Making Hay

by Veronica Henry

  Rick was sitting astride a Harley-Davidson in faded jeans ripped at the knee, a Che Guevara T-shirt and a black leather jacket. He looked like every father’s nightmare: a devil in angel’s disguise whose hobby was defiling innocent young middle-class virgins and turning them into drug-crazed biker chicks overnight.

  ‘Wow.’ Mandy ran her hands admiringly over the gleaming chrome.

  He grinned ruefully.

  ‘I’m probably going to spend the rest of my life paying it off. Have you been on a bike before?’

  Mandy shook her head. There was no point in pretending.

  ‘It’s no problem. Just put your hands round my waist. And relax. Go with it.’

  It was all very well saying relax, but every horror story Mandy had ever heard about motorbikes raced through her mind. Yet she knew she couldn’t bottle out; she didn’t want to look like a wuss and, besides, she had a feeling it was one of those things you had to experience once, even if you never did it again. Her heart was hammering wildly as she put on the helmet Rick held out to her and climbed on behind him. Thank God her Diesel jeans were low-slung and quite baggy and she hadn’t put on high heels. She slid her arms round his waist and breathed in the smell of his jacket. Leather and oil and eucalyptus.

  She felt reckless, rebellious and quite, quite wicked. And she hadn’t even done anything wrong yet. A mixture of fear and elation rose in her throat as he started the bike and accelerated out of the drive, gravel spraying everywhere.

  She felt as if her stomach had been left behind, fought the urge to scream at him to stop. She shut her eyes but that was worse. He took a bend, leaning the bike to the left, and she felt sure they were going to hit the road, but no sooner had she braced herself for the impact than they were upright again. Trees, gates and houses flashed past. Heads turned.

  Eventually, Rick pulled into the car park of a country pub. It wasn’t one Mandy recognized – it wasn’t one of theirs – but there were half a dozen other bikes parked up and a crowd of people sitting at tables outside, drinking beer.

  Rick pulled off his helmet and turned to her with a smile.

  ‘How was it?’

  Barely able to speak with exhilaration, Mandy smiled back at him, eyes shining.

  ‘Fantastic.’

  She was hooked.

  At Tinker’s Barn, Ginny was regretting having had such a hot bath because she was now rather red in the face. Putting foundation over the top had resulted in a ridiculously clown-like mask which she’d then had to scrub off. She resisted the temptation to glug down a glass of white wine to calm her rising panic because drink always made her cheeks flush and would therefore worsen her plight. She wondered if either of the twins had any of that green stuff that was supposed to calm down your complexion, but decided not to call upon either of them for advice, because it wouldn’t stop there. She would put off doing her face for another ten minutes, and get dressed instead.

  She’d chosen her clothes for their safety, if nothing else. Lucy had said casual dress, which Ginny knew could mean anything, so she opted for semi-smart-but-not-dressy. A black velvet shirt, which had a hint of Lycra in it to make it clingy. It was supposed to be fitted, only she’d bought it two sizes too big because she didn’t quite have the nerve for fitted; what she really wanted was baggy. Underneath she had a long grey jersey skirt, which she thought swirled quite nicely around the top of her black suede ankle boots, which were for her quite high.

  Once dressed, she spent five minutes with a round brush blow-drying her hair, something she never usually did. She’d also conditioned it for once. There hadn’t been time to snip off her split ends with the kitchen scissors, but when she’d finished it hung straight and quite shiny to her shoulders. Her face was still a bit flushed, but she couldn’t wait for ever, so she put on her make-up. Only when she’d finished did she open her wardrobe door to gauge the final effect in the mirror.

  She gave a wail of despair. The twins came bursting in immediately. They’d obviously been hovering like vultures outside the door, waiting to see what she’d put on. They were very excited about her evening out.

  ‘I look like a total frump. I look like a librarian.’

  Kitty and Sasha glanced appraisingly at their mother, then at each other.

  ‘Look, Mum. You look lovely. You just need… sexing up a bit.’

  ‘Sexing up? Sounds like something from one of those awful rap records.’

  The twins looked at each other again. Ginny suspected a plot.

  ‘We’ve been dying to do this for ages,’ said Kitty.

