The second time, I was attending one of Henry’s festivals to watch him play the bongos in a ska-influenced folk band. I ate a cannabis-laced brownie, mainly to alleviate my boredom. I then inhaled two falafel wraps and slept for the first time that weekend. Despite both experiences providing much-needed escapism, I wanted a life that I didn’t need to escape from. I was always fearful that my mother had passed on her addictive personality, and although I got away with it with booze, I wasn’t prepared to take too many chances. I also wasn’t prepared to spend my life with someone who would expose the girls to anything more than a hangover.
I watched for a few seconds as Frank reacted, or failed to react, to what Anthony had said, and it was like my lungs were shrinking. Each second that he chewed and nodded, breathing became more difficult. It was the first time I had considered that I might be wrong about him; that I might not really know him and that as quickly as I had found him, he could be lost. Eventually, I said I was feeling a bit dizzy and would turn in early and read. Frank didn’t stop me, but watched with a puzzled expression as I climbed down the ladder. In our cabin I crawled on to the bed. The ceiling was only a foot or so from my face. It felt like a coffin. Because we had such a strong connection, I had assumed that everything he was would be in alignment with what I wanted. It couldn’t be possible otherwise.
I lay listening to the sound of the water lapping against the boat and Anthony’s laugh floating in through the porthole. After an hour or so it was silent. I rearranged my limbs in an effort to feign sleep, but it was a pointless performance, because after Anthony and Margie crashed into the cabin, Frank didn’t follow. When the silence started to become unnerving, I dragged myself out of the sleep space and went back up to the deck. Frank was looking back towards the shore, a blurry shadow in the distance.
‘Hi,’ I said quietly. He turned and smiled. A smile that said nothing other than he was pleased to see me.
‘Did you sleep?’ I shook my head. ‘Was Anthony a bit much? He can be an acquired taste but he’s loyal to a fault.’ I thought of the ex-wife he was eager to evict.
‘It’s not Anthony. Not really. Well, sort of it’s Anthony …’
‘You can tell me,’ said Frank. ‘You can tell me anything.’ I stood next to him, close but not touching.
‘Drugs are not my thing, and if that’s what you wanna do that’s cool, but it’s not for me.’ What I didn’t add was, ‘Therefore you’re not for me.’
‘No. No, of course not.’ He removed his shirt. And then his shoes, trousers and socks. Then, with a pause that I suspected was for effect rather than hesitation, he removed his underwear. He held my gaze, challenging me to maintain eye contact. ‘I get my highs elsewhere,’ he said. He took two strides and bombed into the English Channel. I covered my mouth with both hands to stop a scream flying out. Frank disappeared beneath the water and the seconds seemed to stretch to minutes. We hadn’t had a safety briefing; I could hear the captain’s snores; I really couldn’t be involved in a tragic accident during a holiday I wasn’t supposed to be on. As I was scanning the deck for anything buoyant, Frank emerged a couple of feet from the boat. He spat a stream of water in my direction, like a cherub on a fountain.
‘What you waiting for?’ he shouted.
‘Shhh! You’ll wake the others.’
‘It’s not even that cold.’
‘I can’t.’
‘You will though.’ I glanced back to the cabin. No movement from below. Before I could talk myself out of it, I took off the muumuu and my underwear.
‘Amazing,’ said Frank, and it gave me the burst of adrenaline I needed to jump. It was so quiet under the water. Briefly, I felt sad I couldn’t stay there. But then the instinct for continuity took over, or whatever it is that keeps us eating and working and having sex when so much of life is overwhelming. I kicked my legs to the surface. Frank swam over and I wrapped myself around him.
‘You could have just answered the question.’
‘Where’s the fun in that?’
‘You know, I wasn’t even supposed to go to your event. Do you think everything happens for a reason?’
‘No. It’s all just random chaos, babe.’ I liked feeling adventurous. I liked him calling me ‘babe’. I’ll never deny that I liked it.
