most important bit of yoga.’

‘Show me the book.’ Joan hauled herself up off the floor and grabbed the book from Kenny. ‘Look,’ she said with indignation. ‘It says if you’re a beginner, you can use a block to rest your hand on in case you can’t reach the floor.’

‘As the only block round here is in your head,’ retorted Kenny, ‘I didn’t see the point of mentioning it.’

‘Can I move now?’ Holly was still touching the floor and it was getting very painful. Her leg muscles were on fire and there was a possibility she might collapse.

‘Yeah,’ said both Kenny and Joan, who were fighting for possession of the book.

‘But how?’ yelped Holly, just before she fell. The wooden sitting room floor, even with its covering of rag rugs, wasn’t much use for cushioning a person after a fall. She rubbed her wrist which ached from unaccustomed effort before examining her right knee, which would probably bruise. ‘So much for
Yoga: Starting Out Guide to Inner Peace.’

‘It’s Stella’s fault. She gave you the book,’ Joan accused.

‘I think she thought I’d just look at the pictures, not actually do any of it,’ grumbled Holly. ‘Gimme a look at that position.’

‘Why bother,’ said Joan. ‘We’ve done ten minutes and it hurts. How can that contribute to inner peace? And Kenny hasn’t done anything except order us around.’

‘I am already in a state of inner peace,’ Kenny said smugly and crossed his legs into an approximation of the lotus position to show them. ‘I don’t need yoga.’

‘You wouldn’t know inner peace if it bit you,’ snapped Joan. ‘You’re just pleased because that man chatted you up last night. He wasn’t really interested, he preferred me!’

‘We were in a gay bar,’ shot back Kenny. ‘Why would he be interested in you?’

‘Maybe he was bi,’ Joan said grumpily.

‘Or tri,’ suggested Kenny evilly. ‘Try anything.’

Holly smothered a grin. When Kenny and Joan fought they were like a comedy double act. There was no malice in it: squabbling was like conversation to them and they’d have been astonished if a third party thought they actually meant any harm by their snappy little remarks.

Still grumpy, Joan got up off the couch and marched into Holly’s kitchenette where she began opening cupboards in search of chocolate.

It was too cold to dream of venturing outside for a walk and too early in the day to retire to the pub. Holly had got up late that morning and had thrown on scabby grey tracksuit bottoms, a faded navy fleece and yesterday’s socks to amble down to the shop for the papers. Once home, she’d flopped on the couch with tea, toast and all the delicious Sunday supplements. She hadn’t showered, washed her hair or even put on so much as lip balm. It was that sort of day.

Bored, and arguing like a pair of old tabby cats, Kenny and Joan had arrived just after two, with their newspapers, a family pack of cheese and onion crisps, and a dispute in full flood about whose go it was to wash up.

Kenny, who was as meticulous about washing up as he was about laundry, insisted that he was fed up doing the saucepans when it was Joan’s turn. Joan, who thought that saucepans only needed a cursory blast under the tap, argued that she
did
the saucepans and that it was a question of semantics over what constituted washing them correctly.

‘If we got a dog, we wouldn’t have to scrub dishes at all because it would lick the worst engrained bits off,’ Joan remarked, knowing that squeamish Kenny would blanch at the very notion.

‘If we put food in the shower, would the dog lick that too?’ demanded Kenny, ‘because
you
never clean it.’

‘You’re turning into your mother,’ Joan said crossly.

‘I am not,’ said Kenny. ‘Am I, Holly?’

‘Don’t look at me,’ she said. ‘I’m not today’s referee.’

‘I suppose I wouldn’t mind turning into my mother,’ Kenny said thoughtfully. ‘She is amazing, really.’ Kenny’s mother was a stylish widow who worked part-time in an art gallery and enjoyed a non-stop social life.

‘I’ve never met anyone like you,’ groaned Joan. ‘Yourself and your mother have this deranged mutual appreciation society going. That’s what’s wrong with you – your mother spent your whole life telling you you’re wonderful.’

Kenny smirked at her. ‘That’s ’cos I am,’ he said sweetly.

