The Fix Up, page 5
She shook her head at him.
He laughed. “Poor Thom, he was the one to insist I soon learn how to dodge anything like that. I don’t blame him for keeping a low profile. I had one friend of my mum’s, years ago, who kept hinting she’d love to ‘show me the ropes’. And emphasised ropes. I declined for every reason you could think of and then some. In the end I had to ask my mum to do something.”
“Did she?”
Moss nodded. “Yeah, said I had a morality clause in my contract. Or she told me she said that, but by the way the woman gave me a wide berth the next time, I’ve a feeling that wasn’t all she said. Anyway, whatever it was, it worked. It was all fine and dandy until the stalkerish episode I told you about. I’ve no idea how I would have coped with that if it hadn’t been for Thom’s support and suggestions, even if we didn’t go with the more outrageous of them. Before you ask, I’m not sharing them. Very much in the dodgy spectrum. In the end we used the morality bit, and added I’d be penniless and on the dole when the film ended. A bit far-fetched but Thom showed her an, ahem…document purporting to say that.”
“I love it! It’d be the same for either of you, I guess. Thomas doesn’t come here for anything but peace, and goes into hermit mode, and after that horror I’d reckon you’d be the same.”
“Oh yes,” Moss said and shuddered. “There’s a time and a place for everything. I’ve been thinking, and at the risk of sounding up myself, it works even better if we say Thom and I were both here for a while, then me by myself for the last three or four days?” He glanced sideways at her. “And we discovered how close we are and want to be even closer? Yes?”
Why on earth not? Maybe it is time to live dangerously.
“Yes.” She returned his high five with vigour. Perhaps they might pull it all off. Maybe—as long as she didn’t screw up.
“So on to the next.” Moss gestured at the wine. “Can I top us up?” They’d only had a small glass each. Arietta nodded. As she rarely drank alone, it was good to sit with someone and savour the merlot.
“Okay.” Moss sorted the drinks and put the bottle back down. “Mini condensed Amos Kirby life story. Loved drama in my teens, did a lot of amateur stuff. Kept me out of mischief—mainly, though I did once almost get caught in the props cupboard with— Okay, enough of that.” He coughed. “Don’t want to give you the wrong idea.”
“Never,” Arietta said gravely, then spoiled it as she sniggered. “Good visual, though.”
“Thanks for that, love.”
“Love?”
“Practising, and stop distracting me. I can’t get the poor girl’s horrified expression as we heard the door open out of my mind. Or the slap on the face I got as the door closed behind whoever it was. Sad thing, I hadn’t even managed to get to half first base, let alone first. The joys of youth, and all that. So where was I?”
“In the prop cupboard?” Arietta suggested. “With a sore face and an angry girl, who I must add, went in willingly I assume, so why was she so incensed? Surely she didn’t think you were going to play tiddlywinks or count backcloths?”
“True enough,” Moss said. “I learnt my lesson, though. Don’t choose anywhere you might be discovered.”
Arietta rolled her eyes. “I bet. With a twin brother I learnt a lot about how the male thought process goes. Apart from thinking with your gonads not your brain, it’s now or I might miss my chance until, all of a sudden, it’s now let’s plot properly. Yes?”
“Yes, okay, we are fickle and lead with a part of our anatomy that prefers to act first.”
She laughed.
Moss tutted. “Enough, woman, let me concentrate.”
Arietta firmed her lips—to stop herself laughing again—folded her arms and inclined her head. He rolled his eyes.
“Okay, Early thirties, left school after I got my first bit role, got a bigger bit role so no uni, though I was going to do history at Durham,” Moss went on. “Still might someday. Been mainly employed since, so very lucky, though I have done the what-almost-seems-mandatory waiting on tables, and also served in a chip shop. Both of which I enjoyed. My batter is second to none. Okay, I like it anyway,” he added as Arietta rolled her eyes. “I make great scraps as well. Or do you call them scranchuns or batter bits?”
“Bits, or scraps. but one of my uni mates used to call them scrumps. I know what you mean anyway.”
