by Alison Bond
‘What is it?’ she said. ‘What’s wrong?’
‘Can I come in?’
‘Of course.’
When they got to her room the walls seemed to have crawled inward, making the space smaller and more crowded. Ruby stood by the open window. Ella sat on the bed and played with the ruffled edges of Ruby’s pillowcase.
‘What is it, El?’
‘Where did you run to the other night?’
‘Home.’
‘Dante was very disappointed. He thought you’d like it.’
‘I didn’t.’
There was an icy atmosphere in the increasingly cramped space. Ella stood up and walked across to the window, looking out at the hair salon. She took Ruby’s hand in hers. ‘I’ve asked him not to see you any more.’
Ruby froze and her hand felt clammy. What?’
‘You and Dante.’
What are you talking about?’
‘I know about La Dolce Vita, I know about the Palace, I know about that time at the Roundhouse and that time at Abby’s party. Please don’t try and deny it. I know everything, okay? But it’s over now. I’ve forgiven him.’
Ruby didn’t know how to respond. And judging from the look on Ella’s face she had lost them both.
‘I’ve never liked it,’ continued Ella, ‘but what can I do? I love him.’
‘So do I,’ said Ruby. She would fight for him if that’s what it took. She was new to this sophistication game, she could learn, he could teach her. Dante would like that, a woman to shape in his own image. She couldn’t go home, she just couldn’t.
‘Ruby, you don’t even know him, not really, not like me.’
Ruby had a sudden flash of the last time she was in bed with him, as close as it was ever possible for two people to be.
‘Oh, bless,’ said Ella, and her mocking tone brought tears to Ruby’s eyes. ‘Do you honestly think that Dante could find happiness with a girl from – where? – from the bleeding valleys like you? Your face at the UFO, it was priceless. I mean, a guy from Hollywood offers you the world and you run away. Dante doesn’t need a baby girl, he needs a woman. Surely you understand that?’
‘I can change,’ said Ruby under her breath.
‘What?’
‘I can change. For him.’
‘Nobody can change that much.’
Ella looked directly at Ruby and smiled. ‘I’m pregnant,’ she said. Later Ruby remembered a hint of smugness in that smile.
‘Is it Dante’s?’
‘Of course. I don’t sleep around.’
‘Will you… I mean, have you thought about… it’s just that I heard,’ said Ruby, ‘that there’s a few places you can go.’ She dropped her voice to a whisper.
‘You think I don’t know that? I know that I don’t have to have this baby, our baby. But I will.’
‘Okay, I’m sorry.’
‘Dante and me,’ said Ella, ‘we’re going to get married.’
Married? She couldn’t have heard that right! Was Dante’s jack-the-lad attitude all an act? He was stepping up to do the honourable thing.
‘He’s Catholic,’ said Ella, by way of explanation. ‘We’re going to Rome and we’re going to get married. So you see, your silly fling with him, it really is over.’
‘You got pregnant on purpose.’ It wasn’t a question.
Ella answered anyway. ‘So what?’ She turned her back on Ruby and started collecting her belongings from around the flat. She’d obviously finished her piece.
‘And Dante?’ dared Ruby. What does he say?’ She knew in her heart that she was grasping at straws. Things would never be the same again.
‘You showed him up in front of everyone at the club. You cried like a girl when someone offered you the chance to make something of yourself. You wouldn’t dare. Dante could never love anyone who hadn’t any guts or ambition. It was pathetic.’
‘I have ambition,’ said Ruby.
‘Where? Where is it? Show me. You came to London – big deal. Ever since you arrived you’ve been talking big about all these things you want to do, but have you actually done anything? Anything except hang around after me and Dante like a bloody puppy?’
Ouch.
‘No.’ Ella stuffed a few pairs of tights into her bag. ‘It’s all just words with you, Ruby.’
‘And what have you done that’s so special?’
Ella pointed across the road. ‘I have a job I really like, my art classes, and I’m leaving it all behind to go to Rome with him. I take my chances in life, that’s why he loves me. He’ll change.’ She tied up her bag, slung it across her shoulder and headed for the door.
