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‘Or I could not kiss him and save everyone a load of hassle.’
‘Don’t you want to kiss him?’
‘Not really. I don’t see what all the fuss is about, to be honest. I kissed Stuart Green once, just to see what it would be like, and that was enough for me.’
‘You never said anything! When was this?’
‘A couple of years ago.’
‘Did you fancy him?’
‘God, no! But I wanted to try it, so I invited him behind the gym building. It was horrible, all slobbery. I can’t see how anyone could find having someone else’s tongue in their mouth erotic.’
‘Wait and see,’ I tell her. ‘I think you’ll change your tune when the right guy comes along. Are you sure you don’t want to find out whether that’s Mark?’
‘Quite sure. Is it time for lunch?’
In the end, she doesn’t quite get her wish as, after the final game on our last morning, Mark envelops her in a massive hug and kisses her hard on the lips. I can see her eyes widen in surprise behind her sunglasses, but she doesn’t push him away. He looks delighted when they break apart; he’s obviously been building up the courage all week.
‘I can clearly see how much he doesn’t fancy you,’ I laugh, as she re-joins me on the sun loungers.
‘Oh, shut up. It was just a goodbye kiss. They probably kiss their friends on the lips all the time where he comes from.’
‘Mm. Do you think they do it that hard, and for that long? What was that, a full five seconds? Hardly a peck.’
‘I don’t know! I wasn’t counting.’
‘You didn’t seem to mind.’
‘Oh, stop! I’ll say it, okay? It was nice. There wasn’t any horrible slobbery tongue in it. In fact, there wasn’t any tongue in it at all. There, do you feel better?’
I’ve paid extra for a late checkout, so we’re able to shower and wash the sand off before the bus collects us to take us back to the airport for our evening flight home. I’ve really enjoyed spending the week with my sister, and it’s nice to see her glowing from the sun and looking so relaxed as the bus trundles around to collect everyone else. As the plane takes off, my thoughts turn to home and the week ahead. I know Paul loves the static caravan in Whitstable, and I do enjoy walking along the seafront to the harbour and on towards Tankerton, but the caravan itself is a bit tired and smells faintly of damp. It’s the kind of smell that gets into the fabric of your clothes, and I have to wash everything several times with strong fabric conditioner to get rid of it when I come home. I’m trying to work out what is the shortest time I can spend down there without offending him. He always tries to get me to come down for the whole week, and I have to invent reasons why I can’t. I reckon I can buy myself a couple of days for just getting straight after coming back from Mallorca, and then I’ll need next weekend to get ready to go back to work, so I might see if I can sell Wednesday to Friday to him.
* * *
It’s very late when we get back home, but Nan and Grandad are still up, waiting for us. As soon as they see the light from my headlights turning in to their small driveway, they fling open the front door and come out to greet us.
‘Did you have a lovely time?’ Nan asks, after she’s hugged us both.
‘We did, thanks. Turns out Katie’s quite the beach volleyball player,’ I tell her.
‘Really?’ Nan turns to Katie in surprise.
‘We’ll just grab our bags, and then we’ll tell you all about it. Why don’t you go in and put the kettle on?’
As we’re getting our stuff out of the boot, Katie turns to me.
‘Don’t tell them about Mark kissing me, will you? We’ll never hear the end of it if you do.’
‘Don’t worry,’ I smile. ‘As someone said to me a week or so ago, “What goes on tour stays on tour.”’
It’s after midnight by the time we’ve filled Nan and Grandad in on the sanitised version of our holiday, and I can feel my eyelids drooping. Katie is yawning too, so we make our excuses and head to bed.
‘I almost forgot,’ Grandad says, as I’m kissing him goodnight, ‘there’s some post for you. Looked important. I’ll just go and grab it.’
‘Leave it,’ I tell him. ‘I’ll have a look at it in the morning. I’m sure it’s nothing so urgent that it won’t keep for another day.’
‘Okay. It’s on top of the microwave in the kitchen if you change your mind.’
