by Jade West
She flicked through the notes. “She’ll never take this, and you know it.”
I shrugged. “Make something up. Say you won it at bingo or some crap. Whatever you want.”
She smiled and slipped it in her pocket. “I’ll work something out.”
“Just don’t say it was from me. It’s not a… I just want to…” I sighed. “Just make sure she has a good time.”
She winked. “I will. You can count on it.”
Yes, I could.
The guys were wolf whistling again before she was clear of the yard. I’d have given them another roasting if she hadn’t spun on her own sweaty heels and given them the finger herself.
I got back to that air-con.
“I’m nervous,” I admitted, eyes still closed tight. “Maybe I shouldn’t have…”
“You really should have,” Tonya insisted.
I finally dared to look. The sight in the mirror took me aback.
“You like?” the hairdresser asked, her smile wide.
I ran my fingers through my shorter hair, and it felt so soft. So stylish. I hadn’t had a long bob since I’d had Mia, having neither had the time nor the inclination to maintain it. Or the money, for that matter, not in the beginning.
I hadn’t had the time, inclination or money to keep up with the deep-cherry hair dye, either, but it was another thing I’d opted to revisit with a little encouragement from Tonya. I shook my head, and the longer lengths shimmied, just about grazed my shoulders.
I grabbed a deep breath and couldn’t stop smiling. “I love it. I really love it.” I turned to Tonya. “I feel like me again! Oh my God, I really feel like me!”
“You look like you, as well,” she said. She still had foils in her hair from her highlights, but came over anyway, wrapped her arms around my neck. “It’s just like old times. Ahhh, can you remember? You and me, singing along to the top-forty pop chart in your bedroom. You had this hair then.”
I laughed. “With Nanna singing along on the landing in her opera voice. How could I ever forget? Happy days.”
They were indeed happy days, when Pops was still alive, too. He and Nanna used to be at ours all the time. The thought hit me in the belly. I’d been so close to Pops. Darren, too. He’d been close to both of them.
But now wasn’t the time to be thinking about any of that.
The hairdresser held up a second mirror and I was pleasantly surprised to find how much of a difference my new cut made to the back of me. I looked cared for. No more straggly limp pony, no more freshly-raked mess of split ends. The style changed my face, too. Made me appear younger. Fresher. Sexier.
I felt my eyes welling and it was so ridiculous I had to laugh.
“Daft old goat,” Tonya said, but she was teary-eyed as well. I laughed harder at the realisation and she pulled a face. “This is from the ammonia!” she protested. “Don’t for a second think it isn’t, missy!”
I stared at myself with a strange mix of elation and sorrow. Sorrow for the me I’d abandoned all that time ago. Sorrow for the self-esteem I’d buried with Brian and only just started to rediscover. Sorrow for the years going through the motions. For the years when I didn’t matter to myself.
Sorrow for the years I’d written myself off as a woman.
“I can’t believe how emotional a silly little haircut is making me.” I met Tonya’s eyes. “Never again,” I said. My voice was low and steely. “Not ever. I’m never giving myself up again.”
She nodded. “Not ever. You’re back now. Forever.”
Yes.
Yes, I was.
I had a spring in my step as we hit the shops, and suddenly the racks of clothes held promise – a little excitement, too. I picked up items I’d never have considered before, cute little tops that showed a bit of cleavage, some dresses in brighter colours, fitted at the bust and flared enough to skim my hips. I tried everything, and put it all back, committing to maybe I’ll come back for it every time Tonya tutted at me.
I held my breath as she stopped outside Jaunt – a trendy but uber tasteful boutique that I’d admired from outside but never ventured in.
“Come on!” she said. “We’re on a roll.”
I looked at the price tags in the window. “This is a bit… extravagant…”
She took my arm. “No harm trying, Jo. No harm at all.”
As soon as I was inside I wished I’d held my ground. The place was teeming with beautiful clothes that made my heart stutter. Tonya picked up a scarlet tunic top with a handkerchief hem and the fabric billowed and rippled like a dream.
