“You must be bloody joking!” shouted Kay. He was stillmoving towards her, a disgusting look of lust in his little piggy eyes thatbulged out of his pudgy face. As she backed slowly away, she reached the edgeof the bed and now tripped, falling backwards, spreadeagling herself on themattress.
“Yes, that’s the idea, sweetheart. Come on, come to Daddy,you know it makes sense. Two hundred short, you say? Well, let’s call that fourshags and a blowie between now and when I leave for Scotland next week, plusthe 800 quid you’ve got coming next week and we’ll call it quits until nextmonth.”
With that, he bellyflopped down onto the bed, trying to pinher down underneath him. Fitter and slimmer than him, she just about managed towriggle out of his way and jump up. Running across to the window, she wrenchedit open, part of the rotting wooden frame coming away in her hand.
“Let’s get something clear,” she said firmly, trying todisguise the fear in her voice. “No matter how desperate I get, I have nointention of selling myself for money, and especially not to a disgusting piglike you. Now you’ve got ten seconds to get off that bed and get out that door,or I swear I’ll scream rape out of this window.”
Kay meant every word, and felt strangely euphoric as shesaid it. Perhaps she had brought some of her youthful fire back from her recenttrip to the past. She had not felt this strong and energised for a very longtime. Whatever the reason for her newfound bravado, her forceful stance had thedesired effect.
Wheezing as he winched his gargantuan frame off the bed,McVie looked furious, but with relief she saw that he was cooperating. For onehorrible moment there she had thought that he really was going to force himselfupon her.
He walked towards the door, but when he got there he turnedback, unable to resist having a final dig.
“You think you’re a big, brave lassie, but I can have youanytime I want. Right now, I’ve got other fish to fry.”
Under other circumstances, this might have seemed like areasonable pun, assuming he was referring to the chip shop, but Kay was in nomood for jokes.
“Just get out,” she ordered.
“Don’t fret. I’m out of here – for now, but this isn’t over.Oh, and I suggest you get yourself a nice, warm jumper, because you’re going toneed it. That heating’s staying off and it’ll be the electricity next.”
With that, he turned on his heels and clumped back down thestairs.
The rush of adrenalin she had felt during the confrontationwas now fading, supplanted by relief of the sort that made her burst intotears. Composing herself, she went into the bathroom and did her best to makeherself presentable. As she had explained to the angel, there was someone thatshe was hoping to see tonight and she wanted to make a good impression on him.
She felt hungry, and on any other night would have gonedownstairs to get some chips. Despite the scene she had witnessed downstairsearlier, she knew that Anna would give her an extra-large portion of chips. Shehad formed quite a rapport with the young Polish girl who was one of the fewpeople around who seemed to have any time for Kay these days. But tonight shedecided to give it a miss.
Going downstairs could mean running into McVie again, andshe didn’t want to do anything that would get Anna into trouble. She wouldn’tput it past McVie to sexually harass her as well after the conversationearlier. He really was an absolute bastard. Not the same type of bastard asAlan, but a bastard all the same.
She seemed to attract them in all shapes and sizes. Did shehave some sort of tracking device buried somewhere inside that enabled them tohome in on her? It certainly seemed that way and it had been going on eversince that fateful night of the summer ball when she had taken up with Glen aquarter of a century ago.
But tonight was going to be different, because there was oneman who she knew was different. His name was Richard Kent, a retired policemanwhom she had known since her schooldays. She had had a crush on him then, andshe still had it now, though she had reluctantly accepted that nothing was evergoing to come of it. He was married and had firmly rebuffed all her advancestowards him.
She hadn’t pushed it. She wasn’t a homewrecker, despite herrecent behaviour and after the experience of having her teeth punched out itwould be very foolish of her to make the same mistake again. She had only seenhis wife, Debs, a couple of times but those were enough to show Kay that shewasn’t someone to get on the wrong side of.
On one of those occasions, just a couple of weeks ago, Debshad made a scene by turning up at the pub one Saturday lunchtime and dragginghim out over some unfulfilled promise to take her Christmas shopping. Anothertime, he had stayed in the pub so long one afternoon that she had brought hisSunday dinner down to the pub and slapped it down on the bar in front of him.
No, Mrs Kent was not a woman to be trifled with. But thatwas OK because nothing was going to happen between Kay and her husband – atleast not in this place and at this time. But what Kay had in mind would betaking place in the past before Kent had even met his wife. Not only that, itwould not even be in the same universe.
A few weeks ago, Kay and Kent had got talking in the pub. Hewas in there a lot these days since he had lost his job, and they had rekindledtheir friendship that dated back to schooldays.
That night they had a heart-to-heart conversation about theend-of-term ball and the turn of events that had led to her
