by Jane Fallon
She beams a smile at me. ‘Hi! Come on in.’
‘I … um … I’m overdressed, aren’t I?’
‘What? No, you look fabulous.’ I follow her inside, wondering if I should nip home and change. Gail is handing me a drink, though, an elegant flute of fizz. I put it down. ‘Oh, no, I came to see if you wanted any help …’
‘All done,’ she says, leading me into the living room, picking up my glass as she goes. It’s gigantic, with the biggest, whitest sofa I have ever seen, heavy, dark wood side tables, an open fire, framed abstract art. The patio doors leading on to the garden are gaping wide.
‘Too cold?’ she says.
‘A little bit, maybe, but it’s …’ I’m interrupted by the doorbell. I feel ridiculously nervous, like a prize cow that’s about to be examined and appraised. Gail goes to answer it. I hear voices, a man and a woman. Air-kissing. I take a sip of my drink.
I stand there for what seems like an awfully long time while they go via the kitchen to get a drink. I wonder if I should go in there to greet them, but it feels presumptuous, so I just stay where I am, listening to them all talking and laughing. Eventually, I hear Gail saying, ‘Oh, come and meet Laura,’ and I stand to attention, shifting from foot to foot in my uncomfortable heels.
It’s the woman from opposite. Stella. And, I assume, her fiancé Al. He’s clearly a good bit older than her – eleven years, I think Gail said – but toned and tanned and buffed to perfection, with that glow that says, ‘I’m rich and successful.’ He’s handsome under there somewhere, but his eyes appear to have been stretched round and open and he has blinding white veneers on his teeth, so now he looks like a startled baby bird who’s wearing dentures. Like Stella, he has an unfeasibly large head of hair. Just a shade too dark, in his case. I make a note to ask Gail about the hair. Maybe it’s something in the local water. I could bottle it and make a fortune. He looks familiar. I’m not sure why.
Stella looks immaculate, in faded jeans, with flat, bejewelled thong sandals revealing golden ankles and perfectly manicured toes and, guess what, a soft-fitted retro T-shirt. I feel like someone’s aunt, making way too much effort, while all the cool kids are naturally chic in whatever they threw on.
‘Laura, this is Stella and Al,’ Gail says as she comes in. Stella and Al look me up and down; she with a bit of a sneer, he, I would say, with a slightly wolfish smile.
‘Hi,’ I manage.
‘Hello,’ Stella says, somehow imbuing the two syllables with disdain. The huge hair is tied up like the most luxurious horse’s tail you ever seen. Every bit of her glows with health and self-care. Apart from her lips, which are just … well … weird, in my opinion. Two mutant slugs that have taken up residence on her face. And her eyes, the outside corners of which are pulled up at a sharp angle. It looks painful.
‘Laura’s going to be living in the annexe for a while,’ Gail says. ‘Do you remember, I told you? Her house fell through.’
‘There are definitely worse places to end up,’ Al says.
‘Yes, it’s lovely.’ I’m wracking my brains as to where I know him from.
Stella turns to Gail, ignoring me. ‘Did you hear that Roman and Jan are moving away for a year? He’s opening an office in Nice.’
It’s a blatant attempt to exclude me from the conversation.
‘Oh no, I didn’t know,’ Gail says. I’m willing the doorbell to ring and more guests to arrive, to dilute the awkwardness.
‘The girls are so upset. They’ve become such good friends with Sophia.’
‘Oh,’ Gail says. ‘Laura has a daughter. She’s seven, isn’t that right, Laura?’
I nod. ‘Betsy. How old are yours?’
Stella graces me with her attention. ‘Eight and ten, but they’re very sophisticated.’
Clearly, Betsy is not considered worthy. ‘Oh well, Betsy isn’t. She’s a typical little girl, you know. Her idea of sophistication is eating Nandos with a knife and fork. But I’m sure they’ll get on.’
‘Hmmm,’ is all that Stella can manage. She turns back to Gail. ‘I suppose Sophia will be off to uni in the autumn, anyway, but still …’
I sip my champagne nervously. I have a tendency to drink a little too much in social situations when I’m feeling uncomfortable. Especially if I feel I’m on show. I remind myself to go slow. But I’m irritated by the way I know she’s prejudged me. ‘Maybe Betsy could have a playdate with them? She’ll be with me every weekend.’
