When Good Friends Go Bad (8 page)

Jen's head swirled, blood pounding in her ears, unable to make sense of the words Starkey was saying, or appreciate the apologetic glances Georgina was casting in her direction, as she picked up the American Express card that had fallen from Jen's numb fingers. Starkey had let go of her but she could still smell his aftershave, still feel his fingers on her arm, his traitorous kiss on her cheek. Georgina looked appalled and abashed, as well she might, the bitch, so close to getting away without Jen discovering her secret.

Meg was already sinking back into her chair, her eyes flitting from one to the other, relishing the drama. She knew. Jen was certain. She'd been too quick to recognise him, surprised but not surprised enough. But how?

Of course. Babs Pitstop. Blabberchops Babs, their old classmate who'd met Meg at Waterloo and filled her in about Georgina. It would explain some of the sly digs Meg had made tonight about Georgina's marriage.

But then why hadn't Meg warned Jen? Why hadn't she come right out and told her? Instead of asking, treacherously,
if she ever heard from him?

Because, the answer came to her, Meg's mischievous streak had always enjoyed scenes like this. But not at the expense of her best friends, Jen had always thought her better than that. Perhaps Jen wasn't doing her justice, perhaps Meg had been looking for the right way to tell her and then Georgina had arrived and, well, what seems significant and highly crucial to one person doesn't necessarily seem . . .

Traitors, she thought bitterly. They were both traitors.

Starkey's hands had dropped by his sides, his eyes concerned as Meg leaned across the table and shook Jen's arm. 'Are you OK?'

'Jennifer, darling,' Georgina's voice cracked. 'I meant to tell you . . . I wanted to . . .'

'Too bad you didn't follow through,' Starkey said, slipping into the seat beside Jen. 'At least one of us would have been prepared.' His voice was wry and deeper than she remembered. 'Sorry.' This was to Jen and he sounded genuine, she hoped. 'This wasn't planned.'

With difficulty she forced herself to focus. Somehow she was back in her seat, staring at the crumpled napkin in her hand, with Meg, Georgina and Starkey all gazing at her with expressions of varying concern.

'Why couldn't you have waited in the car?' Georgina sounded accusing and almost tearful. 'I told you I'd be right out.'

'I guess I didn't feel like hanging out like some lackey while you dragged out your business meeting.'

'I did not say
business,
Aiden.' She was the only one still standing, ready to bolt. 'You never
ever
listen.'

'I reckon I'd remember if you mentioned these particular guests.' He stretched out his long legs, giving Jen a wry humourless smile with so much history behind it she almost threw up. 'You all right?'

'I'm fine.' Her voice caught and she forced it to behave. 'Why wouldn't I be?'

'Cos you bear an uncanny resemblance to Casper the Friendly Ghost,' Meg suggested. 'Doesn't she, Starkey?'

'No shit.' He looked up at Georgina, dark hair falling over his forehead. 'Guess you kinda forgot to mention our
marital bliss?'
The last two words were drawled with heavy irony.

'Amazingly enough your name didn't come up,' Georgina said sharply. 'We had far better things to talk about,' she added, but her eyes when she stared at Jen were miserable with guilt. 'Should we get you some brandy?'

'No. There's truly nothing wrong with me.' The last thing she wanted was all this concern. 'It's just low blood pressure.' Digging her nails into her palms, Jen forced herself to regain control, when every fibre of her being wanted to jump up screaming; to slap the silly pseudo-sympathetic expression off Meg's face; to kick Starkey in the nuts; to smash the wine bottle over Georgina's head and overturn the table like a petulant teenager. Instead she calmly explained, 'I've had a couple of dizzy spells the last few days. Not been myself.'

'Well, then . . .' Georgina wrung her hands, looking suddenly helpless. 'Perhaps we should go.'

'And perhaps not.' Starkey settled in his chair, his elbow resting on the table. 'I for one would like some coffee. This is turning out to be a helluva night.' He said it softly.

Painfully aware of his presence, so close beside her, Jen was afraid to look up for fear of what she'd see in his eyes.

