Me. Her. Him - Chapter 28

Background: Angela is shocked when William, an old friend from her past, who she hoped never to see again, comes back into her life, after he applies for a role at her work and successfully secures the job. William’s sudden reappearance puts Angela on edge. She’s terrified he’s discovered her secret, which she needs to protect her family from. William’s convinced Angela knows what happened to his former girlfriend, Caz, who hasn't been seen for twenty years, and that something terrible happened to her. The only person, who can help Angela, is her once best friend, Michelle, but Angela hasn’t seen Michelle for more than a decade. Faced with the threat of William’s return, they know they’ll need to work together to save their future, even if this does mean reopening old wounds, and revisiting a past they'd rather keep buried.

*****************

September 1998

Lauren insisted she was fine with rustling up the lasagne on her own. She’d had the meat sauce on the go throughout the day, saying it would taste gorgeous later, if we left it to cook for a few hours, and it really does smell amazing.

Michelle’s quiet. I keep looking across at her, every muscle inside me tensing. She hasn’t said much since Caz arrived and handed her the flowers. At least Caz doesn’t appear to have noticed. She’s chatting away to Lauren and Hayley, like she was the other night at the club. They seem like the best of friends already. The flowers Caz brought are sitting in a vase of water in the centre of the table.

Michelle takes a long gulp of her red wine, and then bangs her glass on the table which makes us all jump. I notice the wine’s left a dark stain on her lips. Oh no. She’s already had a couple of glasses, and she’s reaching for the bottle to pour herself a third. She doesn’t normally drink this much, but I can’t say anything, I imagine her snapping at me if I do. Caz has barely drunk her first glass. She went wild on the Saturday we were out, so I’m surprised she’s not drunk more. She certainly isn’t coming across as nervous, like she was when Lauren and I first spotted her waiting outside with the flowers.

‘Sorry,’ Michelle says, holding up her hands and grinning. She wipes her mouth. ‘Guess I don’t know my own strength. So, Caz, where are you staying at the moment?’

Oh crap. My eyes flick to Caz.

‘Oh, I’m staying in Stratford,’ Caz answers. She doesn’t appear to have noticed the sternness in Michelle’s voice. I’m sure Lauren and Hayley have. They’re both looking into their plates, sensing what’s coming. Caz curls her finger around a strand of her red hair. ‘My boyfriend’s got a place there. It’s not the fanciest of places in the world, but in some ways it’s better than my parent’s flat in Hull, you know.’

‘So what does your boyfriend do for a living?’ Michelle says. ‘Are you working?’

Michelle’s been waiting for the right moment to ask these questions all evening. Caz doesn’t seem fazed by her questions at all though. In fact Caz is smiling, perhaps she likes the attention.

‘Oh, bit and bobs, you know what I mean.’ Caz laughs and picks up her glass of water. ‘William, he . . . doesn’t really know what he wants to do at the moment. We’re both still young; the world’s our oyster, as they say.’

‘But what about you?’ Michelle says.

Please stop talking Michelle. I fix my gaze on her but she isn’t looking at me. Her eyes are focused on Caz to her right.

Caz sips at her water. ‘I’ve worked behind bars, worked in shops. I just get bored after so many weeks you know. I haven’t found something that’s really attracted me enough to stay. At the moment I’m a lady of leisure, which is pretty fabulous. I always wanted to go into fashion when I was young, but now I can’t think of anything more boring, if I’m honest.’

‘So, forgive me if I’m putting you on the spot here, but why were you up round this way on your own the other night?’ Michelle asks.

God this is beginning to sound like an episode of Law and Order.

I want to kick Michelle under the table to get her to stop talking. She’s clasping her hands together on the table, and looking at Caz with a horrible glint in her eye. Michelle’s doing her upmost to embarrass Caz in front of us.

Caz shrugs. ‘I just fancied a night out by myself, that’s all. Sometimes I go out on my own; it’s no big deal really. It made the night a whole lot better, when I got talking to you guys though.’

‘I bet it did,’ Michelle mutters.

