Chapter 9

‘This is Siobhan, that’s Jennie, over there’s Liam and Noel the twins, and this,’ Robyn tickled the bubble-haired sprite clutching a stuffed tortoise at their mother’s knee, ‘is our Nigella.’  The three-year-old giggled: a pocket-sized Robyn, with her ethereal titian colouring.  ‘Mom and Dad have bought a TV now!’

Heidi, inevitably, did not the joke but enjoyed their weave past assorted Mosses en route to the booze-burdened sideboard.  ‘Nice names,’ she commented, grinning involuntarily at Nigella – at whose Wotsit-stained fingers Amanda had earlier scowled a you-dare-get-those-near-my-dress warning.

‘Now what drinkies can I get you?’

‘Malibu and coke for me, please, and a chardonnay for Manda.’ 

Heidi glanced to Amanda – instinctive heed for a friend who knows no-one at a party – and itched with embarrassment.  The girl had half a buttock on a kitchen chair and was scrutinising her nails.  Her body language screeched: ‘I may catch fleas from this seat, and my acrylic manicure is far more interesting than this function or anyone at it.’

Heidi wished now she’d been brave and come alone, but she’d always socialised in packs.  Manda was far from her closest crony, but her only unattached one; the only one she could dragoon into spending New Year at a do where bowls of prawns and pickled onions fought to out-reek each other, and Motown classics bawled from the stereo.  She found herself ashamed she’d sold tonight so superciliously to Manda as ‘a quaint little do,’ and hoped Robyn’s guests wouldn’t lump her on a par with the girl.

‘There you go, my love.’  Robyn handed Heidi the two glasses, just as a rangy young man mooched through with a beer.  Robyn ambushed him.  ‘And this is my big brother Rowan.  Ro, Heidi.’

‘Hello Heidi.’  He proffered his hand – though rather regretted doing so when he clocked those deadly yellow talons and rings.

Heidi had to put Manda’s wine down to shake hands, and sniggered at the ungainly manoeuvre.  She found herself smiling into a kind, nonplussed face, which seemed such a balm after Wozzy’s handsome gloom.  ‘Pleasure to meet you, Rowan.’

‘Likewise.’  She amused him, all inappropriate in her daffodil mini dress and thigh boots.   The effect was more sweet than slutty, though – as though she really knew no better.  ‘Our Rob’s told me loads about you.’

Has she now?  Emily, on the sofa arm opposite, was hypocritically indignant.  She had only half an ear to Neville, patriarch of the Moss clan; the rest of her antennae were primed for any flirty nuances to that sideboard chat.

 ‘What you want to invite the likes of her for?’ she had hissed at Robyn when Heidi arrived, instantly hating the yap-voiced beanpole being relieved of her Gucci coat by Eileen Moss.  ‘Why has she come – to take the piss out of us peasants?  Dom hates snobs, you know.’

‘Good job he’s not here then, eh?  She’s at a loose end.  Until ten days ago, she was due to spend the evening with her fiancé at some big family bash – well obviously her invitation to that was cancelled.  Anyway, you know it’s always open house here New Year – I can invite who I like.’

‘Look at them, though,’ Emily snorted as Heidi and Amanda, having cast off their coats to reveal spray-gold physiques and those incongruous miniskirts, entered the lounge, ‘last time I saw that much plastic was in my Lego set as a kid.’

‘Miaow!  Granted, her mate’s a bit of a mealy mare, but Heid’s OK.  Once you get to know her.  I feel sorry for her.  How would you feel if the bloke you thought you were going to spend the rest of your life with chucked you four days before Christmas?’

‘I’m sure her money’ll soften the blow.’

‘How’s money going to help?  She’s devastated.’

‘She hides it well.’

‘It’s called putting on a brave face, Em.  Don’t assume things – you don’t know her.  She was in a right state when I met her that day.’

‘Yeah, Jennie said she sobbed all over your holly wreaths.  Sounded very drama-queeny.’

‘They have different ways to us up there,’ Robyn waved in the direction of Upper B as though it were Mars.  ‘I didn’t expect to like her much myself, but she’s vulnerable.  It wasn’t just the big white dress she wanted.  She really loved that guy – Worcester, or whatever his name is – but it sounds like he’d got issues.  Insecure hypocrite, obsessed by what she might be after from him – yet all the time he seemed to be with her only for appearances and sex.’

‘She doesn’t look as though she’d offer a fat lot else.’  Emily boggled at her florist friend’s astuteness.

