Love and Fallout (5 page)

‘But I thought…' I thought this was part of the package, the eco-chic theme.

He shoots Jude a meaningful look and scratches the soft wires of his beard. ‘Go again.'

‘Right, shopping as protest,' says Jude seriously, pushing a chunky bracelet further up her arm and nodding towards my shirt. ‘So you could say that particular pea-green garment is a sort of protest. Or is that just what people do when you put it on?'

Someone in the crew hoots. A board clacks, ‘That's it!'

Jude pats my knee. ‘It's for the camera, darling,' she says. ‘Strictly tongue-in-cheek.'

I remind myself about the bucket of salt.

Lulu is sent to organise coffee, and since I'm not needed for the moment I escape with her to the kitchen for ten minutes of normality. While we gather mugs, my phone bleeps.

Sorry haven't rung. Things been crazy. Everything ok? Pip x

What sort of crazy? Probably not this sort. I've decided not to tell her about the TV show yet, and for once I don't encourage her to ring.

Hi kiddo – everything fine. Speak soon. Lots of love, mum xxx

The message vanishes and the screensaver reappears; the kids last year on Camber Sands: Pippa, suntanned under a wide-brimmed fedora, Dom beside her smiling with a closed mouth because he was still wearing his braces.

Lulu stirs the mugs and frowns. ‘I can't remember if I put sugar in Zeb's.'

‘Zeb. That's an interesting name, what's it short for?'

‘Simon,' she says, lifting the tray and making for the living room.

It's another blossomy afternoon and sunlight falls in slats along the garden fence. Jude is already outside with a cigarette, which she raises in greeting.

‘Hideous for the skin,' she says. I tell her I smoked roll-ups back in the day and she says it's impossible to make a woodbine look stylish unless you're eighteen and working the retro-grunge look.

‘You came around to the idea then?' she says. ‘Zeb feared you were going to bolt. We had a Hare Krishna once and she refused outright.'

I shrug, reminding myself to play along. ‘It's an experience.'

‘Exactly,' she says. ‘One you won't regret. And it's for your daughter too.'

‘Is it?' I conjure Pippa with sudden alarm. ‘Did she sign the letter?'

‘No no,' Jude waves her cigarette hand. ‘What I mean is, we learn what's acceptable from our mothers, don't we? What you're telling her is that this,' she takes me in with another sweep of her cigarette, ‘is okay.'

I have a flash of Pippa in one of her outfits, mobile in hand, jumbo handbag on shoulder.

‘Believe me, I have no influence whatsoever on my daughter. Sometimes I wish I did.'

Me and Dom get along fine, apart from the usual tussles over wet towels on floors and homework, but with Pip it's more complicated. I can't dispel the idea I'm not the mother she wants.

Jude regards me with interest. ‘Even so, darling. It's going to make you feel like a new woman when we sort you out.'

Sorting me out includes hair and make-up, for which Bobby, an attractive black American man with heavy-framed glasses, has been drafted in. He tells me I have gorgeous eyes. People have remarked on my eyes before; they're hazel, like Mum's, with a double row of eyelashes. Once or twice I was told off at school for wearing mascara, even though I didn't have a make-up bag, it was Maggie who was always getting marched to the cloakrooms to wash her face. Maggie. My muscles tense at the memory of her in the turquoise dress. Pete's right, she wouldn't have meant to upset me, but haven't we been friends for long enough? Why would she think I'd actually enjoy a make-over? Especially that sequence we filmed yesterday called ‘The right shape for your shape' which involved me standing in my underwear while Jude assessed my body from various angles.
Just don't put me in a hexagon
I said. But joking didn't make things any less harrowing. Would Maggie want to go through that? She's my oldest friend, we grew up next door to each other, and yes, we're different, but when you've known each other since you were riding bikes together or running away from boys, the differences count for less. Or so I thought.