'I'll get the waiter, shall I?' Meg seemed energised suddenly.

'No, you go, Aiden,' Georgina commanded sharply as she pulled a chair out and sat back down. 'And bring us all some water too. Jennifer and I need a minute to talk.'

We've nothing to say. I'm going to bed.
Jen tried to force her frozen lips to form the words, but they refused to come, and Starkey was already getting up.

'Yes, your majesty.' He gave an ironic 'see what I have to put up with' bow, that suggested acquiescence only because he felt like it. Taking his own sweet time, he strolled towards the bar, the familiar slouching walk that Jen had forgotten but now seemed emblazoned on her memory as his personal trademark. He was tall, at least three inches taller than Ollie. Tonight he was wearing jeans, pointed leather boots and what looked like a battered air force jacket, much used and possibly authentic.

Well, of course, the long black coat, the twin of her own, had probably been relegated to the Salvation Army years ago. God, how she'd loved that coat. Striding around Ashport in it, all he'd have needed was a black cowboy hat to look like the silent mysterious hero of a spaghetti Western. She'd even loved how it smelt, a mixture of tobacco, grass and Starkey's own personal warm earthy odour.

How many freezing evenings had he buried their linked hands in its roomy pockets or drawn it around them both as they'd snogged at the bus stop, often letting three buses go by because they didn't want the moment to end? Soft romantic kisses. Wild passionate ones. Starkey used to joke they might as well have their lips permanently welded together. Jen had needed constant applications of lip balm to stop her lips turning into Brillo pads.

But what was the use in remembering all that? He was no Western hero, just the lying cheating sod who'd slouched back in the picture as the father of her so-called friend's unborn child. Nothing could be more final than that.

Their impasse was eventually broken by a booming voice.

'My dahling, I've been admiring that stunning wrap of yours all evening. And that
wonderful
outfit. I simply have to know – wherever did you get it? Who is the designer? I insist you tell me his name forthwith!'

Lady Bracknell herself, Bella Stringent, had launched herself upon them like a thirties ocean liner, all waving flags and popping champagne corks. She grabbed Georgina's hand with her own jewel-encrusted manicured one, giant rings flashing under the chandelier.

For a minute they were all dumbstruck.

Behind Bella arrived her small, sandy-haired, pudgy companion, a cheerful little tugboat to her
Titanic,
holding out his hand to introduce himself.

'Irwin Beidlebaum,' he announced. His accent was thick, his intelligent eyes and energy broadcasting the very essence of a New York Jew. 'Hope we're not intruding.'

Meg gasped, tossing her luxuriant red hair and all but launching herself from her seat in her haste to be first to shake the sacred mitt. 'Not
the
Irwin Beidlebaum?' she said in her most kittenish voice. If he'd worn a ring, she'd probably have knelt down and kissed it.

'I expect so,' he said modestly, pulling chairs from the next table for himself and Bella Stringent.

It was all too much for Jen. She could see Starkey walking back across the room, carrying a tray of glasses.

'Excuse me,' she said politely, staggering to her feet. And then ran to the door labelled Damsel to throw up.

She was in there a long, long time. After she'd vomited her entire stomach contents, all that expensive food expelled in sharp, compulsive heaves, she'd rested on the toilet, head in her hands, wanting more than anything in the world not to have to go back out.

Luckily the small though elegantly decorated room had only one cubicle and a lock on the outer door. There was no risk of intrusion when she got up and splashed water over her face, staring bleakly at the dead-eyed, white-faced ghost in the mirror.

What had he seen when he looked at her? The girl he'd first met, the scruffy tomboy who'd played football with her dad? The smitten teenager who'd do anything to impress him? Or Jen, the disillusioned adult, no longer believing the world was an Aladdin's cave of miracles and delights?

As the tap continued to gush unheeded, she remembered how joyfully she'd tried to look sexy for him when they'd started dating. Loose sweatshirts with the neck torn out, drooping to reveal one naked shoulder. Her Saturday job earnings had paid for a tiny leather skirt and a long studded belt that went around her waist twice, fishnet stockings, shortie boots. In the Oxfam shop she'd rooted out a fake leopard-skin handbag, a thigh-skimming petticoat dress, the perfect accoutrements of a teenage girl just discovering her sexual power over men.

