Another Summer (3 page)

The deluge seemed to come from nowhere.  Joe was having a quick walk before the long day of driving and if he hadn’t ducked into the shelter, he’d never have noticed the girl.  She was drenched, hunched in the corner of the bench, arms around her knees.

“You wouldn’t have a cigarette?”

“Don’t smoke, sorry.  But after the week I’ve had, I might be taking it up.”

She tossed a soggy packet at the bin, too miserable to smile at his feeble joke.  “Doesn’t matter, I’m pregnant, anyway.”

“So, why are you sitting here soaking wet?” 

“Nowhere else to go.”

“How about home?”

Joe twitched with the urge to get out of there as she choked on a sob, hiding her face in her arms, her feet pulled up on the seat as if she wanted to be invisible.  He made himself sit down so he could hear what she was mumbling.

“I’ve lost my train ticket back to Cheltenham.  I crashed a party last night and my bag got nicked.  My parents are so going to kill me.  I’m meant to be staying with a friend from school.”

“School?  How old are you?”

“Almost seventeen,” she sniffed, raking her hands through her wet blonde crop.

Joe was wishing he’d rushed past the shelter and taken his chances in the rain.  It wasn’t down to him to take care of a random stranger but it didn’t get much worse than being sixteen, pregnant, broke and stranded.  How could he walk away and leave her? 

“It’s none of my business but Scarborough’s a long way from Cheltenham for a pregnant girl on her own?”

“I wasn’t supposed to be on my own.  I came to tell Simon about the baby but he’s not even here.  He’s moved to York and now I can’t get there either because I don’t have any money.”

“So, this Simon’s the father?  But you didn’t know he’d moved?”  Joe was getting the picture but he didn’t want to trample too harshly over her delusions.  “When was the last time you saw him?”

“At the Gold Cup in March.  I do waitressing sometimes at the racecourse.”  She bit her lip, trying not to cry.  “We only had a couple of days but he was so lovely to me.  And funny, telling me stories about his mother’s B&B in Scarborough.”

“And now you’re here looking for the place?”

“I remembered the name and I found it,” she insisted, clearly pleased with herself.  “Simon’s mother was very busy but she gave me his address in York.”

Nice of her, Joe thought.  Fob her off with an address but don’t think about giving her a safe bed for the night.  Joe recalled all the duff numbers he’d given out to girls, over the years.  This guy was going to love being dropped in it by his mother, if the address even existed.

But that was hardly Joe’s problem and he really wanted to keep it that way.  But the annoying little voice was back, reminding him that in a couple of years, it could be his daughter at the mercy of heartless bastards passing by.

“I’m driving down to Cornwall today,” he found himself saying in a responsible voice he barely  recognised.  “I could drop you off in Cheltenham on the way?  You’ll have to take my word for it that you can trust me.  But my name’s Joe Marsh and I have a daughter who’s not much younger than you.”

“Really?  You’d do that?  A lift would be so great, thanks.  I’m Lisa,” she told him, already looking more cheerful.  “I don’t suppose you could take me to York first?”

He decided to ignore that.  York was the last place he wanted to go.  He had to get to Cornwall before Evie decided her life was better without him.  He’d been half hoping Lisa would turn down his offer but he’d obviously done too good a job of sounding reassuring.  She was already picking up her backpack.

“Do you know if the toilet’s open yet?” she asked.  “It was padlocked before.  That’s when I got soaked and I’m dying for a pee.”

He noticed she was shivering in her wet jeans and thin pink top.  Why did young girls never wear coats?  And when had he suddenly morphed into the older generation?  But a fatherly tone was definitely called for.  He didn’t want to come across as any sort of pervert.

“Listen, my hotel’s just along the promenade.  You could probably do with a hot shower before you end up with pneumonia.” 

“Really?  You’d let me do that?”

Christ!  Was that all it took?  No wonder she’d got herself into trouble.  Just as well he’d turned over a new leaf as far as women were concerned, as it was far too easy to sneak her into his bedroom.

He left her to it and went out again for sandwiches  and hot tea.  Thankfully it had stopped raining and when he came back, he could hear her in the shower and his room looked like Top Shop with stuff all over the bed.  Feeling uneasy, he ate his breakfast and tried to read the paper until eventually, the door opened and he glanced up to tell her to get a move on.

