These Days of Ours (2 page)

Or maybe that should be A Giant Step.

Downstairs,
Things Can Only Get Better
, a constant on Kate’s pink Walkman, blared out. Her friends, head to toe in trendiest black, bellowed the anthemic chorus, leaping up and down
on Aunty Marjorie’s cherished Persian rugs. Everybody Kate knew dressed in black all the time. Polo necks. Tights. It was as if there was no other colour available in the shops; as if all
teenagers were constantly en route to a funeral.

Up in the spare bedroom, the music was muffled to a thumping pulse in the darkness. Kate sat on the pile of coats on the bed and regarded her boyfriend of six months, who was kissing distance
away. Charlie was taller than her. She liked how she had to stand on tiptoes to kiss him, and she liked the concave spot just below his shoulder where her head fitted when they wound their arms
about each other. There were things she didn’t like about him – his tendency to get stuck into a tedious conversation with her dad when Kate was ready to leave the house, or his
ambivalence towards Becca – but they didn’t seem to matter.

‘Why not?’ Kate was asking. ‘Seriously, though,’ she said, seriously. ‘We’re mad about each other, aren’t we?’

‘Yes.’ Charlie’s dark eyebrows descended, as if he was in pain. ‘Of course we are. Well,’ he added, those eyebrows on the up again. ‘
I’m
mad
about
you
.’

Kate punched him. Rather hard. ‘Sorry,’ she laughed when he flinched. ‘So . . . we’re crazy about each other and we have a bedroom to ourselves with no parents popping in
without knocking . . . so why don’t we . . .’ Kate had been practising her sultry look but suspected it was more duck than siren.

‘It’s not very romantic, is it?’ Charlie looked around the sparsely furnished spare room with its magnolia woodchip walls and its fitted wardrobes. In a corner stood an
exercise bike, with drying underwear – sturdy enough to suggest it was Aunty Marjorie’s rather than Becca’s – draped over its handlebars. A half-built model aeroplane sat
marooned on the beige carpet. ‘And I can’t think of a single epic love poem about the coat pile.’ He squirmed on the shifting hillock of cardigans and jackets.

‘Write one, then.’ Kate poked him. This time she didn’t say sorry. ‘Take some time off from writing the greatest novel the world has ever read.’

‘You call it that,’ said Charlie. ‘Not me.’ Kate knew if she patted the back pocket of Charlie’s punky pinstripe trousers (that wasn’t a bad idea; she was
keen on Charlie’s bottom) she’d encounter a tiny notepad and a stub of pencil. ‘You say your novel is about love. Real love. Raw important love. Small, beautiful love.’ Kate
ducked to maintain eye contact as he dipped his head, wincing as she quoted him back at himself. ‘Think of it as research!’

Edging closer, trusting proximity and pheromones to be her most persuasive allies, Kate placed a hand on Charlie’s thigh. ‘Come here,’ she said in a low voice. They kissed and
she moved nearer still, so they were entwined, his strong arms like straitjacket sleeves around her.

‘Kate, no,’ he murmured.

‘But why?’ she murmured back. Kate knew of Charlie’s sexual adventures with his ex. Everybody knew. His ex was not a discreet girl. Kate froze, mid-kiss, as an unwelcome
thought coughed and made itself known. ‘Christ, Charlie!’ She pulled away, popping their bubble of intimacy. ‘Did you fancy Natalie more than me?’ She jumped up as he
laughed. ‘Don’t laugh at me! Answer the question.’

Spreading his hands in a gesture of surrender, Charlie said, ‘I laughed because that’s dumb, Kate. I fancy you more than I’ve ever fancied anybody. I fancy you more than . .
.’ He cast about desperately for some goddess that any sensible male of his age would lust after. ‘More than Demi Moore!’ he shouted, triumphant.

‘Yeah, right.’ Kate knew what she was and what she wasn’t. She was five feet and a little bit, with legs that were more reliable than elegant, and a witty face peeping out from
a fringe that was never quite straight. She prowled, arms folded, as the moody rumble of Oasis seeped up through the floorboards.

‘Don’t you get it?’ pleaded Charlie. ‘I don’t just fancy you, Kate. That’s only part of it. I love you.’

That wasn’t the first time Charlie had said that since Kate’s fifth birthday party, but it was still in single digits. Kate stared at him, his straight nose and full lips outlined in
the silver moonlight that struggled through Aunty Marjorie’s neurotically ironed net curtains. His jumpers were no longer stained and he was now the parent to his feckless mother, but
Charlie’s basic raw material was unchanged since 1981. He’d been certain then and he was certain now, but how could he be so sure this was love? Kate’s friends bandied the word,
using it about one boy one week, and another lad the next. Kate was cautious about the four letters, wary of their power, sure of their magic.

