Girl Heart Boy: No Such Thing as Forever (Book 1) (12 page)

‘Well, just ignore the call if you don’t want to do it … Anyway, it might not be a bad idea to be, like, slightly less available.’

I fell back on my bed and looked at the glow-in-the-dark stars on the ceiling. ‘God, Ash, how come everything’s so simple for you?’

She was quiet for a moment. ‘Dunno, babes. Maybe I just pick my battles.’

I remembered what she’d said on the night of the party, about pretending. ‘Anyway. Thanks for the info. You’re like my own personal sex dictionary.’

She laughed. ‘You knows it. Have fun. Don’t do anything I wouldn’t do.’

She was still sniggering when I hung up.

In the end my problem was solved for me, because Joe didn’t call anyway. Or, at least, not intentionally. I
had finally fallen asleep at close to midnight only to suffer about a million dreams about phone sex. So to be woken by my phone ringing was disorientating, like waking up and discovering you really are naked in the exam room. My heart beating loudly, I squinted at the neon display: Joe.

‘Hello?’

Nothing. I heard sporadic muffled sounds of talking, then a laugh. A female laugh. Properly awake now, I ended the call then immediately called him back. He answered on the fifth ring.

‘Sarah?’

I cleared my throat. ‘Oh, hi. Just returning your call.’

‘Um, I didn’t call you?’ I heard giggling in the background.

‘Um, yes you did? Check your phone. You called me just now.’ I heard fumbling sounds.

‘Oh. Right. So I did. Sorry, babe, I must have sat on it or something.’ Further offstage hilarity.

‘Who’s that with you?’ I asked, keeping my tone even.

‘Oh. No one in particular.’ His voice became less distinct. ‘Say hi to Sarah.’ Someone laughed and said something I couldn’t catch. I thought I heard Joe shush them. Her. Whoever. I rested my cheek against the headboard. Oh well, while I had him on the phone …

‘So. I was waiting for your call earlier,’ I said, lightly. ‘I’d put on my best PJs and everything.’

Joe cleared his throat. ‘Yeah, sorry about that. We’ll do it soon, yeah?’

Why couldn’t his friends piss off and leave him to talk to me in peace? I hated the stilted way he spoke when they were around.

‘I’m free tomorrow night,’ I purred. I caught sight of myself in the mirrored wardrobe door and pulled a face. When did I become the kind of girl who phones a boy at two o’clock in the morning and makes cat noises at them?

He phoned me first, I reminded myself, even if it was by accident.

‘Yes, that sounds goo–’ he stopped. ‘Ah no, I’m working …’ He lowered his voice. ‘Listen, I’ll call you soon. I promise.’ I started to respond, but he said, louder now, ‘Look, I’d better go.’ I only just had time to say a quick ‘bye’ before he ended the call.

I stared at my phone for a few seconds, its blank face suddenly all annoying and metaphorical. Was he with Mimi? It had sounded like her voice. Even though he’d told her about me, I hated that they were friends. HATED it. She was a vicious, evil bitch, and he was my gorgeous, sexy Joe. I was terrified that she’d get her claws into him, bewitch him with her
stupid flicky hair and annoying laugh. I could hear Donna telling me to chill out – he’d chosen me, hadn’t he? But the fact remained. Mimi was there with him. I was not.

People always talk about the weather when it comes to funerals, like if it’s raining it’s apt, if it’s sunny it’s ironic. But the weather on Friday was totally schizo, raining one minute, sunny the next. Which, actually, does kind of sum up the mood of the day. The funeral itself was horrible. Rich cried, his mum cried, his dad cried, various relatives both young and old cried. His granddad was a little wizened figure in the front row, stooped and shaking with grief. And me, Cass, Donna, Ashley and even Jack and Ollie all cried because it was horrible seeing Rich so upset.

Like, there was a good turn-out and the vicar did a nice eulogy. He’d known Nanny Blue pretty well cos she’d gone to his church (although Rich told us she only went for the social side and was ninety-eight per cent certain she didn’t believe). Rich said a few words about her, which was so moving I thought my head would explode with the effort of crying quietly. He’d obviously loved her so much. My heart ached for him that she was gone.

So, yeah, it went well. But in the end it was still our friend saying goodbye to his nan, whose decomposing body was in a wooden box at the end of the church.

But, strangely, the wake afterwards was completely different. It was quiet to begin with, but there was soon almost a party atmosphere, with people drinking to Nanny Blue and talking about their happy memories of her. It was a celebration of her life, I guess. Even Rich seemed to enjoy it, although every now and then he’d have to disappear to some quiet corner to compose himself.

