Purgatory Is a Place Too Read online

  I was anxious. What would Paul do? How would he play it? On the other hand, he had no choice about being ahead of us. We’d be chasing him and he wouldn’t know what we were up to until, hopefully, it was too late.

  Pete glanced at me. I wanted to reach out and touch fists with him. But that would be rather inflammatory to the gossip mongers.

  I followed all Rob’s instructions, nursing the tyres, just hitting through when it didn’t waste any time. Pete got ahead. He was up with his Dad two laps before I was. Gently, gently does it, I thought. I got my bumper onto Pete’s. Just lightly, slowly adding pressure. He himself was being pressed gradually, steadily, more heavily into his Dad’s back bumper. A double ghost push to be eventually finished off as a pool cue. He glanced in the mirror, guessing what I was up to. But what to do himself? The corner was coming up where the whole manoeuvre would either take effect or go horribly wrong as the case might be. He decided to join in I guess. As the corner came up, I just gently pushed them both out wide and went by. Pete stamped on the accelerator just briefly enough to cannon his Dad that bit further out than himself. Then Pete himself got back into the race to chase me down. But he’d gone too heavy on his tyres getting up to his Dad too early and he ran out of steam, allowing his Dad to catch him up on the last bend and shove him out the way. I on the other hand, hung on to my final burst of speed and came in a most surprising first.

  Jo was positively hoarse when she hugged me.

  “Well, I didn’t expect that!” I exclaimed. “You poor thing Jo, it must be very lonely up there on the stands with no-one to shout with…”

  “You just kept on coming,” Jo told me. “I kept imagining the background music to Jaws! Dun – Dun – Dun – Dun…the approach of the shark..!”

  The scrutineers looked ironically at us. “What’s this? A family outing?”

  They went through in order, starting with me. Jo ended up helping all of us in turn. I hung around possessively as Paul’s car went through.

  “Off you go now,” one of the scrutineers said to me.

  “Oh no, this is my car,” I declared. “I want to see how it’s doing!”

  They glanced at Paul. He smiled slightly and shrugged. I sat cross-legged and watched like a hawk. I kept badgering the scrutineers about what they thought about this, and what about that and would so and so be acceptable, and if I put a certain suggestion in via the driver’s panel how would it be received do you think?

  Finally one man waved his ruler at me. “Are you going to let us concentrate or aren’t you?”

  The other one put a warning finger to his lips. I shut up, but half a minute later I opened my mouth as I thought of another irresistible question. They put their fingers to their lips. I subsided and even tried putting a hand over my mouth, but yet another question started to pop out.

  He looked severely over his glasses, hurrumphed and put his finger one last time to his lips. I got up and left. Behind me I heard amused guffaws breaking out. I glanced back to see the men laughing and Paul with his hand over his eyes, his shoulders shaking. Huh!

  I stalked around ignoring Paul for the rest of the time. Not because of the laughing, but because I didn’t have any idea how to relate to him at the moment.

  Pete put an arm around my waist and said, “That was brilliant.”

  “You helped though,” I said. Then I wagged a finger at him. “And what’s the first rule of the Birmingham Wheels Raceway? Nurse your tyres.”

  He pulled a face. “I know! I just got caught up in the chase!”

  “Oh well, I feel better now,” I admitted to him. “At least I’ve won my first couple of encounters, so now a bit of cut and thrust and tit for tat will feel ok because I’ve started out with my honour intact…”

  Pete nodded. “Not sure I have though…”

  I didn’t answer him. It was up to him how he assessed his own performance. “What do you think of my car? You’ve seen it race lots now.”

  “Fast, nimble, and corners well. I’m dying to have a go in it.”

  “So am I,” I agreed jealously. “I want to know how it handles. Guess I’ll have to wait till the end of the season now…” Out of the corner of my eye I saw Paul approaching. “Ok, Pete, Jo and I are heading off now because we’ve got to get up to Buxton for the F2 Nationals by lunchtime tomorrow!”

  “Remind me never to go after the Silver,” Pete called after me as I disappeared off. “Just hearing about your schedule is exhausting!”