Ruby couldn’t bear to see the best friend she’d ever had walk away in anger. ‘Ella, wait!’
Wearily, Ella turned round. ‘Yes?’
What will I do without you?’ Ruby knew she sounded feeble but she couldn’t pretend not to care.
‘Go home, Ruby. Go home and marry someone like your daddy, who’ll always think you’re perfect no matter what you do.’
‘I never said I was perfect,’ cried Ruby. ‘I wasn’t trying to be.’
‘No,’ said Ella, ‘you were trying to be me. You were jealous. Well, it’s my life, Ruby, and you can’t have it.’
Ruby saw that Ella had missed one of her beaded necklaces hanging from a picture frame. Beads not jewels, Ella didn’t have everything. The way she spoke, once so appealing to Ruby, now sounded cheap and nasty. She picked up the necklace and hurled it violently at Ella, an expression of the frustration that was building tears in her eyes. She wanted to hurt Ella.
‘It suited you, didn’t it?’ said Ruby. ‘Having me around to make you look good. It must have been wonderful for you to be the sophisticated one for once.’
‘Don’t be ridiculous.’
‘Really? Poor little Ella, lives at home with her mum and dad while she waits for a husband. How very modern.’
‘Shut up.’ Ella picked up the necklace and shoved it into her bag. ‘Goodbye, Ruby, good luck,’ she said with scornful insincerity, and left.
Ruby ran to the door and shouted down the stairs. ‘Dante will never change! And if you think he will then you’re a fool. Why would I be jealous of you? I pity you.’
After she was sure that Ella had gone Ruby raced to the telephone box across the street and phoned Dante. She knew she had time before Ella reached him, she knew he would be alone. She was struck with remorse that she had not called him before now, had not called him immediately, shown courage. She knew that this could be her last chance.
When he answered, the sound of his voice made her light-headed. If he was surprised by her sudden call his voice didn’t show it. If he’d missed her he didn’t say so. Maybe he hadn’t noticed that it had been six days since they were last together. ‘You told Ella,’ she said.
‘I told her ages ago,’ said Dante.
What? Why?’
‘We were in bed. We were telling dirty stories. Sometimes she likes to hear about the women I make love to.’
A wave of nausea threatened to consume Ruby. She was a dirty story, one of many. Something that she thought was precious had turned out to be a cheap replica.
‘Do I mean anything to you?’ she asked. ‘Really mean anything?’
‘What is this? Ruby, it’s late.’
Silent tears ran down her cold cheeks. ‘I know,’ she said. ‘It’s just that when we’re together I feel like we could be everything to each other. And you don’t ever think that, do you? Not about me.’
There was a pause, and Ruby heard the sound of a match being struck and Dante’s deep breath. ‘Not about anyone,’ he said.
‘And Ella? She told me you’ve agreed to stop seeing me.’
‘To stop seeing you, yes. But not the others.’
‘The others? Dante, how many are there?’
‘A few, nothing regular. You’re different, Ella sees that and it threatens her.’
A glimmer of hope then, pathetic as it was, and Ruby clung to it
in despair. Now that her grasp was faltering she was frantic to hold on to her life here. Dante was a pig, and in some dark corner of her heart she already knew that he would only be bad for her, but she was in love with him. Desire had completely engulfed her senses and burnt away her logic.
‘But won’t you miss me?’ she said.
‘Obviously. You are different, Ella’s right. But I’ve made my choice. So, a baby, Italy, it might be fun, don’t you think?’
Was this how love ended? A few words and that was that. It wasn’t enough.
‘Please don’t go. It doesn’t have to be over,’ she said eagerly. ‘I would never tell Ella, she won’t know.’
‘Don’t beg, Ruby. It doesn’t suit you.’
If she couldn’t beg then how was she supposed to get him back? Every word she thought of was a desperate plea. Dante liked guts and ambition. He liked his women to be strong.
