Venus Envy (32 page)

But I had to face the sad truth. Once I’d tarted the place up, it was still a tarted-up place that sold old junk, as opposed to a dingy, filthy little place that sold old junk.

Younger’s was an answer to my darling mother. ‘Oh, do come out of that fleapit and come home, sweetheart, you know you’re not fitted for life in “the Smoke”,’ she said.

‘Mum, I’m doing OK,’ I lied.

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‘I hope you’re growing out your hair. Has the owner

offered to take you to dinner yet?’

‘Not yet.’

Heavy sigh. ‘What’s the problem, darling, you’re not

still wearing trouser suits, are you? Who do you expect to find if you sit in that dust bowl all day? And Gail tells me you never go out at night.’

‘I can’t really afford it,’ I said stupidly, prompting another twenty minutes on why I should take the King’s shilling and do my dad’s filing for him.

‘You could live at home rent-free. And there are so many tremendous young chaps down here.’

Like Nigel Feather of the Woldingham Young Conservatives? Spare me! ‘Mummy, women don’t

, need to have a boyfriend to make them feel complete,’

I said righteously.

‘What utter, utter nonsense,’ my mother said swiftly.

‘A woman without a man is a failure, darling, and she becomes bitter and twisted like your aunt Caroline.’

I shuddered. Aunt Caroline was my mother’s ygunger and uglier sister, who was indeed as bitter as a sloe and twisted as a pretzel.

‘Well, I’m nothing like Aunt Caroline,’ I said firmly,

‘and I really must dash, Mum, ‘bye now.’

I put down the phone and looked at my reflection miserably. I was thin and drawn, not so much Kate Moss as a scrawny chicken. Misery had robbed my skin of all its bloom, my hair was a mess and the highlights out of a packet had an unpleasant brassy quality to them. My bank had taken to sending me nasty letters, but they should be grateful I was making anything at all.

I wondered if I should truly jack this in and go home.

The thought came to me that Tom Drummond would have cheered me, would have told me I was doing the right thing. This shop had an old yard in the

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back, where Gordon kept a potter’s wheel, and let me throw sculptures on my breaks. Some of the stuff was drivel, but most of it was pretty good, fuelled by my depression and sickness of heart. Gordon kept telling me he could never sell any of it.

Tom would tell me to do it anyway. I remembered with a pang how he’d always been so keen on being true to oneself.

That filled me with such longing I started to cry. I was doing a lot of that lately. I’d told Gordon my hayfever was chronic.

‘In December?’ he asked, but I pretended not to hear him.

I’d sold two paintings all week when I came home on Friday. One to a woman who asked if a ship scene from the S.taithes Group could be attributed to Turner. I thought I deserved a medal for not giggling even a tiny bit.

‘Well, no, but very much in the spirit of Turner,’ I said.

‘Yes. The artists had much in common,’ she said decisively. ‘I’m always told I have a good eye.’ “

I bit my tongue. I did not say, for example, that if she had a good eye it was the duff one that was looking at pictures. Or that what Turner and this guy had in common was that they were both painters.

(I know I said it was in his spirit, but I was being paid to talk crap. What was her excuse?)

At any rate, money changed hands, so everybody got something out of it.

Gordon had been shouting at me because he had deleted last month’s sales from our computer, it was hailing outside and it had cracked our front window, so I was cross and freezing and soaked, because Green Park station was shut down due to a security alert, and the bus was late. I hadn’t bothered to tart up my

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make-up, and my white slacks were now cuffed with

dirt, and I generally looked like shit.

So no change there.

At any rate, I got home and found the light in our flat was on and there was a general noise of revelry. Bloody brilliant. I did so want to socialise merrily with Clan the Man or Dave the Rave, or Gail’s latest conquest. I did so want to pretend I was having a terrific, Swinging London time, talking about media or fashion and trying to make up stories to make my job seem interesting. Yes, that was what I wanted to do, as opposed to something unsatisfying like sinking into a bubble bath with a family-sized bar of Fruit and Nut.

Perhaps if I waited out here for a bit Keisha would sod off to the tapas bar in Camden or something, conquest in tow.

But it was too bloody cold for plan B, so I had to bite the bullet and walk up the stairs.

