The Grey Man

CHAPTER FIVE

Tesco was round the corner from Specsavers where Linda worked. She liked to meet him off the bus each night but as it was so cold and wet, Kevin had called her at lunchtime and said they would meet in the supermarket. They did their weekly shop on Friday nights.

Linda took the car to work as Specsavers had free staff parking round the back. Since Kevin finished work an hour earlier than she did, he took the bus to her so they could drive home together. He could have taken the bus all the way, but their ten-year-old Fiesta was on its last legs. Sometimes he had to get under the bonnet before it would start. Anyway, he liked to chat to Linda as they drove home together or went round the supermarket.

The next stop was his. As he got up, he spotted Linda in the doorway of the dry cleaner's. She looked lovely in her black coat, with her shoulder-length dark brown hair blowing across her face. So what if they had been geeks at school? They weren't now. Or, at least, Linda wasn't. He loved her, and always had, even at school. But he had been twenty before he had plucked up the courage to ask her out.

Linda looked up and saw him. She waved and smiled, her cheeks pink with cold. Kevin felt so lucky to have her. He ran down the stairs, jumped off the bus and was in the doorway with her. They kissed and Linda opened her umbrella. The wind turned it inside out. Kevin helped her to put it right.

'Why didn't you wait in Tesco's? Look at you, you're all wet.'

They walked off arm in arm towards the supermarket.

'I wanted to make sure you didn't get too wet. I thought I'd come to the rescue with what's left of my umbrella,' Linda told him. Like Kevin, she always made every effort to spend a few extra minutes with her other half. Kevin felt a surge of love for her. Neither of them had ever been out with anyone else. So what if other people thought they were geeks? So long as they had each other, it didn't matter. Occasionally, Kevin would lie in bed in the middle of the night and worry about what life would be like if she wasn't there. What if she left him? Or got ill and died? 'Come on. Let's get the shopping done and go home,' he said.

As they walked up to Tesco, Kevin said, 'I just met Debs on the bus. From school, remember?'

Of course Linda remembered. Debs had been the really pretty punk that all the boys fancied and all the girls had wanted to look like. 'You fancied her, didn't you?'

'Nah, not really. Well, OK. Everyone did. Not that she would have looked at me.'

'How is she? I never liked her.'

Kevin kept it brief. He didn't say Debs had been taking the piss out of his haircut. And his wife. 'She seemed OK, I suppose. Now, what shall we get for tea?'