Between Friends Read online

  We’re going to light a fire on the beach tonight and perform the ritual then. It’s not quite a full moon, but Anya says the universe doesn’t care if the moon is full, that’s just for health and safety purposes so you can see where you’re going in the dark. With any luck, my soul mate will wander into the café tomorrow and our eyes will cross over my pert meringues and that will be that, job done. Ishmael is coming along to the beach tonight, but he’s going to do a spot of night fishing and watch us from a distance (he’s a bit too inhibited to dance around a fire and chant) but I think he’s worried we might set ourselves ablaze so needs to keep an eye out and a bucket handy. Ta ta for now.

  Love, Aggie

  ‘E’ Bluey

  From: Aggie

  To: Polly

  Date: 7 February

  Hi, Pol

  Me again. It’s one am and I am far too hyped-up on caffeine to sleep.

  So … I wrote down everything I wanted my dream-man to be. This was a harder afternoon’s work than you might imagine. At first I tried to steer away from the romantic hero type, and dreamt up a normal man – he was called Jason. Unfortunately, by the end of the afternoon, Jason was drowning under a sea of potato peelings in the compost bin. He was so bloody boring I fell asleep on the counter just imagining him. I decided to seek expert advice from Ishmael, who was fixing his fishing nets on the beach, and having argued it down to the bone, Ishmael said I should just wait and see who I naturally fall in love with, hopefully a nice, faithful, run-of-the-mill fella, and to forget magic.

  Pah!

  I told him that I don’t bloody-well want a run-of-the-mill man. If this is my one chance to manifest my hero then fuck it! I’m going to conjure up the best damn stud monkey I can dream of.

  By seven pm I was sat in the café with my pen wedged between my teeth and staring at a scrappy piece of paper sitting on the counter (I crossed out fewer errors on my O level maths paper).

  By nine pm, Anya dragged me out of the café (her halo had slipped a bit) saying she’d got the fire to its peak and I would just have to go with what I’d got. So we went outside and bathed the man with no name (ooh, book title?) in the exotic power of the moon for half an hour. Summer Santiago said to bathe him for an hour, but there’s only so much dancing and chanting two women can do, especially wearing wellies, ear muffs and Argyle jumpers. Eventually we rolled him into a thin taper and set him alight, but then, suddenly, when the taper had burned half-through, I panicked, blew it out, ran back to the cafe, put him on the draining board and stared at the words, must have good girth. Anya gave up at this point and went inside to watch Morse on Sky.

  The reason I panicked is this: I suddenly thought, ‘What if it all comes true?’ What if Mr Perfect really does pitch up? The book isn’t called, Be Careful What You Wish For, for nothing, and if there’s one thing I’m aware of when it comes to dreaming up characters, it’s that the hero should be adorable, but flawed, and my dream man had absolutely no flaws. I realised, hopefully in the nick of time, that I didn’t want the universe to give me Mr Perfect Pants after all (hmm, another book title) because I’d have to pretend to be Mrs Perfect Pants, and I’m not sure I can pull that off. For example, can Mrs Perfect Pants accidentally fart in her husband’s company and look up to the sky and say, ‘Did you just hear thunder?’ Can she have bat wings, or one eye pointing marginally in the wrong direction (why why why didn’t mum get me an eye patch when I was little?) and a penchant for fantasising about Monty Don while watching telly and sucking out the insides of a Ferrero Roche?

  No, she cannot.

  And after twenty years of living with the human embodiment of Barbie’s Ken, I would look up to the sky and say to the universe, ‘Seriously! What were you thinking sending me this perfect piece of shite?’ And the universe would shrug and say, ‘We told you to be careful what you wished for, you twat.’

  Anyway, I made sure the flame was completely out by stamping on it, which has left a terrible black mark on Casey’s tiles. But I’m worried because I did perform a mini-ceremony, and what if it was enough magic to have him pitch up, but not enough magic to have him manifest exactly as requested, which would mean that I’d be lumbered, not with Mr Perfect Pants, but a mutant version of Mr Perfect Pants ...

  This way lies madness

  Ciao, gorgeous

  Aggie

  Bluey

  From: Polly

  To: Aggie

  Date: 8 February

  Hi, Aggie

  You are a complete nutter, but I love you. Has Mr Perfect Pants shown up yet?

  I’m sorry you’re having a crisis of confidence with your writing. I know it’s probably no consolation, but I loved But That’s Not What I Meant – I couldn’t put it down. Also - and you’re going to faint when I tell you this - but Gethyn got his mum to send him copies of all your books. Yes, all of them! I know, bonkers. I think he feels guilty because of the review. You should see his face when he’s reading your stuff – tickled to death is the best way to describe it.

  Nothing much else to tell you. Preparing for war is pretty boring which means I have lots of time to think, which is exactly what I wished for when I decided to come here, but it seems that having an abundance of time to think is terrible as it serves to clog-up the mind even more. There’s talk that HQ would most probably be taken out by either a terrorist or a chemical attack, once things kick off. Great, that’s certainly something to look forward to! Please keep the news from Appledart coming in.

  By the way, maybe you could find a handsome hill walker to hook up with?

