by Della Galton
The kitchen clock was ten minutes fast. She hadn’t won at all, she’d lost. And now she could hear the voice again, excitedly mumbling the same words over and over in a stream of vindictive triumph: ‘Told you so, told you so, told you so…’
Chapter Sixteen
SJ and Alison had been born and brought up on the outskirts of Bournemouth. It was SJ’s fault that the entire family had ended up living in or around London. Or at least that’s how it felt when she looked back over her life.
She had studied English Literature at Kingston University, moving into a flat share nearby, and Alison had quickly decided that London was THE place to be and had escaped to visit her sister at every possible opportunity. This had been both flattering – not that SJ had been under any great illusion that she was the main attraction – and worrying, because it was the party scene that Alison loved.
“London is so fab,” she’d tell SJ whenever she turned up – usually without any warning. “You are SO lucky to live here. You’ve got EVERYTHING on your doorstep. You don’t even need a car!”
By everything, she meant clubs, bars and restaurants. SJ did her best to keep an eye on her, but Alison was way too adept at giving her the slip and sneaking off to ‘enjoy herself’. SJ, immersed in studying, found the responsibility of looking after her sister weighed heavy on her shoulders.
“Just let her get on with it,” Tanya said. “The more you try to rein her in, the more she’ll kick back against you. She’ll soon get bored with clubbing – she hasn’t got the money for a start.”
SJ didn’t have the money either. She worked in Pizza Express in her spare time, but she was still mostly broke.
“Waitressing’s a mug’s game,” Alison told her when she suggested she might do the same. “You’d be much better off getting a rich man.”
“I’m in love with Derek,” SJ pointed out, slightly irritated. “And as soon as we can afford it we’re getting married.”
“Well, you won’t catch me scrimping and saving to get married,” Alison said. “I’m going to have a big white wedding, all the trimmings.” She spread her hands wide. “Marquee, brass band, honeymoon in Barbados – the lot.”
“Well, I hope you fall for someone who can afford all that,” SJ said, knowing their parents certainly couldn’t.
Alison sighed theatrically. “Durr. It’s just as easy to fall for a rich man as it is to fall for a poor man. Easier in fact – as they’re likely to give you a better time.”
“What they’re like as a person is more important than how much they earn,” SJ said, wishing she didn’t sound so pompous.
“Well, yes, I know. I’m not saying it isn’t. But I want a decent life, SJ. I don’t want to end up like Mum and Dad, living on some poxy little housing estate. I want my own beauty salon for a start. I’m not going to get that by hooking up with some loser. Not that Derek’s a loser,” she added hastily.
SJ gave up. It was pointless arguing with her sister. She always did what she wanted in the end anyway. She was quite surprised when Alison brought Clive back to the house one night. He wasn’t what she’d expected. Although he was seven years older than Alison, and clearly not short of money – he owned a house in Romford – he wasn’t flash. On the contrary, he seemed quite shy and serious. And although the age gap bothered SJ a bit – Alison might give the impression of being twenty-five, but was only actually seventeen – Clive did seem to really care about her.
“I think he might actually be good for her,” she told Tanya. “He might settle her down a bit.”
“Or she’ll get bored of him,” Tanya said with a wry smile. “But I think you’re right. He’s not heartbreaker material, is he?”
SJ was as shocked as Alison was when Alison got pregnant two months after meeting Clive.
“For heaven’s sake, I thought you were on the pill.”
“I must have forgotten one,” Alison murmured. “I didn’t think it would make that much difference.”
And so it had been Alison who got married first. SJ and Derek had in fact put their wedding on hold for a couple of years because SJ knew her parents wanted to help out and – despite the fact that Clive was able to pay for his own wedding, which had been as big and expensive as Alison had planned – they’d insisted on contributing too. And not just financially.
They’d sold their house in Bournemouth and bought a place in Romford near Alison and Clive so they could help out with the baby while Alison went to do her City & Guilds diploma in beauty therapy.
