by Cathy Kelly
Nor had he expected another one of them, the big red-headed one he thought it was going to be hardest to get a good picture of, to turn up looking like something out of a 1940s movie. She looked incredible, like some pin-up, but a modern pin-up, with those amazing long legs.
He had always known Ginger was tall but she just seemed sort of big because of all those big dark long jackets she wore. He’d got the impression she was a large girl underneath it all, but hey, there was a lot of action under all those clothes.
‘Right,’ he said, realising he had been staring at her a bit too long. ‘Let’s set this up.’
Lulu wasn’t a stylist for nothing and before Jack knew it, she and his assistant were dragging out props from the cupboards, putting out a couple of cardboard palm trees, a few sun loungers, a little table and corny-looking plastic Martini glasses that might make it look as though the girls were on holiday somewhere.
‘You could always put in a cool background,’ she said, looking at him.
‘No budget,’ he said. ‘They won’t do it. This is what we are stuck with.’
‘OK then,’ she said, ‘you have to gold-light it up, it’s the only way we’re going to get that summer look for it.’
‘Perhaps when we are doing the individual shots,’ he said thoughtfully.
Lulu caught Ginger’s eye, saw the anguish in them. It was one thing to pose with the other girls but quite another to pose on her own.
‘No,’ she said, ‘group shots: that’s it. We are not doing this again, we are going to do some amazing group shots and we are going to look at them here and we are going to pick out a variety of ones which work.’
‘Hey,’ said Jack, ‘that’s not how I work. You can look at them on the computer but you don’t get to pick them.’
‘Sorry,’ said Lulu, ‘but I’m the stylist and I’m in charge of Ginger here. She no likee the picture, the picture no appearee in the paper.’
‘Yeah and that goes for me too,’ said Fiona. ‘No picture that I don’t like is going in, because I’m not letting Mattheson – or whatever sub she currently has under her thumb – decide what shot of me to put in.’
‘I agree completely,’ said Jodie nervously.
‘You can bully me all you want,’ said Jack, ‘but I just take the shots and I send up the ones that I think work.’
‘Yes,’ said Lulu, smiling, sort of an evil smile. ‘We all like that idea – but they’ll be the most amazing shots as chosen by us or no shoot.’
‘I’m not someone you can boss around, ‘said Jack. ‘I’m a journalist, honey, I’m in a union.’
‘Good for you, big boy,’ smiled Lulu. ‘We ready to rock and roll, or what?’
Ginger had never worked so hard in her life. It was exhausting: wearing the killer heels was exhausting, holding the poses that Lulu told her to hold was exhausting. She was in the middle for some reason. And beside her, Fiona couldn’t help bitching about how boring it all was and how much work she had to do.
‘But I guess I am getting to learn Krav Maga properly,’ she added. ‘I always wanted to do that. It’s worth looking like a moron in this shoot. What’s your thing, I forgot?’ she asked Ginger.
‘Personal trainer in CrossFit,’ said Ginger, sucking her waist in and giving a sultry look straight down the lens at Jack as directed by Lulu. ‘Haven’t met him yet. Monday.’ Ginger didn’t add that she was mildly sick at the thought. What if he wanted to weigh her? He would want to. She knew it.
‘Handy to get a few free personal workouts,’ shrugged Fiona. ‘That’s the problem of working in an office – it’s so sedentary. It’s good to kick-start yourself with some exercise.’
Ginger waited for the moment when she’d feel humiliated by this remark, but it didn’t come. Fiona didn’t mean it in any rude way, not the way Liza had meant it that horrible night at the wedding. Liza had implied that Ginger was just too lazy to do any exercise. Fiona was saying, ‘Yes, fitting in working out is hard but it’s possible.’
‘Do you work out much?’ she asked.
‘I used to do more,’ said Fiona, ‘but I moved in with my girlfriend and she’s got a little boy. We spend all our time with him, it’s fun.’
‘Wonderful,’ said Ginger. ‘How old is he?’