Michelle avoids looking in my direction and goes back to her plate, and plays with her knife and fork. The clink of metal on her plate is sharp in my ear. Caz returns to chatting to Lauren and Hayley, the conversation with Michelle seemingly forgotten, at least for the time being. I sit back in my seat. At least Michelle seems to have finished grilling Caz for the time being.

Caz offers to wash up once we finish eating; perhaps she’s still trying to get on Michelle’s good side.

‘I hope you don’t mind, but I let my boyfriend know where I am. He was going to be in the area this evening anyway, so I told him where to pick me up.’

‘No, that’s fine,’ I say, glancing over my shoulder at Michelle, Hayley and Lauren, who are flopped out on the sofa. I didn’t like the idea of Caz making her way home on her own in the first place, so I’m glad she said he’s meeting her. I would’ve felt obliged to offer her a bed here again for the night. ‘It’s been great to see you again, actually.’

She beams. ‘Well, I had such a good time with you the other night, that I couldn’t resist seeing you all again. I made a note of your street when I left in the morning a week ago. How long are you guys staying here for?’

‘We don’t know exactly,’ I say. I lower my voice. ‘It could be a few more months, or a year perhaps. Lauren and Hayley they might . . . well, I’m not sure at the moment if whether they’ll end up staying much longer. Living together sounds exciting at first, but when it comes down to it, sometimes you begin to realise that you’re better off not being in such close proximity to each other all the time.’

‘I know what you mean. I’ve found that since I moved in with my boyfriend, you know, but there’s little I can do about that at the moment. I’ve got nowhere else I can go,’ Caz says. Is she hoping we might offer her a room here? ‘Well, thank you again, for a lovely dinner. I really do think we should do this on a regular basis.’

 ‘Definitely. If you give me your contact details we can keep in touch.’

She’s about to respond, when there’s a knock on the door.

‘Oh, that’ll be William,’ she says. ‘Don’t worry, I’ll get it.’

Caz leap frogs across the room in the direction of the front door. Michelle’s eyes are big and wide, like there’s been some big announcement saying there’s an imminent threat to human life. Michelle snaps her head round to me and glares. She’ll be thinking I’ve told Caz it’s okay for her to bring some more people over. The front door opens, and then there are voices.

In a few seconds Caz is back in the living room, with William standing behind her. The top of his head seems to nearly reach the ceiling. He salutes us. My eyes reach his, and I notice the corner of his mouth twitch. It feels like my very souls being sucked out. His eyes continue to slide around the room. God, he’s . . . he’s gorgeous.

‘This is William,’ Caz says.

‘Hiya,’ he says his voice a little gruff.

My stomachs flipping like a pancake. Lauren and Hayley have both sat up in their seats and are smiling at him. Michelle hasn’t taken her eyes away from her book. Her head will be burning. I know I’m going to be the one who faces her wrath later, but I can’t take my eyes off of William. He’s not muscle bound, the kind of guy Lauren would pull droopy faces at, he’s . . . he’s confident, that’s what it is. Just glancing at the five o’clock shadow on his face makes the bottom of my spine tingle.

‘Don’t worry, we won’t be staying,’ Caz says, realising Michelle’s probably about to explode.

‘I just wanted to say hello to Caz’s new posh friends. Smells amazing in here, I’m jealous, I’ve just had a kebab.’ He grins.

‘Nice to meet you,’ I say, my voice quivering a little.

My voice sounds ridiculously posh inside my head. God, he’s probably going to look down on me.

His eyes linger on mine. He smiles. It’s like my body doesn’t belong to me anymore. I grab the work surface to steady myself. He reminds me a little bit of a classic New York gangster, with his hair gelled back like that. All he needs is a suit, and he’d look the part.

‘Anyways, we better get going, we don’t want to outstay our welcome,’ Caz says, glancing at Michelle, who doesn’t look back at her, and then gripping hold of William’s arm. ‘I’ll be in touch, Angela.’

William doesn’t say anything. Caz leads him back to the front door, but before they disappear into the hallway, he looks once back towards me. For a brief moment, I want to abandon Michelle, Hayley and Lauren and go with them, but instead I let them leave, without another word.

**************