“I’m not having my grandchild looked after by strangers,” their mother had declared. “Don’t you worry, pet. And I’m not having you throwing your life away on a little ’un – and being cheated out of a decent career, just because you got caught out.”
SJ had flinched at this – being as she’d been the ‘little ‘un’ their mother had presumably ‘thrown her life away on’. And what was the decent career she’d been cheated out of anyway? Until that moment SJ hadn’t known their mother had felt cheated. She’d always seemed perfectly happy being at home with them.
When SJ and Derek finally got married, it had been low key. Even her hen night, which Tanya had organised, had been pretty low key. It had involved SJ and a group of her friends going for a meal in Chinatown. For entertainment, Tanya had organised a list of tasks which she’d had to perform (or pay a forfeit) during the evening. SJ had loved it. At the end of it she’d rolled home gloriously drunk and she’d married Derek, feeling only slightly hungover, the next day.
She’d never regretted the low-keyness of her wedding until a few years later, when she’d been invited to a hen night in Dublin by a tutor she worked with. As the minibus dropped her back home SJ reflected that if she could have relived her hen night she’d definitely go to Dublin.
It was an amazing place. But now she was back she couldn’t wait to see Derek. It was the first weekend they’d spent apart. It was healthy to spend time apart, she mused, as she waved a last goodbye to the girls and tottered down her path – she never had mastered the art of heels – towards her front door. Absence made the heart grow fonder, they said. But actually it did. She wondered if he’d missed her as much as she’d missed him. It hadn’t sounded like it – he’d been out with the boys last night.
They’d had more than a few drinks, judging by his slurred ‘I love you’ when they’d spoken on the phone around midnight. But then what was wrong with that? So had she with Jackie and the crowd. It was good to let your hair down from time to time. And lecturers were experts at partying.
“Morning, Sarah-Jane,” their neighbour Norah called cheerily as SJ rummaged in her bag for her key. “Did you have a good time?”
“Yes, thank you, we did.” Norah was the last person she felt like talking to, but luckily she looked like she was off to church, pristine in a navy and white suit, her horn rimmed glasses perched on her beaky nose. SJ felt dishevelled in comparison. She hadn’t had time for a shower that morning. They hadn’t actually rolled into bed until four, and the plane had left at some unearthly hour.
“Lovely to see Alison again,” Norah went on breezily. “She hasn’t been over in a while, has she?”
SJ blinked. She hadn’t realised Norah kept such a close eye on her guests’ comings and goings. But actually she was right – Alison hadn’t been over lately. She usually only came over when there was a family birthday, or if she wanted SJ to baby-sit.
“She’s ever such a pretty girl, isn’t she?” Norah was practically hanging over the fence in anticipation of a good gossip.
SJ muttered something unintelligible – she was way too hungover for chit-chat – and let herself into the house.
Everything looked very tidy. Derek had obviously had a splurge, bless him – he hated housework. She paused in the kitchen, breathing in the sweet smell of home. He’d even sprayed air freshener around the place. Maybe she should go away more often.
She found him in the lounge, sprawled on the settee with the papers. When he saw her he
blinked sleepily. “Hi, hun, I didn’t hear you come in. You’re back early.”
“It’s gone half eleven,” SJ pointed out, gazing bleary eyed at her watch. “Have you missed me?” The sight of his crumpled brown hair and unshaven chin caught at her heart. She’d never got over the fact that she still loved him so much – after nearly six years together the honeymoon period should have been well and truly over.
She dropped her overnight bag as he stood up and then they were buried in each other’s arms and she was breathing in his familiar scent and grazing her cheek against his chin. “Thank you for tidying up. You haven’t been here all night, have you?”
“I’ll have you know I’ve been up since the crack of dawn.” He drew himself up to his full height, which was only an inch or so taller than her in bare feet. “I’m a regular Mr Mop, me. I’m thinking of getting a job as a domestic engineer, what do you reckon?”
“What’s a domestic engineer?”
“A cleaner, my sweet lamb. Now let me take you on a full guided tour and you can let me know if my work is up to your exacting standards.”
