Counting Chimneys: A novel of love, heartbreak and romance in 1960s Brighton (Brighton Girls Trilogy Book 2) Read online

  Counting Chimneys

  A novel of love, heartbreak and romance in 1960s Brighton

  Sandy Taylor

  Contents

  Dedication

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Chapter 46

  Chapter 47

  Chapter 48

  Chapter 49

  Chapter 50

  Chapter 51

  Chapter 52

  Chapter 53

  Chapter 54

  Chapter 55

  Chapter 56

  Chapter 57

  Epilogue

  Letter from Sandy

  The Girls from See Saw Lane

  Also by Sandy Taylor

  Acknowledgments

  Copyright

  To my children Kate and Bo.

  Love you all the world and tuppence on Sundays.

  1

  London 1969

  It was one of those lovely days that sometimes happen in March when the air is warm and people have left their coats at home, the daffodils are bobbing in the plastic buckets outside flower shops and you know that spring is just around the corner.

  I decided to walk back to my flat after work, rather than catching the bus as usual. The North London streets were busy with commuters, and I wove in and out of them, smiling at everyone and feeling so happy to be part of the city, a single girl with a career, living my life just how I wanted. I stopped at the corner shop to buy bread, milk, cheese and tomatoes and treated myself to a magazine.

  ‘You’re looking cheerful,’ said Mrs Spatchcock, the owner, suspiciously. She was suspicious of everyone because everyone, she said, was a potential shoplifter – even regulars like me.

  ‘I am cheerful,’ I replied, adding a tube of peppermints.

  ‘Huh,’ said Mrs Spatchcock. ‘Well you want to be careful going around smiling like that. The day’s not over yet. There’s still plenty of time for things to go wrong.’

  ‘Good day to you too,’ I said. She wasn’t going to bring me down, not that day.

  I cut through the park, smiling at the familiar characters that always seemed to be there: the man who hugged trees, the dog walker who must have had half the dogs in Islington running round her heels, young mothers with prams and the joggers who circled the park in a never-ending production line. If someone had told me four years ago that I could feel this happy I would have laughed at them, but I was happy. I had good friends, a great job on a music magazine and the nicest and kindest, not to mention sexiest, boyfriend in the whole world. I knew I was lucky, but now and again a niggling thought would nudge at my brain. I was happy, but did I deserve to be? Time for a Scarlett O’Hara moment: ‘I would think about that tomorrow.’ For now I was going to enjoy this beautiful day.

  I almost skipped along Victoria Terrace, past the tall Victorian houses with their long windows and their steps. I avoided the children playing marbles on the pavement and listened to ‘Hey Jude’ coming out of an open window. The cherry trees were just coming into blossom, and the grey paving slabs were already dotted with pink petals, like confetti. I said ‘hello’ to a couple of neighbours, trotted up the steps to the front door of number 59 and opened it with my key. I was met with the familiar mixture of smells: Mr Sheen furniture polish, bleach, Rive Gauche – the perfume that my friend Polly wore all the time – and cats.

  The two of us rented rooms in 59 Victoria Terrace. Our landlady, Evelyn Pierce, lived on the ground floor, and we had to go through her hall to reach the stairs. The telephone was mounted on the wall just outside her front room. This was a constant source of irritation, partly because it meant going up or down stairs every time we wanted to make a call or answer the phone, and partly because its location made it impossible to have a private conversation. Mrs P did not even bother trying to pretend she didn’t eavesdrop. It was her favourite pastime. She called it ‘taking an interest’, because she saw it as her duty to look after the moral well-being of Polly and me.

  There was a long wooden table against the wall beneath the telephone where the phone directories were stacked. This was where our post was laid out in the morning and where we left messages for one another.

  I stopped and picked up a letter addressed to me. There were also two yellow slips of paper, the kind reserved for telephone messages, with my name on: Dottie.

  Without looking at them, I went up two flights of stairs and into my room. It was not a large room, but it wasn’t small either, and although I had no say in the decor, which was entirely to Mrs P’s pink and peachy floral taste, I had added my own touches: posters and a couple of nice lamps from Habitat and throws over the furniture to tone it down a bit. I switched on the kettle to make tea then went over to the window, slid open the sash to let in the fresh air and the traffic noises and sat down to read my messages.

  The first made my stomach flutter with pleasure. It was written in Polly’s scrawled writing and said:

  Message for: Dottie

  Time: 5.15 p.m.

  From: Polly, your attractive housemate

  Message: Joe called (!!!) wants to meet you tonight he has a surprise for you am not supposed to say but it’s TICKETS TO SEE ‘THE WHO’ on April 23rd!!!!!!

  Action required: Call him back ASAP or I will

  Any other information: Knock on my door when you’re back I have BUNS!!!!