Stella raises a sceptical eyebrow. At least, I think that’s what she’s trying to do; it’s hard to tell on her frozen face. ‘My girls have a very busy schedule. They don’t really do impromptu playdates. Or playdates at all, actually. They’re a bit old for that.’
I want to say, Poor them, but I don’t want to make things awkward for Gail. Stella eliminates the threat, though, by more or less turning her back on me. ‘Of course, they won’t be leaving before the autumn. And they’re not selling up, so that’s something –’
‘You look very familiar, Al,’ I interrupt. Stella stops talking and shoots him a look that could turn milk.
‘I was just thinking the same,’ he says. He has one of those voices actors have in TV shows from the seventies. Smooth. Silky. Seductive. I bet he practises it when he’s alone.
‘You don’t work in St John’s Wood, maybe?’
He takes a slow sip of his drink. ‘I do, actually. Do you?’ Stella looks from him to me and back again.
‘Yes,’ I say. ‘Well, yes and no …’
‘Laura runs a cleaning company,’ Gail pipes up.
Stella turns to me, pillowy lips pouted. ‘Oh, you’re a cleaner.’
‘I run a cleaning company,’ I say, as politely as I can.
‘Mmm,’ she says, unconvinced.
‘In St John’s Wood?’ Al says.
‘Mainly. Maybe you work for one of the companies …’
He puffs his chest up proudly. ‘AJT Music. I’m the CEO.’
‘Oh well, you’re one of my clients,’ I say. Stella glares at me. I ignore her. Fuck her. All I’m doing is having a civil conversation. ‘You’ve probably seen me dropping off supplies or popping in to check everything is OK.’
‘That must be it. I never forget a face,’ he says. He’s being friendly, but there’s something unsettling about him, something flirty in his tone that makes me uncomfortable, as if this is a dynamic he and Stella play out often and I’m just a mouse to be toyed with.
‘That makes sense,’ Gail says. ‘I gave Al one of my ads for the annexe to put up at work. I gave them to everyone on The Close. I thought, that way, I’d end up with someone respectable.’ She laughs to show that this is a joke, although I imagine there’s a grain of truth in it somewhere.
‘That’s it. That’s where I saw it.’
‘Ah, so I’m responsible for you moving in,’ Al says, with a raised eyebrow. Stella’s nostrils flare.
‘Oh! I keep meaning to tell you. We’ve secured Ottolenghi to do the catering,’ she says to Gail, out of nowhere. ‘It’s not something he would usually do, but …’ She leaves the sentence hanging, for us to draw our own conclusions about how they persuaded him. Cold hard cash, I assume. To be fair, it does sound like a bit of a coup.
‘Wow,’ Gail says. ‘Fabulous.’
Stella is obviously disappointed that we don’t ask more questions. ‘Al won’t tell me what it’s costing.’ She lays a hand on Al’s arm.
‘Nothing but the best,’ he says, smiling at her cheesily. I have to force myself not to pull a face. C–ringe, as Betsy would say.
I decide I need to try to claw back some goodwill, so I take a chance. ‘Oh yes, Gail told me you were getting married. Congratulations.’
I wait for her to tell me that she was talking about a birthday party for one of her daughters or just a routine Sunday lunch, but she ignores me. Al at least has the good grace to be polite. ‘Thank you. It only took her twelve years to persuade me.’ He laughs heartily at his own joke, and I smile weakly. Thankfully, the doorbell rin
gs. Gail puts her glass down on the mantelpiece.
‘It’s OK,’ Al says, making a move towards the door. ‘I’ll let them in. I need the little boys’ room anyway.’
Gail, Stella and I stand there in silence for a moment. I give Stella a forced smile. ‘How about you? Do you work?’ I ask, although I already know what the answer will be.
She looks at me as if I’ve just asked her if she gives blow jobs for small change. ‘No. I don’t.’
‘Oh,’ I say disingenuously. ‘You’re unemployed. That’s tough.’
Beside me, Gail snorts, then attempts to disguise it as a cough. Stella narrows her eyes at me, and, if I was taken in for questioning, I would swear that this is the moment that she decides she hates me.