  ‘It’s OK – we won’t do anything outrageous. You can trust us,’ added Sasha.

  And so Ginny found herself at the hands of her daughters. They ordered her to strip right down to her underwear. Even that made them shudder. Sasha marched back in with a black lacy bra with a bright pink bow at the cleavage and matching G-string.

  ‘I bought these in a sale, but they’re too big. They should be just right for you.’

  Ginny picked them up reluctantly. She’d never been comfortable with a thong – she’d bought a three-pack from Marks & Spencer once, but it was rather like sitting on a barbed wire fence all day. Sasha, however, insisted.

  ‘If you feel sexy underneath, it’ll shine through.’

  ‘I don’t want to look sexy. I just want to look… nice,’ grumbled Ginny, but did as she was told. She looked at herself in the mirror and couldn’t resist a smile. Actually, she didn’t look at all bad. She still had a good figure, if a tiny bit thicker round the middle than she might have liked, but at least she didn’t look like a sumo wrestler from behind.

  Kitty was telling her off.

  ‘You could have shaved your legs.’

  ‘I didn’t need to. I had a long skirt on.’

  ‘Well, you can’t wear fishnets now. All the hairs will poke through. Never mind – you’ll have to make do with opaques.’

  Ginny thought that was probably for the best. At this rate she was going to look as if she was touting for business, she mused, as Sasha manoeuvred her into a tight, black, long-sleeved lacy T-shirt. Shored up by the bra underneath, it gave her an impressive, but not too revealing, cleavage. Kitty produced a dark red silk skirt cut on the bias, which was teamed with a pair of knee-length black suede boots. The girls then attacked her hair, teasing it and backcombing it until she feared it would look like a bird’s nest, but then it was smoothed and pinned up with just a few chosen strands escaping. Then they re-did her make-up: daubs of charcoal grey and taupe that went on with the addition of tinted moisturizer, light-deflecting powder and highlighting blusher. The finishing touches were a three-stranded jet choker, matching dangly earrings and red, red lipstick.

  Ginny looked in the mirror for the second time that evening and screamed. She didn’t recognize the person standing there. She looked positively glamorous. The knee-length boots made her calves look incredibly slim and elegant. The make-up combined with her hairstyle gave her usually round face a semblance of bone structure. The fitted top and flirty skirt looked fluid and streamlined. She looked like a sexy, confident woman who knew what suited her. Which couldn’t in fact be further from the truth.

  Suddenly there was a knock on the door downstairs.

  ‘Dad’s here to pick us up.’

  There was a flurry of activity as the girls went to get their stuff. They were going to supper at David’s. She walked to the door to see them off, hoping that he wouldn’t get out of the car, but he did. He looked at her with an expression she couldn’t define, but she felt sure was distaste.

  ‘What on earth are you wearing?’

  ‘Doesn’t she look fantastic? Give him a twirl, Mum.’

  Feeling horribly self-conscious, Ginny held her arms out to her sides for a second so David could see her in all her glory, and felt hot mortification at the horror on his face.

  ‘Very nice. Very… Moulin Rouge.’

  He obviously thought she looked like a tart.

  As soon as th
ey’d gone, she rushed back to the mirror for a second appraisal. David was right. She looked like mutton. She couldn’t possibly, possibly turn up to a dinner party looking like that. She didn’t have the confidence. She wouldn’t tell the twins. They’d been so sweet, and were so excited and proud of their handiwork.

  Once she was quite sure the coast was clear she put the velvet shirt on over the tight T-shirt, took off the choker and scrubbed off the red lipstick, replacing it with her usual neutral, barely-there, boring nothing colour. She still felt like another person, though, and her tummy was churning. She was slightly turned on by her disguise, but also apprehensive about this evening. It had been years since she’d gone to a social event on her own.

  Barney lay on the bed, waiting for Suzanna to finish her bath and come in to get dressed. It had taken him hours in the shower to wash away the brick and plaster dust and grime earlier on. Even his teeth seemed coated in the stuff – he’d brushed them twice this evening. But they’d done it. Everything they didn’t want was gone – the last skip had been lowered on to the lorry that afternoon.