  I leaned my head back, letting my hair fall over the back of the chair. The sunlight was warm on my face. Could the day get any better? I wondered. I could have tea and buns and a good gossip with Polly and then, if the bathroom was free and there was still some hot water left, I’d have a bath and wash my hair, put on the amazing new maxi dress I’d bought in C&A earlier that week and then I’d go out and meet Joe – probably the most perfect boyfriend in the world – and he could surprise me with tickets to see one of my favourite bands in the whole world EVER, although I still remained loyal to Paul McCartney and… Who knows after that?

  I looked at the second message. This was in Mrs Pierce’s handwriting and was as curly and fussy as her wallpaper.

  It said:

  Message for: Miss D Perks, lodger

  Time: 10 a.m.

  From: Mrs E Pierce, landlady

  Message: Your sister Rita called to let you know the baby’s christening will be at 3 p.m. on April 23rd followed by a reception at her
house. As the chief godmother your presence is required all weekend.

  Action required: None. Await official invitation

  Any other information: Your sister sounds a dear. Why don’t you ever call her?

  2

  Joe and I were snuggled up together half watching Peyton Place. The little television took pride of place in the living room. Mrs P was always telling us how lucky we were to have access to a television, and we knew she was right. It was very small and you needed a reasonable amount of imagination to work out what the picture on the flickering screen was supposed to be. Right now Mia Farrow appeared to be walking through a white field at night, in the middle of a heavy snowstorm.

  We were the only two people in the living room, because it was our night for the couch. Polly and I had a rota pinned to the wall in the kitchen with our names on and our allocated nights. Mrs P allowed gentlemen callers, as she liked to call them, as long as they were gone by 10.30 p.m. sharp and they didn’t go within a mile of a bedroom.

  Joe nuzzled his face into my neck. ‘You smell nice,’ he said. ‘What is it?’

  ‘Polly’s Rive Gauche,’ I said.

  ‘Strange name for a perfume.’

  ‘No, I mean the name of the perfume is Rive Gauche, but it belongs to Polly. She let me borrow a couple of squirts earlier.’

  ‘Well it’s nice, whoever it belongs to.’

  ‘Thanks.’

  ‘And you look nice tonight.’

  ‘C&A bargain rail.’

  ‘You’re funny, do you know that?’

  ‘Yes, I rather think I do.’ The credits for Peyton Place rolled down the screen. ‘Fancy a coffee?’ I said.

  ‘Sounds good.’

  I stood up and stretched then walked into the little kitchen and filled the kettle. The water did its usual spitting as it came out of the tap. It used to make me jump in the beginning, but now I was so used to it that I thought something was wrong if it didn’t spit. Darkness was falling beyond the window; London was quietening down, settling in for the night. I lit the only gas ring on the cooker and waited for the kettle to boil. There was a film of grease halfway up the washing-up bowl, and the kitchen window needed a clean. Stockings hung over the drying rack overhead. Neither of us were very good at cleaning up – we were too busy being young and having fun to worry about that. Now and then Mrs P would come upstairs and have a grumble, and then we’d have a frantic clean up for fear she would chuck us out, but apart from those occasions, we were a bit lazy about the domestic arrangements.

  I thought about the nice things that Joe had just said about me. Now I was able to accept a compliment without making some smart-alec comment. If someone told me I looked nice, I believed them, which hadn’t always been the case. Polly said I still thought of myself as the fat girl, and she was probably right. I always made sure I laughed at myself before anyone else had a chance to. I wasn’t fat any more – I wasn’t exactly thin either – but I had accepted that the fat girl would always be a part of me. Life had taught me that there were more important things than how I looked.

  The kettle began to jump about and whistle. I sniffed the contents of the bottle of milk we kept in the cupboard under the sink, which was the coolest place in the flat.

  ‘Black all right?’ I shouted to Joe.

  ‘Milk gone off again?’ he said as I brought the two cups in and put them on the coffee table.

  ‘ ’Fraid so.’

  ‘It’s okay, I’m getting a taste for black coffee, definitely more sophisticated.’

  ‘Oh definitely.’

  Joe put his arm around me. ‘I wish you weren’t going away this weekend.’

  ‘I have to. I’m the godmother. I would never be forgiven if I didn’t go.’

  ‘I can’t believe I’m going to see The Who with my brother and not you.’

  ‘Don’t talk about it. I’m beginning to think my darling sister practises witchcraft on the side and deliberately picked the day of the concert for the christening.’

  ‘I’ll miss you.’

  ‘I’ll miss you too,’ I said, snuggling into him, and I would. We saw each other practically every evening, and it had been like that almost from the start.

  We had met a year ago at a promotional night for the magazine Trend I worked for. Joe had come along with a friend, and I had been passing round plates of food. He’d stared suspiciously at the canapés and said, ‘Is that fish or meat?’

