Sins (48 page)

John nodded. Privately he thought there was nothing more rousing than a bit of Shakespeare. At least a chap could understand what was happening, and feel his heart swell when he heard the familiar lines. Not like the modern stuff. What was it they were called? Kitchen sink dramas? He hadn’t met Janey’s boyfriend but he had heard Jay talking about him, and although Jay hadn’t said so in so many words, John had gained the impression that he wasn’t too impressed. It hadn’t been said outright, but John had also gained the impression that Janey was dipping into her own money to help fund her boyfriend. John couldn’t imagine a situation in which it would ever be acceptable for a chap to expect to be financed by a young woman, especially a decent young woman like Janey. A very nice young woman. He’d always liked her. Liked her a lot, in fact.

Janey noticed the young musician from the flat above Charlie’s looking in derision at John as they crossed the narrow hallway. With his long hair, jeans and floral shirt, the musician was the epitome of the King’s Road scene, whilst John, who was wearing grey slacks, a navy-blue blazer, and a white shirt with a modestly spotted tie, his hair cut short back and sides, looked more like someone of Janey’s father’s generation.

She removed her key to Charlie’s room from her handbag and opened the door.

Charlie’s bedsit had a small section curtained off to provide a kitchen, the rest of the space taken up by a bed settee, which was more or less always left in the ‘bed’ position, a camping table, a couple of bentwood dining chairs and a huge old wardrobe with a broken door that that to be wedged closed with a piece of cardboard and had one foot missing. A television was perched precariously on a too-small stand, whilst the bookshelves either side of the ancient gas fire groaned under the combined weight of, amongst other things, an old Dansette record player, some books, a guitar, which Charlie had insisted he wanted and then had never played, and over a year’s worth of dust.

The heavy velvet curtains that hung at the window had come via the Walton Street shop, having been thrown out by a client for whom the shop was making new ones.

Janey knew the interior of the flat so well, right down to the threadbare place in the ancient Turkey carpet covering the lino, and which had to be avoided when one was wearing heels, and so didn’t need to hesitate as John did in the gloom.

The room smelled of pot, and as usual Charlie’s clothes were heaped on top of one of the bentwood chairs, but not just Charlie’s clothes. Janey could see the bright colours of a girl’s dress poking out from the legs of Charlie’s jeans. It was one of her own designs, she recognised absently, as her brain and her heart raced to analyse what the fact that the dress was there meant. She looked towards the bed where, through the gloom, she could
now see that there were two heads sharing the pillow. Her heart won, thudding into her ribs with a mixture of shock, betrayal and pain. John, who had come into the room behind Janey, looked from Janey’s white face towards the bed, and realised immediately what was happening. Instinctively he stepped between Janey and the bed’s occupants, but it was too late. Disturbed by their entrance, the girl had woken and was now sitting up, dragging the coverlet around her as she did so.

‘Cindy!’ Janey knew that her lips had formed her partner’s name; she could hear the sound of it exploding inside her head.

Charlie was awake now as well, the pair of them huddling together in the untidy bed, Charlie scowling and looking defiant in the way that he always did when he had done something wrong and wasn’t going to admit it. Cindy, meanwhile, was looking almost amused. Neither of them, it seemed, was the least bit repentant.

‘Come on, Janey, let me take you home.’

She had almost forgotten that John was there, but now it was a wonderful relief to be able to turn to him and let him take charge, ushering her solicitously back out into the early afternoon sunshine, whilst patting her hand tenderly.

She knew that he had flagged down a taxi and was helping her into it, but it was as though she was distanced from it, as though a part of her wasn’t really there and had been left behind in the Edgware Road flat. Images flashed through her head. Charlie had been sleeping with his arm round Cindy, and facing her, something he had never ever done with her. In fact, she had never actually
spent a whole night with him. Cindy had looked so beautiful, with the subdued light giving her skin a soft lustrous gleam. She’d had that heavy-eyed look of a woman who had enjoyed good sex. Pain speared Janey as keenly as any knife as she realised just how long it was since she and Charlie had actually had sex.

