I Think I'll Just Curl Up and Die (2 page)

She kicked a flip flop under the bed. Life was very unjust. Never mind her ageing parents – she was the one who needed a love life. She'd got to the bit in The Novel (the one she'd been writing for months and which was going to make her a household name) where the hero seduces the heroine behind the greenhouse in the manor garden. The problem was, never having been seduced, Laura was afraid some of the detail might be wrong. What she needed was first hand research. She fancied Jon Joseph like crazy but, to date, he hadn't exactly fallen over himself to be with her. Of course, it could be that Sumitha was right and that he was so overcome with passion that he couldn't bring himself to confront his own emotions. Perhaps if she went over to Jemma's house, she might bump into him – he did live next door to Jemma, after all.

Consoling herself with thoughts of a joyous reunion, she kicked the washing into the corner and started varnishing her toenails.

By Wednesday, the object of Laura's affections was battling with the design of a strip cartoon, the final assignment of the masterclass with Blob at the Dellfield Activity Holiday Centre. It had been a fantastic week and Jon was now more sure than ever that he wanted to be a political cartoonist.

The course leader – who was really called Eric Batterby, but who used Blob as his pen name – leaned over the table where Jon was working and handed him a pile of sketches which had been his last assignment.

‘Good work, Jon. Liked it a lot. Who's the funky girl with the bike in this one? Oh, and by the way, that cartoon of the Prime Minister and the fishing fleet was very funny.'

Jon looked at the top sketch in surprise. He knew he doodled all the time, but he had no recollection of doing this one. It was that kid – the one who'd knocked him off his bike back in the summer term. The one who'd kept staring at him that night at the club. Laura someone. Mind you, her face had always interested him. It had a kind of ‘mess with me at your peril' look and yet her eyes were soft and vulnerable. He'd love to sketch her portrait.

Get real, he told himself firmly. What was he thinking about? The only girl he was even mildly interested in was Sumitha. Next term, he would find a way of asking her out.

‘I'll see you later, Jon' said the tutor. ‘I'm meeting your father for a beer at lunchtime.'

Jon's heart sank. Doubtless Dad would do his ‘Now I hope you realise my son is something special,' routine and make a complete fool of himself. Even though he had come round to the idea that Jon was not going to go to Cambridge or become a lawyer, he couldn't seem to stop bragging to the world about his son's prowess. On the first day, he had cornered Eric and told him that he was lucky to have such a talented lad in his class. Jon had nearly died. Why couldn't he stick to his Golf Improvers course and forget about his son for once?

Still, the tutor liked his stuff. He was on his way to being a proper artist. And when he got back, he'd ask Sumitha out. Fired with confidence, Jon began drawing himself as Orlando Bloom, surrounded by swooning girls.

In the early hours of Thursday morning, Rajiv Banerji was tapping his foot impatiently as the baggage carousel in the arrivals hall at Heathrow airport jerked into life.

‘I hope we don't have to wait too long,' he said, looking at his watch, ‘I want to get home to open my post and sort out my rotas and plan next Tuesday's meeting.'

‘Calm down, Rajiv,' said his wife, laying a hand on his arm. ‘You've had a lovely holiday – no need to get all worked up and stressed out again so soon.'

He smiled. ‘Yes, all in all, it was a good break,' he admitted, grabbing hold of little Sandeep who was about to leap on to the carousel. ‘And so good that Sumitha has seen how life is in India.' He glanced over to where his daughter was perched on her rucksack listening to her iPod with a dreamy expression on her face.

‘That nice boy Bilu is just what she needs – and from such a good family too. He'll knock all this Western nonsense out of her head. She's already saying she is going to grow her hair long again,' he added, looking at his wife in smug satisfaction. Somehow he felt that she had not backed him enough on the issue of Sumitha and the haircut.

Chitrita Banerji inclined her head, smiled but said nothing. She had watched from the window as Sumitha and Bilu had said goodbye to one another at her mother's house the previous day, and as a result, right now, it was not her daughter's hair she was worried about.

Sumitha, meanwhile, was staring dreamily into space, reliving her first kiss from Bilu under the margosa tree in her grandmother's garden.

