I Should Be So Lucky (2 page)

Naomi – with reluctance – moved away from the connecting door, crossed the hall (neatly avoiding the loose bits of parquet) and went into the kitchen to make a mug of tea. She should put the light on, but it
was
such a waste. ‘Good lighting is essential. It’s safer.’ Viola, Kate and Miles, in a rare moment of sibling solidarity, had all given her the lecture when the electrics were being rejigged. In spite of daily yoga and being able to horrify the grandchildren by still being able to contort her feet to behind her ears, Naomi was finding that her knees weren’t quite what they were, and in the past year she’d had a few adrenalin-surge moments on the stairs when it had felt as if her joints were locking up like a rusting engine and that putting a foot down in the right place on the next step wasn’t going to happen. Running twelve light bulbs at once in one room, however, could only be an outrageous expense, whatever they claimed about low voltage and green options. When she was a young thing of eighteen and first escaped from Burnley to a grim but thrilling Bayswater bedsit, the household managed well enough with one bulb per room and a torch on string for the lav. No one had died of dark.

She would take her tea into the sitting room and watch the news on TV, she decided. That way, she would be in the right place to see Viola’s headlights swinging into the driveway when she got home. Perhaps she’d come in and join her for a shot of bedtime Scotch. After all, in spite of this being-separate thing when it came to living arrangements, what was the point of having your own family as your neighbours if you didn’t at least pass the time of day with them?

‘It’s OK, Dad, she’s gone!’ Rachel let her long-held breath go in one whooshing sigh and bounced back to the sofa where her father – on a ‘just passing’ visit – sat as still as a spooked cat, a mug of tea halfway to his mouth.

‘Does she do a lot of that? The checking-up thing?’ Marco flipped one long leg across the other, tweaking at his jeans and taking a peek at the sharp, shiny toes of his cowboy boots. Rachel gave him a look and teased, ‘They’re just shoes, you know, Dad. You are
such
a girl!’

Marco fondly stroked the surface of the inky snakeskin. ‘Boots, to be exact. But they’re new, Rache! You know what it’s like when you’ve found the
exact thing
you didn’t even know you were looking for. I
heart
them, fell desperately in love the moment I saw them in the window at R. Soles. But tell me about your grand-mama. Doesn’t it creep you out when she breathes through the wood like that? Does she do it when your mother’s here?’

‘No – when Mum’s around and Gran wants something she makes a big thing of knocking on the door and saying she’s sorry to disturb us. It’s fine … but you know, really, it was only supposed to be for a little while after Rhys died and Mum was so upset cos all those loony people kept writing on our fence and shoving vile notes through the door, but it’s been, like, more than a
year
? I want to go back home. I think we
should
. I love Gran and all, but this place spooks me.’

‘It would spook anyone.’ Marco looked at the purple chenille curtains that moved gently in the draught from French doors that were closed but not airproof. ‘This place is all noise and movement, like there’s always someone else in here, rustling about.’

‘Eek! Don’t say things like that, it’s too scary.’

‘Sorry. Anyway, it’s probably mice and lack of double glazing. Hey, look, I’d better go. Your gran might go for a round-two raid and burst in here to see if she can catch you snogging some poor spotty geezer on the sofa, and we both know how thrilled she’d be to see me.’

‘Spotty? As if. I do have
some
taste,’ Rachel scoffed. ‘But it’s been really good to see you. And to meet your new boots.’

‘And it’s always a delight to see you, girl.’ Marco pulled back the chenille curtain and peered out. ‘OK, looks clear enough. I should be able to skirt round the shrubbery to the gates without Nana Naomi catching sight.’

‘Be careful you don’t get mud on your snakeskin.’ Rachel giggled.

‘Shudder! I’d rather take them off and carry them through the nettles in just my socks.’

‘Oh, Dad!’ Rachel laughed as Marco stepped out through the doors into the darkness. ‘You are just
so
…’

‘Gay? Yes, darling, I know. Everyone knows.’ He kissed the top of her head and hugged her. ‘Goodnight,
princess
, and come and hang out at mine if you’re mizzy here. We’re always thrilled to have you around.’

