The Ice Cream Girls by Dorothy Koomson
‘Oh, Fez,’ I say and move to hug her. She is so soft and warm in my arms, it’s hard to believe she could have made the sound she just did with that laugh.
‘I’m being silly,’ she says. ‘I have a good life. A great life. I have a man who loves me and an amazing career. And I choose to stay. But still, I can’t help how I feel. And I love him. He’s a prat sometimes, but I love him. I chose that.’ She pulls away from me, and gives me an almost real smile. ‘It’s fine, really. It’s fine.’ Unconvinced and still concerned, I sit back and watch her avoid making eye contact. ‘The thing is, Sez, for better or worse, he knows everything about me. And that’s why I don’t leave. It’ll take a forever to have that with someone else. It pisses me off that you’ve got this happy marriage that’s not one hundred per cent honest.’
I grind my top row of teeth into my bottom row as my defences kick in and I remind myself not to react. She is upset, so I cannot react.
‘Sometimes I feel like you married him under false pretences. And you’ve stayed married because of those false pretences. And that’s not fair.’
‘I married him because I love him and I stayed married because I worked hard at it. We have both wanted to leave and give up over the years, but we didn’t. That’s why I’m still married, because both of us have made it work.’ The me in my head, the one who is free to do as she pleases, says that to my sister. The me in the room, the one who has felt guilt every day for more than twenty years, says nothing. I take it from her. I take almost all those comments from anyone who knows about him. Because knowing means they are in a position to judge. Not the right position because no one else was there apart from me and her and him, but it’s a position of power. And when you wield that sort of power, the power that could destroy my life with a single misspoken word, I do not mess with you. I do not argue, I do not snap back, I do not censure. When you have power over my life, I let you get away with everything – including murder.
‘You need to be honest with him,’ she says. ‘I don’t know how you can live with yourself when you’re not being honest with him.’
I give a vague nod. I find it hard to live with myself in many, many ways, this one isn’t particularly special.
Mez’s heels clatter down the stairs. ‘You had better not have moved, Serena Gillmare, or there will be trouble,’ she calls.
Faye smiles ‘I’m fine’ at me and waves me back to my position by the dining room window. I stand then scuttle back as she returns her line of sight to the magazine.
Mez dumps her bag in the chair by the door, the waft of freshly applied make-up and perfume coming before her. Her head is slightly lowered as she comes towards me. She picks up her discarded tape measure and drapes it around her neck again, then picks up her red velvet pincushion and twangs it into place around her wrist. As I watch her, I spot the red rivulets running through the pearly-whites of her eyes. That’s why she was gone for so long – she has been crying.
‘You moved, didn’t you, Gillmare?’ she accuses jokily in an over-bright falsetto. ‘You moved and now I’m going to have to redo the waistband and refit the skirt.’
‘That’s OK,’ I reply, matching her tone but not sounding as shrill, ‘it was feeling a little tight around the middle, anyway. It’d be a struggle to sit down, so this time you can maybe have it give a little more, well, give.’
‘O. M. G!’ she says in a mock American accent. ‘You want an amazing dress and you want to be able to sit down as well? Why don’t you just ask for painless childbirth while you’re at it? In fact, why don’t you just ask for other impossible things like never-melting chocolate? I hear Father Christmas is taking requests.’
Faye, still hiding behind her magazine and for intents and purposes still uninvolved in the dress part of the proceedings, laughs. It is a warm, sweet laugh, one that is so unconnected to the one of a few minutes ago, I’d be forgiven for thinking I’d imagined the other one. And that I’d imagined the quiet but damning tirade she’d rained down upon me.
Mez starts to remove and replace pins at an alarming speed.
‘Ow!’ I yelp as she jabs another pin into me.
‘There you go again – why don’t you add, “fewer nerve-endings” on to your fantasy wish list for Father Christmas?’ Faye laughs again and the tension between them starts to decrease, as if a pressure valve has been opened.
The new-found tension between Faye and I won’t be so easily dissipated. And there is something bothering Mez that is making her like this. She wouldn’t normally go away to cry, she wouldn’t normally use Faye’s longing to get married against her, she wouldn’t even be using her pins to get at me. Something is driving her to be like this, and I suspect it’s got something to do with the wedding. Or rather, it’s got something to do with me going through with the wedding when I haven’t told Evan about him.
Since all that stuff exploded twenty years ago, everything seems to come back to him. Back to the decisions I made as a fifteen-year-old. If I had known that falling for the wrong man when I was still really a girl would all but destroy my family, I would have chosen differently.
But at the time, I was fifteen. I did not know that when you drop a stone of a stupid choice in the pool of your life, it can cause a tidal wave to surge outwards, destroying everyone and everything in its path. I did not realise that falling in love would set about ruining the lives of everyone I knew.
poppy
‘Can I buy you a drink?’ he asks.