But he choked on his tea.  He knew he was staring.  Who wouldn’t?  Lisa, save for a turban round her head, had walked into the room stark naked.  She ducked back behind the door but not before he’d had an eyeful of breasts, a lush and very pert handful.  And a pierced navel that was an unexpected turn-on.

“Jesus!  Put some clothes on?” 

So much for not behaving like a perv.  But what man could pluck a girl off the street, have her naked in the same room and not feel something inappropriate?

“I didn’t hear you come back and there’s no big towel in the bathroom.”

“Here, have this.”  He’d left the towel in a heap on the bedroom floor.  He tossed it towards the hand clasping the door.  “It’s a long drive to Cornwall.  I need to get on the road.”

“But you are going to take me to York?”

“I’ll think about it if you hurry up!”

Wrapped in the towel, she grabbed some clothes from the bed and eventually came back wearing clean jeans and a glittery yellow T-shirt that clung to her bra-less nipples.  What was this, some sort of conspiracy?

Joe fixed his eyes on the paper as she dragged a comb through her wet hair.  Then he gave up trying to look comfortable and got up to stuff his things into his holdall.

“Sorry to be so long but I’m ready now.”

She scrambled her clothes together, clearly afraid he would go off without her.  She didn’t know how tempted he was to do just that but he couldn’t bring himself to  abandon her, more’s the pity.

“Your coat?” 

“I didn’t bring one.  It was hot when I got on the train.”

“You do know Scarborough’s in Yorkshire?”

He couldn’t hide his irritation.  He wanted her covered up.  There was no way he’d be able to drive with her tits jiggling like that beside him.

“Here, you better have mine.”

He tugged off his jacket and bundled her into it, resisting the temptation to button it up to the neck.

“Hey, this is cool,” she said, stroking her hands down the worn denim.  “They cost a bomb, all beaten up like this.”

“That one’s original.  And I’m not parting with it for any money, even though my wife keeps putting it in the Oxfam bag.”

“Your wife?  I forgot you said you had a daughter. You don’t look married.”

In a previous life he’d have liked that.  But now he wanted to look married, to actually be married, more than anything else in the world.

“I’m meeting my wife in Cornwall and I’d like to get there before dark.  So could we please just get on with it?”  He thrust her breakfast at her.  “You can eat this in the car.”

But driving proved to be more of a nightmare than he’d imagined.  The windscreen was constantly lashed by horizontal rain and it took all of his concentration to steer through the surface water on the road.  He needed to be quiet but Lisa wanted to chat.

“Thank you for the lift.”

“You’re welcome.  But maybe you should avoid talking to strange men in bus shelters, from now on.”

“It was a pedestrianised area.  There weren’t any buses.”

“Don’t split hairs.  What were you going to do if I hadn’t come along?  Christ!  You were going to hitch, weren’t you?  Do you have any sense?”

“It wasn’t my fault I had my handbag pinched.  I only put it down for a minute.  What else was I meant to do?  And I wouldn’t have hitched in the middle of the night, that’s why I was waiting.  I didn’t know it was going to pour.” 

She wasn’t safe to be let out on her own so it looked like he was going to be stuck with her.  And now he’d made her cry so on top of everything else, he felt guilty.  He counted to ten and tried to sound more certain than he felt.  What was he letting himself in for?

“Look, I promise I’ll get you home in one piece.  You don’t need to cry about it.”

“But what about York?” she sniffed.  “Please?  I came all this way to see Simon and it isn’t very far.”

Maybe not, but it would be a big waste of his time.  And hers, considering she was clearly on a wild goose chase.  But maybe she needed to find that out for herself and he’d have to be heartless to refuse to take her.  If he put his foot down, he could still make it to Cornwall by tonight.

He wondered what Evie was doing in that isolated cottage on her own.  Had she had time yet to reflect and reconsider?  She’d made her point but how long was she prepared to stick it out?  It wasn’t as if he’d gone out of his way to make her miserable.

Evie woke with the mother of all headaches and a cringing sense of embarrassment.  Had she lost her marbles on the long drive south?  Drinking with a stranger, flirting like some desperate housewife.  What had possessed her?   And now she had to cook lunch, when even the thought of food made her want to throw up.

