Gary Puckett & The Gap
YOUNG GIRL
I stretched, arms out wide, and kicked my legs out in accompaniment, thumping against something – ‘Sorry, Lucy!’ – the cat, it turned out, in the process.
She jumped off the bed with a loud meow of protest, but nothing could shake the Saturday morning mood that I’d woken with.
For the shop it was the busiest day of the week, which resultantly meant that it was my best. It didn’t matter how much stock I sold – though of course, that was a lovely thing, too – but the bustle of bodies and the chatter of people discovering things, falling in love with things, making ridiculous impulse purchases that they’d tell their friends about over dinner later that evening…
David always said that I made myself too much a part of other people’s stories, but it brought me joy, and I’d reached a point in life where a little joy was reason enough to do anything.
I rolled to the opposite side of the bed and enjoyed the coolness of the pillowcase against my cheek, enjoyed a quiet inhale of our fabric softener, and then threw myself upright.
‘This won’t get the baby washed.’
At this time on a Saturday morning there was every chance that David was still sound asleep in his pit.
He’d been out last night and I hadn’t heard him come home – pray to God he had come home – so I trod around the flat with care: opening the linen cupboard slowly, slowly, so it didn’t creak too loud; creeping to the bathroom on Scooby-Doo tiptoes, trying to miss the telltale floorboards as I went.
Though every effort was ruined entirely when I eased open the bathroom door and was greeted with–
‘Oh my fuck!’
–a near naked woman.
Ah, I thought, so David did come home last night.
‘Who the hell are you?’
I instantly forgave her the blunt force of the question. She was, after all, standing in a strange man’s bathroom the morning after the night before, wearing nothing but underwear that doubled as a cheese wire. I could see how she might feel vulnerable, or standoffish.
I smiled. ‘I’m Patti, David’s wife. Who the hell are you?’
The woman’s eyes widened. ‘His wife?’
‘Mhm,’ I answered. I reached round to behind the door and took one of the guest robes from the spare hook. ‘Take this, love. Are you a tea person…?’
I drew the line at offering her my towel.
I still needed to shower before work. That said, my mother raised me better than to be an unwilling host. So while the young woman – young enough to be mine and David’s daughter, I guessed, which was a thought I shook off with some difficulty on the way to the kitchen – was making herself decent, I was making batter.
‘Will pancakes do you?’ I asked when she took a tentative step in.
‘Oh, you really don’t… I mean, I should really…’ I turned in time to catch her pushing loose strands of hair behind her ears. She looked even younger in this natural light. ‘I should really go, get out of the way. You and David probably need to… I don’t know, talk?’
I laughed. ‘I’ll be long gone before he even gets up.’
‘Oh, God. Because of me?’
I realised the error in my phrasing and I flashed her a smile. ‘No, because of work.’
After I turned back to my batter, there was a long silence that stretched out in the space behind me, disturbed only by the subtle scrape of wood against tile as she pulled out a chair at the table. The kettle flicked to a boil, and the pan turned red on the hob to signal its readiness.
‘One pancake or two?’ I turned to ask. She had her arms stretched out ahead of her, playing with loose skin on her cuticles. ‘I didn’t even get your name,’ I signalled when she didn’t answer the first question. She answered without looking at me.
‘Sally-Ann.’
‘Sally-Ann.’ I pulled out my own chair. ‘David didn’t mention me?’
She shook her head. ‘I wouldn’t have, if I’d known…’
‘No, well, that’s perhaps why he didn’t mention me.
’ I wanted to reach out to give her hands a squeeze – to stop her worrying at them – but I thought that would be an intimacy too far.
Even if she was sitting at my breakfast table in my guest robe…
‘Where did the two of you meet, if you don’t mind me asking? ’
‘I was just at a bar with some friends and he–’
‘Brought you a drink and flashed you a winning smile?’
‘Christ, this is too much, isn’t it?’ She pushed her chair back. ‘I really should go.’
‘Now, don’t be ridiculous. Look, David needs to explain all this, really.
But he’s asleep and I’m making breakfast either way, and if he bought you a drink then I’d wager he bought you enough to cause a raging hangover, too.
Am I right?’ I ducked into her sightline and I was relieved to see the crack of a smile.
‘In which case, sit, eat, keep me company. One or two?’
She put a hand to her head and laughed; a nervous, self-conscious sound. ‘Two, please.’
‘With sugar?’
‘Jesus, that would be… I mean, it would be just perfect. But honestly, Mrs–’
‘Patti, please. You’ve slept with my husband; there are no formalities between us now.’
‘Why aren’t you shouting at me?’ she asked. Her brow creased. I wondered how many wrinkled foreheads in this city my husband had been responsible for over the years.
‘I’m not a shouter.’ I smiled. ‘Tea or coffee?’
She hesitated before she answered. ‘Tea, please, and thank you.’
‘You’re welcome.’ I stood and went back to what I was doing.
It was hardly my first time making breakfast for a woman David had lured home.
It wouldn’t be the last either, at a guess.
So it wasn’t at all like a strange thing for me to be doing.
I could see why Sally-Ann might struggle with the concept, though…
‘Do you need any help?’ she asked in that same nervous tone.
‘Not at all, not at all.’ I pulled cups and saucers together; the best for guests. ‘You’re only meant to be keeping me company. Tell me, Sally-Ann, what do you do for a living? Anything interesting?’
‘I’m a rep at a travel agent’s.’
‘Hmm, and what’s that like?’
* * *
I was just unlocking the front door of the shop when my phone screeched in my pocket.
It didn’t take a genius to work out who it would be, so I let it ring.
The same ringtone howled again another three times, though, while I turned on the lights for the main floor and the cabinets, then started up the till.
I was firmly parked on the stool behind my counter with my latest read – Patricia Highsmith’s Carol, for the millionth time – when my conscience finally got the better of me and I decided to call back.
‘Well, that was a right bloody mess you left me with this morning, Patti,’ David answered in place of a hello. I was glad he couldn’t see my smirk. ‘What on earth were you thinking?’
‘I startled the poor girl. She needed breakfast for the shock.’
‘She didn’t need anything for the shock!’ His voice rose a decibel and my smirk deepened to a grin. ‘I thought we talked about it.’
‘Yes, David,’ I agreed blindly.
‘I woo them, I bring them home, and then in the morning…’
‘I introduce myself as your wife and ask them to leave,’ I finished his masterplan.
‘Could I get the second half of that again, please?’
‘I ask them to– honestly, this is ridiculous.’
‘What’s ridiculous is pancakes. Pancakes that I wasn’t party to, incidentally–’
‘Did you want pancakes with me and Sally-Ann?’
‘And a woman that I have to explain myself to, the instant I bloody wake up’ – he carried on like I hadn’t spoken – ‘and, to add insult to injury. Do you want to know what’s insult to injury, Patti? Shall I tell you?’
I could sense what was coming but I encouraged him all the same.
‘The veritable mountain of washing up you’ve lumbered me with! Honestly, Patricia, sometimes I… I wonder to God why I married you at all if this is what I can expect.’
It had all come out in such a rush that I was sure I could hear him panting down the phone when he was finished.
I gave the poor sod a minute to catch his breath, and rethink any parts of the argument that he might like to take back.
Experience had taught me that with enough time left to think, David would eventually say–
‘That’s unfair of me. I’m sorry. No, I take that back. You’re an excellent wife.’
I giggled. ‘Thank you, that means–’
‘Just please stop making them breakfast?’
‘I’ll try, David, really, I will. You have my word.’