Quite often people assumed that Nesta never listened to them, or that she never knew what was going on. Thinking her blithe or stupid, they never expected a clever or considerate response. As if the black of her thick mascara, the flaking gold and green of her favoured eyeshadow, obscured the world beyond her most immediate, selfish concerns. Sometimes Nesta saw more than people imagined, and she understood.
“Sue, I had this time...just before my trouble last year...and I couldn’t leave the house. It’s really horrible when you get like that. But don’t give in to it. You know that, in the end, you have to get out and do things.”
“Oh,” Sue began, “I’m not housebound—”
“Listen. I want to explain.” Nesta bit her lip. “You know what got me out of the house in the end?”
“Was that when you had all that bother and disappeared?” asked Sue, being as tactful as she could.
“Hm. The only way I could leave my house was to go with that man. It was all I could do. To stay with him in the daytime in his house and then for both of us to dress up at night and walk the streets in disguise. Really...I didn’t feel normal enough to be out in the day.”
That was the end of Nesta’s explanation. It was more than she had told anyone in the year since her breakdown.
Big Sue said, “It isn’t that I don’t feel normal, exactly...” She took a long drag on her Regal. “And I don’t feel altogether scared when I’m outdoors. Not all the time. There are some nasty buggers out and about and it pays to be careful, but I won’t let them terrorise me. It’s just, when I’m out, I feel exposed.”
Nesta looked at her friend and it seemed she was the same size as the chair she was sitting in.
“Come on,” Nesta said. “Come out with me.”
“I’m not dressed.”
Nesta shrugged. “My stepmam used to say, if you want to get ahead, get a hat.”
Minutes later they were trudging up the main road, linking arms as they sloughed off the drowsiness of Sue’s gas-heated living room. Big Sue took small steps on the slushy path. She said of the Forsythe house opposite, “Look at them with their lights on, music blasting. I wonder if they’ve still got all my knickers and bras.” She had a brief flash of all them lads, running about indoors, playing the fool with her new underthings. “They must be sick in the head.”
Nesta was turned the other way, squinting into the drifting darkness of Woodham Way. The road was almost smooth and unruffled. There’d been little traffic that night.
Big Sue said, “Fancy driving a taxi tonight.”
Heading towards them, nosing determinedly through thick snow, came a big black cab. It ploughed blindly past the bus stop and as it swept past Nesta and Big Sue, they saw that there was only one passenger. She sat in the back seat, staring at the houses of Phoenix Court. Her hair was golden and fluffed up proudly.
Then the taxi was gone.
Big Sue let out a great cackle. “You know who that was, don’t you?” She picked up her pace.
Nesta stared after the car. “I think I do. Do you think she’s come back for the party?”
The older woman grinned. “Ha’way, Nesta. I reckon this do is gunna be a good ‘un!”
FOUR
At number sixteen the party was well underway.
When the schmaltzy songs came on, Jane was in the corner, nuzzling another cocktail. Who was standing next to her this time? One of Judith’s teenagers, listening politely as Jane bitched about everyone dancing. Sheila and Simon were hugging each other close in the middle of the impromptu dance floor. The song was ‘Sometimes When We Touch’ and they seemed to be mired in the carpet’s swirling orange pattern. They stirred, hardly shuffling their feet, staring into each other’s eyes. He’s a skinny little thing, Jane was hissing to Judith’s son, he has to crane his scrawny neck to see into his wife’s eyes. He clung to her as if they were in a flood. His too tight jeans had a crotch that sagged low and his bomber-jacket sleeves were bunched up as his wife wheeled him slowly about. Sheila was gargantuan, with masses of kinky mushroom-coloured hair. Now he pushed his head flat to her breasts and she stared serenely out. Sheila watched their daughter slip quietly out of the back door.
“She goes collecting stones at night-time,” Sheila explained to Fran over her husband’s shoulder. Fran was dancing with her own husband, but she felt forced into it. She gave Sheila a sickly smile. “She makes her own jewellery, you know,” said Sheila proudly.
Jane’s attention was drawn away from the happy dancing couples. Her mother Rose and her pirate lover wanted to talk seriously to her about something. All she remembered afterwards were their mouths working earnestly, through the love songs. She was nodding intently, as if taking in what they said. But talking with Rose was impossible with that bloody stuffed parrot staring her right in the eye.
Penny shuffled through to have her mermaid frock admired by Rose once more, and Jane was glad of the distraction. Rose was calling out, “Oh, if I was still under twenty I would dress as a mermaid every day!”
Penny was telling them that she had nachos under the grill. “You what, pet?” Rose was saying. “What’s that you’ve got?” Jane’s mother had taken a shine to the motherless Penny. Of course Penny was so much more glamorous than Jane, Rose’s natural daughter. And all Jane could think was, What on earth are nachos? When Penny showed them, they were like plates of crisps with cheese and tomatoes and olives, which Jane usually hated and these ones tasted of TCP.
“Ooooh!” Rose smacked her lips. “Eating with our hands! This is like our cruise round the world!”
Penny filled the dining table with scalding hot plates of nachos