I look up from the pint glass of orange and soda in front of me, look him right in the eye. ‘No,’ I say. I find that, out here, looking someone in the eye as you say ‘no’ is the best tactic. They realise that you mean it. They realise that you’re maybe not the giggly girl who’ll be impressed because they’ve deigned to talk to you. They realise that you know that just because they’ve looked at you, fancied a shag and want to make it happen, you don’t necessarily have to go along with it.
Every night this week I have come to the Lonely Ploughman pub near Mum and Dad’s house after working on the beach hut to get something to eat and to have a drink. Mum and Dad are still ‘uncomfortable’ having me around. Every time I walk into a room, one of them – usually Dad – leaves, the other – usually Mum – stays as long as they can before making an excuse and leaving. Meals, which used to be such a family affair, are now rationed out and it is each person for themselves to finding a quiet space to eat it in.
If I sit at the table, they eat in the living room. If I take my plate into the living room, they go upstairs – despite the rows we used to have about food and plates in the bedrooms. It’s just easier all round if I’m not there, if I stay away as long as possible until I’ve done what needs to be done with Serena and they can see that I am not the monster they believe me to be.
This pub, one I never went into as a child, is nice and quiet. Mostly men come in here, from what I’ve seen this week, and mostly the type of men who have no qualms about approaching a woman sitting on her own. I’m pretty sure they don’t think I’m a prozzie, not when I dress in the old jeans and shirts and cardigans of Dad’s I found in the black binbags in the garage. (They’re too big, too mannish, and slightly dated, but they’re not from the eighties and they’re not from prison, so they’re the best I can do until I find a job.) So they must think I’m lonely, desperate and on the look-out because every night at least two different men have asked if they can buy me a drink.
Like this man in front of me. Admittedly, he is better looking than the usual ones who come over, convinced they’re talking to a woman who is ‘up for it’. He has dark hair that is combed back off his face, a square jaw, smooth forehead, straight nose, nice lips. In short, a good looking man. If I was interested.
‘Please?’ the man asks.
‘No,’ I reply. Short. Simple. Unambiguous.
‘Go on, let me buy you a drink. What’s the worst that could happen?’
I am not answering that question because that would give him an ‘in??
He sits any way.
‘I’m Alain,’ he says.
It sounded as if he said his name was ‘A Lon’ but I’m not going to ask, because that would be engaging. He holds out his hand, expecting me to shake it, I think. I stare at it for a few seconds, then refocus on his face.
‘I’m not interested in your name or you,’ I reply.
‘Wow, that’s blunt and to the point.’
I continue to stare into my drink – I am still not going to give him an ‘in’ by continuing this conversation.
‘Whoever he is, he must have hurt you pretty bad to make you so . . .’
‘No one made me anything. I am just not interested in you. Please leave me alone.’
‘I guess that’s me told.’
‘Yes, it is.’
He stands up again. Finally! He’s got the message. He’s not very persistent, and I like that. Most of the persistent men this week have to be told. And when I say the words, it’s like watching cockroaches scurry when a light is turned on as they more often than not walk away without uttering another word. I’m surprised word hasn’t got round yet.
‘You’re beautiful, you know?’ A Lon says. ‘Despite the harsh words, you’re really quite beautiful.’
‘Thanks,’ I mumble. He is a different kind of persistent. He uses compliments and flattery as well as normal conversation to try to wear you down. ‘But I’m still not interested.’
‘I’ll simply have to work just that much harder to change that,’ he says.
‘Don’t bother. There’s nothing you can do that will change my mind.’
‘We’ll see.’
‘I’ve just come out of prison,’ I say. This is what I have to say to get rid of the persistent ones, the ones who do not skulk away mumbling ‘frigid bitch’ or ‘lesbo’ when I tell them to leave me alone. Those words are my equivalent of a can of man repellent.
‘Oh?’ he says, joining the ranks of the extremely persistent ones. The ones who think I am either winding them up or trying to turn them on. They hear ‘prison’ and an image of women in skimpy pyjamas chained up together, getting it on at every opportunity, starts to dance in their minds. They then start to fantasise about him and me and a friend – another woman who is, like myself, gagging for it – getting it on.
‘Yes, I have just come out of prison and I would very much like to be left alone.’
‘What were you in for?’ A Lon asks, right on cue. His hand is curled around the top of the chair he has just vacated, and he is ready to pull it out and sit down. He is hoping for a confession as well as a jump.
I stare him straight in the eye so that he knows I am not joking. ‘For killing my boyfriend,’ I say.
This is the point where they run. Some straight away, scurrying like filthy cockroaches back to the cracks they crawled from once the light has been shed on them. Some pause. They weigh up the possibility of sex with a gagging-for-it-bird such as myself with the probability that I am a psycho, and I will do the same to them if they dare to even contemplate messing me around. Then they run without uttering another word.
A Lon pulls out his chair and plants his jeans-covered behind on it, settles his sweating pint glass of lager on the knobbly wooden table and then rests his bare elbows on either side of it and his face in his hands. ‘Tell me everything,’ he says.
‘Why would I do that?’ I reply.
‘Because I’ve never met a real-life killer before. Not up close. I’m fascinated.’