When they arrived back at Cheyne Walk, to Janey’s relief John took charge of everything, putting on the kettle and making them both a cup of tea.

‘Would you like me to telephone your parents?’

‘Oh, no,’ Janey said immediately. ‘There’s no point in worrying them.’

‘You should have someone with you.’

Janey managed a small smile. John really was so sweetly old-fashioned and chivalrous.

‘I’m not on my own,’ she pointed out. ‘You’re here with me–not that I want to delay you. You’ve done so much already. Besides, Rose will be back later, I expect.’

‘I’m not leaving you here on your own,’ John told her firmly.

‘Oh, John…’ Somehow this evidence of his kindness brought her closer to tears than Charlie’s betrayal had. ‘I can’t let you do that. You must have things to do.’

‘Nothing that can’t wait. Now, you drink that tea whilst it’s still hot.’

‘You sound just like my father,’ Janey told her with a shaky smile.

‘He’s a fine man.’

‘Yes.’ A tear rolled down her face.

‘Don’t, Janey. He’s not worth it.’

John took the cup of tea from her and folded her into
his arms, comfortingly patting her back, much as though she was still the same little girl she had been when they had all played together, Janey recognised. It felt like the safest place on earth.

Ella lay in Oliver’s bed watching the early morning sunshine paint shadow patterns on the ceiling. Her body felt soft and relaxed, different somehow. A sharp thrill of knowledge flared through her. It
was
different. Last night she had had her first proper orgasm. Just thinking about it sent an aftershock through her, making her clitoris ache reminiscently.

It was nearly a week since she had first gone to bed with him, but last night had been the first time she had stayed all night.

She rolled over onto her side so that she could look at him. He was still asleep, his overnight growth of stubble darkening his jaw. Who could have thought that sex could give so many different pleasures, so many different sensations? She could look back now on the Ella she had been a week ago with both superiority and amusement. How naïve and foolish she had been, and yet at the same time how wise. Knowing what she did now, feeling what she had felt now, Ella knew that it would never have done for her to have gone to Brad as she had been. In her naïvety she had definitely made the right choice.

Things were working out remarkably well. Tomorrow Oliver was leaving New York for five weeks with the fashion team to do an important shoot out in the desert. His absence would bring a natural end to her tutelage She was grateful to him for everything that he had taught her, but of course it would be wrong for her to continue having sex with him now.

It would be the end of the summer before Brad returned to New York, by which time Oliver would be on his way back to London. No wonder she was feeling so relieved and so happy.

Last night had been skin-shiveringly wonderful. Her toes curled in on themselves in remembered delight as she replayed the things Oliver had done. There was no need for them to share this intimacy any more; by rights she should get up and leave now, whilst Oliver was still asleep. She had achieved what she had set out to, after all, and it was unnecessary for her to be here now in his bed, breathing in the scent of him, her body luxuriating in its memory of the feel of him against it and within it.

She could have sworn that she hadn’t made a sound, but nevertheless Oliver was awake now, turning his head to look at her, giving her that triumphant, arrogant look she had come to recognise.

‘Come here.’

The smile he gave her as he lifted his arm so that she could move closer to him told her all she needed to know about what he had in mind.

She could ignore his invitation. She could turn away. She should certainly do both, but she didn’t, and now it
was beginning all over again, the delicious anticipatory build-up that would soon become an insatiable demanding ache, that would then…Aaahh, it was too late to go on thinking now. Too late to do anything other than feel and want and need for just one more time. Just one more time wouldn’t hurt anyone.

For the third night running Emerald couldn’t sleep. In fact, she hadn’t slept properly since she had last seen Max, which was a week ago now, and she knew why, even though she resented admitting it. There was an emptiness inside her, an ache, a need that infuriated her just as much as it ate into her, and it wasn’t for Max, the very thought of whom now made her shudder with distaste.