  Love, Pol

  Bluey

  From: Andrea Evans, Midhope on the Moor

  To: Polly

  Date: 8 February

  Dear, Polly.

  You probably won’t remember me, but it’s Andrea Jones. I sat next to you in geography class in the fifth form. I work at the shop now. I know Janet has written but I wanted to write too and say how much I admire you for going away with the army and for what you’ve achieved in your life (your dad is very proud of you and we hear everything about you in the shop).

  Not much to tell you about my life. I didn’t get a proper job after school. I married Kev Evans and had a family. We bought one of the new houses they built on the rec. We’ve got four kids so I’m pretty much run-ragged. We split up a couple of years ago. He’s living with Abbie Peterson now, but he has the kids at some point every week, he’s good like that.

  You got it right, I think, having a career first. I’ve done nothing with my life. I always wanted to be a nurse but Kev said I was too shy and soft and to stay at home with the kids. Anyway, it’s too late now and even if it wasn’t, how could I train for a new job when I’ve got my kids to look after? I’m not surprised you’ve done well. You were always so pretty and clever. I remember your mum always bought you lovely shoes.

  Anyway, I just wanted to say that I’ll never forget how nice you were to me in school. Not many people wanted to sit next to me because of my alopecia, but you always did which was kind. Are you still in touch with Agatha Braithwaite? She comes in the shop quite a bit now she’s moved back to Midhope. She’s gone off somewhere again (like she does). Nobody really knows where she’s gone. There was talk of Scotland but then someone else said she’s in prison for fraud. Her mother looks dreadful. Janet can’t stand Aggie, but I can. She always makes me laugh! Look after yourself.

  Love, Andrea

  ‘E’ Bluey

  From: Aggie

  To: Gethyn

  Date: 8 February

  Dear, Gethyn

  In answer to your questions:

  1. I wasn’t offended by your review, I simply disagreed with your hypothesis.

  2. Yes, I was a muse - to an artist. He had cataracts and needed to ‘feel’ my form rather than just look at it. He was rich in cash but not in spirit. He was not particularly eccentric, either, that was artistic licence. He was, however, fairly romantic (money helps with classic romantic gestures as poor men canno
t afford to be romantic) but I didn’t like his kisses (imagine a conga eel feeding on a melon and you’re there) so that was that.

  3. Quotation marks are hardly a hazard (although I was almost decapitated by a giant exclamation mark once). Surely the use of quotation marks is better than writing, ‘ooh er, missus’ each time a double entendre is suggested?

  Regarding any future correspondence, I have never been regarded as a distraction before and I’m not sure I’m happy with this terminology. Writing letters eats in to my busy schedule and I have no wish to be abandoned once you are no longer in need of distraction. If you can confirm that our correspondence is something you take seriously as opposed to using me as a temporary form of entertainment, I shall correspond.

  Regards,

  Agatha

  ‘E’ Bluey

  From: Aggie

  To: Polly

  Date: 9 February

  Hi, Pol.

  It’s late afternoon and I’m sitting in my cottage looking across to Skye. I love this time of the day - the still time - when the birds are thinking about settling down after a last flurry of excitement, when it’s not quite dark but not light either. The sea is a lovely translucent evening blue – that colour which is a perfect mix of blue and pink – and the lights in the tiny villages on Skye are just beginning to twinkle. Anya says twilight is nature’s way of putting mammals and birds (and everything else that scamps about on the planet) in a calm place before bedtime – like Horlicks or Camomile tea. But most humans have stopped noticing how everything, even the sea, takes a little time out at twilight, which is a shame. Have you noticed that humans rush around at the most calming times of the day? If we were more in tune, rush hour would become meander hour; wouldn’t that be lovely?

  Twilight is a special time for me. I can’t help but think of Mum and those lovely years when I was little. She used to stroke my hair and sing me a bedtime song; I insisted on the same song every night:

  Just a song a twilight, when the lights are low,

  And the flickering shadows, softly come and go,

  Tho' the heart be weary, sad the day and long,

  Still to us at twilight, comes Love's old song.

  I still get her to sing it, now and again. Maybe I should grab my coat and enjoy the last dregs of twilight – go roaming in the gloaming, as twere.

  Love, Ag

  Bluey

  From: Gethyn

  To: Aggie

  Date: 9 February

  Dear, Agatha

  But you were a distraction – a welcome one. I should have been attending a meeting with the Chief of Staff, but I became so engrossed in your letter I missed the beginning of the meeting.

  Back to our discussion. I agree, the same stories are indeed told over and over again (nothing is new under the sun etc.) and they can be as individual as they are timeless. But I’ve been giving some thought to the formulaic element of the romantic novel and feel that it is, on the whole, a story arc that acts as a disservice to women.

  To explain: the classic idea that a stereotypical romantic male – the hero - will ride up on his charger (after a great number of obstacles have been scaled) and rescue the damsel in distress, only serves to perpetuate the idea of the white knight. I do not believe men can live up to this stereotyping. Are romantic novels setting men up to fail? And weren’t white knights, in actuality, dark characters? Men do not have the same mental processes or hormonal fluctuations as women, we do like to please and are capable of falling in love, however.