There’s always one. Always one cockroach that’s bigger and braver than the rest. That decides to stand its ground when the light comes on and the human lumbers into sight: they decide not to go legging it for the safety of the damp, fusty corners in the cell, they decide they are up to any challenge a human might present. After all, they’re the only things that will survive a nuclear war.
I’ve always thought that those cockroaches are the most stupid. Not brave, stupid. What’s most likely to occur – a nuclear explosion, or the size five foot of a prisoner? Exactly. I told any such cockroach so when I squished it: ‘It’s all about probability – and you’re more likely to die this way than to experience a nuclear war.’
This man in front of me is a stupid cockroach. He has no idea that when I was inside, my disgust and fear of those creatures wore off pretty quickly – it became a simple case of me versus them and I always won.
‘Seeing as you don’t seem to get the message that I want you to leave me alone, I’ll do the decent thing – leave you alone.’ I stand up, wrap Dad’s cardigan around myself and turn towards the door.
My legs are as shaky as a newborn animal’s as I stride away from him, out of the gloom of the pub into the clear night outside. I have to stop, just beyond the entrance because I am shaking so much.
Why? I wonder. I’m not scared of him, and he didn’t come across as frightening or threatening in any way. I have known fear and terror and this is nothing like that. But none of the other men who have approached me every night for the past week have had this effect on me.
‘Maybe you like him,’ Marcus says. I was wondering when he would show up. I turn to my left, he’s there. He’s often there, beside me, watching me. Listening to my thoughts, observing my life, giving me a hard time. Even if I can’t make out his tall, slender form, the light bouncing off his mousy-blond hair and glinting in his blue eyes, I can still hear him. You’d think he’d haunt the person who killed him but, no, it seems I have that honour. Maybe because he blames me: if it hadn’t been for the accident, she wouldn’t have been able to do what she did.
I ignore him, and instead turn my face upwards to the dark sky. It is black and it is clear and it is where I want to be right now. My fear of the sky has worn off, and has been replaced by a desire to be a part of it. To dance and jump from cloud to cloud, to string together the stars, to swim in the pitch black ocean of a starless night. I want to be up there.
‘You do, don’t you? You like him,’ Marcus persists as I start to walk towards home.
‘Shut up,’ I say to him in my head.
‘You really, really like him. Don’t know why, he is an idiot. Eyes too close together, teeth too straight. Too pretty by far.’
‘He’s better looking than you.’
‘Not possible, my dear.’
‘Go away, Marcus.’
‘No.’
‘Fine. Don’t go away. I’m just going to ignore you.’
‘You can try, but you won’t succeed.’
I’m not shaking any more; focusing on ignoring Marcus has had the effect of calming me down.
‘Poppy, talk to me,’ he begs. He used to have this voice, did Marcus, that he would use afterwards. It was as smooth and gentle as baby’s skin, perfectly pitched to touch that part of me that might be looking to escape. ‘Please talk to me, Poppy, please.’ It hit its target every time, every time I would forgive him, wouldn’t consider leaving because I knew it wouldn’t happen again, I knew he could not be sorrier, I knew that things would be OK if I tried a little bit harder as well.
I start back towards Mum and Dad’s without Marcus in my head. I don’t know who he thinks he is, but he can’t control me any more.
serena
August, 1986
Every time I came and left home, I would look at the space up the road from my house, where he would pull up and drop me off – ‘our’ spot. I would always look at it if I walked past, I’d imagine seeing his car, imagine what I’d think if I was a stranger walking past and saw a white Escort, parked there, with two people in the front. I’d imagine
As I walked on the opposite side of the street approaching ‘our spot’ I glanced across at the place as usual and there was his car.
But surely, it couldn’t be. I was meant to see him tomorrow, not today. And he never risked coming to pick me up, just dropping me off when it was late. It had to be another car that looked like his. I carried on walking, carried on staring and as I drew level with the car, I realised it was his car. And he was in it.
Not alone.
Beside him was the girl from the park. The one who had been eating ice cream and he had gone to speak to, about three months earlier.
He had his fingers tangled up in the long strands of her black tresses and was smiling at her as she spoke.
He leant forwards and kissed her. Brief but significant. Then he sat back and looked right at me. Almost as if he had been waiting for me to come home so he could do that and I could see.
That was why he hadn’t said a word two days earlier when I had to cancel him to go shopping with Faye. He hadn’t said a word, hadn’t reacted, because he didn’t care whether I was there or not. If I didn’t turn up, there was always someone else who could stand in for me. There was always the ice cream girl.
August, 1986
‘Serena, what do you expect? You can’t keep cancelling on me and expect me to sit in on my own, can you?’
I had only cancelled on him the once. Once. I did not say that, though. It was not worth the trouble it would cause for me to point that out.
‘Why were you kissing her?’ I asked quietly, careful to strip my tone of anything that even resembled anger or jealousy. He would hate that.
‘Are you questioning me? Saying that I can’t do something?’ he asked defensively.