She glanced in the wardrobe mirror and winced at the sight of her puffy eyes, not helped by a long bout of crying during the night.  If Jake could see her now, he’d run a mile.  And when had she become so fickle, anyway? She was heartbroken over Joe.  Why did she care what Jake thought?  But she was too hungover and sleep deprived to work it out.

The sloping ceiling in the bedroom was suddenly claustrophobic.  Faded cabbage roses had felt safe and familiar when she’d first arrived but now she needed to get out into the fresh morning air.  She dragged herself downstairs and made coffee, drinking it on the sunny back step, the stone flags still cool and damp under her feet.

It was sad to see the garden so neglected.  The grass was almost knee-high and the borders were overrun with weeds.  But the quiet was soothing.  No traffic, just chirping birds and the inviting swish of the sea at the bottom of the cliff.

She’d always loved swimming in the sea and she found she couldn’t resist it.  The water was cold and she was a bit wary at first.  But after a few moments when there was barely a twinge from her scar, she set off across the bay, long strokes starting to clear the muddle in her head.

When she’d tired herself out, she floated for a while on her back, gazing up at the scudding white clouds and let the ripple of memories wash over her.

As soon as she met him, that first summer when she’d been barely sixteen, Evie had known he was trouble but didn’t know enough to keep out of his way.

It had felt odd, being at Granny Barbara’s on her own.  She felt restless and irritable, as if she didn’t quite fit in her skin.  She’d watched her father drive off, knowing she couldn’t go home for six whole weeks, and she’d felt trapped.

Even the traditional first swim of the summer hadn’t been right, a bit pointless somehow without Vanessa to race against.  When she finally gave up and got out of the water, a boy was watching her, tossing sticks for an ancient collie as he sat cross-legged on a rock.

She hesitated, heart thudding.  She was clueless around boys, even the spotty crowd she knew from school.  But she was freezing and he was sitting on her towel.  She knew she had to say something.

“Isn’t that Bonnie, the Drydens’ dog?”

He nodded.  “I’m crashing with Steve for a bit, we’re flatmates at uni.  I’m Joe Marsh.  Which sister might you be?  Steve said the oldest one was a babe.”

Her whole life, she’d been known as the pretty one’s little sister.  Nobody ever noticed how much it upset her.

“Vanessa’s working in Edinburgh now.  I’m here on my own this summer.  I’m Evie.”

“Well, Evie, if it gets any better than you, your sister must be really something.”

Not sure what he meant, she stood there feeling flustered, crossing her arms as his eyes raked over her old navy swimsuit.  Too small now, it rode up between the cheeks of her bum but she knew if she tried to tug it down, her boobs would spill over the top.  

“Could I have my towel please?”

He leaned back on his hands, one knee raised on the rock, his bare foot sprinkling her towel with sand.  His jeans were washed-out, a bit frayed.  His black hair curled on the collar of his sweatshirt and his dark eyes were twinkling at her, challenging her to grab the towel if she wanted it.

She didn’t know what to do.  It was only an old hand towel and it wouldn’t take long to run back up to the cottage and get dried there.  But she didn’t want to be a wimp and rush away.

Eventually, half smiling, he shook it out and tossed it to her.  She snatched at it, desperate to hide her blushing face, wishing he’d turn round so she could get dried properly but it wasn’t even big enough to wrap around.

“So, what’s with swimming at the crack of dawn?”

“Hardly!” she scoffed.  “This is much later than usual because I just got here last night.”

“Lucky for me I didn’t miss you.  You’re from Newcastle, I think Steve said?  You come for a few weeks  every year?”

She nodded.  “My parents have gone on a cruise, so I’ll be here a bit longer this summer.”

She wondered what else Steve had told him.  Probably not much about her.  Last summer Steve had got off with Vanessa and when Evie wasn’t being useful for providing cover, she’d mostly been ignored by all of his mates.

Joe Marsh seemed nothing like them.  She wondered what he was doing there but didn’t quite have the nerve to ask him.  The way he was looking at her was making her nervous enough.

“Poor you.  Stuck here on your own with nobody to play with.”

Flustered again by his teasing, she didn’t know what she was meant to say.  It seemed easier to drape the towel round her shoulders and start to walk away.  She hadn’t expected him to jump up and fall into step beside her.

“In a hurry to get somewhere?” he laughed as the dog started romping round their ankles.  “Watch the daft mutt doesn’t trip you up.”

