by Ling, Maria
"I don't know what kind of money you think we'll be making," Peter said, "but it won't be enough to start having T-shirts printed for us, I promise you."
"That could be a problem," Karen said reflectively. "There must be a T-shirt for the roadie. Can't you wear one from your last tour, Stuart? It would get us some publicity."
"It would cause chaos," Peter corrected. "Mass hysteria. Thousand-strong crowds would be holding vigils outside our hotels. And then we'd be lynched when people realised it was just us."
"But the press would be there to cover it," Karen argued. "Any publicity is better than no publicity."
"That," Peter said, "is a statement open to debate. I'm sorry, Karen, but we'll have to carry our own equipment. Which means you're getting off lightly."
"Well, yes," Karen conceded. "That's the advantage of being a singer."
"So I'm not hired, then?" Stuart asked. He was standing in the middle of the room, arms folded, accepting their friendly mockery with an indulgent smile. Jen abandoned her guitar case and walked over to join him, and he unfolded his arms and slipped them around her, pulling her close against his chest. She leaned her head back against his shoulder, and gave a small sigh of contentment.
"You're not," Peter said. "Sorry, Stuart. You'll have to find work elsewhere."
"I'll think of something," Karen said. "Just you wait. I'm going to get my money's worth out of you."
"Shout when you need me," Stuart said, and Jen felt his arms tighten around her. "I'll keep myself busy somehow."
Karen shot them both an affectionate look, and Jen smiled back at her.
"Is everyone packed up?" Peter asked, glancing around. "Because then we could start loading things into the car."
Rhoda slid down elegantly from the stool, and picked up her guitar case.
"I'm ready," she said. "Even my suitcase is all packed. It's in my room, Stuart, my angel -- would you be a darling and carry it to the car?"
Stuart sighed, and reluctantly took his arms away from Jen.
"Sure," he said, and headed for the door to the stairs.
Peter gave Rhoda a disapproving look.
"I cannot believe how much stuff you brought with you just for one weekend," he said. "How do you survive on tour?"
Rhoda smiled at him, not at all offended.
"That's easy," she confided. "I just get the men to do all the fetching and carrying for me."
"I believe you," Peter said fervently.
"They're all such darlings," Rhoda said, holding her guitar case out to him with a winning smile. "And so are you, Peter dear."
"You can carry your own guitar, Rhoda, thank you very much," Peter said, and immediately contradicted himself by taking the case out of her hand and slinging it over his shoulder.
Jen glanced at Cathy, and was surprised and rather touched to find her watching Peter with nothing but adoration in her eyes.
"Come on then," Peter said in a resigned tone. "Let's get on with the fetching and carrying, shall we?"
They all trooped upstairs, meeting Stuart in the hallway with Rhoda's suitcase in one hand, and her and Sue's travel bags in the other. He exchanged a long-suffering look with Peter, and then started to manoeuvre his way through the front door, which was already wide open.
"Keys," Peter muttered to himself, reaching into his pocket with his free hand, and pulling the key ring out with an expression of astonished relief on his face.
"First go," Sue said. "I'm impressed, Peter."
"Thank you," Peter said, as calmly as if it were an everyday occurrence, and proceeded to unlock the car. Stuart hefted the baggage into the boot, and then gave Peter a hand with the guitar cases.
"All done," Sue said, surrendering her bodhran in its black leather case and watching it disappear into the interior of the car. "Aren't we organised?"
"I'd better get my stuff together as well," Karen said to Cathy, "and then we can load up your car too."
"Oh," Cathy said uncertainly. "Yes, I suppose so."
"There's no hurry, Karen," Peter said, giving Cathy a hug. "She takes two hours minimum to pack. Don't you, sweetheart?"
"Not two," Cathy said with a guilty look. "But I suppose I'd better start now."
"I'll help you," Jen said impulsively.
Cathy turned, and gave her a lovely sweet smile.
"Thank you," she said.