  He and Suzanna had cheered as the hideous carpet that was spread throughout the pub was finally rolled up and taken away. They’d spent the day scrubbing at the flagstones underneath. Barney had gone to the local reclamation yard for advice and come away with several tins of solvent designed to remove the sticky residue left by the mixture of glue and underlay. It was hard work; their knuckles were red and raw and the best manicurist in the world would have no effect on the state of their nails. But when they’d sat back to survey their efforts, the results had filled them with glee. Already the interior of the pub had a different atmosphere – just by removing the heavy, gloomy carpets and curtains, and stripping off the hideous brown veneer on the bar, it had a lighter feel.

  Now they had a blank canvas, the fun was about to start. As was the really hard work. Demolition was easy. Now they had three weeks to pull everything together: a kitchen, a restaurant, staff, a menu, the bedrooms, an image. Barney tried to blank it all out as he invariably felt overwhelmed when he considered what they had to achieve. He was going to enjoy tonight, relax and get to know the people he was working for – or should that be with? It was probably the last evening he was going to be able to unwind for some time.

  He caught his breath as Suzanna came in from the bathroom wrapped in a towel. He could smell the Laura Mercier bath foam she’d been using: the scent of warm honey radiated off her skin. From half-closed eyes he watched her get dressed. She slipped on a pink lace-edged cardigan with tiny mother of pearl buttons. With it went a grey silk ruffled gypsy skirt with an asymmetric hem and delicate strappy sandals of the same pink as her cardigan. She pulled her hair up into a ponytail on top of her head, teasing the ends and spritzing them with spray, before fixing it all in place with a pink silk flower. She scooped up her lipstick, a comb and a packet of cigarettes and stuck them in a little raffia bag that was decorated with brightly coloured straw flowers. It could have been pilfered from a little girl’s dressing-up box or it could have cost a fortune from some exclusive backstreet boutique in Richmond. You never knew with Suzanna.

  Barney thought she looked gorgeous. Not at all tarty – even though she’d left the top few buttons of her cardigan undone, and her heels were quite dangerously high – but fresh, young and incredibly sexy. He wanted to pull her into his arms and kiss her. That’s what he would have done years ago. They’d often made love before they went out, she still damp from the shower, he freshly shaven and half dressed. But it had been a long time since those days.

  He reached out an arm lazily from the bed and grinned.

  ‘Come here.’

  She walked over to him, half smiling. He caressed the side of her thigh; a gentle gesture, not, he hoped, a lecherous grope. He could feel the warmth of her skin through the silk.

  ‘You look gorgeous.’

  She smiled. ‘Thank you.’ She didn’t physically edge away, but he sensed her reluctance to succumb to his touch. It was an infinitesimal tension. Maybe he was hypersensitive to it; maybe he had anticipated it. Maybe he should just pull her to him and hang the consequences? They didn’t need to be at the Liddiards’ for another half an hour. It was what they should be doing, for God’s sake, a beautiful married couple on a warm spring evening that was balmy with promise. Making love. Because they did still love each other, after all that had happened.

  But Barney was too afraid that the moment would be spoiled. He was terrified of rejection, of the shutters coming down. If he didn’t try it on, then he couldn’t be rejected.

  He swung his legs decisively over the edge of the bed and stood up.

  ‘Shall we walk? It’s a lovely evening. We can get a cab back later if we’re tired.’

  He thought he could see the relief in her eyes. He turned away so she couldn’t see the hurt in his, and grabbed his jacket off the back of the bedroom door.

  *

  As David drove back towards Cheltenham, he pondered over what he had seen. If he hadn’t heard her speak, he wouldn’t have believed it was Ginny. How could she have changed so much in such a short space of time? Was it the country air? He thought she looked… fantastic. Sophisticated and knowing, slightly exotic. Younger, but at the same time more experienced. Annoyingly, he felt a tinge of regret. He wished he was taking her out tonight, instead of taking the twins back to the hellhole that Marlborough Crescent was becoming.

  They’d managed to complete the surgery, and it was now up and running and looking very smart. He was gratified that most of his private patients from Evesham had followed him there, as he had a faultless chairside manner. He’d taken out extensive advertising in the local lifestyle magazine, done leaflet drops in all the best roads, and his client list was gradually building up.

