02. STOCKINGS

Carol pulled the left fishnet up her thigh and clipped on the suspender. She cast a critical eye at her reflection in the mirror and thought “Not bad, considering…” She knew that Chris and her were having their problems but she thought that, with luck, they might just come through it unscathed. Despite the fact that she felt ridiculous, she’d decided to dress herself up in this ridiculous gear that he’d kept on buying for her birthdays and surprise him when he got home. She wasn’t sure any more whether he’d think it was a pleasant surprise, but she decided it was worth a go.

Chris and Carol had got together about three Christmases ago, in fact Christmas Day was kind of their anniversary. She was quite a bit older than he was, but he’d been nice to her when she’d worked behind the bar at the Oddfellows, and when the opportunity had presented itself as she’d been going round the pub collecting glasses after Arthur had called time, just after midnight, she’d taken her chance and pounced on him as he leant drunkenly against the fruit machine and he hadn’t put up too much of a fight.

The other lads had ribbed him of course, when they’d all reappeared for a swift lunchtime half the next morning, before staggering homewards to their turkeys and their tellys. Even in her own mind she’d probably reckoned on it lasting until New Year’s Eve, but somehow they’d gone way beyond that and, here they were, three years on, still sharing her little flat just down the road from the pub.

Money had been tight recently of course, but she supposed it was much the same for everybody. Her own nursing job kept a roof over their heads, but Chris had been laid off a few weeks ago and it didn’t look like they’d be needing him back any time soon.

In fact it had been her suggestion that she might try asking at the Oddfellows as to whether she might be able to work a few shifts again that had led to him storming out earlier. He’d been so angry when he left, and it was only when she thought about it afterwards that she’d realised that he hadn’t been angry at her, just at the fact that she was even having to consider extra work just because he felt so useless about the fact that he wasn’t earning himself. Then it dawned on her that, considering how they’d first got together, the one place he probably didn’t want her working was the Oddfellows.

She’d realised that it might be best if she tried to explain to him that she wasn’t like that any more, that she was perfectly happy with him and their relationship just the way it was, but she knew it was his pride that was hurting and his confidence made everyone else appear to be a better bet than him. If only he knew how she felt. If only he realised how much better her life was with him in it. She resolved to tell him that night. She’d popped down to the off-licence and made the most of a two-for-one offer they had on and picked up a couple of bottles of fizzy white, and then she decided to do herself up a bit to give him a nice fantasy welcome when he got in.

She knew he wouldn’t be that long. It was freezing outside and he didn’t enough cash to go to the Oddfellows to drown his sorrows.

Three hours later and her mood had changed for the worse. She’d opened the first bottle after an hour or so, but when she’d emptied that one and he still hadn’t appeared, she’d furiously popped the cork on the second bottle and sat alone in the darkness, raging and then sobbing in a seemingly endless cycle. Eventually, when she’d had enough of that, she stomped angrily back into the bedroom and tore off the stupid outfit she’d had on and changed into her usual T-shirt and leggings and thought about going to bed and ignoring him whenever he finally chose to show his stupid face.

Then she decided she’d wait up for him instead. He wasn’t going to get away with it that easily. She tottered woozily around the bedroom collecting the various bits and pieces of the so-called glamorous underwear that she’d been wearing and furiously shoving them back into the drawer where they’d lain undisturbed for so long, then she went back to the living room, sat down on the couch, poured herself the last of the wine and switched on the television to watch whatever happened to be on.

Out of the corner of her eye she spotted one of her discarded stockings. She’d obviously missed it when she was putting her stuff away. Suddenly she became aware of how ridiculous she must have looked earlier on, and started giggling to herself, realising how lucky she was that Chris hadn’t seen her like that. She staggered across the room and retrieved the foolish object, rolled it into a ball and, after a moment, started fiddling around with it and seeing just how many silly ideas she could come up with like they used to do in that old improv TV show. "A lovely hat", "some dangly earrings", "a blindfold". She was just investigating the possibilities of using the stocking as a catapult, using one of the discarded corks as ammunition, when the telephone rang.

She was so surprised that she accidentally fired the cork right at the phone and knocked the handset out of its cradle.

She could just make out the tinny voice saying “hello?”

Why on earth was Stu ringing her at this time of night?