Authors: Alexandra Potter
‘I love this beach,’ sighed Rita, collapsing on to the sand next to her. ‘It’s so much nicer than the crowded ones down at Venice and Santa Monica. They’re packed like sardines, full of Brits abroad . . .’ Missing the irony, she rummaged through her bag, pulling out suntan lotion, hair scrunchie, lip-salve, swimming goggles, cigarettes and her latest self-help manual,
Give up Men and Get a Life
. Rita was nothing if not prepared. ‘And anyway, the scenery’s a lot nicer.’ She motioned towards the group of surfers running in and out of the sea in the distance, riding the waves, their wetsuits clinging to their athletic bodies.
‘I thought you were off men.’
‘I am, but there’s no harm in looking.’ She smiled. ‘Or being looked at.’ Unfastening her bikini top, she began smearing herself in SPF 30, tutting at the extra bit of flesh on her stomach. ‘Can you do my back?’
Sitting up, Frankie squirted creamy squiggles all over Rita’s shoulders and began rubbing them in. Despite a lifetime of sunbeds, fake tan, holidays in Tenerife, and the past four months in California, Rita was still mozzarella white. Being ginger-haired, she never tanned, she freckled, burned and then peeled like a roasted red pepper.
‘There you go.’ Frankie gave her back the lotion. ‘You look as if you’re ready to swim the Channel.’ Rita was daubed in a thick layer of white gunge.
‘Just because you’ve got bloody olive skin,’ she tutted. ‘Thin with olive skin. Is there anything I’ve got that you haven’t?’
‘Tits.’ Frankie smiled, turning to lie on her stomach and wriggling like a fish to unclip her bikini top so she didn’t get a tan mark. Unlike Rita, she was too embarrassed to go topless. It wasn’t that she had a hang-up about the size of her boobs, 34B was plenty big enough thanks, and it wasn’t as if there was anybody around to gawp at them, apart from the surfers, and they had more than an eyeful with Rita’s generous pair. But she was too self-conscious. Hugh had always said she had ‘lovely breasts . . . a perfect handful’, and last year on their fortnight’s holiday in the South of France he’d persuaded her to go topless. But she’d only done it the once. She’d felt as if everybody was staring at her nipples. God knows why. In fact, the beach in Juan les Pins had been nipple city. Hugh had called her inhibited. Which was a bit rich, coming from a man who’d only wear shorts if they went past his knees.
Grabbing Rita’s self-help book, she flicked idly to the chapter entitled ‘Annoying Male Habits’. It was about sixty pages long.
‘How are you feeling?’ Rita slathered her ankles in cream.
‘Rough,’ mumbled Frankie, without looking up.
‘Me too. I never normally get hangovers. It must have been those bloody margaritas.’
‘And all the champagne,’ Frankie reminded her.
Groaning, Rita finished doing her legs and, snapping the lid shut on her suntan lotion, lay back, spread-eagled on her towel, which had ‘Club Ibiza Hotel’ embroidered in the corner. She giggled to herself. ‘I must have been plastered last night. I’ve just remembered I nearly snogged Dorian.’
‘
You didn’t
.’ Frankie stopped reading about ‘men’s unacceptable bathroom behavior’. This was far more interesting than Dr Bernstein’s professional opinion on the psychological damage inflicted on a female when her male partner did not put the toilet seat down.
‘Don’t be daft,’ Rita tutted indignantly. ‘Of course I didn’t. I was off my head, not out of it. Well, not completely anyway.’ She suddenly got a flashback of herself pulling up her skirt to show off the red devil tattoo on her bum. God, she must have been bollocksed. She didn’t have a tattoo – red devil or otherwise. ‘Anyway, like I said, I’m off blokes.’ Reaching over, she swapped her sunglasses for a pair of sunbed goggles. She didn’t want panda eyes. ‘You looked as if you were having a good time.’
‘What do you mean?’ Frankie felt suddenly defensive.
‘With Reilly on the dance floor. You looked happy.’
Reilly
. She’d decided earlier that she wasn’t going to think about him any more. Any feelings she might have had last night had been a mistake. She loved Hugh, remember.
‘Do you think so?’ she still couldn’t resist asking.
‘I know so, I saw you both . . . just before I crashed out. If I didn’t know better, I’d have thought something was going on between you two.’
‘Don’t be ridiculous.’
