Dating Down Read online

  “So when did this Grace die?” Carrie enquires, curling up alongside me.

  “Not sure,” I sigh. “Not long ago.”

  “Well, it seems like he’s got a lot of issues to sort out. Are you sure he’s worth it?”

  “He’s worth it.” If I was able to tell her the truth, she wouldn’t have to ask me that. “You won’t tell the others this, will you?”

  “Course not,” she assures me, all pink smiles. “We’re best friends.”

  “We used to be, until Rachael came along.”

  This time Carrie squirms, and just like it always does when she’s put on the spot, her nose wrinkles up.

  “What made you choose them?” I ask.

  “They did all the things I wanted to do,” she sighs, looking me in the eye. “All you ever wanted to do was stay in playing make believe.”

  I know she’s not doing it on purpose, but everything she says just makes me feel even more rotten. “If you haven’t noticed, I’m done with pretending.”

  “Good.” She beams. “Because Rachael really likes you, and she wants you to be part of the gang!”

  Tuesday 10:30 a.m.

  Tammy

  My mobile rings. As I fumble beneath the covers, hope turns to dismay when I see it’s only Carrie. “Hi.”

  “Hi,” she says, and I can almost hear the sunshine in her voice. “What are you doing?”

  “Nothing much.”

  “Still no news from Gary?”

  “No.” My voice sounds strange, as dry and lifeless as the rest of me.

  “I know what will cheer you up.”

  “What?”

  “Rachael wants you to come to the tennis club with us.”

  I should be happy. This is what I’ve always wanted, but I can’t enjoy being popular after I betrayed Gary. “I hate tennis,” I groan. “And I’m grounded.”

  “Still?”

  “Till next Saturday.”

  “Oh. Are you sure your mum won’t let you out?”

  “Positive.” For once I’m glad Mummy is a total bitch, because the last thing I want to do is run around on a tennis court getting all hot and sweaty.

  “But I thought she was always nagging you to lose weight.”

  “She is,” I sigh, hating Carrie for reminding me what a fat, useless cow I am.

  “And what’s one of the best ways to get thin?”

  “Anorexia?” I offer.

  “Stop being stupid.”

  “Dark chocolate?”

  “Tammy!”

  “Exercise.”

  “Yes!” she exclaims. “So I’m sure if you ask your mum if you can come and play tennis with me and lose a few pounds, she isn’t going to say no, is she?”

  “But I hate tennis.”

  “You don’t have to play tennis,” she laughs. “No one goes to the tennis club to play tennis. We go to get a manicure, have a Jacuzzi, or just hang around the bar. Please say you’ll come. It will mean a lot to Rachael. And to me.”

  I don’t know why I say yes when all I really want to do is mope around in the gloom of my room, but I’ve wanted to be popular for so long that it seems almost criminal to turn down the invite. When I ask Mummy if I can go, she is so happy she even cancels a meeting with an important client to help me get ready.

  An hour later, looking like a different person and feeling only marginally less depressed, I get into Carrie’s black BMW in a tight white T-shirt and pleated tennis skirt that barely covers my bum.

  “Way to go, Tammy!” Looking relaxed and confident in a primrose summer dress and her Barbie blond hair tied back in a loose ponytail, Carrie beams across at me.

  I check myself out in the mirror. Mummy’s plaited my hair so it will stay nice and tidy when I’m running around on the tennis court. And although she made me up to give me a healthy sheen, the only clue I’m wearing any makeup is slightly longer eyelashes and pink lips. “I look gross!”

  “No you don’t,” Carrie disagrees, pulling away. “Now stop sulking. The best way to get over being dumped is to move on, and looking like that, you’re not going to have any trouble finding yourself another Gary!”

  We get out our tennis rackets and circle the grass courts a few times before taking up residence on the big sofas in the club bar. The tennis club, I quickly learn, is not the place you go to play tennis. It is the new pick-up joint, and everyone is dressed to impress in micro white tennis skirts and the tightest of tops.

