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BUNTING’S STRUNG ACROSS Queen Street, like it’s for Holly Sykes’s Independence Day. The Scottish lady in the wool shop’s watering her hanging baskets, and Mr. Gilbert the jeweler’s putting trays of rings into his front windows, and Mike and Todd the butchers’re offloading a headless pig from the back of a van where a dozen carcasses are hanging from hooks. Outside the library a bunch of union men are collecting money in buckets for the striking miners with Socialist Workers holding signs saying COAL NOT DOLE and THATCHER DECLARES WAR ON THE WORKERS. Ed Brubeck’s freewheeling this way on his bike. I step into the Indoor Market so he can’t see me. He moved to Gravesend last year from Manchester, where his dad got sent down for burglary and assault. He doesn’t have any friends and shows no sign of wanting any. Normally that’d get you crucified at our school, but when a sixth-former had a go at him Brubeck punched his nose out of shape, so he’s been left alone since. He cycles by without seeing me, a fishing rod tied to his crossbar, and I carry on. By the games arcade a busker’s playing funeral music on a clarinet. Someone lobs a coin into his case and he bursts into the theme from Dallas. When I get to Magic Bus Records I peer inside. I was looking at R for Ramones. Vi
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OUTSIDE NATWEST BANK on Milton Road, I run into Brendan. Moussed-back hair, paisley tie, and his blazer slung over his shoulder, you’d think he was off to Handsome School, not the offices of Stott and Conway. Bit of a heartthrob is my older brother, among my friends’ older sisters—pass me the vomit bucket. He married Ruth, his boss Mr. Conway’s daughter, at the town hall with a flashy reception at the Chaucer Country Club. I wasn’t a bridesmaid ’cause I don’t wear dresses, specially dresses that make you look like a Gone with the Windcollectible, so Sharon and Ruth’s nieces did all that stuff, and loads of our Cork relatives came over. Brendan’s Mam’s golden boy and Mam’s Brendan’s golden mam. Later they’ll be poring over every detail of what I say right now.
“Morning,” I tell him. “How’s it going?”
“Can’t complain. All well at the Captain?”
“Fine. Mam’s full of the joys of spring today.”
“Yeah?” Brendan smiles, puzzled. “How come?”
I shrug. “Must’ve got out on the right side of bed.”
“Cool.” He notices my duffel bag. “Off on a trip, are we?”
“Not exactly. I’m revising French at Stella Yearwood’s—then I’m staying overnight. It’s exams next week.”
My brother looks impressed. “Good for you, little sis.”
“Is Ruth any better?”
“Not a lot. God only knows why it’s called ‘morning sickness’ when it’s worse in the middle of the night.”
“Perhaps it’s Mother Nature’s way of toughening you up for when the baby arrives,” I suggest. “All those sleepless nights, the arguing, the puke … Needs stamina.”
My brother doesn’t take the bait. “Guess so.” It’s hard to imagine Brendan being anyone’s dad but, come Christmas, he will be.
Behind us the NatWest opens its doors and the bank clerks start filing in. “Not that Mr. Conway’ll fire his son-in-law,” I say to Brendan, “but don’t you start at nine?”
“This is true. See you tomorrow, if you’re back from your revision-a-thon. Mam’s invited us over for lunch. Have a great day.”
“It’s the best day of my life already,” I tell my brother and, in a secondhand way, Mam.
One flash of his award-wi
ON MONDAY, I’LL get a key cut for Vi
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THE BACK DOOR’S never locked ’cause Vi
He claps his hand over his heart and sort of laughs, like he’d just been shot. “ Jesus, Hol. I thought you were a burglar!”
I sort of laugh too. “You’re … at home.”
“Cock-up with the rota—the new secretary’s bloody hopeless—so Kev phoned to say I’ve got the day off, after all.”
“Brill,” I say. “That’s great, ’cause … I’ve got a surprise.”
“Great, I love them. But put the kettle on first, eh? I’ll be right down. Shit, what am I saying? I’m out of coffee—be a sweetheart, pop out to Staffa’s and get a jar of Gold Blend. I’ll pay, uh, you when you get back.”
I need to say this first: “Mam found out ’bout us, Vin.”
“Oh? Oh.” He looks thoughtful. “Right. How did she, uh …”
Suddenly I’m scared he won’t want me. “Not great. Went a bit apeshit, actually. Told me I couldn’t see you again and, like, threatened to lock me in the cellar. So I walked out. So …”