“Try it,” she said and shoved it in my direction. I held it up to my torso in front of the mirror.
“I can’t…”
She found some fitted black jeans from the rack and forced them into my arms. “And these.”
I didn’t hand them back, because in truth I didn’t want to. My soul had already taken ownership of them, my fingers gripping tight. I added a cold-shoulder turquoise number to the mix, a slightly boho blouse that screamed at me from the mannequin, a cherry blossom bodycon dress that I’d have to wear with shaping underwear, and a couple of decent camis with lace trimmings.
I daren’t imagine how much the little bundle would come to, convincing myself that most of it would look totally shit on me.
But it didn’t. It didn’t at all.
“Oh my fucking God!” Tonya squealed as I stepped from the fitting room in the bodycon dress. “That was made for you!”
Even without the shaper knickers I was inclined to agree with her. It wrapped me in its beautiful contours, highlighting the slopes and curves that should be there, and somehow managing to skim over the ones that shouldn’t. Fuck knows how.
The other items followed suit. Teamed with the new hair and a splash of makeup it was like another woman staring back at me, and I liked her. I really liked her.
Every item ended up on the yes pile. Every single one.
I sighed as I re-examined the selection. “Which one shall I take?”
Tonya waggled a finger at me. “Uh uh, no fucking way, girlfriend.” She laughed. “These babies were made for you.”
I totted up the total. “There’s nearly four hundred quid’s worth of clothes in this haul,” I groaned. “I’ll take the bodycon dress, and that’s pushing it. A hundred quid for a bloody dress, I must have lost my mind.”
I pulled the dress from the pile and made to hang the others on the no rack before my heart could break, but she stopped me, tugged the clothes from my fingers.
“I’ll get these,” she said.
I grabbed her by the elbow before she was even a foot away. “Sorry?”
She sighed, looked pretty shifty. “I was going to tell you, but I wanted it to be a surprise.” She put her hand on her hip, like she meant business. “I won six hundred quid on a scratch card. I want to share it with you.” She looked at herself in the mirror, checked out her highlights. “Spent my bit already, got some good shit coming in the post. Quite an eBay haul…” She pulled a face, looked a little embarrassed.
“Well, congratulations!” I said. “And I’m touched by the gesture, but that money’s yours. You should spend it on you.” I gestured to her own pile of maybes back in the changing room.
“Don’t like them,” she lied. “I think I’ll probably need to lose a couple of inches first.”
“Whatever, Tonya.” I laughed. “I know you’re trying to save me and all that, and I appreciate it, I really do. I appreciate it more than you could ever know, truly, but I’m not taking that money from you. No way.” I yanked back the clothes before she could protest. “I’ll get the bodycon dress, as a one-off ridiculous splurge, and I’ll wear it on a night out. You can buy me a drink or two with your winnings, deal?”
“Not really,” she said. She fumbled in her handbag pulled out a handful of notes. A big handful. “I already got the cash out. I wanted to give it to you.”
I felt a strange tickle of gratitude in my chest, but I forced it
aside. I took her hand, pushed that cash back in her purse. “No,” I said. “Thank you, but no. Spend it on you, please. You deserve it more than I do.” I smiled. “My lucky day will come. Maybe I should get a scratch card myself, eh? Maybe we’re onto a winning streak?”
She looked thoroughly fucking mortified. “Please don’t do this,” she said. “Those clothes look amazing on you. I know you want them. I know you feel good in them, I can see it written all over you.”
“They’re only clothes!” I said. I ignored my pained heart. “It doesn’t matter, Tonya. I got my hair done. That’s a start, right?”
“Please, Jodie.” She stared right at me. “I want to do this.”
I closed my eyes, shook my head. By the time I opened them again I was as strong as steel. “And I really want you to spend the money on you.”
I hung the rejected items on the no rack and made an exit, but every step towards the register and the inevitable exit beyond grew harder. My mind went to the forbidden zone, to that extra card in my purse, the one I never use. The one I’ve never even considered using, not since Darren and I nearly came to blows over my plans to use it for Disneyland for the kids.
