CHAPTER 80
With a shout from Stevie of ‘Don’t be a stranger, lass!’, I stepped out of the bus and into the car, Jon in the driver’s seat once more. As I settled down in the back seat, Di called to me over her shoulder.

“Hiya, Deb! Hop in. I was just about to start the third degree on Jonny boy here. About a certain fellow officer who officially officiates in our office, sort of thing”

Rhys, of course; you teasing cow. I wondered what Jon felt about being the butt of her humour, but he seemed fine with it. I picked my words carefully, thinking of Gemma’s uncertainty.

“Yeah, some of the girls will be a bit disappointed. Gemma in particular”

Di looked back again, her confusion evident.

“I thought she was all into George North?”

“Yeah, but he’s the figure on the pedestal, isn’t it? Rhys was the one they could touch”

As Diane chuckled something including that last word of mine, our driver made a token-man protest.

“Hey! What about me?”

He almost seemed disappointed, and I suddenly remembered a cheeky comment from Gemma, about liking her beef by the mouthful.

“Gemma likes beef, not veal!”

Diane prodded him some more, and it was so apparent that she really cared for what she had called her fresh meat. The teasing was there, but it went so far, and no further, and it almost pushed Cooper from the centre of my thoughts… and where on Earth did the motorway go? We were in the outskirts of Cardiff, almost home, and of course they took me all the way. I made sure they understood their own obs, to turn up for a meal at least once, that Jon was, in Stevie’s words, not to be a stranger, and then they were gone.

I stood at the kerb for a couple of minutes, before I made my decision, walking away from the House and into Ruth’s. Kim was behind the counter, and she understood at once. There was a table free at the back, and she sat me there with a pot of tea appearing immediately afterwards, before I was joined by Ruth, and then Kim as the last of the queue was served.

Ruth looked broken, and she took my hands in hers a little too firmly.

“We saw the news, love. Why didn’t you go for anonymity? You would have been entitled to it, you know”

I was crashing now, Diane and Jon’s humour away with their car, and Kim clearly saw my mood as harshly as I felt it. I had the words, somewhere, but they took a while to struggle through all the other things I needed to scream.

Finally…

“Charlie. Charlie and Tiff, and Paula, and Jazz and Nell. If they could do it, I had to. Show the world who he is, what he is, aye?”

A few deep breaths.

“That footballer as well. He did it. I had to”

Then it was there, the core of everything.

“Cooper, yeah? He had to bloody well SEE. He had to know what I thought of him, and when he said… when he said he loved me…”

Kim was shaking her head, almost in sorrow, and she put a finger to my lips, cutting me off before I could really disintegrate.

“What are you doing tonight? Your boss was on the phone, then in here. Hour ago. He saw the news as well”

“Oh shit”

Kim was shaking her head rapidly.

“No, no, Deb. Not like that, not at all. All he said was that he wanted you to take a few days off. He said he might call round here again”

It seemed the genie was well out of the bottle, and a few minutes after Kim had set a bowl of hotpot down in front of me, Bert walked in. Being the gentleman I knew hm to be, he made a little gesture to me as he stood by the door: okay to have a chat?

I nodded him over, and Kim served him with a cuppa as I finished the last bit of stew and potatoes.

“You okay, Debbie?”

I nodded.

“Seems like everyone’s asking me that, Bert”

“Well, loads of us saw the news. Brian Dennahy and that, big news, it is. You should have told me, love. No!”

I had started to object, and he stopped me dead.

“Don’t want you driving for a couple of days, woman. What were you going to do tonight?”

I shrugged, wondering if my slowly crystallising decision to get utterly pissed would raise any problems, and he seemed to read my mind.

“Harry will have seen the news as well, love. Going to be a talking point for a while. What about that place in town you like? The pink place?”

It made sense, but of course I found my objections, concerns for my girls, getting unpacked, so on and so on, and Kim walked away with my bag, returning in twenty minutes with Charlie and Tiff. My first girl was clear and to the point.

“Gemma will cook tonight for the rest of them. Four of us will hit Marlene’s, and Phil will collect us later. Sorted”

I bit the bullet, as I couldn’t face Harry’s concern after what must surely be the outing of the century for his customers. That Debbie Wells, did you know…?

“Okay, then. Book a cab for now?”

Bert coughed.

“Got a people carrier outside, love. I was just dropping off some fitters for a breakdown. I’ll collect them after I drop you off, if that’s okay?”

He paused, seeming lost for words for the first time since I had met him, then he spoke on.

“Lads at work were talking when I came out, love”

My stomach lurched. So many years as Debbie, so easily lost, just so I could make one bastard squirm. That thought was overtaken immediately by everything I had been saying about needing Cooper to know. Stable doors and horses, Petrie.

“What have they said, Bert?”

He smiled, and there was more than a touch of pride in it.

