Page 5 of Dancing Fools and All That Jazz
I feel sorry for Little Janine Young. Ruby added the ‘little’ because she’s both petite and also the youngest of our group at only twenty-three. ‘Sounds like a character in a nursery rhyme.’ Ruby had laughed when she first came up with the nickname. ‘Little Janine Young has lost her tongue.’ Poor girl. In truth, anyone would be dumbstruck with Fay giving them the evil eye, let alone a quiet shy girl like Janine. Ruby’s nickname, Frosty Fay, has never been so apt.
Janine has turned lobster red and is trying to stutter out an explanation. I would normally have stayed to smooth things over, but in truth I am relieved when Ruby leaves them to it and steers me toward the door.
‘Ouch. Just got frost bitten. Now it’s poor Little Janine Young’s turn,’ she murmurs.
‘What’s the matter with that woman?’ I glance back at Fay berating Janine as we leave the studio and step into the dark car park. ‘She prickles at the slightest thing, and she seems to really have it in for Janine.’
‘Don’t think she’s too fond of me, either.’ Ruby exaggerates Fay’s clipped tones, ‘“My problem is not helped by continuous interruptions, Ruby!”’
I smile as Ruby replicates Fay’s sneer perfectly.
‘Hey, Frosty and I will never be on the same wavelength. Her loss.’ Ruby shrugs.
Reaching my car, Ruby stops, grabs me and wraps her arms around me to give me a bear hug.
I swallow back a sob and with no warning, a wave of anger judders through my body, making me produce a guttural groan.
Ruby, sensing my teetering emotions, pulls back. ‘Sorry. No being nice. Stay furiously frigging focussed.’
I smile. Ruby’s language is as colourful as her bright clothing. When we first met, I’d found her swearing disconcerting, but I soon realised it’s part of her ‘say-it-as-it-is’ psyche. From her wide smile to her closely cropped hair and her sparkling teak eyes, I love her loud, brash manner.
Bonnie and Cath head for the vehicle next to mine and Cath calls in her lilting Irish accent, ‘You be sure to take care of yourselves ladies. We need you fighting fit to have any hope of winning this competition in Paris.’ She bursts into song as she’s prone to do with the slightestassociation. This time it’s something about a night in Paris being like a year elsewhere.
I quickly get in my car.
Ruby jumps into the passenger seat, all ears. ‘Now, tell me. Vince. What have you found out and how?’
‘I have you to thank for that…’ I begin.
Ruby raises her eyebrows.
‘SE. I wouldn’t have known about SE. Would have had no idea it was a dating app if you hadn’t shown it me on your phone.’
‘Spontaneous Encounters. God, is that still going? I haven’t used it since Max and I hooked up again… sorry, go on.’
‘Well, Vince left his tablet. It was down the side of the settee – I found it when I was tidying. I mean, I thought it was James’s, and I was worried he’d been playing games instead of doing his homework. So, I scanned through all those icons across the screen and there it was, the same dating site you used to use. I was horrified. I thought, what’s James doing on dating sites when he’s only fourteen? Especially knowing all the things you got up to with the blokes you met. I mean, no offence intended.’
‘None taken.’ Ruby’s eyes twinkle.
‘But then I realised the tablet was a newer model. It wasn’t James’s and then I saw Vince’s work stuff and I knew it had to be his. He can’t have realised he’d left it. Then it…’ My words dry up.
Ruby waits patiently.
I swallow and try again. ‘It hit me like a hammer. Vince was using Spontaneous Encounters.’
Ruby presses her lips together.
‘He couldn’t have known he’d left it at home. I mean, it was easy to open the app. The password was the same as our alarm code – the date we got married. What a joke. And then I saw them…’
‘Go on.’
‘All the encounters… A whole history. I was shaking as I hit the home button. He seemed to have several profiles. I clicked on one of them and there was a picture of him from years ago. It was taken on our honeymoon. I had been photoshopped out.’ I clench my fist.
Ruby squeezes my hand.
‘Honestly, I wanted to throw up. He was using another name. On this profile, he was Ben Johnson. I felt so repulsed I had a sort of tunnel vision; I could barely see the detail. But, Ruby, the dates, they went back years. And the lists of women he’d met. So many. And as I took it all in, I realised these encounters were all arranged for midweek when he was away from home.’
‘How many?’