When I got to the door, the loudest laughter was Gail’s. Actually, it wasn’t very loud. It was just per.sistent. It sounded like a very tinkly brook, or a sweet infant chuckling in an endearing fashion. It was her Force Ten Man Attack laugh. I hardly needed to get into the flat to see the expressions that accompanied it, such as the Shy Di glance up under the fringe, the girlish flick of the hair, and the Light Gesture, for example resting her manicured nails very lightly on the coat sleeve of the target.

There was no escaping the conclusion that the worst had happened. Gail, too, had got herself a bloke. So now it was only I who was single in the whole flat.

Topping myself would take far too much energy, so I got out my keys and opened the door.

And stopped dead. Because standing in the middle of the room, her hand resting lightly on the cuff of her conquest, was Gail, looking stunning in a wispy John Rocha piece of nothing. She was laughing and flirting

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and genuinely lighting up the room. I could sense the pleasure and happiness flowing from every pore of her exfoliated skin. She’d pulled out all the stops. Her make-up was so good it looked like a pro had done it at Harrods counter an hour ago, and maybe they had. Her hair was done up in a very stylish and complicated French pleat, giving her a classy, if still girlish, look. She was teetering in high heels that made her look even slimmer than normal, her bum had almost completely disappeared. And she was drenched in Chanel No. xg, I could smell it across the room.

None of this was much of a shock. Gail takes her bloke-hunting very seriously. .

But her man took me a second to get used to. ‘Hello, Alex,’ said Tom.

‘Tom,’ I aid.

I wished the ground would open and pull me into its gaping maw, but it stayed annoyingly firm under my feet. I became painfully aware of my red nose, watering eyes, stringy hair and drenched trousers. The last time he’d laid eyes on me I’d looked like rubbish, and now I was looking even worse.

I could not think of one dry or witty thing to say. ‘Tom,’ I repeated. ‘Tom Drummond.’

‘Very good, Alex, you get full marks on the recognition test,’ Gail giggled. ‘Can’t you say anything else?’

‘What a?e you doing here?’ I asked weakly.

‘Picking me up for a date, what does it look like?’ Gail said, not vcithout a note of triumph.

‘Oh,’ I said, as waves of jealousy rocked through me. This was completely surreal. This did not compute.

‘I expect you’re a bit surprised to see me here,’ said Tom, responding to my sister’s squeeze. Tve been talking to Gail for a couple of weeks, actually. Ever since the wedding.’

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‘The wedding?’

‘Yes. After all the fuss, they had it quietly in the family chapel, but I don’t think Ellen minded. We -‘ he looked hideously embarrassed - ‘managed to find Charlie and persuade him he was making a dreadful mistake. He came to his senses. He had to win Ellen back, naturally, but it worked out all right in the end.’

‘Win her back? That must have taken all of two seconds,’ Gail giggled.

‘Where’s Snowy, she hasn’t been back here?’

‘I believe she’s going to sell that flat and live abroad somewhere,’ Tom said. His voice was very measured, but I could hardly look at him. Even though things had worked out all right, it must have cost his family. The shame. The scandal. God, I thought with my heart in my mouth, how he must adore Gail to associate himself with this place. With us. With me.

‘That’s nice,’ I managed. ‘You - you never said you were talking to Tom.’

‘Oh, I knew how you felt about him,’ Gail said airily, ‘so I didn’t want to tell people we were going out until it was serious. But I’m afraid it is, rather, so you’ll just have to kiss and make up.’

Tom looked about as sick as I felt. Oh God, I couldn’t bear this, I just couldn’t. The greasy burger I’d had for lunch was suddenly clamouring for a returr appearance. Tom hated me and he loved my sister, and Gail looked blissfully happy about it. I wondered what stage they had got to - was she already picking out her own wedding gown?

‘Will you excuse me? I need a bath,’ I heard myself blurt out. ‘Do have a wonderful time.’

‘Oh, I will. Tom’s taking me to Romeo and Juliet at the National. I can’t believe you never told me how romantic he is, Alex—’

But I had already rushed past her and shut the door. z8o

I tried to put a brave face on it.

I did, really. I started getting up earlier, making sure I had time to wash and brush my hair. And I always put on a layer of make-up, no matter how cheap.

I don’t know why I bothered.. Nothing was going to get me back to my usual self, not unless the Good Looks Fairy dropped a two-week holiday in the Seychelles, all food and cosmetics provided, into my lap.