Late on Friday evening, in Thorburn Crescent, Ginny Gee was wondering how two weeks living in a swimsuit and a couple of sarongs could produce so much laundry, when the bell rang.

‘I'll get it,' yelled Chelsea who had seen Rob cycling into the Crescent.

‘Hi!' she said, grinning broadly, and hoping that her suntan made her look entirely irresistible.

‘Hiya,' said Rob. ‘Is your Mum in?'

‘Yes,' sighed Chelsea, running her fingers through her chestnut curls, ‘but she's busy.' It's me you're supposed to be after, not her, she thought irritably. This wasn't how the boys in Spain reacted to her – there it was all wolf whistles and bottom pinching and here she was being practically ignored by the boy of her dreams.

‘Well, hello there Rob, and how are you?' gushed Ginny, coming downstairs with an armful of washing.

‘Did you have a good holiday, Mrs Gee?' asked Rob.

‘Now, how many times have I told you? It's Ginny,' said Chelsea's mum, smiling.

‘Ginny,' said Rob. ‘I just wondered if you could have a look at my entry for the Leehampton Young Writers' Competition – I'm not too sure about the ending.'

‘Sure, no problem,' said Ginny. ‘Leave it on the table and I'll give it a look over the weekend.'

‘GINNY!' Barry Gee yelled from the confines of the kitchen. ‘What in the name of heaven is this?'

Chelsea's mum cringed.

‘Oh dear, probs.' She smiled. ‘Chelsea, why don't you take Rob upstairs and I'll bring you up drinks in a moment?'

About time too, thought Chelsea, showing Rob the way.

Ginny took a deep breath and walked into the kitchen.

Her husband was standing there surrounded by three headless trout and a pile of what looked like sliced canvas. They hadn't even finished unpacking and he was back in Amateur Chef of the Year mode, thought Ginny wryly. What was more worrying was the rather vicious way in which he was waving a Barclaycard bill in the air.

‘I found this,' he said shortly.

‘Ah yes,' said Ginny. ‘Well, it came the day we left for Spain and I didn't want to spoil the holiday atmosphere so I … '

‘So you hid it in the toaster – brilliant!' said Barry. ‘Ginny, this bill is for £1,396. What in the name of goodness has been going on?'

‘Well, these things mount up,' began Ginny, wishing she had had the foresight to put the bill in her knicker drawer. ‘You know how it is.'

‘Frankly, no. Half this stuff is totally unnecessary,'
snapped Barry, scanning his eyes over the list of purchases. ‘You are simply going to have to cut back.'

‘Well, if you got a job, maybe I wouldn't have to,' shouted Ginny. ‘If you spent more time job hunting and less time messing about with gourmet recipes, we might be better off.'

Barry had been feeling rather guilty about his lack of success in the job hunting stakes and didn't need reminding of the fact by his wife.

‘I have an image to keep up – I'm in the public eye,' continued Ginny. This last year she had discovered that it takes a lot of hard work to look good when bits of you that you forgot you had started flopping and sagging all over the place. Getting older was not something Ginny could easily accommodate.

‘Oh yes, I forgot – the local rag demands that its feature writer dresses solely in Joseph and Karen Millen, does it? And of course, when you're on the radio, everyone can see your designer gear, can't they? Well, we have a house to run and Warwick to put through university and … '

Upstairs, Chelsea heard the rising tones of unrest and firmly shut her bedroom door.

‘Did you miss me?' she asked Rob.

‘What? Oh – er, yes, course I did' said Rob. ‘What with Jon away too, there was no one to have a laugh with.'

Laughing was not precisely what Chelsea had in mind.

Still, nothing ventured, nothing gained. What was it her mother was always going on about? ‘If you want something
in this life, Chelsea, you have to go out and make darned sure you get it.'

She leaned over and kissed Rob on the lips. He looked surprised – although not totally displeased. But he didn't kiss her back.

‘Rob, you do like me, don't you?' said Chelsea.

‘What? Oh, er, yes – of course I do,' replied Rob, suddenly showing an intense interest in his thumbnails. ‘You're cool.'

Chelsea felt a warm glow. As romantic avowals went it might not win prizes but it was the best she'd received to date.

Maybe things were looking up, she thought.