“Great. So, Mum and Dad are alive and living in Franschhoek, South Africa. Loving their retirement. Two elder sisters, both married. Donna the eldest, just about to hit the big four-oh and doesn’t care. Married to Frank, has two boys, and lives in Portugal. Marian, two years older than me, married to Chris and living not far from Mum and Dad, is steadfastly refusing to have any kids. Says two nephews are enough kids in her vicinity. Not that that makes sense as Portugal and South Africa aren’t exactly on the other’s doorstep, but I think I know what she means. Each to their own.”
Would he like kids? Arietta had no intention of asking.
“What else?” Moss continued. “I’m thirty-three, single, solvent, hale and healthy. I did think I might be in love once, a long while ago, but it turned out she was, in her words, ‘slumming’ while the rich boyfriend was away. When he returned a few weeks later ‘bye, bye, Moss’ and that was the end of us. Hurt at the time, lots of consequences, one who…but…not relevant at the moment, maybe later.” He sighed. “That’s life. I got over it soon enough, which shows it wasn’t serious after all. Also taught me to be cautious.”
One who? What else had he been going to say? Arietta considered pushing him and decided it wouldn’t be right. Not yet.
“I bet. Guess we all go through that stage to some degree or another.” She certainly had. In spades.
“Guess so. Anyway, I love seafood and fish in any shape or form, except jellied eels. Give me real ale every time, no fizzy lager stuff, and my secret vice is prawn-flavoured crisps. Hate pork and detest fruit with meat. Fruit is fruit, meat is meat, and in my mind, never the twain should merge. Note I didn’t say never meet.” He rolled his eyes and Arietta laughed.
“Yeah, a bit cringeworthy.” She opened her laptop. “Hold on.”
“What are you doing?” Moss asked curiously. “What should I hold on to?”
“Ha-ha. Funny, very funny.” Arietta rolled her eyes. “I’m writing it down like a plot,” she explained as she typed furiously, hit a wrong key, cussed, pressed delete and typed what she meant. “I’ll get rid of it soon, don’t worry. I’m taking your advice and treating it like a plot for a book. And if it isn’t all true, it would make a darned good plot as well. This way, though, it’s more likely to stick in my brain. As long as I don’t accidentally think it’s a real plot and you find your life story as my next book.”
Moss roared with laughter. “It’s all true, I promise, but I love your style. You could always disguise me somehow, give me a double chin and a wart or three.”
“Nah, too stereotypical for a baddie. Make you a smooth-talker and—” She broke off as she decided that to say a hot lover would be one sentence too far. “And anyway, I don’t want lots of Moss fans dissing me.”
“Fair enough, and I like the fact you think I’ve got fans. Sometimes I do wonder, especially when I get crap written about me on social media. Okay, I try to ignore it, but occasionally it stings.”
She hadn’t realised he could be vulnerable as well. It helped her think she just might have made the right decisions about agreeing to go to the wedding with him. For if she were honest, to send her regrets now would look weird, and cause a lot of speculation she didn’t want.
“Your turn,” Moss said.
“Just a sec. Right, think I’ve got it all.” Arietta pressed Save and shut her laptop. She’d reread it all later. “I don’t know how much Thomas has told you?” She wasn’t sure where to start. Did he really want to know how old she was when she walked or how Thomas had broken her arm by sitting on her? Had Thomas mentioned her habit of eating jelly babies headfirst, then legs and finally the torso?
“Pretend he’s told me nothing, it’ll be easier,” Moss suggested. “Just tell me what you’d share with a new maybe-lover and add a bit more. After all, what Thom would tell me would be nothing like you’d say.”
“True.” Why hadn’t she thought of that? “Our mum and dad live about an hour’s drive from here,—still in the same house they bought when they got married. That’s when they aren’t, as Mum puts it, gadding about. They travel a lot. One brother, my annoying, ten-minutes-older twin who you know oh-so well. So, thirty-one and three-quarters, single and solvent, own this house as my godmother left it to me. Thomas was peeved as she left him a motorbike, three dozen chickens and a sewing machine. Non-vintage. Aunt Mairi, as I called her, was loaded, and left the rest to a home for ageing whippets. Not that that isn’t worthy, but as Thomas said the motorbike needed a MOT, and the chickens were past laying.”
“Was she his godmother too?”
