Free Past Secrets by Cathy Kelly Page B

to Shona by now. They’d become fast friends from the moment they’d met on Maggie’s first day in the library, where she discovered that her new friend’s second degree subject was indubitably Teasing: Honours Module. Now Maggie leaned over and swatted Shona on the arm with her ruler. ‘Brat.’
    ‘Haven’t-a-Clue Barbie.’
    ‘Slapper.’
    ‘Oh, thank you,’ Shona said, pretending to preen. She was impossible to shock. ‘Shona O’Slapper, I like that. Now, can you swap shifts with me? I know you’re on till six tonight, but I’ll do it and you can go early if you’ll do tomorrow afternoon for me? You could spend another hour honing your body in Extreme Fatness,’ she wheedled. Shona had accompanied Maggie to the gym once and hated it, hence the new name.
    ‘Are you and Paul going out?’ inquired Maggie.
    ‘I’m providing a shoulder to cry on,’ Shona informed her. ‘Ross has broken up with Johann.’ Ross was a hairdresser who lived in the apartment
     
    below Shona and Paul, providing the perfect opportunity for Shona’s fag-haggery and giving Paula chance to watch football on the television while she and Ross sat in the apartment below, rewatching old Will & Grace episodes and bitching happily.
    ‘He’s inconsolable, even though he whined all the time they were going out about how insensitive Johann was and how he didn’t like Nureyev.’ Nureyev was Ross’s beloved pet, a lop-eared rabbit, who was spoiled beyond belief and had his own Vuitton bunny carrier as well as a purple velvet collar with his name spelled out in diamante. He lived in luxury in Ross’s Philippe Starck-style kitchen and was house-trained to use a cat litter box. ‘Nobody’s ever truly gorgeous until they dump you, right? We’re partying to get him over it.’ ‘On a Wednesday?’
    ‘Woe’s day, sweetie, as the ancient Danes would say. It’s apt.’
    ‘Who’s looking after Nureyev?’
    ‘We’re going to leave the Discovery channel on
    for him. He loves all those shows about meerkats.’
    Maggie was still laughing at the idea of the
    rabbit sulkily glued to the television when she got
    to her own front door and pulled out her keys.
    The mortice lock was undone. Grey must have
    got home early, she thought with a smile. That was
    good, they could have a blissfully long evening
    together. Good call, Maguire, she thought as she let
    herself in. Sometimes a girl’s gotta know when to miss stretching on a mat so she can stretch on a bed. And for all of his intellectual cool, Grey knew some pelvic contortions the Pilates teacher had never taught. It was funny though, Grey was supposed to be at a meeting perhaps it had been cancelled?
    ‘Shouldn’t be too late, honey,’ Grey had said on the phone earlier. ‘You’ve got your class tonight so I’ll pick up That food on the way home.’ Grey believed in sharing cooking duties, although he preferred takeout to actual slaving and stirring with wooden spoons.
    Inside the apartment, Maggie heard muted noises coming from the apartment’s lone bedroom. Grey must be watching the TV, she thought, and, shedding her possessions as she went, handbag on to the floor, jacket on the couch, she crossed the small living room, went down the hall and pushed their bedroom door open.
    The door was still swinging open when Maggie stopped on the threshold, frozen.
    Grey was on the bed, naked and lying underneath a woman, also naked.
    The woman’s hair hung like a silken curtain, erotically half covering a lingerie-model body with a hand-span waist and high, perfect C-cup breasts. Three mouths opened in surprise. Maggie twisted her head sideways to try to get the scene to make sense. It was like a clever illustration in a psychoanalyst’s office, a bizarre, mind-bending scene designed to make you question everything you knew: what’s wrong with this picture?
     
    Well, Doctor, that’s our bed with our duvet tangled up on the floor, and my side table pretty much the way I left it this