Doctor Who_ Father Time - Lance Parkin [79]
With the other hand, he was starting the ignition.
As the phone rang again, he was parping the car horn, trying to negotiate the crowds.
‘This isn’t like Miranda,’ he said.
‘It’ll be hours before we get to your house,’ Debbie said quietly. ‘We should call the police, get them looking.’
The Doctor hung up the phone. He hesitated. ‘If she’s not at home, where is she?’
* * *
Alex had gone home.
Dinah claimed she didn’t have a row with him, but Miranda knew she’d been planning to spend the night with him. She had found that shocking, in a rather abstract way. Thinking about it, though, it was only because it wasn’t the sort of thing she would ever do.
Dinah claimed Alex was ill, and ‘too drunk, anyway’.
So there were just the three of them. Bob was hanging around, trying to get back into Miranda’s good books. She was suddenly very self-conscious around him. Miranda had told Dinah what had happened, and Dinah agreed to have a chat with Bob. After that, they agreed to clear up in the morning, and went their separate ways. Dinah was in her parents’ room, Bob in her little brother’s. Miranda got Dinah’s bed.
Miranda didn’t need much sleep, indeed she could do without it.
Bob and Dinah both seemed exhausted. Minutes after they’d gone to bed, the house was silent.
Miranda lay on the bed, staring up at the ceiling. Dinah’s room was odd. There were posters all over the walls. Posters of Tom Cruise and a-ha, all the pop stars and film stars Dinah had a crush on. Dinah had a record player, and a stack of albums and tapes. At the foot of the bed was a menagerie of toy animals. She wondered where Dinah kept her chemistry set or her encyclopedias.
All so unreal.
Perhaps the alcohol had affected her a little, after all. She felt a little giddy.
She’d just had her first kiss, she reminded herself.
And then all this thinking had spoiled it. Her endless analysis, her constant need to sit back and mentally write up what had just happened to her. Treating the world as though it was an experiment and she was the neutral observer.
She was doing it now.
Miranda wondered what the solution was. By definition, a display of spontaneity now wouldn’t be a true display of spontaneity, but a calculated act.
And she was doing it again.
She liked Bob, she had liked having a boyfriend. It was... virgin territory for her, but she didn’t feel nervous. She trusted him.
Miranda made her decision: to go to Bob, slip into bed beside him and see what happened. No plans beyond that. She asked herself where she would draw the line, doubting that Bob would, and surprised herself by not knowing the answer. That clinched it as the right course of action.
She checked herself in the dressing-table mirror, took a deep breath, and then sneaked out on to the landing, tiptoeing so that she didn’t wake anyone up or let anyone know what she was doing.
Bob was in Dinah’s brother’s room. Miranda knew which door that was. She decided not to knock. She’d sneak in, get into bed beside him.
The door was a little ajar. She went in, closing it behind her.
The room was cluttered, full of toys belonging to Dinah’s little brother.
The bed was empty. It had been slept in, but now it was empty.
Miranda was baffled, but only for a moment. She stepped back on to the landing. The next door along was Dinah’s parents’ room. The door was closed, so she opened it, ever so carefully, just in case, as she hoped against hope, she was wrong.
She was right: there were two people on the bed.
It was dark, but Miranda could see in the dark.
Dinah was straddling Bob, wearing nothing but a gold necklace. Bob had his skinny legs together, his arms around Dinah’s neck and his eyes closed.
Dinah turned her head and saw Miranda. Her face was expressionless, dead, as though it didn’t know where to start.
And the only thing Miranda could bring herself to think was, I bought her that necklace.
Bob was perfectly placed