Peter had not exaggerated much, Jen found, as Cathy worked methodically through her clothes, folding each little slip dress carefully, and laying out her dainty pastel blue travel bag as neatly as a box of chocolates. Rather than helping, she found herself sitting at the foot of the bed and watching in something approaching admiration.
"Stuart said you did a whole lot of cleaning for him, before we all turned up," she said after a while.
Cathy glanced up, smiling, from an intricate arrangement of lace underwear.
"I like it," she said. "I like to make things neat and tidy. And it was necessary. You should have seen the state of the kitchen when I arrived! You won't believe this, but there was jam on the floor!"
Jen choked back a laugh with great difficulty.
"Stuart is fairly laid-back about cleaning," she admitted.
Cathy nodded gravely.
"I know," she said in a hushed voice, as if Jen had confided a criminal tendency. "But he is so lovely and kind."
"Yes," Jen said, smiling at the description, "yes, he is."
"He kept telling me to sit down and take it easy, but I can't if things are untidy. I'm afraid I made him a little impatient."
Jen silently fractured a rib.
"There," Cathy said with satisfaction, standing back and surveying her completed handiwork. "That's everything except my flute. I think Peter has it, I must remember to ask him before he leaves."
"What made you want to learn the flute?" Jen asked, curious. "It seems unusual -- for a first choice of instrument, I mean."
"Yes, I know." Cathy sat down on the bed, on the other side of her travel bag, and pulled her legs up under her with a simple, artless movement that won Jen's heart instantly. "It seems to be, but it isn't really. Most children start off on the recorder, and the flute is just a natural progression from there. I always knew I wanted to be a musician, and I always knew I wanted to play the flute. It's the most beautiful instrument in the world, when it's played well."
Jen hesitated.
"Sue said you played in a professional orchestra for a while," she said, hoping this was not too painful an area to venture into.
"Yes, I did," Cathy said sadly. "It was terrible. There were some wonderful musicians in it, people who really cared about their music, but there were some who only cared about themselves. They would try to twist everything to their own advantage, even if it meant that the performance suffered. It got so unpleasant, I knew I had to leave."
"And now you're playing in Peter's band?" Jen went on, tactfully omitting the intervening period.
"Yes." Cathy brightened. "It's wonderful. I've met so many lovely people, like Karen and John and Stuart, people who just live for their music. And the audiences, too -- there's no snobbery or anything, everyone is just there because they love music. It's just wonderful."
Jen smiled at her with real affection.
"I always think so," she said.
"Are you two done?" Karen stood in the doorway, bag in hand. "Only I'm ready now."
"Oh, yes." Cathy flew off the bed, and picked up her bag.
"Well," Karen said to Jen in an undertone as they followed her down the stairs, "what do you think of her?"
"Of…" Jen glanced at Cathy, who was just vanishing through the front door.
"Yes."
"I think she's sweet."
Karen nodded.
"She seems such a drip to begin with, but she is sweet. I'm glad you like her -- I do." Karen paused in the hallway to pick up her guitar case, which was leaning against the wall. Then she gave Jen a significant look. "You don't mind me going back in Cathy's car?" she
asked.
Jen hugged her, case and bag and all.
"Of course not," she said. "And I'm so happy you talked me into doing this record."
Karen smiled.
"That's all I wanted to hear," she said.
"There's one thing I still haven't asked you, Stuart," Jen said that evening, as they sat by the kitchen table. Outside on the lawn, the shadows were lengthening, and the golden light from the setting sun fired the tops of the trees.
The farewells had been said, everyone had hugged everyone and agreed to do this again soon, and the cars had driven off into the countryside, and silence had fallen.
The two of them had wandered in the garden for a while, arms around each other, sides touching, content to be silent together in the warmth of the autumn sun. Then they had gone back indoors, and settled in the kitchen with a cup of tea and a beer, respectively.
"What's that?" Stuart asked, crunching his empty beer can in one hand and leaning back to throw it accurately against the swing-top lid of the bin, where it disappeared.
"I'm only curious," Jen said. "I'm not trying to start anything."
Stuart looked at her with a sardonic half-smile.