  I’d looked down at the food. ‘I haven’t a clue,’ I’d said, laughing. ‘But it smells okay.’ Then he’d taken the tray from me and put it down on a nearby table. ‘Fancy a dance?’ he’d asked, and before I’d had a chance to respond, he’d led me onto the small dance floor and taken me into his arms. I remember thinking how well our bodies fitted, the gentle pressure of his hand on my back, and how smooth his face felt against mine. After the dance I’d gone back to passing out food and drinks and making sure that all our guests were happy. Every now and then I would catch his eye, and we would smile at each other. At the end of the evening I wasn’t surprised to find him waiting for me. We’d walked hand in hand through the dark streets of North London to his flat in Holloway Road. I wasn’t in the habit of going home with strange men but Joe hadn’t felt strange. There’d been something about him that I liked. I’d felt safe with this boy.

  We’d lain on his bed listening to his Revolver LP, he’d lit a candle that was wedged into the top of a rosé wine bottle and then he’d turned off the light. We hadn’t spoken at first – we’d just lain there listening to the Beatles singing ‘Doctor Robert’. I’d closed my eyes as he’d run his hand gently up and down my arm. Then we’d spoken about our pasts. I’d told him about my funny, bonkers family. He’d told me about his rather normal one. I’d told him about my friend Mary Pickles. I hadn’t realised I was crying till I felt Joe gently wiping away the tears that were running down my face. It was in that moment that I knew this was something special. I’d turned my body into his and we’d made love, gently at first and then with a passion I hadn’t known existed, and then I’d cried again and felt stupid for crying, but it was okay – Joe had let me cry until I fell asleep in his arms.

  ‘Penny for them,’ he whispered into my hair now.

  ‘Oh they’re worth more than a penny,’ I said. ‘I was remembering the first time we made love.’

  Joe stood up. ‘Fancy a rerun?’ he said, smiling down at me and holding out his hand.

  ‘Not unless you want to get me chucked out of the flat.’

  Joe sat down again and put his arm around me. ‘You could always move in with me.’

  ‘Now there’s a thought,’ I said smiling at him.

  3

  As soon as I walked out of Brighton station I could smell the sea, that particular smell that goes with seaside towns, a mixture of seaweed and orange peel and fish and chips. The air was filled with the taste of salt, a sharp tang that stuck to my tongue and coated my lips. The wind blowing up West Street from the promenade carried memories that settled on my shoulders like an old overcoat. I walked down towards the seafront. So much had changed since I was a girl but not the sea or the beach. This place was the keeper of all my dearest memories. They were there amongst the pebbles and the rock pools. They ran along the beach, splashing and laughing as they plunged into the icy cold water. No one else saw what I saw when they leaned on these old green railings. Only I could see those moments caught in time – those precious memories with my best friend Mary Pickles. Wherever I went in my life I knew that this was where I would always find her.

  I caught a bus back to the estate and walked the last few hundred yards from the bus stop to the house where I’d spent my childhood. During the course of the journey I had somehow gone from being a young, free, fashionable young woman into an awkward ugly duckling. As soon as Mum opened the front door to the house wearing the same pinny she always wore and drying her hands on the same dishcloth she always used to dry up, I felt the transformation was complete.

 
‘Look at you! You’re a sight for sore eyes!’ Mum said, hugging me close. Her wiry hair was rough against my cheek. She let me go and stepped back, holding onto the tops of my arms with her hands. ‘I swear you get more sophisticated every time we see you! I hate to say it but London seems to suit you.’

  ‘It’s good to see you, Mum,’ I said, kissing her cheek.

  ‘Why don’t you go up and unpack and freshen up, and I’ll put the kettle on,’ said Mum. ‘I made you some jam tarts specially.’

  I put my head round the living-room door. My sister Rita was sitting on the sofa next to her husband Nigel, baby Miranda was sitting on the floor and Dad was in his usual chair by the fire. He winked at me and grinned. I said hello to everyone then hauled my case up the narrow stairs and into my old bedroom, the one I used to share with Rita. All the old furniture was still there: the two single beds, the wardrobe and the chest of drawers. It was all crammed together, nothing matched anything else, and it all seemed a bit dowdy and old-fashioned. But it was home.

  I took everything out of my case, hung the dress and coat I’d bought specially for the christening in the wardrobe, and laid my cosmetics and washing stuff on the top of the drawers. Then I sat down on the bed. The room looked just the same as it always did; it was as if I had never gone away. I remembered counting the days until Rita got married and I would have the room to myself. I had imagined Mary and I spending hours in this room trying out new make-up, fiddling with our hair and listening to our favourite records. I picked up the framed photo of us that stood on the cabinet next to my bed and even though it had been taken eight years ago, I remembered the moment as if it was yesterday. Mary had been given a brownie camera for her fifteenth birthday and we had gone down to Brighton seafront. We’d asked an elderly couple who were walking along the prom to take our picture. We’d sat on the railings, and I had my arm around Mary’s shoulder. It was windy that day and the breeze was ruffling our skirts and Mary’s hair had blown across her face. We were both laughing into the camera.