An Endless Summer(71)

“Hi, Jan! Hi, Roy!” I beamed.

“You look really well, honey, been keeping you busy on the hill?”

“You know it.” I offered her a double-fingered pow-pow motion and thought, What is wrong with me? Music really must soothe the savage beast.

“How can we help you, young Amy?” Roy asked with a smile.

I wanted to grin evilly, but instead, I opted for cool, calm, and matter-of-fact, like I had rehearsed in the car. “Oh, I just need to run an errand.”

“Can I help?” Roy said.

“I hope so, I just need to pay some money on Sean’s account; he asked me to drop in.”

I waited, hoping I wasn’t met with confusion, as I had just assumed this would be the place. It was the sole store in town with a hardware section and I guessed that Sean would hold an account here.

“Ah, yes, of course, come through, come through.” Roy started towards the back of the store where all the home hardware and DIY essentials were housed.

Bingo!

Until now I hadn’t needed to use my account with my ‘essentials money’ from my parents. Aside from the odd food shopping and cleaning products, I hadn’t touched it at all. It was ridiculous, all that had happened to the hotel, all that had been cleaned, repaired and renovated thanks to Sean’s generosity… Well, it had to stop.

The money was to be used at my discretion so that’s what I was doing. Besides, it was for hotel stuff so I was sure my dad would approve. It’s not like I was going to Amcal to blow it all on Revlon products, however tempting it was.

Roy waddled behind the counter. A balding, portly man with bandy legs, Roy lived in his navy blue overalls, changing only his flannelette shirt every day to mix up the look.

He retrieved an A4, navy exercise book from under the counter. Opening it, he licked his thumb and flicked through the pages.

“Now let’s see, M for Murphy, Murphy, Murphy, Murphy … Ah, here we go!” He pointed to a page.

By this time, I had pulled out my cheque book and held my breath, bracing myself for the figure. I wasn’t completely sure what I could contribute to the cause; it all depended on how massive the damage was.

Roy spun the book around to face me. “That’s what’s owing. – how much did you want to put on it?”

I sighed with relief. The tally read $465. I had thought it would have been much worse than that, running into four figure sums, at least. This, I could do. I wanted to make a statement, and paying off a portion wasn’t as grand a gesture as leaving a clean slate.

As I wrote out the cheque, I envisioned the look on his face when he came in to pay the bill and grinned to myself. Now that I would like to see. I had absolutely no remorse filling out a cheque for the $465. I knew between the verandah, the locksmithing, and the paint, all that would have exceeded the $465 mark. I signed off and tore off the slip and handed it to Roy with a smile. It was like a huge weight had been lifted.

I wasn’t getting free labour or special treatment, I was paying my own way and it felt good. I would keep my smug knowledge to myself, though. I knew Sean would eventually find out but if he wanted to be Mister Cryptic, fall-off-the-back-of-a-truck, I could be Miss Oops, my-pen-slipped-on-my-cheque-book.

Roy wrote me out a receipt and sealed the deal by placing the cheque in the cash register and slamming it shut. I felt like I could face anything, until I heard my name.

“Amy?”





Chapter Thirty-Four



I could hardly believe what I was seeing.

A lean, Amazonian, modelesque woman stood in front of me in three-quarter-length Lycra pants and a black sports bra that exposed a flat, toned tummy.

She didn’t wear a skeric of make-up – she didn’t have to; her skin was radiant and flawless without it. The only thing that masked her face were the silken wisps of brown hair that fell from her sleek, perky ponytail, which fell to the middle of her back. But it was those eyes, those big, blue, innocent eyes that I would know anywhere – they were the only thing that hadn’t changed.

Once I had stopped gawking like an idiot I managed to voice the only thing that popped into my mind.

“Tammy Maskala?”

“Oh, my God, Amy!” She laughed and folded her arms around me, almost squeezing the life out of me. I wrapped my arms tentatively around her, and yep, she was toned all right.

“I knew it was you; I heard your voice and thought that has to be Amy Henderson.”

The last time I saw Tammy was a couple of years ago and, um … She’d changed somewhat.

She had morphed from a mousey, knock-kneed schoolgirl into a bronzed, Amazonian beauty queen.

“Wow, so what are you doing with yourself these days?” I asked, trying not to openly stare.