Funny how I now wanted to get back to my usual self. Prior to that, I hadn’t thought my usual self was much cop. Too fat, breasts too small, thighs too big, bum too squishy. Generally undainty and unGail-like. It was only now I’d taken a downhill turn that I realised I hadn’t been all that bad. OK, so I wasn’t cool, and prior to being revamped by Keisha I wasn’t stylish. But I’d had a certain fresh young prettiness, the kind that all women overlook but most men think is cute.

Of course, that had all changed now.

I was about as fresh as last Easter’s eggs.

And all the freshness that hal been sucked out of me had been sucked into Gail. She primped and preened like a supermodel. She had her hair cut in a blunt, sexy curtain, she spent ninety quid on make-up, she bullied my mother into giving her extra money for dresses.

‘Alex!’ she cried, bouncing into my room in a slinky scrap of red. ‘What do you think of this? Would Tom go for this look?’

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A corpse would have gone for that look. Gail at her best could turn a statue on.

Tm sure he’ll love it,’ I muttered.

‘No, no, it’s too much,’ she decided, ‘I’m going to go demure, I bet Tom likes demure.’

I’d sort of been crossing my fingers that she would stick with the hot red thing, because Tom hated girls who looked cheap. It was always fun watching him squirm out of the drunken embraces of various Yanks at Oxford, murmuring, ‘How kind,’ and ‘Thank you so much.’

But Gall is a pro. She takes no prisoners. Her radar, ” locked on target, is incredibly accurate. Out went every short skirt and tight top she owned. In came virginal white, enchanting pastels and sweet twinset cardigans. Her spike heels gave way to pumps and maryjanes. And not a pair of trousers survived.

Her bedroom, once home to hunt-saboteur leaflets and annoying books on macrobiotic cooking, was transformed. Out went Only Sadists Wear Leather and The Organic Dinner Party, in came mounds of fluffy teddy bears. She hung an Athena print of a simpering infant over her anti-vivisection poster, and filled a crystal vase with roses to put on the windowsill.

‘Why don’t you just get a copy of How To Be a Good Wife and Mother, and leave it on your bed?’ I suggested sourly.

‘Ooh!. I will!’ Gail breathed. ‘Where do I get it?’

I would like to be able to say that Tom saw through this. I supposed I cherished a very faint hope that he might still resemble the man I knew at college. Tom had been a perfect gentleman himself, but the way I remembered it, he liked my independence, he didn’t want a Stepford Wife.

But then again we had only been friends.

Maybe he was looking for something quite different in a girlfriend. Like Linda… she had been a real.girls

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in-pearls heroine. The kind of chick they feature in black and white on the inside page of Country Life, you know the one, ‘Miss Claudia De Were, engaged to be married to Lord Richard Hamilton’. Linda would have shopped, and decorated, and organised holidays, and supervised the nanny, and pretended to have lots of headaches. A bit like my sister, only better bred. But what Gail lacked in blood, she made up for in looks.

Tom was just like the rest of them. He had fallen for that startled-fawn look, and God help him now, he was in trouble. Gail was manicured and feminine enough to make Barbie look butch. I thought miserably of what a great couple they would make: ex-Army, take-no-prisoners Tom Drummond, and fragile Gail Wilde.

And there was no hope for me. Tom was in deep enough to. call Gail, to be round here, to take her out to dinner, and the theatre, and the ballet. After all the trouble we - I - had caused at Carrefour, he was still here.

‘Look at the lovely flowers!’ Gail screamed, squealing for joy the day after their date. Tom had sent a huge bunch of yellow roses from Lavender Blue, the designer florist. I’d prayed they were for Keisha, but no such luck. ‘Wow! Can you believe, it!’

‘He’s got you bad,’ Bronwen said, admiringly. ‘Mmm.’ Gail ripped open the envelope. ‘“Thank you for a delightful evening, Tom.” Oh, how adorable, it’s so romantic.’

‘It’s not that romantic,’ Keisha said coolly. ‘He doesn’t say “love”. And they’re not red.’

‘As if that mattered! What do you think, Alex?’ ‘I - uh ‘

The phone rang. Bronwen jumped on it, and then her face fell, like it did any time anyone who was not Clan the Man called. ‘It’s Tom Drummond for you, Gail,’ she said.

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I quietly grabbed my coat and headed out the door.