‘I’m not saying I did think that . . .’ Rita knew she was treading on dodgy ground. Frankie could be so touchy. ‘I know you’re not interested in him . . .’ She flicked an ant off her bellybutton ring. ‘Which is just as well.’
‘Why?’
Realising she’d opened a can of worms, Rita tried to cover her tracks. ‘Well, it’d be awful if you were really into the bloke, wouldn’t it?’
‘Would it?’ Somehow, somewhere, she’d suddenly swapped sides.
‘Christ, Frankie, anyone would think you did fancy him the way you’re going on.’
‘Of course I don’t,’ she snapped, picking up a shell and scraping off the sand. ‘I’m just curious, that’s all. Why would it be so awful?’
‘Because he’s an arsehole.’
‘
An arsehole?
Since when?’ Frankie felt shocked. And surprisingly defensive. ‘You’ve changed your tune. I thought you really liked him.’
‘I did, until last night.’
‘Why, what happened last night?’ Her mind raced. ‘Did I miss something?’
Pushing up her goggles so the elastic hugged her hair like a headband, Rita sat up and began rubbing in zinc whitener stick on her cheekbones. ‘Well, I wasn’t going to tell you . . .’
Bullshit, Rita could never keep her mouth shut.
‘. . . but seeing as you’re not bothered about him anyway . . .’
Twisting her body round and holding her bikini top, Frankie looked up at her. ‘Come on, don’t keep me in suspense.’
‘Look, it’s no big deal . . .’
‘
Rita
.’
Rita stopped zincing and sighed resignedly. ‘Well, apparently he told Dorian that he wasn’t interested . . . in you . . .’ She added it as an afterthought.
Frankie didn’t say anything. She couldn’t.
‘I mean, what a bighead. As if he’d stand a chance anyway.’ Rita tutted, grabbing a mirror and looking at her reflection. ‘He’s
so
not your type . . .’
Frankie felt as if she’d been hit by a bus. A double-decker. ‘When did he say this?’ Dazed, she stared at Rita, who was picking off a bit of leftover mascara from an eyelash.
‘Last night.’
Last night
. Frankie’s mind whirled into freefall. Last night he’d wrapped his arms around her on the dance floor . . . Last night he’d looked at her and said he had the most gorgeous woman in his arms . . . Last night . . . She caught hold of herself. Hang on a minute. What had happened last night didn’t mean anything to her, so why should it have meant anything to Reilly? And so what if he wasn’t interested in her. Why should she care? She wasn’t interested in him either. Fastening her top, she sat up cross-legged, feeling the sun hot on her skin, idly watching the waves and listening to them break on the sand, smelling the surf and tasting the salt from the spray. It brought her back to her senses.
Rita lit a cigarette and glanced at her. ‘Are you all right? I shouldn’t have opened my big gob, should I?’
‘Don’t be silly, I’m fine. I’m glad Reilly doesn’t fancy me.’ She fiddled with her watchstrap, unfastening and fastening it. ‘Don’t get me wrong, it would be flattering if he did. After all, being dumped doesn’t exactly do wonders for your confidence . . .’
‘Oh, shit, I knew I shouldn’t have said anything.’
Frankie continued, ‘But I don’t want him to fancy me. It would just complicate things, wouldn’t it? Like you and Dorian.’
Rita rolled her eyes. ‘Christ, we’re not complicated. Dorian wants a shag and I won’t give him one. It’s pretty simple really.’
Frankie laughed. Her mood lifted. ‘You know what I mean. Reilly and I are just friends.’ She stopped fiddling with her watch and looked down, running her hands through the sand, watching it trickle between her fingers. ‘The only man I want to be interested in me is Hugh.’
‘
Frankie
.’
‘I know.’ Smiling, she held up her hands in surrender. ‘Shoot me.’
24
‘This is LA County Beach Patrol.’
Frankie must have dozed off, because the next thing she was aware of was a booming voice jolting her awake.
‘You are breaking the law.’
