The Ugly Sister (11 page)

Of course she knows that neither of these options is a remote possibility; she’s not stupid. And she also knows that even if she could miraculously sort out the practicalities then that would be it. She would have officially given up on Cleo and there would be no going back. And she doesn’t really think she can
allow that to happen while there’s still a glimmer of hope, however faint.

She hasn’t spoken to Phoebe in a few days and, even though she knows that by this time – eight thirty in the evening – Phoebe is bound to be out somewhere with her friends, enjoying herself, Abi can’t resist calling. She’s feeling down. This isn’t her usual state of mind. She’s happy enough being on her own, really she is. She just misses her daughter, that’s all.

‘Mum!’ Phoebe shouts when she answers. Abi can hear music and laughter in the background. She can practically feel the heat and smell the sea. She forgot, of course, when she dialled, that it’s more like half ten or even later wherever Phoebe is.

‘Hi, darling.’ Abi finds herself shouting to match Phoebe’s pitch. ‘Where are you?’

‘At a beach party.’

‘No,’ Abi laughs. ‘I mean where in the world.’

‘Oh. Naxos. We got here a couple of days ago. It’s fab.’

‘Are you all OK?’ Abi can tell that this isn’t the time to have the cosy catch-up she wanted. She reminds herself not to burden her daughter with her neediness.

‘We’re great, we’re all great. Don’t worry about us.’

There’s no way Abi will be heeding that advice, but she just says, ‘Well, I just wanted to say hi and that I love you.’

‘Love you too, Mum. How’s it going with Auntie Cleo?’

‘Fantastic,’ Abi says in what she hopes is a convincing voice. Now is not the time. ‘Really good.’

She says goodbye and Phoebe promises to call her back at a more sociable hour. Abi just manages to stop herself asking too many questions about who her daughter is with and exactly where they are staying and whether she is remembering all the lectures Abi gave her about rohypnol and STDs and always sticking with her two friends. She’ll save those for another day. She looks at her watch: eight thirty-seven. She decides to go to bed with her book and a big glass of wine. Actually, she thinks, she might as well take the rest of the bottle with her, save her coming downstairs again.

She has already hunted for a bottle of anything she recognizes the name of – a Pinot Grigio or a Sauvignon Blanc – that she might feel comfortable opening because she could safely assume that it isn’t worth a small fortune (although, who knows, maybe you do need a mortgage to purchase a certain fine year of Sauvignon Blanc – she wouldn’t have a clue truthfully – but she figures the names of any wines she has ever drunk before are probably the best bets). She’s thought about asking which ones it’s OK to help herself to, but that seems like saying she expects Cleo and Jon to provide her with drinks. She could bring a bottle home from the off-licence up the road, of course, but she worries that makes her look a bit desperate and, anyway, on each occasion she has, they
are put in the cupboard, not even the fridge, so unworthy are they, so she would have to drink them warm, which even she is
loath to do. Consequently she is in the process of educating her palate to appreciate the many bottles with unpronounceable names that are languishing in the wine fridge. This evening, left to her own devices, she tries to pick one that looks familiar, that they have all shared before, reasoning that if that’s the case it’s unlikely to be priceless.

At about five past ten she hears Jon and Cleo come in much earlier than she’d anticipated. She considers going down in her pyjamas to ask if they had a good time, to get the low-down on the restaurant, but as she’s pulling on a hoody over her little vest top she hears footsteps on the stairs and Cleo saying, ‘I’m going to bed,’ in a voice that contains no hint of an invitation, and then slamming the bedroom door. The evening obviously went well, then.

Abi starts to climb back into bed, but then curiosity and, surprisingly, a genuine concern for Jon’s wellbeing take over and she creeps down past their bedroom door and into the kitchen to find him. He’s pouring himself a glass of red and looking, it’s fair to say, miserable. He jumps when Abi comes in, and then looks at her hopefully, giving away for a fleeting moment that he thought she might be Cleo come to make up.

‘Oh,’ he says. ‘Hi.’

Abi decides not to give away that she’s heard anything. ‘Good night?’

‘Yes. Thanks.’

‘Where’s Cleo?’

Jon takes a long sip of his drink. ‘Gone to bed. She’s got an early start … you know.’

‘Right,’ Abi says.

