Clouds Below the Mountains (4 page)

“I'm very happy,” demurred Cheryl, trying to finish the last page of her book. “ Though I can't see us making much use of it. I thought you said we'd be out and about.”

“Well, yes, we'll probably hire a car and have a look around us. Although I noticed that there was snow on Mount Teide as we flew in over the bay, so a trip up there will be very definitely out.”

“I'm not bothered, I really want to try and get a good sun tan while we are here. I'm fed up with having to go on the sun bed at home and I've heard it's not very good for your skin.”

“Do you fancy a spot of lunch, Cheryl?”, Paul asked, staring down his wife's cleavage as she had changed into a yellow plunge neck top, which revealed a tantalizing amount of her breasts.

“The kid's look nice. It's worth spending that bit extra and getting them rigged out in designer clothes. Jack really suits that check shirt, doesn't he, and Annabelle is adorable in that pretty top and skirt?”

“You don't look too bad yourself,” said Cheryl, putting her book down with a sigh. “Those calf length pants are all the rage at the moment. Yes, let's go down to the restaurant, though really I could do with a drink first.”

“Then get one from the mini bar, my darling,” said Paul expansively. “That's what its there for and get me a gin and tonic while you're at it. There's a love.”

***

“It's a bit poky with three beds in, Doreen,” said Jean, to her older sister as they looked around their bedroom on the first floor. “And there's hardly a view. We're looking over a courtyard, a field that looks as if they're going to start building on and the foothills of a volcanic mountain. Do you think when Milly comes out of the bathroom we should see if she wants a room change?”

“Can you really be bothered, Jean? All that upheaval, taking our clothes out of the wardrobe, going down to Reception and having to argue that we're not happy with our room. If you and Milly want to, that's up to you, but I'm pleased we've made it. You know what I'm like flying, it's not my favourite pursuit.”

The toilet flushed in the bathroom and their cousin Milly, joined them in the bedroom. She had heard their conversation while she was sat on the toilet and wasn't bothered either way.

“Let's go and have lunch, eh? You're probably tired, Jean, and things always look grim when you're tired. Once we've had a feed and your carb's start kicking in, you won't be worrying about the accommodation. Just be pleased you're not on the checkout at Safeway.”

“Aye, you're right, I've been saving for this holiday for a long time,” Jean said. “I should be grateful I've got you two to come away with, now that Larry's passed away.”

“Now, Jean,” said her sister. “ We said we wouldn't mention any sad things, not only did your Larry pass over remember, but so did our mother, God rest her soul. No. we're here to enjoy ourselves and we'll leave our problems behind in good old Blighty. Let's get off and order a bottle of wine with our meal, that will perk our spirits up.”

The three women set off down the corridor, after carefully making sure that their door was secure. They meant to take advantage of the security safe in their bedroom, as Doreen and Milly had brought a few nice pieces of jewellery and at the moment were hiding them in their cosmetic bags.

Doreen, the single elder sister led the way. She was quite a tall sturdily built woman in her late fifties, big boned her mother used to say. She wore a loose lilac and cream paisley kaftan and her brown hair was cut short with a few highlighted pieces in her fringe. Doreen liked to feel smart as she was Manageress of a bridal shop and was used to wearing clothes which would her larger appearance

Jean, on the other hand, having recently been bereaved, felt that she couldn't dress so flamboyantly as her sister. She wore a short sleeved cream Peter Pan collar blouse and a plain brown skirt with flat cream sandals. Those colours had always suited her now faded coppery hair. Her round face though, had a permanent look of worry since she had been left to fend for herself by a husband, who had been self employed. Money had been tight, even when he found work as a gardener in the area where they lived and she had been forced to take work as a checkout “girl”, once their son had left home and taken his wages with him.

Milly, their cousin, had no such worries. She had a nice bungalow in Harwood, a suburb of Bolton, a husband who worked as a lecturer and two children in their mid twenties who had made good marriages. There was no shortage of money in that household, as when Milly's parents had passed on they left her a farm as her inheritance. She had quickly sold it and now enjoyed three holidays a year, as well as having paid for lavish weddings for her two daughters. Her clothes were bought at an expensive department store in town and she had her softly curled auburn hair washed and set each week.

