A Sea Change (Quick Reads 2013) Page 2

  Jenna finally arrived at the terraced house where she lived. She had a bedsit on the third floor. She shared a bathroom and kitchen with six other people. Six other people who didn’t know how to use a dishcloth or bleach, or even flush the toilet, sometimes. She ended up cleaning up herself, even though they were supposed to take turns. It was either that, or live in squalor.

  She’d tried to make her room as nice as she could, but it was difficult. The carpet was green with mould in the corners. The wallpaper was ancient and coming off the wall in clumps. The windows let the cold in through the cracks in winter and turned the place into a sauna in summer. She couldn’t afford proper curtains, so she’d hung a pair of old sheets from the rail. On the walls, she’d stuck photos of her heroines: Marilyn Monroe and Dita von Teese – both glamorous pin-up girls not afraid to show off their curves. She tried to copy their image, but it was hard to look the part when you barely had enough money to keep body and soul together. Still, she always tried to wear a dress, and lipstick, and put her hair up, and this look usually helped to lift her spirits. If things were going badly, and you slobbed about in jeans and no make-up, you were bound to feel bad about yourself.

  No amount of dressing up took away her fear, though. She sat in the middle of her bed. It would only be a matter of time before the landlord came knocking. She didn’t have the money for her rent. Her stomach churned with dread. Where would she go if he kicked her out? She didn’t think she could get any lower. She’d left her mum’s house a year ago when their rows had got out of control. She’d thought she could stand on her own two feet. It was much harder than she thought.

  Jenna thought about phoning her mates and meeting them at the pub, then she remembered she wouldn’t be able to afford a drink. She was penniless. Someone would buy her one, of course they would, but she didn’t want to feel like a scrounger. She flopped back down onto the mattress. The room smelled stale. The air was almost too hot to breathe. Everyone was saying what a fantastic weekend it was going to be, with soaring temperatures and fun in the sun.

  There wasn’t going to be any fun on the third floor of 21a Boscombe Terrace.

  It was after his second beer that Craig began to miss Michelle.

  He knew it would happen. The first drink relaxed you. By the second, your defences were down and emotions started to kick in. It would take another two or three beers to blot out the feelings altogether, but Craig didn’t want to get drunk. He was going to have to put up with how he felt.

  They’d gone out for five years, Craig and Michelle. It had been a very easy relationship with no drama. They enjoyed each other’s company and liked the same things. Then six months ago she’d been offered the chance to run a hairdressing salon at a big glitzy hotel in Dubai.

  The salon she had run in Birmingham city centre was struggling. She’d had to let valued staff go. She’d cut back on the cleaning and the number of towels they used. She hated cutting corners but she had no choice. People just weren’t spending the money any more. They were going three months, even longer, without having their colour done, or doing it themselves at home. She was worried that the shop was going to go under. Then the opportunity of a lifetime had come along. Craig had had no second thoughts.

  ‘You have to take it,’ he told her. ‘You hate your job at the moment. It’s depressing. Dubai will be an awesome chance for you.’

  Michelle and Craig were sensible enough to realise that their relationship wouldn’t survive the separation. Neither of them wanted the pressure or the guilt of trying to maintain it in the long term.

  ‘I don’t want you to get out there and feel you can’t have fun,’ Craig told her.

  ‘And I don’t want you to mope around because I’m not there,’ said Michelle.

  So they agreed to part, but as friends. He drove her to the airport. She hugged him tight at the departure gate, and cried a bit, but he could tell she was excited about her new life. They’d agreed he would go out there at Christmas if neither of them had found someone else. Neither of them had so far, but Craig didn’t think he would go. Long-distance relationships never worked. He’d seen the pictures she’d posted on Facebook and it felt as if he was looking at a stranger. They went on Skype from time to time too, but he found it upsetting. It just reminded him of what he was missing.