‘You’re very lucky,’ said Holly softly.

When all the papers and the crisps had been digested, the boredom and the arguments got worse. There was no joy to be had in watching the soap omnibus because they’d seen all the soaps during the week in the first place.

‘I hate Sunday afternoons,’ Joan said, when she discovered that there wasn’t a sliver of chocolate left anywhere. ‘The weekend is almost over and all that’s left is miserable old Sunday night and getting up in the morning.’

‘We could go for a walk,’ suggested Holly.

‘And freeze?’ said Kenny in outrage. ‘Are you mad? If God had meant us to walk in cold weather, he’d have given us fur.’

‘I’d never use fur in any of my collections,’ Joan said thoughtfully. ‘It’s cruelty to animals.’

‘You made a leather top last month,’ Kenny pointed out.

‘That was vintage lace with beading and one teeny piece of leather in it,’ snapped Joan.

Holly closed her eyes and wished that something would happen to shut them both up. As if on cue, there was an almighty bang outside the door, a hippo-falling-down-the-stairs sort of noise.

The three of them leapt to their feet and ran to investigate.

Kenny wrenched open Holly’s door to find three large suitcases and a broken packing case sitting outside, clearly having fallen down the stairs from the upper landing. The suitcases were intact but the packing case had disgorged its
filling all over the hall. There was no sign of whoever owned the cases. Kenny leaned over the staircase and looked downstairs. There was nobody there.

‘It must be someone new moving in upstairs,’ he decided.

‘I hope they’re nicer than that mad woman who lived up there before,’ Joan said, poking around at the packing case to see if she could find anything to identify the owner. ‘She was always complaining about my music.’

As Joan’s idea of music was club played at tinnitus-inducing volume, Holly could sympathise with the previous upstairs tenant.

‘Lots of black clothes,’ Holly commented, eyeing the clothes peeking out from the case, ‘which means the owner is definitely a woman.’

Both Kenny and Joan groaned.

‘Just our luck,’ sighed Kenny. ‘Why can’t anyone gorgeous and male move in?’

Joan pulled out a sweater from the broken case.

‘Joan,
don’t
,’ hissed Holly. ‘You can’t go through someone else’s things!’

‘It could have fallen out. Wow, definitely a man!’ said Joan, holding up an enormous man’s sweater.

‘Big man,’ said Kenny delightedly.

‘Big but not smart enough to stop all his belongings from falling down the stairs,’ said a voice.

Holly and Joan jumped guiltily.

A man in his late twenties ambled down the stairs towards them. He had strawberry-blond hair cut very short, a friendly open face with a sprinkling of freckles, long, rueful eyes and enormous shoulders. His mouth was creased up into a huge grin, yet there was something shy about his gaze. He looked, Holly thought, like one of those big, solid men normally found in rugby strip about to run out onto a pitch and thunder into other big, solid men. She could imagine him as a schoolboy sports star, a bit of a hero to younger boys.

‘Hello,’ said Joan eagerly. ‘Are you moving in?’

She and Kenny were both standing to attention: Joan, biting her lips to bring some colour into them, Kenny adopting his model pose of standing slightly sideways to show off his toned physique. Holly, conscious that she looked like a well-fed vagrant in her baggy, horrible old sweat gear and unwashed hair, didn’t bother doing anything.

‘Yes, Tom Barry,’ the giant said, holding out a huge hand to shake.

Up close, he was even bigger, the sort of bloke who’d be useful in a bash-down-a-locked-door situation. But Holly decided he looked too kind and gentle to bash into anything.

‘Joan Atwood.’

‘And Kenny Erskine.’

Joan and Kenny introduced themselves enthusiastically.

‘Nice to meet you,’ Tom said.

‘This is Holly Miller,’ said Kenny, realising that Holly was lurking behind them and being her usual shy self.

Holly, however, was mortally embarrassed at the thought of her unwashed hair. She must look positively rank today.

‘Hi,’ she said, giving him a little wave from behind the other pair.

‘Holly lives here,’ said Kenny, ‘and Joan and I live opposite.’