3
By the time I go home later – having again made the excuse that I need to FaceTime with my daughter – I’ve met four more residents of The Close. Eva’s husband, Rafa – as blankly pleasant as she is. He’s a cosmetic dentist with a private practice on Harley Street, and I can see him checking out my molars whenever I smile. I wonder if he’s responsible for the oversized veneers they all sport. Roman and Jan – similar in age to Eva and Rafa – who clearly used the same surgeon, because they look almost identical: high-cheeked and wide-eyed, mandatory thick hair, his in a swept-back bouffant and hers in loose blonde waves. The main difference is that she has an arse like a shelf that in no possible universe grew on its own. I have no idea how she sits down, but, on the plus side, Roman always has somewhere to put his drink. They’re friendly enough, but distant, as if they’ve decided it’s hardly worth getting to know me, since they’re moving away. And Katya, from number 2 – younger than the others by a good few years, so I assume a second or even third wife. She tells me she’s ‘married to Guy, who’s away on business’ when I ask her what she does, but is, at least, sweet and welcoming.
They all look like pictures of glowing, privileged health who have then let a slightly drunken surgeon run roughshod over their facial features. I swear there’s not an original nose among them. Even Katya, who can’t be more than twenty-five, has obviously already had either Botox or a severe facelift, because when she smiles her face looks as if it’s about to split open with the effort. And her lips – like Stella’s, like Eva’s, like Jan’s – are unnaturally full.
Apparently, the couple from number 1 never accept invitations; 7 spend most of their time in Russia; and Bill and Anya from number 8 are on holiday in Dubai. Stella and Al are clearly the sun around which all these planets revolve. The golden couple. They hold court, each in the centre of a circle of their own gender. Even in this sea of fabulously rich and successful people, it’s indisputable that Stella and Al are the unacknowledged – or maybe it is acknowledged; who knows? – Queen and King of The Close.
As social occasions go, it’s hardly the highlight of my year, but at least there are now a few people who will say hello to me in the street if I bump into them. In fact, Eva and Rafa have invited me to their thirtieth-anniversary party in a couple of weeks’ time, and Katya has asked me if I’d like to join her at the day spa for a pampering (which I definitely can’t afford to do, although I didn’t actually say so, I just made non-committal noises about work and Betsy. Katya looked at me wide-eyed – something I’m not sure she could help, so stretched is her skin, so tight her ponytail – and said, ‘You’re so lucky to have a little girl. Don’t you just want to spend all day dressing her up?’ and I laughed, thinking how Betsy’s idea of hell is being made to wear something she’s not supposed to climb trees in) so my social diary is positively bursting. Tonight I’m just relieved to go back to my own space, though.
About half an hour later I hear noises in the street and peer through my front window to see Stella and Al, and Eva and Rafa, saying their goodbyes in front of the house. There’s a lot of cheek-kissing and friendly promises to meet up again soon, but the minute Eva and Rafa head off in the direction of number 5 I notice Stella’s demeanour change. The smile drops from her face and she stalks off towards her front door, leaving Al in her wake. Clearly, they are not in for a night of marital bliss. He goes to follow her, but then glances up at my window and catches me watching before I have the chance to duck down. He gives me a lecherous grin and a wave and I feel compelled to wave back, feeling as if I’ve been caught spying. Which, let’s face it, I have.
I busy myself washing up a mug that’s in the sink, as if, if he looks back, he’ll think that’s what I was doing all along. Luckily, he’s distracted by Jan, Roman and Katya all leaving together and I step back out of sight.
My phone rings and I jump. I pick it up and see it’s Angie. I don’t often get calls once they’ve all commenced work for the evening. A few times, when they’ve accidentally tripped alarms, or forgotten how to set one as they leave. Once, when there was water dripping through the ceiling of one of the offices and they had no idea who to call. Once, when someone sliced their finger open on a piece of metal in one of the bins and had to be taken to A&E and I went in to cover for them. Sometimes it’s just to let me know one of them has had to go home early because they’re sick, or some unusual circumstance means they’ll need to do extra hours. Tonight is one of those times. Angie tells me that the finance office were in the middle of a party when they arrived and the last stragglers have only just left, leaving behind a trail of destruction. She wants to know if I can authorize the extra hours it’s going to take to clean it up. I tell her yes, ask her to take a few photos of the mess on her phone, just in case they quibble. Then I offer to come down and help – an extra pair of hands – but she’s happy they can manage. I often go in and help out if there’s an emergency. It’s important the customers are satisfied.