  Rachael, who is trying to win Morgan back by making him insane with jealousy, is eyeing up some really cute guy with sandy hair (also dressed in white but not playing tennis) who is by the fruit machine. Jane and Callum are still an item, but Callum’s not here because, surprise, he is playing tennis. Carrie, who has ditched Simon, has every guy in the bar offering to buy her drinks and teach her pool. As for me, I’ve just got to accept I’m just lucky to be here with all of them, because no guys ever look at me.

  “What about him?” Rachael points out a guy with brownish hair who has just entered the bar with a sports bag slung over his shoulder. “He’s pretty fit.”

  Carrie nods, her eyes twinkling with mischief. “What do you think, Jane?”

  Jane shakes her head and goes back to reading her magazine.

  Rachael fixes her green eyes on me to prompt me for my response, but after an hour of nonstop guys, “What are you wearing tonight?” and bitching about Sue, I’ve run out of non-committal answers. “He’s all right, I suppose.”

  “All right?” Rachael exclaims. “He’s hot!”

  The guy catches us looking at him. He winks and raises his glass towards us. Carrie and Jane both start to giggle; me, my cheeks are redder than scarlet lip liner. I tug at my skirt, but no matter how hard I pull, it won’t reach my knees.

  “Go and talk to him,” says Rachael, looking at me.

  “Why?”

  “Because you’ll need someone to go to Helen’s party with,” Carrie explains, keeping her voice low. “Go on. You don’t want to play too hard to get.”

  “I’m not interested.” I take a sip of my orange juice and go back to reading about all my new friends on Facebook, which is only marginally more interesting than the conversation.

  “Why?” asks Jane.

  “Gary,” Carrie says, answering for me. “She still likes him.”

  “But he dumped you,” Rachel tells me, as if I need reminding of the reason I’ve been crying my eyes out since the summer ball.

  “Yes, I know.”

  “He did you a favour,” Rachael continues. “But you should have done the dumping. I mean, getting arrested for not buying a train ticket – who does that?”

  “I don’t care!” I protest.

  “You should care,” Jane tells me with all seriousness. “If I had to spend half the night down a police station because Callum got himself arrested for ticket dodging, I wouldn’t want to know him.”

  “Well, that isn’t likely to happen, as Callum’s father’s a millionaire!” The need to defend Gary surges through my body in uncontrolled anger.

  “I think you’re all being really mean to Tammy,” Carrie interrupts. “You can’t help who you fall in love with, and what does it really matter how much money Gary has as long as they’re happy?”

  “No one was asking you!” Rachael scolds.

  I watch Carrie shrink back into her chair as an awkward silence descends over our table.

  “Look, let’s not fight amongst ourselves.” Speaking first, Rachael takes back control. “We’re here to cheer Tammy up. Now who can we get to take her to Helen’s party?”

  “What about Spencer?” Jane suggests.

  “I don’t want to go with anyone!” But no one is listening to me.

  “Spencer’s no good,” Rachael sighs, shaking her head. “Oh no, look who’s just walked in.”

  Sue strolls into the bar hand in hand with Paul the tennis coach, followed by Morgan and Callum, who seem to be enjoying a private joke about the match they’ve just played.
/>
  “I’m off!” Jane quickly checks her reflection in the glass-topped table.

  “Oh no you’re not.” Using her compact mirror to spy on them, Rachael watches Morgan order a bottle of white wine and head off to join Sue and Paul, who are sitting at a table next to the French windows.

  “What?” Jane looks mortified.

  “Sue’s there,” she snaps. “If he wants to see you, he can come over here.”

  To my shock, Jane keeps her place, though she continues to look at Callum with longing eyes as he chats with the others. Leaning back in his chair, Callum beckons her to join him, but she doesn’t. She does exactly what Rachel tells her to do, same as Carrie, but not the same as me.

  I’ve had enough. I’ve enough of sitting there bored with them all discussing who I can and cannot go to Helen’s party with. Picking up my orange juice, I head out onto the balcony.

