Morgan, Paige and Tiff stood frozen by the French windows.
Tiff looked at the others, then back at Emily. ‘Oh, for fuck’s sake,’ she muttered and then went outside too. She stood by Emily and slowly stretched out her arms, head tilted up, silk pyjamas soaked within minutes. Morgan came next. Then Paige. More of the round to oval green leaves, like hazel tree ones, tumbled down from branches. As the mistral blew them, they danced around the girls, who stood shivering by the pool, water trickling down their cheeks. The others’ pained expressions looked just like Emily’s as she remembered what an utterly close friendship the four of them had ruined, back in 2004.
* * *
AndIwas always labelled the dramatic one.Tiff replayed last night in her mind. She brushed damp hair out of her face and shook her head. She reached to her bedside table and picked up her phone for the umpteenth time. Lying under the covers, she read another text from her agent. A great audition had come up for a romcom on Amazon Prime, about a love triangle. Tiff was in the running to play one of the three leads. The actor they’d set up for the role had bailed just before contracts were signed. Tiff hadn’t been the casting director’s first choice but this was a unique opportunity. The audition was last-minute and the day after tomorrow. She’d need to get to London as soon as possible so that her agent could fill her in properly.
Tiff had booked a flight for a few hours’ time. The others would understand. This was her future. Three heads would be as good as four. As Emily said, Tiff had lost her empathy, so what was the big deal? She’d strived not to analyse Emily’s behaviour last night, trivialising it as her friend making a fuss. However, the truth was, standing there in the rain, she knew exactly how Emily had hoped to feel, in that basic way children and teenagers did before the responsibilities of adulthood put barriers up, keeping out raw nature, raw emotions. When was the last time Tiff had run as fast as she could through a field, collapsing with laughter onto fresh grass? Or lain on the ground to inspect an insect, almost crying at its beauty? Beaches had become all about the swimsuit and tan, not about singing along with the breeze, lying in the tide as the ocean covered you with a salty water sheet and then pulled it back. As for hikes, they were more about the calorie burning instead of enjoying a sense of oneness with wildlife. Tiff had forgotten how it felt to have everything frivolous stripped back to what was important.
She looked at her phone again. Her agent had emailed her the audition scene, a monologue. The director wantedfeistiness– a word her agent usually hated, saying it was sexist and subtly undermined women who were simply assertive.
Emily snored by her side. Her friend hadn’t dropped off until a couple of hours ago. They’d come in from the rain and gone to bed without saying anything. Then hadn’t been the time for Tiff to announce her premature departure. Tiff hadn’t slept. Nothing new, the night before a big day on set, she’d be unable to switch off the lines going around her head. Concealer had become her best friend, along with eye drops, facials and the occasional sleeping pill. She’d even taken a line of cocaine once, at a party. Someone said that it gave you such a rush, but the subsequent crash meant that tiredness set in, and, Tiff hoped, deep sleep. That rush certainly did take her breath away, filled her with power and confidence, and she’d had sex with her director – but she still couldn’t sleep afterwards.
Emily’s eyelids fluttered. Tiff jumped up and went for a shower, not sure how to admit she was bailing. By the time she’d got dressed and fixed her hair, it was seven fifteen and the others were in the living room, drinking coffee, not talking. It reminded her of the first day of rehearsals, meeting actors with a reputation. You believed you knew them because of their past work, but actually didn’t know them at all.
Slut.A hateful word. Wholesome, young Emily hadn’t deserved it, she wasn’t even sleeping with Hugo, never had with anyone. Tiff, Morgan and Paige were more streetwise, but Hugo being able to take advantage of Emily was less surprising. Tiff gazed at Morgan, in jeans and a T-shirt, no make-up, no false face. Then Paige in her crease-free, cotton trousers and blouse tucked in, still effortlessly stylish. The four of them used to joke that they had each other’s backs – and their fronts. Like the time in Year Seven when the Home Economics teacher asked the class to come up with a healthy baking recipe. Pupils created bakes swapping in low fat butter and wholemeal flour. Tiff chose to make a cheesecake topped with lots of fruit, excited at how colourful it would look. However, their exacting teacher tore her apart in front of the other pupils, in a sneering, clinical voice. Said Tiff was tipping towards tubby and no wonder, if she thought simply adding healthy ingredients would cancel out a dish’s high saturated fat content. Tiff laughed it off in front of the class, but Morgan, Paige and Emily found her sobbing in the toilets afterwards. She said it was the teacher’s rude tone that upset her. They persuaded Tiff to make a complaint to her personal tutor, Mlle Vachon.
