A Step In Time (25 page)

As I poured out the whole sorry tale I started to realise how silly it all was. Matty had broken my heart and made me look like a fool. I’d even got a police caution because of him. It was crazy to go back to him. Even if I hadn’t fallen for Patrick who was kind, loving and – Phil was right – totally hot.

‘So why did you get back with Matty?’ Phil said. ‘I saw the thing he did in
Hot
magazine. It was a bit creepy.’

‘You think?’ I said, surprised. ‘I thought it was romantic.’

Phil rolled his eyes.

‘You would,’ he said. ‘Gestures like that aren’t romantic. They’re just for show. Real romance is tiny things. Everyday things. Like Bertie making me a cup of tea every morning before he leaves for work.’

‘And Patrick looking for Donnie,’ I muttered.

‘Cora told me to follow my head and not my heart,’ I said, louder. ‘It makes complete sense for me and Matty to be together. We’re good together. We’re a brand. We make each other better. Babs even said it would improve my chances of getting on a drama.’

‘Sounds like a business decision,’ Phil pointed out. ‘That’s not very romantic.’

‘Cora said romance just leads to trouble,’ I said. ‘It’s not worth the heartache.’

I paused.

‘But Cora was wrong,’ I said slowly, realising that all her advice had been based on Donnie jilting her. And Donnie hadn’t jilted her after all. ‘Cora was wrong.’

Phil looked at me, bewildered. I buried my face in my hands.

‘What should I do, Phil?’ I said. ‘I’ve made so many wrong decisions and now I’ve made a huge mess of everything.’

Phil put his arm round me.

‘I know exactly what you should do,’ he said. I looked up at him hopefully.

‘Get drunk,’ he said.

Which was indeed a brilliant idea at four o’clock on a Friday evening when I was confused and heartsick and just wanted to get through the day. But seemed much less brilliant when I was on my way to the studio early the next morning for a dress rehearsal before the live show that evening.

I sat mutely in the car, hidden behind sunglasses. I didn’t speak to the costume girls, really, as they flitted around me pinning me into the black dress I was wearing for the tango. I nodded when the hairdresser showed me her ideas to pull my hair back off my face and give me bright red lips, even though I knew red lipstick didn’t suit me.

I was hungover, without a doubt, but I was mostly feeling really awful about running out on Patrick. I was horribly aware we’d not rehearsed our dance as much as we should have, and I had a nagging voice in my head telling me this was bound to be our last week on the show. We’d gone as far as we could, I thought. On Sunday I’d be back to business as usual. The very thought made me want to cry, so I pinched my lips together and said nothing at all.

When Patrick eventually showed up, five minutes before our dress rehearsal slot, he barely acknowledged me. He was busy messaging on his phone – Sarah-Lou, I thought. He gave me an abrupt nod and said ‘ready?’ and that was it.

But I wasn’t ready. Not even a bit. As the band struck up the opening notes of ‘Back to Black’, my mind went blank. And not in a good way. I honestly didn’t know what to do. I followed Patrick’s lead, but I was a bit behind the whole time, and I didn’t do the backwards bend properly at all.

The dress rehearsal wasn’t great. But Patrick didn’t hang about afterwards to give me notes like he’d done in the past. He disappeared off somewhere and only came back as the live show was starting. So by the time we took to the stage, I was almost throwing up because I was so nervous. I was glad that Cora hadn’t made it tonight, and that Matty was doing some club night in Manchester. I didn’t want anyone to witness my failure.

And, as if I’d willed it to happen, the dance was a disaster from start to finish. I trod on my dress. I went left instead of right. I stepped on Patrick’s foot. And, worst of all, I tensed up when I went to bend backwards, meaning Patrick fumbled and almost dropped me on my head. It was embarrassing. The audience gave us good-natured applause but, by the time we went to hear what the judges had to say, I was almost in tears.

‘It was a disaster, darling,’ said one. Another told us, quite sternly, that we’d disappointed him. Then the twinkly-eyed head judge, Frank, took off his glasses and looked at us.

‘Something’s happened with you two,’ he said in his rough cockney tones. ‘I don’t know what it is, but I suggest you sort it out quick bloody smart.’

‘Tensions do run high at this stage in the competition,’ said Melissa, the presenter. I glared at her. What did she know?

‘It’s all good,’ Patrick said, taking my hand. I clung on to it. ‘We’re good. This was a tricky dance.’

Frank looked disbelieving.

