You Must Be Sisters (17 page)

‘… so I felt I could afford it,’ he finished. ‘An Elan, anyway. When I’m really flash I’ll buy a Europa.’

‘Nice, yes. But I love Elans. So light and powerful to ride in.’

Claire tensed, waiting for him to say the obvious, which was ‘Well then, would you like a light and powerful ride in it?’ But thank goodness he didn’t.

‘So you’re Nikki,’ he said instead.

‘Excuse the hideous curlers. This is my homely evening.’

She rearranged herself in her chair, looking far from homely, and smiled at him. She was wearing a sort of towelling turban. Geoff offered her a cigarette; she took it; there was a tiny shift in the balance of the threesome as she and Geoff lit up and Claire didn’t.

‘What are you drinking?’ she asked, leaning over in a cloud of smoke to look in his glass.

‘Sherry.’

‘Goodness, how ladylike! Such a tiddly glass too. Fancy a whisky?’

Geoff brightened. ‘Well, now you mention it …’

She was wearing a thin silky caftan. They watched her as she shimmered out and returned a few moments later with a bottle, glasses, ice and a bowl of olives. She sat down and switched on the cosy table lamp. ‘On the rocks?’

There was a certain air about Nikki; half transient, as if she was going on somewhere exciting very soon – even in a turban she
managed
to convey that impression – and half intimate, as if just for the moment she couldn’t bear to drag herself away. Claire had always admired this.

‘Cheers,’ she said, smiling at him as Claire had smiled. They clinked glasses. She turned to Claire. ‘
Sure
you don’t want any?’

‘No, I don’t really like whisky, thanks.’ She wished she did; she felt prissy drinking sherry now, even though Geoff was pouring her out another.

Ice clinked; they sipped. Nikki smiled dreamily and said, almost to herself: ‘I just feel like going out tonight. So dreary staying in.’

‘That reminds me,’ said Geoff, turning to Claire. ‘We’d better get a move on.’

Claire sighed with relief. There had been no hesitation, no asking of her to join them or, worse still, no moment’s thoughtful silence as he worked out how he was going to ring up Nikki next time and suggest some little jaunt in the Lotus. Claire glanced at him; he looked particularly stolid. The danger was over; she knew it. They chatted, they finished their drinks. He was behaving perfectly; he was neither ignoring Yvonne, who was back with her tea now, nor becoming, well, rather silly with Nikki. Most people did both. He was just being polite; in a kind way to Yvonne, in an appreciative way to Nikki.

And in a few moments they would drive off, just the two of them, and drop in at a riverside pub for a drink and be at last alone. They hadn’t been alone at all yet, what with Holly and everything.

Then perhaps they’d go for a meal, the sort they should have had when they went to Eastbourne. And after that … sitting next to him, she didn’t dare look at his face, only at his hand, such a beautiful brown hand that was reaching out for an olive. She would do anything he wanted.

‘… you see,’ Yvonne was saying, ‘we have this kitty, and we all put in a pound a week, just for milk and things. But then, of course,’ she rolled an eye towards Nikki, ‘some of us aren’t here for breakfast and so that puts everything out.’

‘Sounds interesting,’ said Geoff gallantly.

‘I mean, I don’t like to
interfere
, but –’

The doorbell rang. Claire got up. Who could it be? She walked down the hall. No doubt some stud for Nikki.

‘Laura!’

‘Hello,’ said Laura. ‘I’ve brought the car back.’

‘Heavens, you’ve come all the way from Bristol? Just like that?’

‘I thought it was time for your turn.’

‘That’s nice, but how unexpected.’

They were in the living-room now. ‘Hi, Nikki and Yvonne,’ said Laura, ‘and hello, er …’

‘Geoff, this is Laura,’ said Claire. Laura looked at him; he must be Claire’s friend then, if she introduced him.

In the general pause that followed Claire thought, fleetingly, of her evening with Geoff. Much as she loved Laura, she thought of it. ‘Er, are you staying the night? I mean, can you?’

‘Yes please. That OK?’

‘Of course. You can sleep on the sofa.’ This romantic tête à tête business would just have to wait for another night. Never mind. Anyway, it was good to see Laura; interesting too, because there was something on her mind. This sudden arrival – even Laura wasn’t this impulsive – and now a restlessness about her, a fidgeting.

‘What on earth are you wearing?’ asked Nikki.

‘It’s a jumble sale dress,’ Laura answered. ‘5p, it cost. Isn’t it nice? I feel like somebody out of a Steinbeck book.’

