Out Late with Friends and Regrets (27 page)

“Where’s my FUCKING BIKE?”

Instinctively, Fin looked anxiously at the other doors to see if the yell had disturbed anybody.

“Hello?” she called quietly.
 
“Hang on, I’ll be down...”

A young woman in jeans and a neat jacket seemed to be about to shout again, her face tense with anger.
 
Fin smiled as disarmingly as possible as she reached the ground floor.

“Hey, don’t worry, I’m afraid I had to move it outside for a minute – I’m moving into the flat on the second floor, and-”

“Oh
God!
”
 
The woman had already opened the front door and looked up and down the street.
 
“That’s the
third
one!”
 
And she turned towards Fin with alarmingly bared teeth.
 
Fin swiftly produced the bike from the back of the Transit with a friendly “There we are!
 
So sorry, I’m afraid I had to-”, but the rider was off, ignoring the apology.
 
Not the best way to start off with the neighbours.

Six more boxes.
 
Twelve to go.
 
It was taking forever.
 
She should have started with the easy stuff.
 
She was now physically very tired, and sat on the bottom stair, head leaning against the banisters, to recover.
 
A horn sounded, very loudly, outside.
 
She opened the door, and saw a large lorry behind the van, unable to get by.
 
When he saw her move towards the Transit, and thus presumably acknowledging responsibility, the driver began a colourful tirade, “Fucking idiot
woman
” being the least of it.
 
She tried to edge the Transit further up on the pavement to give him the extra room he needed, but was foiled by the approach of an old man with a walking stick.
 
She would have to drive round the block and repark.
 
Off the kerb again, she narrowly avoided a cyclist who had swerved past the lorry on the opposite pavement and swept into her path.
 
The lorry driver continued to lean repeatedly on his horn, and the cyclist turned and shouted a single, nasty epithet.
 
Red-faced and shaking, she stalled the engine, and had to endure further loud abuse from the lorry driver until she was able to turn left into the main street and search for the next turning which would eventually take her back to Clutton Street.
 
The lorry hugged her rear bumper, honking and flashing his lights, until she made the turn.
 
Too late, she wished she had stuck a finger out of the window at him.

There was a policeman a few yards away from the door of number six, chatting to a man with a broom outside the shop next door.
 
She would almost have to wipe the bodywork along the back of his shirt to reclaim her original position.
 
Like they say, you never saw a copper when you wanted one, did you.
 
She parked and got out of the driver’s seat, dismayed at how wobbly her legs were.
 
Predictably, the constable sauntered over to her as she unlocked the door.

“I’m sorry, madam, I’m afraid you can’t park there,” he said.

Trying to keep her voice as calm and steady as she could, she explained the circumstances, including the bicycle in the back of the van.

He listened, his brown eyes fixed on hers – eyelashes far too long for a policeman, she thought, as she concentrated on holding his gaze and looking honest – and said, “So you’re in possession of a bicycle whose owner doesn’t know you’ve got it, and illegally parked not only on a double yellow line, but also a narrow pavement.”
 
The corner of his mouth twitched.
 
“Well, at least you’re facing the right way.”

He looked inside the tiny hall to see the still-formidable stack of boxes, and then along the pavement to where the shopkeeper stood leaning on his broom, watching with interest.

“Oi, Ahmed!
 
Can this lady put some stuff in your shop for a bit, she needs to park her van somewhere more sensible and return a stolen bike!”

Ahmed grinned and grumbled, fetching a trolley from his premises, and helped her move the boxes to the inside of his crowded little shop.
 
It didn’t take too long, with the trolley taking two or three items at a time.

“You come back for them quick, madam,” he urged, “or my wife will definitely kill me!”

Fin put the remaining bicycle back in the passageway, closed the front door and drove to an adjacent street suggested by the policeman, where she was able to park on a meter.
 
On her return, the bicycle had apparently been ridden away, and with the aid of Ahmed’s trolley she spent the next forty minutes taking the boxes in and up.

She returned the trolley and thanked him, telling him she would be sure to need some cleaning materials from his shop in the next few days.

Then the weary journey to Cantlesham and back, to drop off the van and the cottage keys, and pick up her car.
 
After the teatime crawl into town, she drove into Mornington Road and stopped outside Rachel and Dave’s house. There were no parking restrictions there, and Rachel had suggested it might be a good place to leave her car for the time being.

She switched the engine off, and let her head fall back against the headrest.
 
She felt exhausted.
 
It was only then that she realised that she hadn’t eaten all day, and spent considerable time trying to summon up the will to move.

“Shabby chic is
in
, apparently!” exclaimed Ellie, taking in the dingy varnished fifties furniture, and the impact marks and grease on the fridge and cooker.

“Told you!
 
But it’s only a six week ordeal, and we can go out for coffee if you like,” said Fin, watching a cloud of dust from the ancient vacuum cleaner’s broken bag float lazily in the air.
 
In maybe a minute more, it would resettle gently on the nasty carpet, newly furrowed by her energetic attempts to remove the micro-detritus of years.