She tried to summon the fighter inside her. She must have one, surely? Didn’t everyone? Or perhaps hers had seized up years ago, underused because life had never felt this hard before. She always got what she wanted, always. ‘You’ll regret letting me go,’ she said. She concentrated on keeping her voice low and steady. Sexy, even. These could be the last words she ever spoke to him. ‘One day, you’ll hear my name and you’ll be sorry.’
‘Maybe I will,’ he said. ‘That depends on you. You need to find yourself.’
She wiped away her tears and held back the next onslaught until she returned to her room. She threw herself down on the bed and pounded her pillows with her fists, venting some of the pain. She thrashed around like a toddler having a tantrum until she was exhausted.
It kind of worked. She lay back on the bed and caught her breath. Each new mouthful of air was steadier than the last. The chaos in her head began to subside.
She would run away. She had to get out of London. It would be too depressing to see Dante’s ghost on every corner. She felt high on the emotions coursing through her, like a bad trip, and acted on impulse. She fished in the wastebasket for Max Parker’s business card and made the call.
It was Hollywood or home. Which one would Dante want her to choose? The fight was only just beginning.
If he was to hear her name one day and be sorry, then she must make that name for herself, for him.
8
Kelly had been in Los Angeles for an hour and forty-five minutes and she realized that her mental image of the place might need some adjusting. She hadn’t seen a single movie star. It wasn’t that she rationally expected a welcoming committee of famous faces but she’d hoped she might see one or two celebrities or at least some designer luggage on the carousel. So far she was not impressed. Her first five minutes of American life were spent irritated by the way that everything was automated: the voices telling her where to go and what to do, the toilet which had flushed surprisingly beneath her when she lifted herself up a tiny fraction to scratch her thigh, even the paper towel dispenser in the ladies. For hygiene reasons, she supposed, but didn’t reaching for a paper towel establish that you’d just washed your hands?
The next hour and forty minutes were spent in the biggest immigration queue she had ever seen (admittedly she hadn’t seen very many). It was worse than Sainsbury’s on the Saturday before Christmas, and there wasn’t even a magazine rack to browse through. She was tired and irritable. By the time she spoke to her first honest-to-God American (she presumed they wouldn’t let anybody illegal work the passport desk) she had already decided this wasn’t going to be her kind of place.
This was supposed to be Hollywood. She wanted Passport Control to be some kind of red-carpet, bulbs-flashing fashion display, and so far it wasn’t living up to her expectations. But when she looked out at the tall palm trees beyond the glass, perfectly at home against the pale blue sky, she couldn’t wait to get outside. She was hopeful that sunny California might live up to at least part of the hype.
It had been easy to book a last-minute flight on the Internet. It wasn’t even that expensive and it took ten minutes. Just ten minutes to commit herself to an adventure that she was scared to undertake. But what scared her more was telling Jez that she was going without him. So she didn’t.
She knew that Jez wouldn’t understand why she needed a break from him. She needed to know that being with him was a choice, not a habit. Little things that he did were starting to annoy her, stupid things, like putting empty milk cartons back in the fridge or cracking blue jokes with Darren over breakfast. The way he styled his hair. The way he refused to wear anything on his feet except his scruffy trainers with holes in them and still complained when it was wet. Even the gentle touch of his hand when he held hers could irritate her. And he called it love.
She wasn’t brave enough to end it, she didn’t even know if she wanted to, but she wasn’t sure that she was happy either. Jez was good to her and made her laugh, she still fancied him, but their relationship had stalled. It was the sort of limbo that can only be broken by decisive action. It wasn’t running away, she told herself, it was moving towards answers. Maybe by finding out more about Ruby she would understand things about herself, like why she was risking potential happiness with a perfectly decent guy who loved her.
Kelly reached for the two notes in her pocket: the one from Ruby which made her uncomfortable, and one that Sean had given her with Max Parker’s contact details. The address and phone number had been sitting in his address book under Ρ for Parker all this time and Kelly had asked him if he ever used it.
