Cross Her Heart(65)

‘Anyway,’ Katie waits until she’s swallowed a bit of her sandwich before continuing to speak and Charlotte makes a note not to talk with her own mouth full any more. ‘I did the work in about five minutes, so if Mummy asks when she picks me up, there’s no need for suspicion. The summer hols are ours! Four hours a day, anyway.’

‘Will she come to check on you, do you think?’ Charlotte says, worried. It would be shite if Katie’s ma caught her out. She’d lock her up all summer for it, to keep her safe.

‘No. She’s seeing the therapist and he told her she has to let me be during the tutor lessons. Death, death, death, worry. That’s all she does. I wouldn’t mind if she was worried about her own – her death I could cope with – it’s all being transferred to me. It’s not fucking fair.’

That makes Charlotte laugh. Katie has given her surreal and puce. In return, Charlotte has given her fucking and shite.

‘You wouldn’t have had to have the extra lessons at all if you didn’t play so soft and simple all the time.’

‘Life is easier this way,’ she says with a shrug. ‘Why do you play so tough?’

‘I don’t play tough,’ Charlotte grins and Katie smiles back, leaning on her shoulder. After a moment, she sits upright and frowns.

‘You’re getting boobs!’ One slim finger pokes Charlotte’s chest.

‘Get off!’ She pushes Katie’s hand away, blushing and awkward. She’s tried to hide it under a baggy shirt but her chest is getting bigger. She hates it. Ma said there was no point in getting a training bra because if she got big as fast as they did in Ma’s family then in a couple of months she’d need a proper one.

Katie looks down at her own slight frame. Not even the hint of anything other than flatness under her shirt. ‘That’s not fair. I’m months older than you. If you get your period before me as well, I’m going to be so annoyed.’

Charlotte wrinkled her nose. ‘Don’t be disgusting.’ She gets to her feet. She’s itching to do something. She’d taken half of one of her ma’s pills this morning but the haze is wearing off and she wants to rob some booze. She doesn’t want to think about boobs and periods and the things she’d pretended to have read in a book. She wants to run away with Katie and stay like they are forever.

The curse, that’s what Jean calls it. She’ll be getting the curse soon. You’d better make sure she knows what to use.

The curse. Getting the curse. It’s hanging over her, she can feel it. Of course she’ll get the curse first. She’s cursed already.





52


NOW


MARILYN

I bang hard on the door, the muggy heat fuelling my irritation. There’s probably a bell but I can’t be bothered to look. I don’t care what she said in the office, I’m damned well going to have it out with her now. Apologise? Penny can go swivel. I’ve been quietly raging all day about her smug little face, and I’m going to get it out of her about the money even if no one will believe me. I want to know for me.

No one answers and I bang again.

‘I know you’re in there, Julia!’ She doesn’t get off so easily. There are lights on, I can see them behind the awful net curtains – she must surely be renting – so someone’s home. The door opens as thunder rumbles overhead and the first drops of rain fall. She stares at me and neither of us speak.

‘Who is it?’ a voice calls from inside. A voice that grates with bitterness and cigarettes. ‘Whatever they’re selling, we’re not buying anything!’

‘What are you doing here?’ None of Julia’s usual cockiness. She looks tired, shoes kicked off on the thin carpet but still in her office clothes. Her blouse is untucked, the edges creased and her sleeves are rolled up.

‘We need to talk.’

She glances behind her, up a flight of stairs. A chairlift is at the top and I can also see a pile of creased clothes on the landing. There’s a wheelchair in the hall. ‘It’s for me!’ she calls back. ‘Someone from work to talk about the promotion I might be getting.’

‘Promotion? What prom—’

She puts one finger to her lips, and I find myself falling silent as she nods me inside. I’m thrown by all this. I expected a sleek single girl’s apartment. Small but blandly stylish. I come in from the rain and she closes the door behind me, signalling me into a downstairs room.

‘Why would you come here?’ she says quietly. Her cockiness is gone, it’s all defensive aggressive now.

‘You live here?’ I ask. The room is too hot, central-heating-on-in-summer hot and there’s a sharp tang in the air it takes me a moment to identify. Stale urine.

‘My mother’s house. Yes, I live here. What do you want, Marilyn?’

I’m so confused that for a moment I don’t know why I am here. ‘The money,’ I say eventually. ‘You’re the thief. Lisa wouldn’t lie about that. I just want to hear it from you.’ I look around. ‘I don’t understand you. The veneers on your teeth. The fillers? You have them, don’t bullshit me. But you live like this.’ I wave my hand around. ‘Why spend money on shit like that? Why steal money to spend on shit like that? Why steal money from Penny only to buy her something with it? I don’t get it!’