She patted the dog as they walked.  “I have to get back.  My gran’s cooking breakfast.”

“Sounds good to me.”

She started to worry that he’d follow her all the way back up to the cottage and expect to be invited in.  Granny Barbara would have a heart attack.  But then she remembered he’d obviously been looking for Vanessa.  He wouldn’t want to waste his time with her.

Joe stopped suddenly at the bottom of the cliff steps and she almost walked into him, only just stopping herself from putting her hands on his chest.  She saw the university crest on his grey top, the curve of muscle beneath.  Standing so close she had to look up to properly see him and the sheltered cove seemed suddenly too small for both of them.

“You’re much too pretty to be wasted on this place.  Maybe I’ll see you around?”

Before she could think of anything to say, he was bounding up the concrete steps to the Drydens’ smart house at the top of the cliff.  Had he really said she was pretty?  Nobody ever said that.  How was she meant to tell if he was winding her up?

Her stomach in knots, she picked her way up the railway sleepers that had served for years as steps from her grandmother’s cottage to the beach, wondering how she’d get through the ritual of breakfast, when all she wanted to do was go over every word Joe Marsh had said.

But Barbara Lee, dressed in her customary washed-out cords and a fisherman’s jersey with more darning than the original bottle green wool, was at the stove brandishing a metal spatula that looked as old as the cottage.  The frying pan of sizzling calories made Evie shudder.

“Could I just have toast?”

“Stuff and nonsense.  Run upstairs and get dressed.  It’s almost done.”

As usual, Evie did what she was told.  Feeling all at sixes and sevens, she pushed the coppery tangles out of her eyes as she frowned at her boobs in the mirror.  Was it a good thing that Joe Marsh had looked at them as if he could see right through the wet fabric of her swimsuit?

She tugged on a pair of jeans and an old checked shirt, unusually bothered by a missing button as she struggled to do it up.  Bloody embarrassing boobs!  And why had she never noticed she had such a paltry wardrobe? 

Granny Barbara was already at the table, favourite brown tea pot poised to pour.  Evie sat down and buttered a piece of toast.  Some instinct told her not to mention Joe but she couldn’t think about anything else.  I’ll see you around, he’d said.  But how was that likely to happen?

“Gran, how do you manage without a phone?  What if somebody wanted to get in touch with you?”

“Hate the things.  Why put up with constant interruptions, just on the off chance?  Anyway, I see people all the time when I’m on my bicycle in the village.  And I get lovely invitations in the post.  I was just about to tell you.”

Evie listened politely as her plate was piled high with bacon, tomatoes and mushrooms.  She tried not to groan.  She’d be bursting out of all her clothes at this rate.

“The Drydens have invited us to a party on Saturday night.  Their oldest boy Malcolm’s getting married in a couple of weeks so they’re having open house for the village.”

“Us?  You mean me as well?”

“Of course.  Everyone’s going to be there.  Steven has a friend staying.  From what I hear, he can charm for England.  Causing quite a stir in the village, apparently.  Too old for you, thank goodness.  But the party won’t be all old fogies.”

Evie could barely swallow her food.  A party!  And Joe Marsh was going to be there.  She didn’t care that he was older than her.  He’d said she was pretty and she had a chance to see him again at the weekend.

But what was she going to wear?  She couldn’t go looking like a schoolgirl but she didn’t have a single dress.  Her dad had given her some money but she wouldn’t know where to start without Vanessa there to help her.  She dragged her attention back to what her grandmother was saying.

“The Drydens have invited me to the wedding in London.  So kind when it’s years since I taught the two boys piano.  They’re putting me up in a lovely hotel and I’ve bought a nice little two piece.  It’s all very exciting.  But we’ll have to arrange for you to stay with someone overnight.”

“Gran, I’m sixteen.  I don’t need a babysitter.  I’ll be fine right here.”

“I don’t know what your parents would say about that.”

“They’d say I was a sensible girl and this is hardly the crime capital of the western world.”

Even as she said it, Evie wondered why she was being so insistent.  She normally hated being left on her own but somehow this felt different.

“Well, I suppose it would be alright,”  Granny Barbara agreed eventually.  “You’re not your sister, are you?  I don’t suppose there’s much mischief you could get up to.”