She usually went on a cruise with one of her friends from the Flower Arranging club at this time of the year. Her husband didn't do cruises, but her friend had developed MS and was advised by her doctor to rest. Still, she was glad to be here in the sunshine with her cousins and leave her husband to get on with it.

They walked down the stairs to Reception, where Doreen asked where the restaurant was and how much it cost to use their security safe? She was directed to another flight of stairs, that they hadn't seen when they were booking in and informed that lunch finished at two thirty and the hire of the safe cost one thousand pesetas per week.

“Plenty of time to relax, have a glass of wine and then I suggest we go walk about and have a look at the facilities, unless of course you want to grab some sun loungers,” she said to the others. “I fancy having a look at the beauty room, I forgot to put some polish on my nails.”

Jean and Milly agreed that they would like to look around after their meal, so they continued down the stairs to the lower floor.

***

It was very full in the fifty eight covers restaurant. They just managed to get a table, when some other guests had finished their dessert and moved out onto the patio with their coffee.

“This is nice,” said Milly, looking around the airy room, where two waiters and a waitress speedily removed empty plates from the white paper covered tables. “Do you and Jean want to go and choose your food while I wait here, so that no one pinches our table?”

The sisters agreed that they would, then a waiter came over and asked Milly could he get her a drink from the bar?

“A bottle of medium white or do we order by the glass here?,” she asked the dark eyed waiter, whose name badge said he was called Miguel.

“Usually people have a glass of wine with their luncheon, Senora, then order a bottle at dinner time,” he replied.

“Then we'll do as the other people do, please bring three glasses,” she said.

Milly looked about her, trying to spot anyone that had come with them on the plane from Manchester. Yes, there was that dear little boy with his mummy and grandparents. He was sitting in a high chair chewing on a sausage and waving his fork about in the air. God bless him, what a pity he didn't have his daddy with him. I don't know, these young girls nowadays. Oh and there was the elderly couple. My word, he had his plate piled high. There was at least two slices of black forest gateau, a fruit filled pastry, a piece of apple pie and a dollop of icecream. He was certainly getting his moneys' worth.

“Well, there's plenty to choose from,” said Doreen, as she came back to the table with a salad at the side of a pork chop, a portion of lasagne, three roast potatoes, some broccoli, a spoonful of spaghetti bolognaise and a freshly warmed roll. “I don't know how I'm going to eat it all, but I'm certainly going to try.” Jean's plate was similarly filled and by the time she got back to the table, so was Milly's.

***

“What do you fancy doing, Cheryl?”, asked Paul, after they had their lunch and were sitting out on the patio having a drink at the pool bar. “What do you kids want to do? Would you like to go and have a look at the Kid's club, or do you want to get changed into your swimming gear and play in the pool?”

“I would like to go to the Kid's club and see what that is all about,” Annabelle replied. “I might make some new friends there. I can't play with Jack all the time.”

“And Jack, do you want to go with Annabelle?” Jack nodded his head vigorously. “Then that leaves us two, Mummy,” said Paul, feeling pleased that he would have Cheryl to himself for an hour or so. “Shall we get a couple of sun loungers later and chill?”

***

“Looks like you've got an admirer, Sonya,” said Kate Lewis, as they waited for Evan to finish off his icecream, which he was doing very messily.

“Who?”, said Sonya, looking around the room for some handsome man to materialize.

“The waiter who took our plates away before. The one that ruffled Evan's hair and pulled a funny face at him. He's been looking at you, every time he stops for a breather by his loading trolley.

Typically Latin, isn't he, with that swarthy skin and come to bed eyes?”

“That will do, Kate,” said Greg disapprovingly. “ Don't encourage her. If she has to have a holiday romance, I don't want her flirting with some foreigner. She'll be bound to meet an unattached male if she goes to the disco I saw advertised at midnight.”