Charlie reached out from the bed and took each of her hands in his, unfolding her arms, unlocking her mood a little. ‘You never seem to believe me when I say it,’ he whispered. In
the dark his body was almost invisible in its
de rigueur
black, his disembodied face an anxious oval above his polo neck, his hair wilting a little, despite the gel he lavished on it.

‘I do believe you.’ Kate looked down at him, benign again. How speedily her moods shifted around Charlie. ‘I do,’ she repeated sadly. ‘So why can’t we . .
.?’

‘I’ve never done it before.’ Charlie’s lips clamped shut over his admission, as if daring her to comment.

‘Yes you have!’ Kate realised how ridiculous it was to insist Charlie was wrong about his own virginity, or lack thereof. ‘Haven’t you?’

‘Believe it or not, sometimes you girls get the facts wrong when you huddle in the loos and swap stories.’ Charlie dropped her hands and stood up. Over by the window his slender body
took shape in the mercury light. ‘I don’t know why Natalie said we had sex. We just kissed, really, and fooled around a bit.’ He half smiled over his shoulder. ‘Sorry. I
know you don’t like me talking about her.’

‘Now I know she’s a lying nutcase I don’t mind so much.’ Kate sat heavily on the end of the bed. ‘I really thought . . .’

‘I wanted to tell you. But it’s embarrassing.’ His head sank. ‘All the other guys have done it.’ Charlie cleared his throat, said casually, ‘Guess this is
when you chuck me, yeah?’

‘What if the other boys only
say
they’ve done it?’ Kate stretched out one leg, inky as a spider in its opaque hosiery, ending in a clumpy black shoe. ‘You’re
right, Charlie. This isn’t the right time or place for our first time. We can wait.’ Marvelling at his assumption she’d dump him over something so trivial, Kate pretended not to
notice how his whole body sighed with relief. ‘Fancy a dance?’

‘No.’ Charlie closed the distance between them with one stride, laying Kate back among the coats and covering her body with his. ‘I fancy
you
.’ He kissed her, his
hair flopping into her eyes. They almost slid to the floor, but righted themselves, refusing to let their lips lose contact.

‘You’ve changed your mind, then?’ giggled Kate against his teeth as she tugged at his jumper and he fumbled, chimp-like, with the buttons of her shirt.

‘We don’t need romance,’ breathed Charlie, leaning away just long enough to tear his jumper over his head and toss it away. ‘We
are
romance.’

Suddenly the music grew louder. A wedge of gold appeared on the floor. The door had opened, just a sliver.

Kate dived under the coats.

‘
Shit!
’ Charlie followed her, hurriedly pulling windcheaters and denim jackets and second-hand raincoats over them both. By the time the triangle of light grew large enough to
illuminate the bed, they’d burrowed down deep and were invisible to the incomers.

Nose to nose in their murky tent, Kate mouthed
Becca!
to Charlie as she heard her cousin say, ‘Julian! Listen! This is important,’ in the special voice she used to house-train
boyfriends, nine parts candy floss to one part napalm.

‘And so is this.’

Kate and Charlie stifled their giggles, their faces beetroot, as smoochy noises travelled through the layers of coats.
Urgh!
mimed Kate, who had no wish to eavesdrop on Becca’s
romantic interlude.

‘No!’ said Becca. ‘If I don’t get what I want, then neither do you.’

‘Oh come here.’ Six foot four of British upper class male entitlement, gift wrapped in corduroy and tweed, Julian was accustomed to getting his own way. He and Becca illustrated the
well-known paradox
irresistible force meets immovable object
. The pair of them were both irresistible
and
immovable, but Kate knew who she’d back in any battle of wills.

The music from downstairs turned up a notch. Bon Jovi yodelled loud enough to rattle the shelving. There would be complaints from the neighbours but Becca, Kate knew, would visit with flowers
and wine and girlish remorse, and all would be forgiven. Good at making a mess, Becca was even better at clearing it up. Countless times, Becca had got Kate out of trouble. Almost as many times as
she’d got her
into
trouble.

‘God, you’re gorgeous,’ breathed Julian, as Charlie pretended to vomit.

‘Kate helped me choose this.’ Becca twirled for Julian in her burgundy micro mini. ‘I borrowed her choker.’

‘It looks better on you.’