29
RUBY WAS INVITED back to school. She wrote a letter of apology to Ms Davison and was quietly moved to another form. Her new tutor, Mrs Case, was approaching retirement – little danger of another social media scandal. I made her give me the password to every one of her accounts, promising I wouldn’t use them unless she gave me cause to. We had a long discussion about the trust-building process. Ruby failed to see how my suggestion of helping out around the house had any correlation to rebuilding my confidence that she could be safe online. The discussion devolved into an argument, and again to an unrestrained screaming match. I didn’t even say goodnight to her, and remorse kept me awake until the early hours of the morning. On Ruby’s first day back, I ironed her shirt and skirt and offered to French braid her hair. She refused, as I had known she would, but I wanted her to believe I was willing. From the living-room window, I watched my daughter’s ponytail bob as she disappeared down the road, and said a silent apology for all the occasions she had begged me to braid her hair before school and I told her I didn’t have the time. If I could do it again I would make the time, I would steal it.
When I arrived at work, Nush was in reception. She was also openly crying. I could see damp patches on the front of her white T-shirt from the door. Marcus was sitting next to her, holding a box of tissues.
‘Alison,’ she whimpered when she saw me. I think she intended to summon me but I felt like backing away. I inhaled, pushed my hair back from my face, and accessed my inner ‘work mode’.
‘Marcus, thanks for your help. I can take it from here,’ I said firmly. Marcus handed Nush another tissue and kept his eyes on her as he stood. ‘She’ll be fine, Marcus. I’ll give you a call if I need you. Don’t wait for that call.’ He hung his head and sloped off. ‘Nush,’ I said. ‘You cannot turn up like this. It’s not professional.’ Nush crumpled and uncrumpled the tissue in her hand.
‘I know, but I have no one else to turn to.’ I tried not to dwell on how dismal that was.
‘What’s happened? Has someone died?’ I had the idiotic thought that Frank might be hurt. Crashed his car or fallen into an empty elevator shaft. And no one would have told me, because why would they?
‘I feel like I’m dying,’ said Nush plainly, as though the statement was reasonable.
‘I don’t want to dismiss your feelings, but you are young, you are beautiful and you’re about to create something fantastic. Whatever this is, it can be solved.’ I took the tissue from her fidgeting hands. ‘We’ll solve it.’ Nush searched my face, perhaps for evidence that I could come good on this assertion.
‘I broke up with my boyfriend.’ I felt a bit affronted. We had spent all that time together and yet Nush hadn’t mentioned a romance. My expression must have matched my emotion because Nush said, ‘I’m sorry I didn’t tell you. He’s a little bit famous and we wanted to keep it under wraps.’
‘Who?’ I asked. And why wasn’t he helping us to promote the gallery, I questioned silently.
‘Tino McMillan,’ Nush sighed. He wasn’t a little bit famous. He was gossip-site-sidebar famous. I mean, I knew who he was for a start. I also knew he had a not-a-little-bit-famous girlfriend – a British soap actress who had gone through puberty in my living room. Which explained why he was holding back on the promotion front.
‘I’m sorry to hear that,’ I said. I was. I remember the week after graduation, when David dumped me for the third and final time, it felt like my vital organs were about to fall out of my body. ‘It does sound like maybe he wasn’t in it for the long haul anyway.’
‘What makes you say that!’ snapped Nush.
‘Nothing. I’m sorry. I just thought … Doesn’t he have a girlfriend?’ Nush sniffed n
oisily and I gave her back the tissue, which she immediately set about crumpling and uncrumpling again.
‘It was over between them. Their agents basically insisted they stay together. And now they’ve made me stop seeing him. For the publicity, you know?’ I didn’t.
‘It sounds suspect,’ I said delicately. ‘If he wanted to be with you he would be taking steps to make that happen.’
‘Maybe, maybe not. I don’t care. I don’t care about anything.’ But she had to care, because if she didn’t care I could kiss goodbye to my contract, the only thing keeping Carter and Annie and the bank manager at bay. It was fine for Nush to become apathetic – she had youth on her side – but not when my work life was in her hands.
