The Quarry Read Online Free PDF Page A

were always the same.
    ‘Anyway. Think I’ll get another drink,’ Haze says, standing. ‘Anybody else need another drink?’
    ‘Yeah, that’s what this conversation needs,’ Pris says. ‘More alcohol.’
    The sitting room is probably the most civilised space in the house, and the warmest. It has that long rectangular coffee table made of wood in the middle; the one with the flower vase at its centre. A three-seater couch faces each of its long sides and an easy chair faces each of its short sides. One of the couches and a chair are matching blue velvet; the other couch is brown, pretend leather. The other seat is a swivel chair made of stretchy red fabric pulled tight over an expanded polystyrene moulding. Pris has told me this is a piece of authentic seventies batwing kitsch and so old it’s been back in fashion at least twice. Or would have been but for the tears in the fabric and the stains on it. (Last time we talked, she wasn’t sure of the current position of such furniture – she said she’d have to consult a magazine called Wallpaper . Which I found confusing, because we’re talking about a chair.) Anyway, the red chair and brown sofa don’t match anything else in the room.
    Guy was sitting in the red chair until he left. He used to always sit in the blue velvet armchair when we had guests, until his back got so bad and getting out of the chair became so difficult. Paul is sitting there instead. Hol and Pris are sitting on the blue velvet sofa. Alison, Haze and Rob are on the brown one.
    I’ve pulled out the blue velvet pouffe that usually squats under the table in the bay window. I’m sitting on it, hunched, with my hands clasped between my pressed-together knees. The pouffe has lost a lot of its stuffing, or it’s compressed over the years, so you sit quite near the floor on it, plus it makes a sort of crackling noise when you sit on it and you have to kind of waggle your bottom to get comfortable, but I don’t mind.
    I’m sat by the side of the blue velvet sofa, near Hol. Hol has said a couple of times I should sit up on the couch with her and Pris but I don’t want to; I’d feel too big and obvious and people might expect me to join in. From here, low down, I can watch and listen without disturbing anybody.
    Hol has put on a faded orange cardigan instead of the green fleece, and big thick blue socks. Paul is wearing neat-looking blue jeans and an open-necked pink shirt. Pris wears tight glittery trousers and a baggy black jumper, Rob wears black chinos and a grey polo neck, Alison is in a black knee-length dress with thick black woollen tights, and Haze has olive trousers and the same dark green Therapy? T-shirt and loose padded tartan shirt he arrived in.
    Pris is pretty and curvy and the colour of coffee with milk, with dark eyes and shiny black, scraped-back hair with lots of ringlets. Rob is about average height but quite wide; gym-fit, Hol has said. He keeps his head shaved but he has brown hair, I think. Alison is small and blonde and always wears make-up. Hol says Alison used to be fat and now exists in a state of perpetual semi-starvation. Haze is nearly as tall as me, though he doesn’t carry himself that way. He’s been slowly putting on weight ever since I’ve known him and his thin brown hair is receding in an orderly fashion straight back from his eyebrows, which are usually slightly raised.
    Hol’s face looks a little flushed, as does Paul’s. This might be because they have been arguing, or because they have been drinking wine. Paul arrived with a crate of red wine from the French region of Médoc, and so far four bottles have been opened and three finished. I tried some, though I prefer sweet white wine if I feel I have to drink. Drinking isn’t really for me. I suffer from acid reflux but more importantly I don’t like the feeling of losing control. (I think most people drink because they’re not happy with their sober self and wish to alter matters, whereas I am quite