The voice again. Where the hell was it coming from? Prising her face off her towel, she looked up, squinting in the glare of the sun – and had the fright of her life. Less than two yards away from her discarded flip-flops was a canary-yellow four-wheel-drive, a life-size Tonka Toy, out of which was leaning a man clutching a megaphone. Seeing her stir, he began climbing down from his seat and strode purposefully across the sand towards her. Frankie recoiled. He had the word ‘Coastguard’ in two-inch letters emblazoned across his zip-up, elasticated bomber jacket. Not that he bore any resemblance to how she imagined a coastguard on Malibu beach would look. With his tobacco-stained sunglasses and suspicious thatch of aubergine-coloured hair, he stood, legs astride, in front of her and breathed in, trying to hitch up his Boy Scout shorts, which were jammed underneath his middle-age spread, and cleared his throat. Twice. ‘Excuse me, ma’am, but nude sunbathing is not allowed in the state of California.’ He jangled his sprawling bunch of keys, a symbol of both his importance and, no doubt, his big dangly manhood. Not.
‘What are you talking about? We’re not nude.’ Twisting her arms around her back, Frankie grappled with her bikini top, trying to refasten it. Why was it the bloody things were so easy to take off but incredibly fiddly to put back on?
‘I’m afraid your . . .’ He paused momentarily as he looked across at Rita, who was lolled on her back wearing her goggles, snoring with her mouth open, her naked chest, like two white meringues, on full display. ‘Er . . . your friend . . . is breaking the law.’
‘You mean topless?’ The penny dropped. Is that what all this was about? Surely he wasn’t serious. Leaning over, she nudged Rita, who woke, dazed and snuffling.
‘Jesus, what’s a girl got to do around here to get some shut-eye?’ She caught sight of the coastguard, who was scribbling something on his ring-binder notepad, while surreptitiously looking at her chest. ‘What the . . .’ She sat up, her breasts swinging jauntily in defiance.
Ripping off a piece of paper, he passed it to Rita, who stared at it, trying to focus.
‘You’re giving me a ticket?’
He nodded. ‘You’re indecent,’ he sounded disapproving, while at the same time having a thorough inspection of her chest.
‘Why, thanks.’ She smiled, flirtatiously, trying to charm him. He wasn’t to be charmed.
Jamming his notepad and pen into the rather snug pocket of his shorts, he cleared his throat – again – and with a podgy, nail-bitten finger shoved his sunglasses on to the sunken bridge of his nose. ‘Either replace your top or vacate the beach.’ And without waiting for an answer he strutted – as best he could on sand – back to his truck and, winching himself behind the wheel, set off across the beach.
Rita’s face fell as she watched him go. ‘I can’t fucking believe it.’ She stared at the ticket in her hand. ‘The bastard’s given me a sixty-dollar ticket for showing a bit of cleavage.’ Grabbing her top, she huffily tied it around her neck. ‘Which is a bit rich considering this is where they used to film
Baywatch
.’ Screwing it up with disgust, she threw it in her bag. ‘C’mon, let’s go and get something to eat. I’m ravenous.’ Suddenly desperate to feed her hangover, Rita scooped up her towel and threw her bag over her shoulder.
‘Are you going to pay it?’ Frankie followed her across the beach.
‘I’ve got no choice, have I? I don’t want to end up in court.’ Pausing at the bottom of the stairs leading up to the road, she turned to Frankie. ‘I’d feel like a right tit.’
They looked at each other, her words taking a nanosecond to register, before both cracking up with laughter.
They drove to the Hook, Line and Sinker Inn, a cheap’n’cheerful seafood restaurant along the Pacific Coast Highway that was a favourite with the surfer crowd and the groovier, less glitzy of the Malibu residents. Unlike the other restaurants specialising in seafood, which had white uniformed waiters, a choice of freshly baked rolls and individual pots of butter, a tinkling piano and plenty of hush, this was strictly self-service, with plastic sachets of ketchup and mayo, two-dollar side-orders of onion rings and plenty of noise – from the brawling kitchen staff, as well as the diners.
‘They do great fish and chips,’ chirped Rita, as they turned into the car park. ‘I mean, I know you’re a vegetarian and everything, but you can still eat the chips.’ Her mouth watered. ‘It’s a shame you can’t taste the king prawns, they’re delicious . . . I just wish they’d fry them in breadcrumbs . . .’ She sounded wistful. ‘There’s nothing better than a nice plate of scampi.’
Lazily resting her head on her forearm, which had absorbed all the heat from the sun and was belting it out like a fleshy radiator, Frankie leaned out of the window. Obviously Rita was on the classic seafood diet today. See food and eat it. She smiled at the pun, until she caught sight of something that wiped it from her face and made her stomach take a nosedive. ‘Oh, shit.’