Bad Company(11)

I loved Diane’s house, but it made me feel so homesick, reminding me so much of the lovely house we once had on a tree-lined street not too far from here.

‘Your old man got a job yet, Blythe?’ Ralph Aird shouted across the playground one day. He put on a posh voice. ‘Or should I say a “position”.’ Then he laughed. It was more of a cackle actually.

Actually J.B. hadn’t, and that was making me angrier every day. Mum was out working so hard and all he seemed to do was sit at home watching Margo and sending out CVs. But I wasn’t going to admit that to the awful Ralph.

‘He’s got an “executive” position actually,’ I lied. (Why did I always do that?) ‘In a bank.’

Ralph Aird would never find out any different anyway, I thought. The only time he’d ever be in a bank would be to rob it.

He strode across the playground towards Diane and me. He looked smug. So smug I felt my stomach churn.

‘Sure about that are you?’ He said it as if he knew something I didn’t.

‘Of course I am,’ I said defiantly.

He glanced around at his mates. They all sniggered. ‘I think you should visit the supermarket after school. I think they might have a special offer on you’d be well interested in. Eh boys?’

He turned away and swaggered off, his mates trailing behind him, still sniggering.

‘What do you mean by that!’ I yelled after him, but he wouldn’t answer.

I looked at Diane. ‘What do you think he’s up to?’

‘Has J.B. started work in the supermarket without telling you?’ She called him J.B. now too.

I shook my head. ‘He’s been for interviews, but he never gets anywhere. Who’d want to employ a jailbird?’ I said. ‘But he and Mum had been talking about some job he was considering. He’d said he might have to take it.’

‘If he’s only stacking shelves he might be too ashamed to tell you about it.’

He wouldn’t tell me anyway, I thought. I never listened to him. Wasn’t interested and I made sure he knew it.

‘We’ll both go to the supermarket after school. Check it out.’

That’s the kind of friend she is, I thought.

‘And if he is only stacking shelves, he’ll get quite a shock when he sees you! He’ll be the one who’s embarrassed,’ she giggled.

‘I’ll die if he’s stacking shelves, Diane,’ I said. After everything I’d always said about him. Stacking shelves!

‘No you won’t,’ Diane said flatly. ‘You’ll just tell Ralph Aird he has got an executive position, but he’s got to get shop floor practice first.’

‘And anyway,’ she went on as we filed in to our next class. ‘you can’t be responsible for all the humiliating things your dad does.’

That was funny. It was what Murdo always said, and I told her so.

She just shrugged. ‘At least Rob Roy says some things that are sensible.’

But he wasn’t stacking shelves. We walked all round the supermarket, looked behind the bacon counter and the delicatessen, at the checkouts and the bakery and he was nowhere to be seen. I began to think that maybe he’d been promoted already. Either that or Ralph Aird was having me on.

‘I’ve had enough of this,’ Diane said in disgust. ‘Special offers. Two for the price of one. My mum would never shop here. She buys us all organic or free-range. Let’s have a coke and just go.’

So we headed for the burger bar in the supermarket. Burgers A GoGo. Where everybody my age went for the music and to laugh at the teenage assistants with their funny hats with bulls’ heads sticking out of them, and their stupid aprons. To make things even funnier they sped from table to table on roller skates. High Speed Service, it was called.

And that’s where we found him. Looking ridiculous with a laughing bull sticking out of the top of his hat and serving Ralph Aird and all his cronies. J.B. the executive. I stopped dead and couldn’t take my eyes off him. I would have run off then, but Ralph spotted me. He had obviously been looking out for me and he shouted loudly across the cafe and waved.

‘Hey Lissa, honey, how’s it going?’

J.B. was planting cokes on the table in front of them. I saw his back straighten before, slowly, he turned to face me. At least he had the decency to look mortified. Behind his back Ralph Aird laughed and mouthed to me, ‘Executive position!’ Then, to rub salt into it, he began to moo like a cow and all his friends joined in.

And then, as if all that wasn’t embarrassing enough, J.B. began to roller skate toward me. I almost died. Didn’t he know how stupid he looked? Didn’t he care? I turned and ran out as fast as I could. Didn’t turn even when he called after me.