Just Between Us. Cathy Kelly

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СКАЧАТЬ anything she could have a cigarette, otherwise she was going to eat all her mousse, and lick the plate, and she couldn’t afford to burst out of her outfit.

      Caroline, Lilli, Selina and Andrea were waiting eagerly. Donna was smiling, encouragingly. Holly thought of how bad she was at lying, and then thought of how flattering it was that Caroline and Lilli really imagined that she could have a sexy boyfriend.

      ‘Is it someone famous?’ demanded Lilli, suddenly suspicious.

      ‘No,’ stammered Holly.

      Donna gave her another kick under the table and Holly winced. She’d be black and blue tomorrow.

      ‘Well…’ They all looked at her eagerly. In fact, their entire end of the table was looking at her eagerly. All conversation seemed to have ceased as everyone waited for news of the new, improved Holly Miller’s man.

      ‘Go on,’ urged Donna.

      Holly gulped. For some deranged reason, the only man who came to mind was the current object of Kenny’s longing: a male model named Xavier. Hard-bodied, blond-haired and with the face of a pouting archangel, Xavier reeked of sex, although Holly had it on good authority (from a drooling Kenny) that the only sex Xavier was interested in was not the female of the species. Trust her to come up with a fantasy boyfriend who was gay. Kenny would wet himself laughing when he heard.

      ‘Tell us,’ demanded Caroline.

      Holly proceeded to describe Xavier in each perfect detail, leaving out the vital facts that he was gay and not going out with her. Lying by omission, she knew. What had Kenny said? ‘His lower lip is like a big biteable, coral silk throw pillow. Yummy.’ Kenny’s imagination knew no bounds when he was in lust.

      ‘A throw pillow, imagine. He sounds amazing.’ Even Lilli was impressed.

      Holly smiled hollowly and took a huge gulp of wine. She’d kill Donna later.

      But as Caroline and Lilli began describing their other halves in glowing terms in order to prove that Holly wasn’t the only one who could nab a handsome man, Holly began to realise why she’d gone along with Donna and lied. Feminism was a wildly outdated concept to Caroline and Lilli. Having a man was a status symbol to beat all others. Without one, Holly was low caste.

      ‘Hi, Holly,’ said a voice.

      It was Brona, one of the few girls in school who’d been shyer than she was. Whereas Caroline and Lilli had disdainfully seen Brona as dull and unstylish, Holly’s kind eyes saw an old friend whose eyes glittered with a spark of fun.

      Holly leapt to her feet and hugged Brona warmly. ‘How are you!’ she said delightedly, ‘it’s so lovely to see you. You haven’t been here all night, have you? Where were you?’

      ‘At the back of the room, I didn’t like to interrupt,’ Brona said, sliding mischievous blue eyes in the direction of Caroline and Lilli.

      Holly grinned and bore her off to a quiet corner to talk.

      ‘You look completely amazing, Holly,’ said Brona in genuine admiration. ‘Poor Lilli’s eyes are out on stalks with jealousy. How are you?’

      After a thoroughly enjoyable half hour, Holly had learned that Brona was working as a locum in Donegal having qualified as a doctor three years before. In her spare time, she painted, went scuba diving and she had just bought a recently-restored fisherman’s cottage on the coast. She was utterly happy.

      ‘Dr Reilly,’ said Holly, impressed. ‘Let’s go back and tell the gangettes and they’ll be wildly impressed.’

      Brona grinned. ‘Maybe not,’ she said. ‘I’ve learned not to want to impress people for the wrong reasons. Whenever I find myself rushing to try and let people see how clever I am, I ask myself: Why would I want to impress them?’

      Holly flushed. ‘Yeah, you’re right,’ she said, shame washing over her because that’s just what she’d wanted to do: to impress her old classmates. Why had she bothered lying? She was what she was. What was the point of pretending?

      ‘I used to be miserably intimidated by the Carolines and the Lillis when we were in school,’ Brona revealed. ‘But I’m not quiet any more. Med school knocks that out of you, and I don’t feel the need to bother talking to people who once looked down at me.’

      ‘No, you’re right, I agree totally,’ Holly said.

      ‘I was a bit nervous of coming here tonight, you see,’ Brona said, ‘and now I have, I’m pleased because it’s shown me how much I’ve changed and become a new, stronger person.’

      When Brona left, Holly sat down beside Donna again, feeling like a fraud.

      The conversation hadn’t moved on from the subject of men.

      ‘You’re so lucky, Holly,’ Caroline said dreamily. ‘I do love being married, but there are times when I wish I was young, free and single like you. I’ve never had the chance to go out with lots of men and have wild flings…’

      ‘I know what you mean,’ said Donna, who was quite drunk now. ‘It’d be incredible to not be Mummy for a while, and party with gorgeous guys. You can look when you’re married but that’s it.’

      ‘You can look, all right,’ giggled Caroline, pointing at the waiter, who was very young and good-looking. ‘Holly’s the only one of us who can chat him up.’

      ‘Do you know something,’ Lilli said thoughtfully, ‘he’s the image of that guy you used to go out with, Holly. That guy you took to our debs dance. What was his name?’

      ‘Richie!’ said Donna, delighted to have remembered the name through the fog of alcohol. ‘Whatever happened to him?’

      ‘I have no idea,’ said Holly, shuddering. ‘It was so long ago I can barely remember what he looked like.’ She could, actually, but she didn’t want to even think about Richie. He’d been her first boyfriend and the first one to dump her unceremoniously. His image was embedded in her brain as the prototype guy-not-to-trust. Since Richie, Holly’s luck with men hadn’t improved. She didn’t really trust any of them.

      ‘He was cute, that Richie,’ Lilli said.

      ‘But not as cute as your new guy sounds,’ gushed Caroline.

      ‘We’ve got to meet this new boyfriend of yours,’ Lilli added. ‘You’ll have to bring him to Kinvarra.’

      Holly glued a smile to her face. ‘Yeah, sure,’ she said.

      The children’s wear department in Lee’s was heaving with pre-Christmas shoppers the following morning, which did nothing for Holly’s mild hangover. She hadn’t got drunk: you couldn’t and keep track of all the lies about a fabulous boyfriend with lips that resembled soft furnishings. But as she hadn’t been able to smoke, she’d certainly drunk more than usual – two Bloody Marys followed by a couple of glasses of wine at dinner.

      Getting up that morning had been hard and she’d had to hit the snooze button three times before she could haul herself out of bed. She’d only just remembered to grab the bag with the precious corset which she’d sworn she’d return to Gabriella that day.

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