Reasons to Be Cheerful

by Nina Stibbe

  Andy was slightly nonplussed by Devonshire Place–it being after all just a row of identical houses with no gardens or anything of any interest about them.

  ‘Why are we looking at this street?’ he asked.

  ‘We used to come here as kids.’

  ‘What for?’

  ‘The dentist,’ I lied.

  It was actually the address of the doctor who used to turn a blind eye and supply my mother with pills for cash when she’d reached her limit at home. But I didn’t tell Andy that.

  London Zoo was only a short walk away and I paid the entrance fee with a cash gift from Mr Holt. Andy was mesmerized by various bears and birds, and all the African mammals. He dawdled and read every bit of information, about each animal, out loud, and told me extra things he knew from his pre-trip reading. Some bombs had hit the zoo in World War Two, he told me; one had damaged the rodent house and some zebras had escaped.

  ‘Yikes,’ I said.

  ‘All the venomous snakes had to be destroyed at the outbreak of war,’ he said, blinking.

  ‘In case they got into enemy hands?’ I asked.

  ‘No, so they couldn’t escape in the event of a bombing, and go round biting people.’

  ‘As if the citizens of London hadn’t got enough on their plates,’ I tutted.

  We didn’t take taxis after that first one because Andy had brought the A–Z of London and felt we should walk. For me, zooming around in a taxi was the epitome of London. For Andy, it was walking as slowly as possible through the park, to avoid arriving at places where he might be in the way of bustling London people, and so we ambled, arm in arm, in the winter sun and though it was perfectly pleasant I was aware that Andy wasn’t exactly enjoying London.

  His map-reading took us along a canal and into Camden Town and then from there on to the Underground, which Andy was keen to use, to get us back to St Pancras station. We took the wrong branch and had to get off and return to Camden, or something like that; whatever it was we ended up on a Tube that stopped in between Mornington Crescent and Camden Town, and didn’t move again for two minutes. I imagined the worst and kept glancing at Andy–opposite me–but he was deep in his book, London Underground from Construction to Commuters, which had people sleeping in Holborn Tube station, presumably during the Blitz, on the front cover. He didn’t look up to grimace at me, which I thought unfriendly, and I told him later he shouldn’t really read a book about the London Underground while on it–it made him look ridiculous, I said, like a tourist, a thing I’d avoid at any cost.

  ‘But I am a tourist, and where better to read about it?’

  We were back at St Pancras hours early for our train. I considered my aunt Josephine but felt Kilburn might be cutting it a bit fine for the return train, and instead suggested we get back into the Tube and go to Charing Cross–where my sister was born, but more importantly, to see Trafalgar Square. Andy agreed and so we set off again.

  Trafalgar Square looked quite impressive–full of pigeons and people feeding pigeons and having their photograph taken with pigeons on their arms and heads. We gazed at the scene and I felt I had triumphed, that this was London at its best: the stone lions, the buildings, the buses circling and Nelson up there in the sky.

  A man nearby was photographing the scene and in so doing, became part of the scene himself. He was a professional, wearing a smart but baggy suit, using a good camera. He saw me looking at him and turned to us.

  ‘You want me to take your photograph?’ he asked. ‘The two of you together.’

  We smiled and shrugged.

  ‘A proper portrait? I’ll post you the picture.’ He showed us an example of a handsome couple in black and white, in that very place.

  ‘Yes,’ I said, gripping Andy’s arm, ‘let’s do it.’

  It was expensive but the photographer made a big deal of getting us in the right position. He wanted key things in the background and the sun in front and that kind of thing, and not to have Nelson’s Column coming out of one of our heads–amateurs made mistakes like that all the time, he said. We posed; arms around one another, looking straight to camera. I did the new smile I’d been perfecting in the mirror for just such an event–lower lip covering lower bottom half of upper teeth, as if I was about to say a word beginning with V (imagine Anita Harris)–and I believe Andy said, ‘Cheeeese.’

  Click! went the camera.

  We laughed, and then we kissed and, click!–he’d taken another, of our kiss.