‘Uncalled-for, Em.’  Robyn boggled at her law scholar friend’s lack of it.  ‘I’m going to see if she wants a drink.’

The sideboard chat had hit a lull, and Heidi guiltily remembered her scowling, still drinkless friend.  ‘Best take this to Manda ’fore it gets tepid.’

Robyn swooped in.  ‘You remember Em, don’t you, Ro?  Come and say hello.’
Emily casually twirled her wine glass and affected elaborate interest in Neville’s pronouncements about this year’s damson crop.

‘…absolute beauties…some smashin’ crumbles…hello our Ro,’ he broke off, obliging Emily to also look up at the young man.

Rowan grinned affectionately at his dad, then forced his eyes to Emily, the way she had to him.  ‘How are you, Em?’

‘Great to see you, Rowan.’  She hopped to her feet and kissed him, because it seemed rude to greet someone sitting down.  It was hard to tell whose colour would have blended best with the damsons of Neville’s cultivation. 

Rowan remembered Emily well – but not quite like this. 

He first knew her as a mop-haired clever kid four years younger than him, who never stopped yakking.  When she mutated into a mop-haired teenager with a cringe-making crush on him – always lingering at the house in puppy fat-accentuating T-shirts and more make-up than Melba Most – Rowan had taken to going out more often.

‘So how’s things?’  Emily’s glass wobbled in her hand.  She perched back on the sofa arm, deciding that standing involved having to find uses for too many limbs, and brought her too close to his eyes.

‘Fine, yeah.  Still working in the bank.  Still in my walking group.  But how’s about you?  Been on your travels, haven’t you?’

It was a Rowan trait to deflect conversation from himself.  Not only did his aptitude lie in listening rather than talking, he genuinely thought his life of no interest to anyone.

He’d worked at the HSBC in Kingswinford since leaving school; lived at home until he was twenty-two, when he vacated the populous Moss home to buy a maisonette in nearby Steptoe Road; adored his siblings; remained nonchalantly single despite sporadic endeavours at girlfriends; and harboured often hidden zeal for hill walks, cycling, Roman history, cooking, darts and West Bromwich Albion.

Emily fizzed on about Kuala Lumpur and Hong Kong, so self-conscious in company with an old crush, wanting to giggle as she recalled traits her adolescent self found so attractive.

She called up a random memory of seeing him mend a bike chain.  Such a prosaic chore, but his method of performing it seemed to speak volumes about the man.  His slender face had been so intent on the task, his fingers so spry, Emily itched to scratch the surface of this deep, meticulous soul.  She was so fascinated, she could have been spying on porn.

It was hilarious now, thinking about it.  Emily couldn’t picture Dominic sullied with axle grease, tending a bicycle as though it were an injured animal – but he had words with which to beguile her.  No, a mechanically-minded silent man was no match now for one with gallantry and a library of vocabulary.

He was casually clad, in the shirt-and-jeans set-up she used to like him in.  Many a time she’d been here, with Robyn, when he came home from the bank, and preferred him changed out of those severe suits, which never seemed ‘him.’

‘Your friend’s gone,’ Robyn informed Heidi at ten-to-eleven, ‘called a taxi while you were in the loo just.  Said she was going to some other party.’

‘Nice of her to say goodbye.’  Heidi was surprised by her own nonchalance.  She’d had several drinks, which usually made her waily but tonight had the trick of calming, rationalising her.  Amanda was no loss.  She’d snubbed everyone tonight, made brazen arrangements on her mobile to meet other friends, and tried to urge Heidi out of there since they arrived.

‘Come to Lucas’s party with me?’

‘No.  Rob’s been good to me.  She really looked after me that day.’  It wouldn’t interest Amanda how Robyn had listened, dispensed tea but no empty-headed clichés, and quizzed Heidi on her interests, suggesting that a constructive pursuit might divert her from despair.

‘We’ll compromise then.  Stay for the Auld Lang Syne business, then make our excuses?’

‘That’s rude, and anyway I’m enjoying myself.’

Amanda’s look could have frozen a skin on to custard.  She’d intended having a hoot at Lucas’s about where she’d been tonight, and poor Heidi’s obvious dementia in choosing to stay in that hillbilly hole.

Heidi teetered to the loo at that juncture – returning to find Manda vanished.