SJ giggled. They both knew her standards were far from exacting. Her A tidy house is a sign of a sick mind fridge magnet had pride of place between the organised people are just too lazy to look for things and life’s too short to drink bad wine.
“And then…” Derek went on, biting her neck experimentally and sending shivers of lust down her spine, “if my work is to your approval, I shall demand payment in kind in the bedroom.”
“I’ve got something for you,” SJ muttered, wondering in amazement how it was still possible for him to elicit such a startling response from her body – particularly her hungover, party-all-night, very tired body.
A brief rummage in her bag produced a bent bar of chocolate with A Present from Temple Bar emblazoned across the wrapper.
“Ha ha – lunch.” Derek pounced on it and then put it to one side and took hold of her shoulders. “But first, my tour. Follow me.”
They didn’t get any further than the bedroom. He’d even changed the sheets, she noticed, touched as he flung back the purple duvet cover that clashed horribly with the lime green walls of their bedroom.
“I really ought to have a shower first.”
He brushed away her protests with a kiss and she was glad she’d at least cleaned her teeth and had been sucking mints on the plane.
“I shall lick you clean,” he announced, with a wicked gleam in his eyes. Then he coughed, squared his shoulders and straightened his face as his voice took on a more formal tone.
“But first, I shall require you to remove your clothes. You can go behind the screen. Call me when you’re undressed. I shall need to check your notes.”
He was slipping from ‘domestic engineer’ into ‘doctor’ mode, SJ realised with a flicker of amusement as she moved around the other side of the bed and unbuttoned her jeans.
“Now Mrs Anderson, there’s really nothing to worry about. My name is Doctor Clit. If you could lie back on the couch and relax – I’m going to need to examine you.” He pulled on an imaginary pair of latex gloves and slanted a wicked grin at her to see how she was taking it.
SJ smiled back at him and lay down obediently. They’d played this game a thousand times before. She knew the drill.
“I will need to have a very close inspection,” he continued, sitting on the bed beside her and trailing a hand along the outside of her bare thigh. “Are you ready, Mrs Anderson? Are there any little problems you need to tell me about before we start?”
SJ shook her head, looked at his serious profile and went along with the game.
It was only later, when she was still reeling from her orgasm and Derek was reaching for a post coital fag, that she remembered what their next door neighbour had said about Alison.
She propped herself up on her elbows, still fuzzy and soft in the afterglow, and turned her attention to her husband.
“What did Alison want?”
“Alison?” He looked momentarily puzzled, as if he couldn’t quite remember who Alison was.
“My sister, Alison,” SJ murmured sleepily. “Norah caught me on the way in and she mentioned her.”
“Ah – that Alison.” He passed her a lit Silk Cut and nodded. “Yes, she did pop by yesterday. I meant to tell you. She wanted to know if you fancied going halves on your dad’s birthday present. She’s a bit strapped for cash.”
Alison was always strapped for cash when it came to buying presents for other people. SJ smiled. “Did she have any suggestions?”
“She didn’t really say. I told her you’d ring her some time.”
“Okay,” SJ said happily. The cigarette had woken her up again and she could never sleep in the daytime like Derek could, however tired she was. She clambered out of bed and showered and sorted out her dirty laundry to take downstairs.
She might as well put a load of washing on, she thought, hauling Derek’s jeans out of the washing basket and emptying the pockets on auto pilot. A toffee, a fiver and a receipt. She smiled. However many times she asked him he never remembered to take things out of his pockets. Distractedly, she glanced at the receipt
Two pizzas – one pepperoni, one Hawaiian – ordered at ten thirty-five the previous night and delivered by Peter. What an amazing thing technology was. Hang on a minute. Hadn’t Derek told her he’d gone out for a pizza? So why would the receipt say it had been delivered? She felt the hairs on the back of her neck prickle and a spark of unease flickered in her stomach. Alison’s favourite pizza was Hawaiian.
It didn’t mean anything. No doubt there was a perfectly reasonable explanation. She went back upstairs and found Derek was fast asleep. Perched on the edge of the bed, she stroked a strand of hair back from his face. “Hey, sleepy head, are you staying there all day?”
