Penny tried to turn the telly on. Andy flung himself down in an armchair. “You won’t be able to do it,” he snapped.
“Oh, where’s my lovely Andy that I used to know?” she sang mockingly, thumping the set. Trying the button again. Click. Click. It wasn’t working at all. The screen was stubbornly opaque. Recently she had found herself thinking that Andy wasn’t fun to live with any more. Now he went off into the kitchen, where she could hear him clatter, making a sandwich. Apricot stilton with whole-grain mustard. He ate these on the hour, every hour, in place of cigarettes. When he came back to the living room he said, through a mouthful of chewed sandwich, “Before you say anything, I’m feeding up my muscles. I’m still a growing boy.”
She stared at him. And it was true. She hadn’t noticed how much extra weight he was carrying. Today he wore his cropped black T-shirt. It said Grrr in glittery golden letters. A little bit of stomach was coming out from under it, above his extra-tight jeans. Though he bragged about how much he was working out, how much extra he was devouring daily during and between meals, she knew how prissy and mortified he would be if she drew attention to his increased size. Filled out, she decided would be the phrase she would use if asked. She would work to make it sound very attractive.
“I can’t get the telly to come on,” she said.
“See,” he tutted. “My programme’s finished anyway.”
“Mine isn’t.”
Andy rolled his eyes. She had become a fan of Home and Away.
She phoned Elsie’s house and asked if Craig could come round to look at the telly — before half past one.
They watched through the living-room blinds as he came across the kids’ play park. He carried his metal toolbox under one arm and dragged his bad leg in the snow.
“The cold must make it worse,” said Andy.
She looked at him, checking that he wasn’t being cruel. His face was thoughtful and composed. “Have you shagged him yet?”
“Andy, you’re so blunt.”
“Well, have you?”
“Yes.”
He looked at her and she laughed.
“I’m not telling you what he was like.”
“Suit yourself.”
“You always want to know that stuff,” she said accusingly. “What people are like. It’s like you can draw up a big chart and point out their best features, their special skills.”
“Well,” he said. “So you can.”
“Like the decathlon.”
“I take it he’s rubbish, then.”
“No, he’s —” She pursed her lips. “He’s lovely, actually.”
Then Craig was there. He brought in with him the smoky, ginny, dog-smelly atmosphere of Elsie’s house as he installed himself on the living-room carpet. After saying cursory hellos to Andy and Penny and giving Penny a chaste kiss on the lips, he applied himself to the proper task.
Penny took herself off to catch the bus to hospital. She warned them that she wanted to watch the second showing of Home and Away when she returned.
Craig unfolded the dark, cluttered compartments of his toolbox. Andy stayed to watch him work. He was careful and precise and something about his application and the way you could see one thought after another chase across his forehead kept Andy watching. His hands were scarred, dirty and skilled. Their nails were stumpy and nibbled. He wore thick white socks and trainers with a kangaroo motif. Soon he had the whole TV in pieces and scattered across the carpet.
“I hope you know what you’re doing,” said Andy, wanting to draw his attention away for a moment.
Craig looked round briefly. “Not at all.” He smiled. His teeth were very even. “It can’t be that difficult.”
He asked for the Hoover. Andy jumped up — oh, far too eagerly, he scolded himself — to fetch it from the hail cupboard and banged his funny bone getting it out.
Then he sat enthralled as Craig wielded the attachments and set about hoovering each and every part of the TV’s innards.
“Will that do any good?” Andy breathed.
“Dust gets everywhere,” Craig grunted. “It causes problems.”
When he was satisfied the bits were clean, he told Andy to put the Hoover away. It took him another hour to reconstruct all the parts.
“Amazing,” Andy said, once the telly was back in one piece.
Craig held up a single golden screw. It was tiny. “I couldn’t find a place for this bit,” he said sadly and went to put it on the fireplace.
He switched the telly on. The picture appeared like a dream.
“Huh,” said Penny, when she arrived just in time for Home and Away. Andy and Craig were drinking cans of lager in celebration. “Maybe you should get up to the hospital,” she said. “Take Liz to bits and give her a good hoovering.”
ELEVEN
On the table beside the hospital bed someone had left a box of Quality Street. What would Liz want with chocolates? Probably they were left over from someone’s Christmas. They stood among the few flowers that visitors had brought.
Fran sighed and looked around the room. Funny that Liz had a room to herself. They must think it serious. For a month she hadn’t so much as blinked. Fran found that she couldn’t say anything to Liz. She couldn’t talk to a body like this. It didn’t seem right.
“When I was little,” Fran told
