All That Mullarkey

by Sue Moorcroft

  But she put off telling him, because she didn’t want to think of him being hurt. Crazy how it was so easy to postpone something so important.

  ‘So,’ he said glumly. ‘What’s new?’

  ‘I had a lovely day out with Clive and Shona at the weekend. A nice lunch and then a long walk along the embankment in Bedford, watching the canoeists bobbing about.’

  He grunted. ‘I thought you said it wasn’t serious?’

  She examined her ring finger, now bare. ‘We don’t need to be serious to have lunch and a walk.’

  ‘Anything more interesting?’

  ‘My packing’s driving me mad. Liza’s entertaining Shona tonight and Justin’s doing the same tomorrow, so I really ought to get finished.’

  His expression set. ‘How very accommodating of Justin. I don’t suppose you’re ever going to be free of him, now. You’ve let him get too fond of the girl.’

  Anger flickered through her. ‘“The girl” – you mean my daughter, Shona? Justin’s daughter? You think I ought to have deprived Shona of her father?’

  He shrugged. His bacon and mushroom baguette arrived and he snatched it up to bite into it as if it had done him a personal injury.

  He’d always been a bad loser, even at Pictionary or Monopoly. Now, of course, Cleo didn’t have to put up with it. She could even antagonise him. ‘Did I mention?’ Her voice sounded unnaturally clear and high. ‘We discussed moving in together, me and Justin? Just on a house-share basis. That way Shona would have both her parents –’

  Bang! Gav’s fist crashed down on the wooden table so hard that the whole bar paused.

  Cleo froze, her food halfway to her mouth.

  With eyes of stone he hissed, ‘You’re never going to share a house with that bastard if I’ve got anything to do with it.’

  The following silence seemed even louder than the crashing of his fist.

  Steadily, she reached for her coat, tucking her bag and her lunch under her arm. ‘But you haven’t got anything to do with it.’

  She was angry all the way back to the office. Then he sent a text of a sad face and she began to feel sorry for him all over again …

  But then she received a call from her garage to say that her car had failed its MOT and she felt sorrier for herself.

  Chapter Forty

  It was a pain, having to drive back into Peterborough after picking Shona up from Dora’s. But good old Dora had made Shona a soft cheese roll to keep her going while Cleo took care of her bit of business. Business that had to be broached this evening, now, before she lost her bottle.

  She found the road, keyed his flat number into the security thingy, waited for the tinned sound of his voice, then pushed in through the door and trod upstairs at Shona’s pace. He was waiting for them at his front door.

  ‘Jussin!’ squealed Shona, letting go of Cleo’s hand and launching into her bouncing run.

  ‘This is handy,’ he grinned, swooping her up. ‘I’ve just bought some biscuits.’

  Cleo had to wait for Shona to get over the excitement of seeing Justin, being somewhere new and having a biscuit in each hand. Sitting on his sofa, Cleo tried not to be mega-aware of the door to his bedroom. Shona finally settled in front of the big television with her favourite satellite channel, Nick Junior, and Justin plumped down beside Cleo.

  ‘It was a pleasant surprise when I heard your voice. I was sure it’d be another delivery or taxi.’

  ‘Bob!’ Shona shouted, launching herself to her feet to point at the television.

  ‘Bob the Builder,’ Cleo agreed. ‘Your favourite.’ Shona sank back down to the carpet.

  Justin still looked tired, strained. The tiny lines that ran away from his startling eyes seemed more deeply grooved. When he flashed a grin, she could see how those lines had formed over the course of a hundred thousand smiles.

  Right, deep breath. Say it. ‘I have a proposition for you. I mean a proposal,’ she amended quickly to try and forestall the clever-clever remark she saw coming.

  Obviously a failure, as he replied, ‘I’ll say yes to either.’

  She tried to frown him down. His eyes shone with silent laughter.

  She cleared her throat. ‘Right. The thing is … do you remember saying …’ Why was she making such heavy weather of this? She who’d been specifically trained to be articulate, cogent, concise, to get up in front of any amount of people and engage and maintain their attention? She metaphorically squared her shoulders.