Kate pulled an outraged face in the dark, but had to agree with Julian’s ungentlemanly comment. Everything looked better on Becca. Anointed as the family ‘Pretty One’, she
lived up to her title, with expensively tended blonde streaks and a diet-honed body.

Strangers always sensed the girls were related, even though one cousin was leggy and va-va-voom, and the other was shorter, darker and generally huddled over a book (the ‘Clever
One’). It was the eyes; both Kate and Becca saw the world through china blue peepers that hinted at their shared Irish heritage. Through the coats she heard her cousin defend her.

‘Don’t you say a bad word about my Kate. She’s the best friend I could ever have.’

‘I don’t know why she puts up with you,’ said Julian.

‘She loves me,’ said Becca, serene, certain. ‘Like I love her. I’d give her my last penny.’

‘But you’d borrow it back.’ Julian risked moving closer. ‘Never mind mousey little Kate . . .’

‘No you don’t!’ Becca slapped away Julian’s hands. ‘Kate’s no mouse. Leave her out of this. We need to talk.’

Julian exhaled loudly, his passion efficiently doused. ‘I know what it means when girls say that. What have I done now?’ He hung his blond head and bit his lip.

‘It’s what you
haven’t
done.’

‘Oh Christ.’ Julian slapped his forehead. ‘That’s a big subject. We’ll be here all night, woman. Can’t we narrow it down?’

‘How long have we been going out?’

‘Six glorious months, beloved.’ Julian snaked his arms around her waist.

‘Same as us,’ whispered Charlie.

‘I’ll never forget,’ said Julian, nuzzling Becca’s ear, ‘how astonished I was to discover that good Catholic girls do it on the first date.’

Kate’s eyes widened and she determined to take that up with Becca at another time; the sly little beast claimed she’d made Julian wait for weeks.
As if
, she thought,
sex is
a treat to reward good behaviour, like throwing a chew toy to an obedient labrador
.

‘Get
off
.’ Becca shoved Julian. She was built along Valkyrie lines; he stumbled backwards on the model aeroplane and fell against the exercise bike.

‘Steady on.’

Kate could tell from Julian’s patrician tone that Becca had gone slightly too far. Unlike Kate’s relationship with Charlie – which just pootled merrily along – her
cousin’s love affair was a series of strategic skirmishes. They’d met when Becca had applied to be a receptionist at Julian’s property firm. He’d declared her ‘far too
distracting’ to work with, and suggested dinner instead. They’d tussled for the upper hand ever since; Kate suspected that Julian underestimated his opponent.

A typical battle had been waged over Aunty Marjorie’s Sunday lunch table just a few weeks ago, the balance of power passing from Becca to Julian and back again over the roast potatoes.

‘We’d begun to wonder if we were ever going to meet Becca’s chap,’ said Aunty Marjorie, passing Julian a plate loaded with enough food to feed a greedy family of
four.

‘Hmm,’ mused Becca archly. ‘It’s almost as if he didn’t want to meet my family.’ Her look stapled Julian to his chair. ‘Almost as if he didn’t
want me to think we’re getting serious.’

Julian laughed uncomfortably.

‘So you
are
serious about Becca?’ Kate’s mum had asked, gravy on her chin.

‘Of course he’s serious about her,’ said Aunty Marjorie. ‘Aren’t you, Julian? A well brought up chap like you would never lead my daughter up the garden
path.’

‘Well?’ Becca had actually fluttered her eyelashes at Julian, who looked as if he wanted to throw down his cutlery and throttle her.

‘I have very strong feelings for your daughter,’ said Julian finally.

Aunty Marjorie nudged her husband and Uncle Hugh came to; he often drifted off into his secret dreamworld of golf and silent women.

‘Go on,’ hissed his wife.

Uncle Hugh looked at Julian with regret in his eyes, the way a vet might look at a gerbil he was about to euthanise. ‘Are your intentions honourable, Julian?’

‘Do people really still ask that?’ Kate had been unable to keep quiet any longer.

‘In this house they do.’ Becca kicked her under the table.

Kate kicked her back and they both stifled a laugh, regressing yet again to their shared giggly childhood. This private universe, theirs to visit at will, was a place of joy and nonsense. When
puzzled friends wondered at Kate’s fondness for her cousin, she found it hard to explain why she was so attached to troublesome, all-guns-blazing Becca but it was to do with the way Becca
made her
feel
. Around Becca, Kate felt brave. And a little reckless. For one of life’s prefects, this was heady stuff.

‘My intentions,’ said Julian, snatching back the power by being as straight faced and cool as a statesman, ‘are entirely honourable. I love your daughter, Mr and Mrs Neely, and
I’d never hurt her.’