Arietta shook her head. “Nope, and his godmother is alive and well, and says she’ll leave me some chickens and a clapped-out mini to even us up. He got the better deal, I could do with another sewing machine. Mine is great at scrambling the thread.” She chuckled. “Actually, on second thought, scrub that, it’s probably my crap sewing skills that mangle the cotton and not the machine’s fault. Mind you, a new one, not one from the ark would be good. Preferably one for idiots.”
Moss smirked. “Mine left me a book of sayings. Horrid things like ‘cleanliness is next to godliness’ and ‘a tidy house is a tidy mind’. The tidy house she left me was anything but. Run down, falling down and not a penny to spend on it. She thought actors were all up to no good and said that in her will, plus the declaration she wasn’t going to give me money to waste. Presumably she thought the house wasn’t worth it. When I saw the state it was in I agreed with her. Sorry, go on.”
She tucked that snippet in the back of her mind and hoped she’d remember it. “Not a lot more really. Thomas broke my arm by sitting on it when I wouldn’t make him a cuppa. Mum went ape, Dad drove me to hospital, and Thomas had to make my breakfast every day for six weeks and carry my rucksack to and from school for a couple of months. As it was bright pink and covered with patches of pop stars, I reckon it was penance enough.”
Moss roared with laughter. “Poor Thom. Yeah, I reckon that was punishment and more. Did his street cred survive?”
“Duh, of course. Eventually he did the ‘I’m male enough to embrace my female side’ stuff, but it took a while for his sense of humour to resurface. After school St Andrews Uni, where I met Tacky Tarq and Kristin. Didn’t know them not really, even though she shared with us and he spent some time with me.” That was a neat way of putting it, she thought.
“Didn’t work?” Moss asked with what Arietta decided was considerable constraint.
Arietta shook her head. “Nah, we wanted different things. Anyway, I got a degree in English, left and worked at a few non-memorable jobs. Some I enjoyed, like tourist officer and library assistant, some I didn’t, like bookshop manager. Too many books and no time to read them. Then I decided to try and write and after a few ‘no thank you, sorry, not for us’ replies and a few more ‘heard nothing’ non-replies, got published. The readers of my little genre seem to like me.”
Plus, with the house all paid for she could afford to live from her earnings—just. Not all writers earned mega bucks, but she didn’t intend to share that. It might sound as if she wanted Moss to contribute.
“Food?” Moss prompted.
“Always.”
“Oh good.” He rolled his eyes. “Expand, and not our waistlines.”
Arietta sniggered. “Er, let me see. Love chocolate, coffee and wine, hate liver, kidney and cheese.”
“Cheese, that’s it, the love affair is over.” Moss roared with laughter. “I love it, the stronger the better. On second thoughts, nope, it’s on. It means I get twice as much cheese. Between us we can always find something to eat. Now about that room?”
He was like a dog with a bone.
“Do you really need it?” she asked, suspicious it was a ploy, though she had no idea what for. “Honestly? Wouldn’t a hotel be better?”
“It really wouldn’t and I really do. I have to sleep somewhere,” Moss said reasonably. “I’d rather it here with all the home comforts than in an impersonal hotel. Meals with no gravy, fancy bits and bobs that I can’t identify, and just some jus dribbled over everything soon lose their appeal. As does shop talk every night. Plus, it will add credence to our story if I’m here.”
Arietta sighed. It was all getting rather complicated. “Well…”
“Pretty please, Ettie Betty.”
She glared. “What did you call me?”
Moss winked. “I thought it could be my lover-like name for you. I could make it Etta-Betta if you’d prefer?”
“Not if you value your body as it is.” She’d had some weird nicknames but that one was new. And unacceptable. “Anything less lover-like I have no idea.” Apart from fat-bum, and she had no intention of sharing that thought.
“Ouch.” Moss made a show of covering his groin. “What then?”
“Oh grief. Ari, or Etta, I guess.” She’d never liked her name shortened. “Never unless you have to, please. It leads to stupid jokes like ‘Ari up, and Etta move on’, which actually isn’t funny. Nor is Arc or Arcy, which some twit thought might be good for me at uni.”
