Jill Mansell - Mixed doubles

‘Oh, Pru, I’m so sorry. Can you ever, ever forgive me?’

Dulcie, still looking a sight with mascara tracks dried on her cheeks, gazed miserably at Pru.

‘I’m such a stupid bitch. I’m so, so ashamed of myself. It wasn’t your fault, it was all mine. If you want to,’ she offered in desperation, moving closer to Pru on the front doorstep, ‘you can slap my face.’

Pru made a noise halfway between a sob and a snort of laughter.’Go on,’ Dulcie said humbly, ‘I mean it. Hard as you like.’ She offered her cheek.

‘Don’t be such a berk,’ said Pru. ‘You’d better come in.’ When they reached the bedsitter, Dulcie wrinkled her nose at the overpowering smell of bleach.

She watched as Pru filled the kettle at the sink.

‘I know I’m a berk. Are you still my friend?’

‘Stupid question,’ said Pru, dangerously close to bursting into tears all over again. ‘Lend me fifty pee and I’ll make you a cup of tea.’

When Dulcie had finished shovelling coins into the meter – ‘Not that you’re staying here. You’re coming home with me’ – she delved into her massive handbag and pulled out a dark-green Jolly’s carrier.

‘I was going to buy you flowers, but that’s what guilty husbands do when they’ve cheated on their wives. So I got you these instead.’

Pru opened the carrier containing six Lancôme lipsticks, four Clinique eyeshadows and seven Chanel mascaras.

‘Bit of a job lot. I was parked on double yellows in Milsom Street, didn’t want to get clamped,’

Dulcie apologised. ‘I just raced in and grabbed what I could. Still, more useful than a bunch of roses.’

‘You went into Jolly’s looking like that?’ Pru was touched. ‘Like what?’

Dulcie screamed when she saw her reflection in the mirror.

‘My God, no wonder they asked me if I wanted my mascara waterproof! I’m amazed I wasn’t arrested,’ she said ruefully, ‘for wearing make-up without due care and attention.’

Over cups of tea that tasted faintly of bleach, Dulcie told Pru just how cruel and hurtful Liam had been.

‘He called me a sneaky, low-down, conniving bitch,’ she said with a sigh. ‘He told me I was a sad case who needed to get a life. He said I was desperate and lazy and a pathological liar, and he felt sorry for the next stupid bastard I got my claws into because nobody deserved that much grief’

‘What did you say?’ Pru, who would have been finished off completely by such a slating, particularly one so perilously close to the truth, marvelled at Dulcie’s matter-of-fact tone. She had, it appeared, already got the worst of her misery out of her system.

‘I told him he was a washed-up, over-the-hill, failed ball-basher with delusions of celebrity,’ said Dulcie. ‘I said he was boring and health-obsessed, with about as much personality as a salad sandwich.’ She thought for a moment. ‘Oh, and I told him he was crap in bed.’

Pru’s eyes widened.

‘Was he?’

‘Of course he wasn’t,’ said Dulcie, ‘but you always tell them that.’

‘Crikey.’

‘It niggles away at the back of their mind. They hate it but they can’t help wondering if— Who’s that?’

The doorbell was ringing.

Pru’s hands flew instinctively to her bandaged ears. No one knows I’m here. Don’t answer it.’

But Dulcie, ever curious, was already hanging out of the open window, peering down to the street below.

‘Dulcie, hi!’

‘It’s Eddie,’ Dulcie murmured incredulously.

‘Don’t let him in,’ squeaked Pru.

‘I was just passing,’ Eddie called up, shielding his eyes from the sun. ‘Saw the windows open.

Hang on ...’

As Dulcie watched, the front door opened. A hippy in a drooping Woodstock T-shirt emerged and Eddie grabbed the door before it could slam shut.

‘Wait there,’ he yelled, waving cheerfully to Dulcie, ‘I’m coming up.’

Dulcie greeted him clutching a can of Mr Sheen in one hand and a pair of Pru’s knickers in the other.

‘How on earth could you be just passing?’ she demanded, eyeing Eddie with suspicion. ‘This road isn’t on the way to anywhere.’

‘Well ... you know how it is. Promised Pru I’d keep an eye on the place.’ Eddie was waffling.

‘Make sure it’s secure .. .

in case of burglars, that kind of thing.’

Dulcie’s expression changed to incredulous. Would any self- respecting burglar be seen dead breaking into this hideous dump?

Eddie had taken to driving slowly past Pru’s bedsit every day. He didn’t know quite why, it just gave him an odd sense of comfort. When he had seen the windows open he had experienced a thrill of almost teenage proportions. Pru was home early! She was back! He was going to see her again .. .

now!

Except she wasn’t and he wasn’t. He was being interrogated by Dulcie instead.

‘Anyway,’ Eddie decided the best method of defence was attack, ‘what are you doing here?’

‘Me? I’m polishing.’ To prove it, Dulcie aimed Mr Sheen inexpertly at the peeling paint on one of the window frames. She squirted for several seconds, rubbed vigorously at the paint with the scrunched-up knickers and leapt back as a shower of brittle flakes flew at her like shrapnel, just missing her eyes.

Eddie frowned. As scenarios went, this was fairly unlikely.

‘Why?’

‘Pru’s due back on Saturday,’ Dulcie replied airily. ‘I thought I’d give the place a good clean.’

She gestured to the gleaming floor. ‘I’ve been busy for hours.’

This was positively surreal. The idea of Dulcie scrubbing floors was on a par with Cherie Blair swigging meths from a bottle.

‘Have you heard from her?’ Eddie was suddenly overcome with longing, desperate for news of Pru. He hadn’t had so much as a postcard from Spain. ‘I thought she might have been in touch.’

But Dulcie, shaking her head, looked infuriatingly unconcerned.

Not a word.’

‘Too busy enjoying herself, I expect,’ said Eddie, a brave smile concealing the inner turmoil.

‘I expect.’ Spring-clean evidently completed, Dulcie began closing the windows.

Out of sheer desperation, he said abruptly, ‘I swear, my memory’s like a sieve. I’ve forgotten the name of the friend she’s staying with.’

‘Me too.’

But Eddie noticed Dulcie was smiling to herself, the kind of secretive smile that made you want to shake the person doing it until their teeth rattled.

‘What? Why are you looking like that?’

‘Me?’ Dulcie shrugged and looked innocent. ‘I was just thinking how badly Pru needed this holiday. I bet it’s doing her the world of good.’ She chucked Pru’s knickers over her shoulder into the sink and grinned at Eddie. ‘She’ll come back a different person, you’ll see.’

Eddie gazed dispiritedly at the Mr Sheen-soaked knickers dangling over the hot tap. Just so long as Pru didn’t come back with a different person, he didn’t care.

‘You know, I reckon Eddie’s got a bit of a thing for you,’ said Dulcie mischievously as she hung out of the window once more. ‘He’s gone, by the way. It’s safe to come out now. Ooh, naughty boy. I thought he must be.’

Pru crawled out from under her bed, shuddering as a cobweb draped itself across her face.

‘Must be what?’

‘Driving.’ Gleefully, Dulcie watched his Jag disappear around the corner. ‘Tut tut.’

Pru looked worried.

‘He’s breaking the law.’

And all because the lady might get burgled,’ Dulcie intoned, Milk Tray-style. She swivelled round and broke into a grin. ‘He couldn’t take his eyes off your knickers either. See, it must be love.’

‘My Janet Regers,’ wailed Pru, spotting her favourite pair hanging over the sink.