No, he’d said. No fucking way, Jodie. We’ll find a way to pay for Disney ourselves. This isn’t what that money’s for. This isn’t what Pops meant it to be for!
I checked in my purse and there it was, the pristine plastic tucked cosily behind my standard dog-eared debit card. I pulled it out and rubbed it between my fingers, got a feel for it.
Tonya saw me and sucked in breath. “Pop Pop’s money?!” She nodded. “Oh yes. Yes! This definitely counts! One hundred percent!” She tugged me back to the changing rooms and I had to dig my heels in to slow down.
“I don’t know,” I said. “The will said it was for me only. For experiences of a lifetime.” I gestured to the clothes. “I’m really not sure this counts. It’s just some clothes. Pops worked hard for that money… I don’t want to waste it…” Tears pricked at the thought, at the memory of having the five grand transferred to my savings account and knowing it was his final gift. His instructions had been clear.
This is for Jodie, and Jodie only. It is to be spent on life. On living the dream. On the experiences of a lifetime, just for her, courtesy of old Pop Pop.
Tonya squeezed my arm, squeezed it hard. “Pops would count this as living,” she said. “Pops would know how hard you’ve worked, how hard you’ve tried, know everything you’ve sacrificed to bring those girls up.” She smiled, and she was sad, too. “It’s your time,” she said. “The time you find yourself again. This is an experience of a lifetime.” She sighed. “Please, Jo, if you’re not going to let me buy these clothes for you, then at least let Pops do it. I know he’d want to.”
I looked at the clothes again, and she was right. He would want to. I know he would.
“I feel good in them,” I mumbled to myself. “It’s so nice to feel good again.” I looked at the scarlet top, remembered how amazing I’d felt in it. “Maybe this really is the experience of a lifetime – finding myself again after all this time. Maybe it’s the start of a whole new world.”
Tonya nodded. “Definitely.”
Could I do this?
I weighed it up, back and forth. I mean, once I’d started spending it, would I be able to stop? It’s a slippery slope, right? This living. I’d got used to scrimping and saving, used to making do and putting the kids first, putting Nanna first, putting the essentials first. The non-essentials, too, just so long as they weren’t for me.
Moment of truth and I let my heart make the call. I walked quickly, quickly enough that my frugal, responsible self couldn’t step in and trash the whole thing for me. I handed the clothes over at the register and presented the card with a flourish.
I keyed in the numbers I’d memorised by heart and waited for the transaction to go through.
It went through just fine.
Tonya said very little as we exited the store. I don’t think she could quite believe it.
She was even more surprised when I walked a circuit back through our previous locations for the rest of the maybe-I’ll-come-back-for-thems too.
Living sure felt good.
“I didn’t spend much of it, not really,” I justified as Tonya and I piled through my front door.
She dropped her bags in the hallway next to mine. “I know that. It’s you who’s having the problem with it.”
Not a problem enough to take any of the items back, nor the cute little owl tunics I’d picked up for the girls, either. Or the plum silk headscarf I’d grabbed for Nanna. We could all live a little today, push the boat out.
“Wine?” I asked. “Just the one. A girly end to our girly day.” I checked the clock, Darren would be bringing the girls back any time now. My stomach flipped at the thought. Ridiculous. Like he hadn’t brought them home a million times before in the past seven years.
But not when I’ve had a freshly chopped, dark-cherry bob and a full face of makeup.
I grabbed a couple of glasses and asked Nanna if she was joining us. No, she said after gushing about my hair awhile. She only drinks on special occasions. Christmas and birthdays and Sundays. Sometimes a Saturday too. She was about to watch Question King anyway. She’d leave us girls to it.
Girls. I loved the way she still called us that.
Tonya let out a sigh, dropped into a seat at the dining table and held up her glass. “To new beginnings.”
I laughed. “To cherry-red haircuts, and gangbanging mechanics.” I paused. “And to Pops.”