In the kitchen things were definitely on the downward slope.

‘OK, OK, no need to go on,' Ginny snapped. ‘Anyway, while you're so busy criticising everything I do, what about you? When are you going to cut back on all this designer food?' She waved a tanned hand in the general direction of the trout. Barry glanced at them in surprise, as if they had just surfaced from a nearby stream and placed themselves in his kitchen.

‘Ah – but if I am going to enter the ITV
Superchef
competition, I need to work with quality ingredients,' said Barry hurriedly. ‘A couple of pheasants and the odd pound of okra once in a while is hardly the same as a clutch of designer suits and the odd Prada handbag!'

Ginny sighed. ‘OK, OK, I'll make a pact with you. I'll cut back on my personal spending if you make a real effort to find work. Any work. Soon. Like tomorrow. OK?'

‘OK,' sighed Barry. He had really quite enjoyed his ten months at home since Freshfoods made him redundant. He'd never been one of these high flying chaps with their eye on the boardroom. Give him a pile of pasta and a few prawns and he was happy to create culinary delights all morning. If only people would pay him for inventing twenty things to do with a haddock. But Ginny was right. He'd have to do something.

They would all have to do something or they would be in the soup. Hang on a minute. Now that was a good idea …

‘So come on, Sumitha, tell us
everything!'
said Chelsea. It was the last Saturday of the holidays and the first chance she had had to get together with her friends and catch up on all the gossip. The venue was Jemma's bedroom, because Laura was hoping for a glimpse of Jon. This explained why she was sitting on the windowsill getting pins and needles in her bottom and a crick in her neck from swivelling her head every ten seconds to peer into his front garden.

‘What about this amazing guy?' encouraged Laura. ‘Jemma said you liked him even better than Jon – do you really?' she added hopefully.

Sumitha flopped down on Jemma's floor cushions, ran her fingers through her hair, and sighed.

‘He is,' she said, ‘just divine. He's seventeen, has a body to die for, a wonderful smile and,' she paused for maximum effect, ‘a car.'

‘Wow!' said Chelsea, ‘Is he rich?'

‘Uh-huh.' Sumitha nodded. ‘And next weekend,' she added dreamily, ‘he's staying at our house.'

‘How come?' asked Laura, frowning. ‘I thought he lived in Calcutta.'

‘No, his family just spend the summer holidays there with the grandparents. His mum and dad live in London but they travel a lot, and guess what?'

Everyone looked expectant.

‘Bilu is a boarder in the Sixth Form at – you won't believe this – Bellborough Court!'

That it
so
not on, thought Jemma. She'll get to see him all the time, I'll be the only one left without a boy.

‘That's where Jon goes,' interrupted Laura, her interest suddenly increasing ten fold.

Sumitha glared at her. For once she had centre stage and she was not about to give it up to Laura.

‘Yes, well, my dad was talking to Bilu's dad at my cousin's wedding and it came up in conversation. So Dad said he could stay with us some weekends when his parents were away.'

‘But I thought your parents were really iffy about boyfriends,' said Jemma, clutching at straws.

‘That's the great thing,' said Sumitha, hugging her knees in excitement. ‘Because his family are related by marriage to my cousin's aunt, or something like that, Dad sees him as part of our extended family. And he keeps saying that it is good for me to have the company of a “nicely brought up Bengali boy who shares our standards”. ‘She giggled. ‘He might not say that if he had seen us at the
mela
.
'

‘The what?' said Chelsea, abstractedly picking pink nail polish off her big toe.

‘Oh, it's a fair they have for Rathajatra – to celebrate the monsoon rains coming,' said Sumitha. ‘Everyone goes and Bilu took me – well, the whole family went actually, but we gave them the slip.' She giggled. ‘Bilu bought me jasmine flowers and held my hand.'

‘So you really like him?' said Laura, wishing that Jon had held her hand just once.

‘I am,' said Sumitha, ‘deeply, passionately in love.'

Great, thought Laura. That's Sumitha out of the way. From now on, I can have Jon all to myself. All she had to do now was convince Jon of that fact.

‘So when are we going to get to meet this guy?' asked
Jemma. Perhaps he'd be really gormless and ugly and then she wouldn't feel so bad.