Beneath the Skin(29)
‘Sounds nice,’ David replies. But still he keeps hold of her hand.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Antonia climbs out of her car and looks up. It’s a substantial and imposing period home, bay-fronted and semi-detached in a tree-lined cul-de-sac near the centre of Chorlton. A large property, probably five or six bedrooms, yet a far cry from White Gables. Olivia and Mike Turner have neighbours immediately either side for a start.
She stands for a moment looking around. There’s a small boy with his mum digging in the next garden. She’s wearing a spectacular African dress. A young man in lycra squats down by his bike, another man in a white turban washes his van in the road. The house opposite has been converted into flats. She can smell the sweet aroma of spices from one flat, hear the thump of music from another. It reminds her of childhood. But the people, the noises and the smells feel friendly here.
The doorbell sounds loud to Antonia’s ears as she presses it, almost insistent. Perhaps she should’ve knocked. Clasping the flowers with one hand, she puts the other in the pocket of her wool coat and stands back. There’s a very thin crack between the panels of the red front door and she wonders if it lets in the cold breeze. She breathes in, and then out. It’s silly to feel nervous. She’s been here several times before. But never for coffee and not on her own.
The door opens, letting out a rush of warm air, which blows the newly fallen autumn leaves around Antonia’s ankles. The telephone’s ringing inside.
‘Hi! Come on in.’ Olivia smiles. ‘Let me grab the phone and I’ll be right with you.’
Antonia steps into the hall. She can’t describe how exactly, but the house smells different from the one she shares with David. Not an unpleasant smell, but layers of smell, of children, of cooking, of family. Not that her childhood home smelt this way. Tobacco, beer and dog is all she can recall on the rare occasions she allows her mind to wander. She glances at the pink and white freesias still clutched in her hand as she walks into the kitchen, regretting her choice. It’s clearly a family home. Perhaps chocolates or biscuits would have been better.
The kitchen’s a jumble. Half-eaten bowls of cereal, toast, fruit juice and crumbs. Discarded spoons and spilt milk. A red plastic basket full of damp washing sits on the floor. A solitary piece of buttered, seeded toast lies on the work surface with just one bite missing.
Olivia returns from her phone call, her cheeks slightly pink. ‘Sorry,’ they both say at once.
Olivia is wearing jeans and a checked shirt tied in a knot at her waist. She always looks fresh, Antonia thinks, fresh and healthy and hearty, even though she’s so petite. ‘That was my sister. I’ll ring her back later. What were you about to say?’
Antonia nods towards the toast. ‘Oh, it was just that … I’ve interrupted your breakfast.’
‘Oh, don’t worry. It’s usually lunchtime before I realise that I haven’t eaten anything, but my stomach felt a bit dodgy this morning. Another bug brought home by Hannah, no doubt. Reception is the worst possible class for it. Earache one day, the runs the next. And, of course, the dreaded head lice.’
Olivia catches Antonia’s slight grimace and laughs. ‘Don’t worry. The nits were a couple of weeks ago. Even Mike was enlisted to do some wet combing, much to the girls’ dismay. Men just don’t understand long hair and knots, do they?’
Men and long hair. Long curly hair, Antonia immediately thinks. She replaces it with a smile and a much fonder memory. The nit nurse from school, when she and Sophie went in together, holding hands. Sophie’s head teemed with nits, hers didn’t. ‘It’s the curls,’ the nit nurse had said, as though Antonia had done something wrong. ‘Nits don’t like them.’
‘I don’t suppose men do,’ Antonia replies, wondering if Olivia knows she used to be a hairdresser in her ‘former life’, as she calls it in her head. Of course there’s nothing wrong with hairdressing, but a clean sheet starting with David feels so much easier. ‘I brought you some flowers.’
‘What a lovely smell. Thank you. Let me just fill the washing machine with some bedding and then I’ll put on the coffee. Feel free to clear yourself a space at the table.’
Antonia sits down on a chair for a moment before standing up again and taking the pots and cutlery from the table to the sink. Something tells her that a real friend doesn’t stand on ceremony, but gets stuck in with the chores. By the time Olivia comes back with her arms full of bedding, Antonia has cleared the table, washed up the crockery and put the kettle on.
Olivia smiles as she surveys the results. ‘You can come again,’ she laughs.
The traffic lights on Princess Parkway are on red. They always seem to turn from amber to red the moment the car reaches sixty and purrs like a cat. Sami usually bears down on the accelerator, hoping to jump the lights with only a second to spare, just for the soft thrill, but today his thoughts are elsewhere.
God, I want her now, right now, he sighs. I wonder if she’s been thinking about me.
The thought is uninvited and for a moment Sami wonders if he’s said it out loud.
‘Stop it, man,’ he chides, deliberately aloud to test the sound. He adjusts the mirror and then glances to the right, his sixth sense telling him he’s being admired. An attractive woman in sunglasses is appraising him from a shiny black Mercedes sports car. He glances at the wheels, noting the discreet badge of the performance-tuning company. See? he thinks, grinning back with a nod. Plenty of shapes and sizes to be had. I mustn’t get hung up. It’s only temporary fun. It’s only a laugh.