The Woman Who Met Her Match: The laugh out loud romantic comedy you need to read in 2018. Fiona Gibson
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Because it’s the beauty hall of a department store …
‘Stop this right now,’ his mother barks, snatching at his hand, at which Archie’s breathing reverts instantly – miraculously – to normal. She turns to me. ‘Sorry about that. What were you saying about summer colours?’
A moment of recognition passes between us as I remember myself, not with Cam – he was remarkably good-natured in department stores – but Amy, who couldn’t bear the places, and would jab her poky fingers into the trays of make-up testers if I so much as glanced at a new product.
‘They’re lovely,’ I say. ‘Very fresh and easy to wear. Come over and I’ll show you.’
Obediently, with her son merely muttering now, she manoeuvres the buggy to our counter where she obligingly hops onto a stool.
‘Would you like a colouring book and some crayons?’ I ask Archie. Although he merely scowls, I glance over to where my colleague, Helena, has just rung a customer’s purchase through the till. ‘Helena, could you give this little boy a colouring pack, please?’
‘Sure, no problem.’
His mother shifts on the stool. ‘I can’t be too long, and I’m afraid I’m not planning to buy anything.’
‘Oh, that’s fine. We’re just showing the new range, that’s all.’
‘I mean, I really can’t afford anything. Is this stuff expensive?’
‘It’s a quality brand but really, it’s fine. There’s no obligation at all.’
On the floor beside her, Archie is leafing crossly through the colouring book.
‘I’m Lorrie,’ I add.
‘Jane.’ She smiles faintly.
‘Nice to meet you, Jane.’
‘It’s all pictures of stupid ladies’ faces,’ Archie growls, tossing the colouring book aside. The drawings are lovely, the originals having been sketched by sisters Claudine and Mimi, the now-elderly founders of our company, who live in Grasse in southern France.
‘Well, yes,’ I say. ‘The idea is, you can use the crayons to draw make-up on them …’
‘There’s no boys,’ he complains.
‘Yes, but you can make the ladies into whatever you like.’
He throws the pouch of crayons down. ‘Don’t wanna.’
Yes, you do. Give your poor mother a break, for goodness’ sake, after your phoney asthma attack. ‘You could make them ugly,’ I suggest.
He brightens a little. ‘Like with spots? And black teeth?’
‘Yes, if you want to,’ I reply as Jane exhales slowly, visibly relaxing as Archie starts to deface a picture with exuberance.
‘Please don’t put too much make-up on me,’ she says.
‘Don’t worry, you look great as it is. Are you wearing any now?’ A superfluous question, asked out of politeness: she is bare-faced, a little tired-looking but very pretty, her dark blonde curly hair pulled up into a haphazard top-knot and secured with a plain rubber band.
‘Chance’d be a fine thing,’ she says with a smile.
‘Yes, I remember those days.’
Using a make-up sponge, I apply the thinnest layer of BB cream, and our newest eye shadow in ‘tea biscuit’ on her lids.
‘Haven’t worn make-up since Lila was born,’ she adds, indicating her still-sleeping baby in the buggy.
I add a little eyeliner in a nutty brown, followed by mascara. ‘Well, that’s understandable. Other priorities take over, don’t they? But it’s still nice to take a few minutes for yourself …’
‘Or have a haircut,’ she adds. ‘D’you have children?’
‘Yes, two – almost all grown up now. They’re fifteen and seventeen …’
‘Oh, tell me it all comes back,’ she exclaims as I add a touch more liner. ‘Your life, I mean. Feeling human again.’
‘Yes, of course it does—’
‘Before they reach their teens? Please tell me it happens sooner than that or I think I’ll go stark raving mad!’
‘Don’t worry, it happens much sooner than that.’
Jane smiles, clearly enjoying herself now as Archie draws angry red spots and purple lesions all over an elegant illustration of a woman’s face. ‘Well, I hope I look as good as you do when these two are teenagers. But then, I bet you never let yourself go, even when yours were babies …’
‘Oh, I did,’ I say truthfully. In fact, I remember there were periods when the kids were well beyond babyhood and the very idea of putting on a face to greet the outside world was furthest from my mind. Of course, I don’t tell Jane that, after I lost David, my hair didn’t see a brush for days on end. It didn’t occur to me to look in a mirror, and I only got dressed because friends urged me to.
David and I had been together for fifteen years – we’d never married, we simply hadn’t felt the need – and I had forgotten how to be without him. After the accident, it was the children who literally kept me going. For them, I had to get out of bed every morning because ordinary life didn’t stop. I was a lone parent now, ferrying them to and from Scouts and judo (Amy’s short-lived obsession) and basketball (still her favourite thing in life). I turned up at school concerts – Amy sang in the choir, and Cam briefly flirted with the French horn – and parents’ evenings alone, one of the kinder teachers always making the effort to come over and say, ‘How are you, Lorrie? I know it’s been a difficult time.’
Yes it was – because David was dead. I mean really dead, not a Belinda’s-gone-to-Halifax scenario. It happened on one of those rare winter’s nights when London is properly blanketed in snow, like in a children’s story. We were happily cosied up for the evening in the house we still live in – 120 Pine Street, London E2, an ordinary little terrace made a little less ordinary by the original outdoor wooden shutters at the living room windows. With Cam and Amy in bed, David and I were looking out at the snowflakes falling slowly, illuminated by street lamps. ‘Fancy some wine?’ I asked, and David said yes, and because I was already in PJs he pulled on his thick padded jacket and a woollen beanie and headed out to the 7-eleven. Ever obliging, that’s what he was like. Not a pushover – he knew his own mind, taught English in a challenging North London secondary school and took no nonsense from the kids there – but nicely old-fashioned in that he was willing to go out and buy wine, because I fancied a drink.
Because I wanted it, not him. Because I was worn out from a long week of working and being Mummy, and longed for a glass of something cool and chilled.
If I’d put on the kettle and had a mug of tea, it would never have happened.
If I hadn’t been such a greedy wine-guzzling lush, it would never have happened.
If I hadn’t had a bath after cajoling the kids into bed – and still been in jeans and a sweater rather than PJs – then maybe I’d have nipped out to the shop, and he’d still be with us now.
I try to push away such thoughts and pause to study Jane’s face. She seems to have fallen into a sort of reverie. Choosing a neutral pinky-brown pencil, I outline her full lips, then apply a semi-sheer lipstick with a brush. Archie is now drawing thick round spectacles on the lady with the terrible skin condition in the colouring book.
The off-licence is only a five-minute walk away from our house, around the corner and down towards the Roman Road. And that’s where it happened, just as David turned the corner, the car coming too fast on freshly fallen snow, skidding and slamming into him. And that was the end.
I