Free Vince and Joy by Lisa Jewell

site and ate salad in deck chairs with Kirsty and Chris. They lazed the afternoon away there in the sun, padding barefoot in and out of the caravan every now and then to get cold drinks from the fridge. Chris listened to the football on a crackling transistor and Kirsty painted her toenails electric blue, her toes separated by a pink foam knuckleduster.
    At five o’clock the ice-cream van arrived and the silence was broken by the sound of thirty children screaming at their mothers for money and clambering all over each other to reach the vendor’s hatch. Vince got them all Screwballs and Chris brought out the Monopoly. The four of them sat cross-legged on a hair blanket and threw dice for pieces, while they ate their ice cream. Joy was the top hat, Vince was the iron, Chris was the car and Kirsty was the Scottie dog because she always was.
    Nobody had won by six-thirty and nobody cared.
    Barbara and Alan returned from wherever they’d been all day just before seven, clutching brown paper bags and both wearing hats. Alan threw a disapproving glance at Joy as he wandered towards them and saw her hand clasping Vince’s bare thigh.
    There then followed a brief altercation, as Alan tried to persuade Joy to join them inside for a ‘discussion re our dining plans’.
    ‘But I’m not hungry,’ she said. ‘I’ve been eating all day’
    ‘Honestly,’ he muttered, clenching and unclenching his fists, ‘I thought this was supposed to be a
family
holiday. Barbara? Wasn’t this supposed to be a family holiday? Wasn’t that the whole bloody
point?
’
    Joy tutted loudly and Alan’s face turned puce. ‘We’re only here for your sake, you know that, don’t you?’ he snapped.
    ‘Alan… ’ chided Barbara.
    ‘Well, really – I’m just telling it as it is…’
    ‘Yes, but Alan, we agreed –’
    ‘Yes, yes, yes,’ he sighed, angrily. Barbara smiled apologetically, and guided Alan gently back to their caravan by the elbow.
    The four of them looked at each other. Chris gurned childishly at Joy and she smiled. ‘Sorry,’ she said, sheepishly.
    ‘Have you noticed,’ Vince said to Joy, ‘how much time we seem to spend apologizing for our parents.’
    ‘What do you mean?’ said Chris in mock indignation.
    ‘What the fuck have you got to apologize about
me
for? I’m totally fucking perfect, I am.’
    ‘Yeah. Right,’ harrumphed Vince, then Chris set about him in one of his affectionate but slightly overwhelming play fights, wrestling him on to his back and pummelling him around the ears.
    Joy watched them in wry amusement. You know that sort of behaviour means you’re gay, don’t you?’ she said, nonchalantly running a strand of her hair back and forth across her top lip.
    Kirsty let out a loud hoot of laughter and slapped her thighs in delight.
    ‘Eh?’ said Chris and Vince in unison.
    ‘Uh-huh. Latent homosexuality manifested in a strong desire for physical contact with a member of the same sex.’
    Vince didn’t take offence; just felt a frisson of delight that he had a girlfriend who could a) use long words and b) take the piss out of Chris. Chris on the other hand looked appalled. ‘Fuck off,’ he scoffed.
    ‘Oh, no,’ Vince teased, ‘you’ve really done it now. Questioned the sexuality of a Northern male.’
    ‘Too right,’ said Chris, smoothing down his hair. ‘There in’t no poofs north of Watford, I’ll have you know. They only get bred down South.’
    ‘Oh, like John Inman and Larry Grayson, you mean? Oh, and Russell Harty, too, while we’re at it.’Joy shrugged her eyebrow at him, and Chris threw Vince a look of mock exasperation.
    ‘And I thought she was such a nice girl,’ he said. ‘Well, the competition’s off. You can keep her. She’s all yours.’
    And then it was Vince’s turn to give Chris a good pummelling, while Kirsty and Joy burst into laughter so loud that a flock of wood pigeons took sudden flight from anoverhanging tree, like a groundsheet being shaken free of