Page 66 of Forever, Maybe
Jennifer Frazer seemed to have slipped from her mind, and Nell let it lie. She doubted the information would be welcome.
The Volkswagen Vista had finally claimed a space on the opposite side of the street, thanks to a neighbour pulling out. It reversed in smoothly—Nell sent the driver silent kudos for the precision—and the engine fell quiet.
Stephanie, shading her eyes from the westering sun, squinted at the man emerging from the driver’s side. “That’s Josh, isn’t it? Liza’s fella?”
Nell nodded.
The man—slight, kitted out in double denim—jogged round to the boot, popped it open, and hauled out Liza’s wheelchair with practiced ease. He wheeled it to the passenger side just as Liza swung open her door and extended her legs. The transfer from car to chair was fluid, a routine clearly honed over time.
With Liza settled, Josh ducked back to the boot and hefted out not one, but two crates of lager.
Oh, hell. Nell bit her bottom lip. Six o’clock already, and party guests were still rolling up fresh as daisies and clearly in it for the long haul. The exhaustion of the past few weeks had settled into her bones, and the thought of more hostessing felt about as appealing as a bout of extra itchy thrush.
“Yoo-hoo!” Stephanie bellowed. Those several, generous glasses of rosé had kicked in and she waved at the approaching wheelchair like she was greeting homecoming heroes.
Oh well, Nell told herself. Soon enough, the first wave would start to peel off, as the parents of small children, all of whom would be thoroughly wrecked from overzealous games of tig in the garden, a chaotic session with Calamity Jean and sugar highs courtesy of Trish’s fairy cakes and the candyfloss machine, called it a day.
The rest would splinter into their usual factions: the drinkers drifting out to the garden to make further inroads into the still-impressive mountain of bottles and cans; the quieter crew curling up indoors with teas and coffees, half-watching something gentle and forgettable on the telly.
If she could just get her mum and dad settled, Nell might be able to slip upstairs and,please, universe, in your infinite mercy, crawl straight into bed.
Liza, a bouquet of flowers resting on her lap, rolled towards them, as Josh staggered behind her, one crate held under each arm. They came to a halt before Nell.
Liza beamed, deploying the same wide smile her mother used to wear, as if she were about to sink her teeth into one of those over-stacked burgers every gastropub seemed to churn out these days.
When Nell had painted Brenda’s portrait from that old photograph after her death, the resemblance to Liza had struck her more than ever. Both had the same thick, wiry auburn hair, coal-black eyes, hamster-like cheeks and that porcelain skin that demanded Factor 50 from March to October—even in Scotland.
“Hiya, Nell. Stephanie. Love that dress,” Liza said, and Nell knew she didn’t mean the one from Reiss.
“Do they do it in size crippled?”
Liza, being Liza, was allowed to make that kind of joke.
Stephanie snorted. “If you’ve got the money, they do it in size-whatever-the-fuck-you-like.”
“Ha!” Liza cackled. “Here.” She thrust the flowers—a glorious riot of red, yellow, orange, pink and purple: roses, stocks, sunflowers, solidago, craspedia, and statice—towards Nell.
“These are for you. Not your awfy husband.”
“Thank you!” Nell buried her nose in the bouquet, inhaling the heady floral scents. “Come on in.”
She stepped aside. Danny had borrowed a wheelchair ramp just for today, so Liza could manage the short flight of steps typical of their Edwardian sandstone villa. Nell knew better than to offer help. The childhood accident that had left Liza without the use of her legs had forged an ironclad independence.
Any attempt to assist was usually met with a “fuck off”—sometimes said with a grin, sometimes with a snarl.
Fortunately, the Murrays’ hallway was wide enough for her chair to glide through with ease, and the kitchen, despite being stacked with food and drink, had clear pathways around the furniture and out onto the patio.
But Liza’s chair came to a halt before it reached the French doors. She turned as Nell, Stephanie and Josh followed her in. Josh dumped the beer boxes on the floor with a grunt and cracked open two cans. He must be planning to pick the car up the next day.
Liza jabbed a finger toward the garden. “Christ. What’shedoing here?”
Oh dear. Shane. Nell had completely forgotten that Lizahatedher stepfather (was he still technically that, now that Brenda was gone?)
“Sorry,” Nell said quickly. “I didn’t know he was coming either. Trish made Danny visit him earlier in the week, and he must have wrangled an invitation.”
“Wanna bail, Leese?” Josh asked. His London accent had stuck firm despite his mum dragging him and his siblings north years ago for a now-defunct relationship with a Glaswegian. “We could hit the park, smuggle the beers in under your chair.”
Nell liked Liza, but Daniel’s Hyndland shop manager and his sort of cousin was a one-woman party engine. Part of her couldn’t help hoping she’d say yes.
