‘They definitely knew each other. Dad was pretty adamant about that. And if she is the only surviving link, I need to get to know her. I need to keep her close. I need her to trust me.’
‘How’s she going to trust you if she finds out you’ve used another name?’
‘Because she’s not going to find out,’ I said.
‘OK,’ she said. ‘OK. Just bloody text me when you’re there, all right? She might poison you or something.’
‘Why would she do that?’
‘I don’t know! You don’t know her!’
‘That’s just a really weird thing to say,’ I said.
We sat in uncomfortable silence, and to our relief the ramen arrived.
‘How’s Dan?’ I said, taking a spoonful of the broth. ‘Oh, god, this stuff is so good.’
‘Working all the time,’ Kelly said. ‘How’s Joe?’
‘The opposite.’
This could have been funny – it could have been an opportunity to rescue our evening, but Kelly wasn’t having any of it. ‘You can break up with him, you know,’ she said. I looked at her, my chopsticks aloft. Her jaw was set in a dangerously determined way I’d been witness to for nearly twenty-five years. ‘He won’t die, Rose,’ she said.
‘I know that, Kel. I know he won’t die.’
‘No, I don’t think you do, Rosie. I actually don’t think you do. Somewhere, deep inside of you is this . . . belief that this is it. This is the bond. That it’s better to be in this twosome of yours. Even if – you might not be happy.’
‘Kelly.’ I could feel my hackles rising.
‘He doesn’t even have a job,’ she said.
‘He’s got the burri—’
She held up her chopsticks as if to ward off evil. ‘Oh my gosh. Do not even say that word to me again.’
‘Fine.’
‘And what about the sex?’
‘What about the sex?’
‘Well, from what you’ve told me recently, it’s not been great. I mean I’m not one to talk, ’cos I’m not even having sex right now. We’re just too tired.’ She sighed. ‘I’m sorry. I don’t know, Rosie. It’s just – you don’t look at him after nine years and think, “be the father of my children”?’
I stared at her. ‘Wow,’ I said, my voice rough, my face hot. I knew there was some sense in what she was saying, but I wasn’t going to give up. ‘What have children got to do with this?’
‘I just – someone needs to tell you this. I’m trying to help. Really. I’m sorry. And the thing is – you always seem to think that everyone else is in a better boat than you. And it’s bullshit.’
‘I—’
‘I’m exhausted,’ Kelly said. ‘I am more tired than I’ve ever been in my entire life. And I sometimes feel like I’m carrying all of us.’ Her voice started to break. ‘And Dan’s just lapping up the rewards of it. He goes off to work every day and doesn’t see even a quarter of what I do. And I think so much that I can hardly sleep. And this baby is cracking up my skin all over me, and I’m not ready for that. I’m not ready.’ She stopped, breathing heavily. To my astonishment, she was crying. Kelly never cried.
I shot my hand out towards hers. ‘Kel,’ I said. ‘You’re right. Oh, god, I’m so sorry.’
She took my hand and squeezed it. ‘It’s OK,’ she said. ‘I get it. It’s OK.’
1982
16
Barbara had developed a habit of telephoning Connie and Elise’s bungalow on a regular basis. It irritated Elise the way Connie leapt up like a girl on prom night whose date has rung the doorbell. She would carry the telephone into the bedroom, and it was understood between them that Elise should not follow: this was work, this was important. Elise loathed the curling cord that stretched like a dead snake up the hallway. To compound her frustration, there was so little for her to do. She could have picked up her own notepad, of course, but she felt overwhelmed by a sort of stupor in this place. The activity and bustle and fast-talking of the other people she had met made her feel as if her limbs were clay.
She and Connie were lying side by side at the pool, immobile on their sun loungers, when the telephone rang again. Connie jumped up.
‘Did you know that Lowden isn’t really Barbara’s surname?’ Elise called after her. ‘Born Betty Sheinkovitz.’
‘Who told you that?’ said Connie, but she didn’t stop to hear the answer.
It was Matt, in fact, who had told Elise. Matt who had told her that it was no wonder, with a name like that, that Barbara had wanted to escape the South. Does anyone in this town use their real name? she had asked, and he’d laughed.
*
About fifteen minutes later, Connie returned. ‘Barb wants this film to win her an Oscar,’ she said, grinning.
Elise grimaced. ‘That was why she was calling?’
‘Yep.’ Connie sounded defensive. She plonked herself down on her lounger.
‘And will it?’
‘I’ve no clue, darling. But that’s what Barb wants. She says Don will make healthy box-office figures, so it’ll definitely sell tickets.’ Don Gullick was the actor who had been cast to play Frederick, opposite Barbara. He was, alas for Barbara, more on the meathead side than the sensitive Hamlet type. For all Eric’s protests of agreement with her, they had turned out to be platitudes.
‘Barb says there’s no way she and Lucy can pull off receipts like his, even as a pair,’ said Connie. ‘Can you believe that?’
Barb, Barb, Barb. If she wasn’t so annoyed, Elise would have smiled at the painful irony of Barbara’s nickname in her side. ‘Well, it’s not Barb’s film,’ she said. ‘It’s not a one-woman show.’
‘It is, in a way,’ said Connie. ‘I feel for her. I don’t know if Don can actually act.’
Connie cared about the film; that was understandable. She was alive inside it: invested, important. But Elise felt lost. She was trying very hard not to feel like the odd one out, but she couldn’t help it.
‘Do they all know we’re together?’ she asked Connie. ‘I mean, Shara and Matt know – but does Barbara? Do the rest of them? Do they . . . understand?’
‘Of course they do.’
‘And what do they think about it?’
‘I should think they couldn’t care less. Why on earth do you ask?’
‘I just – I don’t know. You never actually introduced me as your girlfriend.’
‘I didn’t think there was a need. I thought it was perfectly obvious who you are.’
‘So who am I?’ Elise said, sitting up.
‘I’m sorry?’
‘Who am I?’
Connie lifted her sunglasses and squinted, before quickly putting them back on her face. ‘Are you all right?’ she said.
Elise didn’t want to cry. She didn’t want to need anything, or anyone. But it was too late: she wanted Connie – her strength, her love and the giddy pleasure of being the central object of such a person’s affections. She slapped her sun lounger with both palms. ‘Why am I here?’