Read by Danielle Fenemore
Before Christmas Mum took me up West. We went to Selfridges to try on the expensive perfumes, see if there were any freebies going. She walked around from counter to counter; I followed along behind.
“What do you think of that, Rae?” she asked, after she’d dabbed a bit on her wrist. I gave her my rating on a scale of one to ten, glad to be asked to help. We stopped by the Poison counter. Mum gasped. “I love this stuff!” she squealed, running her hand down the purple curved glass.
She didn’t buy any though. She said she’d told Mick she liked it and she hoped he’d buy her some. But she hung around the counter for ages, chatting to the assistants. They smiled and looked at me as if I was a cute animal. Mum patted my head, like she did when there were people to see her do it. After a while she said she had to go and do something and I was to wait for her by the Clarins counter. She said she’d only be a minute. I asked if I could go with her but she shook her head. “Stay here,” she said. “I’ll be back before you know it.”
I stayed by the shiny counter and watched the beautiful ladies in their white coats and bright red lipstick, their hair carefully washed and combed, spraying perfume on passers-by.
The store was full of Christmas shoppers. People flooded in and out of the swinging doors. When I first came to London I used to think you could get stuck in those doors if you weren’t careful; stuck forever, spinning around in glass segments.
One of the women behind the counter was looking at me. She was smiling and saying something to another assistant. Now they were both looking at me, their mouths making ‘O’ shapes, as if they were looking at a baby. I turned away, towards the big department store clock that hung from the ceiling. Four thirty. I was sure Mum had been longer than a minute. I started wandering away from the Clarins counter and towards the other perfumes. When no one was looking I put a small bottle of Poison into my coat pocket.
Now I wanted Mum to be back quickly so we could leave, but I still didn’t see her. I went back to the Clarins counter and walked past the different displays – the palettes of eye-shadows: pinks, purples, greens, just like Dad’s paint box; the lipsticks jutting out like multi-coloured rockets. I ran my finger along the clear glass protecting all the boxes: moisturisers, face masks, body lotions, eye gels. A whole display of pretty white and red boxes with fancy writing, all made in Paris by the looks of things.
“Can I help you?”
It was the pretty woman who had been staring at me. She had blonde hair that folded in big shiny curls, and she was wearing misty pink lipstick.
“You look like you’re after something?”
I dug my hand down into my pocket to make sure the bottle of Poison was still there. Did she know what I’d done?
“No, thanks,” I said, quickly, hoping to sound grown-up, like I knew what I was doing. Like I wasn’t the kind of person who stole things. “I’m waiting for someone.”
“I see,” she said. “Well, while you’re waiting, how about trying on some of our perfume?”
She smiled at me, a great big shiny smile, and now I could see her teeth: pearly white inside her misty pink mouth.
“Follow me,” she said, reaching out her hand and taking mine. I let her lead me. We held hands – she had soft, white hands – back over the fancy French boxes, along the eye-shadows, and the rockets of lipsticks, until we were in front of the perfumes. Then she let go.
“Roll up your sleeve,” she said.
I pushed my jacket up around my elbow, wishing my arms didn’t look so scrawny.
“That’s it,” she said. “Now, what shall we try on today? Let’s see. How about this one: a light and elegant scent with a touch of mystery. How does that sound?”
“Lovely,” I said. I was glad she had not noticed my arm. She had not noticed my arm and she thought I was the kind of person who would suit a light, elegant mysterious scent! I stood still as she held the bottle, cupping her perfectly manicured hands around the base and pressing the nozzle down with one short movement. A spray of bubbles covered my wrist. I waved my arm around, like I had seen Mum do, and then I smelled it. It smelt of flowers, pink honey-dipped flowers, the sort I used to smell sometimes on the way down to the beach, when we lived with Dad.
“It’s beautiful,” I said.
“Well, I’m glad about that,” she said, and smiled again.
She was the fairy godmother in the Wizard of Oz. And I was Dorothy. I half expected her to disappear in a big pink bubble, or to wave her magic wand and whisk me and my red shoes away.
“I have to start packing up now,” she said.
“OK,” I said. Packing up? My heart started beating fast. Why would she be packing up? I looked at the clock. It was five minutes to five.
“What time do you close?” I asked, trying not to show my concern.
“Five o’clock, pet,” she said, but now she was busy and she wasn’t smiling; she had things to do. The shop was starting to empty. A man’s voice came over the loudspeaker; he said the store would close in five minutes. All the counters in this section were shutting down. It was getting much quieter in here, strangely quiet after all the noise and business and shopping. Where was Mum?