‘Not for almost twenty-five years,’ Sean had said. ‘Not since Dante died. But Max is the only other person who knows about you.’
Kelly had taken a crash course in Ruby Valentine. She got what she could from the Internet and Sean filled in some of the blanks. So she knew about Dante. She also knew the names of Ruby’s other children – Octavia and Vincent – and her granddaughter, Sofia. But then everyone knew Sofia Valentine, she was in the public eye. Kelly was incredibly nervous about meeting the family but fascinated at the same time. It was the same way she felt when she read Ruby’s handwriting.
She walked through Arrivals trying her best to look as though she knew what she was doing. At the gates, dozens of people glanced at her and then past her, looking for the people they were waiting for. There were a few expectant uniformed men holding up cards with names on them. One of the cards said Valentine’.
Kelly stopped in her tracks, causing the people behind her to bash their trolley into the back of her thighs. She hesitated partly out of surprise at seeing a name that had been floating at the top of her head for the last forty-eight hours, and partly because she genuinely wondered if someone had sent a car for her. Maybe Sean had called ahead, to Max Parker perhaps, maybe she would be welcomed here.
The middle-aged driver was wearing a smart dark suit and a peaked cap. Was this the sort of luxury she should expect now that she was the daughter of a movie star? Kelly couldn’t remember the last time she had been driven by someone other than herself. This was going to be incredible. She walked over and tapped him on the shoulder.
He turned around and looked at her like a piece of shit on his shoe. ‘Yes?’
‘I… uh…’ Suddenly she was feeling rather foolish. ‘I’m Kelly Coltrane.’
‘And?’
‘Nothing.’
Well, that was stupid. Not the most auspicious beginning.
As she walked away she lost her bearings and turned around in time to see the driver greet a tall, good-looking older man wearing a charcoal suit so sharp that it seemed impossible that it, or rather he, had travelled. His face was clean-shaven and he didn’t talk to the driver as they walked away together. He tapped on a flash mobile phone instead. A cousin perhaps? Her heart raced. And not in an entirely familial way. Maybe it was just a coincidence.
She stocked up on essentials – water, gum and US Weekly (she’d long been curious about US Weekly) – and pulled the smaller of the two notes out of her pocket, covered in Sean’s bizarre h
andwriting. It looked as though a spider had dropped its eight feet in ink and then taken a valium and walked drowsily across the page. Luckily she was used to it. It said: Max Parker, agent, and there was his home address and his office telephone number.
She knew that she should find a hotel and check in. She knew that she should call her dad and tell him that she’d arrived safely.
She located a payphone, dialled a number and a nasal receptionist said ‘CMG.’
‘Hi,’ said Kelly, ‘can I speak to Max Par—’
There was a click and half a ring.
‘Max Parker’s office.’
‘Hi, can I speak to Max Parker?’
‘He’s on a call right now, who’s calling?’
‘My name’s Kelly Coltrane.’
‘Can I help at all; Kelly?’
‘No, that’s okay, I’ll call back.’
‘If you could tell me what this is regarding?’
‘Really, it’s fine, I’ll call back’
‘Max is in meetings for the rest of the day. Perhaps I can take a message?’
‘No message.’
‘Is this regarding a particular client?’
‘What?’
‘I’m just trying to be helpful, ma’am.’
Ma’am? ‘Actually, maybe there is something you can help me with. Do you happen to know the details for Ruby Valentine’s funeral?’ There was a click, followed by intermittent beeping. ‘Uh, hello?’
She was on hold. A new voice came on the line
‘Press.’
‘Sorry?’
‘You’re through to the press office, ma’am.’
Again with the ma’am. ‘Well, hello. Someone put me through to you. I was trying to find out about Ruby Valentine’s funeral.’
‘There is a private family service later this week and then a tribute is being planned in Beverly Hills.’
‘A tribute?’
‘Yes, ma’am. There will be several photo opportunities.’
‘Okay.’
The money in the phone was going down fast and she didn’t have any more change.
‘Could you tell me where the private family service will be held?’