Having poured herself a coffee, Tiff sat down next to Emily on the sofa, sun rays shining through the windows, the clouds of yesterday gone. Morgan and Paige nodded from the armchairs. They’d all had toasted baguette and jam for breakfast.
Tiff took a deep breath. She couldn’t put it off any longer. In the next half an hour, she’d need to leave for the airport. ‘I have something to say…’
Emily face crumpled. ‘Me too. I’m sorry.’ The words burst out. ‘Sorry for letting you three down in Year Eleven… You were the sisters I never had.’
Despite the sense that someone had jumped a scene, jumped to a climax and left Tiff to ad lib, the right words came so easily. ‘I’m so sorry too,’ she mumbled. ‘I shouldn’t have called you a slut, Emily.’
‘I shouldn’t have called you Jabba.’
‘I’m sorry too, everyone,’ said Paige and she turned to Morgan. ‘Especially you.’
‘Same here,’ said Morgan. ‘You were never a princess. I just chose the word that would hurt most. You deserved better from me…’ She looked around. ‘Each of you did.’
Many times over the years, Tiff had wanted their support. Even now, when starting a new show, Tiff would picture her three friends in the wings of the stage at school, cheering her on. As for the fun they had… Paige arranged a trip into town the first weekend of Year Eleven and said it was time to get more fashionable bras. They got pocket money, and earned extra too: Morgan from her gardening work, Emily from a paper round and Tiff from babysitting a neighbour’s children. Even Paige, who helped out in her mother’s offices during the holidays – her parents, as ever, were firm about their daughter learning the value of what they called, ‘a hard day’s graft’. The girls had giggled as Paige refused to let them buy comfy sports bras, instead pulling out ones with lace trims or a deeper plunge. She said it wasn’t for boys, it was for themselves. ‘Treat yourself well and you’ll walk taller,’ she’d announced. Whilst eating her burger afterwards, Tiff couldn’t stop scratching hers, and over dinner that night, her mum had insisted Tiff took off her shirt. Sulkily, she’d shown her the new bra. However, her mum liked it, agreed the four friends were growing up, but had hinted that she thought it looked a little tight.
Whereas Paige, Emily and Morgan had said how well it fitted her gorgeous curves.
The others got up to wash their dishes. Tiff remained on the sofa, swirling her drink around. This director wanted feistiness. He sounded like a dick. Tiff wasn’t one to disappoint, so in that spirit, she took out her phone, went into the text conversation with her agent and typed:
Sorry. Please cancel the audition. Something more important has come up.
19
MORGAN
The taxi driver drove through the town that had a café next to a small building with a yellow and blue sign on the front and the wordsLa Poste– obviously the post office.
‘That’s proof that maths is much more difficult to learn than languages,’ said Morgan. ‘With French, you can often guess the meanings. With maths, there’s no way of guessing answers. You always have to work it out.’
Paige, Emily and Tiff exchanged smiles.
‘I don’t think Mlle Vachon would agree,’ said Paige.
Paige had said Morgan could still study maths at uni, that she should make plans for the future, but doing that when she’d first found out she was expecting had taught Morgan a lesson about setting herself up for disappointment. Pregnant Morgan had sworn she’d still study, get a degree, give her and Olly the life she’d always dreamt of, with a detached house in a leafy suburb, one of those big SUVs to drive around in, and a bonus each year that would pay for a holiday abroad. She wrote a five-year plan. Applied to sixth form college. But then the baby arrived and reality set in – sleepless nights, money needed straightaway for nappies, clothes, so many other things. Her parents were supportive but made it clear she needed to take responsibility.
Morgan used to cry in bed at night until Olly provided her with a different aspiration: to be the best mother ever, to give him the chances she’d now lost.
A tight sensation rose in her chest.
Years ago, teenage Tiff had moaned that her parents hadn’t achieved their dreams, so were trying to live through her instead. Was Morgan in danger of being like that? The toast from breakfast came up to the back of her throat.
