A Good Catch: The perfect Cornish escape full of secrets

Beads of sweat popped out on Greer’s top lip and forehead. She didn’t want to hear any more. ‘Excuse me, Mrs Carter, but I must get some fresh air.’ She made a dash for the door and just heard Mrs Carter’s imploring, ‘Don’t tell Loveday, will you? She thinks her dad was my one and only boyfriend.’

God, what was going on with these adults? What kind of role models were they? She slipped through the pub bar and out to the front where she found an empty bench tucked into the shadows. She breathed the cool night air. It was tinged with the familiar smell of salt, seaweed, diesel and fish and chips. She took stock of her evening. Her parents were some kind of dancing nuts, and her best friend’s mother had gone out with her dad. She didn’t want to imagine how intimate they might or might not have been. Her world seemed to have turned upside down. Then she thought of Jesse and the way he had held her tonight. She was sure she’d seen a flicker of real emotion in his eye. Until her parents had shown themselves up. What would he think of her now? She buried her face in her hands for the second time that evening.

After a while she sensed that she wasn’t alone. Someone sat on the bench next to her and the wooden slats gave way a little, making her bounce slightly.

‘All right, are you, Greer?’ asked Jesse.

She stayed hunched but took her hands from her face. ‘Yes.’

‘Loveday’s mum’s worried about you. She thought you might not be feeling well.’

‘I’m fine.’

‘Sure?’

‘Sure.’

Jesse stretched his long legs out in front of him and stretched his arms over his head. She turned to look at him. He was staring at the stars. She drank in his wonderful profile. His always tousled blond hair was carelessly sticking out in all directions. His eyebrows framed his honest sea-green eyes. His lashes were fair but long and his nose straight and strong. His lips, slightly parted, were on the thin side but they framed his teeth perfectly.

He spoke. ‘Satellite. Look.’ She tilted her head up and followed his pointing finger. Sure enough, across the heavens a bright light was moving at speed. ‘I wanted to be an astronaut when I was young.’

She smiled. ‘You are young.’

Now he turned those sea-green eyes to her. ‘Greer, I’ve got six O levels and I’m leaving school to work with my dad. I’m already old.’

‘You’re only sixteen. You can go to college, get some more qualifications.’

‘That’s for people like you. You want to go to college, don’t you?’

‘Art school. But my dad wants me to do a secretarial course.’

‘Sensible.’

‘I don’t want sensible. I want to be an interior designer. To make beautiful houses for beautiful people, and …’ She looked down at her feet in their pretty pink suede court shoes, ‘and I want to be married and have children.’

Jesse lifted his arm and put it round her shoulders, aware of what he was doing, thinking again of her smooth skin and her firm thighs. He couldn’t seem to stop himself: the mix of alcohol, the heat of the pub and his raging hormones had put his body and his mind at odds with each other. ‘Do you now? And who have you got your eye on?’

It was now or never, under the starry night sky, and still slightly drunk she looked him full in the eye and breathed, ‘You.’

His father’s words – you’d do a lot worse than to marry that girl – drifted through Jesse’s alcoholic haze.

Greer felt his arm lift a little away from her and he was silent for a moment before he started to laugh. Now his arm was back by his side, searching for his other arm to cross defensively over his chest, his heart.

‘You’re a funny one when you’re drunk, aren’t you?’ He stood up. ‘Let’s go back. The others will be wondering where we are. We don’t want to start any rumours, do we?’

She stayed where she was, horrified and ashamed that she’d played her hand so openly.

‘I’ll join you in a minute.’

He looked down at her and held out a large hand. ‘Come on, you. We all say silly things when we’re pissed. I promise not to tell. Now take my hand and let’s go back.’

*

The party had degenerated into several couples clinging to each other in a slow dance. Around the edges sat groups of people chatting or snogging. The fire pit for the hog roast had died down to a mellow glow and the hog itself was just a charred carcass. Greer glanced around to find her parents. She saw them through a window sitting inside in the bar.

