Free The Men and the Girls by Joanna Trollope Page B

behind her.
    Uncle Leonard held out his wineglass. ‘Good riddance,’ he said, ‘to the whole boiling of them.’
    â€˜I didn’t go because I wanted to,’ Joss said to Kate, ‘she asked me. She asked me to carry her shopping, in front of Mr Patel, so I had to.’
    â€˜Of course,’ Kate said. She sat on the edge of her bed, her and James’s bed, and screwed a tissue up into a scruffy little ball. ‘It was kind, to go.’
    Joss stood on the old Afghan rug in front of Kate, and jabbed at a hole in it with her boot toe. ‘The hat was only a joke—’
    â€˜It’s lovely. I said so. I love it.’
    â€˜It’s awful. I’ll take it back.’
    â€˜Please not,’ Kate said. She wanted Joss to come a little nearer, so that she could hold her, in this cold bedroom, in her misery. ‘I’m behaving so badly,’ she said. ‘I don’t know what’s the matter. Miss Bachelor—’
    â€˜She’s OK,’ Joss said, in the encouraging, reassuring voice she sometimes used with the twins.
    â€˜Why does James want to go?’
    â€˜I dunno.’
    â€˜What’s it like? What’s her room like?’
    â€˜Dreary,’ Joss said. ‘Old-looking. Everything’s old.’
    Old, Kate thought. She shivered. She held her arms out to Joss. ‘Give us a hug.’
    Joss came and stood stiffly against her.
    â€˜I wish I was fourteen again,’ Kate said into Joss’s shoulder, ‘like you.’
    Joss said nothing. She only ever thought about age in tiny amounts, like whether a boy you fancied was three months younger or older than you were. Kate was thirty-six now, but that didn’t mean anything, it was just the sort of age mums were.
    â€˜We must go down,’ Kate said. ‘James bought me a cake. I’ll – I’ll put my hat on, for the cake.’
    â€˜Jesus,’ Joss said, pulling away. ‘Jesus, don’t do that!’
    Kate stood up. She pushed her hair away from her face, and her bangles, the Indian bangles made of shell inlaid in brass that Joss had given her for Christmas, clacked together.
    â€˜I do like that hat, Joss. I do. I just couldn’t bear it when I took it out and I saw James—’ She stopped. ‘Come on. Come downstairs with me and help me eat my cake.’
    Later, while they were washing up, the telephone rang. As usual, Kate went to answer it.
    â€˜It’s Hugh,’ she said, holding the receiver out to James. ‘He sounds pissed.’
    â€˜I am pissed,’ Hugh said to James, ‘pissed and pissed off.’
    James manoeuvred a chair towards the telephone with his foot and sat down.
    â€˜What now?’
    â€˜Want to hear about my new career?’
    James closed his eyes. He held the receiver a little way from his ear and Hugh’s voice came clearly out of it.
    â€˜I’m going to open garages, James, garages and bowling alleys and lavatories for the disabled. I’m going to be Hugh Hunter, the megastar of the mini-market, I’m going to pull them in in their tens, I shall make hundreds. Oh James—’ Hugh’s voice cracked. ‘Oh James, what’s it all been bloody for ?’
    James opened his eyes and looked at Kate. She finished drying a handful of forks and put them down on the table with a soft clatter. She didn’t look back.
    â€˜Where are you?’ James said. ‘At home?’
    â€˜No. No, I couldn’t stand it, I wasn’t fit company for anyone. I’m in the boozer, our local.’
    â€˜Stay there,’ James said. ‘I’ll come.’
    â€˜You’re a friend—’
    â€˜But you are not to get sentimental.’
    â€˜Promise.’
    â€˜Twenty minutes. I’ll be twenty minutes. Don’t drink any more.’
    He put the telephone back and stood up. ‘I’m so terribly sorry,’ he said to Kate, ‘and on your birthday.’