“No offence, Fin,” said Ellie, grimacing in a manner that was nothing if not offensive, “but coffee and muffins in a
cafe
is a really
good
idea - galloping salmonella is the last thing I need right now.
 
I’ve met this woman-”

“Tell me about it over coffee, ratbag,” said Fin.
 
She was surprised to experience a little flash of jealousy.

They thumped down the stairs, slowing down as one of the two doors at the bottom opened, and the bicycle owner came out.
 

“Hel-
lo!
” said Ellie, in a throaty voice, narrowing her eyes slightly and turning on a high-power smile.
 
The girl, again in the jeans and neat jacket, seemed about to smile back, but then glanced at Fin and back to Ellie.
 
She narrowed her own eyes, but without the smile, and wheeled her bike out into the street, slamming the door behind her.

“
Must
you try out your Leslie Phillips impression on my new neighbours?” asked Fin.

“Just breaking the ice for you, Fin, that one looked a definite possibility to me; did you see the way she looked at us?”

Fin rolled her eyes, as she followed Ellie out of the door.

“And the next thing I knew was Dave rapping on the car window – nearly gave me a heart attack – and dragging me in for a bowl of home-made soup and hot crusty bread,” said Fin some minutes later, spooning through the pattern of her flat white. “And a large glass of wine.
 
Bless them, they wanted me to stay the night, but I said no.
 
Thought I’d get an early start today on sorting my worldlies and cleaning the place.”

“Sounds like one of those days all right!”

“Yep.
 
At least I know what
not
to do when I move out again.
 
It’ll be a moonlight flit.
 
Two a.m.
 
No traffic.
 
However, you were going to tell me about this new woman of yours, weren’t you?”

“Mmm, nothing definite,” replied Ellie.
 
“But it’s time I had a girlfriend.
 
I really thought you were going to be it, but-” she sighed theatrically, “it wasn’t to be.”

“So what’s she like?”

“Oh... Quite nice.
 
Could do with a bit of a makeover, but very bright.
 
One of the new history tutors starting next term.”

“You’ll be in direct competition with Bloody Henry Moffet, then!”

Ellie laughed.
 
“No contest, obviously,” she said, “assuming, of course that the lady is for turning in the first place.”

“Good grief.
 
You don’t even know that she’s up for it! What are you
like
, Ellie!”

“Successful, usually, poppet.
 
Anyway, gotta go.
 
Got my summer course to teach.
 
Lovely old buffers and buffettes - missed out on education because they were never expected to do anything clever.
 
God, they’re keen – they put some of these idle young term-time tossers to shame. I’ll call you. Bye!”

Fin blew into one of her empty sugar tubes to open it up, and neatly rolled and inserted the others on the table into it.
 
She wiped muffin crumbs off the surface on to her plate with her napkin, and stacked the tableware before dropping a tip in the saucer on the counter, and leaving.

The bicycle belonging to the young woman on the ground floor was back in the hall, and Fin wondered what she did on her trips out.
 
On the other side of her front door, the boost that Ellie’s company had given her evaporated, as the view of pipes and brick wall barely three feet from the small
 
window reminded her how sunless the next six weeks were going to be.
 
Oh well, at least it wasn’t winter.
 
That would be too depressing for words.
 
The flat had been left without a single light bulb, so Fin had been to Ahmed’s (“Kahn-Do. Everything for the Elegant House”) and bought several planet-aggressive 100 watt bulbs and three white paper lampshades, to raise the light levels in the flat.
 
She fitted these and switched on, immediately feeling more cheerful.
 
Then she ran a bucket of warm water to clean the kitchen floor and appliances, and was suddenly overcome by a duvet-thick, smothering cloud of tiredness.

“I’ll just close my eyes for ten minutes,” she said aloud, “just a little power nap.”

The battery in the alarm clock must have failed.
 
It couldn’t be six o’clock. She hauled herself to her feet, and put on her radio.
 
No, that wasn’t any of the lunchtime programmes.
 
The traffic report confirmed it.
 
Homegoing congestion was just beginning to clear.
 
She groaned, her head feeling heavy and achey.
 
She should have worked through the tiredness barrier, got the flat nice and clean, had a shower and an early night.
 
One of her regular clients was due in at the shop tomorrow, to place an annual order which had been a highlight of every August for the last three years.
 
She simply couldn’t
not
be there to handle it, and ringing to put him off until the next day wasn’t an option.
 

The kitchen, whose tiny window shared its outlook with that of the lounge, would take half a day’s work to get it even acceptably hygienic.
 
Its one splash of colour, the red bucket of cold suds still awaiting her attention, mocked her.
 
No, too late.
 
She couldn’t face it now.
 
Nor the dark shower cubicle, with its black lace edging of mould, which hardly offered the most attractive invitation to wash away the last forty-eight hours.
 
She lifted one arm, and sniffed under it.
 
Regrettably, there was no choice; she would have to face the evil shower.
 
Later, though.