Sweets From Morocco

by Jo Verity

  ‘Nothing much. A few of us thought we’d go out. To sort of celebrate being half way through the exams. We’re going to The Presto for a coffee. That’s all.’

  ‘Is Diane going?’ her mother asked.

  ‘Yes. Probably. I’m not sure.’ Tessa tried not to catch Lewis’s eye.

  ‘Well, ten o’clock is plenty late enough for a Friday night. It’s not safe for young girls to be in town when the pubs turn out.’

  She hated her father, the way he blackmailed her with constant digs about safety and not worrying her mother. He’d been the one who lost the wretched baby after all – and therefore the one who’d driven their mother around the bend. He was the one who shouldn’t have been allowed to go out.

  ‘Okay, Dad.’ She was tempted to add that she’d be staying out as long as she liked in a couple of months time – all night if she wanted to – but it was silly to start an argument now.

  This time she dressed more casually – a navy blue skirt and a crisp white blouse – and clipped on pearl earrings, hoping to look older than her eighteen years. With no idea what an evening with Tony Rundle might entail, she raided her shoe fund, placing two half crowns in her purse.

  Lewis heard Tessa crossing the hall and his father shouting, ‘Ten o’clock,’ as she opened the front door. He was in the kitchen, helping his mother with the dishes and she was telling him something about an appointment Gran had with the specialist the following week, but he was only half-listening.

  ‘Don’t worry, Mum,’ he said, ‘Gran’s as tough as old boots.’

  It had become a habit with all of them to reassure Peggy Swinburne whenever she showed any signs of agitation. Her pessimism filled the kitchen, infecting the very air, and he escaped as soon as he could, explaining that he wanted to get his weekend homework out of the way so that he could play tennis. ‘If I buy that racquet tomorrow, I’ll need to get used to it before I play a proper match.’

  Before he took his books out, he slipped in to Tessa’s room and removed her diary from the drawer. He felt less guilt this time. Her yarn about the coffee bar had been unconvincing and, if he were to help her, he first needed to find out what she was up to. The diary was a substantial one, with a full page for each day. Today’s page was, as yet, empty except for ‘Rundle. The Bell. 8pm’ written beside the date. It didn’t take a genius to work out where his sister was going and with whom.

  Until now, Tessa’s boyfriends had been pupils at Lewis’s school or belonged to the Scout troupe he attended. They had all been friendly enough, no doubt hoping that he would put in a good word on their behalf. They might not have been so sanguine if they’d known that Tessa was sharing details of those inept courtships with him. ‘Save you making the same mistakes. Not that anyone would fall for you, little brother.’ Those days were over. Tessa had abandoned boys and was throwing herself at a man, apparently besotted with him, as were the rest of her silly friends. He appreciated that Rundle was handsome, in a moody, James Dean way, but it was common knowledge that he’d had a string of girls, and rumoured that he’d fathered a child when he was seventeen.

  Lewis lay on his bed and stared at the model aeroplanes twisting on their cotton lines. The scientific aspect of human reproduction was awe-inspiring, but the urges that initiated it seemed disturbingly random. Wouldn’t it be better for the human race if sexual gratification were to be separated from impregnation? His friends hinted at their sexual expertise but they never supplied any credible details. Lewis guessed that most of it was speculation – all to the good as he was sure that they were incapable of connecting their adolescent fantasies with the reality of parenthood.

  His thoughts slid sideways, to Kirsty Ross. Although he’d only met her a few weeks ago, Lewis felt he’d known her for ever. Like Tessa, she was self-assured and held firm opinions but he was pretty sure she wouldn’t bulldoze or bully in the way that his sister often did. Kirsty knew interesting snippets about everything – plants, the solar system, music, aeroplanes, cooking – but she never showed off, revealing her knowledge only at the appropriate moment. Not only was she intelligent and sympathetic but he liked the way her hair escaped from restraining clips to form a fuzzy halo around her head; her pale, clear eyes; her lips, tilting up at the corners, as though she were always on the point of laughing; her strong arms and unpainted fingernails. He wondered what it would be like to kiss her. Not the slithery, sloppy kissing that went on when they’d drunk cider and played postman’s knock at Jenny Daniels’s party last Christmas, but firm, dry kisses that would prove that he was more than another seventeen-year-old seeing how far he could get. Perhaps he should kiss her, before someone else did.