Bobby sifts his fingers through my hair and says hmm a lot. He produces a booklet of nylon hair swatches, each tinted a different shade, and tests them against my face before settling on Firecracker. I struggle to imagine a whole head of Firecracker, but when I ask questions he becomes mysterious and says
Trust me
, so I sit back and let the mixing, separating and painting begin.

‘All these products are organic so they're super gentle,' he assures me, and I remember 1982, the one and only time I tried to colour my hair – in the wintry outdoors with a bottle of bleach.

The hair takes ages. When it's done Bobby moves on to make-up. He tells me what good skin I have. He says he often finds this with curvaceous ladies; maybe it's all that blood pumping around their bodies giving them a healthy flush. What do I think? He says he once worked with Meryl Streep and she had the most beautiful skin of any actress he ever came across who didn't have an actual weight problem. Like porcelain.

When I've been dressed they stand around and examine me approvingly. I'm wearing a long green skirt made from crepey material – part of a fair trade couture range – which sways in fronds when I move. The rest is questionable. Particularly the pink bodice. I glance down and there are my breasts, lifted from the darkness and displayed like shy newborns quivering before an audience. I insisted to Jude that I'd never wear something like this, but she's of the flat-chested model physique and kept saying, ‘You've got a lovely pair, Tessa, show them off.' After negotiations she eventually fetched a cream jacket with seed pearls and feathers stitched around the collar. I've been instructed not to button it.

My feet are shod in a pair of stiletto heels – nude because this will apparently lengthen my legs – and Jude has made me get into something called Miracle Tights, which are supposed to give an instant streamlining effect. The operation of putting them on was like struggling into a pair of washing-up gloves three sizes too small.

‘Are you sure it all goes?' I ask, assessing what I can see of the ensemble.

‘
Goes
,' Jude laughs. ‘Co-ordinating handbags are for the MIFs darling.'

‘The what?'

‘The Milk In Firsts. Trust me, you look gorgeous.' Bobby agrees and says he should probably leave the room before he starts having heterosexual thoughts.

It is time for the unveiling. There's a hush. Jude steers me like the mother ship towards the mirror, gold-frilled, like the ones in picture books about Snow White. I'm half-suspecting someone will swing a bottle of champagne against me. The blindfold is supposed to heighten tension. Jude counts to three before untying it with a flourish.

And there is a woman I only partially recognise. I stare back at her, the woman with the cleavage, the woman with the bright orangey-red hair cut in slices around her face. She has swallowed me whole. I am blinking out of her generously mascara-ed eyelashes.

‘Oh!' The woman wobbles back on her dagger heels. ‘This is strange.'

‘Strange?' Repeats Jude from off camera.

Zeb yells
cut
and asks if I want to take a minute. Jude strides over, ‘What's wrong, darling?'

I look down at myself, put a hand to my hair. ‘I don't feel like me.'

She throws her head back, ‘That's the whole point!
You're not supposed to feel like you. You aren't you.'

‘Who am I then?'

At that moment Bobby arrives like a coach to a boxing ring. He sweeps a powder brush over my nose while Jude talks.

‘Come on darling, we need to wrap this up. I don't think I can bear another night in a Travel Lodge.' She looks to Bobby, ‘Jesus, remember when we used to have an actual budget for this show.'

We go through the scene again and this time I give them what they want, which is a gasp of pleasure followed by a twirl. Afterwards, Pete and Dom are ushered in. Dom is wearing his biggest, blackest Goth boots and an expression of bemusement. I hope he didn't tell his teachers why he's got the afternoon off. Pete is clasping a bunch of roses which have obviously been supplied.

‘What d'you think of Mum's new look?' comes Jude's voice. Dom doesn't answer. Zeb checks his watch. ‘It's all in the edit,' he says. Jude asks Pete what he thinks of me. There are two high spots of colour on his cheeks as if he's been drinking.

‘She looks amazing,' he says. ‘I can't believe she's my wife.' His eyes have gone like half-set jelly.