  He’d been too caught up with the investigation to find anyone else. His mates egged him on when they went to the pub in Everdene for a drink. They thought he should find someone new, but he didn’t want to force it. He wasn’t one for one-night stands, not like some of his friends who went out with a different girl every time they came down to Devon. Maybe this weekend he should start to have a look round, he thought.

  Not tonight, though. He wanted to wind down and get a decent night’s sleep so that he could make the most of the weekend. Craig watched the waves roll in towards the shore. There would be plenty of time for pulling. He had the whole week, after all.

  At half past nine, there was a bang on Jenna’s door. It was so loud that she jumped off the bed, her heart thumping. She realised she had fallen asleep. She did that a lot these days. Being asleep was so much better than being awake. Her mouth went dry with fear. The knock came again, even louder. She thought about pretending that she wasn’t in.

  ‘Oi!’ There was a shout from the other side of the door. She knew that voice only too well. ‘I know you’re in there. Open up.’

  The landlord probably did know she was in there. He had spies everywhere. She didn’t trust any of the other tenants in the house.

  ‘OK!’ she called out, and hated how weedy her voice sounded.

  She opened the door. The Prof was standing there. They called him The Prof because of his thick, black-rimmed glasses. Not because he was clever, unless you counted ripping desperate people off as clever. He was wearing a grubby white shirt, jeans and scuffed black slip-on shoes. Anyone would think he was on the breadline too.

  ‘You got something for me?’ He wandered in as if he owned the place. Which – technically – he did, but it was her room. He should respect her privacy.

  Jenna swallowed hard.

  ‘I’m really sorry,’ she stammered. ‘My boss wouldn’t pay me. I haven’t got the rent money. I’ll get it for you by Monday. I promise.’

  He made a clicking noise with his tongue behind his teeth.

  ‘You’re already behind. I’m going to have to start charging you interest.’

  ‘I can’t afford to pay you interest. I can’t afford the rent as it is.’

  He shrugged.

  ‘It’s not my problem.’

  He walked over towards the window and looked around, then nodded.

  ‘It’s a big room, this. Too big for one. I could probably get a family in here. Not waste it on someone who won’t pay up.’

  He was threatening her, Jenna realised. How did he expect her to find the money? There was no point in asking him for sympathy. Men like him didn’t care. How did he sleep at night, she wondered? Better than she did, probably.

  She looked at him, and her stomach turned. He must rake in a fortune with all the money he took. What did he spend it on? He certainly didn’t spend it on his clothes, or his hair, which needed a good cut, not to mention a wash. Or his car either – she’d seen him drive round in a battered old Ford Mondeo. She wondered where he lived, and if he had a wife, or any kids. She pitied them if he did.

  Sometimes Jenna wondered if there were any decent men in the world.

  He was walking towards her wardrobe, opening it up, looking through her stuff with that stupid grin on his face.

  ‘Get out of my wardrobe,’ Jenna told him.

  He looked up. His hands were mauling her clothes, all the vintage dresses she’d bought in charity shops and at jumble sales and from eBay. ‘Just seeing if there’s anything I could take instead of cash . . .’

  She stepped towards him.

  ‘There isn’t anything. I’ve told you. I’ll get the rent money.’

  He
raised an eyebrow.

  ‘Yeah?’ He looked her up and down. She shuddered as she felt his gaze undress her. She knew what he was thinking. She folded her arms across her chest. She didn’t have to take this unspoken threat. He was a bully.

  ‘Where do you get off, treating people like this?’

  The Prof took a step back, surprised by her outburst.

  ‘Like what?’

  ‘Bullying them. Not just me, either. I’ve seen you bully that woman downstairs – the one with the baby. Does it make you feel good?’

  He scowled, slamming the wardrobe door shut.

  ‘All I want is what’s owed to me. Nothing wrong with that.’

  He came towards her with a smile. He reached out his hand and ran the back of his fingers down her cheek. His breath was stale and sour.

  ‘Get me the rent. By Monday. And if I were you, I’d keep your opinions to yourself.’