‘Three,’ Fiona’s eyes lit up. ‘He’s a beautiful little boy. I want to adopt him. That’s why I don’t let Carla Mattheson get to me,’ she said, ‘because I’ve got something else going on, another life. That’s the trick,’ she said, ignoring Jack yelling at them all to stop talking because he was going to start shooting again. ‘Work is just work. My dad always said that when you die you’ll never wish you had spent more time at the office.’
‘Will you stop talking,’ yelled Jack impatiently, ‘I want to get some pictures here before the entire day is over. At least models don’t talk.’
When the shoot was over, they all stood clustered around Jack’s computer looking at the digital images. There were hundreds, literally hundreds. But even Ginger – who simply couldn’t bear to look at herself at first – found that she looked great in the pictures. She wasn’t thin, but she was curvy and . . . sexy? Yes, she definitely looked sexy and she’d never looked sexy in her life. Not once, not ever.
‘You like?’ said Jack, looking up at her, a little glint in his eye.
‘Yes,’ she said, utterly straightforward.
‘You’re a strange one,’ he said. ‘It’s like you’re surprised or something.’
‘Just happy,’ said Lulu, intervening. ‘Ladies, why don’t you all get changed and I will go through the photos with Jack here,’ she put a firm hand on his shoulders. ‘We’ll nail it down to the ten that we like best.’
‘Ten?’ said Jack.
‘Ten,’ said Lulu,
‘I’ve got your number, babe, just wish you’d give me yours,’ muttered Jack.
‘You old smooth-talker,’ Lulu said, without an ounce of softness, ‘but when we have a deal on the pictures, we’ll discuss numbers. Until then, no dice.’
Between them, Lulu and Jack picked out ten pictures in which all three of the girls looked amazing.
‘Carla won’t like this – she was hoping for not-so-good shots to sell the “before” piece,’ Jack said.
‘But these look amazing and professional, which is what selling papers is all about,’ Lulu countered. ‘If she wants individual shots, you could crop them.’
‘Wish I could hire you here,’ said Jack, ‘you’re good at this.’
‘Did it for a living for a long time with a lot of famous photographers,’ said Lulu, ‘but I don’t have the time now.’
‘What do you do?’
‘Are we on a date?’ said Lulu.
‘Sorry, hands off, I know,’ said Jack, putting up his hands in mock surrender.
Jodie, Fiona and Ginger laughed. Even the studio assistant, who had been laboriously putting away all the equipment and whose arms were worn out by holding up giant circular metallic gold highlighters, managed a laugh.
‘I think our work here is done,’ said Lulu. ‘Get your stuff, ladies, we’re out of here.’
Ginger watched Jack hand Lulu a bit of paper which had to be his phone number, which Lulu smoothly took up, folded and slipped into her jeans pocket.
‘I’ll call you after I see the magazine,’ said Lulu. ‘We might like a couple of those shots,’ she added idly. ‘Ginger would like a few nice ones of her.’
‘No problem.’
Ginger managed to hold it together until they were out on the street and were separate from the other girls. Then she grabbed Lulu’s arm and squealed.
‘I never ever thought that could work! Lulu, you’re a magician! What you did was incredible. I have never liked a picture of me in my life.’
‘You just never had anyone to tell you how to do this sort of stuff,’ said Lulu simp
ly. ‘You didn’t have a mum and mums help with this sort of stuff. Or else friends do, and you had a crappy friend. I helped Zoe and she helped me, and our mum – who is fabulous and bonkers and loves fashion – helped both of us, but you didn’t have that. Instead, by all accounts, you had a bitchy friend who made you feel like crap forever. You should be proud of how you look, Ginger. We’re all shaped differently and the world makes it hard for anyone who isn’t built for high fashion. For example, I have absolutely no tits whatsoever. I’m as flat as a pancake.’
‘You don’t look it,’ said Ginger, surprised.
‘Without the aid of major padding when required, I would be like a boy, but you’ve got to work with that. I wear things that show off the bone structure in my chest, and if I really want to make an impact in the boob way, I go for fakery. I’ve seen models who are so slim you can’t see them when they turn sideways and they have bodies issues, so Ginger, you have got to learn to be comfortable with your body and look after it. It’s the only one you’ve got.’