‘I will. Soon. And thanks for coming over. It was fun; better than maths homework, anyway.’

‘Oh, thanks! Glad to have been so very useful. Now I must rush, James will be wondering where I am. Do send my love to your gorgeous mum and tell her I’ll give her a call soon. It’s time we had one of our lunches. Right, stay by the window and watch me do my
Great Escape
number.’

He peered into the night, looking around like someone badly acting a spy routine, scuttled over to the dense shrubbery that ran from the side of the house to the front gate and vanished into the bushes. Rachel closed and locked the doors and stood watching the trail of trembling foliage marking the progress of her father. If Naomi were looking out of the front windows she’d imagine there was a bear weaving its way through the hydrangeas. Then he waved briefly from the pavement side of the gates and vanished. Moments later Rachel heard the revving of a Mini Cooper and her father was off, back to his light, bright apartment in Notting Hill where his light, bright partner James would be waiting for him.

The traffic was slow and heavy for a late mid-week evening, as if – Viola idly thought, as she and her Polo crawled along the dual carriageway – while she and the
book
group had been wolfing cake and sympathizing with Marianne Dashwood regarding her knack for picking the fit but feckless option when it came to men, there had been a dire national emergency announced on TV and Twitter, and half the population had taken to the roads to bolt for rural safety. A small earthquake in Earls Court, perhaps. Or the Thames filling up with weird water-borne radiation that was causing the capital’s kettles to glow scarlet as the water heated. As she came to yet another red traffic light she looked into the nearby cars, half expecting to see hastily piled-up bedding, cat baskets, children in pyjamas, sleeping. But no – mostly it was … couples. It was always couples. Lately when she’d looked at the loved-up, the paired-off, she’d felt a sad stab of envy.

Back at Charlotte’s, the others would by now have been asking each other if Viola was seeing anybody yet. She’d bet the question had come up the moment the front door had shut behind her – she’d ask Amanda about it at work tomorrow. Amanda, bless her, would tentatively have suggested maybe it was a bit soon; Charlotte would have said no, it was high time to get back on the dating circuit, Viola wasn’t getting any younger. What none of them would have come out with (because you just didn’t, ever, not even if you were as gormlessly tactless as Charlotte) was that Rhys had been a selfish, cheating bastard and giving him even sixteen days’ grieving grace was possibly more than he deserved,
let
alone sixteen months. Soon, people would sidle round to the
whyever did you marry him
question. They probably had already in private, though not yet to her face – but any day now they would. Especially her sister Kate, who’d managed to look as if she predicted doom even on the wedding day, taking her aside from other guests before the ceremony to ask her about five times
if she was sure
. At the time she’d just giggled and told Kate she was being like the kind of fussy mother who keeps asking a small child if they need a wee. But maybe Kate had second-guessed disaster: Rhys had turned out to be a complete sod with a complete absence of the fidelity gene, but his sudden death had been a huge shock, even though she’d spent most of the funeral service wondering which of the many assembled women in the congregation had been the mistress he’d sped off to leave her for on that fatally icy February night.

Ahead of her were more red lights, but also a blue flashing one. So that was the hold-up: an accident. Traffic was down to one lane and police were directing alternate lines of cars past the scene. Viola felt her heart beating faster. Reminded of Rhys’s demolished Porsche, she really didn’t want to see cars crunched up like sweet wrappers, maybe someone still trapped and frantic; really didn’t want to imagine scenes of desperate rescue inside the parked ambulance that she could now see on the verge. One that wasn’t going anywhere was always a bad sign, wasn’t it? Because if there was hope, it would
surely
be speeding with full siren-blast to the nearest A & E.

Quickly, she turned up the nearest side road. The diversion she had in mind would be the long way round and would take her past Bell Cottage (now rented out), shared during those tempestuous months with Rhys, but needs must. She stopped at the roadside to call Rachel, tell her she would be home in fifteen minutes, and then sped on her way, pleased to be free of snarled-up traffic and wondering why so few others had opted for a detour. Who were those people who slowed down to look at crash sites? How could anyone want to do more than get past as fast as was safe and not have their minds scarred by the sight of someone else’s catastrophe?

