‘I can’t believe you’ve all just stood here and let her carry on like that.’ Short Fran said.
‘If you think you can stop her, feel free.’ Shelley said.
‘Shelley tried and Tricia told her to f*** off.’ I said.
‘Oh for God’s sake. So? I’ve heard you say worse and for less reason.’ Short Fran said to Shelley dismissively.
During the whole exchange we’d all been staring at Tricia with a sort of morbid fascination, and as we watched the current guy Tricia was devouring came up for air. Tricia downed another Smirnoff in one gulp and moved on to current guy’s friend. As if rehearsed we all groaned in unison.
Short Fran said ‘I’m going over. Someone’s got to stop her. She needs saving from herself, she’ll be mortified in the morning and probably blame us if we don’t do something about it.’
‘I’m coming with you.’ I said.
Short Fran and I barged our way through the crowd over to the Tricia kissathon, my pregnant state helping to clear the path as most people jumped out the way in deference to my bump, so there wasn’t really that much barging needed.
‘Hi Trish.’ Short Fran said all happy, hoping this alone would be enough to distract Tricia, and Tricia did stop long enough to look round and see who it was, but without a word to either of us turned back again to the new current guy.
‘Who’s your friend?’ Short Fran said.
Tricia broke away properly this time, looked at Fran then looked back to the guy and said ‘what’s your name?’
‘Colin’ he said without letting go of Trish.
‘His name’s Colin.’ Trish said swaying slightly.
‘Hi Colin’ Fran said. ‘I’m sure you realise my friend Tricia here’s had a bit too much to drink.’
‘Well . . yes.’
‘Good, then you’ll understand why I need to take her away.’ Fran said reasonably.
‘Yeah.’ He said looking crestfallen. The fact was he really wasn’t much of a looker and only seemed about seventeen anyway, so he probably thought Tricia was the answer to his Christmas wish list.
‘Scuse me’ Tricia slurred. ‘But who asked you to butt in?’
‘Come on Tricia, come with me and see the rest of the girls.’ Fran said taking hold of Tricia’s arm ready to pull her away.
Tricia shook her arm free and said ‘I don’t wanna see the girls, I’m quite happy here thank you.’
‘Course you do, it’s Christmas, we always see each other at Christmas.’ Fran took hold of Tricia’s arm again but this time a little more forcefully.
‘Look Fran why don’t you just mind your own business for once, you’re always telling everybody what to do, just leave me alone will you.’ Tricia said almost assertively, well it was obviously with assertive intentions but her tipsy state had taken the edge off any real threat.
‘Look I know you’re upset about Daniel, but this isn’t the solution, trust me.’ Fran said.
‘You know do you? Know all about it do you?’
‘Yes you phoned me and told me remember.’ Fran said pulling now on Tricia’s arm.
Tricia with some effort pulled her arm free again, and took Colin’s drink from him that he’d picked up during hers and Fran’s exchange. She took a large gulp from the pint glass and handed it solemnly back to him, and then turned back to Fran. ‘And I suppose now you’re going to give me the I told you so lecture.’
‘No I was going to say what a scumbag Daniel was actually, and thank goodness you dumped him when you did.’
All this time I’d stood watching without saying anything, as had most of the people standing nearby who’d given up on their own conversations and turned to watch the free sideshow. Without even realising it I’d been stroking my bump absent mindedly and with that and all the noise everyone was making Ella had started moving, and I involuntarily shouted ‘she’s moving’ to which Tricia and Short Fran ceased hostilities to look at my bump, along with everyone else of course.
‘Oh Judy that’s so wunnerful’ Tricia slurred. ‘I think it’s wunnerful you’re havin a baby. Don’t you think it’s wunnerful Fran?’
‘Yes it’s wonderful.’ Short Fran said.
‘It’s the most wunnerful thing in the world. It’s a baby, your very own baby. I wish I was having a baby, I’d really like to have a baby of my own, don’t you think? And my bestest friend is having one, it’s so wunnerful.’ Tricia said unsteadily as her eyes filled and a fat tear rolled down her cheek.