He obviously doesn’t want to confide in her, and why should he? Just because they’ve spent a couple of fairly pleasant early evenings together doesn’t mean he is about to start treating her like family. They just don’t know each other well enough for that however long they’ve been related on paper. She makes a move to go. It’s obvious that Jon doesn’t want company.

‘Actually,’ he says as she’s turning away, ‘it was a disaster. We had a fight in the cab on the way and it was all downhill from there. We never even got to dessert.’

Abi looks back. Jon has slumped down onto one of the kitchen chairs and is rubbing his eyes with one hand as if he has a headache. She sits down opposite him.

‘Sorry to hear that.’

‘It’s my fault,’ he says. ‘I was trying to be pleased for her, but, to be honest, it scares me to death the idea that she’s taking up modelling again and I guess she picked up on that. She was furious that I was being so unsupportive. I shouldn’t really be telling you this …’

‘You don’t have to.’

‘It’s just … I don’t want you to think that I’m not behind her, of course I am if that’s what she really
wants to do. I’m just not sure it’s the best thing for her … for us both, if I’m being honest.’

Abi doesn’t really know what to say to that. In some ways she’s always thought that modelling was the worst thing that ever happened to her sister. That Caroline had always been a better person than Cleo ever could be. But she also knows that for Cleo it was everything. And Abi desperately wants her sister to be happy because maybe, if she was, she could afford to be nicer to those around her.

‘It’s hard work,’ is all Abi says, which she knows doesn’t really mean anything, but she’s struggling.

‘It’s not that. Well, that’s part of it. She was always exhausted when she was working and, of course, she never ate properly … but it’s more the whole package, the need for her to always look perfect, to go out and be seen in the right places, the paparazzi and the gossip columns. Everything has to revolve round it. I’m aware that I sound like a sulky child, by the way,’ he says, smiling. ‘Like I’m worried I won’t get enough attention or something. I just don’t want the girls to have to get involved in all that. To get used to having photographers following them around and their friends reading nasty comments about their mum in the papers. And, honestly, the bottom line is that she’s been a nicer person since she gave up, like I said before. A kinder person …’

Abi can certainly believe that. Jon looks abjectly miserable. She feels sorry for him. Being her sister’s
sister is hard enough. It’s difficult to imagine what being her husband must be like.

‘But I also know that if it’s what she really wants to do then I have to support her. It’s not up to me to tell her how to live her life. I should have told her it was fantastic and just left it at that.’

‘She was modelling when you first met her. What’s changed?’

Jon sighs. ‘It was before I set up MacMahon Fairchild. I was working for one of the big agencies and we were doing some flashy campaign – a car or a perfume, I don’t even remember. Cleo was the model. I thought she was beautiful, obviously, but she was horribly rude to everyone, a real nightmare. Then in the middle of the afternoon I came across her hiding out in the kitchen in floods of tears. She said she thought everyone hated her and I said she was probably right because of how high-handed she was being. I’d had enough by then and I didn’t really care if she walked out at that point.’

‘Brave man.’

‘Anyway, she smiled. Said she knew I was right and that was part of why she was upset. She was trying to change, but it was like everyone expected her to be a diva now and so she couldn’t help slipping into the role. She seemed so vulnerable, like she really was a sweet person and the whole prima donna thing was an act. She was always like that with me. For a long time, anyway.’

‘I get the impression the diva won out in the end, though.’

He nods, sadly. ‘I don’t think she ever mastered being gracious at work. And that gradually became her whole personality. Until she stopped modelling, that is. Then she was like she was when we first met. But I still should have acted like I was pleased for her tonight, though. I’m her husband; I’m meant to be head of her cheerleading team.’

‘That I’d like to see.’

He gives her a half smile, but Abi can tell his heart’s not really in it.

‘Don’t beat yourself up. She’ll probably have forgotten all about it in the morning.’

Jon doesn’t seem to be listening to her platitudes, though. He’s got something on his mind and he wants to say it. ‘The honest truth is for the five years since she stopped modelling until she suddenly decided she wanted to give it another try we were closer than we’ve ever been. We had the girls and we were a family and I really thought that things had changed.’ He exhales noisily. ‘OK,’ he says abruptly, draining the last of his wine. ‘Too much information. I should go to bed.’

