I Owe You One

by Sophie Kinsella

  I blink at Nicole, trying to hide my surprise. Compassion? I’ve never heard her talk like this before.

  “I totally agree!” I say eagerly, as she reaches into a low drawer for her curling wand. “You know, I often think we could do more at the shop to help people. Like, have a senior citizens’ cooking group or something?”

  Maybe we can be close sisters after all, I’m thinking. Maybe we can start a joint community project and really bond….But as Nicole sits back up again, she shoots me a blank look.

  “It’s not about the shop,” she says pityingly. “You and Mum are obsessed by that stupid shop.”

  That stupid shop? I feel a tweak of indignation. That stupid shop which is paying for the roof over her head? Which paid for her wedding?

  I don’t say anything, though, because I’m trying to be positive and bonding.

  “Compassion is about yourself,” Nicole continues wisely. “It’s about your journey. It’s about: What is your light and how do you make it shine?”

  “Right,” I say, slightly baffled. “I was just thinking that some of our older customers might be a bit lonely….”

  Nicole isn’t even listening, I realize.

  “Compassion is actually very much a Buddhist concept,” she informs me, plugging in the curling wand. “If your compassion does not include yourself, it is incomplete. That’s a quote from Buddha. You should get into Buddhism, Fixie. It’s like…”

  I wait for her to tell me what it’s like, then realize she’s finished.

  “Maybe I will,” I say, nodding. “Absolutely.”

  “My yoga teacher, Anita, says affirmations are crucial for me right now,” Nicole adds. “It’s important for me to boost my endorphins, because I’m pretty vulnerable, with Drew away.” She eyes me seriously. “I could spiral.”

  “Right,” I say hastily. “Awful. Poor you.”

  “Anita says I’ve got to prioritize myself,” Nicole carries on. “Take care of myself. You know? It’s always about other people, but sometimes you have to say, ‘Sod other people; it’s about me. I deserve it.’ Sit there.”

  Nicole nods at a chair and I take a seat. She brushes out my hair, sprays it with something from a bottle, then starts winding it round the curling wand.

  I notice a book on the dressing table called Your Animal Psychological Self, and Nicole follows my gaze as she creates a tightly curled ringlet.

  “I’ve got into psychological profiles too,” she says. “I’m a Dragonfly. I’ll give you a questionnaire. You should, like, rearrange your whole life according to…” She trails off and stares critically at a second ringlet. “Your hair doesn’t really shine, does it?”

  “No,” I admit. “It doesn’t.”

  My hair is the same length as Nicole’s—shoulder-blade level. But while hers ripples and glows with a combination of highlights and natural brilliance, mine just hangs. Nicole blasts my head with more spray and pulls my hair so tight that tears come to my eyes.

  “You know Ryan’s got a girlfriend?” she says. “Ariana. I mean, I don’t know what you’re expecting, Fixie, but—”

  “Leila says they’ve split up,” I say, too quickly.

  “Really?” Nicole makes a skeptical face and releases another ringlet. “I follow Ariana on Instagram. She’s amazing. She’s all about compassion too. Compassion through cuisine.”

  “Right.” I try to sound more nonchalant. “Well, they’re over now, so—”

  “Look, this is her.” To my dismay, Nicole thrusts her phone into my field of vision. “She’s so inspirational. I commented on her pomegranate salad once, and she replied to me.”

  “Don’t!” I want to wail. “Don’t show me pictures of Ryan’s girlfriend, or ex-girlfriend, or whatever she is!” But that would sound insecure, so I keep my mouth shut. I know Nicole isn’t trying to torment me; she just doesn’t think about other people much. She’s scrolling through the photos now, presumably searching for her own comment. Short of closing my eyes, I can’t escape, so I gaze morosely at the blond Californian vision in front of me, doing yoga, cooking, and rollerblading in tiny shorts.

  I’ve seen Ariana’s Instagram page before. Well, of course I have. I keep following her, then un-following her, then following her again. She probably thinks I’m a nutjob, if she’s ever noticed me, which she won’t have done because she has 26.6 thousand followers.

  “Here we are.” Nicole finally stops on a photo of Ariana wearing a pink crop top and leggings, standing in an arabesque pose, holding out a big salad to the camera.

  “I mean, is she exercising or cooking or what?” I say at last.

  “Both,” says Nicole. “It’s her new thing. She cooks and works out all at once.”

  “Right,” I say, trying not to fixate on Ariana’s white teeth and perfect rounded butt. “Well. You know. Good for her.”

  As Nicole releases another ringlet, her phone bleeps and she reaches for it. “Oh,” she says, frowning at a message. “I have to go.” She puts the curling wand down and reaches for her bag. “Sorry,” she adds as an afterthought. “Julie from my yoga class is at the tube station. I said I’d meet her, because she’s never been here before.”

  “You’re going now?” I say in horror. “But what about my hair?”

  “I’ve started you off,” says Nicole. “You can finish it yourself.”

  “No, I can’t!”

  I catch my reflection in the mirror and wince. Half my head is a ringletty mass of curls. The rest is lying flat and dispirited, like a girl who hasn’t been asked to dance.

