not going out with,’ Leonie requested in an attempt to get the conversation back on an even keel.
Both girls giggled. ‘Brad is his name,’ explained Abby eagerly. ‘He’s sixteen, tall, with naturally blond hair and he drives a jeep. He was nuts about Mel. He brought us both for a pizza.’
‘Brad, mm,’ said Leonie with a fake smile, her mind doing cartwheels. A sixteen-year-old with his own transport going out with her little girl! Melanie was only fourteen – a very knowing fourteen it had to be said, but still fourteen for all that. What the hell was Ray thinking of! She could have been assaulted, raped, anything!
‘His parents are Dad’s friends, and we weren’t out long,’ Abby added. ‘Dad said he’d murder Brad if we were gone more than an hour and a half, and the pizza place is just down the street.’
‘I wasn’t that interested,’ Mel said airily. ‘He’s too immature for me.’
‘He wasn’t,’ protested Abby and, with a catch in her voice, added, ‘he was lovely.’
I wished he’d fancied me instead of Mel, were the unspoken words.
Leonie’s heart ached for her much-loved daughter, the one who looked just like her. Abby had none of her twin’s effortless prettiness. Abby was as tall as Mel but stocky, with a solid body, mousy brown hair like Leonie’s before she got at it with the bleach, and a round, pleasant face that was only enlivened by her mother’s startling blue eyes. She was a steady, reliable estate car to Melanie’s sleek, capricious Ferrari, and she knew it.
Leonie adored her and saw such beauty and strength of character in Abby’s kind, loving face. But fourteen-year-old girls didn’t want strength of character: they wanted to look like drop-dead gorgeous movie stars and have teenage boys falling at their feet like flies. Mel did, Abby didn’t. And there was nothing their mother could do to even matters up.
At home, the girls rushed out of the car, eager to see their beloved Penny, Clover the cat and Herman.
‘Penny,’ they squealed in unison as their grandmother opened the front door and Penny sprang out like a caged tiger, hysterical with delight. A huge group hug ensued, with everyone trying to cuddle Penny and have it proved that they were her favourite and had been missed the most. With typical feline indifference, Clover refused to have any truck with cuddles, flicked her tail sharply in disapproval and shot off into the garden.
‘She’s affected by the paint fumes,’ muttered Leonie’s mother wickedly.
Luggage was dropped carelessly in the hall, waiting for Leonie to haul it to the various bedrooms.
‘Mom!’ said Mel, aghast, on entering the kitchen which had been magnolia the last time she’d seen it. ‘What have you been doing?’
‘Having an orgy with Francis Bacon,’ laughed Danny, coming up behind his sister and staring at the brightly coloured disaster area which his grandmother had failed to tidy up completely. ‘Were you helping, Gran?’
‘No, and don’t tease your poor mother. She’s been trying to brighten this place up,’ she said sternly, heading to the cooker where a chicken stew was bubbling appetizingly. ‘Your mother needs a hand to tidy up.’
‘I’ve got people to phone,’ said Mel, backing out of the room rapidly at the notion of ruining her nails cleaning up all that horrible newsprint and emulsion. Fliss had given her a French manicure before they’d left for Logan Airport. Domestic work would ruin the effect and she wanted her hands perfect for the next day when she’d pay a visit to her arch enemy and supposed friend, Dervla Malone.
‘Me too.’ Danny was gone like a shot, leaving Abby, her mother, grandmother and a still joyous Penny amid the endless paint-splattered newspapers and cans of paint.
‘I’ll help, Mum,’ said Abby loyally.
‘No, love, we’ll eat in the living room,’ Leonie decided, looking dismally at the chaos and deciding that she couldn’t face a proper clean up. She’d bag all the newspaper and that would be it for the moment. ‘Thanks for cooking,’ she added, giving her mother a peck on the cheek.
They ate on their knees in the living room with the TV on while Danny controlled the remote and flicked from channel to channel in between wolfing down chicken and rice.
Green, thought Leonie, looking around the small but cosy room with its apple-green walls and profusion of plants. Green was the colour she should have painted the kitchen. Not horrible midnight blue. If they could cope with blue for a week, she’d re-do it all next weekend. Maybe a paler green…
Mel’s words intruded into her brain, dragging her away from paint.
‘…Fliss is really nice,’ Mel was whispering to her grandmother, who was nodding wisely and trying not to look at her daughter.
Leonie felt her face burn, knowing her mother pitied her and hating it. Claire had loved Ray and had been heartbroken when they’d got a divorce. ‘There aren’t as many fish in the sea when you’re actively looking, Leonie,’ she had said gently at the time. ‘You love each other: can’t you get on with it and stop looking for true love? I’m so afraid you’ll regret this.’
Ten years on, she’d been proved right, Leonie thought bitterly. Ray had had several long-term girlfriends while she, the great believer in true love, had had so few dates that flirting with the postman was her idea of romantic excitement. And he was past sixty and grizzled looking.
She pretended to concentrate on the sitcom Danny was watching and surreptitiously listened to Mel telling her grandmother all about the holiday.
‘Dad’s house is lovely but not big enough for us, Gran, although it had en suites everywhere,’ said the girl who’d been raised in a succession of small homes and now lived in a cottage with one bathroom and a constant queue for it.
‘Fliss wants to convert one bedroom into a dressing room for herself. She has so many clothes!’
Yeah, snarled Leonie to herself. Probably all band-aid skirts and second-skin leather things. She imagined a cheerleader type, shimmering blonde hair and teeth that had never eaten too many sugar-laden Curly Wurlys as a child. Or maybe she was a hard-bitten businesswoman, another lawyer, all power suits like someone from LA Law. Suddenly Leonie stopped, horrified at herself. What was wrong with her, she wondered blindly. She’d wanted to leave Ray, she’d started the whole agonizing process of separation and divorce – so why was she now jealous of this gorgeous Fliss? He was entitled to another life; she’d practically pushed him into it, hadn’t she?
What sort of person was she turning into if she begrudged Ray a little happiness? A bitch, that’s what. A cast-iron bitch.
Abby was eating very little of her dinner. She normally wolfed it down, eating far more quickly than her twin who nibbled daintily. Now, Abby pushed bits of chicken listlessly around her plate. ‘Are you feeling all right?’ Leonie asked in concern, staring across the coffee table to where Abby sat beside her grandmother on the sofa-bed.
Abby smiled brightly. ‘Fine, Mum, fine,’ she replied. ‘I’m just not hungry.’
‘That’d be a first,’ guffawed Danny.
Abby’s eyes glistened but she said nothing.
Leonie gave her an encouraging grin and vowed to kill Danny when she got him alone. He wouldn’t know how to spell ‘thoughtfulness’, never mind know what it meant. Abby silently took the plates out to the kitchen while Mel rummaged around in a very trendy vinyl handbag Leonie had never seen before. More holiday goodies from a doting father.
‘The holiday snaps,’ Mel announced happily, finding a huge wad of photo envelopes. ‘I can’t wait any longer to show them to you, Mum.’
Leonie cranked her jaw into a steely smile and hoped she could fake a bit of pleasure at the sight of the beautiful Fliss.
Leonie, Claire and Mel squashed up together on the two-seater to view the precious