‘The best thing for you to do is have him see you being successful.’ Nush glanced at me suspiciously. I nodded as if I had all the answers. ‘If he sees you go to shit right now, he’ll think he has all the power, but if he sees you thriving he might understand what a fool he’s been to have lost this.’
‘Oh, Alison,’ she said. ‘Have you thought about microblading your brows? It would give so much more definition to your face.’
‘No,’ I said. ‘Nush, the art show?’ She sighed.
‘You’re right. I can’t let him undo all the good work I’ve done. I need to go Lemonade on his arse. That’s Beyoncé.’
‘I know.’ I didn’t know. Nush looked over my shoulder and towards the window. Something she saw there in the empty street made her well up again. ‘Nush, you’ve got twenty-four hours. Eat crap, listen to sad songs, and then let’s make this happen!’ I gave her a couple of firm pats on the knee.
‘You’re totally right. Who the fuck does he think he is?’ I shook my head, although I was pretty sure he knew he was a rock star. ‘I’ll have a self-care day, get a massage and a colonic, and then I’ll show him who he’s fucking with, the fuckbag.’
‘Great stuff. Get to it.’ Nush stood up, wedged her tiny crocodile-skin bag under her arm, and marched out on to the street. I sank back into the sofa to allow my body to recover from the near miss, and examined my eyebrows with my compact before heading upstairs.
Annie could have tried harder. She might have lowered her head and spoken in a slower, more careful way. I’ve seen her do it. When Dee’s thirteen-year-old cat died of pancreatic cancer, she organized a collection and gave a speech that, if I believed she had a heart, I would have accepted as heartfelt. But ten minutes after I had packed off Nush and fallen into something of a groove with my admin, Annie appeared by my chair to tell me that Dylan had left an urgent message. She was not emoting sympathy; she looked relieved to have ticked one of her many boxes for the day. I thanked her because it was the grown-up thing to do and I was the grown-up. With this came responsibilities and emergencies and urgent calls – she would learn that in time.
I called Dylan and asked him why he was ringing the office when there was a direct route to me via my mobile.
‘It’s Ruby. There’s been an incident at school,’ he said. He was panting. ‘I tried your mobile but it wouldn’t connect.’
‘I was on the tube. Leave a message. What’s happened? Is she hurt?’ My mouth went dry. An image of the ponytail, no longer bouncing, flashed through my mind.
‘She got in a fight. Something about Snapchat.’ I only recognized my fear as it was replaced by irritation.
‘You don’t need to call me because Ruby’s had a falling out with one of her friends. Have you not noticed how fast her rotation is?’ Ruby had so many best friends that I’d stopped keeping track of their names. If I found one in my kitchen I would refer to them as ‘dear’. It was one of the rare times I felt like a proper mum.
‘Not a falling out,’ said Dylan. I could tell from the way the volume of his voice rose and fell that he was distracted, perhaps looking around for someone. I imagined it being one of those smug school mums, Lycra’d up and ready for the gym and brunch.
‘What’s going on, Dylan?’ I snapped.
‘A fight. An actual fight. Hair pulling, scratching, the works. It was vicious, Al. And there were other kids filming it. We both need to be here.’ Now terror and rage jostled around my body, competing for top billing. I left, walked out without shutting down my computer. I didn’t tell anyone; I didn’t prepare my excuses. I retraced my steps, and went straight back down to the tube platform I had emerged from not an hour before. As a kid I had believed that if I retraced my steps, I might turn back time. One afternoon, I was home alone whilst Mum was out with one of her friends. He collected her in a huge silver car, but I didn’t see his face because she’d told me to stay out of sight until they were gone. She’d left me a stack of sandwiches and an orange Club bar. I was methodically nibbling the chocolate from the biscuit when there was a knock at the door. Standing on the mat was an old man, or at least he seemed old to me at the time. He was probably only in his fifties – or forties with some tough times thrown in. He asked me if my mother was home, and when I confirmed she wasn’t, he told me he was there to value her jewellery. I remembered my legs burning when we didn’t have the fare for the bus, and the school trip I spent in the office because Mum ‘forgot’ to pay for my place. She hadn’t said it explicitly, but I knew we needed more money and thought she’d be pleased I had found a way to get some. The man waited as I ran upstairs to fetch the big crimson box where she kept all her rings and bracelets. He peered inside before closing it with an authoritative snap.