  But the surgery had eaten voraciously into their budget. There was nothing left over to do up the house and Faith was becoming increasingly hysterical as she realized that the underfloor heating, wall-to-wall carpeting and state-of-the-art kitchen she’d set her heart on were not going to appear before the baby was born. David had had to put his foot down. The house might not be House and Garden, but it was perfectly habitable – the kitchen was only five years old, maybe not to their taste but serviceable. Faith continually ranted about the nursery suite on the top floor – a bedroom for the baby, adjoining bathroom, a ‘day’ nursery and a room for the au pair. David put her straight – the baby would have to go in the boxroom next to theirs and the au pair would have to wait. Until he’d made the money needed to convert things to her liking. He certainly wasn’t going to put himself into any more debt. Faith had had a panic attack and David had fought the urge to slap her – it was what she needed, but he knew walloping a pregnant woman was indefensible.

  There was no doubt about it: the honeymoon was over. He couldn’t believe that Faith was the same woman who’d made him feel like a god. Who had, as she called it, empowered him to achieve his potential. Who’d made him reach for the stars. And did things to him that only girls who subscribed to Cosmopolitan could know about.

  Now all he had was a monstrous mortgage and less sex than ever in his life. Gone was the cosy little dream he’d envisaged for himself, the utopia he had described to Ginny when he’d tried to defend his decision to leave her. Ginny, who had put up with their own rather grotty melamine kitchen without a word of complaint. In fact, she’d got off her arse and had a go at painting it after she’d watched one of those make-over programmes, and bought new handles for the doors. It had looked, if anything, worse, as the paint hadn’t gone on very smoothly, but she’d just laughed. David felt a nasty stab of guilt as he remembered promising her that a new kitchen was top of the list next time he had any spare cash. But Faith had come along before then. Faith, who wasn’t happy with the kitchen that was ten times better than the one Ginny had put up with for years. Faith, who wanted stainless-steel pyrolitic ovens and an electric wok. And a dual cyclone washing machine because of all the laundry sh
e’d be doing when the baby arrived. He had a flashback to Ginny bent over a twin tub, pulling out reams of terry nappies like a conjurer pulling handkerchiefs from his pocket. He didn’t suppose Faith had ever seen a twin tub.

  He put Craig David on the CD and thought he caught the twins exchanging amused glances in the rear-view mirror. He immediately felt defensive.

  ‘What? What’s wrong with it?’

  ‘Nothing, Dad. Very groovy.’

  What were they complaining about? Surely it was good to have a father who had his finger on the pulse and knew about the latest music? Or would they prefer him to listen to Barbra bloody Streisand? David defiantly turned up the volume and put his foot down so they sped through the back lanes to Cheltenham. Though in fact he wasn’t in any hurry to get home. He was going to have to cook supper, as Faith still insisted that preparing food made her nauseous, even though she was well into her third trimester. She’d enlightened him with the fact that morning sickness could last well beyond the magic three-month cut-off point, had proven it by showing him the paragraph in her Mother and Baby manual, but David was convinced it was some sort of plot by women to avoid doing what they didn’t like doing when they were pregnant. Supper was going to be a logistical nightmare – Faith had a long list of foods that apparently gave her heartburn (morning sickness and heartburn weren’t mutually exclusive, apparently), Kitty still insisted on everything that passed her lips being organic and was a demi-vegetarian, whatever that meant, and Sasha was just plain fussy and didn’t eat anything with bones or fat or that looked like what it was.

  What he fancied was a big fat juicy steak, cooked rare, with chips and a spinach and watercress salad, but that was off everyone’s menu except his own. Ginny loved steak. It was the one thing she cooked to perfection. She always used to buy them a sirloin each on birthdays and anniversaries. David’s mouth watered at the thought, then with a sigh he resigned himself to pasta. Again. He’d start shitting penne at this rate.

  Ginny needn’t have been nervous about going to supper at Honeycote House, as Lucy and Mickey were the most natural hosts in the world and instantly put guests at their ease. There was no ceremony, no formality. Mickey led her out on to the terrace to enjoy the last few fingers of sunlight and pressed a glass of champagne into her hand – no need to ask what she wanted to drink, who would refuse vintage bubbles?