  Tessa reached The Bell a few minutes before eight. A clamour of voices, punctuated by coarse laughter, came from the far side of the shabby door to the saloon bar. She glanced up and down the street, hoping to see Rundle.

  ‘Fancy a drink, love?’ The invitation came from a stocky, balding man, older than her father, who had crossed the road from the bus stop opposite.

  ‘I’m waiting for someone, thanks.’

  ‘Why don’t I keep you company until the lucky man turns up?’

  For a moment she regretted her tight skirt and thick mascara, but the smirk on the man’s face transformed regret to rage and she glared at him. ‘Why don’t you fuck off, you grotty little pervert?’

  ‘Slag,’ he muttered and pushed through the swing doors.

  Proud of the way she’d handled things, yet upset to have come across as ‘that sort of girl’, she hurried away from the pub. Hanging around outside The Bell was going to lead to trouble but if she went in she would have to face the disgusting man again.

  Caught up in indecision, she failed to notice Rundle, walking towards her.

  ‘Hi,’ he said then, as though it were the most natural thing in the world, he kissed her on her lips. Throwing his arm around her shoulder, he claimed her and, squeezing her against him, swung her around and they headed towards the pub.

  She did not relish a second encounter with the leering man, and the earthy smell of Rundle’s leather jacket and the intimacy of his arm around her gave her confidence. ‘Couldn’t we go … somewhere else?’

  He stopped and pulled her against him, kissing her hard, forcing his tongue between her lips. ‘We could go back to mine, if you like.’

  All she had intended to suggest was that they go to a different pub but, instantly and shockingly aroused by his kiss, she whispered, ‘Okay.’

  On the bus, he kept his arm around her, occasionally leaning to kiss her or nuzzle her neck. He asked a few questions – where she lived, what music she listened to – clearly expecting no more than a word or two in reply which was a relief because she was finding it increasingly difficult to think.

  ‘You okay?’ he asked, unlocking the front door. ‘You look a bit – I dunno – shaky.’

  She had always known it would happen this way – unexpected yet undeniable. It was a shame that Pamela and Diane Stoddy and Geoffrey and even the horrid man couldn’t see her now.

  She had no idea whether this stranger had hair on his chest or what size shoes he took and yet she was going to get into his bed and allow him to touch her most intimate places. She knew how to deal with boys like Geoffrey, how to make them do what she wanted and to stop them when they needed to be stopped, but Tony Rundle was a man and she wasn’t so na•ve as to imagine that she would be dictating terms.

  She took a deep breath and smiled, ‘I’m fine,’ then followed him through the hall and up the lino-covered stairs.

  She’d expected his room to be decorated with pictures of motorbikes and obscure bands but, apart from a mirror and a poster for a Picasso exhibition in Madrid, the white walls were bare. One corner was kitted out as a rudimentary kitchen with a sink and a couple of gas rings. The pale-wood furniture was plain and timeless. Books and records were arranged neatly on shelves next to a record player. The dark green bedspread, draped symmetrically over the single bed, matched the
curtains.

  ‘You’re shivering.’ He pointed to the raised hairs on her arms. ‘Here.’ He took off his jacket and draped it around her shoulders. ‘Fancy a drink?’

  If this were it, she needed to be more relaxed. ‘Yes, please.’

  He opened a small cupboard beneath the sink. ‘I’ve got beer or whisky.’

  The leather of his coat was warm and supple, giving her the odd sensation that she had grown another skin; that she was beginning the metamorphosis into the next phase of her life. ‘Whisky, please.’

  He poured whisky into two small tumblers. ‘Anything with yours?’

  She had never drunk whisky before and couldn’t think what ‘anything’ might be. ‘No thanks.’

  The whisky smelled of mild herbs but it numbed her tongue and burned its way to her stomach. Within seconds the alcohol was setting her cheeks on fire and disconnecting her, making it progressively more difficult to concentrate on what was happening.

