Read Online Lemonade and Lies by Elaine Johns - Free Book Online Page B

the bizarre sight of the ancient, wrinkled busker who looked as if one stiff breeze might carry him off. Locals had nicknamed him Banjo Billy.
    This morning he was dressed in an odd collection of clothes, the outfit courtesy of either Oxfam or the British Heart Foundation. Those seemed to be his favoured retail outlets. A tan coloured forage cap was parked jauntily on his head. The man wore all his clothes with a jaunty air, and the confidence of eighty odd years of going against conventional wisdom.
    Trevor’s repertoire was wide ranging. He massacred modern music and the classics alike, totally ignoring key signatures and time signatures. He mowed down bar lines as if they didn’t exist, steamrollered over them, dropping beats here and there, shoving others in where they shouldn’t be, for extra value.
    If you listened carefully, you might recognise snippets of the original tune, but that didn’t happen often. As a music lover, I found his playing unnerving and couldn’t listen to it for long. As a fellow human being, I never ceased to be amazed by his joy, his love of life, his enthusiasm for music, and his dogged determination to keep on doing what he wanted to. Trevor didn’t care what other people thought. He was great. Phenomenal. Astronomical. A diamond parcelled in newspaper and tied up with frayed string. He made me smile.
    “Here, catch.” Alice threw the beach bag and all her clothes in my direction.
    “Where’d that come from?” I asked.
    “Just bought it. You like?” She did the catwalk thing, parading up and down, coming to a halt in front of me.
    “Cute. But why?”
    Obviously she looked fabulous – not everyone does in a wetsuit, but my friend had a head start. Lots of gym time.
    “Hooked up with the surf school dude.” She pointed back up the beach. “Bought some lessons and this sweet little wetsuit.”
    “Hell of a sea running out there,” I said. “Why don’t you stay here and read a book?”
    “God, Jill. What are you, my mother? You can be a tight-ass-stick-in-the-mud sometimes. The man’s a qualified instructor; he’ll hardly let me drown.”
    My friend flounced off back up the beach to join the gaggle of newbies collecting around the surf school hut. Which was fair enough, she was an adult and could make up her own mind.
    But I was worried. I always am when people I care about go near water. It’s an old legacy. And Alice wasn’t much of a swimmer, not even in a pool, where the water remained conveniently passive and in the same place.
    Here, in the surf break, the force of the Atlantic wouldn’t be so obedient. Here, the ocean was in control and it could roar with fury, demanding respect for its awesome power. Not to give that respect, could draw a heavy forfeit. A life.
    I was once a decent open-water swimmer. The sea had held no fear for me. And my younger brother had been a strong swimmer as well, but still the rip had dragged him under and I hadn’t been able to get out to him in time. I think my mother blamed me, in the beginning, at least. But it was something we didn’t talk about now, as if Brian had never existed, for there was too much pain.
    I’d insisted my kids learned to swim and never tried to stop them going to the beach (that would be really neurotic). But if they were in the ocean I watched them relentlessly. Like Alice, now. I didn’t take my eyes off her - crashing into waves, losing her board. She hadn’t got the knack of paddling fast enough to catch a wave. Most times she’d miss it, sliding uselessly over its back, forced to wait patiently for the next swell.
    But it didn’t stop her excitement. After an hour she ran back up the beach trailing the short-board - and the instructor - with her. Alice seemed to collect people .
    “Wow, you should try that, girl. Gives you a real high.” Her grin lit up the whole of her face.
    “Yeah?”
    “Makes you feel alive,” she said, still mugging it.
    “How’s that?”
    “The freedom. It’s