  “Please finish it off,” I beg. “It won’t take long.”

  “But Julie’s waiting,” says Nicole. “She’s there.”

  “She could find the way, surely—”

  “That’s not the point!” Nicole seems offended. “Fixie, you could be a little less selfish. My husband is halfway across the world, OK? This is a really difficult time for me.”

  Her phone buzzes with a call and she lifts it to her ear. “Oh, hi, Drew,” she says irritably. “I’m in the middle of something, yeah? I’ll call you back.”

  She rings off and glowers at me again. “Friendship is vital for my endorphin levels right now. And you want me to stay here and fix your hair?”

  Now she puts it like that, I suddenly feel shallow.

  “Sorry,” I say humbly. “I’m sure I can finish it off myself. You go.”

  “Thank you,” says Nicole in pointed tones. “And blow the candles out when you leave. Otherwise, like…” She trails off in her vague way.

  “I will,” I say hastily. “And thanks!”

  As she heads out of the room, I pick up the wand. I wind some hair around it, trying—unsuccessfully—not to burn my fingers, then release it and stare at my hair in dismay.

  I’ve made it curl backward somehow. It looks totally weird.

  I try one more time—burning my fingers again—then give up. I can’t sit here struggling with a hair wand when Mum’s doing all the work. I’ll shove my hair in a clip. It’ll be fine.

  I switch off the wand, blow out the candles, straighten a plaque which says, BELIEVE YOU CAN AND YOU’RE HALFWAY THERE, then leave the room. I go to my bedroom, grab one of my new hair clips, and wind my hair in a knot. I put on my shortest black dress, because Ryan once said to me, “Great legs.” I do my makeup as quickly as I can and peer at myself, trying not to think how pale and English I look compared to Ariana.

  Then I hear a noise from Mum’s room and turn away from the mirror, impatient with staring at myself. Enough brooding. I’ll go and see if Mum needs any help.

  * * *

  —

  Mum only has two smart dresses and she never goes shopping. (“Not for me, love.”) But she’s so slim, she can’t help looking lovely in her trusty blue linen shift and matching heels from the charity shop. Sh
e’s sitting in front of her kidney-shaped dressing table and I perch on the bed, passing makeup to her out of my makeup bag. (Mum’s had the same No. 7 palette forever, and all the good colors have worn away.)

  “Tell me about the day,” she says, as she squirts foundation onto her fingers.

  “Oh, it was pretty good. A couple came in this morning to stock their whole kitchen. They bought everything.”

  “Excellent!” Mum’s eyes sparkle with the fire she always gets when we make a good sale.

  “Only I had to get rid of Greg,” I add. “He kept asking them how often they cook at home and what they make. You know, quizzing them about risotto. He was trying to be helpful, but it freaked them out.”

  “Poor Greg.” Mum shakes her head ruefully. “He does try.”

  “And then Jake brought round his olive-oil people….You know, he has all these really grand ideas, Mum,” I say, feeling a knot of tension rise. “He wants to open a branch in Notting Hill. He wants to rename the shop the Notting Hill Family Deli; can you believe it? We’re not even a deli!”

  I’m expecting Mum to be as wounded by this idea as I am. But she just nods thoughtfully and says, “That’ll never happen. You know Jake. He needs his little schemes. Always has done.” She glances at me and smiles. “Don’t worry, Fixie. I’ll have a word.”

  She sounds so easy and unruffled, the knot in my stomach starts to unclench. Mum is magic like that. She’s like one of those therapists who know where all the pressure points are. A word here, a hug there, and everything eases. Sitting here with her, I feel like all the threat has melted away. Our shop will never be anything but Farrs. And Jake will never get his stupid pretentious schemes past Mum.

  “Ryan’s coming tonight, I hear?” says Mum, brushing shadow vaguely onto her eyelids with the air of someone who really doesn’t care how it comes out. It’s not that she can’t do makeup—she used to do mine perfectly when I competed in junior skating competitions. Eye shadow, glitter, the works. But when it’s herself, she hardly bothers.

  “Yes.” I try to sound casual. “Apparently he is. I wonder what brings him to the UK.”

  “Fixie, darling…” Mum hesitates, brush in hand. “Be careful. I know he hurt you last year.”

  Not Mum too.

  “He didn’t!” My voice shoots out before I can stop it. “God! I mean, I wasn’t hurt. We had a thing, we ended…no big deal.”

  Mum looks so unconvinced, I don’t know why I bother.

  “I know Ryan’s always been there in your life,” she says, applying highlighter. “And we’re all fond of him. But there are lots of other men in the world, love.”

  “I know,” I say, although a voice in my brain is instantly protesting, Yes, but not like Ryan.

  “He may be nice-looking,” Mum continues resolutely, “and he may be a big success in Hollywood, but when it comes to emotional matters, he’s always been a bit—” She breaks off and her face creases in thought. “Oh, love, my head’s not working. What’s the word you all use? Crumbly.”

  “Crumbly?” I stare at her before it hits me. “You mean flaky?”

  “Flaky!” Mum meets my eye and starts to laugh. “Yes! Flaky.”