But that was a bit later. We’d arrived at the pub, or ‘sixteenth-century coaching inn’ as the sign on our table said, before Rich and his family, cos they’d gone to the family-only cremation ceremony/service/whatever you call it. We recognized a few of Rich’s extended family, but we didn’t really know anyone else. It felt wrong to be there without him, like we were gate-crashing, and I don’t know about the others but I wanted to hang on to their clothes like a kid hangs on to his mum the first day of big school.

As we sat down I got a text from Joe:

I smiled to myself, suppressing a little squeal of glee. That was half term sorted, then. A few days in Devon, then two days with Joe. Perfect. Without saying anything to the others, I put my phone away to reply later. Even I knew that now wasn’t the time or place to be texting.

‘Poor Rich,’ said Ash, voicing what we were all thinking. ‘What he must be going through.’

‘And his mum,’ added Jack, who was carefully tearing the order of service into strips.

I sighed. ‘It’ll happen to us all.’ And then: ‘What?’ as Donna started smirking into her Diet Coke. But I was already biting my cheeks trying not to smile.

Ash shook her head. ‘You’re sick, the pair of you.’

‘Uh-huh, so why are you smiling then?’ asked Cass, whose own mouth was turning up at the edges.

And then we were all silently vibrating with laughter, looking down at the table so we wouldn’t catch anyone’s eye.

‘Oh God, we’re so going to hell,’ squeaked Cass.

‘I know,’ I said, rushing to get the words out before another wave of hysteria hit me. ‘What kind of freak laughs at a wake?’

‘It’s just the tension,’ came a voice from beside us. Rich. That shut us up. We hadn’t seen him come in.

‘Oh, mate … Look, we didn’t mean …’ Jack was distraught, but Rich stopped him.

‘Don’t worry about it. Honestly.’ He sat down and put a bottle of Champagne, or fizzy wine anyway, on the table. ‘So …’ He twisted the cork. ‘I want to drink to Nanny Blue.’ He ceremonially popped the cork and poured seven small glasses. ‘To my nan,’ he said, holding his glass high then downing it in one. It was a bit weird, to be honest. Like something someone our parents’ age would do. The rest of us exchanged worried looks. ‘Don’t worry,’ he said, laughing. ‘I’m not going to get pissed. Or high.’ He shrugged. ‘She used to propose a toast every time she had a drink. It didn’t have to be anything big. She’d drink to, like, a sunny day, or more
Fawlty Towers
repeats on G.O.L.D., or whatever … It was just one of her things.’

Cass held her glass up – ‘To Nanny Blue!’ – and we all did the same.

‘How’s your granddad doing?’ asked Ollie, after we’d all been up to the buffet to get our plates of quiche and pasta salad.

Rich shrugged. ‘Dunno.’

‘D’you think you’ll become closer and stuff, now your nan’s gone?’ asked Donna.

Rich shook his head. ‘No way. I don’t see why I should start being nice to him now, when he’s barely said a civil word to me. And he was always horrible to Nan.’ We followed his gaze as he looked over at his granddad, who cut a pretty pathetic figure, sitting on his own and crying into his Guinness.

‘Don’t feel sorry for him,’ said Rich, seeing the expression on my face. ‘Why do you think no one’s sitting with him, even at his wife’s funeral?’

Cass’s brow creased with the effort of not sympathizing with the old man. ‘How did he and your nan meet?’

‘She was his secretary. He’s a few years older than her … than she was,’ he corrected himself. ‘She says … 
said
he was charming and wealthy and swept her off her feet and shit … The charm certainly didn’t last long, though. God knows why she stayed with the bastard.’

As if he could hear us, his granddad got to his feet and started tottering over to us, swaying and stumbling and obviously hammered. ‘Great,’ muttered Rich.

‘All right, poof?’ said his granddad, slapping a gnarly hand on Rich’s shoulder. ‘Bit of a nerve, bringing your boyfriend.’ He fixed rheumy eyes on Ollie, who was sitting next to Rich.

‘He’s not my boyfriend, Granddad,’ said Rich, through gritted teeth, his eyes down.

‘Yeah yeah, I believe you, thousands wouldn’t.’ And with that he tottered off in the direction of the toilets.

Rich looked at Ollie. ‘Sorry, mate.’

He shrugged. ‘Don’t worry about it.’ But you could tell he was a bit shaken. We all were.