Later, she wondered if her doomy thoughts had had some karmic influence on what happened next. As she slowed down for a big shrub-shrouded roundabout before rejoining the dual carriageway, something went clunk at the back of the Polo and Viola felt a sudden lack of give in the steering wheel. In a heart-pounding panic, trying to remember what the Stig always told the celebrity guest drivers on
Top Gear
about how to steer into skids, she tried to brake, but the car had developed its own sense of direction and lurched sideways, almost bouncing across the raised kerb and on to the roundabout before coming to a thudding halt in the middle of a large bush. For several moments she sat silent,
trying
to calm her thumping heart and feeling desperately thankful that all of her seemed to be in one functioning piece and that she hadn’t been punched in the face by an airbag. Can’t have been that bad then, she thought, still shaking as she pushed the door open as far as she could.

‘Oh, brilliant,’ she sighed, as her hand was immediately attacked by spikes and thorns. The bush was one of the nasty stabby kind. Every little twig on it seemed keen to dig into her to remind her that she was in vading its space. Considering this was only a suburban roundabout, she appeared to have landed in the middle of a small forest. And just when she needed them, there seemed to be no cars around. Not that they could have seen her. The black Polo was so engulfed in foliage it was as if the stuff had grown around it, like the forest of thorns round Sleeping Beauty’s castle. Viola just hoped she’d be off the traffic island in under a hundred years. Tentatively she stepped out, trying to push down as much of the undergrowth as she could.

‘Hey, are you all right? What happened there?’ A man appeared next to her, taking her hand and treading the branches out of her way and leading her to a clearing, further into the centre of the island. He was dressed all in black, a fair bit too old to be wearing a hoodie, and the fleeting idea that he was a good old-fashioned cat burglar, diverted between local break-ins by her careering Polo, came into her head. Where had he
come
from? He must have sprinted across the road.

‘I think so,’ she said, pulling leaves from her hair. ‘My car, though … I think there must have been a puncture or something, it went all …’

‘It’s OK. It looks rescuable. Are you with the AA?’

‘Yes, thank goodness. I’ll give them a call …’ She stepped back towards the car door.

‘No, wait, you’ll get covered in scratches. Mahonia are spiky bastards; it’ll rip your coat to shreds. Let me help; I’m guessing your bag is on the passenger seat?’

She hesitated. How safe was this? Not remotely safe, would be her guess. If she’d been right to come up with the burglary-career option, then he could be halfway down the street with her credit cards and cash before she’d got free of the last of the twigs. All the same, she waited where she was as he crunched easily over the branches to the far side of the car. In the weak shine from the Polo’s sidelights his teeth gleamed as he looked back and smiled at her: a wolfish sideways grin that didn’t quite reassure her – it brought to mind the way that people who say a toothy Alsatian dog ‘just wants to play’ make you immediately want to get behind the nearest high wall. In contrast to the bright teeth, his face looked streakily muddy and his hands were covered in earth. As her eyes adjusted to the gloom she could also make out that beyond him, further into the clearing, there was a small green Land Rover, against which was propped
a
spade. So that was where he’d sprung from so swiftly.

What, she asked herself, would anyone be doing in the middle of a woody traffic island late at night with a spade? Only one thing, one horribly gruesome thing came to mind, along with an image of a shallow grave and every lurid police drama she’d ever seen. Her mother, it occurred to her, would have been thrilled. As an avid reader of murder mysteries Naomi would have been right there, congratulating Viola’s rescuer on picking the perfect spot for a bit of late-night body-burying.

‘Oh dear Lord,’ she breathed, catching sight of a deep and recently dug hole. What the hell was this guy
doing
?

‘Here’s your bag.’ Her rescuer returned and handed it over. ‘I hope your phone didn’t drop out of it in all the lurching about. The battery’s given out on mine.’

‘Um … thanks.’ She fumbled around inside the bag, completely incapable of getting her trembling hands to find what she was looking for.

‘Look, you’re really shaken up, aren’t you?’ he said. ‘Why don’t I just give you a ride to wherever you were going and you can sort it out in the morning from somewhere a bit warmer and easier than this? Your car’s not in anyone’s way, after all.’