  So, what happens when we meet a woman we really like? We pursue her (men like to pursue) but in our perusal we know women have a set idea of what constitutes romance and we endeavour to meet this need and expectation, even though it is all just a temporary act to satisfy the ego of the woman in the eyes of her peers. Inevitably, the man becomes settled into the relationship and the artificially heightened romance phase (which was an unnatural process to him in the first place) falls away. Funnily enough, the woman becomes disenchanted when his true persona comes to the fore. Ah, and that’s another point, I am not comfortable with the use of the phrase, ‘happy ending’ - use of inverted commas allowed in this case, I feel. Rather than saying that a book or a film has a happy ending, shouldn’t we all agree to say that there is a pre-requisite in contemporary romantic fiction for the main protagonists in the story to achieve an acceptable outcome by the end of the book, whereby the reader believes that such an outcome will lead to the continued happiness and contentment of the hero beyond the remit of the story?

  Regarding your writing style, if art reflects life, then you, Agatha, are the hero in your own story, and if all stories are the same (an ongoing journey of transformation) shouldn’t you also keep pushing yourself further to enable your own personal growth?

  Yours,

  Gethyn

  P.S. I disagree that poor men cannot be romantic. Perhaps the crux of the whole issue is that we differ in what constitutes as romance.

  P.P.S. You were happy to be a muse to a millionaire but not happy to be a distraction to me …

  P.P.P.S. You said you were almost decapitated by a giant exclamation mark. Can you expand on this?

  P.P.P.P.S. Harems can be hugely successful blueprint for living harmoniously, but that is a discussion for another time, perhaps.

  P.P.P.P.P.S. Something about you has led me to be unacceptably frivolous with postscript. I hope you write again soon.

  Bluey

  From: Polly

  To: Aggie

  Date: 10 February

  Hi, Aggie

  It’s midday and I’m sitting on a sandbag in the sunshine drinking tea, and for once, I have great news.

  We finally have a tent of our own!

  Gethyn managed to procure (OK, steal) a tent for us to sleep in. He’s refusing to say where it came from, but it’s American and he’s very good at cards.

  Honestly though, Ag, what an absolute relief it is to have a home of our own. I don’t have to sleep next to a lorry and fold my bed up every morning, and can leave my kit in one place. I still go to the wash tent to get water from the bowser for a wash, but at least I can have a quick ‘baby wipe’ clean-up in private now, although, to be fair to the guys out here, I often think that they are more embarrassed than the handful of women who also use the wash tent. This time away with the army seems to be teaching me how to become indifferent to being a woman. Although, most of the men here definitely see me as a woman first, then as a northerner (so sick of having my accent mimicked), and then as a met forecaster – ‘here she is, Little Miss Sunshine, the weather girl’. My life here is more challenging physically than if I was a man, but luckily my navy days taught me how to be resilient. I’m fed, watered, I don’t have to shoot anyone (hopefully) and as long as I stay determined to show them all that I can cope with it, I’m sorted.

  In other news, it’s really hotting-up out here, and I would know as I have to read the temperature out to the troops every day. The operational tempo is hotting up too, which has led to the army digging out trenches around the HQ for us to jump into if the war should suddenly start, but they look like empty mass-graves to me.

  What news from Appledart? Has your soulmate manifested (or has anyone pitched up who you might even just snog?). I think it was a good idea to help out at the café. A handsome backpacker is bound to pitch up at some point, or a mysterious foreigner, perhaps? Hope so.

  Write soon.

  Love, Polly

  ‘E’ Bluey

  From: Aggie

  To: Polly

  Date: 14 February

  Hi, Pol

  Happy Valentine’s Day!

  That’s fab news regarding the tent. I suppose I shall have to cut Gethyn some slack as he came up with the goods (although it pains me to say it). Did he tell you we’re continuing with our correspondence? I’m happy to write to one of our chaps ‘at the front’, although I’m yet to be convinced he isn’t a bit up himself.

  The fire ritual on the bea
ch worked (kind of). Within a day of the ceremony I did indeed have a date. His name was Sven, a marine biologist from Sweden (honest to God that was his name and profession, even I wouldn’t create someone so clichéd) and he was staying at the pub on a two day diving break.

  He sauntered (like an cheeky, adorable Adonis) into the café, with the rain dripping off his chiselled jaw and his trousers sticking to his bulging thighs, and I swear a great shaft of sunlight entered the café, making his dazzling blue eyes sparkle and his teeth glint whiter than an advert for Persil. I was cool for at least the first ten minutes, but flirted my arse off after that. Anya’s nose kept twitching, so I should have known better than to accept his offer to join him in the pub for dinner, but of course, I just couldn’t say no.

  Did I tell you I travel to the only other village on horseback now? I ride Hyde and Jeckyl comes along on a halter lead - he can’t stand being left alone. At seven pm, I pinned my courage to the sticking place, Ishmael saddled me up, slapped Hyde on the behind (which is ever so riske for Ishmael) and I set off with a torch and a sense of purpose, on the five mile journey in the dark to the pub.