Caught in the Act

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Caught in the Act Page 19

by Gemma Fox


  They were almost at the door when Carol heard someone call her name. She turned round in surprise and saw Gareth loping over to her with a lazy grin on his face.

  ‘Wait up,’ he said, the grin holding firm. There was no disguising it now, Gareth was most definitely calling her. Everybody turned to look at him, even the woman in the grey serge suit.

  Carol reddened until she didn’t think she could get any redder.

  ‘Is there something the matter?’ he asked.

  ‘No, why? Should there be?’ she lied.

  ‘I thought you’d sit with me on the bus,’ he said, smiling. ‘I wondered if I had done something—you know—something to upset you.’

  ‘Oh, oh right—no, no I, just—I wasn’t sure…’ she blustered. Why the hell was he doing this now? Did he want her to die of embarrassment? Couldn’t he have done something less public, less obvious? ‘…and Netty saved me a seat.’

  The grin didn’t falter. ‘I could save you one tomorrow, if you like.’ So brazen, so confident, so very, very sure of himself—or possibly Gareth was just acting his socks off. Carol looked into his eyes. No, apparently not—it looked as if it might just be real.

  Alongside her, Netty and Jan and Diana stood shoulder to shoulder and stared at him. Carol felt uncomfortable on his behalf; it took some front not to back down in the face of three best friends.

  ‘OK then,’ said Carol, wishing he would go. But he didn’t. Instead they all stood there, uneasy, uncomfortable, looking from face to face, not sure where to go from there. It was Netty who finally set them all free. ‘Well, I don’t know about anyone else but I re ally need a fag and a wee,’ she said with a dismissive sniff.

  At that Gareth turned and waved and trotted back towards the boys.

  ‘Come along, keep up, we haven’t got all day,’ said Miss Haze, reappearing from inside the hostel—and all at once the moment was gone and they turned and hurried after her.

  ‘Well, well well,’ said Netty, throwing her holdall onto the bed when they finally got upstairs to their room. ‘Ain’t love grand?’

  Fifteen minutes later they were all hauled out to the bus. Carol sat with the gang but did smile at Gareth. At the host school, once the stage was all set, lit and ready, the cast and crew ate in the dining room—where, for some reason, only the lights above the tables they were using were on, which added to their growing tension, last-minute nerves making the food taste like cardboard.

  Carol felt sick and excited by turns as she got into her costume and put on her makeup. Finally she settled the crown on her head and looked into the pitted mirror above a shelf that passed for a dressing table.

  She looked as pale and haunted as any mad queen should. It felt as if she was walking through a dream.

  ‘Five minutes, this is your five-minute call,’ said a voice over the Tannoy.

  Netty sighed and nipped outside for one last cigarette while the conversation amongst the rest of them dropped to a low tense hum.

  ‘Get your arses up on stage, the music is about to start,’ said a stagehand, popping his head round the door and then all at once they were off.

  ‘Break a leg,’ said Diana, adjusting the wart as she elbowed her way past Carol in the wings.

  ‘I planned to break wind,’ hissed one of the boys from Duncan’s army.

  ‘I thought that you already had,’ growled Netty. She was wearing a pointed hat, lots of worry lines and whiskers; they re ally suited her.

  And then all at once the witches were hunched around the cauldron—and there was total stillness. From beyond the heavy curtains Carol could hear the audience, fidgeting and coughing and gossiping, and then the lights went down and the hall was suddenly quiet and expectant.

  Carol struggled to stay calm, taking deep breaths, feeling incredibly alone. Her mind went blank, head throbbing as she waited for her cue. And a moment later the curtain went up and the play began—and then it was time and Carol stepped out onto the stage into a great pool of light and began to speak, and strangely enough, despite her fears, all the words were there in her head.

  No more than seconds or perhaps a lifetime later, it was all over and done with and the cast stood at the front of the stage, taking the very first bows of the run.

  Gareth caught hold of one of her hands, Adie the other. Carol felt relieved and elated, stopping for an instant to look around, taking it all in, the loud applause and the cheers rolling towards them like a warm and appreciative sea. As she had come up for one more bow Carol caught Gareth’s eye, and he winked and then grinned, and she shivered, and this time Carol didn’t try to fight the feeling. It felt good and exciting to be so close and she grinned right back at him.

