Chapter 83

"So it went alright, the dinner?" Elspeth asked, nestled on Briana's lap.

Hope was still unpacking her bag in their room, and Marcus was starting to cook dinner, but Shawna had curled up on the sofa to talk with their friends.

"It did. It was good," she assured them. "Even Lotty seemed to relax after a while. Drew was a bit shy, especially around Marcus, but the baby was gorgeous. We practically had to pry her out of Hope's grasp when it was time to leave."

"I heard that!" Hope's call came from the bedroom.

"Is that a denial?" Shawna called back and didn't get a response. "What about you guys, how was your break?"

"Revealing," Briana said after sharing a look with Elspeth. Elspeth rolled her eyes.

"Oh?"

"Have you any idea how big her house is?" Briana nodded towards Elspeth.

"It's not that big. It's just..."

"Eight bedrooms," Briana interrupted. "And Lorraine's? Seven bedrooms, a study and a drawing room. Who the fuck has had a drawing room since Queen Victoria died? I mean, really?"

"It's just a house!" Elspeth muttered.

"Is she worried you're only after her for the money, now?" Shawna asked, unable to keep the grin completely off her face.

"No," Elspeth replied primly. "She is afraid that she's going to have to live in the relative squalor of a three-bed semi in Berwick. With a downstairs bathroom. And no butler."

Briana laughed and tickled her, leaving Shawna to smile. Hope finally joined them and they settled down again.

"What about Lorraine and Tony? How did they get on?" Hope asked as Marcus brought her tea through. "Thanks, Honey."

"I'm not sure," Briana admitted. "They seemed to have fun while we were out, but Tony wasn't allowed to sleep at their house, even in one of the seventy-four spare bedrooms, and when we came back to my parents' place Lorraine stayed at home."

"Tony went up there to pick her up this morning, so we're waiting to find out what happened, too."

Marcus brought in a pile of plates, passing them around, and then returned to the kitchen for a heaped bowl of risotto. The bowl was almost empty and two half-full plates had been placed in the bottom of the oven to keep warm for Tony and Lorraine when Briana's phone rang.

"Yello!" she answered and mouthed Tony to the others as she pointed to the handset. "Uh-huh. Hang on, I'll ask him.

"Marcus, Tony wants to know if you've got a wheel brace?"

"No, but I've got a socket set that'll probably fit?"

"He says he's got a socket set, will that do?"

"Right, and where are you? OK, hang on. Let me write that down..." She gestured, and Hope grabbed the pen and pad from the window sill to pass to her.

"Right, got it. Someone'll be there soon, OK?"

"What's up?" Shawna asked when Briana flipped the phone shut.

"Flat tyre." Marcus suggested, already getting his boots on.

"Exactly," Briana confirmed. "Are you going?"

"No point in taking a car all the way out there and all the way back," Marcus pointed out. "If I ride out there I can put the bike in the back for the return — saves petrol."

"You going green on us, Marcus?" Elspeth asked.

"No, I'm going cheap on you," he admitted.

"Hang on," Hope said as she scooped up the last of her rice. "Give me a second to get changed and I'll come with you."

"You just want to hear Lorraine's gossip first," Elspeth laughed.

"Maybe," Hope smiled as she disappeared back into the bedroom.

"More like she wants to spend three-quarters of an hour on the back of Marcus' bike," Briana corrected.

"That'll be it," Shawna confirmed, and Hope didn't even pretend to try to deny it when she returned.

"Don't forget the socket-set!" Shawna called, as Marcus started to close the door. He flushed as he hurried back in to grab it from the cupboard and then headed out again. "I think he likes taking her out on the bike almost as much as she likes going."

"You don't?" Elspeth asked her.

"I like the feeling of pressing myself up against Marcus' back, sure," Shawna acknowledged. "I just don't like going on the bike."

"Too cold or you don't trust Marcus?"

"It can get cold, I suppose. And Marcus I trust absolutely. It's all the other idiots on the road. I won't drive. My Mum tried to get me lessons, but ... no, not me."

"So, what happened?" Hope asked, shielding her eyes against the low sun as it jabbed through the trees that screened the opposite side of the road. Marcus and Tony worked at the roadside, jacking the truck up to change the wheel, and the two girls huddled in the lee of the pines as the wind whipped along the road.

"I don't know. Probably a nail or a screw," Lorraine said shrugging. She had rummaged around in her bag for a coat to wear, not having expected to have to get out the van, and the light jacket she'd found wasn't really up to the job. Hope, by contrast, was still revelling the warmth of being pressed against Marcus back all the way, feeling the play of muscles across his ribs as he leant the bike.

"I don't mean the tyre," Hope said and waved dismissively towards the road. "I meant with you and Tony. And staying at home when they all went back to Bri's house."

"Oh, my mother ... She wouldn't let me go."

"How can she stop you?"

"By threatening not to pay my tuition."

"She didn't!"

"Yep. And told me I was 'throwing my life away over some oik.'"

"Oik? Tony."

"Apparently he doesn't have sufficient prospects. She wasn't going to let me come back — or at least, she said she wasn't. I pointed out that would mean that your Dad and Elspeth's parents would be able to laud over her that their children got degrees when hers didn't."

"How did she take that?"

"The exact phrase was, I think, 'I am not going to have to acknowledge that lesbian before you!'"

"Am I allowed to give her a slap?"

"You'll have to join the queue. God, it's freezing out here. TONY! GET A MOVE ON!"

"Nearly there!" he called back with a wave. "You could always come down a give a bloody hand if you want to get going quicker," he added with a mutter.

"I don't think she heard that," Marcus pointed out, hefting the spare wheel into place.

"She wasn't meant to," Tony pointed out, rubbing his fingers together to try and get enough feeling to thread the wheel nuts. "She'll tell you all the mechanical facts of the wheel and that no trouble. Practical applications, though, I'm not so sure."