“Uh huh,” he mumbled, opening one eye. “Have you brought me a cup of coffee?”
“I’ll make us one in a minute. So what time did Alison come round last night? Was it before you went out with the boys or after?”
“After.”
SJ frowned. “But I thought you said you went to the Jolly Sailor and had a few more in town and then went for a late night pizza.”
“Yeah, we did. What’s with all the questions, SJ?”
“So what time did Alison come over then?”
There was a little silence, and she could feel a nugget of anxiousness building deep within her. Something didn’t add up, but then her brain wasn’t exactly in gear. What she really needed was to catch up on sleep. But Derek still hadn’t answered her question.
“I was quite pissed, SJ. I’m not sure of the times.” He closed his eyes, indicating the discussion was over. SJ wished she could leave it there, but she couldn’t.
She wished Norah had been more specific, but she could hardly nip round and cross-question her… ‘Er, what time exactly was my sister here?’ Although doubtless she’d be able to tell her the exact times of arrival and departure. Norah didn’t have a terribly exciting life. And why was Derek being so evasive? It wasn’t like him.
He couldn’t have anything to hide. Nothing to do with Alison anyway – he didn’t like her much. He’d always agreed with SJ that her sister was deep-down- shallow. In fact, she had a feeling he’d coined the phrase.
Downstairs she paced while she waited for the kettle to boil. Maybe she should give Alison a ring. That would clarify things.
“Hiya, SJ, how’s it going?” Her sister sounded bright and chirpy. “Did you have a good time in Dublin?”
“Yeah – great, thanks. Derek said you’d popped over about Dad’s present.”
“That’s right. I thought we could get him a season ticket for the Saints. What do you think? Mum said he’d like one, but they’re quite expensive.”
“Good idea.” SJ was burning to ask what time Alison had come over, but she didn’t want to admit she didn’t know. She cleared her throat and heard herself saying, in a voice so casual she couldn’t believe it was he
rs, “Did you enjoy the pizza?”
“Er – yes, it was scrummy, thanks. Look, I’ve got to go, SJ – the kids are fighting. Speak soon. Byee.”
SJ disconnected, feeling cold. Why would Derek say he’d had pizza in town with the boys if he’d had it here with Alison?
Her heart was thudding. Her heart knew there was a problem before her hungover brain had latched on to what it was. Irritated, she stomped into the kitchen and made some coffee.
The phone rang.
“Hi, SJ, it’s – um – Chalky here, is Derek about?”
“He’s asleep,” she murmured, wondering if Chalky had been one of the lads Derek had been out with. Probably – Chalky never missed an excuse for a good piss-up.
“Okay, no worries, I just – um – wanted to let him know I’ve got that Bond film he was after. I can drop it over if he’s in a rush. Otherwise I’ll see him Tuesday.”
“Couldn’t you have given it to him last night?” SJ blurted out, wishing she could think of a more subtle way of asking him if he’d been out with Derek, but unable to come up with anything at such short notice.
“Well, um - yeah – if I’d seen him last night. But – durr – I didn’t, did I? He said he’d had enough at lunchtime and sodded off early. Flamin’ lightweight!”
“Oh,” SJ said, feeling faint. “Right, Chalky. Thanks, I’ll tell him you called.”
She marched upstairs, but in the doorway of their bedroom, she hesitated. Derek was still asleep on his back, half covered by the duvet, one hand flung back on the pillow like a child’s. The midday sunlight slanted across his muscled upper body and highlighted his sculpted cheekbones and the lighter bits in his brown hair where he’d been out in the sun. As she stood there gazing at him, she felt a rush of love so intense she could have wept.
He loved her. He wouldn’t hurt her, he wouldn’t betray her – he surely wouldn’t have anything to do with Alison. Derek was well aware of how she felt about her sister. Yet something was wrong.
Her heart was still on triple time. A giant hand twisted her intestines and squeezed at her bowels. At best he wasn’t telling her the full story about Alison’s visit. And at worst he was lying. Why?
