Sam West: Home Intruder

“Ed? Where are you?” drifted Jaz’s voice from the kitchen.

“I’m coming,” he said, shaking his head as if to dislodge the musings over Linda.

“Here.”

She passed him a glass of red in the hallway, and he accepted it with a thanks. Together they made their way outside, taking a seat on the wooden bench underneath the living room window.

“It’s so quiet here,” Jaz sighed, lifting her face to the low hanging sun. In less than hour it would be sunset, and the view of the setting sun over Levan Bay would be spectacular. “What are the neighbours like?”

Ed sipped his wine and smoked, he too enjoying the peace.

“This street has always been quiet. Mrs Harrison lived two doors down when I was here. If she she’s still alive she must be in her nineties. As for next door, I don’t know. Looks empty to me. Well kept, but empty,” he said squinting at the house. “Used to be a family that lived there, I can’t remember their names. Now it’s probably some rich bastards from London who come down for a holiday one week a year who don’t even bother renting the damn place out because they’re so stinking rich.”

Jaz laughed. “Like us, you mean?”

“We ain’t that rich.”

“You will be if you sell the house.”

“We, my darling. We.”

They sat there in companionable silence for a few minutes, enjoying the quiet and the clean, salt air. A seagull circled overhead, its war cries bringing back a hundred memories of his childhood all at once. Happy memories.

Discreetly he swiped away a nostalgic tear and pulled his love close.

Linda and Boko arrived just after sunset. As promised, they came armed with a Chinese takeaway.

Jaz opened the door to them, a bright smile plastered on her face. Boko returned it, although she didn’t much care for the all too obvious lecherous gleam in his little eyes set in the potato head. Subconsciously she tugged up the front of her flowery blue sun dress, thinking her tits had spilled out of it or something. Apparently Linda didn’t like the way Boko was looking at her either, for it seemed a take a lot of effort on her part to return Jaz’s smile.

Oh boy, this is gonna be fun .

Linda was wearing too-tight blue jeans with a too-tight white t-shirt that accentuated her spare tyre. Jaz tried not to share at the woman’s muffin top, although for some reason the sight of it pleased her.

“Hello, you must be Boko,” she said, extending a hand. “It’s nice to meet you.”

He held her hand for too long, and did he just stroke her palm with his thumb? She pulled her hand away with a shudder of revulsion that she hoped she caught in time.

Linda was positively effusive when she saw Ed in the kitchen. She kissed him and said how much she and Boko had been looking forward to this evening.

Jaz’s toes curled in embarrassment for her. Could she be any more obvious that she still carried a torch for him?

Never mind the torch. More like a fucking inferno …

The four of them sat round the large, pine table.

“It looks so different,” Linda said, gazing around the room. “When you were here, it was so much more…”

“Old fashioned? Chintzy?”

“No, I was going to say homely.”

“I like all this white. Maybe people aren’t the only things that can move on. Perhaps houses can too.”

You go Ed, she thought with a smile. Put that slag in her place …

She didn’t know why she was thinking like such a bitch.

Come on Jaz, make an effort. This isn’t like you at all .

“So what do you guys do for a living?” Jaz asked brightly.

And unthinkingly. It was a pretty standard opening gambit when she was socialising with strangers on home turf. But in this instance, as soon as it was out her mouth, she knew it was the wrong thing to say. She busied herself uncorking the wine to hide her blunder.

“I used to work at the fudge factory, ‘till they laid me off a few weeks ago. Ain’t much in the way of jobs down here. Boko does a bit of labouring, when he can find the work, that is.”

“Oh,” Jaz said, kicking herself, handing Linda a glass of wine.

She poured out wine for Ed and Boko, then took a huge gulp from her own glass.

I seriously need to be pissed to get through this night …

“What do you do then?” Linda asked Jaz. “I expect you got some fancy job in London.”

“I’m a freelance photographer and a born and bred Londoner. But God, what I’d give to live in a place like this. Beats a career in London any day.”

She wanted to get across that she only had a career because she didn’t live in a small town with no industry. She was implying that if Linda were to live in London, then she too would have a brilliant career. Which was a load of bollocks, but she had a feeling it had fallen on deaf ears anyway. Either that or she had come off as intensely patronising.

“Whatever,” Linda said before turning her full attention to Ed. Jaz flinched inside at her rudeness. “I hear you’re an editor for a paper, Ed. That is so amazing, but then, you always were the one with your nose buried in a book. I couldn’t be doing with school myself.”

“Me neither,” Boko agreed.

Jaz could well believe it. He looked thick. Thick and unpleasant. His head was shaved and he was big, only just on the right side of fat. His eyes were too small and she didn’t like the way they continuously strayed to her breasts. He wore a plain white t-shirt that accentuated his broad shoulders and solid gut. The sight of him made her shudder.

I really don’t like these people, she thought, then berated herself for being a snob.

“I love my job, it was worth all the years of study,” Ed was saying.

“So you ain’t ever moving back then?” Linda asked.

“No, we’re just here to fix the roof. And for me to say goodbye to the house I guess.”

“I do roofing.”

They all turned to look at Boko.

“You do?” Ed asked.

She wondered if Linda and Boko were also able to pick up on the alarm in his deceptively casual tone.

“Yeah. I could do it real cheap for ya.”

“That’s very kind of you, and everything, but I’ve already half promised the job to this other company.”

Jaz heard the lie, but could the others?

“My God Ed, Boko really needs the work. He’s trustworthy and he’ll be half the price of anyone else.”

“Well, I…” Ed stammered, put on the spot.

“I can start tomorrow.”

“Good, that’s that settled then,” said Linda, raising her wine glass. “Cheers everybody.”

“Cheers,” they all echoed.

Jesus Christ Ed, why can’t you ever say no?

No one spoke as Linda peeled open the tin foil tops of the takeaway cartons.

“So then,” Linda said, spooning noodles and limp vegetables out of the silver trays onto their plates. “When did you two get married?”

“Last week,” Ed and Jaz said in unison, then giggled sheepishly.

Linda did not look amused.

“Last week? What about your mum, Ed? I heard she only passed away a few weeks ago.”

“That’s right.”

There was a steel in his voice that Jaz had rarely heard before.

“Oh. How comes you two got married so soon after she died? You must have done it, in like, the same week .”

Jaz flinched. It was a sore topic. Ed had been all set to postpone the wedding. Jaz had been the one who had insisted they go through with it. She had got on with Ed’s mum, and felt sure she would have wanted him to keep the date.

And in a really sick kind of way, it had worked out well. Relatives that had travelled hundreds of miles did not have to go home, then come back again, to attend the wedding.