Ginger nodded fervently. Lulu was right.
They passed a shop with a plate-glass window and she caught sight of herself back in her street clothes. With the beautiful hair and make-up still on, she even felt as if she was walking differently, walking as if she finally believed she was a sexy woman.
She drew herself up and walked taller, not hunching, not trying to hide.
‘Yes,’ she said, more to herself than to Lulu. ‘It’s the only one I’ve got.’
Callie
Callie woke with Ketchup fast asleep beside her. It felt so strange being back in her childhood home, but feeling her mother accept her again had made her both so very grateful and so tired that she hadn’t been able to do anything except relax into the feeling. After such stress, her body simply needed to let go of all anxiety.
They’d had a wonderful evening that first night, with her mother and Poppy talking non-stop to each other. Poppy even looked like her grandmother, Callie realised now.
Poppy had been so little when she’d last seen them together that she hadn’t realised how alike they were in so many ways. They laughed and giggled, talked about the soaps they liked and discussed different people. It turned out that her mother watched Keeping up with the Kardashians and had her own ideas on which of the family was the more interesting.
It was early in the morning, just after seven, and Callie knew she ought to get up. From downstairs, she could hear her mother rattling around in the kitchen – comforting, familiar sounds. The dog had slept most of the night with Poppy but Callie had heard him come downstairs early on, probably because the attic was very hot at night. He’d panted loudly beside her in the heat until he’d finally fallen asleep.
‘You’re lovely but you are wriggly and noisy,’ Callie had said to the little dog, as she picked him up, snuggled him and then carried him out onto the landing. There wasn’t a sound from the attic so Poppy hadn’t stirred. Sleeping the sleep of the exhausted and happy? At least, Callie hoped she was happy. Poppy had been through so much. From listening to her daughter and her mother, it turned out that lots of Poppy’s friends had been in touch with her and most of them had been nice. A couple had apparently said bitchy things about her father, but her grandmother had airily said that it would all be sorted out soon, which was what she and Callie had agreed to say.
‘I can’t tell her everything yet,’ Callie had said.
‘No,’ agreed Pat. ‘She adores him, doesn’t she? Poor child. Let’s break it all to her gently. Softly-softly, I always say.’
The early-morning peacefulness in the house was shattered when she heard a car door slam. There were voices, one high-pitched, the voice of their neighbour who was always out doing her garden and therefore saw the goings-on of the road, and another lower voice that Callie would have recognised anywhere. Her brother Freddie.
She hurriedly pulled on some clothes and ran into the bathroom to scrub her face with a facecloth and brush her teeth. There was no time for primping or beautifying – not that she bothered with much of that these days. Her skin looked on the outside the same way she felt on the inside: dried up. She used a bit of her mother’s deodorant and a quick squirt of a perfume she was sure her aunt had once had, and was therefore at least thirty years old, and went downstairs to meet her brother.
Who knew what he’d say when he saw her?
The tall man in the kitchen both looked like her younger brother and looked different: he’d filled out, grown older and had a beard that was greying. He was still good-looking, hair cut short, and there was the most wonderful sense of calm around him. His eyes, the same grey as her own, were warm as he saw his sister.
He smiled.
How could he look at her so warmly when she’d abandoned them all . . .?
But the thought stilled in her mind as Freddie crossed the kitchen to hold her in his arms.
Callie let the tears flow. ‘I am so sorry. I thought you’d hate me, never want to see me again—’
‘Cal, babes, I’m the one who was the heroin addict, I get to make the amends and say sorry. Sorry for what I put you through. I’m clean for nine years now. And there’s nothing to forgive. Drugs meant I wasn’t there when you needed me. I hated Jason and he put you in a cage.’
‘That’s what I always said,’ said Pat Sheridan, standing with a tea towel in her hand and watching her two children embracing. ‘The heroin had a grip on you, Freddie, and Jason had a grip on you, Claire. It’s like you were addicted to him or something. Now you’re back.’
With that simple explanation of it all, she turned and went back to the stove where a panful of rashers and sausages were frying.