  Once the great roar of adrenalin had burned off, the long day finally caught up with everyone. Tired and sleepy, they had had to travel to the hostel, which seemed like miles away, and that was the first time Carol and Gareth sat together. It made it kind of official, and whatever people thought—if they thought anything at all or even noticed—no one said a word as she slipped silently into the seat alongside him. He gave her the window seat. Looking back, Carol wasn’t sure if Gareth was being gentlemanly or whether he was worried she might slither off, given half a chance. It felt slightly claustrophobic and at first she found it hard to relax. As the miles unrolled past the dusty glass, Carol finally felt tiredness claim her, and sleepily curled up into Gareth’s shoulder, pulling her jacket over her like a blanket, eyes heavy.

  She didn’t resist as he slipped his arm around her and held her close up against him, nor did she fight or protest when she felt Gareth’s other hand slide oh-so-stealthily to rest casually, lightly between her knees. But it did have an effect; Carol was instantly wide awake.

  She held her breath, wondering whether to pretend to be asleep or to wake and move away. What would she do if his fingers moved higher? What happened if he moved at all? But as it was, before Carol could make up her mind, the bus lumbered into the hostel car park and, yawning and aching, everyone clambered down and went in search of their beds. Gareth moved, stretched and got to his feet. As they parted by the hostel steps, he pulled her close and brushed his lips across hers.

  ‘Night night,’ he purred. ‘Sweet dreams.’

  There was a lot of whooping from people close by. Carol felt her face colour.

  The sensation of Gareth’s body so close to hers and that hand setting so easily on her thigh lingered. Even the idea of it made something warm and dark and very ancient quiver in the pit of her stomach.

  ‘Well done, everybody. It’s going to be a fantastic tour if you keep this standard up,’ said Miss Haze, following them up to the dormitory. ‘I’ll go and see if we can rustle up some hot chocolate and biscuits from somewhere.’

  The door to the dormitory swung open behind them. ‘Oh, there you are, Miss Haze. I tried to catch you when we got off the coach. I think Fiona may be getting a migraine,’ said her mother accusingly. She was carrying an empty hot-water bottle and smelling salts. ‘It’s the pressure. I do worry about her; she puts so much of herself into the part. It’s a good thing that I came along; I’ve got no idea how you would have dealt with it without me. It’s going to be a long night. I would appreciate it if the rest of you would keep the noise down.’

  All the girls in the dormitory stared at Fiona’s mother, though no one dared to speak.

  ‘Thank you,’ said Miss Haze icily. She watched Fiona’s mother withdraw and then said, ‘Well done everyone—I’ll go and sort out the hot chocolate. Assuming Fiona makes its through the night, we’ve got another long day tomorrow.’

  Carol headed off towards her bunk, the imprint of Gareth’s fingers on her leg burning like a stigma.

  ‘Carol?’

  Carol looked up in surprise, expecting to see herself surrounded by teenage versions of her friends. Instead Diana was rattling a tin in her direction.

  ‘Do you want to put the others in as well?’

  Carol blinked to focus her thoughts as well as h
er eyes. ‘What?’ She could still feel the heat of Gareth’s touch.

  Oblivious, Diana handed her the little tin full of glass-headed map pins. ‘I thought if we did red for performances, green for side trips and cultural visits…They’re all marked and numbered.’ She pointed to the map.

  Carol nodded. There was a list of the numbers pinned alongside.

  ‘Are you all right?’ asked Diana anxiously.

  ‘Yeah, I’m fine. I think I’m just coming down with a nasty case of nostalgia. I keep remembering things about what we did and where we went—and who said what to who, all in wide screen, Dolby sound, full Technicolor.’

  Diana grinned. ‘I think we all are. It’s contagious. I’ll ask Netty to pick us up a bottle of Baileys and some wine from the offie, or how about some brandy and vodka, so she can whip up one of her patent snowballs?’

  Carol laughed. ‘Good plan, although this time tell her to remember the advocaat.’

  ‘The only answer is anaesthetic,’ said Diana firmly, picking up a pile of photographs. ‘And lots of it.’

  ‘That’s my girl, welcome back,’ smiled Carol.

