The Men in her Life

unfair of Simon to get himself laid without telling her, when she always told him everything about her love life. Sitting in the kitchen with a glass of water that tasted like a diluted swimming-pool, Holly weighed up whether she could be bothered to put on sandals and nip up the road to the off-licence for some cold Perrier and a bottle of white wine, decided she could not, went back into her bedroom and threw herself face down on the bed. It seemed less hot lying spreadeagled on the sheet than staring up at the ceiling. The sawing downstairs started again. Holly pulled herself to her feet and jumped up and down on the floor hard several times. The sawing noise stopped immediately. For a moment Holly wondered if her reaction had been too extreme. What if her new neighbour was a single, tall, good-looking man? Well, if he was, what was he doing putting up shelves on a summer Sunday evening? She didn’t think she would be interested in someone who was both unpopular and fanatical about DIY, and even if they could get over those big hurdles, he would find out sooner or later that she had a temper, and if he thought that was unreasonable then they weren’t going to last very long anyway.
    Holly tried to empty her mind. She wanted to be asleep before Matt and Ella returned. It was bad enough that Simon was bonking his heart out only yards away across the courtyard, but she didn’t want to have to overhear the passionate lovemaking of two young people about to be separated for a year.
    It was two o’clock when they returned. Holly glanced at the five different faces of her alarm clocks to verify the hour before rising reluctantly and padding downstairs to open the door.
    ‘We forgot our key...’
    ‘I’m so sorry,’ Ella said.
    ‘It’s all right,’ Holly lied, trying her best not to wake up properly, but they were excited. They’d consumed a bottle of champagne and they talked about it as if it were a hugely extravagant treat. Their zest and giggling made Holly feel jaded and depressed.
    ‘You’ll have to allow at least an hour to get to Heathrow,’ she told them, yawning, ‘so when do you want to be woken?’
    ‘Aren’t you coming too?’ Ella asked, crestfallen.
    ‘I’ll be at work,’ Holly said.
    ‘Couldn’t you take the morning off?’ Matt asked. It almost sounded like a challenge.
    ‘I could,’ Holly said, yawning again, but flattered that they both seemed to want her company.
    ‘Oh please do,’ Ella pleaded.
    ‘All right then. Now go to bed.’
    She heard the echo of Mo in her voice. As a child, Holly had often woken her mother in the middle of the night to ask questions about God and sex and stuff like that. How annoying it must have been.

    At the departure gate, Ella kissed Holly on the cheek, and then Holly pretended to see something she wanted in Knickerbox so that Ella and Matt could have a few minutes alone together. It wasn’t exactly private in the milling crowds of Terminal Three, but everyone was so busy saying their own goodbyes that nobody looked at the teenagers’ extended, passionate kiss.
    Why did kissing become so perfunctory as one grew older, Holly wondered, peering at them from behind a spinner of lingerie. She remembered the never-ending exchanges of saliva with boys round the back of the Irish club, and dancing to 10 cc at the end of discos, eyes closed, mouth open, drinking a boy’s tongue as his hands made exploratory reconnaissance of her bra fastening. There had been very few boys tall enough for her to feel really comfortable smooching. Her idea of love in those days had been to be with someone on whose shoulder she could rest her head, without bending her knees.
    ‘Do you wear this kind of stuff?’ Matt was suddenly holding up a black teddy in front of her face, smiling his deliciously cheeky sideways smile at her.
    ‘No,’ Holly pulled herself up to her full height, which was an inch or so taller than he was, ‘mine has to be much more expensive.’
    He held her eyes, daring her to be the first to look away. It was a game she had played more often than he had, but he was good, very good, and she was on the point of capitulating when he finally dropped his gaze.
    ‘Has she gone through, then?’ Holly asked unnecessarily, since she had watched Ella go. She had not turned back to wave. Holly thought that she might be crying and she was sure Ella was far too proud to let it show.
    ‘Yeah.’ For a moment, Matt looked completely dejected.
    ‘Shall we