  ‘Hey!’ he said. ‘I took another for free–I’ll send both. That’ll be a good one, I’m telling you, that’s my trick to get the best shots!’ He was thrilled.

  We paid him. I seem to remember the cost was £10, which sounds outrageous but felt worth it. We’d spent very little money all day except for the taxi to Devonshire Place for me to get my bearings, and the zoo tickets had been a present. The photographer wrote down Andy’s name and address in a little notebook. He flipped the pages and I saw the names of other people he’d snapped.

  ‘How long until it comes?’ I asked, impatient.

  ‘Ah, a week, maybe two?’ he said. ‘It depends how busy I get. Maybe a big story blows up and I’m off, or things are quiet.’

  I often think of that man. The photographer. You couldn’t meet a nicer person.

  ‘You here for sightseeing?’ he’d said. ‘Where have you been?’

  ‘London Zoo.’

  ‘Beautiful–such a gorgeous day, lovely light, winter light, good for photography.’

  Andy asked him about his job and he described it as documenting the greatest city on earth and I felt it might be just what was needed to awaken Andy’s love of London. It certainly awakened mine–because London Photographer wasn’t a million miles away from Jobbing Writer, in terms of wandering around, engaging with people, noting the lovely light.

  ‘You’ve got to be there,’ he said, ‘and click, click, and that’s it.’

  Having our photograph taken had been my highlight of the day. The being approached. The discussion. The pose, the self-conscious laughter, the embrace. And that kiss–although quick, and chaste–was our best kiss ever. It was public, in front of a London Photographer, surrounded by people and pigeons and sharply contrasting shadows and under the pale blue sky and Nelson. It was a statement of our togetherness.

  On the train home I asked Andy–deep in his book–‘What’s been your highlight of the day?’

  I always like to ask people their highlight, to give them a chance to describe a thing. They might say the thing they most enjoyed, or a bun they’ve liked, or a funny moment, but they might say something surprising, something difficult or troubling, like Andy did then.

  ‘Probably the one hundred and twenty-nine seconds in the Tube train, stationary, between Mornington Crescent and Camden Town.’

  ‘What?’ I said. ‘That was my lowlight.’

  ‘It was real,’ said Andy, ‘and unexpected.’

  ‘Well, I hated it.’

  ‘It happens a lot,’ said Andy, ‘on that bit of the Northern Line.’

  He didn’t have to ask me my highlight, he already knew it. Having that photograph taken has been one of the highlights of my whole life. Not that we ever saw it. After three weeks had passed I concluded the photographer must have lost his notebook.

  26. The Ossie Dress

  The fail didn’t put me off driving; on the contrary, I asked Mrs Woodward to book me in for the next possible test.

  ‘Just get behind the wheel whenever you possibly can,’ she advised.

  And I did. I took any driving practice I could find, with anyone.

  ‘Are you going anywhere in the car during the next couple of weeks?’ I asked JP.

  ‘Not that I can think of,’ he said, ‘unless you’d like to drive us home for lunch and back during the week?’

  ‘OK, yes, I’ll do it,’ I said.

  It was hard work, driving to Blackberry Lane every lunchtime with that pair. Tammy didn’t like sitting in the back, but she had to
since JP had to be in the driving-instructor role. We’d arrive at the house, and I’d have to feed him his cigarettes while Tammy cooked an omelette on sardines on toast or whatever they were having.

  As I say, I found it difficult.

  ‘I say,’ said JP one lunchtime, ‘how would you like a run out to the Swan Hotel in Loughborough next week?’

  ‘Oh, yes!’ said Tammy. ‘Good thinking.’

  ‘It’s the BDA Annual Winter Dinner Dance,’ said JP. ‘You could drive us there, and then I can have a drink.’

  ‘When is it?’ I asked.

  ‘A week on Monday,’ said Tammy.

  ‘A dance, on a Monday?’ I asked.

  ‘It’s always on the second Monday of December,’ said Tammy. ‘It’s officially the most Christmassy night of the year, bar Christmas Eve, and we get the Tuesday off.’

  ‘OK,’ I said, quite excited at the thought of attending a dinner dance, dressing up, maybe dancing with a lovely dentist who cared about the dentally needy, or would change. Or just dancing in the dark with people who didn’t know me.