“Definitely not Arcy… Fair enough to the rest, petal, my love. How’s that?” He beamed as if he’d handed her first prize for something special, but spoiled it as he winked and grinned. “Good, eh?”
“Complicated. Okay, you win, dearest. Or is that sweet cheeks?” How had she never realised banter was fun? “Lollipop, cupcake, precious?”
He paled in an overdramatic manner. “Ow, woman. Dearest, or my love will do admirably. Sweet cheeks is a bit too sugary.”
She agreed with that. “Right, where were we?”
“A room?” Moss prompted. “After all, I have to live somewhere.”
“Don’t you have a home?” Arietta asked absently, forgetting he was looking for somewhere near where he was going to film, and that it was all a way of getting to know each other. It seemed an awful lot of faff for a wedding she didn’t want to go to. It would be so much easier to send her apologies.
But then there would be no reason to meet with Moss. And if she were honest, she enjoyed their time together. As long as it stayed casual and there was no pressure for anything else. She wasn’t up for that yet.
“Yeah, but I’d rather be here.”
Chapter Four
Arietta blinked. She’d been so deep in thought she’d forgotten what she’d asked him. Ah, yes, a home. “Why’s that? What’s wrong with it? Where is it anyway?” She’d noticed he hadn’t told her where it was.
“Apart from I want to be with you? It’s had cows in it.”
“Cows?” Had she wandered into a different universe? “You keep cows in your house?”
“Not me and not anymore, but it was a cowshed.”
“Surely you’ve had it converted, cleaned and so on?” It sounded intriguing. She loved how creative some people could be. Not, she guessed, that he’d done it all himself.
He nodded. “Of course, they moved to brand new, all-mooing, all-dancing quarters, but their presence sort of lingers. I keep finding presents, especially in the garden.”
“Good for the roses. So what else?”
“Tadpoles,” he said mournfully.
“Tadpoles?”
Moss nodded. “In the pool.”
“What’s wrong with that?” Arietta asked, mystified. “Frogs breed in pools.”
“Not in a swimming pool.”
The conversation was becoming more surreal by the minute. “Right… Why?”
“They wanted a new environment and who am I to deny them that?” Moss asked. “But it’s damned inconvenient if you want a swim. You could swallow one, and that wouldn’t be good for you or them. Then there’s the local fishermen of course.”
“Fishing for tadpoles?” She really was confused now.
“No, don’t be daft.” He gave her a sorrowful look, which he spoiled by winking. “Trout. They use my drive as a short cut down to the river, which is all fine and dandy, I don’t mind generally. The fishermen, not the trout. However, that’s no good for us to get to know each other on the quiet.”
“Why not for us, us?”
He did his innocent expression. “They fish at the oddest hours. They know who’s around when, where and who with. You think women gossip? You should hear our fishermen. And of course you get the tales of the ones that get away…and then the winks. We’d have people offering to sell us trout or tadpoles, apologising for mud on the path, or water spilled on the doormat. Eavesdropping to see what we were up to, did we need any help and who washes the car for us? I thought that was the whole idea, we need to be together, with a bit of solitude. We can’t do it there very easily, and anyway I know your office is all set up here. You’d need to sort one out at Bannock Cottage.”
Arietta’s mind was reeling. It was too much to take in at once. Plus, she still had no idea where this Bannock Cottage was.
“Now tell me the truth,” she demanded. “I like your fairy tales, but not about this.”
“Okay, spoilsport,” he grumbled. “There are fishermen around but…yes, not relevant. Or the tadpoles and cows. What really happened was I had workmen in to install a new bathroom and somehow they managed to flood the place. Damp house, can’t use the electricity until it dries out and at least two rooms will need replastering. It’s a bloody nuisance as I’ve got to move a hell of a lot of stuff out, because the place isn’t secure at the moment. Harassed is an understatement. Plus the film is near here and I do not want to go into a hotel. I’d end up having to find somewhere to rent and…well, it seemed like a good idea at the time. Saves me hiding from people or trying to find the energy to cook and… Shit, that sounds as if I mean I’d want you to cook. That’s not it and—enough, gonna shut up now, except to say if you want to ask Thom if he thinks it’s a good idea, go ahead.”