She shivered at the thought, resting her forehead on the cold mirror. Her dad always said she was asking for trouble dressing like that and she'd dismissed him as quaintly outdated. 'Men only want one thing' was his litany, said with mild regret for the failings of his own sex. 'I know, I was a lad myself once,' he'd nod soberly as she struggled to imagine him ever being a teenager, chatting up the girls with a Brylcreemed ducktail quiff and pointy winklepicker shoes.

'Look at her, Gordon,' he said once when his old friend, the smiling round-faced foreman of the factory, had stopped by with a bottle of Johnnie Walker. 'She says they all dress like that these days. Her mother would be rolling in her grave if she could see the length of that frock.'

Her father's boss, Mr Gordon Farber, had given her a greasy ingratiating grin. 'Ah well, Derek, old lad, I think you got off easy. At least there's no tattoos or body piercings that I can see, at any rate.'

Her stomach rolled again and she rushed for the toilet, heaving up nothing but bile.

How old and out of touch she'd thought her dad. Almost as bad as Rowan's mum with her favourite oft-recited warnings: 'No man wants to marry soiled goods' and 'They won't buy the cow if they can get the milk for free'. How the four friends had fallen about hysterically as soon as she was out of earshot. Once, when Rowan had left the room, Meg had retorted, 'Yeah, and why stick with a frigid bitch when her milk of human kindness curdled in the udder? No wonder her old man legged it.'

Yet after Starkey's abandonment, all communication cut off as cruelly as if she were a creditor chasing down unpaid bills, Jen had a new insight on Mrs Howard. Left to cope alone, why wouldn't she go insane with grief? Jen herself was almost suicidal after the treachery and awfulness that had befallen her. For long lonely years she'd worn her misery like widow's weeds, black sackcloth accessorised by an invisible force field that shrieked 'keep off'. Should anyone dare approach, a lacerating tongue eviscerated their pathetic chat-up lines.

These days, despite Helen's urging to smarten up, she mostly stuck with jeans and trainers and maybe a nice, not too revealing top. If a man needed to see skin to find her attractive, the hell with him.

Ollie loved her grungy look, he was always telling her so. She tried to focus on Ollie, using him as a beacon to keep the shadows at bay. He wanted to understand her, and he'd been patiently and gradually dismantling the emotional defences she'd spent years building up. But there was no avoiding it, was there? One glimpse of Starkey and it had all come rushing back.

When she came out of the toilet, Meg was waiting in the hall, reapplying her lipstick in the reflection of the round brass doorknob. 'Are you all right? Everyone's worried about you.' She straightened up and squeezed Jen affectionately, ignoring her rigid posture. 'We're in the bar, they're closing the dining room. Here,' she pulled a small bottle out of her fringed bag. 'Rescue Remedy. Put a few drops on your tongue. It's good for emergencies.'

Like a zombie Jen obeyed, tasting only a slight brandy sting. Meg kept up the chatter as she led the way.

'Bella Stringent asked Georgina to design her an outfit for the Tony awards, can you believe it? Next stop, the Oscars! She's up for one, you know.' Her eyes sparkled. 'And Irwin Beidlebaum's a pussycat. I told him I'm an actress. He said next time I'm in something, he might stop by.'

'I'll bet he did.' Jen couldn't help but sound sour, the taste of vomit lingering in her throat despite drinking gallons of tap water. 'Who is this Beetlebum anyway?'

'Hey, where have you been, man?' Meg looked as if Jen had said she'd never heard of Tom Cruise. 'He's only the dude who puts on all those massive musical productions. Mega-big shot. Ultra-megabucks. Hell, the
New York Times
called him the guy who saved Broadway.'

Who bloody cares?
Jen wanted to screech. Meg could have been talking Swahili for all her poor beleaguered brain was taking in. 'I thought that was Andrew Lloyd Webber?' she managed.

