A Hundred Pieces of Me by Lucy Dillon Read Free Book Online Page B

She smiles apologetically. ‘And I’m not Cinderella.’
    He laughs, and turns back to the crowd, only just thinning out as the band milk the applause. ‘Look, it’ll be in there somewhere, we can find it once this lot have finished.’
    We. We can go and find it.
    ‘Can you hop as far as the bar? If I help you?’ Kit’s blue eyes are dark when he looks at her, and Gina has the sudden thrilling sensation that he feels exactly the same way she does. As if she could climb right inside him, as if everything else in this crowded room is slightly blurry in comparison with his sharp outline.
    She nods. He grabs her hand and Gina lets Kit lead her to the five-deep bar where the student serving waves at him and makes a ‘Drink?’ gesture. His hand is warm and damp and grips hers tightly, ostensibly so they don’t become separated in the crowd, but there’s no crowd where they’re standing and he only lets go to collect the beers.
    They take their drinks to a quieter corner and before Gina can even worry about what they’re going to talk about, they’re talking. About the band, about her lost shoe, about the bar, about their favourite music, about the amazing coincidence that Kit’s mates with Naomi’s brother, Shaun. His amused blue eyes never leave her face, and Gina feels as if she’s been here before, as if they’ve known each other all their lives.
    They have another beer, and discover they both love Nick Drake, and are left-handed, and always wanted a cat but were never allowed one. And the headliners arrive but Kit and Gina are still talking in the dark corner of the bar, the space between them slowly disappearing. She only hears The Marras in the distance, but that’s fine. It’s as if they’re playing in a corner of her bedroom.
    This is the best night of my life, she thinks, light-headed with a funny serene happiness that makes her feels as if she’s floating like a helium balloon over the crowd of dancers. Nothing will ever feel better than this.
    And it’s not even midnight.
     
     
     
    To get to her mother’s home in Hartley, Gina had to drive past 7 Church Lane, the house Janet had coveted for as long as they’d lived in the area.
    It was the handsomest house on a road of handsome houses – 1930s mock-Tudor detached, all clean black-and-white half-timbering, with flowerbeds edging a velvety lawn, and a cherry tree in exactly the right spot in the garden, poised like a flattering hat on a beautiful face. As if to mark it out as the best house in the row, a red postbox was set into the brick wall outside the sunburst wrought-iron gate, the GR monogram picked out in gold.
    G for Gina, she used to think as a teenager, ever monitoring her surroundings for Signs. R for who? It had made her tingle with anticipation and a bit of dread, that her R was out there, but might not find her in boring Hartley.
    Janet used to swivel in the passenger seat of Terry’s brown Rover P6 as they drove past, but at the same time as her eyes were clearly drinking in 7 Church Lane’s domestic perfection, she insisted she had no interest in being ‘the sort of person who is that obsessed with their lawn – it takes a lot of work, keeping it up, a real burden’. As an adolescent, from her slumped position in the back seat (in case anyone from school saw her out in Terry’s ancient car), Gina had secretly mouthed along in unison with her mother’s observations. Even now Janet’s voice was permanently connected with the geography of the drive back home – the apple tree that should be cut back, the conservatory that would be better with a sloping roof. Once or twice, Terry had caught Gina’s eye in the rear-view mirror, the twinkle in his expression offering a gentle solidarity with Janet’s self-delusion, and Gina had felt a funny mixture of guilt and relief that made her drop her gaze, even though part of her wanted to grin back. Maybe even roll her eyes.
    It was unsettling to see that flash of a different man,