  Jenna jerked her head away. She could see that she’d rattled him. Something she’d said had touched a nerve. At least he hadn’t mentioned interest. Even so, she still didn’t have the rent. She hadn’t got anything to sell. No jewellery, no nice watch, no computer, fancy phone or iPod. Those had all gone ages ago. At least she’d bought herself some time, though.

  He looked at her steadily. She could see the stubble starting to poke through on his chin.

  ‘I’ll be back first thing on Monday.’

  She thought he was probably enjoying torturing her. It’s not as if he needed the money that much. He owned several houses around the town. He must be coining in thousands a week. He could afford to wait. If she pointed out that fact, she knew what he’d say. ‘If I let you get away with it, they’ll all want to pay late.’

  At last he left the room. Jenna hadn’t thought that she was going to get rid of him that easily, but maybe he had someone else to pick on. Her landlord was scum. He wasn’t the only one of his kind around, though. There were quite a few ‘entrepreneurs’ in Tawcombe who’d bought up the big old Victorian houses that had been so splendid in their heyday. Especially now the town was a run-down seaside resort filled with unemployed and disillusioned people with no hope of escape. The landlords slapped up chipboard walls and cheap kitchens and crammed in as many tenants as they could find.

  Jenna certainly wasn’t the only person struggling. There were no decent jobs out here in the sticks. You could pick up casual work during the summer season if you were lucky, but there was slim chance of a proper career. She’d wanted to go to college but her mum had just laughed. She’d refused to support Jenna while she studied.

  ‘Cheers for that, Mum,’ she thought bitterly, though she shouldn’t have been surprised. Her mum had never gone out of her way to help her with anything. Jenna had thought she’d be able to make a better life for herself on her own, but her plan had backfired big time. She was worse off now than she’d ever been, but no way was she going to go crawling back home. She knew she could just step outside and get on the bus that would take her two miles up the road to the estate where her mum lived, but she couldn’t bear the thought of the look on her mum’s face.

  ‘Look what the cat’s brought in,’ she could hear her mother saying gleefully.

  Never, thought Jenna. I’m never going back there. Instead, she had to find nearly four hundred quid by Monday morning, or she’d be out on the pavement surrounded by what little she had left.

  Her landlord, The Prof, didn’t make idle threats. She knew that for certain.

  When night had fallen, the beach was wrapped in a soft navy-blue blanket spattered with stars. Craig unrolled his sleeping bag and curled up on one of the bunks in the beach hut, leaving the door slightly open. It was unlikely that anyone would try to get in, and he loved to go to sleep with the sound of the waves in the background. It was so soothing, more soothing than any lullaby. He loved the sound of the constant ‘shushing’ as the tide went in and out.

  He checked the weather forecast on his phone before he fell asleep. Tomorrow was set fair. He’d get up early and hit the surf before anyone else.

  Two minutes after his head hit the pillow, Craig was asleep.

  Jenna was still wide awake at midnight. Her room was stifling, but if she opened her window the noise came in from outside the pub opposite. Her mind was whirling as she thought about the unfairness of the day. The full weight of being sacked was gradually beginning to hit her. Not only did she not have the money for the rent – her immediate problem – but what was she going to live on?

  As she closed her eyes and tried to shut out the laughter of the pub-goers, her mind began to wander. What was the point of playing by the rules? It didn’t seem to get you anywhere. The people she knew who’d done best in life, like The Prof, didn’t seem to bother. Her family had never played it straight, any of them. They were on to every scam going, and they were all as happy as Larry. If you played it straight, it seemed as if you just sank to the bottom.

  How was she going to get out of this trap? There would be no work going in Tawcombe for the rest of the summer. All the jobs were already taken. Maybe she could move to a bigger place? Bamford was the nearest big town, but she couldn’t see a life for herself there. She didn’t know anyone, for a start. Or a bigger city? Plymouth? Exeter? The thought of that terrified her. She’d only really known Tawcombe her whole life.

  Jenna sighed. She was stuck here. She couldn’t even afford a lottery ticket.