‘I just hope the audience see enough in you to keep you here for another week,’ he said. ‘You deserve to be in the semi-final in my opinion, but it’s not up to me.’

As we went through the double doors, out of sight of the cameras, Patrick dropped my hand and headed off down the corridor.

‘Patrick,’ I called.

He turned back and looked at me.

‘Sorry,’ I said.

But he didn’t respond.

And that wasn’t even the worst of it. Of course we were in the bottom two – alongside the Olympic swimmer who was dressed as Tarzan and dancing a jive. We had to dance again to stay in the competition and I was terrified.

I tried my best to dance the tango better this time and it was marginally improved. But we were under-rehearsed, awkward and unhappy and it showed.

‘I never want to dance that tango ever again,’ I told Melissa as she led us out to wait for the judges’ verdict.

She laughed, but I hadn’t been joking.

In the end, I think, it was purely due to the Tarzan costume that we stayed in. Frank was no fan of ‘silly outfits’ as he called them and, as he held the deciding vote, his decision to keep us in for another week won through. But it was close. Really close. And Patrick was furious.

‘Let’s take Monday off, too,’ he said, marching out of the studio with me almost running to keep up with him. ‘See if two days off can’t improve our dancing a bit.’

‘Do you think we should clear the air?’ I said, breathlessly. ‘Maybe we should talk about what happened?’

He stopped walking.

‘There’s nothing to talk about,’ he said. ‘I misread the signals, Amy. Just like I misread them when I nearly kissed you after our Charleston. I thought perhaps we had something, but I was wrong.’

‘We do have something,’ I said quietly, my head reeling in surprise that he thought he’d instigated our almost-kiss after our dance that time. I was under the impression it had all been me. ‘Maybe in another time or place we could have been something special.’

Patrick gave me a furious look.

‘Oh, that’s bull,’ he said. ‘You’re ruining your life by chasing Matty and going after celebrity and if you can’t see that, I can’t help you.’

‘Don’t be so superior,’ I said. ‘You just hate that I’m ambitious for something other than bloody dancing.’

Patrick shook his head.

‘I hate that you’re not ambitious enough,’ he said. ‘You’re amazing, Amy. You deserve so much more than this.’

He turned away from me and walked towards the door.

‘See you on Tuesday,’ he said.

Chapter Forty-Four

I barely slept that night. I kept going over our dance in my head, working out where it had gone wrong, and what had happened. And always coming to the same conclusion: it was my fault. If I’d not run out on Patrick, we’d have practised more, things wouldn’t have been so awkward and perhaps we wouldn’t have said those horrible things to one another. I cringed thinking about how he’d said I was shallow and how I’d proved him right. In fact, that was the most awful thing about it, that he was right.

But, said a little voice in my head at about four in the morning, he didn’t have to be so smug and sanctimonious about it. He didn’t have to be so downright nasty.

Suddenly angry I sat up in my tangled duvet and threw my pillow across the room.

‘He’s the douchebag,’ I said to the empty room. ‘Not Matty.’

Although, thinking about it, I’d not even heard from Matty. I’d messaged him on my way home from the studio asking him to call but he hadn’t.

I threw my other pillow.

‘They’re all douchebags.’

Giving up on sleep, I got out of bed, wrapped a cardigan round myself and jammed my feet into slippers, and went into the living room where I watched Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers films until the sun came up. And that’s when exhaustion finally caught up with me and I slept. I woke up much later to the sound of Cora knocking on the patio doors.

Bleary-eyed, I let her in and staggered back to the sofa, making sure I turned the DVD off before she realised I was watching Ginger.

Cora handed me a plate loaded with slices of lemon drizzle cake and went off to the kitchen area to make tea.

‘Do you want to tell me about it?’ she said as the kettle boiled.

‘No.’

‘Fine.’ She poured water into mugs and searched for a teaspoon.

‘I’m very angry,’ I said.

‘Good,’ Cora smiled. ‘That will put some fire in your belly. What’s your next dance?’

‘Foxtrot,’ I said sulkily. ‘And rumba.’

Cora whistled.

‘Tricky,’ she said.

‘I know.’

‘Not talking to Patrick at all?’ She handed me a mug and I shook my head.

‘We kissed,’ I admitted. ‘Then I ran away and he was annoyed. He said I’m throwing my life away chasing fame.’

Cora looked thoughtful.

‘Are you?’

I shrugged.