  Diana sniffed. ‘I don’t know what you mean. I’ve never been away,’ she said. ‘I was just semiretired.’

  Carol skewered their journey north with a trail of brightly coloured pins. ‘Remember the bottle of Scotch we had on the last tour disco? We should have got one for tonight.’

  ‘What, and throw up and feel lousy tomorrow during the performance?’

  ‘Well, it worked last time—and we don’t have to go mad.’ Carol thought for a few moments and then grinned. ‘Actually, maybe we do. Maybe it is just what we all need.’

  ‘Who is going mad?’ said Netty, heading out towards them, eyeing up the display.

  ‘I was just saying we should re ally get a bottle of Scotch for tonight.’

  Netty held her hand out. ‘Are you paying or are we planning to have a whip-round like last time?’

  ‘Actually,’ said Diana looking thoughtful, ‘I think last time we paid for the Scotch with my winnings from thrashing Duncan’s lot at poker.’

  Netty grinned. ‘Anyone got a pack of cards?’

  TEN

  The stagehands from the school reunion helped to carry in the speakers for the guy doing the Saturday evening disco. He arrived to set up just after teatime and well before dinner, and was called Dave. He had a bleached blond mullet, a nasty fake tan, badly capped teeth and said ‘groovy’ a lot. He was wearing a turquoise-blue sequinned dinner jacket and Cuban heels. The entire crew dwarfed him by at least a foot. Some by a foot and a half.

  Rehearsals over for the day, Diana and Carol stood by the double doors into the main hall, watching the guys trail through with the disco gear, a string of ants with beer bellies, all wearing tour T-shirts and jeans.

  ‘He is absolutely perfect,’ hissed Carol under her breath as Dave scuttled by them, carrying what looked suspiciously like a smoke machine. ‘Adie’s going to love this. Do you think he’s got a mirror ball?’

  ‘Who, Dave? I can’t imagine him travelling anywhere without one, can you? Do you think I should go down and invite the preachers to join us later?’ said Diana. ‘I do appreciate that they’ve been keeping a low profile until now but it’s going to get pretty noisy later on.’ She nodded towards the corridor opposite the one that led into their wing of Burbeck House. At the entrance was a nicely varnished wooden arrow-shaped sign on a stick that read ‘All Christian Delegates This Way’.

  It made it seem like their corridor led to perdition.

  ‘You’re the one married to a vicar, Di—how do Christians feel about Black Sabbath?’

  Diana glanced at Dave the DJ as he pattered past again, this time bearing a box of vinyl marked, ‘Golden Oldies—M-R’ in thick marker pen.

  ‘Hedley likes everything from Led Zeppelin to Vivaldi—but Dave doesn’t look much like a rocker to me—he’s more of your Bucks Fizz kind of boy. On the phone he told me that he was middle-of-the-road.’

  Carol laughed as he waved coyly from behind the mixing desk. ‘Are we talking sexually or musically?’

  Diana pulled her oh-very-funny face, and then went on, ‘He strikes me as someone keener on Dollar and doing the Time Warp, maybe a bit of Slade mixed in to round the evening off, when everyone gets warmed up.’

  Carol lifted her eyebrows. ‘Come on. Get real. That isn’t going to happen. The stagehands will never let him get away with that sort of stuff. Look at them—they were head-bangers to a man. Don’t you remember the mosh pit down the front at the end-of-tour disco? Battlehardened roadies. I seem to remember that they were stage diving into the crowd at one point. Well, at least onto each other—well, at least he was.’ Carol pointed to one of the crew as he lurched past them with a set of disco lights balanced precariously on one shoulder.

  Diana stared at them. ‘Yes, I know that, but they’re all grown-ups now. Colin’s a chartered accountant, Peter’s in IT and Robin runs his own transport company. Alan’s gone bald, for God’s sake. No, I’m sure it will be fine.’

  As he slid the last of the speakers onto the stage, one of the crew turned round and, back arched, face contorted into a pained grimace, burst into a great flurry of air guitar while da-da-da-ing Deep Purple’s, ‘Smoke on the Water’. His performance was met by a wild, whooping, screeching round of applause from the rest of the gang.

  ‘OK, on second thoughts,’ said Diana, ‘I better go and invite the Christians. I’d rather have them here from the start than walking in on us halfway through to complain about the noise.’