My legs were tired. I slumped down onto the floor, my back against the counter. If I sat there she would find me when she came back from wherever she had gone. She would smell my flowery, elegant scent and then we would go home. Down there I could see people’s feet as they left the shop: high heels, flats, boots, all moving towards the swinging doors that flipped them out into the cold. The floor looked less shiny from here. You could see the marks where people’s shoes had been, each person leaving a trace of themselves along the shop floor, like thousands of snails. I concentrated on following each trail, as if they were lines on a map, working out how they intersected and overlapped, where they began and ended. I built a whole network in my head. I worked as hard as I could at this so I didn’t have to think about anything else. That was what I was doing when I heard her voice. She was shouting at someone.
“Take your hands off me,” she was saying. “What do you think you’re doing?’
Her voice was getting nearer. The store was getting quieter. I didn’t look up. Maybe if I didn’t say anything she’d stop. I kept following the trails: where did they end up, I wondered, whose house did they lead to?
“I’m not drunk. How dare you? Get your hands off me.”
I wondered what marks my shoes made. My red kickers had a chunky sole; they would leave a serious impression on the floor. I wondered if anyone would notice my tracks if I kept walking – kept walking and didn’t look back.
“Rae. What you doing down there?” She was looking at me now. Her face was red and blotchy, her eyes glazed over. “These people!” she was saying. “I don’t know what they want. I was just having a quiet drink and now they say I have to leave. What’s going on?’
I stood up. She was looking at me but she couldn’t really see me. Her eyes were as misty as the Fairy Godmother’s lipstick. There was a man in a white shirt and a navy jacket with gold buttons. He was wearing a peaked hat, ducked low on his head so you couldn’t properly see his eyes. He put his arm around Mum, trying to hold her up, as if she’d fall down if he let go. The Fairy Godmother was looking at me again, staring and whispering to her friend as if she’d seen an animal run over in the middle of the road. I hated her now, hated myself for being tricked by her stupid girlie ways.
“Come on,” I said to Mum. “Let’s go.” I reached out my hand towards her.
“That’s what I was trying to tell them,” she said. “I just want to go home.”
The security man looked at me. “I’ll help you to the door,” he said. But I didn’t want his help. I wished he would leave us alone. I wished he would bugger off and leave us alone. He started moving towards the exit, one arm around Mum who was dragging her heels. I was holding her other hand. We must have made a funny sight. Peaked hat was tutting under his breath, as if Mum was some kind of moron. I wanted to shout at him. I wanted to spit at him and tell him he was the moron with his stupid hat, and his stupid buttoned jacket. Mum started wailing. “What have I done?” as if she’d lost something, left something behind. I squeezed her hand. Luckily there was a bus waiting outside the store and the man helped me get her on. I didn’t say anything to him, just left him standing on the pavement as I shuffled Mum into an empty seat. Within seconds she was asleep.
But when it came to paying for our tickets, I realised I didn’t have any money. I had to search Mum’s pockets but my fingers were stuffed into my gloves and I couldn’t move them around properly. The driver sat there, drumming his fingers on the wheel as if he didn’t believe I was going to pay. Eventually I found her purse. There was just enough for the two of us to get home. The driver gave me the tickets and tutted as I walked away. People were staring at me. There was a girl about my age with her mother. They were surrounded by bags of expensive things, presents wrapped with ribbon, and coloured string. The girl was looking at me. “Don’t stare,” her mother said, pulling the girl away but it didn’t stop her. “What are you looking at?” I said, scowling, as I sat down next to Mum. The girl turned quickly away, scared. I scowled again, just to be sure.
As the bus crawled along Oxford Street, I looked out of the window: street sellers with their fake perfume and roasted chestnuts; men in thick overcoats, steam from their mouths, as they hurried to find something for their wives; kids with mittens and red cheeks, staring at the toy displays. I thought about all the buses, weaving their way through the streets of London, red lozenges carrying people, zigzagging across the city. I wondered if Dad was sitting on one of these buses. I wondered what he was doing for Christmas. If he was even alive.
I patted my pocket to make sure the bottle of Poison was still there. Then I looked at Mum. Her eyes were starting to open. There was a spool of spit dribbling from her mouth. I wiped if off with the tip of my glove.
“Are we nearly there yet?” she said.
I nodded.
“Almost,” I told her, patting the top of her head. “We’re almost there.”
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Are We Nearly There Yet? was read by Danielle Fenemore at the Liars' League Santa & Satan event on Tuesday 11 December, 2007.
Emily Pedder is a London-based writer. Her short fiction has appeared in several magazines (Telltales, Mslexia etc), and in 2001 she co-founded Matter, a literary anthology promoting new writers. She completed her first novel in 2004 and is now working on her second, for which she won an Arts Council Grant.
Danielle Fenemore trained at Mountview. Her stage credits include My Fair Lady (Cambridge Arts Theatre), The Ripper (New Players Theatre), Honk (George Square), Sweeney Todd (Union Theatre), SpeedDating the Musical (Jermyn Street Theatre), An Act of Twisting (Kings Head Theatre), Tony Blair the Musical (Gilded Balloon), and It’s Only Make Believe (Upstairs at the Gatehouse). Her website is www.daniellefenemore.com
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