  She stole a look at her watch. It was already nine o’clock. ‘D’you have a telephone?’ she asked.

  ‘There’s a phone box at the end of the street.’ He raised an eyebrow. ‘Got to phone Mummy and Daddy?’

  She tried not to hear the sneer in his voice. ‘Of course not. I just wanted to—’

  ‘That’s okay, then.’ He took the glass from her hand and placed it on the table next to the bed. Brushing her cheek with the back of his hand, he whispered, ‘You’re a funny girl, aren’t you? You’re burning hot now. Perhaps you’ve got too many clothes on. Let’s put that right, shall we?’ Without waiting for her answer, he pushed the jacket off her shoulders and began to undress her, kissing her as he removed each item of clothing before folding it and placing it on the arm of the easy chair. Cardigan. Blouse. Skirt. It seemed to go on and on. Once or twice she attempted to help him undo a button or zip, but he brushed her hand away. She let him continue, feeling dirty yet excited, knowing she should ask why he still had all his clothes on, but unable to speak because he was kissing her and she was melting. Bra. Stockings. Wasn’t this what she had wanted? Suspender belt. Knickers. He pushed her down on the bed and, still fully clothed, knelt over her. His face looked different now – soppy and sweaty and distorted.

  She was glad that she was drunk. It was as well that her mind was floating away from her body whilst this panting stranger inspected her.

  ‘Can I have another drink, please?’ Her voice echoed in her head as though she were speaking from the bottom of a well.

  He poured more whisky into her glass then began stripping his own clothes off, this time dropping them on the floor, hopping as he yanked first one leg, then the other out of his jeans.

  Whenever she accidentally caught sight of Lewis without his clothes on it was funny and rather sweet. He looked much like he had as a child but with a fuzz of dark hair above his little dangling willy. Rundle’s nakedness shocked her. His engorged penis protruded from a mat of thick, red curls. It seemed to defy gravity, pointing up and out at an impossible angle. She’d seen drawings scratched on the back of doors in public lavatories; discussed it at length with her friends. All the information had been there in the biology books but she hadn’t believed it because it was so unbelievable.

  He pushed his hips out and grinned as if proud of himself and wanting her to appreciate the ‘thing’. It was so big and so ugly with that bruised-looking head. She tried to sit up but he pushed her back against the pillows and began to rub her roughly between her legs.

  ‘Here we go, little schoolgirl,’ he whispered.

  She wanted him to stop. No she didn’t. Yes she did. Pleasure and pain became indistinguishable. Now he was saying something, asking her something, but she couldn’t make sense of the words. He took something from the drawer next to the bed then straddled her, pulling her hips towards him. She closed her eyes, trying to forget how big it was, wanting him to get on with it – get the whole thing over and done with.

  Chapter 10

  Lewis ploughed on through his homework but, as it neared the time when Tessa should come home, he found it impossible to keep his mind on his books. The television rumbled on in the living room below and he pictured his father getting up from his armchair to wind the clock on the mantelpiece. He could see him swinging open the convex glass, waiting for Big Ben to strike ten before nudging the minute hand backwards or forwards, revealing to the second how late Tessa might be.

  His father called up the stairs. ‘Lewis?’

  ‘I’ll be down in a minute.’

  Tessa always expected him to back her up, rounding extravagant statements off with ‘…wasn’t it, Lewis?’ or ‘I’m right aren’t I, Lewis?’, tangling him up in her schemes. It was getting a bit much. Before going down, he tossed Tessa’s diary on her bed. If she knew he was on to her, she might think again before continuing on her reckless path.

  The volume on the television had been turned down but his mother, hunched forward in her chair, arms folded tightly across her chest, was staring at the flickering screen as if trying to lip read. His father stood in the bay window, peering up and down the street. ‘Your sister’s twenty minutes late. It’s not good enough. She knows how worried your mother gets.’ He habitually used his wife’s ‘nerves’ to short circuit debate and imply that his stringent rules were based on altruism. ‘D’you know any of these girls that she’s gone out with?’

  Lewis shrugged. ‘She goes round with a crowd.’

  ‘Do we know where any of them live?’ Dick Swinburne glanced between Lewis and his wife, his ‘we’ including her for the first time. She shook her head.