  The scent of fresh-cut grass on a perfect summer’s day calms me a little, and watching but not really watching one of the matches taking place on the clay courts, I drift back into myself.

  For years they laughed at me because I liked reading Trudy Kensington. They said I was sad. How sad is sitting in a bar waiting for some guy to ask you out or throwing yourself at a complete stranger to make the guy you like jealous?

  At least my Trudy Kensington novels have let me experience love without getting hurt or hurting someone else. I had everything I needed to sustain me in a safe and secure make-believe world, and if I didn’t like the story, I could simply change it by imagining a different ending. I should have stayed living in my imagination. I should never have tried to be Carrie. If I had, Gary, my real-life Ralph Forrester, would still be happy and content, and my heart would still be in one piece.

  “Tammy, what are you doing?” Carrie comes rushing out to the balcony.

  “I’m fed up with you trying to pair me up,” I tell her.

  “But Rachael –”

  “Do you always do everything Rachael says?” I demand.

  Carrie just stands there looking confused.

  “I don’t know what I’m doing here.” I’m so wound up I could scream.

  “But I thought you wanted to come out with us.”

  “So did I,” I sigh. “But what I should be doing is trying to make things up with Gary.”

  “Then why don’t you?”

  “Because, for the hundredth time, he won’t answer my calls!”

  “So? You know where he lives. Go round there and make him talk to you.”

  I can’t believe I didn’t think of it. “Carrie, you’re the best.”

  “Go and get him,” she tells me, hugging me back.

  “I will.” I don’t know what I’m going to do or say, but Gary can’t ignore me if I’m standing in front of him. Collecting up my bag, I run for the exit.

  “Tammy, wait.” She grabs my arm and turns me round, and she looks so white that I almost stumble from the fear. “What are you going to tell your mum?”

  I groan as I try to think up a plausible reason why I won’t be coming straight back from tennis. Fortunately, the perfect answer is staring me in the face.

  “Tell her we’ve signed up for Pilates.”

  Carrie smiles when she notices the poster I’m looking at that advertises nightly Pilates classes.

  “Okay,” she agrees. “But you better be back before eight, or you’ll be grounded for life!”

  I feel alive for the first time in days as the cab speeds towards the main road. In a few minutes, I’ll see him again, and then all I need to do is figure out what I’m going to say. Getting out my compact, I check myself in the mirror. I’m hot and flustered, but I still look okay – well, as okay as someone like me is ever going to look.

  I get more than a few stares when I step out of the taxi in my tennis whites. The aroma of petrol fumes, cigarette smoke, and rotting rubbish from overflowing bins fills the air. Wishing I’d grabbed a change of clothes, I sling my handbag over my shoulder and make my way up the broken path, trying to ignore the group of kids smoking on the street corner with tins of beer in hand, looking up my skirt.

  There’s no bell on the neatly painted yellow door and so I knock, my hands, my stomach, my legs trembling from the adrenaline overdose. I’ve no idea what I’m going to say to him and even less idea what I’m going to do if he’s still at work. I guess I should have asked the taxi to wait. I knock again, and this time I hear the rumble as someone runs down the stairs – he’s in.

  My heart quickens, beating so hard and so fast it bruises my rib cage. He’s in. This is it, my chance to put things right. I tuck a loose curl behind my ear and lick my lips. Should I smile or look sad? I’ve got a second to decide. I smile. When I’m scared or nervous, I smile, and I smile because I want to see him again. The door opens. I smooth my top and my hair and tug at my skirt. This is the moment of truth, my last chance to make things right.

  Tuesday 4:00 p.m.

  Tammy

  It isn’t Gary looking down at me. I’m guessing it’s his mate Bill, but Bill doesn’t look how I imagined he would. For some reason I thought he’d look like Gary, dressed head to toe in black with attitude, but Bill looks like a regular guy: blue jeans, white T-shirt. And, judging by his messed-up blond hair and bleary blue eyes, I’ve just woken him up.

  “Is Gary in?”

  Yawning, he shakes his head.

  “Do you know when he’ll be back?” Bill’s got to row or play rugby, because he fills the door frame.