  ‘I’m going to find things tough, financially, with the new house. And it really hasn’t been helped by an unexpected car bill of over five hundred pounds.’

  He frowned. ‘Ought I to be paying more towards Shona’s keep?’

  She flushed. ‘That wasn’t what I meant! I’ve come to tell you that I’ve made a decision to take in a lodger, preferably one with their own furniture that I can share the use of.’

  He looked dubious. ‘I suppose that’s sensible. So long as it’s the right person.’ His gaze flicked automatically to Shona.

  She dropped her eyes. ‘I wondered if you’d be interested.’

  He stared. ‘But you swore you didn’t want to house share with me. What about all the stuff about girlfriends and boyfriends at breakfast?’

  ‘I still don’t want to buy a house with you. The offer is for you to be a paying guest and the first six months would be on a trial basis. The rent will be reasonable but I’m not offering to do your washing or pick up your towels. There’s a double room each, plus a single for Shona, we’d have to share the other rooms and you might hate it. But it’ll get you out of this place, in the short term. And solve some of my financial woes, also in the short term.’ There. Concise and cogent.

  If she’d anticipated that he’d leap on the suggestion with bellows of joy, she was in for a disappointment. Instead, his frown deepened. So she added, ‘Perhaps you’d better think about it.’ Was she disappointed? No, of course not. It was just a possible solution, one she’d been toying with and, until Gav had pissed her off so much, hadn’t been serious about. But it was definitely a solution, even if only for six months.

  But she hadn’t foreseen such a complete lack of enthusiasm. He was staring at Shona who was bouncing her nappied bottom on the floor in excitement that Paddington Bear was beginning. He turned back to Cleo. ‘What if all the crap stuff comes with me? Then it’ll be your house bombarded with pizzas and dog turds, taxis and fire bombs. It’ll be you and Shona, not just me.’

  ‘Oh.’ She hadn’t even thought about it.

  A silence developed as the idea circulated her brain, a silence except for Nick Junior and her heartbeat. This very room had been filled with black smoke, the kitchen, the bedroom where they’d had the sex they never talked about now. If Shona had been there the night of the fire … Panic nipped her throat.

  Be sensible. Think. Slowly, she said, ‘It’s never followed you to my house. You’ve stayed over, you stayed for weeks and nothing happened.’

  He hesitated. ‘True. But I’d hate to bring my problems with me.’ He sighed and rubbed his eyes with the heels of his hands. ‘They’re nothing to do with you, after all.’

  ‘We could give it a go.’

  Wearily, he smiled. ‘Really?’

  ‘Really.’

  With a deep sigh, he let his head fall back. ‘Cleo, it would be brilliant. I’ve got to get out of here. If I hear that tosser shout, “I’ll getchoo!” again I’ll smack him one. Then I’ll get arrested again.’

  Gav stared at his phone and thought about making a call. A simple call, an everyday occurrence.

  He checked his watch.

  Looked at the phone.

  She’d been so annoyed with him today, left him sitting in the pub like some idiot with a half-eaten lunch and a nasty taste in his mouth. He’d managed things very badly, starting on that bastard Justin. He should’ve learnt that it always made her edgy.

  But why? She insisted there was nothing between them, apart from the child. She insisted i
t was right to let the child and its father remain close. What was right about it? What claim did bastard Justin have to the bastard child, anyway? Surely any rights ought to be nullified, forfeit, by his stealing another man’s wife to grow his child in.

  His wife. She’d been his wife. Still was, officially, although she was so far from him now, separated by time, a lover, a child. A child he couldn’t give her. It wasn’t fair, that. He hadn’t asked to be infertile, didn’t deserve it, that terrible condition that had robbed him of everything.

  His wife. His Cleo. His lover, partner, friend.

  The lunches had been a good idea, he knew, because they almost brought that old Cleo back into focus, to when her body had been his, not known by bastard Justin, not a host to a baby. His.

  But today he’d let his temper get the better of him. He should have continued to be the good-natured guy he could be for her.

  Now he’d screwed up. She’d been so cold, so angry, he couldn’t settle until he’d straightened things out. He reached for the phone.