  On Monday evening, as Jo and I fell into bed really early, and I heard Jo begging Zanna, please not tonight, not until she’d had at least ten hours sleep, I could see why you had to be young and single to keep up this level of commitment to the racing. And sometime this week I was going to have to waste time lurking around in fast food restaurants till late at night. Maybe I could take my tablet and spend some time researching the physics and maths of aerodynamics and uplift? But I wouldn’t mind betting that you didn’t get approached if you looked too concentrated and studious. And the tablet wouldn’t be ‘clean’.

  Even sitting around looking completely bored and available for distractions, I scored a fat zero. No luck this week. I really needed to meet another girl and start gathering some more names and stories, I thought as I walked to the bus stop. The weather was so hot now that I’d had to dispense with the camouflaging coat or just look plain weird. As I turned the corner a couple of yards from the bus stop a bloke grabbed my bare arm. “What are you doing here? You should be at number fourteen.”

  I stared at him. “I’m sorry, I didn’t realise…”

  He put his face close to mine. “Of course you did, and you know what we do with little girls who don’t do what they’re told don’t you?” His tone was threatening.

  I shook my head, then realised that would shake the camera footage. “No, I don’t,” I said.

  I hoped he’d follow it up with some vile threat, but instead he hissed, “Well you soon will!” His hand tightened on my arm. “Come with me.”

  Just then the bus came round the corner and stopped at the bus stop and some people got off. I yanked my arm sharply out of his grip and ran towards the door of the bus and leapt on. I handed the bus driver my ticket and the bus drove off. I glanced back to see the guy staring malevolently after the retreating vehicle. A deliberately threatening pose I guessed to frighten me, because surely he couldn’t care that much about one single girl? I sat shakily down in a seat, my heart beating fast. I felt quite conflicted. That was my first real opportunity to be taken along to some sort of gathering, but I hadn’t set up the emergency alarm yet because nothing much had been happening. And I’d just acted with visceral self-survival. If I’d gone with him then, before I’d been prepared for it, anything could have happened. Now I could face punishment if he found me again. On the other hand, when he went back to number fourteen and complained about me to the other men, no-one would know who the hell he was talking about, so as long as I avoided him, I should be ok… Would I recognise him again though? I’d have to look really hard at the footage and memorise his face.

  Damian had rung to ask me if I had any particular preference for a couple of days in June. I’d suggested this coming weekend. It was the British Championship at Nutts Corner in Northern Ireland. There were meets both days. They always tried to set something over there to make sure they were included and that people made the effort to go over, but I couldn’t afford it. The ferry fare was right out of my reach. Pete and Paul were going. They’d have gone anyway, but as the Gold roof it was Pete’s duty to put himself about and be seen not to ignore any track, and Paul would be looking forward to it for old time’s sake.

  Zanna pounced, and whisked Jo away on a romantic weekend. I could see from Jo’s face that she’d have rather spent her first weekend off in months, lying slobbing completely alone somewhere. But actually, I felt Zanna had been remarkably patient recently. She’d taken up with Jo before the Stocks season had started and had had her completely to herself for qu
ite some time. The crazy manic demands of the timetable had come as an unwelcome shock to her, and now Jo needed to give her some rewards for waiting.

  The activity they had lined up for me and Quinn turned out to be wind surfing. At first it had seemed promising. We were by the seaside in the sun. There was a huge harbour one side of a long spit, and a huge sandy beach on the other side. It seemed like it was going to be a fun little holiday. But actually it turned out to be hell.

  The instructor had asked if we could swim. “I did my twenty-five metre badge at primary,” I said uncertainly. But I’d hardly ever been swimming since.

  I hated the water. I hated the waves. I couldn’t get the hang of how to use the wind, or even what the wind was doing. Or even what the point of the whole thing was. I spent most of my time in the water, gulping so much salt water in I wanted to throw up. Quinn was speeding past on his boardy sailed thing leaning back, arms out straight, perfectly balanced, looking super-cool. At the end of the day he swam over to me as I hung in the water clinging to my board, bobbing around in my buoyancy aid, which they’d had to institute after watching me for twenty minutes and which Quinn hadn’t needed to wear, and he laughed. “I’ve never seen you so scared!”