‘Do you want eggs too, Freddie, love?’ she said. ‘I get the nice free-range ones.’
Freddie still held on to his sister, still hugging her as if trying to make up for the lost ten years.
‘Eggs, lovely. Let’s talk about all that another time,’ he said. ‘For now let’s just sit down and try and visit. I want to hear all about my beautiful niece.’
Callie began to cry. She didn’t deserve this but she wanted it so much. She held on to her brother, feeling the solidity of his chest as he embraced her. He was the same build as her father: tall, broad, with a barrel chest and solid arms.
‘Hush,’ he said now. ‘You’re back.’
They sat at the kitchen table as he ate his breakfast with relish and Callie drank coffee.
‘Eat,’ said her mother. ‘You’re too thin.’
‘Ah, Ma, leave her alone,’ said Freddie, and they both laughed.
It was like all those years ago, except Da would have been pottering around and Aunt Phil would be belting in, fag in hand, lippie in the other, saying she was late for the bus and was going to get a ride on Larry from across the road’s motorbike.
Someone would have made a remark about how a Honda 50 would only be marginally faster than walking to the factory but not much, and Phil would have roared laughing with that deep smoker’s voice and slammed the door on the way out.
Aware of Poppy being asleep upstairs, Freddie kept his voice low as he told his sister about the years of addiction and where it had brought him.
‘I owe you an apology, and Jason for paying for rehab when I ran off from it,’ he said.
‘You don’t owe that piece of shit anything,’ said Pat.
‘No,’ insisted Freddie. ‘That’s not how it works. I have to say sorry to the people I hurt and one day I’ll say it to him. Well, maybe,’ he amended, seeing the doubt on Callie’s face. ‘So I’ll say it to you instead. I put Ma here through hell but she did her best to stay with me.’
Pat blushed with pleasure. ‘It’s what a mother does,’ she said. ‘If she can. I was nearly broken, Freddie, you know that.’
‘I wasn’t here to help,’ Callie added guiltily.
‘You had your own problems,’ Fre
ddie pointed out.
‘How are you so calm?’ cried Callie.
‘I meditate and go to Narcotics Anonymous meetings. Kerry keeps me sane. Walking in the woods, feeling the air, the trees, nature all around me. I’m lucky: I got out and managed to stay out. Something like ninety per cent of heroin addicts don’t. How could I say a word to you for your life choices, Cal? You didn’t end up selling drugs on the street to keep your habit going, did you?’
Freddie, who used to smoke like a trooper, no longer smoked, so when Pat needed to light up one of her ten-a-day – ‘I am going to give up!’ was her constant refrain – Callie and Freddie sat outside in the garden and filled each other in on their lives.
‘So you don’t think he’s coming back, then?’ Freddie asked finally about Jason.
‘I hoped he would. I hoped it was a bad dream, but it kept going on, and bad dreams stop. So no. He hasn’t made contact with us. I was obviously imagining that he loved me, but, Freddie, he adored Poppy. If he could leave her, just run off, then it must all be true: every word of it. He’s gone and he’s never coming home. He did all the things they said.’
When Poppy got up, she was at first shy with this new uncle, but soon the two of them were talking nineteen to the dozen, with Poppy asking endless questions about her mother as a child.
‘She cut my hair once when I was asleep,’ Freddie was saying. ‘a weird fringe like a scarecrow – high up one side and longer the other. I was mutilated!’
‘Don’t listen to a word he says, Poppy,’ laughed her mother. ‘He’s an awful liar.’
Poppy and Freddie took Ketchup out for a walk and Callie, worn out from the emotion of the morning, sat with her mother.
‘I pray you never have to see Poppy go through addiction,’ Pat Sheridan said fiercely. ‘It was hell, pure hell. He started on the hash and then that wasn’t enough, and he was on to everything he could get his hands on, and finally, because it was cheap, he moved on to the heroin. I kept thinking he’d overdose and he’d be gone. Now they have that drug, Naloxone, and some families have it for their kids – it gets the lungs working if they overdose by mistake.’