Already planning what she’d wear tonight, Nuala scuttled happily over to the Angel. It was almost three o’clock and the pub would be closing for the afternoon. A group of customers was trailing back to the last remaining car in the car park. By the way they were waddling, Nuala guessed they’d had lunch followed by syrup sponge pudding and custard.
They were American tourists, she discovered, overhearing them as they passed her on the pavement.
‘What a double act, those two in there,’ drawled the taller of the males. ‘Like Lucy and Desi all over again.’
‘I thought she was going to brain the guy with an ashtray,’ said his wife. ‘Did you notice if they’re married?’
Stifling a smile, Nuala reached the entrance to the Angel. Just wait until she told Kate and Dexter what the Americans were saying about them. Pushing open the door, she entered the pub and exclaimed,
‘Hey, you two, you’ll never guess—’
That was as far as she got. The rest of the words died before they even reached Nuala’s mouth.
Behind the bar Dexter and Kate sprang guiltily apart, but there could be no mistaking what had been going on during those brief seconds before her arrival.
Nuala gaped. Kate and Dexter? Dexter and ... and Kate? It was unthinkable, like discovering that Jake had been carrying on a torrid affair with, crikey, Princess Anne. In fact, given Jake’s wicked track record, that was actually less unlikely than the scenario she’d just walked in on.
‘God, sorry,’ gasped Kate. ‘Nuala, I meant to—’
‘Lock the door?’ Nuala tilted her head enquiringly.
‘No. Well, yes ... I mean ...’ Kate stammered, her face the picture of guilt.
‘Hopeless.’ Dexter rolled his eyes. ‘Can you believe it? This is the girl who isn’t scared of anyone or anything, and look at her now.’
But incredibly, he was saying it in a good-natured rather than an irritated way.
Unable to resist it, Nuala said, ‘You jumped away from Kate pretty smartish.’
He nodded, acknowledging the dig with a wry smile. ‘OK, but it’s something you needed to know.
Kate was the one who didn’t want to upset you.’
‘Upset me?’ Nuala echoed in disbelief. ‘Upset me? Damn right I’m upset!’
Kate was looking even more distraught. Dexter put a protective arm round her. ‘Now you’re being unfair,’ he told Nuala. ‘It’s nothing to do with—’
‘Good grief, I’m not upset about you.’ Nuala pulled a face. ‘I’m upset because I’ve just arranged a girls’ night out for me, Maddy and Kate so we can go out and pull loads of men, but I don’t suppose Kate will want to come along now.’
‘On a manhunt? Poor sods,’ said Dexter. ‘Anyhow, Kate doesn’t need to any more. She’s got me.’
They actually looked like a proper couple. It took a bit of getting used to, but the more Nuala thought it through, the more sense it made.
‘I’m really sorry,’ Kate apologised again. ‘It happened acouple of days ago, took us both completely by surprise, talk about a bolt from the blue
‘It’s fine,’ said Nuala, ‘honestly. You don’t have to worry about me.’
Kate looked unconvinced. ‘But you seemed a bit put out just now.’
‘That’s because I thought the three of us could go out tonight and have a great time, then if Maddy got a bit, you know, mopey,’ Nuala pulled a Maddy-type face to demonstrate, ‘we could gang up on her and force her to cheer up. It’s OK, I can still manage it on my own,’ she said bravely.
‘It’s just going to take that bit more effort.’
‘Like climbing Everest with a motorbike strapped to your back,’ Dexter observed.
‘Thanks. That’s a great help.’ As she looked at him, Nuala realised she was well and truly cured. In all honesty, she and Dexter had been the most mismatched couple since that scary egg woman and John Major.
‘I’ll come with you,’ said Kate unexpectedly.
‘You will?’ Not that Maddy was that much of a liability, not really, but Nuala’s heart lifted as if it had been pumped full of helium.
‘If it’ll help.’ Kate was clearly eager to make up for having got together with the ex-boyfriend Nuala was more than happy to be rid of.
‘I’d rather you stayed here,’ Dexter complained. ‘You might get chatted up.’
Kate gave his cheek a consoling pat.
‘Don’t get stroppy. You don’t just drop your friends when you bag a man. Anyway, it’s my night off. I can go where I like.’
By the sound of it, Nuala was delighted to discover, Dexter had finally met his match.
‘You.’ He pointed a warning finger at Nuala. ‘Make sure she doesn’t get up to anything.’
Grinning, discovering that he no longer had the power to scare her, Nuala said chirpily, ‘You’d have to pay me loads of money to do that.’
Mustn’t be a killjoy, thought Maddy as they piled out of the taxi and headed across the road to Trash. Mustn’t, mustn’t be a killjoy, going to have masses of fun, drink loads, chat up heaps of men and not even think about Ke— thingy, the one I’m not even going to think about.
Easier said than done, maybe, but she owed it to Nuala and Kate. And to herself. So she couldn’t have the man she wanted. So what? Compared with war and famine it was a pretty unimportant reason to go around with a face like, well, the face she’d been going around with for the last fortnight.
Trash was a new club in the centre of Bath, hugely popular and a bit trendier than Maddy was truly comfortable with, but Nuala had been longing to come here for ages, ever since reading in a magazine that it was where the city’s movers and shakers went. Nuala, Maddy suspected, was under the impression that this meant everyone would be leaping around, dancing with abandon to Las Ketchup.
Oh well, if she had to join in, she would.
‘Cheers,’ said Kate, clanking glasses and blissfully unselfconscious of her scars. ‘I still can’t believe everything that’s happened. This morning I was the tragic victim of a hopelessly broken home. Now Mum’s back, and she and my father are giving it another go. When I left the house they were being so lovey-dovey together it’d make you sick.’
‘Cheers.’ Maddy, who could clank with the best of them, said, ‘Good for your mum and dad.’
‘It may be good for them, canoodling away like teenagers, but what about me? They’re my parents.’
Kate grimaced. ‘It’s embarrassing. They’re too old for all that.’
Too old. Taking a sip of wine, Maddy envisaged herself in fifty years’ time. Marcella, aged ninety-something and feisty to the last, had just died in a tragic rollerblading accident. Finally, finally, she and Kerr had a chance to be together. Except she was seventy-seven herself and Kerr was eighty. Gazing dreamily into the distance, Maddy pictured the two of them on their Zimmer frames, inching their way across the shabby linoleum floor of the nursing home, dribbling a bit with the effort, peering short-sightedly at each other before she croaked, ‘Kerr? It’s me, Maddy. I’m free! We can be together at last ...’
And Kerr, typical man, would pause, bemused, and say, ‘Eh? What are you on about, woman? Do I know you?’ Bastard, thought Maddy, outraged.
‘Excuse me?’
Oops, maybe she hadn’t just thought it, perhaps she’d accidentally said it aloud.
‘Sorry.’ Turning, Maddy addressed the man behind her. ‘Just thinking about someone.’
He gave her a sympathetic look. ‘Ex boyfriend?’
‘You could say that. Anyway, we’re here to have fun.’ If she said it often enough, it might come true.
‘That’s a coincidence, it’s why we’re here too.’ The man beamed down at her; he wasn’t what you’d call drop dead gorgeous, but he had a friendly chipmunky face and a decent enough body. ‘My name’s Dave. Hi.’