  ‘Is it a dressy occasion?’ I asked.

  ‘Very,’ said Tammy.

  ‘I should say so,’ agreed JP. ‘It’s the British Dental Association.’

  ‘It’s the one that Andy Nicolello protested at that time,’ said Tammy.

  The thought that Andy might also be outside the Swan Hotel, in a bobble hat and donkey jacket with a placard reading, BDA = BLOODY DISGRACEFUL ATTITUDE, added to the excitement. I’d enjoy breaking away from JP and Tammy as we approached the entrance of the hotel, greeting Andy with exaggerated pride and admiration, and further infuriate them by giving him a long, loving embrace and kiss (I’d be like Jane Fonda)–after which only the most progressive-thinking dentist would dream of approaching me on the dance floor.

  And Andy, having watched me disappear inside, might have a passionate epiphany on the cold stone steps.

  I was going to kill a few birds with one stone that night.

  ‘You can’t be over-dressed,’ Tammy told me. ‘Last year Jossy Turner arrived wrapped, literally, in a silver bandage underneath a fur coat with a matching muff and no one batted an eyelid.’

  ‘What will you be wearing?’ I asked.

  ‘The Halston, of course.’

  The Halston–Tammy’s favourite outfit–was an original fake orange halterneck-and-pants jumpsuit. It was amazing.

  Inspired to find something equally lovely, I walked over to Barbara Road, to Best End Boutique, whose proprietor was April Jickson, the woman I’d met on the London train, who knew my mother and had the twins. I knew I’d feel confident in April’s empty shop, more comfortable than in the thronging teenage shops in town, such as Chelsea Girl and Rosie O’s. The downside being the prices, but then April had a buy-back service where she’d let you display your dress on her pre-worn rail in return for twenty-five per cent of whatever she got for it.

  The window was a fashion tableau for the older, better-off woman. Mrs Greenbottle popped unbidden into my head, not that I’d ever imagined her before. One mannequin, draped in a camel coat, had such fiercely projecting nipples that you could see the beige plastic through the fine-knit black vest. The other two wore different-coloured tartan kilts with white polo necks, and assorted winter bits and bobs. Ski equipment was dotted about, and snowflakes dangled from on high.

  ‘What’s the occasion?’ asked April Jickson.

  ‘The British Dental Association Annual Winter Dinner Dance.’

  ‘Oh, my,’ said April and her eyes lit up. She told me about the silver bandage she’d sold to Jossy Turner last year. ‘You should have seen it–oh my God, it was the sexiest dress ever made.’

  ‘I’ve heard about it.’

  ‘Jossy’s wearing a mackerel fishtail this year,’ she said. ‘She’s not long ago been in for it.’

  ‘Sounds lovely.’

  ‘It is, unless she ruins it with a knicker line.’ April tutted at the thought.

  I tutted too.

  ‘OK, so how many weeks’ salary are we spending here?’ she drawled, sliding hangers along a rail.

  ‘One,’ I said, meaning about £20.

  April looked me up and down for a while and said she knew the exact dress and dragged out a hard-boned kind of thing but held it up against me and declared me a tricky shape. I knew I was a pear. I’d assessed my body shape with help from Woman’s Own and I knew not to wear a hard-boned tube.

  ‘I’m a pear,’ I said.

  She snatched a Zandra Rhodes off the pre-worn rail, making it float through the air before she held it quivering against me.

  ‘No,’ she said, it needed more shoulder than I had. And she took another and another and another until I began feeling anxious that I was going to have to buy something whether I liked it or not, because of all of this displaying, effort and interest–like the obligation to kiss at the cinema if you’d been driven there or paid for. But worse, because of the expense. Finally, she pulled out a turquoise wraparound called the Ossie.

  ‘Oh, turquoise,’ I said.

  ‘Never say turquoise,’ said April. ‘It’s “sea-coloured” when you’re talking about beautiful frocks.’