At last it's over. The crew reel up cables and pack them into boxes. Jude gives me a final hug, ‘Remember you're a beautiful woman,' she says firmly. I thank her. I don't know why I'm thanking her, but she seems so sincere and I want her to leave so badly. And then she does.

Dom flops on the sofa. When I ask what he thought of it all he shrugs, says why did I let them make me a ginge, and asks what's for tea.

‘You'll have to see to yourself tonight,' says Pete. ‘I'm taking your mum out.'

He is looking at me as if we've just met.

‘Great,' I say, ‘I could do with a nice meal after that.'

He tells me I look a million dollars again and then, still with the slightly unhinged half-set jelly expression, he suddenly whoops me around in a circle like a cowboy with a cowgirl. We are laughing and I'm engulfed by a surge of sheer relief.

‘Right, give me ten minutes, I'll just get changed.' My face feels cakey and the shoes are pinching.

‘Changed?' He's stopped laughing. ‘You are changed.'

‘I can't go out like this.'

‘They've spent all day dolling you up.'

I explain about the shoes. He says he wants to show me off. I tell him this isn't Crufts and then Dom chips in from where he's sprawled, ‘You'd look a lot less freaky without all that stuff on your face.' Pete shouts at him. I pull Pete into the kitchen.

‘Are you ashamed of me?' I ask in a low voice so Dom can't hear. I'm leaning on the counter for support, but benefitting from the extra height of the heels.

Pete shakes his head. ‘No, no, I'm proud of you, that's the point.'

‘Let me wash my face then.'

He wraps a hand around the back of his neck, as if I'm one of his more challenging Year Elevens. ‘You are so bloody stubborn. Why can't you go out like you are, just for one night?
'
The jacket is scratchy and I drape it on the kitchen chair. ‘Most women would love all that pampering.'

‘Pampering? I've been pummelled about like a side of beef. Look, I'll be ten minutes, I can hardly walk in these shoes.'

He shakes his head.

‘What?'

‘You,' he says. ‘Why can't I take you out when you're dressed up like a woman for once?'

I rock very slightly on the heels. He bangs the kitchen door shut.

4

An Alien Mug

What with my pack and the tent, getting off the bus took some negotiation. I'd asked the driver to let me know the stop and he'd made a harrumphing noise.

‘One of them are you?' he said. ‘Should have got the 302.'

He dropped me at the bottom of a hill on a main road flanked by wire fencing. At a quarter past three there was still enough light to navigate, although I wasn't sure which direction I was supposed to take. Dad was right, I should have set off earlier. Half hoping for a sign that said
Campsite This Way
, I started up the hill.

It was only after I'd been walking for a while that I realised the fence, which looked a good ten feet tall, must be the one containing the American air base. But there wasn't much to see behind it, only grass, a stretch of concrete and in the distance a collection of low buildings in khaki shades, a few trucks parked beside them. The left boot of my new Doc Martens was beginning to bite at the heel but I pressed on until eventually the hill gave way to an unremarkable view of yet more fencing set against an expanse of pewter-coloured sky. Where were the women? What if the driver had sent me in the wrong direction on purpose? I pictured him in the depot, laughing with his mates over mugs of tea. A lorry rocked past at speed and I stepped onto the verge.

Why weren't there any signs? Eventually I made out a dot in the distance which transformed slowly into the shape of a person: a woman sitting on a garden chair, set back on a hillock of grass facing the road. I picked up speed. She must be one of them. She'd be able to help. I assumed a friendly expression, ready to wave and call out if she hailed me.

‘Hello,' I said, quite bent under the weight of the rucksack.

The woman was oldish, wearing an Aran jumper with legwarmers pulled up to the knee and an enormous wax jacket. The placard staked into the ground beside her read PEACE in large hand-painted letters, and a dove was flying from one corner carrying a sprig of something green in its beak.