“Oh, so you'll be allowing me to go to the disco, Father dear?,” said Sonya. “ I didn't know you were going to let me off the leash, as it were.”

“Now Sonya, you needn't take that tone with me. You've already made one mistake that your mother and I have had to pick up the pieces of. Even though you're twenty six, you're still acting like a teenager. Time to take responsibility for your actions and flirting with a Spanish waiter isn't a sensible course of action as far as I'm concerned.”

“Whose flirting?” said Sonya, feeling annoyed with her mother now, for bringing the waiter to her attention. “I didn't even know who Mother was talking about, when she said the waiter was looking at me.”

“Well, we'll let the matter end here. Let's see if Evan wants to go to the Kid's club first, then we'll get some drinks.”

***

“Hello and what's your name?” asked Tina of Jack, as he was pushed gently by his mother into the small room that was used for the Canary club. “Jack Cooper,” replied the little boy shyly and turned to Cheryl for reassurance that he should be with this lady in a strange room.

“And do you go to nursery in England, Jack?” He nodded in answer, but went back to hold his mummy's hand.

“Do you want me to stay with him?”, Cheryl asked. “Just for a little while until he gets used to you. I'm afraid he only goes to nursery on a Tuesday and a Friday and I had an awful job getting him there in the beginning. Our little girl Annabelle is in the other room, should you need somebody to comfort him later. She's seven, going on twelve by the way.”

“ Oh, we get a lot of timid children when they first arrive in the Kid's club, but you'll see, tomorrow he'll be asking you to bring him. Why don't you come and sit on the mat with Evan? He's new. Perhaps you came on the aeroplane together from England”

The two little boys stared at each other for a moment, then Jack let go of his mummy's hand.

***

“Those clouds over there don't look too promising, Mavis”, observed Fred, as he and his wife relaxed on their sun loungers, under the shade of a palm tree by the swimming pool wall.

“Well, the girl on the coach said the next two days were going to be bad, didn't she? Remember that chap we spoke to at the Antilla last year, he was saying that February and March were the rainy months on Tenerife. He said if you look at the clouds in the morning and they came below the mountain, you could forget sitting in a deck chair and make other arrangements for the rest of the day.”

Mavis took a look at her husband under lowered eyelids as she said her piece. She was still annoyed with Fred for booking at this place instead of the Antilla.

“Why did you book for February anyway, Fred, there was nothing to stop us coming in January, was there?”

“Yer know I was waiting to see what was happening over George's chest. I thought if he got th'all clear we could have a late booking. Anyroad, this were cheapest week, price goes up again with half term looming.”

“With the amount of children that's here already, you'd think it was half term,” Mavis retorted. “I don't know, I would never have dreamt of taking our Valerie and Lilian, off school to go on holiday when they were kiddies.”

“We never had the money anyway in those days, Mavis. Just enough to spend a week in a caravan each summer near Rhyl. We only just scrape enough together to have one of these package holidays and that's with me getting a private pension as well. This bloody government wants shooting, the way they take their share before I get any of it. You know, I've worked for forty nine years for that pension, started as an apprentice with the Post Office, digging holes and climbing poles, then worked me way up to a Level 1, just for this bloody shower to dip their greedy fingers into it. Our Valerie had the right idea when she cleared off to Australia. I wish sometimes we'd bloody well gone with her, but now we're far too old.”

“Calm down love, you'll be pushing up your blood pressure,” said Mavis, having listened to her husband's moans since he retired from work ten years ago. “ Go and have a look in the foyer and see what kind of things they do in the daytime. There'll be a board somewhere with all the activities on.”

***

Jenni and Simon sat a table on the patio overlooking the swimming pool. They had come down too late for lunch, as the restaurant closed at two thirty. The waiter had told them that if they waited until three, the pool bar would be serving hot dogs, beef burgers or pizza. Simon had just ordered a slice of pizza and some french fries each and while they were waiting, he was drinking a pint of beer and Jenni was sipping a coke.