“One of the lads, not saying who, he says ‘No wonder she could give such a good right hook’, and another lad, that Gethin with the tattoos on his neck, he says ‘Aye, and after what she’s been through, can anyone blame her?’. That’s the mood, girl. I choose who works for me, and you know that well. They have your back, as do I. All I want from you now is to take a little time to recover. Once you’re back to yourself, you call in, and we’ll let you know what jobs you’ve got. No arguments, okay?”

Everything was starting to crumble, and they could all see. I held it together, just, until we were on the road after Charlie and Tiff had joined us. Marlene saw us as we entered the Smugglers, and once again, it was a simple but emotional hug before the first pint was set in front of me. Bert had begged off coming in on the twin arguments of being absolutely straight and also driving for work, fitters to collect, etc, etc, but I knew, absolutely, that he simply wanted to leave me to let myself go with only my friends to witness it.

Friends there were, for Paul and Paula were soon there, and then Oily and Rosie, which set Kim all a-flutter until Charlie slapped her arm with a whisper of “Phil, yeah?”, and even with the presence of patches, I had a procession of other punters coming up with words of thanks and sympathy. It seemed to have been a major report on several channels, and I realised immediately what the difference was between their solicitude and what I might have expected at the Clifton.

This was all ‘Well done, girl’ from people who saw me as one of their own, who understood. I was finding out how much I needed that sense of belonging, and that evening it saved me from a complete collapse.

Paula cornered me while I was still sober, and she was smiling, pointing at Kim.

“That one’s a magician, Debbie. She tell you?”

I called Kim over.

“What you been doing, girl?”

“What, with Paula? Not me, is it? Blame Phil. One of his lecturers, yeah? He knows people on the nationals”

Paula snorted into her orange juice.

“You are starting to talk like a bloody media geek now, love! Debbie, he’s only gone and got me a deal with the bloody GUARDIAN!”

“Manchester Guardian?”

“Stopped being that decades ago, but yes, that one. They are going to serialise the first few chapters. Nationally! And they PUBLISH, books as well as the paper!”

Paul joined us, smiling away, and so clearly ‘with’ his ‘missus’ it was painful to see, his arm falling casually over her shoulder as he took a seat.

“Yup, Debbie. Getting the proofs sorted for them, and they’ve had one of their proper editors looking over the structure”

I tried to huff.

“What? My ideas not good enough?”

Paula laughed.

“He says they are spot on. It’s more my memory, keeping the timeline straight, that sort of thing. That and making sure we don’t print anything I could be sued for”

“What? Slandering Ashley fucking cunting fucking Evans…”

That was when it came to me that I was a bit more pissed than I had realised, but it still wasn’t anywhere close to being enough, so I had some more, and I was a late riser indeed the next morning. My schoolgirls were all gone, but Kim was there for breakfast, along with Rosie, which surprised me.

“Yeah, Oily drove us down in a van, and Rockrose and Elf will be down later with my bike. You don’t mind that I crashed here? Girls were okay”

“Stupid question from my bloody sister!. How pissed was I?”

“Not sure. You did get up in the disco, though, dancing to bloody Village People”

“Oh shit. Oh shit with fucking sugar on it”

“Never mind, woman. I’ve got photos, just in case. What are you doing today?”

“I…”

Diane’s present. I still had it. A memory came to me, not as an ambush, but one about Graham and Malcolm.

“Got an idea. It will be all the girls, and we’ll need to get the bus from Queen Street; don’t think driving’s safe for me today. Need to do some phone calls, but, well, this evening it’ll be. The day? I think I need a dose of doing absolutely fuck-all. Got some books to read, sounds to play, ibuprofen to swallow”

Rosie grinned when I explained my idea, telling me how glad she was to see the old Debbie back. Two hours later, and she was off with her sisters as I settled down to a prolonged session of getting my soul back.

I am frolicsome, I am easy…

Phone calls made, we gathered at Queen Street for the bus to Penarth, and made our way down to the beach. Gemma turned up shortly afterwards, driven by Frank, who took me to one side.

“I watched the news, Debbie. Explained a lot, that did”

“Explained what I am as well, Frank”

“Yeah. Same as Gemma, and she’ll be off out with her man at the weekend again, just like any other woman. I’m watching you, though, and you’re still not there yet. So… Well, talk to me, some day; talk to me when you are back with us properly”

“Thanks, mate. I do appreciate it, but, well. Anyway, last four have arrived”

Jazz, Nell, Paula and Paul were making their way down to the water’s edge, where we were all standing, a number of puzzled looks in evidence, so I took out Diane’s gift after hugging my hellos.

“Right, you lot, this is something I got from Diane. A couple of northern oiks complained that this is a crap beach, and compared to where they lived, trust me, it really is, but it is so much better for what we are going to do”

I described Di’s wedding eve, how her friend Bridget had handed her a pebble, given instructions, and then I spread my arms wide, indicating all the pebbles while holding up Di’s present.

“She gave me this, along with instructions. This beach is full of suitable stuff, and so, before you make your own selection, this pebble here, this, is Charlie fucking Cooper. DO I WANT HIM?”

By the time we had all finished, I think we must have thrown half the beach away.