  I glowered at him. “This is fucking awful!”

  He helped me tow the cumbersome thing back to the boarding centre.

  They left us alone in the evening. Nothing to film I guess. Not as much as an interesting big fair-ground ride the place was so snooty. Not half as good as Skeggie. We walked along the beach while I resentfully examined my bruises. “They’re only doing this so they can film us in swimwear,” I muttered. They’d tried to get me into a bikini but I’d refused. They’d put me into a swimsuit cut low at the top and high on the legs. Tonight I really needed to pay some emergency attention to my bikini line. I wished they’d warned me. I least I was discreetly blonde down there. Quinn had been confidently swinging about in his swimming shorts, all the muscles in his chest and arms rippling.

  “I need to talk to you Quinn,” I said.

  He looked warily at me. “Uh oh…”

  Sunday afternoon and they’d pretty much given up on me.

  “You’ll have to give them something they can put in the programme,” Quinn said privately to me. “You’ve been completely useless!” He whispered a suggestion in my ear.

  “Absolutely not!” I said.

  “Go on – I dare you!” His green eyes sparkled wickedly.

  I eyed him. “Only if this isn’t a wind up and you absolutely promise to do it at exactly the same time…”

  “I promise.”

  I examined his expression suspiciously. I didn’t know if I could trust him.

  “Ok Ginty, I’ll do it first and then you just follow me in as fast as possible,” he bargained.

  He glanced to make sure that the cameras were trained on us. “Ok go!” He exclaimed and whipped off his tee-shirt, kicked off his flip flops, stepped out of his trunks and did an elegant high dive off the harbour wall into the sea. In a flat panic I threw off my own tee-shirt and shorts and then did a quick whip of the knickers off and ran at the harbour wall and leapt off. As I plunged down in the dark water I realised this was a really bad idea, and my flip flops detached and floated up to the surface before I did. Quinn was swimming around at the surface grinning at me as I thrashed around choking.

  “Oh God Quinn, now what?” I gasped. “How’d we get out? And what if I drown?”

  “I’ll just have to fish you out and lay you on the harbour wall in the altogether, won’t I?” He teased.

  The cameras were now pointing down at us from above, wielded by a couple of grinning cameramen. Quinn began to swim away in an easy looking elegant crawl. I splashed after him.

  He turned round and tread water, laughing at me. “God, it sounds like a piranha attack behind me!”

  “Seriously Quinn,” I begged. “How are we going to get out?”

  “You’ll have to work that out, won’t you?” He said with a grin. And then he headed back towards the harbour wall, cutting through the water like a dolphin, leaving me here doggy paddling in one spot.

  Reaching the wall, he hauled himself up the metal steps with no apparent embarrassment, water streaming off him, and confidently stepped over the top, taking the towel proffered to him by one of the team, and tying it unhurriedly around his waist. Then he turned round and looked back at me with a wicked grin.

  Bastard! I thought.

  As we all watched it sitting on the Satterthwaites’ settee sometime in late September, they were all pissing themselves.

  “What made you do that?” Jo exclaimed in disbelief.

  “Bloody Quinn, he’s such an A1 bastard!” I snarled.

  On the screen, they were doing a close up of Quinn’s amused face watching across at me. Then he casually took the towel from his waist and used it to dry off his hair. They showed him at a distance from behind, his glistening naked torso silhouetted against the sky.

  “God, he doesn’t care does he?” Jo marvelled a bit gobsmacked.

  “Not Quinn,” I glowered. “He’ll get his kit off at the drop of a hat!”

  “Do you think Cody’s flaked out yet?” Jo speculated with a laugh.

  “She’s welcome to him,” I snapped. “Actually maybe I should have warned her, she’d probably preferred to have watched this episode with a gang of her giggling friends rather than on the settee next to her Dad…”

  Pete grinned at me.

  “So what on earth did you do?” Sue asked.