‘Looks good. I have to nip back to the shop and work out the figure, and I’ll let you know how much I can give you.’ I offered to give him our number, which I had recently memorized, but he told me there was no need and was off down the path. I don’t know how long he was gone before I panicked; I didn’t yet wear a watch. I’d watched two episodes of Danger Mouse and looked at all my comics before the sick, heavy feeling came over me. I went upstairs, got back into my pyjamas and pulled the blanket up to my neck. I thought if I tried hard enough I could undo the day, and go back to waking up in the morning. It worked. I didn’t even know Mum was home until she woke me up the next morning; she didn’t mention the box. When we moved in with Eddie a few years later, she accused a delivery guy of stealing it. I suppose my emotional evolution had been stunted, because when I climbed the escalator back to the daylight, instead of heading for school, I turned towards home. I shut the door behind me and the house felt exactly as it had before I left that morning. My phone rang.
‘I’m at home, Dylan. I can’t. I can’t look at that smug git’s face again.’
‘We’re on our way,’ he said.
I didn’t know where to put myself. I sat in the armchair but it felt too foreboding, like a villain from a crappy movie. The sofa was too relaxed; the kitchen too formal. In the end I stood by the window, watching the street. A woman walked by wearing a toddler on her back. He was chatting away merrily but his mother had a scowl on her face. I wanted to tell her that whatever was troubling her wasn’t that bad, it couldn’t be.
I heard a car door slam and I knew it was them. I could feel Dylan’s anger radiating down the road. I went to the kitchen and then back to the living room. When they entered the house, I was moving again and in the hallway. I had no idea why I was so nervous. Ruby and I stared at each other like cornered animals, neither sure if we were the hunter or hunted.
30
RUBY’S PONYTAIL HAD fallen, or been dragged, to the nape of her neck. The right side of her face was pink and swollen, and the shirt I’d pressed that morning had a rip along the seam of the left sleeve. I wanted to take a picture. Ruby was always so conscientious about capturing her various looks; why not stick a filter on this one? With the caption ‘ASBO Chic’. The thought of doing this made me smile.
‘It’s not funny!’ she shouted. ‘She came at me out of nowhere! And because Kindeace has it in for me, because he totally fancies Ms Davison by the way, I’m the one that’s gonna get in trouble.’ Dylan stayed behind her, staring at his trainers. I assumed he had exhausted h
is anger.
‘Ruby,’ I said, and I was ready to offer her comfort, but as I spoke she folded her arms, already defensive and emotionally primed to reject whatever I might say. I dragged my palms up and down my face and then pressed them together. ‘Ruby. I do not care. I do not care whose fault it was. I do not care who Mr Kindeace may or may not fancy. I only care that my daughter, who I have gone to great pains to teach the difference between wrong and right, keeps making such incredibly stupid decisions, and I’m starting to wonder how many more she’s made that I don’t know about. Anything else you want to share? Any warrants for your arrest? Are you the leader of an international drug cartel?’ I shrugged. ‘You may as well tell me now, because the one thing you have right is that you’re in big trouble.’ Ruby’s lip began to tremble and I felt horrible but also relieved. She darted towards the stairs.
‘Wait,’ I said. She stopped. I went to the kitchen and returned with a packet of frozen peas. ‘For your face.’ She choked out a sob and thundered up the stairs without taking it. ‘Shit,’ I said. ‘What did the school say?’ Dylan hadn’t moved; he still held the car keys in his hand. I started to go to him, but he looked up and something in his face made me stay at a distance.
‘You let me sit in front of that man and look like a complete and utter prick,’ he said. His voice had none of its usual bounce, no emotion – they sounded like words read from an autocue. ‘You lied to me about why Ruby was excluded … for days.’
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