‘Come on Tricia I think Judy needs to sit down.’ Short Fran said guiding Tricia away from Colin and giving me the eyebrows so I’d know to play along.
‘Yes my friend Judy should be sitting down, shouldn’t you Jude.’ Tricia said, the tears flowing freely now. ‘We need to find you a place to sit.’
We helped Tricia back to the rest of the girls, as she was barely capable of walking by herself at least not in a straight line, and everyone parted to let us through.
When we reached the others Tricia said ‘Judy’s got to sit down, she’s having a baby you know.’
‘What, right now?’ Helen said.
‘No not now idiot it’s not due for another couple of months.’ Short Fran said.
‘Phew, thank goodness for that, I thought you meant . . ‘
Shelley laughed as she took over my spot holding Tricia upright, and Di and Tall Fran looked around for a table but it was hopeless.
‘Let’s sit outside’ Di said.
‘Are you mad it’s freezing?’ Tall Fran said.
‘Well have you got a better idea, it’s going to be packed like this everywhere. Anyway it’s not that freezing.’
So we jostled our way outside where they had a couple of tables and some chairs set up in a courtyard bit out the back that were usually only used by smokers getting their nicotine fix, but amazingly they were empty at the moment.
Di was right it wasn’t that freezing, it wasn’t exactly balmy but we all buttoned up in an attempt to keep warm and watched Tricia slump in one of the chairs totally oblivious to the weather. Short Fran went to the bar saying she needed a drink which was fair enough I suppose after rescuing Tricia from herself, and said she’d get a round in for the rest of us while she was there, and see if she could get a coffee or something for Tricia.
‘Well this is one we’ll remember.’ Shelley said after we’d all sat down, all that is except Di who’d wandered away from us to have a cigarette. We’d all tried over the years to get her to give it up but in her case it was a lost cause. At one time or another a few of us had smoked but one by one we’d all given up, and only Di was left still steadfast in her addiction.
‘One to remember?’ Tall Fran queried.
‘One Christmas.’ Shelley answered.
‘Oh yeah I suppose it is.’
‘Are you alright?’ Shelley asked me. It was touching how they all looked after me, touching and ever so slightly annoying, but only ever so slightly.
‘I’m fine’ I said patting my bump. ‘Both fine.’
‘So what happens now?’ Helen said. ‘With Tricia I mean.’
‘Now we chill out, literally out here, but we chill out, have another drink, then I suppose we ought to think about how we’re going to get Tricia home.’ Shelley answered.
‘D’you think she’ll be alright?’ Tall Fran asked.
‘Yeah she’ll be fine, when she’s sobered up. Totally embarrassed and dying of shame of course but fine.’
‘What’s she doing for Christmas?’ I said.
‘I think she said something about going to her mum and dad’s for Christmas dinner.’ Di said having finished her cigarette and rejoining us at the table.
‘Do they still live in Cosgrove Avenue?’ Helen said.
‘I think so.’ I said.
‘I suppose one of us will have to give her a lift then, we can hardly let her drive can we.’ Shelley said.
Short Fran came back with the drinks on a tray and a cup of coffee for Tricia. ‘God it’s like rush hour o
n Hammersmith bridge in there.’ She said putting the tray down. ‘So who’s drawn the short straw to take Tricia home?’
33
26th December – Week 30 + 1 Day
In the end none of us had given Tricia a lift to her parents, but I guess it was me who’d drawn the short straw, because Tricia ended up coming back to my place to sleep it off.
In her drunken state I was the only one she’d listen to. According to Tricia the others where all interfering busy bodies and insufferable know-it-all’s whereas I, on that day anyway and given her state of mind at the time, could do no wrong, I was ‘wunnerful’ and Ella was ‘wunnerful’ too, so I had to be looked after. And that’s how we managed to get her in my car without an argument, by letting her think she was helping and doing me some kind of favour. We couldn’t just leave her on her own at her place and she was adamant she didn’t want to go to her mum’s, so I suggested she came back to mine. She was falling asleep by this point anyway and it seemed like the only sensible option.