Her feeling of relief was swiftly abated when a breathless Loveday ran up to them in distress.

‘Jesse, your brother’s challenged Ricky the DJ to an arm-wrestling match. He’s ever so drunk and I’m frightened he’s going to hurt him.’

‘Oh shit,’ said Jesse, and he sprinted off into the pub.

A crowd had gathered around Grant and Ricky. Ricky was a big lad with strong arms and a beer belly, and he was holding his own. Grant’s tattooed muscles, though, were as dense and hard as granite. He was staring into the DJ’s pudgy face and through bared teeth said, ‘Come on, fat boy. You can do better than this, can’t you?’

Ricky dug deep and strengthened his grip. ‘You don’t scare me, soldier boy. I was in the Falklands. I’ve killed people.’

‘Yeah?’ grimaced Grant, pushing his muscles till they quivered. ‘Well, you’re a tub of lard now, aren’t you?’

There was a sudden parting of the crowd as Mickey and Jesse pushed through. Their arrival momentarily broke Grant’s concentration and Ricky, seeing his chance, slammed Grant’s arm down. The crowd cheered but quickly quietened as they saw Grant smash his fist into Ricky’s face. There was the sickening sound of crunching bone and a splatter of blood arced from the DJ’s nose across the crowd.

Someone must have dialled 999 because within minutes two police cars and an ambulance had arrived, their sirens and blue lights strobing the peace of the harbour.

A few of the more drunken and troublesome teens lingered on the harbour, looking for trouble, before they were herded away by the police; the party quickly broke up, with only the hardened rubberneckers lingering. Ricky the DJ was put in the ambulance with a police officer and driven off to Truro and Treliske Hospital.

Grant was handcuffed after attempting to resist arrest and was being questioned in the bar. It wasn’t long before a Royal Marines Police vehicle arrived and he was locked in the back for the return journey to his Plymouth barracks. Jesse could only watch helplessly as Grant was driven away. Thanks to him, the night had ended on a downer and all the excitement and expectation that had been flowing through the crowd had now drained away, just like the remains of the punch that Pete was pouring down the sink.

Jesse was left with the difficult of job of going home to tell his parents that Grant was, once again, in trouble.

8 (#ulink_bd0aca3c-7f5a-5665-a1fd-7feff40b6e4b)

1989

Greer stepped off the train at Bodmin and walked out to the pavement, where cars were parking ready to collect her fellow travellers. She shielded her eyes against the dazzling June sunshine and stood her suitcase and two canvas ‘overspill’ bags at her feet, face turned to the sun, inhaling the scent of clean Cornish air.

‘Greer darling!’ Her mother’s voice carried on the breeze. Elizabeth was stepping half in and half out of the passenger seat of Bryn’s latest car. Her left leg was still in the footwell, her right on the tarmac, and both hands holding onto the top of the open car door. She was beaming and waving frantically.

Greer could see her father pushing his sunglasses to the top of his head and then opening the heavy door of the big BMW. He got out and walked to the boot. He opened it and then strolled towards her, giving Greer a chance to admire how fit and tanned and successful he looked. ‘Darling, welcome home.’ He kissed her and picked up the suitcase and one of the canvas bags. ‘You can manage that one, can’t you?’ He nodded his head to the remaining bag.

‘I’ve managed all of them from London, Dad.’

‘Hope you haven’t gone all women’s lib on us?’ He laughed.

Greer was thinking that her dad was being as embarrassing as usual and was struggling to come up with a suitable retort when her mother bustled up. ‘Darling Greer. You look so lovely! So slim in that dress. But what have you done with your hair?’

Greer’s free hand flew to the back of her neck where perfect feathers of hair lay short. ‘I got bored with the bob.’

‘But it was a classic cut. You’ve had it since you were three.’

‘Exactly. I’m eighteen years old. I needed a change.’