Free The Hunger Trace by Edward Hogan

sixty-yard dash. They called her ‘Wheezer’ Smedley behind her back. When one of the girls told her this, it disturbed her for only a moment, confirming as it did what she already knew: she was not pretty.
    What she never found out was that, for several weeks after the Pony Club Ball, David Bryant was attracted to her. He liked her strong limbs and the cold soft redness of her face when she walked out on the first leg of their hunting challenge. He liked to see her bend to her haunches – the whipping sound of her inseams, the stretch of denim across her thighs. She looked like she could swim. He would certainly never tell his friends. After that first hunt with the falcons, they questioned him about Wheezer, and he tried to dismiss her fairly as a ‘bloke with tits’, but even this gave too much away. On the day they walked through the field together, on the second leg of their challenge, he stopped abruptly and she bumped into his back. He felt the give of her breasts against his shoulder blades, and tried to convince himself that he was aroused only by the thrill of carrying a firearm.

S IX
     
    ‘Do you know any Jason Donovan, at all?’ Christopher said.
    ‘I’m afraid I do not,’ Louisa said.
    She had just finished playing ‘Devil Got My Woman’. Christopher had come to her cottage to apologise for his ‘savage and brutal behaviour resulting in facial injury’ and then insisted that she play the guitar. She did not like to perform, but after a spell of silence, she thought it might make her forget he was in the room.
    ‘Jason Donovan played Scott in Neighbours . He was world famous.’
    ‘I’ve heard of him.’
    ‘Jason’s a good name. I’ll probably call my progeny Jason,’ he said.
    ‘It’s nice,’ she said.
    Another silence. Christopher became serious. ‘Do you think Jason Donovan is, erm, gay, at all?’ he said.
    Louisa hesitated.
    ‘Do you think he is strange in that way?’ he said.
    ‘I don’t know him.’
    After a little contemplation, they resumed negotiations about music, and settled on ‘Sealed with a Kiss’, Louisa playing the old Gary Lewis version while Christopher shouted ‘quicker, quicker’ and sang every third word. Louisa could feel the vibrations of his foot tapping from across the floor. When they finished he smiled greasily and slid down on the sofa. His brace shone, and Louisa noticed that one of his teeth originated from high on the gum.
    ‘We’re rocking around the music tree, now,’ he said.
    ‘Aren’t we just,’ Louisa said. She recalled the particular facial expression David wore when talking about Christopher. The sort of frozen, distant smile you affect when your horse comes a close third behind your mother-in-law’s.
    ‘This is a nice pad,’ he said, stretching his arm across the top of the button-backed sofa.
    ‘Thank you.’
    ‘Could do with a clean,’ he said. Louisa sighed, looked at her watch.
    ‘Do you like Maggie Green?’ he asked.
    What a question. Louisa wondered if she had sent him.
    ‘You mean Maggie who lives with you?’ It was the first time she had heard her maiden name.
    ‘Yes, my father’s late wife.’
    ‘Your late father’s wife.’ She corrected him automatically.
    He looked at the floor. ‘They are no longer married in the eyes of the law,’ he said. ‘Erm. Do you like her?’
    ‘I really don’t know her.’
    ‘Do you think she’s, erm, erm, ugly, at all?’ He smiled.
    ‘She certainly isn’t that.’
    Louisa felt a degree of discomfort. She reasoned that it may have resulted from the pleasure she took in the conversation.
    ‘She’s not my mother, you know,’ Christopher said.
    ‘I know. I know your mother.’
    ‘Do you?’ he said, leaning forward.
    ‘I knew her. Before.’
    ‘Before she, erm, flew the roost.’
    ‘Yes.’
    ‘Erm. Do you think Maggie Green is a gold-digger, at all?’
    ‘I don’t know her,’ Louisa said.
    ‘I think she is. It’s a bit of a, erm, coincidence, isn’t it? She