Luckily, none of the tenants seemed to have had grand designs when it came to decorating so the paintwork and walls were just in need of a lot of refreshing. Vee opened the window wide, taking a moment to look across the road outside her house and view the village green in the morning sunshine. One of the council employees, dressed in a high-vis vest and combats, was already making tracks across part of it astride a giant sit-on mower, but Vee noticed that a large part was being left to grow and was peppered with wildflowers. The scent of new-mown grass reached her, and she was immediately catapulted back to her childhood, when playing on the green had been part of everyday life unless the weather was so rainy that she and Cassie were grounded.
On those days, they’d made dens under the table and played with their doll’s house and other toys with as many of their friends as they could invite in. The age gap hadn’t really bothered them when they were younger. Tallulah had been very sociable, and had never minded a crowd, particularly on wet days, so each had their own classmates round to join them. Their mum’s view was that the guests were amusing her children and all she needed to do was provide drinks, snacks and an indoor picnic when the hunger pangs became too much. It was only in her final years that Vee’s mum had become trickier to deal with. Bad health and pain had made her crotchety and critical of everything Vee did, which, looking back, was understandable. Hard work at the time though.
Vee turned away from the window but left it open to flood the room with a cleansing, energising breeze. Soon, not a single vestige of the many tenants would remain, and her home would be truly her own. She filled her bucket from the bath tap and, armed with soapy water, she began to give the room an extra scrub, reflecting that it might not be nearly so easy to slot back into village life as it was to get rid of years of neglect. To fit in properly she was going to need to make her peace with the past. She quickly checked her phone but there was still nothing interesting to see. Maybe Rhonda hadn’t seen the message yet. Or perhaps she was as reluctant as Vee had previously been to look back at those turbulent times. It was only now that Vee was starting to feel ready. Rhonda had never been one for empathy. She might have changed over the years, of course, but perhaps she was still the stubborn, unkind girl who had ruled the roost at their school for so long.
When she’d given the walls and ceiling a thorough brush down and the bedroom floor was as clean as it could possibly be, Vee set to with the paint and roller. Rick had provided dust sheets for the floor, and they were soon liberally spattered with white matt emulsion, because what Vee lacked in expertise she made up for in speed. She was thankful for the baseball cap that protected her hair from drips and for today’s clean boiler suit which now felt like an old friend. What would her mother think if she could see her now? Tallulah had always been very image-conscious and would have probably been horrified that her daughter now looked like a giant, white-spotted orange.
‘Sorry, Mum,’ Vee said aloud. ‘Needs must. You’d be pleased with the effect when I’m done, I know you would.’
‘Did you say something?’ Rick’s voice called from the landing. He opened the door cautiously to check if Vee was anywhere near it and then made his way in.
‘I was… erm… talking to my mum,’ Vee said, blushing.
‘Right.’ He looked disconcerted for a moment but was distracted by the brilliance of the new paint. ‘Wow, you’ve made great progress in here. Why don’t we have a coffee in the garden while you let this coat dry? You can see what I’ve been doing in the kitchen. I have chocolate biscuits,’ he added.
Vee needed no second bidding. She washed her hands in the bathroom and then joined Rick, who was already spooning coffee into mugs. The kitchen was gleaming. Rick had made good use of the heavy-duty sprays and the bleach he’d bought. The tiled floor and the units now looked quite presentable and the tiles on the splash back were shining too.
‘This is amazing,’ Vee said, wanting to cry at the transformation. ‘I don’t need a whole new kitchen after all. I know the units are a bit tatty but they’re sound enough, aren’t they?’
Rick handed her a steaming mug of coffee. ‘I hoped you’d say that. Some women would insist on ripping everything out and starting from scratch but if you can wait a while, it’ll save you loads of money because we can shop around and get discounted stuff later.’
Vee was about to reply when the sight of him stopped her in her tracks. Rick was wearing the same kind of boiler suit as she had on herself but for some reason, the one he had donned today was a size or two larger than usual and billowed around him. He also had the matching cap with the peak turned backwards, and his face was smeared with dust and cobwebs. He looked… different… vaguely familiar. Something tugged uncomfortably at Vee’s memory.
‘I… you…’ Vee began and then stopped.
Rick paused in the act of taking a swig of coffee and turned away, but the damage had been done.
‘Ricardo… Beryl called you Ricardo, didn’t she? Why didn’t I realise? I must be going daft. Iknowyou, Rick. You were one of the Vipers, along with Shazzie, Ginny and Brad. You were on that… that trip…’
The ground seemed to shift beneath her feet and Vee’s body swayed. She felt Rick’s strong arms go round her as he gently guided her outside and lowered her onto the step.
‘Put your head between your knees,’ he said gruffly. ‘You’ll be okay in a minute. Take some deep breaths.’
Bemused and nauseous, Vee did as she was told, and gradually the world returned to normal. She opened her eyes and blinked. The garden stretched out in front of her, looking just as unkempt as before, but she hardly registered what she was looking at.
‘Why did you suddenly recognise me?’ asked Rick, avoiding Vee’s eyes as he stood surveying the same view. ‘I looked totally different in those days.’
‘I suppose it was because your hair’s covered up… or it was…’ she said, because Rick had now removed the cap, and his short blond hair was visible again. ‘And you’re wearing a much bigger boiler suit that makes you look…’
‘Fat?’ Rick finished the sentence for Vee when she stalled, trying to think of a more tactful way to put it.
‘Not fat, just kind of wider. And your face is spattered with dirt. I mean, not that you were dirty in those days…’
‘But I was spotty,’ he said, trying to smile. ‘I hated almost everything about myself back then. The only thing that kept me going was my artwork. The graffiti.’
‘Oh!’ Realisation of how the newspaper extracts related to the man now standing beside her caused Vee to pause for thought. Then she remembered the other cutting.
‘And your friends… what happened to them?’ she said.
Rick stared at Vee. ‘Why are you asking me that?’ he asked, narrowing his eyes. ‘Have you been snooping while I was out? You have, haven’t you?’ He slapped his forehead. ‘The photo albums. Of course. I should have hidden them.’
‘Well, you didn’t!’ Vee snapped, stung by the accusation that she’d done something shady. ‘Bookshelves are fair game, surely? Everyone likes to look at a person’s books. It says a lot about their character. It’s what I always do when I visit someone new.’
‘What, rootle through their private possessions?’ Rick’s tone was as loud as hers, and much harsher than usual. Vee, still feeling shaky, jumped to her own defence.
‘I didn’t rootle. They were there, for anyone to see. And I don’t know why you’re being so weird about the albums. Unless you’ve got something to hide?’
There was a silence. Rick put his coffee mug down on the ground and turned to face Vee. Still furious at his accusations, she wasn’t expecting the sudden surge of pure lust that hit her as she looked into those blue, blue eyes. No, no, no. This couldn’t happen. Rick was her landlord, at least for now, and their joint past was now rearing its ugly head. What did he know about fifteen-year-old Vee? And what was he hiding about himself?