‘When shall we meet up next,’ Robyn was asking now, replenishing Heidi with a further Malibu and coke, ‘to have a bash at that flyer?’  As an aside to Emily and Rowan, she clarified: ‘I’ve discovered Heidi’s got a bit of a creative forte, and she’s agreed to give me a hand with a bit of advertising.  I decided I ought to hype my “florist to the stars” status.’

‘Too right.  I mean, if you’re good enough for all these posh actors, you really ought to blow your own…’ Heidi, not idiom-literate, joggled her hand frustratedly, trying to remember the appropriate brass instrument.

‘Trumpet,’ Rowan supplied, suppressing a grin.

‘Yeah, that – a bit more.  I can do Tuesday, Rob…or maybe Wednesday would be better actually, cuz then we can go straight to line dancing after.’

‘She’s roped you in for that too, has she?’  said Emily.

‘Never could get you to come, could I, Ems?’  Robyn spoke with no spite – these girls had always favoured diverse hobbies – but Emily prickled slightly.

‘Not sure how much cop I’ll be,’ Heidi said, ‘but I’m giving it a go.  Wozz…Warwick said I was shallow and had no interests in life.’  She tipped her drink forcibly down her throat.

‘He knows bog all,’ said Robyn, ‘you’ve got your art for a start.’

‘Grade B GCSE.  I haven’t drawn much since.’

‘It’ll come back to you once you start on them posters.’

‘Guess so.  Anyway, what age did you start dancing, Rob?’

‘Six.  At the Karen Darling Studio in Dudley.  Ballet and tap at first, then I got the bug for line dancing.  I qualified to teach it when I was eighteen, then...’
Emily slipped off to the loo, feeling rather needless and wanting the short solitude.

When she returned, the snug trio had advanced from tap dancing to more squeamish childhood anecdotes.  Rowan was no longer silent, but closing a yarn with the punchline ‘…and then you were sick in the hood of my anorak, sis,’ to grossed-out hoots from Heidi.

‘Hey – anorak,’ Heidi squeaked, still thumbing mascara tears from her eyes, ‘that reminds me – I need a new winter coat.  Want to come shopping, Rob?  I was planning to go Thursday.  How about me and you hit the January sales?’

‘Can’t do Thursday,’ Robyn was mildly mocking at this uniquely Heidi train of thought, ‘I’ve got this little shop I have to open!’

‘Oh yeah.  Can’t you leave Jennie in charge for a day?’

‘Not this week – she’s off to Gran Canaria with some mates on Tuesday.’

‘Oh.  Well about you, Em?  Fancy it?’

‘Can’t.  Meeting Dom.’  In fact they had nothing planned – yet – but she wasn’t about to be hauled around malls by Miss Gold Card.

‘You got a photo of your spunky new boyf, by the way?  I could do with cheering up.’

That’s not very complimentary to Rowan.  ‘Not on me, sorry.’

Nobody noticed the very discouraged expression that flashed across Rowan’s face.  He melted away from this now feminine conference to talk to his brothers.

‘Have you got a boyfriend, Rob?’

Robyn sipped some wine, shaking her titian curls.  ‘Not at the moment.’

Heidi was wide-eyed at the negative.  Robyn looked different tonight; stunning.  She’d unbound the bun she favoured for work, and with this swirling hair, her snowy skin and dainty body shape, could have been a flower fairy spawned from one of the buds in her shop.  Heidi, whose mind was never exactly engaged with practical factors, wondered why Rob didn’t wear her glorious hair down more at work.

‘Oh, you’ll never guess what,’ she pouted painfully, ‘me and the folks have been invited to Ronnie’s birthday bash in Feb.  What a cheek!’

‘The ex-father-in-law-to-be?  Ouch!’

‘Daddy still likes to keep in with the Rotary lot, but I won’t be going.  What do they expect after what their precious son did to me?’

‘You should do, you know.  Saunter in there head held high, on the arm of a gorgeous date!’

‘Yeah – who?’

Robyn nodded at Rowan, now blithely comparing the merits of Xbox games with the twins.

Heidi swirled now imaginary droplets around her glass.  ‘Would he?  Be my pretend boyfriend?’

‘I’m sure he would.’

She’d eat him for breakfast!  Emily was instinctively appalled – then reproached herself.  Heidi can eat him at whatever mealtime she wishes.  You are no longer at liberty to care, my girl!

Her next instinct was to reach – with dismayingly shaky fingers – for her mobile, and comfort herself with a little pre-new year text to Dom.