'Yes, well,
Phantom
was OK,' Meg said dismissively, 'but take it from me, Beetlebum – I mean Beidlebaum's the man. And he thinks he might know my godfather.'

'The schlock horror producer? Fantastic!' Her attempt to mirror Meg's enthusiasm failed. She could visibly see the bumpy return to earth as Meg scanned her face.

'Oh honey, tell me you're not
too
bent out of shape about Starkey and old Georgie-Porgie? I'd never have thought he'd go for her, not in a million years.' Meg stretched a python arm around Jen's neck and affectionately squeezed. 'You were always way too good for that dude. I know you were crazy about him, like light years ago, but this guy you're dating now sounds way more cool. Don't take this wrong but I always thought Starkey was kind of a jerk.'

Because he picked me over you, you mean?
It was on the tip of her tongue, but Jen held back. It had been tough when her romance with Starkey had caused a rift in the foursome like the San Andreas fault, not immediately visible but it shook their world.

Meg was so crazy jealous that before long she'd even abandoned Rowan.

In a matter of weeks Meg had been sucked into a wilder, more popular crowd, the cool kids who smoked openly in the playground, broke half the school rules, flirted with or cheeked the teaching staff, yet somehow escaped detention. They were the absolute bane of the games mistress, sauntering in at the end of a cross-country run, swigging cans of Coke from a definitely unauthorised stopover at the local sweet shop.

Georgina and Rowan blamed Jen, she just knew it. And looking back she could understand why. Who would have believed that love could be so consuming, so joyful a torment as to make you throw away everything that had once ruled your life? Horses? Forgotten. Friendships? Unimportant. All she wanted was Starkey.

Jen Starkson was scrawled over every one of her textbooks, decorated with hearts and arrows. And when the bell rang, she was on her bike to see him, cycling as fast as her skinny legs could revolve. How bad that she'd turned into one of those godawful girls who discarded their mates at the first whiff of male pheromones.

Starkey had become the oxygen she needed to survive. When he was busy elsewhere she suffocated, unable to breathe, aching with loneliness and loss in the middle of Rowan and Georgina's chatter.

Upset? About Starkey and Georgina?
She saw Meg's curiosity, tinged perhaps with that most repulsive emotion of all – pity – and knew she had to make her getaway with a remnant of pride. She never could stand people feeling sorry for her or seeing her vulnerable side. Maybe it came of her mother dying when she was too young to remember her and the way grown-ups always treated her when they discovered the fact.

'Oh, puhleeze,' she pasted a huge smile on her face. 'You and Georgie are such drama queens. You actually think I've been crying into my pillow all these years over some spotty lout I had a crush on when I was virtually in nursery?'

Meg grinned appreciatively. 'I don't remember Starkey having spots.'

'That's because they were hidden where the sun don't shine,' Jen lied, shoving Meg with an elbow, a wicked grin playing across her lips.

'Oh ho, so you did get a look at it then?' Meg bumped her purposely with her shoulder. 'I always figured you for such a good little girlie.'

'Only compared with an old sleazebag like you.'

And pushing and shoving each other like fourteen-year-old lads, they lurched their way back across the bar to the others, the very epitome of high-spirited teasing to anyone looking across the room.

'This is Jennifer.' Meg introduced her to Irwin Beidlebaum and Bella Stringent, as she took the chair nearest the impresario, leaving Jen the space by Georgina. 'She's screwing a schoolboy with a schlong the length of the Empire State Building.'

'Lucky girl,' the Beetlebum approved, eyeing her up and down. 'And lucky man.'

They were all laughing but Jen felt a sharp twist of guilt. He'd been so wonderful with her. That first time they'd fallen into bed together, her knee swollen to the size of a balloon, she'd been so nervous and exhausted from the accident that they hadn't even had sex. They'd spent the ensuing nights just lying in each other's arms, talking, kissing, joking and clowning around until she'd finally relaxed and felt safe with him. And he'd proved the most incredible lover, thoughtful, caring and fantastically exciting. To have him reduced publicly to a mere appendage mortified her. And it was all her fault. Another unfunny joke in the worst possible taste notched up to Jen Big-Mouth Bedlow.