Rich tried to laugh it off. ‘Look, just ignore him. He’s a disgusting old bigot, and he’s drunk. My mum told me about this one time …’ And he started telling us stories about what his granddad used to get up to when he was drunk, most of which ended up with the proverbial custard pie in his granddad’s face and were so outrageous we couldn’t help laughing. I caught Cass’s eye and she gave me a sideways smile. Rich somehow always managed to avoid getting into conversations about his sexuality. He’d once told Donna that he wasn’t into confessionals. He is what he is, and he doesn’t feel the need to label it. Which, as Donna said at the time, was just a typically Rich way of saying it’s none of your business. And, actually, if I’m honest, lovely as Rich is, I think he likes being a bit of a man of mystery.

As the afternoon went on the atmosphere got more relaxed, and we slowly split off into separate groups. Rich, Cass and Jack got talking to Rich’s parents, while Ashley and Donna got hit on by a couple of
sleazes who were at least forty – I don’t even think they were part of the funeral party. The poor deluded men thought their luck was in. You could see them exchanging
wahey!
looks. As if. Ash and Donna were loving it, hamming it up all wide-eyed and simpering. Which left me and Ollie, sitting at our now empty table doing cake taste-tests.‘Mmm, yah … yah …’ said Ollie earnestly, screwing his eyes up in concentration as he moved fondant fancy around his mouth like a cow chewing the cud. ‘I’m getting sugar, and modified maize starch … and, yes, a definite hint of humectants.’

Giggling, I took a nibble of a plastic-looking Victoria sponge. Trying to match Ollie’s serious face – how did he do it without creasing up? – I nodded vigorously. ‘Oh yes. Mmm, yes, now you see this is very good. Definite emulsifier here, and … yes, it is, it’s raising agents. Definitely raising agents.’

Ollie pinched a piece of cake from my plate. ‘Actually, that looks all right.’

I watched him put it in his mouth. ‘Well?’

He moaned and rolled his eyes in mock ecstasy. ‘’S’goooorgeous.’ He grinned through cheekfuls of cheapo sponge.

‘You can’t beat rubbish cake,’ I agreed, choosing a mini chocolate slice from the selection plate Ollie had made up.

He looked around. ‘Weird that everyone seems so happy.’

I nodded. ‘I know. I expected everyone to be quiet and sombre. Like, murmured conversations and lots of dabbing of eyes with lace hankies.’

Ollie laughed. ‘Right, cos you always carry a lace hanky with you.’

‘I do actually,’ I replied, primly. ‘I keep it in a pocket in my bloomers.’

‘Don’t, you’ll drive me wild with desire,’ he said, brushing his hands together to get rid of the crumbs.

‘Bloomers your thing, are they?’

He gave me a pouty-mouth phwoooar, then said, ‘Talking of which, how’s it going with Joe?’

I smiled. ‘Yeah, all right. I’m going to stay with him next week.’ I hoped. I felt a little clutch of fear that I’d jinxed it just by mentioning it.

‘Wicked … But you are coming to Devon, right?’

‘Right. I’m seeing Joe after.’

‘Cool.’

We sat in companionable silence for a minute, eating cake and people-watching, then Ollie said, ‘Is this your first funeral?’

I nodded. ‘You?’

‘Well, I went to my own brother’s when I was like a week old, but obviously I don’t remember that.’

I spun round from my position watching the back of the room. ‘Your brother?’

He looked at me. ‘Yeah. I had a twin, Zac. He lived for less than a day. Something about not having grown enough in the womb … I don’t really know.’

I was astonished. ‘Ollie, how come I didn’t know that?’

He shrugged. ‘It’s not something I advertise. No big deal, though. It’s not like I miss him.’

‘Do the others know?’

Ollie smiled. ‘Why, you like having inside info?’

‘No! That’s not what I meant.’ I blushed furiously.

‘Flower, I was kidding. Aw, look at you, all flustered!’ He stroked my cheek, then leant back in his chair and started looking around the room again. ‘To be honest, I don’t know if the others know. If they do it’ll only be because it came up in conversation.’

I could hardly get my head round it. ‘Your poor parents,’ I said. ‘I can’t believe I never knew. Do they talk about him?’

‘Yeah, it’s not a taboo subject or anything, and there are photos of him. We were identical.’ He swallowed and looked down. It obviously still meant something to him.

‘It must be strange to think you shared a womb with someone.’

Ollie nodded. ‘Sometimes I even have a sense that
I remember him. It’s hard to describe … it’s nothing concrete, just a feeling.’