‘Probably,’ I said. ‘I’m following my head and not my heart, like you said.’

‘I said that?’

‘Yes, you did.’

Cora sat down next to me and wrapped her fingers round her mug. I knew the warmth eased the pain of her arthritis and I wondered if she was doing okay. I generally forgot how old she was day to day, but every now and then I got a reminder.

‘Talking about Donnie with you has stirred up emotions I thought I’d buried long ago,’ she said. ‘I’ve been remembering things, revisiting choices I made years ago. Thinking about old faces from the past.’

With a start I remembered that she didn’t yet know Donnie had died.

‘Cora,’ I began. She held up her hand to stop me.

‘I’ve had a happy life, Amy,’ she said. ‘I love my Ginny, and Natasha and her brood. I’ve been successful with the school.’

‘It’s a great school,’ I said.

Cora smiled.

‘It’s ours, you know?’ she said. ‘My friend Audrey and I started it, back in the fifties.’

‘No. Way,’ I said, impressed. I’d assumed she’d just been one of several teachers.

Cora nodded.

‘I’m very proud of what we did there,’ she said. ‘I’ve had a wonderful career. And I had Audrey, and other friends who became my family. But I can’t deny that I sometimes felt lonely. I think I missed opportunities to build a life with someone because I was afraid to trust my instincts.’

I stared at her. What was she trying to say?

‘I had a few men friends over the years,’ she carried on. ‘One in particular, I think, could have been rather good for me. But I turned him down and he married someone else.’

I felt awful. How could I tell her about Donnie now, knowing she was horribly aware that she’d avoided relationships because he’d jilted her?

She patted my knee.

‘I think perhaps I gave you some misguided advice,’ she said, oblivious that my stricken face was due to guilt and not dismay at her story.

‘I don’t know what to do,’ I said, meaning Matty, Patrick, my career – and whether to tell her the truth about Donnie.

Cora stood up and held out her hand.

‘Why don’t you show me your foxtrot?’ she said.

I looked down at myself.

‘I’m wearing my pyjamas,’ I said, with a small smile. ‘And my slippers.’

‘So?’

‘We’ve barely started working on this one,’ I warned her. ‘We just did little pieces last week when Patrick wanted to give me a break from our tango.’

‘So show me the bits you know.’

I started to mark out the steps and Cora watched silently. Then, as I grew more confident, she began giving me tips.

‘Your shoulders are up round your ears,’ she said. ‘Relax.’

‘I feel silly,’ I said.

We were giggling over my slippered feet when Matty arrived home. He threw his bag on the sofa next to where Cora was perching and glared at her.

‘Hi, babe,’ he said, kissing my neck and wrapping his arms round my waist from behind. He smelled of stale beer and his eyes were wide and staring. I wondered if he’d taken something – he certainly wasn’t a stranger to cocaine.

‘Good time last night?’

‘Say hello to Cora,’ I said like a disapproving teacher. ‘And no, not really.’

Matty mumbled hello to Cora.

‘Get rid of her,’ he hissed in my ear. ‘I’m so hot for you. Let’s go back to bed.’

He tugged at the waistband of my pyjama bottoms and I slapped his hand away.

‘Matty,’ I said, embarrassed at his antics. ‘Behave.’

Cora looked awkward and I felt myself blushing as Matty’s hand snaked up my pyjama top and I wriggled away.

‘Don’t,’ I said. ‘Sorry, Cora.’

‘I’ll be off,’ she said.

‘Yeah, off you go, Grandma,’ said Matty. ‘We’ve got things to do.’

That did it. I pulled his arms off me and turned round to face him.

‘How dare you speak to Cora like that!’ I said. I wasn’t shouting but I was close. ‘How dare you even look at Cora like that?’

‘Oh, babe,’ Matty whined. ‘I just wanted some alone time with you.’

‘Well, I’m busy,’ I said. ‘So alone time is going to have to wait.’

‘You’re only dancing,’ he whined. ‘Dancing isn’t busy. You can make time for Matty.’

Cora was still standing behind me, like a sentry, at the patio doors. I thought of her, missing her chances at happiness and I realised I didn’t want to look back on my life when I was her age and think that I’d made some huge mistakes – and I certainly didn’t want to be shackled to a loser, drugged-up DJ who couldn’t even be polite to an elderly lady who deserved his respect.

‘I can’t make time for Matty,’ I said, picking up his bag and shoving it at him. ‘Not now, not later, not ever.’