life was still there, the space where a background should’ve been. Part of him thanked his parents for moving away, giving him an excuse to never go back, but part of him also blamed them for not giving him the option, ever, of returning to the place where he’d grown up, played football, ridden his bike, got drunk in the park and briefly, all too briefly, snogged Nicola Cruickshank outside Boots one Hogmanay.
‘I’ll go.’
‘Really?’
‘Why the hell not, eh?’
He wasn’t at all sure why he was saying this, but his half-drunk instinct had brought him this far – to a smoky pub on a summer day across a table from a beautiful woman with her head screwed on tight – so he could trust it a little further. He finished his pint and got up.
‘Same again?’
Nicola nodded. He got them in and came back to the table. Nicola was grinning from ear to ear.
‘What?’ he said.
‘Nothing. Just looking forward to going to this bloody thing now.’
‘Me too.’
‘Really?’ She sounded dubious. David laughed.
‘No, not really. But if you promise to hold my hand if it gets too scary, I’m sure I’ll manage.’
‘Cross my heart and hope to die.’ She raised her glass and they clinked them together again. ‘To the Keptie High School class of ’88 reunion!’
‘Jesus. There’s still time to change my mind, if you keep up that enthusiastic, cheerleading shit.’
‘Don’t knock it, mister. I’d look great in a ra-ra skirt and pom-poms, even now.’
‘I don’t doubt it.’
They both took a drink, David thinking about Nicola in a cheerleader outfit, Nicola smiling at him over her pint, fully aware of that fact.
After their third pint it was time for Nicola to pick up Amy from her mate’s party. They were getting on so well David badly wanted to stay out with her but he realized that couldn’t happen and offered to walk Nicola up the road.
‘Where’s the party?’ he said.
‘Livingstone Place, just across the Meadows. It’s one street along from our own flat, in Gladstone Terrace.’
‘Really? I’m just down the road in Rankeillor Street.’
‘Small world.’
‘How long did you say you’ve been in Edinburgh?’
‘Four years.’
‘And we’ve never seen each other.’
‘Hardly that surprising unless you spend your time loitering outside Sciennes Primary School, or my work. I scarcely get anywhere else these days.’
They were walking through the Meadows, the large park spread across the area south of the university. The sun was still blazing away in the early evening, and the grass was covered with semi-clad students, tourists and festival-goers, all soaking up rare and valuable rays. Groups of lads kicked footballs about and frisbees got flung far and wide. They walked past some hippies practising firestick juggling, and accepted flyers from some androgynous oriental types for the Ladyboys of Bangkok spectacular. The festival was getting properly going, thought David as he took another handful of flyers from some posh twat for a student revue show in a cave somewhere. He put all the flyers in the next bin. He really hated the fucking festival. They reached the bottom of Livingstone Place and stood kind of awkwardly loitering, like they were at the end of a first date.
‘I’m just going to pick up Amy then head home, do you want to meet her?’ said Nicola, fully expecting David to say no. Why would he want to meet her daughter, just because they’d spent a few hours together after fifteen years of silence?
‘Yeah, why not?’ he said.
‘Really? That’s cool. I could do with the back-up, to be honest. Lots of Amy’s pals seem to have really posh parents, and they all look down on me, single mum and all that. Stuck-up twats. Mind you, if I turn up stinking of booze with a strange man, I don’t suppose that’s gonna endear me to the members of the PTA, now, is it?’
Nicola rang the bell of the main-door flat and a dumpy woman in glasses and a turtleneck answered. She reminded David of that girl from Scooby Doo, not the sexy one, but the one who was always losing her glasses, and who always worked it out in the end.
‘Cassandra,’ said Nicola, turning on the charm, ‘how’s everything going?’
‘Oh, mayhem, as you might expect. Come on in and watch your step, Melissa’s junk is everywhere.’
They followed her down the hall, Nicola turning to whisper to David. ‘Ever been in a room full of eight-year-old girls before?’
‘Not that I remember, which means either no or I was very drunk.’
She made a face as they entered the