Authors: Serena Mackesy
Simply Heaven (63 page)
‘No,’ I lie. ‘But what if I had?’
‘Nothing. Just – not something I thought I’d ever see.’
‘You should try it yourself sometime.’
He laughs. Sticks his hands in his pockets in a slightly obscene way. ‘You’re not going to catch Costa Katsouris buying flowers.’
I elbow him in the ribs. ‘It’ll happen.’
‘Not while there’s backpackers on the gold coast.’ He waggles his eyebrows and gives me a flash of his pearlies. ‘I like your sister-in-law. She’s not bad for an oldie.’
‘Don’t even think about it. You’re not in her league.’
‘Maybe she could do with a bit of youthful vigour to wake her up.’
‘Well, what would she want
you
for, then?’
We do a bit of brother-sister hand-slapping.
‘I have missed you,’ I tell him.
‘Shaddap,’ he says. ‘I haven’t missed
you
at all.’
The road is starting to fill up. A minibus pulls up, decants a load of pink and peeling English. They look like a bucket of prawns.
‘Course,’ he says, ‘there’s always the financial aspect.’
‘Meaning?’
‘Meaning if you made it up with them you’d get your allowance starting up again. Can’t be easy, married to a student. Bet you didn’t think
that
was going to happen.’
‘We’ll survive.’
‘Hah!’ shouts Costa. ‘
You
? Survive on a couple of beans and a reflexologist’s income? Pull the other one! I once saw your credit card catch fire you were swiping it so fast!’
‘Quite naïve for a company director, arentcha?’
‘Well,
you’re
quite ugly for a
Sheila
,’ says my charming brother, ‘but I don’t say anything about it.’
I ignore him.
‘Two things. One, even a derelict village is worth a few bob in the Cotswolds. As is an emerald the size of a pigeon’s egg. And a slightly torn Caravaggio, anywhere in the world. And without that bottomless hole for it all to fall in to—’
‘Quite literally,’ he joshes.
A memory of Mary’s face as she went down flashes through my mind. I dismiss it ‘– we’re not exactly going to starve. It’s certainly enough to keep Beatrice in her maximum security twilight home, anyway.’
‘But I thought you said the house had fallen down?’
‘Well, it did, but it didn’t all fall down at once. Took several weeks before it actually did the decent thing. And you’d be amazed how many people are prepared to overlook the health and safety issues where fine art is concerned.’
‘Yih. And millions and millions of dollars.’
‘And millions and millions of dollars.’
He’s started another game of pocket billiards.
‘Maximum security twilight home, eh?’
‘It’s very nice,’ I assure him innocently. ‘Run by the council, but she’s on a private basis so she only has to share with one other old lady. She’s in with a second-hand car dealer’s widow from Swindon at the moment. Gets to listen to stories about shopping at Primark all day.’
‘That’s nice.’
‘Yeah. And they have a great programme of entertainments.’ I’m starting to laugh. ‘Bingo at three o’clock every afternoon, and once a week, the local evangelist youth group comes in and leads a rousing sing-song. “What a Friend I Have in Jesus”. “There’ll Be Blue Birds Over the White Cliffs of Dover”. “If You’re Happy And You Know It Clap Your Hands”. All the old classics.’
‘She must be as happy as a pig in shit,’ says Costa. ‘Sounds like heaven.’
‘Simply,’ I agree. ‘It’s broadening her horizons no end. And once every few weeks I pay someone to go in and serenade her with a Tom Jones medley just to keep her on her toes. We’re hoping she’ll last a good few years yet, she’s having such a good time.’
‘It makes me proud,’ he says. ‘You’re so loving and forgiving.’
‘I learned at the feet of masters.’
‘Why, thank you. What about the rest of them, then? Mary’s foot-soldiers?’
‘Oh, nothing much. Like you say, I’m the loving and forgiving type. It was sad, obviously, that they had to leave their grace-and favour houses, but, you know … when circumstances change and everything …’
‘Yes. Very sad,’ he says.
‘Poor Hilary. It’s hit him hard. All he can afford is a bedsit in Surbiton, and that’s done no good for his career. It’s weird, I know, but no-one seems to want an art investment advisor with more than one digit in their postcode.’
‘Snobbery,’ says Costa. ‘A terrible thing.’
‘Couldn’t have happened to a nicer guy.’
‘So I gather.’
‘Oh, look!’ I say. ‘It’s coming!’
The big bird rises up from the Gozo channel. Dark against the sun and rushing like a flying beetle. And my heart, still and calm all afternoon, swells with excitement. I slip off the wall, boiling tarmac burning the soles of my feet, and shade my eyes to watch her. There’s great romance about the approach of a helicopter. I always convince myself that if I look hard enough, I will see the faces of the passengers, staring down all lit up from the excitement of their trip along the Dingli cliffs.
‘Beaut, isn’t it?’ I bellow over the blat and thump of the rotors. My hair is flying out behind me and I have to drop my sunglasses down to protect my eyes from the dust.
‘Yeah!’ he shouts back.
Like a child, I jump up and down, wave both arms in greeting.
It passes over our heads and Costa starts to walk towards the terminal.
‘I’ll see you in there!’ I shout. ‘I’m going to go up and watch them disembark!’
I jog up the road to where the airfield is visible through a high chain-link fence. He’s here. Three days away from him, and I’ve got a heart that wants to burst with longing. I will never, ever leave you. I couldn’t. I clamber up on to the low stone wall, thread my fingers through the chain-link and watch. I am three years old again, waiting for Christmas. The ’copter sets down, rotors slowing from blat-blat-blat to thock-thock-thock to schtoof-schtoof-schtoof to silence and cicadas. I scratch the back of my calf with my big toe, try to stop myself jiggling with anticipation.
Luggage van. Little bloke in overalls wheeling steps up to the door. And here they come. Bloke in a suit switching on his moby and waiting for a signal. Middle-aged couple in matching safari shirts. Tall, generously upholstered woman with wild red hair whose smile is as big as my own as she pauses on the concrete and sups the air. Three teenagers sulkily herded by a harassed blonde mother.
And he is here. Lean and quiet and gentle and mine. I grip the fence, wait for him to see me. He hooks his fingers into the tab of his jeans and offers the other hand to an old lady as she wavers on the top step. And I will him:
look at me, look at me, look at me
.
He steps out of the shade, looks up. Sees me. Bathes me in his wide blue smile and raises a hand in the air. Holds it there for one, two, three seconds. I smile back, suddenly shy, raise my own in response and press the palm against the chain-link. Watch him as he bends to pick up his haversack, starts the walk to the exit.
And then I run down the road towards the terminal, so I can touch him.
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Epub ISBN 9781446456903
Version 1.0
Published by Arrow Books 2006
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Copyright © Serena Mackesy 2005
Serena Mackesy has asserted her right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988 to be identified as the author of this work
First published in Great Britain in 2005 by Century
Arrow Books
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A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
ISBN 9780099414766