Material Girl

by Louise Kean

  ‘Do you love me, Daddy?’ I ask, feeling sorry for myself.

  ‘Of course I do! You’re my daughter!’

  ‘But that doesn’t mean you have to love me …’

  ‘Of course I do! Of course I do! Will I see you soon? It would be lovely to see you,’ he says, moving on quickly.

  ‘Yes, soon, I promise. I’m crazy busy but maybe in a couple of weeks, or you could come up to town and we could have lunch or dinner or something?’ I say, and hear him freeze up on the other end of the phone line. He doesn’t like London, it’s ‘too crowded, too busy, too dangerous’. Of course it’s not, but he thinks it is.

  ‘It’s fine, Daddy, or I’ll come home.’

  ‘Right, yeah, that’s probably best,’ he says.

  ‘I’ll speak to you soon, Dad, take care, lots of love.’

  ‘Lots of love, Scarlet, see you soon,’ and he hangs up.

  I wander back up towards the stage to watch the last of the rehearsals. Dolly is nowhere to be seen, but everybody else is milling around nervously, glancing anxiously at Tristan as he wrings and shakes his hands like some kind of 1950s dance he’s learnt in order to win a jive competition.

  ‘There you are!’ I look behind me, because it seems as though he is talking to me, but there is nobody there. It is me. What have I done now?

  ‘Go and get her! Go and get her!’ he pleads, grabbing me by the shoulders and shaking me so my head rattles about on top of my neck.

  ‘Okay,’ I say, ‘but where is she?’

  Tristan lets go and points dramatically at the side of the stage with one hand, covering his eyes with the other. ‘She’s on the sodding phone! In the middle of our final dress rehearsal!’ he says, and a bead of sweat shoots down the side of his face. ‘Please, Make-up, for the love of God, for the love of God! Somebody give me strength!’

  ‘Okay, I’ll go and get her,’ I tell him, as if talking a potential jumper back in off a ledge. I walk up the stairs at the side of the stage, slowly, glancing back over my shoulder at my audience of cast and crew, forty fingers crossed for me. I scan for Gavin and spot him at the side of my stage, and feel a little safer than I did a moment ago.

  Leaning around the curtain nervously, I peek at what is lurking in the wings.

  Dolly is indeed on her mobile phone to her daughter. Her voice sounds cold and hard, and sad. ‘I know you’re very busy, Chloe. Oh it’s just some heap, some stupid British theatre, some stupid play, but that’s not the point … Of course, of course! And I know he’s busy, and they’ve rented the cabin now, of course! And she’s in school … of course you can’t take her out, I didn’t ask you to, did I? … I just though that if you did come over I could take you down to the Lavender House, where my mother used to live, because you’ve never been, and … I’m not getting defensive, you are the one who always does this, Chloe, and … I’m not telling you what to do … I know I wasn’t there for much of it and … no, I don’t expect you to drop anything, it’s just that of course when you get to my age you think that it might be your last … I’m not being dramatic! I’m not trying to make you feel guilty. Well, I can’t help that … but if … If you feel guilty just damn well feel guilty then!’ She throws the phone down the stairs and wipes an eye quickly.

  ‘Hi,’ I say nervously, five feet away.

  ‘He wants me out there, doesn’t he?’

  I nod.

  ‘It’s fine, Lulu, I’m going. Will you get my phone?’ I nod again.

  ‘Never have children, Lulu,’ she says, wiping her other eye. ‘They’ll kick the shit out of you.’

  An hour later, Tristan calls a break for tea. Everybody hovers on one side of the stage, laughing and chatting through their lines nervously, apart from Dolly, who sits in the seats opposite on her own with a cup of tea. I look over and see that nobody, not even Tristan, has gone to talk to her. She glances at the young cast members, and then sips her tea again. I look over and smile until she sees me, and she beckons me over.

  ‘Come and sit with me, Lulu, you’re the only one I can bear.’

  I slump down next to her.

  ‘Now Lulu, you are flushed, and you are wearing a very saucy dress, ha! What’s going on?’ She eyes me mischievously.

  I haven’t told anybody. ‘I have … well, I think I have a date tonight,’ I say, playing with my ponytail nervously.

  ‘With your chap?’ she asks, blowing on her tea.

  ‘No,’ I say, reaching for my powder as I see the sweat prickle through on her forehead, but she bats me away.

