‘I’m glad it was you who answered the door, by the way,’ he adds, his ridiculously tall physique taking up most of the frame. ‘Not Maggie or Sharon, is what I mean. If they saw me arriving here with flowers, I’d never hear the end of it. Unless they’ve both changed drastically since the days when I used to live here, that is,’ he adds, winking at me.
I’m only half listening, my mind’s too busy racing, but suddenly the words Maggie and Sharon catch my ear. I look up at him, suddenly all interested as an idea forms in the back of my head. Perfect. A diversion. Couldn’t have asked for better.
‘Yes…you know, they’re both here…and, you know what? They’d be so annoyed if you called over without saying hi. Come on in!’
Before the poor guy knows what’s hit him, I’ve grabbed his arm, swung him into the hall and shoved him in the direction of the kitchen.
‘Jessie,’ he hisses, panic beginning to rise in his voice, ‘you don’t understand, I came here to see you.’
I’m not even focused on him though. I just want to create a distraction and get out of here. Not very nice of me, I know, but it’s all in aid of the greater good. Besides, plenty of time to apologise later.
‘Go on through to the kitchen,’ I call back at him gaily, ‘and will you tell them all that I’ll see them later!’
Thirty seconds later, I’ve grabbed Maggie’s car keys and am sitting in the driver’s seat, reversing out of the garage. I’m almost there…almost home and dry…when suddenly, like two imploding missiles, Maggie and Sharon hurl themselves against the bonnet, Maggie’s mouth frozen in a silent movie expression of horror. I’m forced to brake or else run them over, so I brake; but just as I’m about to zoom off down the road, I lose two crucial seconds trying to figure out the gear stick on Maggie’s manual car.
But it’s two seconds too much.
Next thing, the two of them are in the car beside me, breathing fire and stale Indian food at me.
‘Fecking insane BITCH!’ roars Maggie from the back seat, grabbing a fistful of my hair. ‘Pull the car over or else I swear, you are so DEAD!’
‘Let go of my hair, or I’ll crash your precious car.’
She does what I tell her without further argument.
‘And I’m not pulling over. We’re going on a road trip.’
And there’s nothing they can do about it either. I’m the one in the driver’s seat.
So, here I am, on my way for a romantic reunion with my ex-boyfriend at his palatial mansion house in the country. Just never thought I’d be bringing Laurel and Hardy along with me for the ride.
Chapter Eleven
‘Will you cool the head, for feck’s sake, Maggie?’ says Sharon, fishing around in the glove compartment for a box of Marlboro Lights, then passing the entire box back to her in an effort to calm her down. ‘Can I remind you that it was either this or else stay at home making small talk for the whole night with Stuttering Steve.’
‘That’s not fair. The stutter’s well and truly gone,’ I say.
‘Ah, but sadly the moniker lives forever.’
I actually think that as soon as she realises just what this evening’s alternative was, Maggie does start to calm down a bit. Mind you, this takes about ten miles and fifteen cigarettes. However, I figure that I’m on slightly safer ground with her as soon as she starts having a go at poor, harmless old Steve. But then that’s Maggie for you. A tree hasn’t fallen in the forest until she’s slagged it off.
‘Christ alive, Steve fecking Hayes,’ she says, sucking on a fag. ‘The very thought of having to entertain that big long string of piss…’
‘He’s in a band now, you know,’ says Sharon. ‘With some eejitty name. The Amazing Few, I think they’re called. Hey, we should go to one of his gigs some night, so we could have a proper laugh.’
‘Well, it’ll cost you. Because you’ll have to pay for the wild horses it’ll take to drag me there.’
Sam’s house is miles, and I really do mean miles, away from Whitehall, well past Kildare town, down a twisty, narrow, secondary road where the houses gradually get bigger and bigger, growing more and more spaced apart, until after a while, you only see a gateway about every five miles or so. Anyway, as soon as we’re through the worst of the rush hour traffic, I drive like a brain-damaged test monkey, not even entertaining Maggie’s demand that she drive instead. Would take way too long with me having to shout navigation instructions at her.
Too rushed. No time. Just got to get there.
Plus if I did give her the wheel, she’d only turn the car round and head straight for home. I’m like a woman consumed; all reason has completely gone out the window and I honestly think that if I hit one more red light, I’ll end up hyperventilating into a paper bag. As it is, my breath is coming nervously in quick, sharp stabs, my head is starting to swim and my heart’s palpitating so much that I think there’s a fair chance I might throw up. Just at the thought of how Sam will react when he sees me. Of what he might say. Or worse, what he might not say.
Then I make a Herculean effort to cop myself on. Because I’m being ridiculous. Of course Sam will be over the moon that I’ve made all this effort to prove how much he still means to me. It’s just a simple case of one of us having to swallow their pride and take the first step, and in this case the fates decreed that it should be me. I just happened to have more time on my hands than him to make the first move and bloody lucky that I did. In a few hours’ time, we’ll be snuggled up in bed together, drinking champagne most likely, toasting our reunion and having a good old giggle about this. The words in that newspaper article, which I’ve memorised and am now silently repeating like a mantra, are keeping me sane and focused, ‘A reunion is imminent.’
Between heavy traffic and seeming to get every bloody set of traffic lights red, the drive takes the guts of an hour. And as if that wasn’t bad enough, I have to put up with Maggie whinging about how hungry she is while Sharon lists out all the TV programmes she’s missing, with particular moaning reserved for the fact that now she won’t get to see Coronation Street.
‘All that was happening on Corrietonight,’ I snap at her, unable to take much more, ‘is that Kevin was being stalked by his ex-girlfriend who breaks into his house to have it out with him.’
‘Very interesting plot synopsis,’ quips Maggie from where she’s sulking away in the back seat, now in a haze of smoke. ‘Can I eat it?’
‘Well I was looking forward to it all day,’ moans Sharon, who I’m on the verge of slapping any minute now, if she keeps this up for much longer. As soon as I’m safely back with Sam, my solemn vow is to buy the girl a subscription to Sky Plus as a thank you for helping me out with the dole, and maybe then that’ll shut her up.
‘In fact, it was the highlight of my whole TV week and what’s more, you knewthat, Jessie Woods.’
‘Well instead of watching someone getting stalked on Corrie,now you get to see the live floor show instead,’ says Maggie and just for a split second I catch a glimpse of her lizard eyes staring at me from the rearview mirror, unblinking. ‘And speaking of which, Cinderella Rockefeller,’ she goes on, ‘suppose he takes one look at you waiting for him like a complete basket case and decides to call the police? Did that ever once filter through your addled brain, before you turned to car theft?’
‘I’m calling in to see my boyfriend, that’s all. What’s wrong with that?’
‘ Ex-boyfriend.’
‘What I’m doing is entirely within the boundaries of the law.’
‘You know, I didn’t likeyou before this, but at least I respectedyou. Now I just think you’re a nut job. It’s not the dole you should be applying for, it’s day care.’
‘Why thank you for that, Maggie. Can’t tell you how much your support means to me. For your information though, I happen to be doing the right thing.’