Impossible to Forget(104)

She had taken the day off from Space Solutions to accommodate the interview, so her time was her own. Having run through her options, she thought she might call on Romany and Tiger, see how they were coping. Romany’s exams had begun, and so things were likely to be a little fraught. Maggie could still remember what it felt like. Of all the exams that she had sat over the years, her A levels had been the most stressful. She had truly believed that her entire life was on the line, that if she failed to get the grades to take the next step then everything would be ruined and her life would be over. How na?ve and over-dramatic that felt now, but at the time she had been convinced it was right. There was even an A level stress nightmare that she still had when she was under extreme pressure, unchanged in its particulars since it had first haunted her thirty-five years ago. If only we could tell our younger selves what they should really be worrying about, she thought.

At Angie’s place (when would she stop thinking of it in those terms?) she rang the doorbell and then waited, half-expecting that there would be no one in, but then she heard someone coming down the stairs towards her. The door opened and there stood Tiger. He was wearing an apron, a masculine-looking navy blue affair, but it was still, most definitely, an apron.

Maggie just laughed. ‘Oh my God, Tiger, you are a picture of domesticity. What on earth are you doing?’

‘I’m making chocolate profiteroles for Romey,’ he replied with an air of defiance. ‘They’re her favourite and she’s got another exam today, so I thought I’d make a batch for when she gets home. Are you coming in?’

‘Only if you’ve got time,’ Maggie replied, gesturing to his attire. ‘I wouldn’t want to interrupt.’ And then she added, ‘Chocolate profiteroles? My! I didn’t know you had it in you.’

‘I am a constant source of surprises!’ he said, tucking his thumbs into the straps of his apron and looking like he might burst into song. ‘Come on up and I’ll stick the kettle on.’

Maggie followed him up the stairs. She let her eyes stray to his bum as he climbed. She told herself it was by force of habit.

The place was, as was usual these days, spotless with not a throw or cushion out of place, and even though he was clearly in the middle of baking, the kitchen was tidy, with everything he had already used piled neatly ready for washing up.

‘So which paper was it today?’ she asked, settling herself into one of the chairs to watch him work.

‘Biology 1,’ he said as he tipped coffee grounds into the coffee-maker.

‘And how was she?’ Maggie asked, thinking of her own nerves that morning.

He turned back to face her. ‘She was okay. We seem to be through the panic stage and now she’s remarkably calm. She’s just getting on with it.’

‘Good for her,’ Maggie said. ‘She’s a wonder, that girl. Angie would be so proud of her.’

‘Wouldn’t she just,’ agreed Tiger.

‘And you should take some of the credit too,’ she added. ‘You’ve been brilliant.’

Tiger gave a modest little shrug, but Maggie thought she saw pride in his eyes. She had never seen him proud of something he’d done before. Was this actually a first?

‘And the Daniel thing?’ she asked. ‘Where are we with that?’

It was a month since Tiger had rung to tell her what had happened on the day of the fashion shoot, but since then Romany must have decided that her A levels were more important than her long-lost father and had banished the subject from the agenda.

‘Nothing,’ said Tiger. ‘It’s like it never happened.’

‘Have you heard from Hope?’ she asked.

Tiger shook his head. ‘I don’t know if Romey has. She’s being pretty tight-lipped about the whole thing.’

‘Well, maybe when the exams are over . . .’

Tiger puffed his lips out. ‘Yeah,’ he said. ‘There’ll be a lot of changes after the exams are over.’

He made the coffee and passed her a cup, and then put on a pair of oven gloves and retrieved the golden choux puffs from the oven. Their smell filled the air and made Maggie’s mouth water.

‘So, I suppose you’ll be heading off into the great blue yonder as soon as you get the green light,’ Maggie said. ‘You’ve done amazingly. We all know what a massive sacrifice it’s been for you to stay here and look after Romany. I didn’t think you could do it, to be honest. I bet you’ve spent the whole year planning where you’re going to go when you can finally escape.’

He didn’t look at her, she noticed, and focused instead on checking that each profiterole was properly cooked.

‘Yeah, well,’ he said. ‘I’ve got a few ideas, but nothing concrete yet.’

She could sense his reluctance to talk about it. Perhaps he was actually going to miss Romany when he left. They had clearly become quite close over the year. But a deal was a deal, and he had very nearly fulfilled his side of the bargain.

‘And it’s Leon’s gig soon, right?’ he said, changing the subject deftly.

That was something else that wasn’t being discussed. When it had first gone in the diary it had seemed so far in the future that it was hard to imagine that they would ever get there, but now, as inevitably happened, the date was almost upon them.

‘How’s he feeling about it?’ Tiger asked. ‘I bet he’s in a right state!’