The Friends We Keep(6)

“I’m liking you more and more,” said Evvie as she opened her trunk and started to unpack.





three


- 1986 -



Evvie’s duvet was not cornflower blue, nor was it Laura Ashley. She had no idea what it was, only that her grandmother had bought it for her, therefore it had sentimental value, even though, next to Maggie’s opulent quilted bed, piled high with cushions, her side of the room looked not just drab, but bare. The duvet was tan and orange, which looked terrible with the blue, and she had nothing to decorate the walls.

“This does not look good,” said Maggie, surveying the room when Evvie had unpacked. “At least we have the Louis Vuitton trunk, which will make an excellent table.” She had nudged it over the thin carpet to sit between the chairs in the bay window, where it did, in fact, make an excellent coffee table. “You know what this room needs? Cushions. And throws. And something for the walls. I think we should have matching beds. My mum bought two of these bedspreads, one for me and one for the guest room, so I’ll just get her to send the other bedspread. And the pillowcases. You know there’s a Habitat somewhere around here. Let’s get the phone book and find out. I think we need to do some shopping.”

Evvie paused, embarrassed. Not just that Maggie seemed so mature—she’d never met anyone who knew how to accessorize at their age—but that it was quite clear that Maggie’s family had money. It wasn’t just the quality of her clothes, although they looked expensive; it was her whole air. She acted as if she expected everything to go her way, with a confidence that seemed well beyond her years. Such was her self-possession, Evvie soon learned, that everything did, in fact, seem to go her way.

When Maggie confided in the warden, conspiratorially, that she was allergic to lizards, the warden said she would take care of it immediately. And did. And now Maggie was almost ushering Evvie out the door to spend what was likely to be serious money at Habitat, except Evvie didn’t have serious money.

What she had made during her time as a child star was locked up in a trust, and without child support and alimony, her mother was working as hard as she could to put Evvie through college. There was no extra cash for frivolities like cushions and framed pictures for the wall. She thought of her father, who, now that he had divorced her mother, had been welcomed back into the bosom of his family. She thought of how much she had loved him when she was a little girl, how she thought he would always be her protector, her savior, and how he had abandoned her in every way possible. She fought the mix of tears and resentment that threatened to wash over her.

Maggie paused, noting Evvie’s expression, presuming it was just about the money. “Look!” She reached into her back pocket and pulled out a credit card. “From my father. To be used for emergencies, and this room is definitely an emergency.”

“I can’t believe you’re describing my duvet as an emergency.” Evvie regained her composure and smiled.

“Is it a duvet you’ve had since you were a baby?”

“No. My grandmother bought it for me to bring to college.”

“Would you ever, in a million years, have picked that duvet out for yourself?”

“Maybe not.” Evvie started to laugh. “Okay. It’s as ugly as sin. Let’s go. As long as it’s not expensive, I’m in. I would pay if I could, but I’m on a strict budget. My money’s tied up in a trust. I don’t have access to it until I’m twenty-one. I think my mom was terrified I’d turn into one of those child star horror stories and blow all my earnings on cocaine and champagne. I think she’s regretting it now but my dad’s one of the trustees and he won’t break it.”

“She sounds very sensible. Don’t worry about it. My dad will be fine if I put it on the credit card. And now I want to hear more about you being a child star.”



* * *



? ? ?

By the time the girls figured out transportation to Bath and reached Habitat, their life stories had spilled out. Maggie had, it seemed, come from the diametric opposite of Evvie’s life in every possible way. She had been raised by the perfect parents, and as the only girl, was adored by her father. Her older brothers excelled in everything they ever touched, and Maggie wanted nothing more than to get married and have a life just like her parents’.

“Will you work?” asked Evvie.

“Not unless I’m forced.” Maggie grimaced.

She had a plan, one that seemed to Evvie to be shockingly old-fashioned. But who was Evvie to point out that times had changed, and a woman was prime minister (even if, as her grandmother often said, there wasn’t anything very womanly about Maggie Thatcher), and weren’t they supposed to be having careers and taking over the world?

Maggie’s plan? To attend university, and to work for a few years in something like PR or marketing, before finding a husband and settling down. She wanted a large country house, at least four children, and two Labrador retrievers, and friends dropping in all the time. She wanted, in short, a life just like the one she had had as a child in Sussex. “And why wouldn’t I?” she said when Evvie pointed that out. “It was completely idyllic.”

Her mother was a wonderful cook who welcomed her father home from work every evening with a gourmet meal. Maggie and her three brothers had dinner with their parents nightly, a boisterous affair that usually saw them sitting at the table chatting about everything, long into the evening. Maggie and her mother would clear the table after dinner, leaving her father and brothers to have some “boy time.”