  Whatever it is officially called, the colour was a certain kind of bluey-green. I’d never seen the sea that shade, except maybe a distant smear of water in a pastel seascape. But it is a colour so lovely it catches my eye if I see it, fleetingly, in a bunch of things, say at Patel’s Homewares, or in a magazine. It’s so nice to look at, so soothing and yet dazzling at the same time and–here’s the big thing–it makes my pale, blotchy skin look creamy and my eyes look green on the green parts and white on the white parts, and all in all I look my best.

  That’s what colour the Ossie was and it was made from the thinnest, finest, slipperiest, silkiest material. A kind of high-quality nylon that clung to every protuberance. I saw this when I was trying it on. I saw that the skirt outlined each leg as I walked quizzically towards the mirror. I saw the shocking chest area, a thing that looks deliberate and sexual and provocative–of course I saw it–the unevenness, the veins and the boss-eyed nipples.

  ‘Is it a bit clingy?’ I said.

  And April said, ‘Oh, no–it’s lovely, so sexy.’

  ‘Sexy? But I don’t…’

  ‘Subtly, though, sexy in a modest way,’ she corrected herself.

  ‘But…’ I gestured to the bra area and plucked at it a bit.

  ‘Oh, you can sort that out with decent undies,’ she said, waving the worry away. She pulled the fabric about with both hands, cigarette between her teeth. I remembered the Dorothy Perkins bra and the little cleavage I could create wearing it and how alluring it looked.

  ‘Shave your legs, obviously–and never wear knickers, for Christ’s sake, never wear knickers under a dress. And if you’re on, wear two tampons at once and pray, or stay at home, but don’t wear knickers.’

  ‘OK.’

  While I was trying various pre-worn handbags, beads and sandals to accessorize the Ossie, a woman burst in and greeted April like an old friend.

  ‘Can I try something on, April?’ she asked. ‘Not that I can buy anything, I just need cheering up.’

  ‘Yes, yes.’ April flung her arms out. ‘Have a play, then come and have a fag and a drink.’

  The woman tried on a huge silky thing and a fake punk dress, but took them off again and then tried some boots. She wandered about in her underwear and the boots, had a cigarette, and complained about her horrible husband–who was a pig and whose name was Denis, same as April’s, a discovery that made them both laugh. The customer wondered if they might be married to the same man, a bigamist, but April said she doubted it–her Denis being housebound. The customer stubbed her cigarette out.

  ‘Thank you, darling, I feel much better,’ she said as she left.

  ‘All part of the service,’ April called after her.

  Another woman came in to buy 15-denier tights and a chain belt and had a glass of wine and s
oda, and borrowed a screwdriver. And then another who bought a ready-made pleated sari in gold and fuchsia, without even trying it on, and wrote down the number of April’s chiropodist. I decided that April Jickson’s shop was the manifestation of the spirit of Woman’s Own. It was a refuge, a playroom, a dressing-up chest, a pub and a toy shop, all rolled into one.

  I bought the Ossie reduced from £21.50 to £20 and–because April said I must not, under any circumstances, wear my Jesus sandals with it, or I’d be breaking a tacit agreement with the designer–I also bought a pair of pre-worn gladiator sandals (£4).

  ‘When you wear someone’s dress, it’s your duty to accessorize properly, otherwise you have no right to wear it,’ she said.

  At home, I got the Ossie out of the bag and regretted it immediately. April had warned me that this might happen–‘Buying an expensive dress can feel like getting pregnant,’ she’d said. ‘You thought it was what you wanted but in the cold light of day, it’s truly terrifying’–so I was prepared for the feeling and reminded myself that it was only a dress and would not, could not, ruin my life and I didn’t let it upset me. I did realize, though, in the freedom of my own flat, that wraparound dresses only look nice when you’re standing still, inside, and looking at yourself face on. In the real world, the dress opens and your leg slides out as you walk and therefore you have to lean slightly forward holding the flap closed with a finger and thumb around mid-thigh.

  I rang my mother and she called in later, especially. She said ‘holding a dress closed’ was itself a ‘look’ and came from the 1960s when, suddenly, people were wearing sexy dresses in non-sexy places and had to hold them shut so as not to be in the papers with their backside on show.