But Irwin Beidlebaum was laughing, tickled by the conversation, the bug-eyed pervert. And how neatly, with one quick quip, Meg had removed her as competition – as if she had remotely wanted to enter. Starkey had positively flinched, his eyes now downcast and glowering.

Penis envy. Meg was brilliant. Men were so predictable. It got to them every time. Wars had been fought over less than this.

'Meg's exaggerating, of course,' she said, winking coquettishly at the Beetlebum, her assumed boldness fuelled by wine, champagne and more wine, and inspired by her fury with Starkey, whose eyes were fastened on her like dark magnets. Meg wasn't the only one who could flirt. If he cared even an iota, she'd use it to make him suffer. 'There's nothing
schoolboy
about the guy.' She felt light-headed suddenly and somehow out of her body. She certainly sounded as if she were channelling Mae West.

'We were concerned you were unwell.' Bella Stringent fixed her with a piercing eye, her voice ringing as if declaiming to the balcony seats.

'Must have been something I ate.' Jen (or was it Mae?) met Bella's gaze head on, so she could avoid her eyes accidentally straying to Starkey or Georgina. Her world had just fallen apart all over again. Why should she be intimidated by fame or weight, however substantial? It was taking every ounce of her willpower just to sit there without fleeing, but she forced herself to summon an extra bout of Mae. 'Evidently the calamari didn't agree with me.'

'Can't abide seafood!' Bella Stringent bellowed. 'I outright refuse to touch prawns or mussels in any form. I detest them like the taxman. All bottom feeders you know.'

A few bar stools swivelled as the occupants turned to see who was making this interesting observation.

'And spotty bottoms at that,' Meg muttered, sotto voce. She and Jen locked eyes before Meg's flicked in Starkey's direction, and suddenly Jen could tell they were both suppressing an insane urge to giggle. Only a momentary spasm on Jen's part, the laugh of a maniac before he shoots himself in the head, but still . . .

Suddenly she felt a marginal release of the pressure that was stifling her lungs. Starkey looked morose, his earlier show of bonhomie completely evaporated. Was she so small-minded that it took him looking like a glowering thundercloud to make her feel ever so faintly mollified?

Apparently, yes. But it wasn't nearly enough.

'But you're all right?' Georgina finally piped up. Sounding relieved she reached for Jen's hand, resting next to her untouched cappuccino. Jen snatched it away as if a flamethrower had scorched her fingers. She had to quickly cover up by pretending a need to sneeze and fumbling for Kleenex in her handbag, but she could see Georgina wasn't fooled.

Well, and did she want her to be?

Shouldn't she also suffer for being a treacherous cow?

Meg perhaps had an excuse. She'd been in America when Georgina took up with Starkey. And if Babs
had
told her, maybe it was kindness that stopped her spilling the beans. Or perhaps she'd thought it should come from Georgina.

All those years of wishing she could see Starkey one more time, to find out what she longed to know: why he'd abandoned her, where he was now, what he was doing. So many sleepless nights, praying to God they'd stumble upon each other accidentally some day. And now she realised she hadn't really wanted to know. It would have been much better if he'd stayed a mystery, the fabulous boy she'd loved and lost.

Not the sodding bastard who'd shagged around with her best friend.

'But to go back to your work, darling.' Bella had wasted enough time on an unknown and was anxious to return to her own agenda. 'If you design this outfit for me, you'll get enormous exposure. The eyes and cameras of the world will be on your creation, the entire theatrical and film community descending on you. This is merely the tip of the iceberg, my dear. Georgina Giordani – designer to the stars.'

She sketched it in the air over their heads, marquee-size, of course, her flabby upper arms wobbling unmercifully. Meg put a hand up to cover her smirk, her thoughts obvious.
Put her in long sleeves, Georgie. Hide those turkey wings.

'I'm incredibly flattered.' Georgina sipped at her water, surprisingly reticent. 'It all sounds like a dream come true. And I would love to oblige. But my business has already grown faster than I could have anticipated. And with a new baby, I'm not even sure how I'd . . .'