Page 66 of The Cocktail Bar
“Stand back, this is my moment,” said Georgina. She felt around the door frame for the cupboard light switch once Blake had put her kirby hair grips to good use and bust open the lock.
The others did as they were told, but despite her shifting and shuffling of paint and tools, rummaging in cardboard boxes and scavenging under the shelves, she could find nothing to fit the bill of a mysterious bottled elixir.
“Noooo!” she screamed, bringing her hands to her face and then falling into a heap on the floor. “It was here, I know it was here, the numpty’s moved it… there’s no other explanation… all this work… for nothing… for nothing!”
“I hate to point out the obvious, Georgina,” said Lennie, “but um, you kind of missed checking under those chequered blankets there.”
Georgina was Charlie Bucket.
This was her last shot at the golden ticket, the visit to the chocolate factory, the wrongs being put to rights, justice, and all things being fair in love as well as war. She peeped through the cracks of her trembling fingers, irked by the disloyalty of her emotions, and sure enough, there sat a cosy pile of tartan blankets on a shelf. My they looked guilty. How had she missed them? Was she colourblind or what?
Blake helped her to her feet and for once she didn’t shrug off another’s assistance in turn for her own independence, and besides, she was expecting now, she had to get used to this. The cupboard fell silent, and another kind of expectation shrouded the air, as she inched herself forward, slowly, hardly daring to believe her luck could truly be in, after all. She slid her hand between two of the heavy weaves, felt to the left, felt to the right and then wedged her arm in further, and there it was, the beautiful, quite unmistakable shape of a bottle.
“Quick, guys, help me separate the blankets. I think I’ve got her!”
Lennie and Blake shuffled forward, one holding the top blanket up, the other pulling the bottom blanket down, and Georgina carefully slid a bottle full of opaque liquid out of its snug hiding place, holding it gently aloft to the light bulb as if that might give them all a clue as to its contents. But there was no label, and there were no distinguishing features. It was simply a bottle containing fluid that was so clear you could literally hold the original Spanish handwritten message the other side of it, and read every word it had to say.
“Now what?” said Blake.
“Back to The Guinevere for Part Two, of course,” said Lennie, cramming the blankets back onto the shelf.
“Can Zara come too?”
Georgina looked at Lennie to gauge his response. “How much have you told her?” he said.
“I’ve not quite gone into the rest of the details.”
“No is your answer then, Blake. You’ve gotta pace yourself, lad, with the ladies; in any case, never a good idea to chase.”
But then Georgina smiled, clutching the bottle to her wonderfully full breast.
“Oh, I think we can make an exception… just this once. Tamara couldn’t get down for the occasion and it would be rather nice to even things out with another female.”
Literal translation: at last, after all these months, hell, after all these years, he’s taking an interest in another woman, somebody other than Alice! It was like she’d always convinced herself; had Alice stayed around, had River not lured her off to stardom and bright lights, she’d have become almost mundane to him, a teenage crush fading into local obscurity with an equally low-profile hubby, round mumsy hips, a sensible beige Nissan Qashqai and a golden retriever.
And then the novelty of Georgina’s realisation wore off, for it quickly became apparent that she was now the sole holder of the grudge.