  ‘Leave it, Lulu. So, not with your chap. With another chap then, eh?’ she asks.

  ‘Not exactly, no,’ I reply, and look at my nails.

  ‘Then who with?’ she asks, staring at me.

  ‘With … another girl,’ I confess, and then cover my face with my hands, waiting for the shock and outrage, that, as usual, doesn’t come. I look through my fingers at her and she is blowing on her tea again.

  ‘Well, does she have a name?’ she asks. She reaches down for her bag at her feet, but it’s clumsy and she almost spills her tea, the cup teetering precariously in the saucer.

  ‘Let me do it,’ I insist, reaching for her bag. I pull out her hipflask by my feet, take her cup off her and throw a shot of gin into her tea, handing her back her cup, screwing the lid back on the hipflask and chucking it back in her bag.

  ‘You know it’s just medicinal, Lulu,’ she says quietly.

  ‘You don’t judge me, I won’t judge you,’ I reply.

  ‘So what’s this girl’s name?’ she asks again, taking another sip of tea, but with a slightly more contented smile.

  ‘Isabella.’

  ‘And what are you looking for with this girl, Lulu?’

  ‘I don’t know.’ I shake my head. ‘I don’t know what I’m doing, really. It’s like I’m free-falling or something.’

  ‘Well, how do you feel about seeing her?’ she asks seriously.

  ‘I don’t know – scared? A bit sick? Nervous?’

  ‘But are you excited, Lulu?’ she asks, eyeing me intently above her cup.

  ‘I don’t know! I don’t know if that’s the word. I feel like it’s some kind of an experiment. I feel like …’

  ‘Like you are being unfaithful to your chap?’ she says matter-of-factly, and it hadn’t even occurred to me until now.

  ‘No, actually, not at all. I don’t know, it doesn’t seem the same as that.’

  ‘Oh but darling, it is. Imagine how you would feel if he was out on a date tonight, but with another chap?’

  I burst with laughter. And then stop quickly. ‘That would be awful!’ I say, shocked. ‘So you think I shouldn’t go?’ I ask.

  ‘No, you utterly must go, Lulu! Of course you must! I did it, absolutely! I loved a woman once. It wasn’t the answer, not for me, but Christ I had the guts to find out. She was famous too. She was older, far more beautiful than I was. Perhaps the most beautiful woman I have ever known. It was just before I won my Oscar. I was in love with her on Oscar night, you know, but of course I had to take my third husband, Bob. What a ridiculous name, Bob. I should have known. Of course he was a darling man, died horribly from pancreatic cancer, left me a fortune, but it wasn’t why I married him. He was desperately good at poker, darling, and I found it amazingly attractive.’

  ‘Isn’t that strange! Ben is a fantastic surfer, amazing. It’s bizarre how attractive I find that.’

  ‘Anyway, Lulu, I was in love with Penelope on the night I won my Oscar, but she was there with her husband and I was there with my Bob. From the start it was a little ridiculous. We were both highly strung and erratic. Her hair was bright auburn, and she had freckles to match. We argued terribly, of course, both shockingly jealous. It quite quickly descended into disaster, and in the end we had to call a halt to it or kill each other. But my God she was beautiful. A man will never have the beauty of a woman. As chiselled, as handsome, it’s not the same. And they don’t need to be adored for it. It’s a strange m
an that does, and beware. We all have our roles. A man who wants to be loved more than he will love is rotten and spoiled, probably by his mother, or some other fool who told him he was the world. And he walked all over her and he’ll walk all over you. Whenever you meet a man, if you think it’s serious, you should always observe, early on, the way that he treats his mother, but then I’ve told you that already. Because inevitably that is how you’ll be treated, Lulu. Everything he feels about women can be heard in their conversations and the affection he has for her. If he can’t tolerate her for more than ten minutes then beware! It will happen to you. I would be interested to hear how our Mr Harvey-Saint talks to his mother …’

  Ben sees his mum on Boxing Day, and sometimes on her birthday. The answerphone, if I ever check it, is filled with messages from her that he hasn’t returned. She worries about him, about me – he even told me she thinks I’m ‘reckless’, and her worry drives him crazy with irritation. He told me once that when she left him as a little boy she surrendered the right to worry about him, and he is still punishing her for it today. He won’t let himself be cared about, by anybody. Would it be easy to say it’s in case he finds that he cares as well, and then they leave again? I don’t want to think that because then he’d be little more than a cliché, a rudimentary counselling problem that a junior could tackle in six weeks of non-intensive therapy. There has to be more to it than that.

