I looked at Zoe. Fact was, there was very little in the shop we could ever afford.
‘We’re just browsing,’ Zoe said, wandering up to the counter and leaning on it. ‘We come every weekend. We love this shop.’
Jodie was expressionless. She didn’t even blink.
‘You don’t usually work here, do you?’ Zoe went on. I went up to join her at the counter, because Zoe’s chatter was making Jodie watch me even more carefully. I was sure she thought I wanted to pinch something.
Jodie shook her head. ‘No, I don’t. I’m just helping someone out for the day. Friend of a friend.’
‘Would that be Geena?’ Zoe was persistent, even though Jodie was talking in the kind of clipped tone that told me she didn’t want to have a conversation. ‘Geena owns the shop, doesn’t she? She knows me quite well because I’m in here all the time.’
Zoe adored Geena, the goth-queen owner of Dead Bouquet, with her flawless make-up and her berry-coloured hair. Trying to impress Geena was the only time Zoe dropped her ice-queen pose.
‘Yeah, Geena, that’s right.’ Jodie wasn’t giving anything away.
‘Shall I go and get you a coffee from the cafe? I sometimes do that for Geena,’ Zoe offered.
‘No, thanks.’ Jodie picked up some flyers and patted them into a tidier pile.
I was sure we were getting on her nerves and I tried to make a face at Zoe, to get her to shut up. It didn’t work. Zoe was making out that we were practically part-time staff at Dead Bouquet.
‘OK if we try some of the clothes?’ Zoe asked. Later in the morning there’d be a queue for the tiny little changing cubicle and Geena wasn’t keen on us trying things on, because we never shelled out in the end.
Jodie shrugged. ‘Long as you put them back properly.’
We spent about half an hour picking out some of the most gorgeous things on the rack. There was a black jacket with a kind of a bustle that made Zoe look like a Victorian schoolmistress and there was a full-length leather coat that trailed on the floor behind me. There was a black spiderweb cape and an amazing tartan mini dress that would even make my mum draw the line. It was just like being a kid again, with a huge dressing-up box.
‘If I had hundreds of pounds I’d buy all of these,’ said Zoe, stroking the spiderweb lace. ‘Every single thing.’
Jodie almost smiled, but not quite.
The weird thing was that we saw Jodie again, just a few days later. We were walking home from school through The Cut, with Kerry tagging along as usual, and Jodie was standing there, leaning against a bare bit of fence, smoking a cigarette. She dipped her head as we went past, but we recognised her.
‘Hi,’ Zoe said. ‘Scarface,’ she hissed to me, from the side of her mouth.
Jodie mumbled something and sucked hard on the cigarette.
I stopped. I can tell when someone’s been crying and they’re trying to hide it. ‘You all right?’
‘I’m fine.’ She sniffed loudly.
Zoe shook her head at me, to get me to keep walking, but I’m hopeless if someone’s upset. I just can’t walk past and leave them to it. I put my hand on her arm. She was much taller than me, but thin as a paper straw. She wasn’t that much older than us, I reckoned – probably only around eighteen.
Jodie gave me a sort of a smile. ‘Just a bit of a row with my boyfriend.’
She told us she lived in the high-rise flats on the edge of our estate, with this boyfriend. She’d come out for a walk because he was in a bad mood.
‘I didn’t think anyone was still in those flats,’ I said. ‘They look all boarded up.’
Jodie blew out smoke and sniffed again. ‘They’re trying to get everyone out. They’re going to knock the flats down. But we’re still there, until we find something else.’
‘Are you going to work in Dead Bouquet again?’ Zoe asked.
Jodie shook her head. ‘Don’t think so. I was just helping out because Geena was ill. Usually I work in Fryin’Chicken.’ Now that she mentioned it, there was a smell of meat and cooking oil hanging around her.
‘I love that stuff,’ Kerry said. Zoe made a face behind her back. ‘But my mum hates it. She says it’s too expensive and full of fat.’
Jodie smiled at Kerry. ‘She might be right.’
‘Are you OK, really?’ I asked Jodie.
Jodie threw her cigarette butt onto the ground and stamped on it lightly. ‘Yeah. Thanks. I just needed some air.’
She started walking away. Then she stopped and turned. ‘Hey,’ she said. ‘Come round tomorrow after school. I always get a load of chicken to take home. I get sick of the stuff. You can help me eat it.’
Zoe scribbled down the number of the flat on the back of her hand.
The next day, we were a bit tense and giggly, full of a weird excitement. Zoe and I had stuffed a change of clothes into our school bags, but Kerry hadn’t thought about that, so she was still in her school uniform as we went towards Jodie’s house. It was just as well: Kerry always looked even more of an embarrassment than usual out of school. The grey and black uniform was boring, but at least it made everyone look as rubbish as each other, even the really cool girl gangs, because they had to wear regulation shoes, tone down their hair colours and they weren’t supposed to wear make-up. But what you wore out of school said a bit more about you. Zoe wore things that were a bit eccentric, that she made herself, and looked good in a ‘so-sue-me’ sort of a way. My mum was a bit soft – especially since the divorce – and when she got paid she could be persuaded to buy me clothes that I wanted and wouldn’t get me laughed at. But Kerry. Her mum bought her supermarket jeans that made her look