"That'll be the day," he said. "Spit it out, Jen."
"Well…" Jen began cautiously. "That day in my flat, when I said you could stay for dinner and you said you had other plans for the evening…what were you doing?"
"I was on a date," Stuart said comfortably. "With a girl I know. Beautiful girl, gorgeous legs, thinks the world of me. We had a wild night together -- I was shattered the next morning. So, what were you doing?"
"Don't tease me, Stuart," Jen said firmly. "What were you really doing?"
"Really?" He raised an eyebrow at her, and she gave him peremptory nod. "I spent the evening in Pete's kitchen with a four-pack, feeling sorry for myself."
"Why?"
He swept her an ocean-blue look.
"Because I'm stupid. I didn't like what you said to me -- about my music. I've got so used to everyone telling me how brilliant I am, I don't think I could handle even an honest assessment, let alone a bloody insult like that. The minute you looked down your nose at me and said -- "
"I wasn't looking down my nose at you," Jen objected. "I couldn't have done. You're almost a foot taller than me. It's not physically possible."
Stuart's mouth twisted briefly, in reluctant acknowledgement.
"Fair enough," he said, "but you looked as if you were trying to. And then you said I was developing well -- no, don't argue, Jen, that's what you said."
"I know," Jen admitted humbly. "And I'm sorry. I didn't mean it to come out quite as badly as it did."
"I could have strangled you," Stuart said, with remarkable composure. "I've never punched a girl in my life, but I came damn close to it that time. Of course, you backtracked fast enough, I'll give you that. Well, in any case, I got angry, and I hit back at you with the first thing that came into my head. Which, okay, was not very clever. It was pretty childish, really. I knew that even at the time -- I kicked myself as soon as I'd said it. But then you said -- "
"I know," Jen interrupted hastily. The whole episode with the girl in the hotel, and everything connected with it, was something she wanted to leave far behind. "I know, and I'm sorry about that. Especially since there was never anything in it."
He shrugged.
"You didn't know that then. Well, anyway, I got myself out of your flat somehow, and went straight to Pete's, and took over his kitchen for the evening."
Jen gave him a severe look.
"And all along you could have been in my flat, getting your dinner cooked for you."
"Yeah." He met her eye squarely, and then grinned at her. "I had a lucky escape, really."
"Oh, you -- " Jen reached out to slap his arm, and he caught her hand neatly in mid-flight and kissed it.
"Actually, Cath cut me in for a share of their dinner, so I did pretty well out of it in the end. Better than if I'd chanced it with you, anyway." He held her hand in an unyielding grip, despite her best efforts. "She's all right, is Cath -- she's a nice girl. A bit too soft at the moment, but she'll grow out of that."
"Sue said she was a dear, but a bit wet sometimes," Jen said, abandoning the uneven struggle.
"Spot on," Stuart said, letting go of her hand with a smile. "That's Cath. Pete adores her, of course, but even he can get a bit ragged at the edges now and then. And you should have heard Karen, the first time they met. Pure venom. But they get on fine now. Of course," he added complacently, "Cath doesn't know I fancy her. It took you to spot that."
Jen blushed scarlet.
"You are not going to tell her about it," she said. "I was being an idiot. I know I was -- and you know I was. But you're not going to tell Cathy. It will embarrass her beyond words."
"I'm not sure." Stuart gave her a teasing look. "Maybe I will tell her. She might be flattered, you never know. Pete won't like it much, though. I might have to break his arm to get past him, once he finds out."
"Please, Stuart, don't tell him! I'd feel so bad if he knew. Don't tell either of them -- please!"
"We'll see." Stuart was not going to ease up on her, she could see that at a glance. He was enjoying every second of it.
She deserved it, too.
"You have no idea," Jen said seriously, "how ridiculously stupid I feel about the whole thing."
"Good," he said, picking up her hand again, and kissing each of her fingers in turn. "You just remember that. It'll teach you to trust me."
"I do. I mean it, Stuart. I do trust you."