  “Your guess is as good as mine.” He shrugs, looking me up and down as if he’s trying to figure out why I’ve come round his house dressed for tennis. “Haven’t seen him for over a week.”

  “Oh.” My voice trembles as my fear conjures up an image of Gary’s body being dragged from the Thames, and I’m forced to steady myself against the wall. “I’m sorry to have bothered you.”

  “You haven’t.” He sounds like Gary, only his voice is a bit deeper and softer. “Are you Tammy?”

  “Yes. How did you know?” I don’t know why, but the fact he knows me drives some of the fear away.

  “Lucky guess.” He forces a miserable kind of smile and steps to one side. “Do you want a cup of tea?”

  I follow Bill into the tiny kitchen, and he puts on the kettle.

  “How do you take it?”

  “Black with a slice of lemon.”

  Gary was right when he said his place was a dump. I don’t think the two of them could have ever cleaned up in their lives. There are bags of rubbish piled up all over the grubby lino floor, and jam-covered knives and spoons are stuck to the yellow work surface, along with mouldy teabags and lumps of god knows what.

  “Don’t have any lemon,” he says, dropping a couple of teabags into some chipped mugs. “Do you want milk instead?”

  “Milk’s fine.” He seems really nice, but just like me, he isn’t sure how to start up the conversation, and I’m bouncing on the balls of my feet in my eagerness for news about Gary. “What time does Gary finish work?”

  “He isn’t at work.”

  “Oh.”

  “I went round there a few days back,” he explains. “Manager said he’d asked for time off.”

  My heart sinks even deeper into my stomach. “How long for?”

  “No idea.”

  I look around the room to try and find something that might stimulate the conversation and nearly bump into him.

  “Sorry about the mess.” Leaning against the sink that is piled high with dishes and pans caked in dried food, he rubs his sad eyes. “It isn’t normally this bad, only I’ve been spending all my time down the hospital.”

  “Oh yes, your brother Jack. How’s he doing?”

  “Jack’s doing great.” He takes out a carton of milk from the fridge that is covered with Post-it notes and crayon drawings his little brother has obviously drawn. “He’ll be home soon.”

  “That’s good.” I watch him add boiling water and milk to the teabags.

  “Yes.
” His voice barely registers any emotion. “Now all I have to do is hope that Social Services will let me keep him.”

  I follow Bill into the front room. Like the kitchen, it’s a tip. The floral sofa is lost beneath a forest of newspapers that smell of chips, one of the armchairs is being used as a laundry basket, and the carpet is covered with Lego and pens. But for some unknown reason, I find myself smiling, because despite the surface-level grime, it’s a happy room.

  Everywhere I look, there are photos, and not like the contrived studio photos we’ve got at home where Mummy’s airbrushed to look younger and me much thinner. These are real family pictures, pictures of happy memories and being.

  Sipping my tea, I’m drawn to the mantelpiece, where baby photographs of all different shapes and sizes in silver, china, and brightly coloured plastic frames battle for position amongst a variety of porcelain figurines, most of which are chipped and being held together by blobs of glue.

  “My mum collected them,” Bill says, moving alongside me.

  “I was wondering.” I wink at him, just so he knows I’m joking, because he seems to have forgotten how to smile. “You don’t look like the type who collects china miniatures.”

  “No.” His finger brushes the portrait of a pretty woman with a happy, round face and long, wavy hair the same colour as his own. “I can’t stand them, but Jack and Gary, they’re not ready for things to change just yet, so I did my best to mend them.”

  Something in the way he touches the photo makes me realise she’s his mother, and she’s not around anymore. “When did she die?”

  “Last year.”

  “I’m sorry.” I can almost hear the tears in his voice.

  “These things happen,” he says, moving along the line of pictures with me. “Bet you can’t guess who that is.”

  He points to a picture of two boys aged about twelve dressed in football gear. I recognise Bill immediately; he looks exactly the same as he does now only smaller. But it’s several moments before I realise who the other boy is.