‘Oh yeah?’ Nikki raised her eyebrows. ‘Anyway, tell me all about ravey Bristol.’

While she talked, Geoff looked at Laura. Yes, she was pretty, he could see that, but what a mess she’d made of herself! All that hair and that terrible droopy dress that made her look like a tramp. She ought to smarten herself up; make the most of herself, like Claire did.

Claire spoke. ‘Well, Geoff and I were just off for a drink.’ She stood up; she hesitated.

It was for Geoff to say, and he knew it. He was nothing if not polite. ‘Are you coming, Laura? I’m sure you and Claire have a lot to talk about.’ Hmm, if it wasn’t one sister it was the other. But still, if he were honest it wasn’t entirely unwelcome.

From her position wedged into the back of the Lotus, Laura inspected the two heads with interest. Obviously they knew each other quite well or they wouldn’t be sitting there in such a settled silence. But how well? And were they, perhaps, just shy? It must be recent, this Geoff business, or Claire would have written to her about it. He wasn’t bad-looking, she had to admit, but on the dull side. In that sports jacket and those dreadful cavalry twill
trousers
he looked like an advertisement for Player’s Senior Service. Manly and dependable; that scene.

They found the riverside pub and sat down with their drinks. A large number of people stared at Laura’s peculiar dress. She stared back at them, half gratified and half embarrassed. Such a bourgeois lot! But she wished she didn’t blush so damn easily.

‘Well,’ asked Claire. ‘What news? Still seeing Mac?’

‘Yes.’ A silence. Then Laura said: ‘I’m living with him.’

Claire’s eyes widened. ‘Really?’

‘Uh-huh.’ She tried to sound casual. ‘He moved into my room a day or so ago.’ There! Now she’d told her. She watched for Claire’s reaction. Geoff, she saw, was fiddling with his glass.

‘Goodness,’ said Claire. ‘I must meet him now.’

‘Do. Come down and visit me – us.’

‘He just moved into your room?’

‘Yep.’

Geoff felt dreadfully in the way. He pretended not to listen and gazed out over the glittering river.

Laura went on: ‘You see, everybody was chucked out of the house he lived in. They’d never paid the rent. So he came in with me.’

‘Simple as that?’

‘Yep,’ said Laura. Geoff, she noticed, was looking most disapproving. He was the sort that would, of course.

‘He simply dropped in,’ insisted Claire, ‘and sort of stayed?’

‘Just about.’ She picked at the holes in her sleeve. Actually, she had to admit that she was feeling rather uncomfortable. The ease with which it had happened had rather taken her by surprise. No discussion, no arrangements to speak of; he wasn’t that sort. One moment he wasn’t there and the next moment, amiable and plimsolled, there he was. Nice, of course; lovely, in fact. But almost
too
easy. And here was Claire harping on just that; irritating of her.

‘Well, what are you going to do about it?’ Claire asked.

‘Oh, I don’t have to think about that yet,’ she said airily, studying her sleeve. ‘The present’s enough for me – us.’

‘Don’t be so silly, Laura. Lovely to have him, but are you sure you want to close yourself off? It’s mad in your first year. Think about all the other men you could be meeting. Such a waste.’

Laura suddenly thought: Was it so easy because I was lonely?

‘Claire!’ she snapped. ‘Stop playing the big sister. I know what I’m doing.’

‘You’re talking in clichés.’

‘Well, it’s a clichéd situation, isn’t it. All this disapproval –’

‘It’s not disapproval. Don’t you understand one bit? I’m just worried about you closing the door on everyone else. Anyway, who’s supporting who?’

Laura fiddled with her sleeve again; the holes were getting bigger. ‘He is, of course,’ she said carefully. ‘His gardening didn’t pay enough, so he’s a bus conductor now.’

‘What?’ Geoff couldn’t stop himself.

‘A bus conductor.’

‘But you say he’s an undiscovered genius,’ said Claire. She looked at Laura; Laura’s face was closed and defiant. Geoff’s presence was making her take up a stance; she would be different if they were alone. Just for a moment Claire resented Geoff being there; then she thought of the candle-lit supper and resented Laura. It was just like Eastbourne all over again. ‘Anyway,’ she said, ‘let’s talk about something else.’

But everything else seemed rather flat after that and their voices kept trailing off in mid-sentence. In fact the evening didn’t last long, and after a swift and muted meal Geoff dropped them off at the flat.

