Starting Over (24 page)

And then his attention was whipped away like a magician’s tablecloth. ‘Christ!’ he breathed.

‘
Franca
!’ Angel exclaimed in an odd voice.

Toby was thrust into Tess’s surprised arms and Ratty stepped slowly towards a woman who was hovering outside the shop, grinning madly. Astride a bicycle, a steadying foot to the kerb, elbows on the handlebars, her chest was very much in evidence and her fair hair plaited into knobs above each ear. Her body looked as if she spent every day eating sensibly and working out.

‘’Ello,’ she called, accent French and sexy. ‘I am welcome?’

‘
Franca
!’ Ratty threw out his arms and homed in.

Franca
squealed as she was lifted clear of the cycle and swung into his embrace.

‘Here comes the mushy stuff!’ Pete joked. ‘They’ll be at it like knives again, you’ll see.’

So. They had been at it like knives before. Which would explain Ratty’s turned back as he crushed
Franca
to him, the long and thorough kiss whilst one of
Franca
’s dainty feet curled up to her taut bottom and her hands locked behind Ratty’s neck.

Angel and Pete, the children and Tess, waited like spare parts until
Franca
broke away from the embrace and waved. Ratty whispered in her ear, made her laugh, pulled her back for more kisses. ‘Tomorrow?’ she managed, giggling as Ratty pursued her lips. ‘Now I am busy!’

And then Ratty was stooping to pick up the cycle, shouting, ‘See you!’ throwing his arm around
Franca
and hustling her around the corner and out of sight.

‘Fancy
Franca
coming back.’ Angel turned to take Toby, who was nodding again now. ‘I didn’t think we’d see her again.’

Pete shifted Jenna in his arms. ‘Looks like she intends finding out if Ratty’s any less set against commitment. He looked pleased to see her, anyway.’

‘Very affectionate,’ Angel agreed. An uncomfortable expression passed over her face. ‘Coming in for coffee, Tess?’

Tess looked over at the corner. Seeing once again Ratty disappearing without a backward look, pushing a cycle with one hand, squeezing a buttock with the other. ‘No,’ she said. ‘No thanks.’ She tried to think of something to add about an early night or a hot bath or making sure Guy hadn’t reappeared. But failed.

‘Thanks for landing me in the shit with Angel.’ Pete stepped into his overalls, shrugging on the sleeves, flipping out the collar. ‘She sends you the following message: “You’d better have made the right choices, you unremitting bastard.” She’s not happy, Rats, with you for doing it, or with me for going along with it. I’m not thrilled about it myself.’

Ratty kept his eyes on the radiator hoses he was examining, turning them towards the light, picking at possible rot spots with stubby nails.

Pete pulled out the drawer of a tool chest. ‘And how was the night with
Franca
?’

‘Much as you’d suppose.’

At the back of the garage Jos lifted his head sharply. ‘Is
Franca
back? You spent the night together, Rats?’

Ratty selected a new jubilee clip, tested the screw. ‘She’s back at the
Peterborough
office for a month or two.’

He could feel Jos’s stare like a prodding finger, before Jos returned to his work in silence. A silence he kept up more or less all morning.

Until Ratty was on the forecourt and Jos must’ve thought him out of earshot. His voice came hollowly from under the ramp. ‘So he and
Franca
got it together again?’

Muffled, Pete’s voice emerged from the foot well of a Rover. ‘Certainly looked that way last night, when
Franca
appeared. All over each other when last seen.’

‘Must be two years?’

‘About that. It was hot at the time.’

Jos sighed. ‘I thought ... I thought he and Tess were heading for each other like a train crash.’

‘Looked that way sometimes, didn’t it?’

‘Was Tess upset?’

‘A bit quiet. Have you got my feeler gauges?’

‘Haven’t even got my own feeler gauges, look in Ratty’s box. She’s bound to feel …’

‘… a bit left out? Probably. Yes, probably.’ Pete tucked his hair back and straightened his back. ‘But you know Ratty.’

The waste bin overflowed. Tess gazed down at her pad and hated the succession of cavorting hedgehogs. She wasn’t in the mood, that was the trouble; creative people depended on being in the mood. And she wasn’t.

Or was it only the creative? Perhaps, some days, keyboard operators’ fingers were stiff and stupid, perhaps supermarket staff served only rude customers, perhaps butchers suffered from imperfect chops or lumpy sausages and bank managers felt like strangling their staff and machine-gunning the customers?

She pencil-slashed at her page of hedgehogs, back and forth, until she’d spoiled the page and about eight beneath. She turned them, slowly, until she came to where the sheets were still unblemished and fresh. Then, skimming the pad violently against the wall, quite likely spoiled them, too. For a month now she’d been uptight, unsettled and irascible. Life had changed and she didn’t like it.

Didn’t like acknowledging that Ratty’s infatuation with
Franca
had removed him from the position of ‘friend’. Well no, he was friendly when they met but he was no longer there for Tess, tugging her hair, calling her ‘Princess’ or ‘gorgeous, sexy woman’.

It was
Franca
;
Franca
who walked hand in hand with Ratty and on whose temples kisses dropped. Sickeningly attractive, unfortunately, with her sexy French accent and pneumatic body, clear skin and pretty hair. Stupid, hateful hairstyle, why didn’t Ratty worry her to leave it loose? Or perhaps it was enough for him to see it loose at night. In bed.

Worse,
Franca
had a history with those Tess considered
her
friends.

Her
friends. And though they remained her friends, she couldn’t shake off the feeling of becoming the second driver in a one-car team.

Long days. Disregarding earlier intentions she bought a television and spent more time at home. Got into
The Bill,
a series of Channel Four documentaries and read
Ceefax
for hours. She even considered subscribing to satellite television.

