then I’d be with him when he dropped off the fire engine.
He cleared his throat.
‘So, Vicky, the two weeks we’re away would normally be my two weeks with the truck,’ he explained. ‘What do you want to do? Do you want to keep it for a month and then I have it for a month?’ I could tell he was working hard to keep his tone casual.
Jason had realised the date clash a few weeks after we’d booked the holiday. He’d been looking at the calendar and when he worked it out he had seriously considered taking the truck with us to the Canary Islands. But then he’d worried about it getting damaged in the suitcase or being stolen from the room and soon he’d decided that the best solution would be for them to adjust their custody arrangement. This, however, required Vicky to play ball. He was terrified Vicky would insist the two weeks we were away were his, whether he was around or not. I’d assumed he’d cleared it with her ages ago, but now I realised he must have been putting it off for as long as he could. Today, he must have hoped that, if he brought me here, she’d be less likely to make it an issue.
‘What do you think?’ asked Jason.
Vicky smiled sadly to herself in a way that I didn’t understand. She was about to reply when there was a loud rapping at the front door. We all started.
‘Vicky! Vicky, are you in there?’ shouted a woman through the letterbox.
Vicky stood up and sighed. She tugged at her skinny jeans and I noticed how much they gaped at the waist.
‘What does she want?’ She went to leave the room, but then, remembering we were there, took a few steps back to explain. ‘It’s that Margaret from the end of the road. I won’t be long.’
As she went into the hall to see to Margaret, Jason and I remained where we were.
‘Are you all right, Maggie? What’s the matter?’ She sounded only mildly concerned.
‘It’s my hair dye. I thought I’d try the Magenta Sunrise this time, but I think I left it on too long and it’s burning my scalp. Can you help?’
‘You silly mare,’ laughed Vicky. I could hear her putting on her jacket. ‘Won’t be long,’ she shouted back to us and then we heard the front door slam.
Out of the window we saw Vicky running down the path behind a woman with a towel round her shoulders, purple dye dripping from her hairline down the sides of her face.
I waited for Jason to do something. When he didn’t, I decided to take the bull by the horns.
‘Shall we go?’ I stood up. I was glad this woman Margaret had come knocking. It gave us the perfect excuse to leave immediately.
‘I don’t know,’ said Jason relaxing into the sofa. ‘I’m not sure if Vicky took a key.’ He tucked a few stray strands of hair behind his ears.
I looked at the toy, still in its bag, centre stage on the coffee-table.
‘Why were you late with the truck?’ I asked. ‘Surely you want to get in Vicky’s good books so that she’ll be nice about the holiday arrangements? She’s not likely to accommodate you now, is she?’
Jason hung his head.
‘I know,’ he said quietly. ‘I just needed one more night with it.’
‘You should explain that to Vicky. She’d understand.’
‘Maybe,’ he shrugged. ‘Maybe not.’
He got to his feet.
‘Are we leaving?’ I moved towards the hallway, happy to be on our way.
‘What? No. Sit down.’ He directed me back to the sofa. ‘You stay there. I need to check something. I won’t be a minute.’ And with that, he went into the hall with the ease that only comes from having once inhabited a place.
‘Check what?’ But it was too late. He’d already disappeared up the stairs.
Alone in Vicky’s house for the first time, I looked around, trying to imagine her and Jason in it together, living here as man and wife.
A three-piece brown leather suite, and a beech sideboard and coffee-table dominated the room. The walls, meanwhile, were skimmed plaster, painted magnolia. The cream colour scheme continued around the bay window, where Vicky had hung thick cotton curtains from a chrome pole that had twisty spiral flourishes at each end. I sniffed the air; there seemed to be a Glade plug-in freshener in every available socket and they gave the room a rich, sickly smell. Apart from a grey vase on the sideboard containing