Mind you, even now, weeks later, whenever I think of Neeve saying, ‘Keep your casserole,’ I convulse with silent laughter.
Shortly after Jana’s arrival, we greet Tasha Ingersoll, dolled up to the nines in – eek! – a blue Hervé Leger bandage dress. I haven’t seen her in at least a year and I’ve never liked her. Next, in skinny jeans and a floaty shirt, is Mo Edgeworth. She’s nice enough but I barely know her, and it’s only then that the common denominator is revealed: every woman here has been shafted by a man.
Steevie’s Lee left her for his assistant. Four days before Jana was due to get married, her fella called it off. Tasha Ingersoll ‘stole’ Neil O’Hegarty from Siobhan O’Hegarty, then Neil escaped and went back to Siobhan. Mo Edgeworth’s boyfriend was married and she didn’t know. Then there’s me …
I should have checked who’d be here. I thought I’d done well by insisting to Steevie that Genevieve Payne couldn’t come. But in the relief of that victory my eye was off the ball and it’s too late now. Everyone greets me with the ‘Full Heart Stare’ where they take my hands, gaze into my eyes and flex a compassion muscle. It’s the look I give people when they’ve had a bereavement or a cancer diagnosis, and it’s only now that I see how humiliating it is to be on the receiving end. I’ll be more careful in future.
‘The moussaka is ready.’ Steevie sounds wounded and snippy.
We sit at the table and I swig my wine, aware that there’s a danger of overdoing it.
‘So!’ Tasha says. ‘How have you been coping?’
‘Honestly, I’m fine.’
My answer is received in rancorous silence.
‘What have you been doing?’
‘Busy, you know, work is all go. Took on a new client on Tuesday. Guess who he is. Hint, he’s a bit fabulous!’
‘Hugh Jackman?’
‘Not that fabulous. Works for the BBC.’
‘Bruce Forsyth.’
‘Ah, come on.’
‘Who is it, Amy?’
‘Matthew Carlisle.’
‘The nanny-shagger!’
‘He’s not –’
Then Tasha says, ‘I think he looks like Tom Ford,’ like it’s a bad thing!
‘Anything else?’ Mo prompts.
‘Spending quality time with my girls. Sofie has moved back in, which I’m delighted about!’
But tales of my daughters don’t cut the mustard in this particular milieu. At the very least I should confide that I’ve just joined Whiskr, or whatever the name of the site is, that matches beard-loving ladies with beardy men. In the ensuing silence I eat too much moussaka to offer a blatantly dishonest display of gratitude for this grim get-together.
‘So? Any men?’ Steevie asks Tasha, and I want to stand up and leave. Only the promise of the fancy cheese restrains me.
Tasha launches into a grisly tale of some dreadful man who had a ninety-degree bend in his penis and that was the least bad thing about him. I’m drinking steadily but heavily. Tasha ends her epic with snarky side-eyes and, ‘All ahead of you, Amy.’
It’s not all ahead of me. I say, ‘We’re failing the Bechdel Test in spectacular fashion.’
Steevie glares, actually glares, then jerkily clears away the plates, and I realize I’ve eaten about seven times as much as anyone else. And here comes the pavlova. Just this course to get through, then the cheese, and then I can go.
I’m never coming to another of these gatherings. I can’t. Then Steevie will take umbrage. So I’m looking an unpleasant choice straight in the face: either I please Steevie or I protect myself – and in the process damage an important friendship. I don’t want this to happen. But that’s personal growth for you. The circumstances that beget it are always unpleasant and so is the actual process. Some day down the road I might feel smug and wise but it’ll be a while coming.
I accept a plate of chocolate pavlova and horse in, barely tasting it.
‘Wooh! Watch that girl eat her feelings!’ Tasha says.
I’m appalled by her bitchiness but my riposte is a great phrase that Neeve taught me: ‘Ouch. Rush me to the burns unit.’
‘Wait till you see her when the cheese arrives,’ Steevie says – oh, no! We’ve just jumped from pass-agg snarkiness to open mean-girlery.
For a second I contemplate throwing my napkin on the table and leaving, but I’m too scared. Instead I tip half a glass of wine down my gullet.
‘So, hey, Amy, while Hugh is away, have you a bucket list?’ Jana is trying desperately to resuscitate things.
‘Aaaaah, travel?’ I blag. ‘Macchu Pichu?’
‘Do the three-day trek?’ Jana asks.
‘Isn’t there a train? Not hiking for three days, don’t wanna see it that much.’ You know, I’m a bit pissed.
‘Dolphins?’ Jana again. ‘Swimming with them?’
‘I worry about the whole dolphin thing. They’ve been tolerant of us until now, but I sense they might turn.’ I really am quite pissed. ‘The only thing I really love is clothes.’ I’m slurring – ‘clothes’ is one long slide of a word. ‘If I could, I’d spend my days scouting second-hand shops.’ God, waaaay too many Ss in that sentence. ‘Tracking down beautiful vintage pieces. I’d have my own shop.’ I’m making a big effort to enunciate clearly.
‘You should do that, Amy.’ Jana is encouraging. Tasha is actually checking her phone.
‘Ah, no!’ I wave away Jana’s enthusiasm. ‘No illusions. Isn’t a career. You might look at two hundred dresses, all of them just cheap old rags. Cheap. Old. Rags.’ I focus on Tasha as I say those words and a desire to laugh bubbles up in me. ‘People would get cross because a dress costs a fiver, when the dry-cleaning cost me a tenner. And I could sit there for three days and no one would buy anything and I couldn’t pay the shop rent. Then I’d be evicted.’
On this cheery note, Tasha stands. ‘I have to go.’
‘So do I,’ I say.
‘You haven’t had your cheese,’ Steevie says.
I look her in the eye. ‘I don’t want any.’ It’s bad. Bad, bad, bad. Hard to know how this happened but we’re at war. It’s terrible and I’m afraid.
‘One thing you should know,’ Tasha cuts across us. ‘When Genevieve brought that casserole over to you, she was only being nice.’
‘Bullshit.’
‘Please don’t swear at me.’ Tasha has gone super-prim.
‘My apologies.’ Sarcasm. Blistering. ‘Most abject. Genevieve was just being a disaster-tourist.’
‘Why would she do that?’ Steevie asks coldly – the same Steevie who knows exactly what Genevieve is like.
‘You think Genevieve fancies Hugh.’ Tasha is scathing.
I’m saying nothing.
I could tell the story of when Hugh got his new car, a second-hand Volkswagen, and Genevieve cooed, ‘Cool wheels,’ then asked if he’d take her for a drive in it, like it was a Porsche.
I could.
But I don’t.
‘She does fancy him,’ Mo interjects. ‘Genevieve told me.’
So Mo is friends with Genevieve as well? They’re all her friends! I’m in a snake-pit of Genevieve Payne lovers!
‘Well …’ Poor Jana is flailing around, trying to reconfigure this into something blameless. ‘Well, maybe she does fancy him because, yeah, Hugh is pretty hot!’
55
I can’t drive home, I’ve had far too much to drink, so I set off on foot in my too-high shoes. When I’m safely away from my Bechdel-Test-failing lunch companions, tears start streaming down my face.
I handled that really badly. I’m ashamed but I’m also resentful. I’m defensive but I’m also sad. Steevie and I have been friends for a long time and suddenly it’s gone to shit. Is everything going to fall apart? Is Hugh’s leaving the start of a major life unravelling?
I hate confrontation, I hate ill-feeling, and I’m shaky and nauseous.
I hobble on in my wrong shoes and, passing Marley Park, I decide to give my poor feet a break, maybe even sober up.