‘Yes. Yes. I'm fine. Why shouldn't I be? It's just a shock, a surprise, really. I never thought...’
‘Thought what?’ asked Val.
‘I, hmm... I never thought that …hmm, you were … that … hmm, close …’
‘Paul and I have been close friends ever since you ended the relationship, Cathy. I'm sorry, it must hurt, but he was hurt too. Terribly hurt. You’ve no idea how devastated he was. And that joking bit about the bedroom. It's not all sex, he’s a very loving man. Though he is a revelation. I think Papua New Guinea changed him. Gave him a more confident, assertive outlook.’
Catherine sat there in a daze, listening to her friend talk in glowing, tender terms of a man she so intimately knew but whose description was now that of a stranger.
The coffee had gone stone-cold and so had the whole world.
The department store was hardly busy and Catherine liked it like this as she wandered amongst the clothes half looking for something, half just wandering. Suddenly she stopped and a frisson went through her. There in front of her, standing out on the rails was a line of wet-look rainwear, some the cheap variety, the plasticky, see-through items beloved of Michael, others expensive, more fashionable, in arresting, gleaming metallic colours. Typical! she thought, They never had these when I wanted them! Thoughts and sensations came pouring back to her. For a moment, she eyed up a cheap, glistening, semi-transparent, red plastic, nice and very soft to the touch. She looked about her, then along the whole line of macs more closely. She smiled to herself. Why not? she thought, and, choosing a deep metallic blue, slipped it on. The view in the mirror was truly stunning. She just had to have it!
‘Hello, duck!’ and a hand touched her shoulder. She jumped and turned.
‘Oh! Maureen!’ and was immediately yanked back into the present as well as the past. ‘Fancy seeing you here!’ she exclaimed with a wide smile.
‘I'm looking for a hat for our Sonia's wedding. I say, duck, that colour really does suit you. What a lovely mac!’
‘Yes, I might buy it. How are things with you anyway, Maureen?’
‘Oh, can't complain. Very quiet these days without you and Miss Jameson, though. It's not the same’.
‘Without Anne?’
‘Of course! You wouldn't know! Yes. She upped and left. Went to work for Mr Cole. After all those years!’
‘What? Brian Cole?’
‘That's the one. Who'd have thought, eh?’
Catherine was stunned. Her head was reeling.
‘Yes,’ said Maureen, ‘I thought she was devoted to Mr Richmond. But …there you go. I always thought there was something about her. Something not quite right between them. And you left a bit sudden, didn't you? I'm not being nosey, duck, but that stuck-up cow - pardon me - wouldn't tell me a thing about it.’
‘Oh,’ said Catherine,’ I left because...because of her. Well, partly.’
‘Oh, really?’ said Maureen, impressed. ‘Is there any chance of you coming back then? Mr. Richmond looks so fraught and harassed and I don’t think he’s too well either. He’s nothing like his old confident self. I'm sure he'd welcome you back with open arms.’
‘There you are!’ A man appeared at Maureen's shoulder. ‘Well, have you got one?’ he asked her in evident exasperation. ‘The meter runs out in ten minutes’.
‘Oh dear!’ tutted Maureen. ‘No. We'll have to come again.’ His face fell. ‘Got to go. You know what men are like. Goodbye, duck. Think about what I said - about coming back,’ and she was gone.
Catherine stood there for a moment, shocked by Maureen’s news and shocked by Michael’s fate. She looked again at her reflection in the long mirror. Would Michael think she looked good in her glittering blue mac? Did she even care? Anne was gone. She deserved that slimy Brian Cole. ‘Fraught and harassed and not too well either.’ The words echoed through her, and she wondered whom he missed the most - her or Anne? For a moment she felt sorry for him. Then more memories came flooding back, but above all dangled the image of Anne under that sweltering sun at the centre of the maze. She took off the mac. She had made up her mind.
The bedroom was warm and the sunlight filtered through the closed curtains. She was lying on the bed, almost dozing yet quite awake, feeling the slow rise of her chest and its fall as she fell into a deeper, relaxed state. Perfect stillness. All there was, was the sound of her breathing.
She felt the soft plastic on her skin and looked down at her gorgeous figure wrapped in stunning, glistening red. Her hands caressed herself all over and, closing her eyes, her fingers moved down between her legs. Paul's voice …
‘On your knees!’
~~~ The End ~~~
Hard Rain Page 22