No, the cause of her inability to sleep was much closer to home. In fact, it might be said that it was ‘home’, she acknowledged irritably. It was Rose’s fault, with her ridiculous self-sacrificing behaviour, her…her very Roseness and the way it had made Emerald somehow so aware of her own isolation. The way it had made her recognise for the first time in her life what she had given up when she had set her own face so determinedly against being part of a loving family. That was because she would have had to share her mother’s love with others, and why should she? The smell of Rose’s denim jacket had touched a nerve inside her so painfully that even now just thinking of how she had felt in the hospital was like touching a raw wound.

If Rose had really had the concern for her she had pretended to, then she would be here with her instead of leaving her on her own.

But as hard as Emerald tried to reach for the comfort of the old tried-and-tested familiar contempt and animosity she had previously felt for Rose and the rest of her family, that new ache prevented her from doing so. The house felt so empty, even Robbie’s room immaculately tidy without him here.

Robbie. Her son.
Her
son. Emerald looked at her alarm clock. Half-past three in the morning; too late to telephone her mother, but in the morning…She lay back against her pillows and closed her eyes.

Janey couldn’t sleep. She desperately needed someone to listen whilst she talked through the problems she felt she was having with one of the new designs. She dare not think of anything but work. The merest thought of Charlie had her eyes welling with tears. She’d been so excited when she’d visualised the finished outfit inside her head. A simple little shift dress from the front, with a daringly low cut-out of a figure eight at the back, the fresh green and white patterned cotton she wanted to use trimmed with plain white braid. Then over the dress there was to be a summer coat, in the exact green of the patterned floral fabric, and lined with it. It would have three-quarter sleeves cuffed in the patterned cotton, huge buttons covered in it and a swing pleat at the back infilled with it. The whole idea really excited her. She’d even thought of adapting it for the Christmas season, in rich velvet, in dark colours, with the keyhole covered in cotton lace dyed the same colour.

The trouble was that no one was wearing green. Some people even thought the colour unlucky. Charlie had a
gorgeous green floral shirt…No, mustn’t think about Charlie. Must keep working. At least that never let her down.

Janey needed to talk to someone who would understand. She was desperate. It was four o’clock in the morning, that meant that it would be around ten o’clock in New York. As quickly as she thought of solving her problem by speaking with her sister, the idea was smothered by reality: the cost of the telephone call–if she could get through–the length of time it would take to explain things to Ella, who would, she knew, demand exact and, to Janey, unnecessary detail.

Rose would sympathise, of course, but Rose was so practical, so purposeful, sooo organised and good at everything she did that Janey hesitated to reveal her own insecurities to her.

She had no one. There was no one for her to turn to, Janey thought miserably. Her eyes were beginning to sting again, and she reached for a rather damp handkerchief. And then she remembered John telling her that she could always turn to him, in that serious oh-so-reliable John voice of his. A small giggle broke through her despair at the thought of her explaining the finer points of dress design to dear lovely but unfashionable John. And he
was
a dear. So very kind and reliable. Just thinking about him made her feel much calmer. Janey started to yawn. Perhaps she would be able to sleep after all. Dear, dear John…

‘Yes, Mummy, that’s right,’ Emerald confirmed, as she wound the white cord of the telephone round her finger.
‘That’s why I’m telephoning. I’ve decided it will be better for Robbie if he spends some of the summer in London, so I’m coming down to Macclesfield for him today. We’ll stay overnight and then travel back tomorrow. Of course I’m sure. I am his mother, after all.’

‘I just thought I’d come and see you and give you a little warning. I know that you’re in love with Josh so there’s no point in you denying it.’ Patsy leaned across Rose’s work table to stub out her cigarette in Rose’s ashtray, making it plain as she had done since she’d walked in unannounced minutes earlier that she was the one who was in control of the situation. ‘And there’s no point either in you playing this silly game of dragging out the winding-up of the partnership.’

‘I am not dragging out anything.’ Somehow Rose managed to keep her voice steady, even though inside she felt as though she was dying with shame and humiliation. Knowing that Patsy knew that she loved Josh was like having the skin ripped off an unhealed wound. It made Rose feel exposed and vulnerable. But that didn’t mean that she was going to let Patsy make accusations against her that just weren’t true.