Free The Key by Geraldine O'Hara Page A

it, falling in—”
    “That’s enough, Harold,” Mother said. “Really, the good people here don’t want to listen to that. I’m more concerned that she’ll get ill after gulping all that water, or at the very least catch a chill. Go in the pub and ask them for a blanket, will you?”
    If I knew Dad, he’d walk away without complaint and do her bidding.
    “And you,” Mother said. “Friend, are you? I’d say boyfriend, but our Jane hasn’t had one ever —not that we know of, anyway — so I can’t see her having one now.”
    She could have been talking to anyone—there were male pairs of shoes in the watching crowd. I’d just sit still and let her get on with it. Embarrass me as much as she liked so long as I could get away from here, face unseen, and back to my flat where I could live the rest of my life alone. I’d been a fool to think finding a man to share my life with would be anything but disastrous. Yet for a while back there, I’d convinced myself it might work, this relationship thing. I’d have just had to pretend to be French for the rest of my days and avoid letting David meet my parents, that was all.
    “Yes, I’m her boyfriend,” David said.
    I snapped my head up, then realised what I’d done. It was too late now, though. I stared up at him as he stared down at me, my heart going mental, making up a new dance as it thudded along. He was soaking, the weight of the water dragging his sweatpants lower than they’d been earlier. Inappropriate for the situation, I studied the damp hairs and skin peeking out from where his T-shirt had ridden up, a ruche of material fingers. I might as well, because I wasn’t going to get to see that sight again.
    “Oh, right,” Mother said. “How long has this been going on then, young lady?”
    I raised my eyes so I could watch his facial expression.
    He smiled. “Long enough for me to know I’d like to see her every day.”
    “Well, that’s a turn-up for the books.” Mother again.
    I wanted her to go away. Wanted everyone standing around us to go away. To leave us in this moment, a sweet, emotional moment that had a lump expanding in my throat as big as a haggis. I must have looked a sight, but I didn’t care now. David looked one, too, hair plastered to his forehead, the kinks stripped out of it by running river water. So he’d jumped in to save me— had saved me. The haggis grew bigger. I wanted to speak, but couldn’t find the words. It seemed we didn’t need any. He was telling me all I needed to know with those eyes of his. That I wasn’t going to spend the rest of my life alone. That, despite my lies, he wanted to see me every day.
    That I had… Bloody hell, that I had a boyfriend .
     
    The blanket was a welcome bit of warmth. Dad had shrouded me in its prickly embrace, making sure I knew I had to return it and not to forget, because I hadn’t been brought up to keep something that wasn’t mine and no daughter of his was a thief. I nodded amid Mother repeating what he’d said, David thanking them for being there, but that he really ought to get me back home now, home in the warm.
    We took a taxi to my flat, saying nothing on the journey, him hugging me to his side. I worried about what he was thinking. I mean, it was all very well him saying he was my boyfriend, but I mulled over why— why would he want a liar in his life? Wasn’t he hurt by my deception? It was clear my parents weren’t French, that I wasn’t French, and very obvious I was plain old Jane Smith.
    We got out of the taxi. Mr Big Bollocks wasn’t in his garden, but he was standing at his living room window, staring out through the glass with a shocked expression. He disappeared, and as me and David walked up the path that bordered Mr Big Bollocks’ hedges, my swollen-groined neighbour flew out of his house and peered over at us.
    “You all right, Jane?” he asked, eyes wide. “Did this man here…? What did he do?”
    “I’m fine, thank you,” I said. “He