‘I finish at half past two.’ He reached to rub the back of his neck. ‘Then I’m done for the day. After that I’ll be out sitting in the sun.’
‘Lovely. It’s a lovely day.’
He could get out of that uniform. It must be stuffy on a day like this, all that nylon. A day when the colours were vivid: the houses orange, the newly planted trees a squeaky-clean green.
Driving must pay well, she thought, and he’d have a large garden at the posh end of town, sloping down to the building site beyond his fence. He’d be lying on a blanket on a freshly laid lawn. He’d lock that uniform away as though it was a snarling beast, to be held at bay till Monday. And his body would be lean and tanned, bristling with the dark, oily hair he was scratching now at the back of his neck. Lying senseless, sun-soaked in white shorts, no longer at the service of the public.
He was too good to be true. Friendly to all and sundry. There was a meaty, solid look about him. The reddish tan set off a white grin he would flash at anyone. But Jane was sure he never smiled at the other women the way he smiled at her.
This morning she had seen him leave his post to run after some woman who’d left her shopping on his back seat. He left the bus unattended to catch up with her. Climbing back aboard, he had caught Jane’s glance. He smiled as if they both knew a secret. Her secret had been that she was watching his too-tight transport-issue trousers.
She wanted to kick the double seat in front in frustration. Even then he’d only look at her with a baffled smile.
She wanted to tell him to keep driving, to go right past her home stop. Take her miles and miles round the winding estates, no matter how mundane the journey, no matter how well routed. She wanted him to drive her to his garden, sit her on his lawn and ply her with soft drinks, wearing his white shorts.
‘You’ll think I’m mad,’ she said. ‘Because I’ve been on your bus four times today.’
She watched his reflection. ‘It’s the only way to travel in a town like this, isn’t it?’ he said. ‘And a day like today, well, it’s too hot to walk.’
He was right. It was an Indian summer.
A breeze whistled under the hydraulic doors, cooling her. Her damp palms were dirtying the paper bag around her newest paperback.
* * *
Fran sat down on the kitchen doorstep. She gave Frank a wan smile.
He was stripped to the waist in the back yard, teasing the kids in the paddling pool. They were screaming and floundering around under the slender ribbons of tap water from the hose pipe he trained on them. They were glad of an afternoon with their father in a playful mood. It was almost a shock to them to see him like this. Only yesterday he’d had one of his off days. He hadn’t gone to work in the converted garage over the road, he couldn’t face it; instead he sat in their darkened living room until bedtime. All day he had stared murderously at the kids’ gerbils. The kids had kept right out of his way.
Jane’s little Peter was there too, clambering up the side of the plastic pool to fling himself back into the soap-frothed water. Fran was surprised he wasn’t missing his mam. She never thought Jane would leave him, even for an afternoon. Peter was growing up alone under her fierce protection and it wasn’t often she let him out of her sight. She’d be back from the car-bootie soon, though, and Fran just knew she wouldn’t take Peter straight home. As usual Fran would have to entertain the pair of them.
She hated asking Jane if she would have another cup of tea, knowing Jane would pretend to think deeply about it and reply, ‘Go on then.’ As if she was doing Fran a favour! That riled Fran, but she would smile as the water drummed heavily in the kettle.
Jane was off looking for the Real Ghostbusters toys for Peter’s Christmas. Fancy planning Christmas in September! Jane said she was almost ready for it; she could wait to get her turkey. Fran didn’t dare think about Christmas yet, aside from getting the cleaning job at Fujitsu, five till ten of an evening, for a bit extra. She needed it, with the four kids and Frank. Jane only had Peter to think about.
She had so little else to consider, she had managed to learn everything there was to know about the Real Ghostbusters. She knew exactly what her son needed to complete his set. Today she was on the hunt for a plastic toilet that filled up with ectoplasm, but she wasn’t sure she would find one. Fran had no idea what her kids’ fads were. They seemed to change so much. The last she remembered was East 17 and Take That. Were they still trendy? Compared with Fran’s kids Peter was a slow, resolute child, at least when he was with Jane.
‘Dad!’ Kerry was Fran’s eldest, nearly ten and looking clumsy in her bathing costume. She submitted to this afternoon in the garden as a kind of ritual humiliation. But Fran could also see that Kerry was playing outside because she was pleased her dad was back to normal. ‘You’ll have someone’s eye out with that hose. Calm down, Dad!’
Laughing, Frank turned up the force. The jet thrashed the water into foam. The younger kids straggled, waving their arms, to the buckling sides.
‘Frank!’ Fran warned from the doorstep. He glanced down, readjusted the nozzle and looked suitably chastened.
At least he wasn’t drunk. Fran just wished he would put a shirt on. He must be feeling happier about the situation at work.