  Lewis did know where several of Tessa’s friends lived – he delivered newspapers to their homes – but disclosing this would enable his father to go knocking on doors, checking to see whether these girls, who had almost certainly not left the house that evening, were safe home. ‘No, Dad. Sorry.’

  Another ten minutes passed and Dick Swinburne took the car keys from his pocket. ‘Something must have happened to her. You stay here and take care of your mother. I’m going to drive into town. To the coffee bar. If I don’t find her, I’m phoning the police.’

  ‘But Dad, it’s only just ten-thirty—’

  ‘The sooner we start looking, the more chance we have of finding her.’

  The statement was absurdly melodramatic but Lewis could understand why his father felt he had to take action. When Gordon went missing, the question that came up time and time again was why had it taken him so long to contact the police.

  Lewis wasn’t a great advocate of what people called ‘instinct’, preferring to weigh up an argument and then make a considered decision. But, unable to see any other way to prevent his father from making a fool of himself, he had no time to ponder and was forced to tell the truth, a truth slightly distorted to avoid mentioning the diary.

  ‘She never went to The Presto, Dad. I … I overheard her telling … friends that she was meeting a chap called Tony Rundle. In The Bell.’ He felt sick at his own treachery.

  His father shook his head. ‘Christ.’

  Lewis attempted to minimise the damage he had done. ‘He’s quite a decent bloke, or so I’ve heard. He’s Mike Stoddy’s mate. Diane’s brother. You know Diane Stoddy, don’t you, Mum?’

  His mother looked up, the light from the muted television flickering across her impassive face, and he thought she was going to say something but his father butted in. ‘That’s neither here nor there. She lied to us and I will not have it. The girl’s in the middle of important exams and she’s going to throw it all away. Anyway, what sort of lad asks a girl to meet him in a pub? A respectable boy would come and collect her. And see that she’s home on time.’

  As if jolted out of a trance, his mother stood up, brushed the creases out of her skirt and went into the kitchen. Her action seemed so purposeful that they followed, watching as she filled the kettle and set out three cups and saucers. ‘I expect she’s missed the bus or something.’ Her voice was calm.

  ‘
Then why hasn’t she phoned? Answer me that,’ Dick Swinburne snapped.

  ‘Perhaps she’s lost her purse.’ Her moderate reply showed no hint of agitation.

  ‘How can you be so bloody cheerful? Don’t you understand, woman? Your daughter is God knows where, with God knows who.’

  Lewis had grown up believing that the slightest upset might push his mother over the edge, yet here was his father, yelling and suggesting that something unspeakable had happened. But his mother continued stirring her tea, the trace of a smile on her lips, and Lewis could only assume that the pink pills she swallowed every morning were doing the trick.

  The door opened and the three of them turned to see Tessa standing half in, half out of the kitchen, her smudged makeup and dishevelled hair giving her a slightly out of focus appearance.

  ‘Sorry I’m a bit late.’

  Lewis felt as if he were floating, lifted by a surge of relief, and he wanted to hug her and apologise for the dreadful thing that she didn’t yet know he had done.

  ‘The front door’s wide open. Anyone could walk in.’ She yawned. ‘I’m ready for bed.’

  His father swung round, nudging the table and rattling the cups in their saucers. ‘Come in here, young lady. Lewis, upstairs. Now.’

  Lewis whispered, ‘Sorry, Tess,’ as he squeezed past her, his eyes averted, relieved to be dismissed yet feeling he should stay to give her his support. He took the stairs two at a time, dropping down to squat on the top step.

  When he and Tessa were small, they loved to sneak out of bed and sit on the stairs, ‘spying’ on the grown-ups. In those days, visitors – Nan and Gramps, before they moved away; Uncle Frank and one of his friends; the couple from next door – dropped in on a Friday or Saturday evening and it was such fun to sit, side by side in their dressing gowns, listening to them laughing and gossiping over a game of whist. Their mother shuttled back and forth to the kitchen, with plates of sandwiches and cups of tea, pretending that she didn’t see them on the stair, her collusion making the whole thing all the more special.