She put her hands behind her neck and piled her hair on top of her head. It suited her, thought Lefty. Made her look older.
“It’s Aurora. Don’t you dare laugh.”
He raised an eyebrow but said nothing.
“Oh, I don’t know myself what’s wrong with me. I always feel there’s something missing, that’s all. Whatever I do, I don’t seem to belong.”
She paused for a long moment, eyes closed, until Lefty thought she had fallen asleep. Then she continued, drowsily.
“My dad died in the war. I almost did too, so my mother told me—in the Blitz. We moved back up to Scotland after the war—near Inverness.”
“Inverness? Wow—Swingsville! So what brings you back here?” asked Lefty. Then he frowned. “Hang on! What do you mean, you were in the Blitz? That’d make you over thirty! Come on, there’s no way you’re more than sixteen. Eighteen, tops. What’s your game?”
The girl–woman called Aurora gave him an enigmatic smile. “No game. I don’t tell many people, and to be honest I don’t know why I’m telling you, but I’m thirty-two. Yes, on the level.”
Lefty gave her a long, hard look, then shook his head as if pestered by a fly. “Yeah, right. Go on, then. You were saying—?”
“Mum died when I was ten, in a car crash. I got out without a scratch. But I didn’t have any other living relatives except my older brother, Steve. We were in and out of children’s homes until I was fifteen. I kept running away. I was good at school, or I was whenever I bothered to go. The problem was, I found lessons too easy. The other kids thought I was a swot, and the teachers couldn’t handle me. So I used to bunk off. Except for science—I liked that. I was good at art too. Of course, even that threw them into a tizzy, ’cause you weren’t supposed to be good at both. Steve would have been OK if it hadn’t been for me. He’s a worker. He’s settled down with his own family now—haven’t seen him for years.
“Anyway, after that I could never seem to hold down a job for more than a week or two.” Then, in a sudden rush, she added: “I always seem to cause trouble, wherever I go. You’ll see—you won’t want me around for long, either.”
She started to rise, ready to leave, but Lefty gripped her arm. “Where’re you going? You got a place to stay?”
“Oh, sure, I’ve got a nice comfy cardboard box on the Embankment. As long as somebody hasn’t beaten me to it....”
“Come on, I’ll take you to my pad. You could do with somethin’ to eat, anyway. It’s all right—I’ll sleep on the couch.”
She looked at him doubtfully for a moment, then came to a decision.
“Sure. Why not? Thanks.”
Outside, it was raining heavily. Lefty hailed a passing cab but it sailed on past, its wake drenching them.
“Come on, it’s not far,” he yelled, grabbing Aurora’s hand, his head down. “We can walk. Run.”
Minutes later they were scampering up half-a-dozen worn, chipped concrete steps and passing through a door still boasting a few shreds of brown paint. Then up four flights of twisting, lino-covered stairs, then another door, which Lefty kicked just below the handle. It flew open.
“It’s not much, but it’s home, to coin a phrase,” Lefty said with a grin. He reached for a box of matches on the cast-iron mantelpiece and shook it, then bent down and lit the gas fire.
“Look, you really oughta get out of those clothes. They’re as wet as if you’d jumped into the Thames. If you....”
He stopped in surprise as, with a few deft movements, Aurora shrugged out of her clothes and draped them over a chair near the fire. That done, she flopped naked into another chair in front of it. Against the segment of dark sky framed by the dirty, rain-streaked window, her face and body reflected the warm orange glow of the gas fire.
Lefty hastily looked in the other direction, pointing. “That’s—er—that’s the piano where we do most of our songwriting. The rest of the guys have got flats in this dump, or just down the road. There’s the bathroom; you have to pull the chain twice to make it flush. No shower, but there should be hot water if you want a bath. The bedroom’s through there. I can probably find you a pair of pajamas if you....”
“No, thanks. I never bother, not when I’ve got a proper bed.”
“Oh, man!” Lefty raised his eyes heavenwards. He reached inside the bedroom door and pulled a string which hung there. An unshaded orange bulb clicked on over the bed, and he picked up his pajamas from a heap on the floor.
“Sleep well,” he said through a yawn as Aurora passed him on her way in.
* * * *
He raised his head groggily and pried open his bleary eyes. What had woken him? Someone must have turned on the radio, for there was tinkling music coming from behind him. Something on Radio Three? Classical, yet a bit avant-garde? Normally the dial was never moved from Radio One. It seemed a bit loud and clear for the old trannie, though. He levered himself up and peered over the back of the sofa.
Aurora, wearing only briefs and bra—but at least she’d got something on—was sitting at the piano, her fingers flickering over the yellowed keys, her face trancelike.
“Hey—you never told me you could play!” Lefty yelled, louder than he had intended. “You said you didn’t like music much! So where’d you learn to do that?”
The girl started violently and drew back her hands as though the keys had suddenly become red-hot. “I said I didn’t like the music I’ve heard. I’ve never had a chance to play an instrument myself before.”
“Oh, sure. Now pull the other one—got bells on it!”
“It’s true.” She looked at him blankly. “Why not? You just find out where the notes are and then play them, don’t you?”
“Yeah, right on. Except that most people take weeks just to learn the basics—and some have lessons for years and still never get further than ‘Jingle Bells’....”
“Well, p’raps I’m just a natural, then. Some people are, aren’t they?”
“So the story goes,” said Lefty dubiously. A moment later the door sprang open with the inevitable crash and four men, all aged between twenty and thirty, burst into the room. They screeched to a halt on spotting Aurora, and began making exaggerated motions of backing out of the door again.
One of them, who sported an Afro hairstyle in bright red hair, said with a grin, “Hey, sorry to break in on your scene, man!”
“Like, we didn’t know you’d got company!” added the one with a droopy, Mexican-style moustache.
Lefty glowered, but before he could speak Aurora snapped: “I don’t know what you’re all staring at. But, if you’re embarrassed, I’ll go and get dressed.”
She left the room with a histrionic sigh. The five young men exchanged guilty looks, wondering what it was they