Shelley followed me home and helped me get Tricia out of the car and upstairs, and then to the bedroom, my bedroom, where she straight away fell onto the bed and into a dead sleep.
Shelley and I had a cuppa and dissected the events of the afternoon, with Tricia in the starring role of course and Short Fran as the hero of the hour. Then Shelley had to go but said she’d call me later to see how Tricia was fairing and if I was coping alright.
Course I did cope alright, I mean there was no coping to be done really as Tricia slept straight through until the next morning. Marsha lent me their blow up bed for the night and Rob helped me set it up, and I spent the night on it in the living room.
By the next morning when she woke up, Tricia was more her usual self albeit with the mother of all hangover’s that meant we were practically whispering to each other to spare her head from any excessive noise. But after a coffee, some toast, and two paracetamol she said she felt almost normal. Of course she was mortified at her behaviour, well she would be wouldn’t she, and vowed she’d not only never drink again, and that she was having nothing to do with men, at all, ever, but also that she’d never go back to Chicago’s again.
But that last about vowing never going back to Chicago’s was short lived as I had to give her a lift there later that morning to pick up her car. But we didn’t go inside so I suppose it doesn’t really count.
On the way back home I stopped off at Sainsbury’s and stocked up a bit, I didn’t need to go too mad as I was spending Christmas day with Dad this year. Since Mum and Dad had split up I’d had to alternate Christmas days between my parents, and as last year I had been at Mum’s this year it was Dad’s turn.
When I got back from Sainsbury’s who should be waiting for me but James. He’d come round, he said, to say happy Christmas and give me a card and a present. He was waiting in his car but jumped out as I pulled in to my usual parking spot, and helped me carry the shopping upstairs. He’d already knocked for me but evidently Rob had told him none too politely that I was out, so he’d waited for me in his car.
It had been a couple of weeks since I’d heard from him, and to tell the truth I was relieved and had begun to think he’d finally got fed up and moved on with his life, but now I didn’t know what to think. After dumping the shopping I opened his present, it was a pair of earring’s that I knew I’d never wear, not only because they were from James but because . . well to tell the truth they were hideous and not my sort of thing at all, but of course I enthused getting into the true spirit of Christmas, that being the giving and receiving of stuff that you wouldn’t normally give house room to but pretending it’s the best gift you’ve ever chosen or received.
I felt I ought to reiterate to James that I was still going out with Rob and that nothing had changed, and said I was sorry I hadn’t got him anything for Christmas, and he said it was okay and that he understood. He still had that lost puppy dog look about him and I felt guilty all over again, but it wasn’t really my fault was it? I mean he was the one who . . oh okay it was my fault a bit, what I should have done was stop seeing him as soon as I knew we were never going to be an item, which was probably the day after I first met him, but I hadn’t had I? So it was my fault a bit. Anyway he didn’t stay long as he said he had stuff to do.
Rob came up as soon as James drove away and was all nonchalant as if his dropping in on me had nothing whatsoever to do with James’s visit, and I played right along letting him think I believed his casual demeanour, but secretly I was buzzing at the thought that Rob was bothered by James’s visit.
I made a late lunch for us both and Rob stayed for the rest of the afternoon. At teatime Mac arrived, home for the holidays, so that put a stop to any idea’s I might have had for a cosy Christmas eve on our own as we spent the evening with Marsha and Mac, and Harry and Flora were as full of Christmas hyperactivity as you might have expected and were allowed to stay up late.
Mac and Marsha were having Mac’s parents over for Christmas day, and I was going to Dad’s so one way and another I didn’t see much of Rob yesterday, both of us doing our family duty and all on the big day. We planned that we’d have our own Christmas on boxing day, and now it was boxing day, and I was so nervous I couldn’t sit still.
At eleven on the dot, the prearranged hour, Rob knocked on the door. I’d barely got the door open before he engulfed me in a bear hug, and for a minute or two we stood just holding each other.
