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“My God, Alice, you look like you’re having some sort of attack. Will you just let me put the cream on your back?”
Reluctantly, she passes me the sun cream and turns around to face the sea, but not before I notice a slight flush to her cheeks that I put down to the blazing sun.
Squirting the lotion onto my hand, I start to apply it to her back. Doing so, I have to think about an old schoolteacher who had facial hair and yellow teeth and wore tights that would wrinkle at the knee. I can’t linger on how good it feels to touch her, how smooth her skin is, and how much I want my hands to keep going until they wrap around the front of her and take her breasts in my hands.
“All done.” I snap the lid back on the bottle and hand it to her as she spins to face me.
“Thanks. Now it’s your turn.”
God, no.
“Turn around,” she instructs, and I’m too weak to argue.
As I turn, I picture my mum, my grandma, Uncle Reggie with his beer gut, and Aunt Lorraine with her bitten-down nails and constantly runny nose. The whole goddamn family stand before me as I try to think of them and their judgmental stares and not how good Alice’s hands feel, how soft her touch is, and how, more than anything, I want to feel her hands somewhere else. That isn’t where this is going, not where it can go. It would all end badly.
I can’t give her what she wants.
And that’s the thought that stills my brain and turns my lurid imaginings off.
Alice upset. Alice crying. Alice disappointed.
“There. All done. And just to reassure you, I haven’t left a phallic sign so you burn with a huge penis shape on your back.”
“That was my initial worry.” I laugh, glad of the distraction from my dark thoughts.
Alice spreads her towel out, and I have to rein in my wandering eyes as she lies down. I follow her lead, spreading my towel next to hers and dropping down with rather less grace than she did.
“Isn’t this the life?” she exhales, and I have to agree with her—it is the life. It’s the life I’ve always wanted, with the woman I’d give anything to spend it with.
If only it were possible.
49
Alice
We sunbathe, swim even though the water is freezing, then dry off and lie in the sun again to warm up. We read until we eventually decide chips and ice cream are called for.
As we pack up, Owen decides to keep his trunks on and just put his shirt back over them because the suggestion that I hold the towel while he changes again makes him break out in a sweat.
My bikini has more or less dried off, so I slip my dress back over it, and we head off the beach towards the seafront.
Owen spends a ridiculous amount of time at the taps rinsing his feet of every grain of sand before carefully drying them and putting his socks and trainers back on.
I don’t mind the bits of sand stuck to my legs and wedged between my toes. It feels like I’m taking part of the beach back home with me, like it doesn’t quite want to let me go yet.
“They’ve spent a lot of money doing up this seafront,” I tell Owen as we slowly stroll along the promenade, admiring the newly renovated arcade fronts, the glass-roofed café, and the giant iron archways that are apparently modern art.
“I can’t even remember the last time I was here. It’s been that long,” he says.
“Did Paul like the beach?” I ask tentatively.
“He loved the beach, but it was always difficult finding dog-friendly ones. There was a great one not far from here, mostly rocks and shingle, and there always seemed to be a high tide, so the small stretch of sand stayed flat and damp. He loved it. I’d throw his ball, and he’d skid across the sand because his little legs couldn’t move as fast as he wanted them to. Then I’d spend the whole time stressing about him getting sand in his eyes.”
Owen looks at the sky, and I let him have the moment.
We wander on for a few yards until we find a place selling chips. The smell is heavenly: freshly fried potatoes mixed with salt and sea air.
We grab a bench looking out over the ocean and eat in such a companionable silence that I want to record it and play it before I go to sleep at night.