  Dolly swills the last of her tea around in her cup.

  ‘You know, you’ve done a fair amount in your life, haven’t you?’ I say.

  ‘Yes, I have, Lulu, and it was deliberate and thank God. I only ever think about life, and living, Lulu: about how much love I’ve squeezed into it so far, and how much more I can squeeze in yet. Don’t limit yourself by thinking about the end. It’s like the man says, dear Tennessee: “Death is one moment and life is so many of them.” What a shame to waste them. Of course, sometimes I’d stop myself and think, What in hell are you doing, Mary? Just going from one goddamn frantic distraction to another, till finally one too many goddamn frantic distractions leads to disaster, and then the end, blackout? But then I decided the best thing was not to think about it, or plan too hard, or worry too much. Life is the thing, Lulu.’

  Tristan claps his hands twice in quick succession, like a toy monkey mechanically smashing symbols together. ‘Can we go again in two, loves?’ he says on the stage, biting his lower lip.

  ‘The circus calls, Lulu,’ Dolly remarks, and downs the last of her tea.

  Tom knocks on Dolly’s door just as I am about to take my first swipe at her mascara with a cotton-wool ball dripping in cleanser.

  ‘Come in,’ she barks, and pushes my hand away.

  He pokes his head and shoulders around the door, and the room becomes a different place, filled with teenage girlish screams and boy-band mania.

  ‘I just wanted to say that it’s an honour, Dolly. I haven’t really had the chance, as yet, but I wanted to make sure I told you, before Monday.’ He flashes her his best movie-star smile, and her hand shoots up to her neck, her fingers dancing around the folds of her skin.

  She turns to me. ‘Lulu, will you run and get Tom and I some more biscuits?’ she says.

  I push past Tom, who barely acknowledges me, and he shoves the door closed behind me. I childishly kick it ajar again with my foot. He doesn’t get to shut me out.

  I snatch the driest, mealiest biscuits from the cupboard, which are so stale they are soggy. Muttering under my breath as I walk back up the corridor I slow down as I hear Dolly talking. It isn’t my intention to eavesdrop, but I find myself tiptoeing closer to the door, which is still slightly ajar.

  ‘You are a very handsome young man, Mr Harvey-Saint,’ she says, in an unfamiliar tone. She sounds like a seventy-year-old schoolgirl.

  ‘I’ve been very lucky,’ he replies, a world away from modesty, and it makes me want to gag.

  ‘We both have, darling. Let me show you some pictures of me, Tom, as a girl. We could have been quite a couple, you and I,’ she tells him.

  ‘Well!’ I hear Tom laugh nervously. ‘You are still a very beautiful woman, Dolly.’

  A feeling of dread catches in my throat. The room is suddenly quiet, and I am poised with my hand on the doorknob, almost certain that I should go in, when the sound of a teacup smashes suddenly on the floor.

  ‘Jesus!’ I hear Tom swear, ‘I’m sorry, I’m sorry! Let me clear that up – I just, I wasn’t expecting, I mean, I didn’t mean for that …’ I hear Tom blurting out his lines urgently.

  ‘Just get out … get out,’ she says quietly.

  ‘I’m sorry, I didn’t think of you and I like that …’ Tom blusters.

  ‘Get out!’ Dolly screams.

  I take a step backwards out in the hall, as the door flies open and Tom rushes out. He looks at me, appalled, and shoots off along the corridor at speed.

  It’s awful and embarrassing and I don’t know what to do. I am frozen in the hallway as I hear Dolly quietly sobbing. I take a step forwards, with my hand on the doorknob as I hear her say, ‘Pull yourself together, you old fool.’ She coughs a couple of times, in quick succession, and I decide to go in.

  I talk straight away. ‘I found some biscuits, Dolly, but I passed Tom in the hall and he said he was late for the dresser so he had to run.’

  ‘Yes, he had to run off,’ she replies, shielding her eyes.

  ‘Oh my goodness, I’ve got cleanser in your eyes and they’ve gone red. Let’s get that mascara off now, shall we?’ I say, practically shutting her eyes for her.

  As I wipe the cotton wool across her eyes, she reaches up and squeezes my hand.

  ‘So I’ll let you know all about my date when I see you on Monday shall I?’ I say. ‘You never know, I might have an epiphany? It might be my route to happiness.’