“To Pops,” Tonya agreed.
We clinked glasses and took a healthy swig. I kicked back in the chair opposite, cast aside my heels and let my aching feet breathe.
“So,” Tonya said, and she had that mischievous look I’d come to know so well over the years. “Since every other horny bitch in the village is chomping at the clit for some Bang Gang servicing, where do you sit on it?”
I almost spat my wine out. “Sorry?!”
She scoffed at me. “Jodie Symmonds, like I don’t know you. Don’t even try and tell me you haven’t thought about it, no matter how pissed off you are.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I said, but my cheeks were scorching.
She laughed. “I knew it.” Her grin was wide. “Bodywand? Many times over, right? Was it about Trent? He featured, right?”
“Shh!” I chided. “Nanna!” But Nanna was well out of earshot and I knew it.
Tonya’s eyes twinkled. “If it’s good enough for Mandy big-gob Taylor and the rest of the village, why not?”
“Because…” I began. “Because… Darren… because the girls…” I lowered my voice. “Because it’s been ages, I might have forgotten what the fuck I’m supposed to do.” I let out a giggle. “It’s probably bloody healed up by now. I’m a reborn virgin.” I smirked to myself. “Brian wasn’t exactly… adventurous.”
She groaned. “Brian was such a boring douchebag. Fuck knows how you even ended up with that loser.”
“You know how I ended up with him.”
“Yeah, yeah. I know the version you told me at the time.”
I smiled. “Internet dating, like I said.”
“Boring Dudes dot com?”
Oh my poor cheeks at the thought of the real story. Me looking for some casual hook-ups to finally get me over Darren, looking for guys who could fuck me senseless and make me feel like a woman again. Risky guys. Wild guys. Guys who’d make me bow-legged and exhausted for days to come. Only I’d found the safe option. Mr Thirty-grand Salary. Mr Respectable. Mr Safe As Fucking Houses.
Mr Fucking Dull.
Tonya leaned in. “The thing I never quite got,” she said. “And I can ask you this now, since you’re…”
“Since I’m..?”
She looked me up and down. “Since you’re… you again. I just never got the move from someone like Darren to someone like Brian. I mean, you and Darren were… intense.”
; “Humping like fucking rabbits, you mean?” I laughed.
“Like rabbits on Viagra.” She downed some more of her wine. “I remember the shit you two used to get up to. Getting it on in Mary Hart’s garden, while her parents were manning the barbeque… that time you disappeared in the Drum’s loo and the whole fucking pool team could hear you… Sucking his dick in the back of Buck’s car on the way to Jenna Ward’s birthday bash…”
I couldn’t help but smile at the memories. “A long time ago.”
“Maybe not so long ago.” She tipped her glass in my direction. “You’d have loved this Bang Gang crap then, just for the wildness of it. I know you would’ve.”
I kept it coy. “Maybe.”
“So, what’s different? Like I said, if it’s good enough for Mandy bloody Taylor, it’s more than good enough for you.”
I waved her suggestion aside. “Why don’t you have a go, if you’re so sure it’s a good idea?”
“Yeah, right.” She rolled her eyes. “Like I have either the cash or the inclination. Trent and Buck are like fucking brothers to me. One million percent friend-zoned.”
“And Petey, and Hugh and Jimmy O?”
She grinned. “Maybe Hugh and Jimmy O. I hear Petey’s not up to all that much.”
“How would you…” I questioned, but the answer was obvious. I smirked, and so did she, and we said it in unison.
“Mandy. Fucking. Taylor.”
We were still laughing when the front door thumped its trademark thump into the wall. The regular Ruby entrance. She’d bang it off its hinges one of these days.
I composed myself as she came bounding through, a caked-on oil smear across her cheek. Standard. Mia followed a lot more meekly, dropped herself into the seat beside me. They pulled and prodded my hair, full of giddy compliments.
“Did you girls have fun?” I asked, grabbing them both in for a kiss. I rubbed at Ruby’s cheek and she pulled a face.