When I dropped Joanne off at her mum’s house, Sarah got out of the back seat and climbed into the front passenger seat next to me. She wound down the window and called after Joanne’s retreating rear, ‘laters bee-yatch!’
Joanne span round and flicked the Vs up at her before calling out, ‘be good you two and if you can’t be good be careful!’ then she did a pretty clear mime of a blow job, pushing an imaginary cock into her mouth with her hand while making the inside of her cheek bulge outwards with her tongue.
‘Classy,’ I said quietly as Sarah wound up the window.
‘I only hang round with her ‘cos she makes me look good.’
‘I can see that,’ I acted like the little conversation we’d just had hadn’t happened, ‘you enjoy yourself tonight then pet?’
She smiled happily, ‘yeah, I did. It was great. You? Sorry you couldn’t drink.’
‘No harm in it this once. Told you, I spend my life in clubs.’
When I got her home, the gates to Bobby’s house were wide open and I drove on through, parking up so she didn’t have far to walk up the gravel driveway, but not right by the windows. ‘Don’t want to wake your dad,’ I said.
‘He won’t be asleep,’ she told me, ‘not till I get in.’
I wouldn’t sleep either if I was him.
‘So where is it then?’
‘Where’s what?’ I asked.
‘My present,’ she said, ‘unless you are gonna carry on pretending you’ve not bought me anything for my 21st?’
‘Glove compartment,’ I said quietly.
Without another word she opened up the glove compartment and took out the long, thin box I’d put there at the beginning of the night. ‘Mmm, it’s beautifully wrapped,’ then she got suspicious, ‘did you get Laura to do it?’
‘Why would I do that when I could just flirt with the lass in the shop until she did it for me?’
‘Thoughtful,’ she said and she took her time unwrapping the gold paper, opened the box and took a long look at the watch I’d bought her. It was a nice gift, just expensive enough to thrill a 21-year-old who wasn’t expecting something that good, but not so extravagant that Bobby or Laura were going to want to take it in turns to beat me to a pulp for buying it. It was just the right side of innocent.
Sarah didn’t say anything at first. I was about as sure as I could be that she was going to like it, so I said, ‘what’s the matter? Not up to much?’
‘It’s great and I fucking love it, thanks!’ and she did and that also gave me more pleasure than it should. Sarah wrapped her arms round me and gave me a big, friendly hug that could just about be described as platonic. ‘You coming in? Dad’ll be chuffed if you do.’
‘No he won’t,’ I said,
‘Yes he will,’ and she laughed self-consciously, ‘you can have one drink with me.’
‘I’m driving.’
She stuck her tongue out at me and called me boring, ‘got to get home to the wife have you?’ she knew how to press my buttons.
‘She’s not my wife,’ I said uselessly, ‘but I do have to get home, yes.’
‘Oh-kay,’ she said it in a sing-song voice and started to climb out of the car, ‘thanks for my pressie, it’s beautiful.’
‘Not every day a girl turns 21.’
‘So true,’ and she was out of the car and gone, except she wasn’t, because there was a blur of movement as she went round the front of the car and was suddenly standing by my window. I wound it down and she said, ‘thanks pet,’ and held her hands wide for another hug and when I didn’t react she said, ‘oh come on, give me some sugar,’ in her mock-American accent. I put an arm out through the window and she wrapped her arms around me and this time the hug was for real. God she smelt so good and I knew I should let go of her, but it was way too nice.
Her voice was muffled by my shoulder but I could still make out every word when she said them back to me, ‘not every day a girl turns 21,’ she agreed and there was a second’s hesitation, ‘and I’ve not even had a birthday kiss… from any one.’
‘A birthday kiss?’ I asked, like I was a simpleton.
‘Yep.’
‘Right,’ I said and before I could think of anything cool or dismissive or safer to say than that, she pulled her head out of my shoulder, placed her cool palms gently on either side of my face and quietly said, ‘Just one,’ and softly planted her lips against mine, then kissed me long and slow. And I did nothing about it, even though I knew this was the dumbest, most dangerous thing I’d probably ever done in my life. I just let her go on kissing me, even when she slid her tongue into my mouth, in fact I kissed her back, until I forgot everything; who I was, who she was, who her dad was, somebody called Laura, everything. And just when I was liking it the most, she stopped.
‘Phew,’ she said, like she had enjoyed it too, ‘time to say goodnight.’
‘Goodnight Sarah,’ I managed.
‘It’s true by the way,’ she added, as she walked slowly away from the car, ‘what Jo said.’ And she laughed, loud and embarrassed like she couldn’t quite believe she’d admitted it to me then she was off, walking down the gravel drive way – but not before turning back and shouting at me, ‘mull that one over on the way home to your wife!’
And I did. Of course I did, I didn’t think about anything else if I’m honest, which is exactly what she wanted, the distracting little bugger.
When I got home Laura was still up. She was sitting on the couch all by herself and her eyes were smudged with tears. I instantly tried to work out what I had done to cause them or, more accurately, I thought about what I had done that she knew about that could have caused them.
‘What’s the matter?’ I said while my panicked, inner voice told me not to be such an idiot. She wasn’t outside Bobby’s house hiding in the bushes. She hadn’t bugged my car. Had she?
‘It’s mum,’ she said softly, ‘she’s dead.’