On Wednesday I get to school way too early. I’m so desperate to give Betsy a hug. I hang around in my car for a bit, but then I see Michaela join the ever-increasing throng of parents, so I make my way over to her.
She gives me a big smile when she sees me. ‘Hey. How are you?’
‘Good,’ I say. Michaela is only a couple of years younger than me, but you’d believe her if she told you she was a teenager. Just a very tired one. Button-nosed, with fair hair and freckles, she has girl-next-door down to a T. I’ve always thought we could be friends, given the chance. I mean, we are, but we’re not confidantes. She has two other children, both younger than Zara, and time is not her friend. ‘I hope she’s been behaving.’
‘Well, it’s only been two days,’ Michaela says, laughing. ‘But honestly, it’s a godsend. They keep each other amused so I have one less kid to worry about entertaining.’
‘And David’s been getting there on time to pick her up? He’s not taking advantage?’
‘He’s been fine, Laura. Stop worrying.’
Michaela refused to accept any offer of payment when she agreed to take Betsy home with her and Zara after school – or after ballet or painting, both of which Zara attends, too – three nights a week. It was one of those awkward things where I didn’t know whether to offer or not, and then I did and she refused, and then I was a bit embarrassed in case she thought I was treating her like the hired help. They live in a block just along the road from David’s. It made sense. ‘Well,’ I say now, ‘just let me know if it gets to be too much.’
‘I promise I will. You should come round one afternoon – I mean, if you’re at a loose end. Don’t feel you can’t drop in and see Bets just because … you know …’
I feel my face break into a big smile. ‘I will. Thank you. Oh look, here they are …’
Betsy steamrollers into me, throwing her arms round my waist as if she hasn’t seen me for weeks, rather than days. I bury my face in her dark blonde hair, inhaling the familiar smell of strawberry shampoo, her favourite.
‘Ready?’ I say, and she nods.
‘See you soon,’ I say to Michaela. ‘And thanks again.’
At this time of day, the drive to my place takes a good forty-five minutes. We sit in a queue of cars, most containing one pare
nt and one child, edging slowly forwards. I used to rail against the laziness of those who drove their offspring to and from school rather than walking, clogging up the roads for those who needed them, but here I am: one of them. I don’t care, though, because I’m here with Betsy while she prattles on, my own small ray of sunshine.
She gasps when she sees the house. ‘Is this ours? Can we get a dog?’
‘No. Just above the garage, remember.’
She runs up the stairs ahead of me, waits while I unlock the door. ‘This is cool,’ she says, taking in the whole place in about three seconds. She hares into the bedroom. ‘Is this my bed when I stay here?’
‘Both of ours,’ I say. ‘We’re sharing.’
‘Brilliant. Can I have this side?’ She puts her schoolbag down on the side of the bed where I have been sleeping.
‘Of course.’
She looks out of the window behind the headboard, on to the large expanse of grass and the woods at the edge of the heath beyond. ‘Can I play out there?’
‘’Fraid not. That’s Gail and Ben’s garden. Do you have homework?’
‘A bit. Spelling. Can we explore?’
‘Homework first.’ I open her bag, and her teddy pops out at me like a jack in the box. ‘Oh good, Bruno came.’
‘Of course he did.’
I prop him up on the pillow, blink back a tear. ‘Right. Homework, explore, tea. How does that sound?’
There’s a gate at the end of The Close that leads to the woods. I’m slightly panicked that I don’t know my way around yet, that we could end up lost, like a pair of doomed fairy-tale characters. ‘Stick to the path,’ I say to her, for the millionth time. It’s beautiful; there’s no doubt about it. The daffodils are out, the birds are singing, there’s even a woodpecker tapping out a rhythm nearby. I take a deep breath. The air is fresh; there’s the smell of new growth and a hint of coconut from the gorse. It’s hard to imagine living with this on your doorstep.
‘If we got a dog, we could bring him over here every day,’ Betsy says.