  ‘Well, darling,’ she replies, composing herself, letting go of my hand, ‘as long as you know that the most life has to offer is a series of joyful moments. That’s it. You can’t be permanently happy. Where was I when somebody was promising day-in, day-out happiness? Happiness isn’t a constant, if you are lucky you glimpse it. Who told you girls you can have it all? Nobody ever got it all, not the men, not the women, not anybody. Not even the Caesars in their vast Roman palaces. Not even Cleopatra on the Nile. Nobody was ever always happy, except the idiots in the nuthouse. But if you glimpse it, just for a series of moments, then what more can you ask?’

  ‘I suppose. But some days it does feels like, if I could just get it right, the balance, then maybe I could have a little of everything, if I could just focus a little harder …’

  ‘Lulu, haven’t you heard a word I’ve said? What more can I tell you than it’s just about you! About doing something that makes you proud of yourself. About acting a certain way. About being honest. Not regretting whole years, whole segments of your life. About loving somebody as much as you can, as hard as you can, but then having the courage to move on when the time is right. People outgrow each other all the time, like sunflowers. Some people need more light than others. But know yourself, Lulu! That’s all you can do.’

  I carry Dolly’s bag upstairs for her and pass it to Gavin as Tristan clinks a glass to make a speech.

  ‘Loves,’ he says, looking around the room. ‘Get some rest tomorrow. Watch Antiques Roadshow, and I’ll see you all on Monday.’ He turns his back on them. It was his big moment and it’s the least I have ever heard him say.

  Dolly leans on bent-over Gavin, who carries her bag out to the car. Tristan wanders around on the stage, picking up the occasional prop and placing it lightly down again. He turns and faces the front of stage, as everybody disperses. He notices I am still there and smiles as he walks over.

  ‘What are you doing tomorrow, Make-up?’ he asks from the front of the stage, flicking imaginary specks off of his jacket, and addressing me in the first row of the stalls.

  ‘I’m going to the zoo, with Ben,’ I say, crossing my arms.

  ‘Right.’ He n
ods his head. ‘Silence and tears,’ he adds finally.

  ‘Let me guess … Byron?’ I ask.

  ‘You got it,’ he says.

  ‘We’ll see,’ I reply. He flashes me a smile and walks off to the wings.

  I spot Gavin loitering by the steps at the side of the stage.

  ‘Hi Gavin, how are you?’ I ask. It feels like ages since I have spoken to him properly.

  He doesn’t answer my question, but says instead, ‘You’re going to the zoo with your bloke tomorrow, then?’

  ‘Yes, I am,’ I say, nodding and smiling.

  ‘London Zoo? Sounds ominous.’ He shoves his hands into his jeans pockets and lowers his chin to his chest.

  ‘Maybe …’ I reply. ‘I don’t know yet. How was your dinner with Arabella?’ I ask.

  ‘Didn’t happen. Decided not to go. Decided not to do that anymore.’ Gavin stares at his feet.

  ‘Oh,’ I say.

  ‘Well … be brave,’ he says, and looks me in the eye for a moment, before wrenching his hands out of his pockets, turning and jogging up the steps by the stage three at a time.

  ‘Why does everybody keep saying that to me?’ I ask as he heads backstage.

  He turns to face me. ‘Because we can see you’ve got it in you.’ Gavin exits stage left.

  What do they know? I’ve got to get through tonight first.

  Scene V: Rapunzel

  I am no good at kissing strangers. I think too much about what they are thinking, care too much about what I’m doing, worry too much about my intentions. Kissing Ben, the first time, and even now, is a different experience to anybody I’ve ever kissed before. It was like we knew each other straight away. We didn’t even have the same kissing technique: he was firmer, more of a pusher; I was slower and definitely softer. But it was like we knew each other anyway. With others, with strangers, I’m no good at kissing. I’m not reckless with abandon, wild and free and crazy. Unless I’m drunk. Then it’s easy, but I don’t remember it the next day. I just remember that it was easy.

  Isabella breaks the ice by giving me my Steinbeck that she got on discount and refuses to take the money for now. She hails a black cab on Charing Cross Road and ushers me into it before her, gesturing with her handful of chipped nail varnish, as if we are on an old-fashioned date and I am the woman. She is all wide eyes and smiles, and control as well. In the cab she tells me, unprompted, that she is twenty-three.