  ‘It’s me,’ he began, cheerfully. He liked to begin, ‘It’s me,’ not, ‘It’s Gav.’ That would be suggesting she might not recognise his voice. He hurried on before she could speak, letting his voice become boyishly rueful, apologetic, but with undertones of mischief. ‘I know you’re busy, I won’t keep you more than a second – I just wanted to say sorry about today. You’re dead right, it’s nothing to do with me, I promise in future to keep my opinions to myself. Are we still friends? Puh-leeze?’

  Silence. Then a giggle. ‘As I presume that nauseating creeping was intended for Cleo, I’ll call her.’ A rattle as the phone was dropped carelessly. Waves of mortification swept up his body. Bloody Liza! He imagined her laughing, repeating what he’d just said. Perhaps making Cleo laugh too.

  His mind churned rapidly, choosing words to redeem the situation. So he groaned when Cleo finally reached the phone, made his voice strained, half-anguished, half-laughing at his own misery. ‘I’m afraid I’ve just mistakenly abased myself at your sister’s feet! I rang to apologise for being so unforgivably arsey today but now you’ll think I’m more of a prick than ever. I’d better put the phone down before things get any worse –’

  She didn’t let him do that; he’d known she wouldn’t. She sighed. ‘You shouldn’t give me a hard time, Gav.’

  Cleo might be a bad lass sometimes, but she had a good heart that wouldn’t let him ring off until he seemed reasonably happy. He could spin the process out and get a larger slice of her time. ‘I know, but the whole situation’s hard on me, Cleo …’ When he finally put the phone down he felt better about everything.

  She was meeting him for lunch again next week.

  He’d make it up to her.

  ‘Well?’ Justin held the door open, looking back expectantly at Martin, Drew and Gez.

  They slid lower in their seats, gazing through the windscreen. After a moment Drew said, ‘We’ll wait here while you check things out.’

  Justin shrugged, jumped out of the cab of the box van, took the path to the front door and knocked. He heard a window above his head open and tipped his head back to find Cleo grinning down at him, hair swinging either side of her face. ‘I’m here,’ he pointed out.

  ‘So you are. The door’s unlocked, come and join the madhouse!’

  He twisted the black iron doorknob and stepped into his new home to find his daughter climbing rapidly backwards down the stairs to greet him. ‘Jussin! House! See, yook, house!’

  He hugged her, laid his tough, seasoned cheek against her adorable, soft, new one. ‘Come on outside and meet the boys.’

  Drew, Martin and Gez climbed down from the van to inspect his daughter.

  Martin said, ‘Jeez! She’s a mini Justin.’

  ‘But she’s pretty,’ Gez joked.

  After a careful inspection, Drew put out his hand and jiggled Shona’s fingers. ‘Hello, sweetheart.’ And then to Justin, ‘All right, Jus, she’s definitely yours. Pity she comes with mother attached.’

  They all glanced up as Cleo appeared at the front door, dishevelled in a T-shirt and jeans but, happily, out of earshot. Martin drew in his breath. ‘Oh, I don’t know. She fills that T-shirt a treat.’

  Drew made a face. ‘But Justin doesn’t get to have sex with her so what use is that? Husband’s still around, too.’ He walked round to the rear of the van to throw up the roller door with a loud rattle.

  The mission was to get all Justin’s gear on the premises. The big sofa, television and stereo were a bit of struggle to coax through the sitting-room door, the stairs were awkward for the bed; but they managed eventually. Justin’s room was the smaller double, with Shona’s the middle room between that and Cleo’s. By the time they’d carried his boxes in, Cleo was offering round tea and Boasters and there was a rush for seats.

  Justin sat on the floor surrounded by a litter of boxes. Cleo had put a box of toys in the dining room, bare as neither of them possessed dining furniture, and Shona was busy emptying it as if she’d never seen any of the toys before.

  Gez, Martin and Drew claimed the sofa. Gez and Martin thanked Cleo for the coffee. Drew was silent and kept staring at Cleo, who perched on a box of books. Sometimes he removed his gaze to glance around the room, then turned his attention back to her.