‘Not,’ added Joan quickly, ‘that we’re a couple.’

‘Hell, no,’ said Kenny, even more quickly. ‘Friends, that’s all.’

‘Friends,’ nodded Joan.

Tom said nothing but smiled down at them all. Holly noticed that his eyes were the colour of faded denim with little yellowy flecks around the irises.

‘Is that a Cork accent?’ Kenny said in a tone that Holly recognised as coquettish.

Tom nodded.

A man of few words, Holly thought.

‘I’m from Clonakilty originally but I’ve been living in Cork city for years.’

‘Ooh, really.’ Kenny and Joan looked riveted, as if Tom
had said he’d just arrived in a space ship from another solar system instead of from the other side of the country.

‘And you’re here to work?’ inquired Joan.

‘I’ve just moved from Cork,’ Tom said. ‘I’ve got a new job here.’

‘Doing what?’

Holly groaned inwardly. They’d be asking him his inside leg measurement next.

‘I’m an architect.’

Holly could see Joan standing up straighter with glee. Joan had recently amused herself making a list of her top ten professions for prospective boyfriends. Architects were in the top ten. ‘Creative but manly,’ said Joan. Firemen were currently top of the list.

‘What sort of stuff?’ Kenny asked.

‘Guys, stop with the third degree,’ Holly reprimanded them.

‘Sorry,’ said Joan. ‘Just curious. We must bring you out for a welcoming drink. We do that for all the residents, don’t we?’

‘Definitely,’ agreed Kenny. ‘We were just going out to the pub now, in fact. Can you come?’

‘Afraid not.’ Tom looked genuinely sorry. ‘I have a friend coming with the van and the rest of my stuff. But the next time, I’d love to go out for a pint.’

‘Goody,’ Kenny said.

‘Well, bye,’ Joan added.

As it looked as if they could stand gawping up at Tom for hours, Holly said a cheery ‘goodbye’ and dragged the other pair back through her door.

‘What a big honey monster,’ crooned Kenny. ‘I love those big, butch types.’

‘Me too,’ sighed Joan. ‘Which one of us was he looking at? Do you think he’s gay?’

‘He could be gay, I don’t know,’ said Kenny. ‘There isn’t a secret handshake, you know, and it’s not always that simple to tell, despite what they say about gaydar. He could
be big and butch gay. We really need to have a look in his CD collection. One Barbra Streisand album and I’ll know for sure.’

Holly didn’t take part in the conversation as she was in the bathroom looking in horror at her greasy, pale face and her greasy, dark hair. Imagine what that guy must have thought when he saw her? She hadn’t even had a shower. Just because Sunday was a slobbing around day, didn’t mean she had to actually be a slob.

‘I am a mess,’ she said in disgust, as she wandered back into the living room. ‘From now on, I am not leaving this flat unless I have full make-up and decent clothes on. I am going to start a new life of being beautifully groomed.’

‘You didn’t really leave the flat,’ Joan reminded her.

‘Even in the flat, then,’ Holly said grimly, ‘I am going to be beautifully groomed, right!’

‘Whatever,’ chorused Joan and Kenny and went back to discussing their new neighbour.

Holly shut the bathroom door and turned on the shower so it would warm up. As she stripped off her skuzzy clothes, she cast around for her ideal woman. Stella and her mother always looked immaculate, which made it difficult when Holly went to Kinvarra for increasingly rare weekends. Used to wearing her oldest clothes around the house until it was time to go out, Holly felt she had to make an effort when she was visiting her parents. Not that Rose ever said a word, but Holly was convinced she could feel the faintest glimmer of disapproval emanating from her mother when she appeared in her elderly sweatpants and all-encompassing sweatshirt.

Tara, who favoured jeans and T-shirts for casual wear, said that Holly was imagining it. ‘Mum doesn’t care what you wear, Holls,’ Tara insisted. ‘She’s just thrilled to see you. Since you started working in Lee’s, you never seem to have time to visit Kinvarra. You could turn up in your birthday suit with a line of tattoos down your back, and Mum and Dad would be delighted.’