Then she could watch all day and all night, all those repeats and pathetic adverts appealing for charitable donations.

And never do anything.

And never see anyone.

And never go anywhere ever,
ever again.

Someone at the back door. Tess ignored the rapping the first time, but when the five rapid knocks sounded again, she trudged downstairs, pulling her jacket on. She’d stepped down into the kitchen before seeing, through the glass, that it was Olly. She snorted. ‘Bugger!’ And opened the door.

‘I’m just going out for a walk. What do you want?’

Olly took a step back. ‘Oh. Right.’

They stared at each other. Olly looked more relaxed, the frown that had drawn a sharp line between his brows was missing.

Then he managed a smile, softening his face. ‘I still want to talk to you for a few minutes. I’ll phone.’

Tess stepped through the door, closing and locking it behind her. ‘I shouldn’t think we can have very much more to say to each other.’

‘Right.’ He trailed back down the drive to his car parked in the lane. Tess pushed her way past it. She’d walk out of the village today, walk for a mile or two on the verges, gazing over the hedges and into the fields. Just this once she didn’t feel like threading her way through the village, having to wave at everyone at the garage or decide whether to call on Angel.

She set off, hands in pockets, head down.

‘Where are you going?’

When she looked behind, Olly was standing looking after her. ‘A walk,’ she tossed back, without pausing. Then she heard his running footsteps, catching her up.

‘I’ll walk with you for a few minutes.’

She stopped abruptly. ‘Why don’t you just piss off?’ She strode away, leaving him standing in the road again.

By the time she got to the first curve she’d begun to wonder uneasily what he could be up to. You never could tell with Olly, tricky, crafty Olly. Maybe it would be smart to know? She glanced back. He was still standing where she’d left him, slapping the fob of his keys against his palm and watching. She shouted, ‘All right, then! But get a move on!’

With the length of his legs he caught up with her in seconds. Gazing away from him, over the fields, she snapped, ‘So? What?’

He tucked his keys into his pocket. Took a deep breath, then sighed. ‘I decided I’d better say sorry.’

She gave an incredulous laugh.

Olly bit his lip. ‘I know it all ended in crap but I was thinking … when we were first going out, it was magic, wasn’t it?’

And he actually seemed to be waiting for an answer. Tess shrugged, ungraciously, it
had
seemed like magic to her but she wasn’t going to admit it. ‘A bit late to realise that.’

A car came up behind them and they hopped up onto the verge out of the way. The car stopped, a navy-blue Triumph Stag. Ratty leant over and wound down the passenger window and raised his eyebrows at Tess. ‘Are you OK?’

‘Fine.’

‘Sure?’

‘Yes!’

After a long, appraising look at Olly, he turned back to her. ‘I expect you’ve got your mobile?’ He held his own mobile up to show her.

She nodded, pulled her phone out of pocket.

Ratty grinned. ‘Should the screen be blank like that?’

She grimaced and switched it on. After a long look Olly’s way, Ratty drove off.

Olly gave a half-laugh. ‘He made it quite obvious he doesn’t trust me.’

‘Some people don’t like violent men.’ Bastard Olly. Fresh disgust flooded in at the memory of how he’d slapped her. She let the gusty little breeze push her into a crosser pace and watched the birds waltzing on the wind above the fields while Olly paced in his thin-soled, unsuitable shoes beside her.

‘I hadn’t really thought …’ he began. He paused, then tried again. ‘It didn’t seem like …’ He sighed and shook his head. ‘I wouldn’t call myself
violent
.’

Tess sighed. ‘Olly, you hit me!’ She turned ready to take out more of her frustrations on him.

‘Oh hell,’ he said.

She let her mood carry her along. ‘If you touch me again I’ll see you in court.’

They tramped on in silence, Tess pushing back tendrils of hair that the breeze teased free from her plait. God, she didn’t want Olly with her. And neither did she want to paint the raffle prize picture she hadn’t even started, but it was probably too late to get out of it. God. She needed a holiday.

‘I am sorry.’ Olly suddenly halted.

Tess turned to face him. ‘It’s a bit late for that.’

He inched closer. ‘But I am sorry. It sounds feeble, now, but in the heat of the moment … I was frightened, I’d just been threatened with bankruptcy and I lashed out. It didn’t seem like violence, precisely. And now I sound pathetic.’

Tess said, flatly, ‘It is violence. You are pathetic. What about the other times?’

She watched his lips thin. ‘I suppose you counted!’

‘I remember them all.’

They glared at each other, defiance and guilt flashing across Olly’s face. It might be that standing up to him – now, when it was too late, secluded here in the leafy lane – was foolhardy to say the least. But Tess almost wished he would crack her one. She was ready for him this time. If his hand so much as twitched, she’d knee him so hard he’d still be spitting his balls out this time next week.

But when it became obvious the silent staring contest wasn’t going to provoke him, Tess turned back towards Middledip. ‘And are you bankrupt?’

He followed. ‘No, I scraped out of it. So, how’s work going?’

Oh, right, that’d be it. She swung on him, teeth gritted. ‘Look Olly, it’s
my
work and it’s
my
money that I earn from it. It’s not going into your pocket or Guy’s. I’m not looking for any non-fee-paying lodgers, either! OK? So you might as well sod off.’

Olly almost smiled, his blond hair lifting in the breeze. ‘I’m not on the scrounge.’ He looked away, looked back. ‘In fact, I’ve got a job, done what I always said I wouldn’t do and gone to work for some huge faceless firm at the same desk in the same office every day, to do as I’m told. I’m a project leader in a soft drinks company. I’ve given up everything I was so intent on but I’m getting paid OK and others take the strain and the shit. I’m making enough to live. Most of my equipment’s gone back to the leasing companies and I’ve started paying off the credit card companies. Those bastards are remorseless when they’re clawing their money back.’