  ‘And the stage diving,’ added Carol as Diana headed off down the corridor. ‘Although, you never know, perhaps they’d like to join in. I’ll see you upstairs in a few minutes. I need to get these clothes off.’

  ‘Is that an invitation?’ said a familiar voice.

  Carol swung round and laughed. ‘Hi, I wondered where you’d got to. Are you following me around, by any chance?’

  ‘No, of course not, I just happened to be walking around looking for you and voilà, there you are,’ said Gareth. He leaned forward and kissed her. ‘How’s it going?’

  ‘You were looking for me?’ she said, stepping back.

  ‘Yep, it’s a fair cop, I own up.’ He held up his hands in surrender. ‘I was. Look, I don’t know what’s going on in that head of yours but I’m not the enemy. I just wondered if you fancied a walk before dinner?’

  Carol tried out a disapproving face to see how it felt. ‘A walk down by the lake with a blanket?’ she said. He grinned. ‘How come you’d got a blanket? Seems a little bit presumptuous.’

  ‘What can I say? I was a Boy Scout: be prepared.’ The grin held. ‘But no, not down to the lake, unless of course you particularly want to. I was thinking we could talk some more, maybe grab a quick drink.’ He glanced down at his watch. ‘There’s three-quarters of an hour or so before we eat.’

  Carol shook her head. ‘Sorry, I’d love to but I need to have a shower and get changed.’

  He looked crestfallen. ‘There’s plenty of time,’ he said.

  Carol hesitated just long enough for Gareth to offer her his hand.

  ‘Ten minutes,’ she said, as he led her out into the garden, ‘and then I have to get ready. I need to take a run-up at it these days.’

  ‘You look great,’ he said.

  Carol narrowed her eyes. ‘Ten minutes.’

  ‘OK, cross my heart,’ he said. And then, when they had fallen into step side by side, hand in hand, Gareth said, ‘So tell me about your life—tell me about what you do, your business. I never re ally had you down as a gardener. But Diana told me that you’re very successful.’

  ‘Didn’t we have this conversation last night?’ Carol said.

  He laughed. ‘Maybe, but I want to know everything about you, all of it—what you think, what you do, what makes you tick.’

  ‘We’ve got ten minutes,’ Carol growled.

  ‘Talk faster.’

  She giggle
d.

  ‘We haven’t got time for levity,’ he said, pretending to be cross. And as they walked Carol began to tell him about herself all over again, and as she did he made her laugh and listened and asked good questions and she remembered what it was that once upon a time had made her love him. Love him? The word reared up unexpectedly and hit her like a body blow, stopping her dead in her tracks. All those years ago it wasn’t just lust; Carol realised she had re ally loved him.

  ‘I have to go and get ready,’ she said, pulling her hand out of his.

  ‘What’s the matter? Are you all right?’

  Carol nodded, not trusting herself to meet Gareth’s eye. ‘We’ve had a lot more than ten minutes, I have to go. I’ll see you later.’

  ‘Sure,’ he began, but before he could say anything else Carol had scurried away, feeling like Cinderella running away from the ball. She tried not to think about love, just about having a shower, getting ready, and getting through until Sunday.

  Her heart was beating frantically as she got to the top of the stairs that led into the dormitory. Wasn’t this exactly what she had come to Burbeck House to find out? That she loved him and that he still loved her?

  At the top of the stairs Carol turned back: Gareth was still there in the hall below, watching her, and as their eyes met Carol felt her heart lurch. Damn, damn, damn.

  Netty’s dress for Saturday evening was a tasteful little number in silver lamé with an ecru feather trim—come to that, so was Adie’s, although his was a bomber jacket over black T-shirt and jeans. It struck Carol that there had to have been some collusion—how psychic did you need to be to come up with matching party frocks? Maybe the pair of them were planning on going to the disco as the ugly sisters.

  Coming out of the shower, wrapped in a bathrobe, towelling her hair dry, Carol caught the pair of them doing a very impressive synchronised stereo twirl across the nasty yellow carpet. She smiled, remembering that first time around—thanks to Adie’s diligent tuition in his mum’s front room—they had all learned to jive, which had gone down a storm on tour.

 

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