‘Happy Christmas.’ He whispered in my ear.
‘Shouldn’t that be happy Boxing Day?’ I said.
‘Well technically I guess,’ he said breaking away but leaving his arm round my shoulders as we walked into the living room. ‘I’ve missed you.’
‘What since yesterday?’ I’d seen him briefly in the morning as I went out the front door on my way to Dad’s.
‘Yes, but it feels more like I haven’t seen you properly for a couple of weeks.’
‘I know what you mean, but there was nothing I could do, Tricia was so . .’
‘I know. Is she alright now?’
‘Well as alright as she can be, but she’ll get over it, I hope anyway.’
‘I got you a present.’ Rob said, clearly he wasn’t that interested in Tricia’s well being, and to tell the truth right at that moment neither was I, in fact Tricia was pretty much the last thing on my mind.
‘I got you one too.’
‘Shall we do it now or wait till later?’
‘No now, let’s do it now.’ I said. I was desperate to know what he’d got me, not out of any motivation of greed but just to find out if it was a ‘serious’ present or not.
We sat down on the settee and I handed over the jumper I’d bought, and he handed over his present that I knew straight away wasn’t going to be serious. I mean it was too big for jewellery, but too small for anything mega, in fact it looked like it was a book. I ripped the paper off and it was, it was a book. A book for god’s sake!
It was called Starting Your Own Business, and was full of useful information about cash flow and bank loans and self employment tax. Great. Just what I need, I’d spent years learning about finance and taken exam after exam, and now I had a book about it. And what did that say in the whole present exchanging league scheme of things? I suppose he had put some thought into it, I mean it was sort of personal with me just starting out working for myself and everything, but it was hardly the declaration of undying love I’d been hoping for was it?
‘I thought with you going to work for yourself and everything . .’ Rob said all eager and excited.
‘It’s great, really great.’ I lied. ‘This’ll be really useful.’
‘You’re sure?’ Obviously I wasn’t being enthusiastic enough and now he sensed my ambiguity.
‘Yeah course I’m sure. Thanks Rob. Open yours now.’ I said trying to inject some passion into my response.
I held my breath while he opened his jumper but I needn’t have worried, he liked it, well he seemed to, and straight away
pulled his current sweatshirt off to be able to put his new jumper on. It fitted thank God, and I breathed again.
‘Thanks Judy. I love it.’
He bent down and kissed me, but I needed more than just a thank you kiss, so I pulled him down beside me. He didn’t resist, not at all in fact, and I would have happily stayed locked in his arms for the rest of the day, but dinner called my attention away from this heavenly scenario.
I’d decided it would be just too much to have a traditional Christmas dinner, for one thing I wasn’t sure I was up to cooking roast turkey with all the trimmings, my cooking wasn’t too bad as long as I stuck to the simple straight forward stuff, you know like scrambled eggs or a ready prepared quiche and all you had to do was warm it up. But even aside from that I figured firstly that we’d both probably have had a Christmas dinner the day before, and also the last thing I wanted was to have to spend half the day in the kitchen stressing about whether I’d basted the turkey often enough, or what time I should put the potatoes on.
After much consideration, I’d decided on a pork and apple casserole, with a side salad. It was a bit ambitious for me as these things go but on the other hand almost impossible to ruin as once you’d done all the preparation, which I had first thing this morning, you could leave it on a low heat for an hour or so and forget about it, and there was no timing of any other stuff to worry about as it was all in the same pot and all cooking at the same time.
We wandered out to the kitchen and I checked the oven as if I knew what I was doing and that any not checking on my part might have ruined something, and Rob opened the bottle of wine he’d bought with him and poured us a glass each.
I sipped mine slowly relishing each mouthful. It wasn’t particularly high in alcohol content but this was the first taste I’d had of anything even vaguely alcoholic for months, and I wanted to make it last. Of course alcohol was strictly taboo, but hey it was Christmas and a glass or two of wine wasn’t going to bend the rules too much. Was it?
39 Weeks Page 24
