Carole Hailey Extract from His Darling Sister
T
hey must have been eighteen or nineteen, too old to be called boys really but still too young to be men. They were outside a beer tent and, aware of their gazes wandering shamelessly over my legs, my breasts, my bum, I walked towards them. “Alright?” I said. “Hi,” one of them replied. I looked them over, assessing their suitability. Maybe this was the opportunity I had been waiting for. Two of them – including the one that had spoken – were okay-looking in a sort of ‘fifth member of a boy band whose name no-one remembers’ type way. Bland. Boring. Predictable. Not a lot of fun to be had with them. The third one was more interesting. Blonde, greasy hair, a line of pimples along his jaw line, he radiated vulnerability, low self-confidence, and hunger. Not hunger for food – if anything he was slightly chubby – but hunger for someone – anyone, other than his parents – to look at him and see the person lurking beneath his needy outer shell. I put my hand in my back pocket, fingering the £20 note Dad had given me and looked at him. “Buy me a drink?” I asked. He looked round to see if I was talking to someone else and when he looked back, I smiled, then bit my bottom lip, just a little bit. He laid his palm flat on his chest. “Me?” he said. “You mean me?” I dropped my chin and looked up at him through my eyelashes. “Only if you’ve got nothing better to do.” His two friends were staring at me in absolute shock. Take that,
carole hailey
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