No Ordinary Gentleman

38

Holly

“You brought this on your own head,” I mutter, slapping jelly viciously to a slice of bread. “If you hadn’t acted like Griffin had leprosy, he wouldn’t have known, and then you wouldn’t have had to go through this whole stupid charade.”

“You’ve not eaten your snacks already, have ye?” Chrissy asks, bundling into the family kitchen with a pile of laundered kitchen towels. “Were you talkin’ to yourself?”

“No,” I retort, slapping the bread onto the top of another before swinging around to face her. So she caught me in the pantry last week. Big whoop! Caught me and helped me fill my little tote with delicious nibbles to take to my room. And fruit. And now she thinks I might be pregnant, so she thought it might be a good idea to say that out loud?

I was so embarrassed. In fact, I think my cheeks are still burning now.

“What’s got your knickers in a knot, then?” She puts the neat pile of towels down and turns to face me, pressing her fist to one generous hip.

“Well, funny you should ask, Chrissy.” I turn back to the jelly sandwich, slice it viciously, and swing back again. “But last night at dinner, Archie saw fit to announce to the family that you think I might be pregnant.”

Hers is not the reaction I anticipated.

Basically, she laughs. She laughs like it’s the funniest thing she’s heard in weeks.

“The wee bampot,” she says, wiping a finger under her eyes. “He’d have me hangit, I’m sure!”

“He’d have you what-it?”

She makes a fist above her ear and sticks out her tongue.

“He’d get you hanged?”

“Aye, and I’d die innocent!” she says with another incredulous chuckle. “I never made any such suggestion. I only said you had the eatin’ habits of an expectant mother. Strange, like. It was, I thought, better than announcing you were trying to stay out o’ reach of himself.” She slides me a very eloquent look. One that says, I see you. I know what this is.

“Oh. Well. Sorry.”

“Not as sorry as you will be,” she mutters as she bustles past me, yanking on the dishwasher door.

“I’ll be sorry why?” I ask, following her progress, perplexed.

“Because that man is no good.” She almost throws a cup onto the top shelf, making it rattle.

“I know,” I protest, aggrieved. “Well, he’s no good for me, but I have been trying to stay away from him.”

“Not Sandy,” she says in a low hiss, the dishwasher door clunking closed. “I’m talkin’ about—”

“There she is.” My shoulders tense at the sound of Mari’s voice. I really could do without this. “I told you you were wrong about her,” she says to Chrissy. “First, she sets her sights on Cameron, then goes after himself. And now, she’s with his brother. What does that tell you about her?”

I turn very slowly in the direction of Mari. “See this outfit?” Like a cheesy game show hostess, I do a little flourish, indicating my denim cutoffs. “Giving a fuck doesn’t really go with it.”

So worth cursing just to see her face.

“Mari, you apologise,” Chrissy chastises.

“I’m only saying—”

“You’re only saying something that’s moving you this close”—I hold up my finger and thumb, the digits almost touching—“to a smack in the jaw.” Cursing and a beatdown. Guess she picked the wrong day to mess with me.

“Holly!” Chrissy censures.

“You’re just a silly girl who knows nothing about anything,” I add, incensed. “A silly girl who’s projecting, as far as I can see.” I whip around to Chrissy as I say, “I saw her in the pub with Cameron at the weekend, the same man who told me she was in the pub last Friday when she called in sick.”

“I was sick,” she retorts. “And then I felt better.”

“You know what, I don’t care. I’m not chasing anybody.” I throw up my hands because I don’t know what else to say. Except maybe I’m the one being chased. But they wouldn’t believe me anyway.

“You.” She points a finger Mari’s way. “Go and hoover the stairs.”

“But that’s the cleaning company’s job,” she complains petulantly.

“Today, it’s yours. Go to the cupboard at the foot o’ the stairs and get out wee Henry.”

Oh man, Mari’s face! Wee Henry is a little red vacuum cleaner—the actual brand is called Henry; Henry the hoover—which has a little black bowler hat and a cheerful face. Yes, a face! It’s the cutest vacuum cleaner I have ever seen, but the castle’s model is pretty old. It spits out more than it sucks up. A bit like Mari around me, I suppose.

“It’ll take ages!” she protests.

“Good,” retorts Chrissy as she folds her arms across her ample chest. “Off you go, now.” With a scowl, Mari huffs and stomps out of the room. Chrissy’s attention turns back to me.

“Sorry,” I blurt out before she can say anything. “You know I don’t curse as a rule, but that girl would make a saint lose his temper.”