  She turned onto her side and curled her legs up, tucking herself into a ball. All she could think about was The Prof’s face on Monday morning. She bet he was hoping she wouldn’t have the money. She was sure he enjoyed kicking people out of his scuzzy rooms so that he could lure someone else in and get the deposit from them.

  Even if she found a job tomorrow morning, she couldn’t get the money she needed in time. Nobody would pay her in advance. There were girls she knew who would know how to get that kind of money quickly. In a seaside town, there were always ways that you could supplement your income. Jenna wasn’t going to take that path. Once you got into that, there was no way out. Anyway, the thought made her skin crawl. If she’d wanted to sell herself, she’d have made a deal with The Prof already . . .

  As she felt the music from the pub pound through her body, she began to turn over possibilities in her mind.

  Five minutes later, Jenna sat up as an idea occurred to her. Her heart thumped. Was it crazy? It seemed so simple. Of course it was wrong, but in the grand scheme of ‘wrong’, it was way down the scale. There were far, far worse things she could do.

  She asked herself which was better – to be straight and penniless, or crooked and in the black, as far as money was concerned? She’d spent enough time already being the former, and it had nothing to recommend it. She’d always had a clear conscience, but you couldn’t eat a strong set of moral values.

  The more she thought about it, the more enticing her idea became.

  As she went over the details and eventually drifted off to sleep, she told herself she only had to do it once, just once, until she got herself back on her feet.

  Chapter Four

  There was nothing more perfect than waking up by the sea and watching the sunrise.

  Every time he saw it, Craig couldn’t believe how lucky he was. By six o’clock in the morning, the copper from the Midlands was walking towards the sea with his surfboard tucked under his arms, his footprints in the damp sand the first of the day. He reached the water’s edge.

  The white frill of surf had looked like nothing from the hut, but once he got up close he realised the waves were pretty big. He ran straight into the water without stopping. His breath was taken away for a split second by the cold, but he carried on, paddling out behind the waves.

  He surfed for nearly an hour. Craig was no expert and he envied the surfers who cut through the water with grace and elegance, as if they were at one with the waves. He knew that came with years of practice. These guys were devoted. They surfed every day, in all conditions. They were fanat
ics.

  He’d heard their tales in the bar often enough. They told him about the surfing hot spots as far away as Hawaii, India and Australia, and their stories inspired him. He admired their devil-may-care attitude to life. They lived to surf. That was it. They picked up work when they could, where they could. They didn’t worry about anything else. They had no responsibilities.

  That kind of mindset didn’t really suit him, being in the police. Until recently, Craig figured he had the best of both worlds. Where were these guys going to be in their old age? None of them would have a pension, just their memories. It was only now that he’d started to have doubts, to begin thinking differently, that he wondered about whether he’d really got it right.

  Craig had given everything to his career. He loved his home town, and he’d wanted to contribute to its future. He wanted to make it a safe place, to protect his fellow townspeople from harm, to give them hope. Someone had once given him hope, after all, which was why he was lucky enough to be here now, enjoying the crystal-clear water.

  By the time he got back to the beach hut with his surfboard, the early-morning sun had nearly dried him off after his dip in the sea. He pulled on his jeans and walked up the beach to the café in the arcade, taking a table outside. He ordered a surfer’s breakfast of bacon, sausage, egg, mushrooms, tomato, beans, hash browns, toast and a pot of tea.

  A guy he knew vaguely, Rusty, pulled up a chair next to him and sat down. That was the great thing about Everdene. You didn’t see someone for months, but when you bumped into them, it was as if you’d seen them yesterday.

  ‘Hey, buddy, how’s it going?’

  Rusty was from South Africa and was a photographer. He took pictures of the sea, blew them up onto canvas and sold them out of a camper van on the front. The tourists loved these shots, which funded Rusty’s lifestyle. He didn’t have to answer to anyone. He’d helped Craig out when he’d started surfing last summer. And Craig knew he would never be as good as Rusty could be in the water.