said we didn't look at all alike.'
'It was the way you said it. So you don't think I'm like a real sister to you then? And what the hell did you mean by saying ‘guess what, she plays the recorder’? So what? It might not be the trendiest of instruments, but it relaxes me, OK? You made me sound like a complete freak. Well thanks a bundle, Stella. Now at least I know what you really think of me.'
Stella grabbed my arm again, but I shook her off.
'Get lost, Stella. I've had enough of you and your boring little friends.'
Two men with crew cuts and sports shirts, each carrying laptop computer cases in one hand and bottles of lager in the other walked past and sniggered. 'Girls, girls,' said the shorter of the pair. 'How about a nice bout of naked mud wrestling to sort out your differences? It can be arranged, for a small fee.'
‘ Mind your own business, assface,' hissed Stella. They too were the sort of men who would extract an unnecessary amount of comedy mileage on learning that I did ‘massage’ for a living. I began to walk away, but she followed me.
'I'm really sorry, Emma. It was so tactless of me, ‘specially after this whole Gavin thing, too. I promise I'll never tell anyone you're adopted again, not unless you say it's OK. Or that you play the recorder. And of course you’re a real sister to me.’
Stella curled her fingers into my palm, her rings clicking against my one signet ring, left to me in Mum’s will. 'Friends again?’
I didn’t answer, and wouldn’t take her hand. Stella, unaccustomed to conciliation, lost patience. 'All right then, Saint Emma, have it your own way. God, some people can't accept an apology. If you think my friends are so boring, why don’t you go out and get a few of your own? In fact , why don’t you just go and get yourself a bloody life ? You know, things could be much worse – you’ve only been dumped, but you’re still lying round the flat like a total martyr all day! It’s just lame.’
'Fuck you,' I said, and wheeled around towards home, walking so fast that I caught up with the two would-be mud wrestling organisers. I barged recklessly past them, almost daring them to say something else to me, but they must have caught sight of my expression, because they wisely refrained.
In the distance I could hear a penitent wailing; ‘Em-ma, I’m sorreee, come baaaack’ , but I didn’t turn around.
Chapter 11
I hated arguing with Stella. We hardly ever fought these days; not the way we had ten years earlier. Although, having said that, I was perhaps finally starting to realise that there was a fine line between keeping the peace, and being trampled on.
She did try to come in and see me when she got in from the pub, but I’d locked my bedroom door and pretended to be asleep. I was just too tired to deal with it all. I decided I’d accept her apology in the morning.
But her words had hit home. I made myself get up early the next day - I had to go back to work at some point, and that day was the start of three new baby massage courses, so I couldn’t very well not turn up. Gavin may have dumped me, I’d had a row with Stella, and it looked like rain – and yet somehow I kept seeing the face of the man on the train; the terrible confused expression of somebody who was not in control of their own life. I just kept thinking, I don’t want to become like that.
However much I missed Gavin, it was a new week. I had things to do – more constructive things than locking myself in my room with a descant recorder. I had a mother to start looking for.
Stella, needless to say, was still in bed, so I sat alone at the breakfast table with a bowl of Special K and my novel, Temples of Delight by Barbara Trapido, propped up against the teapot. It was the first day since Gav and I split up that I’d even had the inclination to read a book, so I took that as another good omen.
Ten minutes later, I rinsed my cereal bowl under the hot tap and upended it on the draining
'It was the way you said it. So you don't think I'm like a real sister to you then? And what the hell did you mean by saying ‘guess what, she plays the recorder’? So what? It might not be the trendiest of instruments, but it relaxes me, OK? You made me sound like a complete freak. Well thanks a bundle, Stella. Now at least I know what you really think of me.'
Stella grabbed my arm again, but I shook her off.
'Get lost, Stella. I've had enough of you and your boring little friends.'
Two men with crew cuts and sports shirts, each carrying laptop computer cases in one hand and bottles of lager in the other walked past and sniggered. 'Girls, girls,' said the shorter of the pair. 'How about a nice bout of naked mud wrestling to sort out your differences? It can be arranged, for a small fee.'
‘ Mind your own business, assface,' hissed Stella. They too were the sort of men who would extract an unnecessary amount of comedy mileage on learning that I did ‘massage’ for a living. I began to walk away, but she followed me.
'I'm really sorry, Emma. It was so tactless of me, ‘specially after this whole Gavin thing, too. I promise I'll never tell anyone you're adopted again, not unless you say it's OK. Or that you play the recorder. And of course you’re a real sister to me.’
Stella curled her fingers into my palm, her rings clicking against my one signet ring, left to me in Mum’s will. 'Friends again?’
I didn’t answer, and wouldn’t take her hand. Stella, unaccustomed to conciliation, lost patience. 'All right then, Saint Emma, have it your own way. God, some people can't accept an apology. If you think my friends are so boring, why don’t you go out and get a few of your own? In fact , why don’t you just go and get yourself a bloody life ? You know, things could be much worse – you’ve only been dumped, but you’re still lying round the flat like a total martyr all day! It’s just lame.’
'Fuck you,' I said, and wheeled around towards home, walking so fast that I caught up with the two would-be mud wrestling organisers. I barged recklessly past them, almost daring them to say something else to me, but they must have caught sight of my expression, because they wisely refrained.
In the distance I could hear a penitent wailing; ‘Em-ma, I’m sorreee, come baaaack’ , but I didn’t turn around.
Chapter 11
I hated arguing with Stella. We hardly ever fought these days; not the way we had ten years earlier. Although, having said that, I was perhaps finally starting to realise that there was a fine line between keeping the peace, and being trampled on.
She did try to come in and see me when she got in from the pub, but I’d locked my bedroom door and pretended to be asleep. I was just too tired to deal with it all. I decided I’d accept her apology in the morning.
But her words had hit home. I made myself get up early the next day - I had to go back to work at some point, and that day was the start of three new baby massage courses, so I couldn’t very well not turn up. Gavin may have dumped me, I’d had a row with Stella, and it looked like rain – and yet somehow I kept seeing the face of the man on the train; the terrible confused expression of somebody who was not in control of their own life. I just kept thinking, I don’t want to become like that.
However much I missed Gavin, it was a new week. I had things to do – more constructive things than locking myself in my room with a descant recorder. I had a mother to start looking for.
Stella, needless to say, was still in bed, so I sat alone at the breakfast table with a bowl of Special K and my novel, Temples of Delight by Barbara Trapido, propped up against the teapot. It was the first day since Gav and I split up that I’d even had the inclination to read a book, so I took that as another good omen.
Ten minutes later, I rinsed my cereal bowl under the hot tap and upended it on the draining
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