  Occasionally, Justin noticed, Cleo intercepted the gaze. Mainly, she ignored it. It didn’t take her ten seconds to make friends with Gez and Martin, thanking them for their help although it was Justin’s gear they’d helped with, pressing more biscuits on them, smiling that wide smile, flicking her hair back from her shoulders. They were blokes and soon responding with smiles of their own, admiring the house, groaning with her about the antique state of the kitchen.

  Eventually, she turned her attention to Drew. ‘More coffee, Drew?’

  Drew shook his head.

  ‘You’re very quiet.’

  He nodded. Then, just as Cleo was giving up on him, said, ‘I don’t get what it is that you expect to get out of moving Justin in. Built-in babysitter? Decorator? Money provider?’

  Justin opened his mouth to interfere, but Cleo was leagues ahead of him.

  ‘Hasn’t he told you?’ She opened her eyes very wide. ‘Justin’s going to be my sexual plaything. It’ll save him rent. I’ll give him Sundays off but he has to provide a matinee performance on Saturdays.’

  Gez and Martin laughed. Drew’s eyebrows dived down to meet over his ferocious glare. ‘You’re avoiding the question,’ he snapped.

  Cleo’s eyebrows lifted. ‘Because you’ve no business asking it.’ She collected the coffee mugs and carried them into the kitchen.

  Justin smirked at Drew. ‘You lost that round, mate.’

  Drew launched himself out of the embrace of the sofa. ‘This just cannot work. You know this woman’s bad news because she’s never straight with you. Don’t let her get her claws in. She’s got a hidden agenda, something to do with the kid. Come and crash with me and Martin until you get sorted out with a new place.’

  Justin smiled. ‘Thanks, Drew. But I’ll take my chances.’

  When Gez’s works van had rattled off down Port Road, Cleo returned to the kitchen to run cold water into the coffee cups. There would be hot water from a boiler the size of a washing machine in the scullery, later. She’d have to work the system out. Just one of twenty million jobs; she’d get around to it.

  As Justin walked into the kitchen she glanced at him from under her lashes. ‘Has he put you off the whole scheme? You can leave any time.’

  He took his jacket off and hung it on the back of the door. ‘What? And miss out on all that sex?’

  Chapter Forty-One

  Wearily, Justin parked outside his new home, where he’d lived with Cleo and Shona for one month.

  He was pretty sure that it wouldn’t be his home for much longer. Today had been terrible. Awful. Nothing that went before had been so bad. He felt as if the buffalo had come back and galloped over him all day.

  He wa
s scared and he wanted someone to tell him it was all going to come right. But he couldn’t see that happening any time soon.

  He let himself in the house.

  It was beginning to look better, the past weeks’ work were beginning to show. Even the circles of the black and orange carpet in the sitting room looked tolerable with his plain furniture. They’d painted the walls a buttery cream and clubbed together for velvet curtains. It looked like some funky retro designer job.

  His bedroom he’d decorated in ivory and inky blue, financing it himself and telling Cleo that he’d had the shades specially mixed and could not, therefore, expect her to pay. He’d helped her wallpaper her room with a tiny pattern of palest grey and lilac flowers and they were going to do Shona’s room soon.

  It was brilliant to be living with Shona. He couldn’t get over the absolute privilege of being with her on a daily basis. And then there was Cleo …

  Everything was going pretty well. They’d had the period of getting used to the new situation, when Cleo would laughingly ask permission before sitting on the sofa or he’d wash a single coffee mug rather than leave it for the next mealtime clear-up.

  Nowadays he’d find Cleo lounging the length of the sofa as if she owned it, merely lifting her feet so that he could sit down. They talked for hours. He told her what was going on in his life – he wasn’t seeing anyone at the moment, he’d settled back in at Rockley, Drew was waiting darkly for Cleo to trick Justin into something. She told him about Nathan giving her more account work, that she was still seeing Clive but hadn’t slept with him.

  He’d teased gently, ‘Back on the celibacy kick?’

  She’d flushed. And that was the only reference they made to the sex they’d shared.

  But it all could end at any minute, even sharing Shona. Especially sharing Shona. He trudged indoors and flopped down on the sofa, too scared and pissed off to get a drink or turn on the television or climb the stairs; only fit to lie alone. Stewing.