Looking Good Dead Read Free Page A

facings hadn’t yet been ravaged by woodworm or the weather. It was a quiet street with a small parade of shops near the top, mostly lived in by youngish couples with kids, apart from Len and Hilda Wainwright, who had retired here from Birmingham on their doctor’s suggestion that the sea air would be good for Hilda’s asthmatic chest. Tom held the view that cutting down on her forty fags a day might have been a better option.
    He pulled his Audi into the tight space in his carport, alongside Kellie’s rusting Espace, pocketed his mobile phone and climbed out, grabbing his briefcase and the flowers. The newsagent across the street was still open, as was the small gym, but the hair salon, ironmonger and estate agency were closed for the day. Two teenage girls stood at the bus stop a short way down, dolled up for a night out, miniskirts so short he could see the start of their buttocks. Feeling a distinct prick of lust, his eyes lingered on them for a moment, following their bare legs up as they shared a cigarette.
    Then he heard the sound of the front door opening, and Kellie’s voice calling out excitedly, ‘Daddy’s home!’
    As a marketing man, Tom had always been good with words, but if anyone had asked him to describe how he felt this moment, every weekday night, when he arrived home to the greeting from the people that meant everything in the whole world to him, he doubted he could have done it. It was a rush of joy, of pride, of utter love. If he could freeze one moment of his life, it would be this, now, as he stood in the open doorway, feeling his kids’ tight hugs, watching Lady, their Alsatian, holding her lead in her mouth, hope on her face, stamping a paw on the ground, tail the size of a giant redwood swinging wildly. And then seeing Kellie’s smiling face.
    She stood in the doorway in denim dungarees and a white T-shirt, her face, framed by a tangle of blonde ringlets, all lit up with her wonderful smile. Then he gave her the pink, yellow and white bouquet of flowers.
    Kellie did what she always did when he gave her flowers. Her blue eyes sparkling with joy, she turned them around in her hands for a moment, going ‘Wow, oh wow!’ as if they genuinely were the most beautiful bunch she had ever seen. Then she brought them to her nose – her tiny, pert little nose he had always loved – and sniffed them. ‘Wow! Look at these. Roses! My favourite flowers in my favourite colours. You are so thoughtful, my darling!’ She kissed him.
    And on this particular evening her kiss was longer, more lingering than usual. Maybe he’d get lucky tonight? Or, God forbid, he thought for a moment as a cloud momentarily slid across his heart, she was prepping him for news of some insane new purchase she had made today on eBay.
    But she said nothing as he went in, and he could see no box, no packing case, no crate, no new gadget or gizmo. And, ten minutes later, relieved of his sticky clothes, showered and changed into shorts and a T-shirt, his see-sawing mood resumed its steady, if temporary, upward trend.
    Max, seven years, fourteen weeks and three days old ‘xactly’, was into Harry Potter. He was also into rubber bracelets and proudly sported white make poverty history, and black and white anti-racism stand up‒speak up ones.
    Tom, pleased that Max was taking an interest in the world even if he didn’t fully understand the significance of the slogans, sat on the chair beside his son’s bed in the little room with its bright yellow wallpaper. He was reading aloud, making his way through the books for the second time, while Max, curled up in his bed, his head poking out of his Harry Potter duvet, blond hair tousled, his large eyes open, absorbed everything.
    Jessica, four, had toothache and had gone into a sudden strop, and was not interested in a story. Her bawling, coming through the bedroom wall, seemed impervious to Kellie’s efforts at calming her down.
    Tom finished the chapter, kissed his son goodnight,