  “I expect you’re about to find out,” I said dryly.

  The team around Quinn were clearly getting a bit worried. “Is she going to come back?”

  Quinn shook his head with a wry smile. “She’d rather cling out there to that buoy and wait until it’s two am and pitch black before she gave us the satisfaction…”

  “She can’t swim too good,” one male voice was saying. “Do you reckon we ought to go and rescue her? They could take the safety boat out to her.”

  “Ah, leave her!” Quinn put in wickedly. “Let’s just see what she does…”

  They trained a telephoto on me as I finally dared to let go of the safe buoy and splashed my way over scary stretches of open water to the next bright orange bobbing realm of safety, and then on to the next. Finally I made it to a yacht. We saw me calling up to a man sitting minding his own business on deck, and him leaning over, and a bit of discussion going on, and then him tossing a lifejacket down to me. With that safely in place, covering my upper interesting bits, we see him leaning over and hauling me up by the arms. I land a bit like a stranded fish on my stomach over the edge of the boat.

  “That’s one seriously gorgeous arse on show there,” Pete commentated naughtily.

  “Oh shut up!” I snipped at him as he grinned sideways at me.

  The yachtsman chivalrously handed me a towel to wrap around my waist and a few minutes later we were climbing down off the back into his little shore RIB and zooming over. I climb the metal steps up the harbour wall, stalk past Quinn, snarling, “Bastard!” as I pass, snatch up my pile of clothes and march in the direction of the Surfing Centre while Quinn falls about in hilarity behind me.

  “I don’t know how you dared sit here watching this with us,” Jo exclaimed, “knowing what was coming up.”

  I folded my arms. “Blimey Jo, you’ve all seen me naked already so I can hardly worry about it!”

  Jo stared at me.

  “Except your Dad of course,” I added hurriedly.

  “I should hope not!” Pete teased.

  All eyes turned on Paul, except mine as I’d suddenly blushed so hot I had to cover my face with my hands.

  “What’s this?” He demanded of his family with a wry smile. “It seems I’ve been missing out on a previously unsuspected interesting family tradition!”

  “Oh shut up!” I said.

  Back in the flat, very late on the Sunday evening, Jo and Zanna came back in. They found me in a
gony, an angry shade of lobster. The sun had been very strong that morning, and without Sue there to prompt me, it hadn’t occurred to me to put any sun cream on.

  Zanna told me off repeatedly as she stripped me off for the second time in a few weeks. “Honestly Eve, you’re so blonde, you should have factor fifty on at all times!”

  She sprawled me out like a star fish and squirted oodles of Aloe Vera gel all over me. Even the cold of the gel seemed to burn like fire.

  I moaned pathetically. She got more ibuprofen down me. Then she sat on the edge of the bed and smiled almost fondly at me.

  “Honestly Eve, you’re useless at taking care of yourself.” She observed. “No wonder Jo feels she has to follow you around everywhere. You’re just a disaster zone without her!”

  At work the next day the men were referring to me as the ‘beacon’.

  I couldn’t wear my overalls because the material was too harsh on my sensitive skin.

  “God,” I groaned, “I’ve never noticed before how often you lot slap me on the back, put your arm across my shoulders and nudge me in the ribs!”

  I started squawking warningly every time anyone came near me.

  Mr Entwistle sighed. “I’ll be glad when this series is over! What are they trying to do to you? A three month long physical endurance test?”

  Jo switched her phone on at lunchtime. “Eve! Have you had your phone on this weekend?”

  I shook my head. We’d had to have them switched off for the filming and I’d forgotten to switch back on.

  “Well Dad’s only gone and won the British Championship!”

  “Never! That’s brilliant!”

  I bounced around yelling to the men that my car had just won the British.

  They were staying out for a couple of days to combine it with visiting friends. But we went up to wait for their return in the Beast on Wednesday evening. We jumped up and down cheering as they turned into the yard. Jo had even dug a Union Jack out of somewhere. Paul and Pete got out smiling broadly. As they unloaded my car I stroked it and purred loudly.