‘If we’re being honest …’ Abi says. ‘Just because she’s got a new agent that doesn’t mean she’s going to be inundated with work. It’s not going to be like it was …’

She feels bad, trying to make the fact that her sister is unlikely to ever rekindle her former glorious career
a positive, but she understands his uneasiness. Cleo in the full flush of success was never a pleasant person to be around. She’s touched by his concern for his wife. Abi can’t imagine she’s easy to live with at the best of times and Jon clearly genuinely cares about her. She’s a little surprised too, truthfully, by Jon’s unease about Cleo’s return to modelling. She always assumed he got off on having a supermodel for a wife, that he liked the status and attention it brought them as a couple. That and the money and the fame by proxy that came his way courtesy of her job. She’d felt sure he revelled in being with a woman every other man in the world thought was gorgeous. She figured Cleo was a prize, a trophy. Apparently not.

It seems that she is often being surprised by Jon these days. He’s not at all the person she’d had him down as.

Cleo is sitting frostily at the breakfast table when Abi comes down a little later than usual the next morning. She assumes that Jon has gone to work. The girls are squabbling over the remote in the living room and Abi can hear Elena chastising them. Either that or she’s part of the argument and she’s trying to turn over to
Loose Women
while they’re watching
Cash in the Attic
. It’s hard to tell.

‘How was dinner?’ she asks as innocently as she can.

Cleo takes a sip of her coffee. Elena, clearly having
given up on whatever it was she was trying to achieve, comes into the kitchen and slips some toast into the toaster for Abi. She actually feels like granola today, but it seems like too much hard work to convey that.

‘For god’s sake, Elena, this is way too weak,’ Cleo says, angrily waving her coffee cup around. Abi cringes at her imperious tone.

‘I’ll get you another one,’ Abi says, jumping up. She smiles at Elena who looks as if she knows something is wrong, but not quite what.

‘No. She’s got to learn. She’s been here three years and she still can’t work the bloody coffee machine properly.’ Cleo goes back to reading the paper, giving Abi the chance to hand her cup to Elena and make furious miming motions trying to convey the word ‘stronger’. But she only ends up looking like she’s practising for a weight-lifting competition. She looks at the machine, which couldn’t appear more complicated if it tried.

‘Maybe there’s a button somewhere …’

‘Oh, leave it,’ Cleo says. ‘I’ll go without.’

Abi touches Elena’s arm to try to reassure her everything’s OK. Elena gives her a wary smile. Abi resolves to hunt around for the instruction manual the next time Cleo is safely out of the house.

‘So … dinner?’ she says as she sits back down.

‘Fine. The food was good.’ Abi waits in case there are any Jon-like revelations to come, but Cleo isn’t telling.

‘Are you busy today?’ She’s not giving up on her happy family summer scenario despite her rational self telling her she should, but, as always seems to happen, nervousness makes her blather on.

‘I mean I’m sure you are, you usually are and now that you have a new agent I guess things will get crazy, but, if you’re not, then maybe we could all do something together. Us and the girls,’ she adds, just in case Cleo’s not sure who she means by ‘all’. Elena puts the toast in front of her and Abi smiles her thanks, waiting for a response from Cleo.

‘I’m going out for lunch,’ Cleo says. ‘And then I must go to the gym because, of course, I won’t be able to go tomorrow.’ Tomorrow being the one day in the week when she is being expected to entertain her two daughters herself because Abi will be working. Abi doesn’t rise to the bait.

‘Right,’ Abi says. ‘Another day, maybe.’ The sight of Cleo, reading glasses perched on the end of her nose, suddenly reminds Abi of something, some forgotten memory of when they were young, and she says, ‘Hey, do you remember the time Mum left her glasses in that café in Leamington Spa and we had to read everything aloud to her for days …?’

Cleo sighs. ‘Not now, Abigail. I’m exhausted.’

The atmosphere in the house is tense to say the least, so on Thursday Abi can’t wait to get out of there and get to work. She’s so early that she has to walk round
the park for twenty minutes while she waits for Richard to open up.

The previous night pretty much went to script. Abi helped Jon cook dinner although their chat was not quite as relaxed as it has been lately, because, she thinks, he was regretting having confided in her in the kitchen the night before. They talked about work mostly and Abi tried to make him laugh by offering up some new suggestions for
onehitcomparison.com
(‘Too fat and lazy to walk round the shops? Let us do the work for you’ and ‘Looking for the cheapest place to buy crack? Take the stress out of your addiction with
onehitcomparison.com
), but even though he smiled she could tell his heart wasn’t really in it. Neither of them mentioned Cleo at all.