‘All by himself?’ says Penny. ‘My, that’s what I call an all rounder.’
‘You can sneer,’ I say. ‘But I think that his homespun values are what I’ve been looking for all this time without really knowing it.’
‘So it’s wedding bells, is it?’ says Penny. ‘A sit-down lunch, two weeks at Horridmelinos and a semi-detached in Chingford.’
‘West Woodford,’ I say, responding just as Mum would have done. ‘I don’t know, but it’s what I’d like at the moment. Anyway, I’m going home to see if he’s still interested. We used to be quite close at one time.’
‘I remember,’ says Penny. ‘You had it off when he came down to our place on that course, didn’t you? I knew I’d seen him somewhere. Carroty-headed feller with big hands.’
‘Burnished rust,’ I say. ‘And all his bodily extremities are well-developed.’
The moment that the words have passed my lips I realise that they may have been ill-judged and Penny is swift to prove me correct. ‘There you go again,’ she says. ‘You can’t help giving yourself away, can you? Socking great helpings of steaming male tonk, that’s what turns you on, isn’t it?’
‘Rubbish!’ I say. ‘Come back to Ching – West Woodford and meet Geoffrey properly before you say things like that. Who knows? You might find that there’s something missing from your life.’
These words, thrown down in anger rather than in a genuine attempt at an invitation, do in fact lead to Penny agreeing to accompany me home for a short visit. Apparently her father is about to separate from his latest wife and she always likes to be out of the way when this is happening. Of course, this kind of experience is a million miles from my own and I always think that Penny considers that there is something slightly strange about me because I am still living with the same mother and father as when I was born.
‘What do they find to say to each other?’ she says. This is the kind of question that opens one’s mind to aspects of family life that one has never properly considered before and I begin to wonder whether Penny’s visit will be as mutually rewarding an experience as I had hoped for. It certainly does not start off very well.
‘Gosh,’ says Penny as we take a prohibitively expensive taxi from Buckhurst Hill Station. ‘Look at those ghastly little houses. Can you imagine living in one of them?’
Before I can answer, the cabby shoves on the anchors and we squeal to a halt outside number 47 Pretty Way. ‘Here you are, Miss,’ he says. ‘That’ll be eighty pence please.’
‘It’s lovely,’ says Penny. ‘It’s got a completely different character from the rest of the houses in the street. I love those gnomes trying to fish the milk bottle tops out of the refuse pit.’
‘That’s the pond,’ I say. ‘A lot of stuff blows in from the people who are waiting at the bus stop.’
Penny and I make a big thing of paying for the taxi and spill the contents of our purses all over the pavement as we struggle to get the money out first but there is no doubt that the damage has been done. The situation is not improved when sister Natalie opens the front door. She is wearing her pink velvet lounging pants and a lilac green transparent blouse that reveals every inch of fabric on the black bra nearly covering her over-developed breasts. I don’t know how she put on her make-up but it looks as if somebody fired it at her out of a cannon – Mum should take her in hand, I have said so, many times.
‘They’re here, Mum,’ she says. ‘Rosie and her posh friend.’
Penny gives Natalie a smile slightly more deadly than cyanide of potassium and pushes into the interior of the house. ‘What a pretty sister you have, Rosie,’ she says. ‘She’s going to look really lovely when her spots clear up. Have you thought about seeing a specialist?’
I might have guessed that Mum would appear flustered and with flour all over her hands and it is no surprise when she tries to shake hands while she is apologising about the state of the house, covers Penny in flour, tries to rub it off with a cloth that has jam on it and – oh! I can’t bear to go on. By the time Dad comes back, says ‘pleased to meet you’ to Penny, tucks his serviette in the top of his collar, sits at the table with his knife and fork bolt upright in either hand and informs everybody that he is looking forward to Coronation Street I am determined that we must get out of the house at any cost.
As soon as Mum has made a pot of tea – oh, why couldn’t we have had Nescafé – I suggest to Penny that we take a stroll round to the tennis club and she agrees with alacrity. It is a lovely evening and as the long hut hoves into view behind the privet hedge covered with the stale crusts of badly cut cucumber sandwiches my heart lifts to the sound of ball making contact with tightly strung gut. I am no great shakes as a tennis player but – who knows – maybe I will be partnering Geoffrey in the longest mixed doubles match of them all?
I do not really expect to see Geoffrey and it is therefore a surprise to look through a gap in the privet and catch sight of my erstwhile beau chasing a high lob which drops inches inside the base line.
‘Hard luck!’ he calls. ‘Just out.’
‘Geoffrey!’ I shout. ‘Yoo hoo, it’s me!’
Geoffrey whips round like a dog hearing the word ‘walkies’ and his eyes probe the privet. He sees me and his eyes light up. ‘Rosie!’ There is a heart-stabbing choke in his voice as he throws his racket aside and starts to run towards me. It is ever so romantic. Just like those bits in the films when the two lovers run towards each other in slow motion. The only difference is that, in the films, one of the lovers does not catch his toe in the top of the net as he tries to vault it. Yes, thank goodness they are playing on a grass court otherwise it might have been serious. Geoffrey ploughs about five yards into the tramlines but gets away with a green nose turning to bright red at the tip.
‘Blast!’ he says. ‘I knew that bloody net was too high. None of my first serves were going in. How are you, Rosie? You’re looking super. Lovely and brown. I have missed you. How – oh –’ He looks at Penny and dries up. I don’t know what it is about her. She is wearing her normal kit of slightly too-tight jeans and a denim shirt with most of the buttons undone.
‘This is Penny Green,’ I say. ‘You have met – fleetingly.’
‘Yes,’ says Geoffrey. ‘I mean, oh yes. How could I ever forget?’ He stares at Penny and swallows hard.
‘Are you going to finish this game, old boy?’ says the man he is playing with. ‘You’re love-five down and fifteen-forty.’
‘Er – no,’ says Geoffrey, feeling his nose tenderly. ‘Let’s call it a draw, shall we? The light’s getting pretty bad anyway.’
‘Dammit, Wilkes!’ says the other man, throwing his racket on the ground. ‘I’ve never finished a game with you yet! How are we ever going to complete the club ladder?’
But Geoffrey does not reply. He opens a gate beside the court and lets Penny and me into the grounds. ‘Jolly lucky you turning up like this,’ he says. ‘There’s a hop on tonight. You’ll be just what the doctor ordered.’
‘I’m not dressed for dancing,’ says Penny, plucking at the front of her shirt.
Geoffrey flushes. ‘Oh, that’s all right. It’s nothing very swish. Anyway, I think you look super just the way you are.’
‘How sweet of you,’ says Penny.
‘Oh it’s nothing.’ Geoffrey twiddles his racket so fast that he drops it on the ground. ‘Would you – er care for a shandy or something? The bar should be open about now.’
‘That would be lovely,’ says Penny. ‘A large gin and tonic would be absolutely divine.’
They go off together into the clubhouse and I breathe an enormous sigh of relief. Thank goodness they seem to have taken to each