"So you should." Another flash of blue. "You won't be giving me any more trouble, understand?"
Jen smiled.
"No more trouble," she said. "That's a promise."
"Good." He kissed the back of her hand. "Now, what do you want to do this evening? There's food in the fridge, and there's a fireplace in the other room, with a pretty good sofa in front of it as I recall, and there's a bed upstairs that's just waiting for you. What's it to be?"
Jen looked at him with wide loving hazel eyes.
"How about all three?" she suggested.
Stuart looked back at her steadily, holding her hand.
"I knew there was something about you that I liked," he said. "Okay then. I'll get us something to eat, and you can just sit there looking gorgeous."
Jen laughed.
"All right," she said. "But I can cook, you know. I've learned."
"Sure." Stuart was not convinced, and she could hardly blame him. "You can show me tomorrow. I've got no plans for the rest of the week, and it's not too far to the doctor's." He met her quelling look with easy impudence. "So tonight we have…" he got up from his chair and walked over to the fridge, and opened the door. "Toast, with or without cheese, a couple of rashers of bacon, a few eggs." He glanced at her. "You could make one of your omelettes, if you still remember how. I trust you that far."
"Thank you."
"Or there is…" he picked something off a shelf and looked at it, frowning, "…some kind of rabbit food that Cath brought with her."
Jen leaned over for a better view.
"That's a mixed salad, Stuart."
"Is it?" He held it up to her in disbelief. "You actually eat this stuff?"
"Well," Jen said in a self-deprecating tone, "at least I know how to cook it."
He flashed her a grin, and tossed the bag onto the worktop.
"Right," he said. "We're having that. I don't suppose it'll do me any lasting damage. Or there is… No, I think that's all I can come up with." He closed the fridge, and crossed over to the corner cabinet. "Apart from a few tins of beans. You remember how to cook tinned beans?"
"Vividly," Jen said, smiling at him.
"Don't forget to take the tin off before you put them in the pan. And that's it, unless you really like Worcestershire sauce."
"Stuart," Jen said, "I don't know how you managed to make it through to adulthood."
"Jen," Stuart said, "you o
f all people ought to know."
Jen giggled.
"Omelette," she said decisively, and pushed her chair back from the table, and got up. "That's what we're having. With a mixed salad. And tomorrow -- " she stood in front of him, giving him a challenging look -- "we're going shopping, and I'm going to cook you my special pasta with tomato and basil sauce, and then I'll be accepting your apologies."
He slid his arms around her waist and pulled her towards him.
"No chance," he said, and smiled into her eyes. "I'll be accepting yours. For burning down the house, if nothing else."
"I made you coffee yesterday," Jen said.
"Don't remind me." He leaned down and kissed her. "It was vicious stuff. You can have another go this evening, if you want."
"I just might," Jen said, stroking his hair. "And now you're going to sit down, and I'll get you another beer, and you're going to watch and learn."
"I love a pushy woman," Stuart said indulgently. "Go on, then."
He grabbed one of the café chairs and pulled it up to the counter. Jen got a can of beer out of the fridge and passed it over to him, and he opened it one-handed and drank it slowly while he watched her assemble eggs, butter, knife, fork, and cereal bowl.
"Frying pan?" she queried.
"Cupboard," he said, pointing.
Jen opened the cupboard next to the cooker, and pulled out a heavy cast iron item.
"Did you buy this with the house, too?"
"No." He grinned at her. "It's my bacon and sausage pan. Don't ruin it."
"I don't intend to," Jen said haughtily.
Stuart drank his beer, and made no comment.
Jen cracked four eggs neatly into the cereal bowl, dropping the shells into the sink. She could clear them away later. Then she sliced off some butter and dropped it into the frying pan, and let it melt and bubble while she whisked up the eggs.
As soon as the butter settled and began to change colour, she tipped the eggs into the pan. Then she left them to fry away happily by themselves while she fetched out two plates and arranged the salad leaves prettily on them. Two forks, two knives. And a wooden spatula for turning the omelette over.
There was no wooden spatula.