Laura disappeared indoors; Claire lingered by the car.

Geoff spoke. ‘Well I never,’ he said. ‘Is your sister always like that?’

‘Like what?’

‘Sort of rebellious. You know.’

‘Yes, she was always wilder than me. She does silly things sometimes.’

‘I can see that.’

Claire was stung. ‘What do you mean, “I can see that”?’

‘Oh. Well, I mean, rushing off with young men she hardly knows.’

‘How do you know she hardly knows him?’

He battled on. ‘If
you’ve
never met this Mac –’

‘That doesn’t mean anything. It doesn’t matter if I’ve never met him. They’re obviously deeply, passionately in love.’

‘Yes, but you yourself were telling her that it was a bit silly –’

‘I might tell her, but I’m her sister. I’m allowed to. You’re not.’ She shrugged. ‘She knows what she’s doing.’

Geoff gazed at her, astonished. ‘Well,’ he said at last. ‘I’d better be pushing off.’ He got into the car. ‘I didn’t know, well, you’d
get
like this. Goodbye.’

‘Goodbye,’ she said. Her voice faltered but the door was closed now.

She watched the tail lights disappear down the street and leant against the wall, exhausted and angry. Angry with Laura for spoiling everything with Geoff, for surely he would never come back after this. Angry with herself, and angry with Geoff for saying things that she as a sister could say but he, an outsider, couldn’t. Yet he wasn’t an outsider; she didn’t want him to be. And of course he was quite right, dammit. Loyalties pulled at her from all sides.

She sighed and went indoors.

But Geoff drove away exhilarated. This was marvellous. Angry looks, confidences, family secrets, a real live quarrel. Lovely not to be polite for once; what a relief. How close they’d come to each other, shouting. He knew her better than twenty,
thirty
well-mannered evenings would have made him know her. When he phoned her up, which would be tomorrow, they would be breathlessly apologetic,
real
.

He was involved now; that was it. And he’d found it so very difficult to be involved with anyone before.

I SHOULD BE
doing my Jung, thought Laura. She should too. There in front of her lay the notes, lit by a ray of sunshine. Every day she would reshuffle them, hoping that something would happen, a stirring in her brain perhaps, a click and a whirr and the whole mechanism would start up as it hadn’t started up for several weeks now. And then perhaps the essay would get written.

But nothing clicked, nothing stirred and ah! how nice it was just to lean out of the window and let the warm spring sun seep into her skin. She lifted her arm to her nose; already her skin had that warm biscuity scent of summer. Time stood still. Since Mac’s arrival she’d found herself caught in a trance of inactivity.

Down below she could see her garden –
their
garden – half-dug but nevertheless satisfying, its dandelions starring the grass and
peeping
out from the coils of rusty iron, its square of earth already showing the broad beans she’d planted. Stout greyish plants; more real, somehow, than Jung. Soon perhaps Mac would dig the rest of the garden and she could plant some more things. She had plans, but nothing seemed to get done.

The room, too, was still only half-finished. Mac, when prodded, said he’d finish painting the walls with her but he never did. She could do them herself of course, but something stopped her, the need perhaps for them to be more of a couple, for them to do ordinary tasks together, solid workmanlike everyday tasks. After all, she thought, heaving about under the sheets binds us together very nicely, but so would painting side by side, our hands speckled with emulsion. In its different way.

Not that he didn’t try to embellish the room. Sometimes he would bring home strange objects to put on the mantelpiece – bits of curly wood or an intriguingly knobbled potato. Nothing useful, just little treasures that he brought to her as a child would.

When he left the gardens and became a bus conductor he still found objects, though of a more urban nature – matchboxes with camels on perhaps. It pleased her, his way of noticing things. Most people at university only noticed things inside their heads. Her parents, on the other hand, only noticed things that had to be done. A pile of leaves in the gutter meant, for them, a blocked drain. For Mac it meant a nice pattern. Sundays with her parents were an exception; Sundays were holidays and one was then at liberty to lift up one’s eyes to admire the trees or cast them down to remark how pretty the snowdrops were and how early for this time of year.

But Mac noticed things. She liked wandering about with him. The fluster of life – telephones ringing, cars hooting – meant nothing to them as they ambled along the pavement. Perhaps they’d stop to watch a dog, purposeful and jaunty, trot past; perhaps an old man sitting on a bench, rustling inside his carrier bag while the pigeons waited. Small things, nice ones.