  I can’t help dissolving into giggles too, even as I’m thinking: So maybe Ryan has been a bit flaky. People change, don’t they?

  “Anyway.” Clearly Mum considers the lecture over. She closes up the highlighter and surveys herself without great interest. “Will we do?”

  “Mascara?” I suggest.

  “Oh, love. So fiddly. I leave that for other people.”

  “Hi, Fixie! Hi, Joanne!” We both turn to see Hannah standing in the doorway, wearing an amazing clingy red dress. Hannah has the most sexy wardrobe in the world, which she says compensates for having the least sexy job in the world. When she tells people what she does, they goggle at her and say, “You’re an actuary?”

  “Hiya!” I go to give her a hug. “I didn’t hear the doorbell.”

  “Nicole was on her way out and she let me in,” says Hannah. “There’s a few guests here too, came in with me. They’ve all arrived early to help.”

  This is typical of Mum’s friends. Maybe in some circles you arrive fashionably late. In Mum’s circle, you pop along early and ask if there’s anything you can do. All the women will be rolling up their sleeves and fighting over who should carry the vol-au-vents through. All the men will be drinking beers and smoking and telling each other what a great guy Mike was.

  “Tim’s on his way,” adds Hannah, and I quickly say, “Great!”

  I’m always careful to sound enthusiastic when we discuss Tim. He’s a good, solid, loyal guy. He’s got the same kind of logical brain as Hannah’s. But he’s missing her empathy. He always pursues the conversation a bit too far and says tactless things without even realizing.

  I’ll always remember him saying, “But, Fixie, presumably you simply didn’t revise hard enough,” when I failed an English test at school. Who talks like that? (Tim, that’s who.)

  Hannah doesn’t mind, though. She says she likes the fact he’s straightforward and doesn’t play games. (I can’t actually imagine Tim playing a game, except some super-high-IQ contest in which he’d keep correcting his competitor.)

  “Did you get yourself a drink, love?” says Mum to Hannah, and Hannah waves back a glass at her.

  “Grapefruit juice.”

  “Ah.” Mum nods wisely. We both know all about Hannah’s regime for conceiving. She and Tim have been trying for four months, and Hannah is already a total expert on maternity-leave rights, cribs, and breast-feeding counselors. She’s also read a million books on child-rearing and has decided to bring up her children as Danish-French hybrids. Apparently then they’ll be super-relaxed, stylish, and eat their vegetables. (I said once, “Why not bring them up British?” and she stared at me and said, “British?” like I was nuts.)

  “OK, so how can I help?” she says now. “What needs doing? Let’s break it down.”

  Let’s break it down is Hannah’s favorite phrase in the world. Give her any job, from a client report to washing her hair, and she’ll break it down into smaller tasks. Her Christmas to-do list has 926 entries, beginning with Order wrapping paper on Boxing Day.

  “We’re fine, love,” says Mum fondly—Mum, who was once given a color-coded organizational calendar by Hannah for her birthday and used it to doodle on during phone calls. Mum really isn’t into systems. She runs the shop out of a hardback notebook, where she writes cryptic messages like Forks—68 or just Greg? and always knows what she meant.

  The doorbell rings, and my stomach lurches. Oh God, is that— It might be—

  “I’ll go!” I say before I can stop myself. I’m aware of Mum and Hannah exchanging looks, but I ignore this and hurry downstairs, nearly tripping on my heels, rehearsing my greeting.

  Hi, Ryan.

  Well, hello, Ryan.

  Hello, stranger.

  But as I approach the front door my heart sinks. I can already see gray hair through the wavy glass, and as I swing the door open, a familiar cantankerous, raspy voice greets me.

  “Come on, come on, don’t keep me on the doorstep!”

  Great. It’s Uncle Ned.

  * * *

  —

  An hour later Ryan still hasn’t arrived and I’d quite like to stab Uncle Ned.

  I pretty much always want to stab Uncle Ned at every family gathering. But I have to smile politely at him, because he’s Dad’s brother and the only one left of that bit of the family. More to the point, Mum gets upset if we slag him off.

  We’re all in the sitting room by now and there’s quite a crowd of Mum’s friends, chatting away. Music is playing, people are greedily eating sausage rolls, and smoke is hazing the air, because Mum’s never believed in the whole “smoke outside” thing. Dad used to smoke inside, so even th
ough she’s not a smoker herself, she almost encourages it.

  “Shop doing well, then, Joanne?” asks Uncle Ned.

  “Not bad.” Mum smiles back over her glass of Cava. “Not at all bad.”

  “Well, I’m not surprised,” Uncle Ned declaims. “Mike was a master at what he did. He set you up for life, Joanne.”

  “He did.” Mum nods with a misty fondness. “He lives on in the shop; that’s how I see it.”

  “He had a knack,” Uncle Ned explains to Mum’s friend Pippa, even though I’m sure Pippa knows as much about the shop as he does. “He knew what people wanted, you see? Clever man. And now Joanne can simply carry on in the same pattern.”

  I’m bristling inside. I know Dad set up the shop, but what’s Uncle Ned saying? That Mum’s been coasting along these last nine years?

  “Bob’s very helpful,” adds Mum, gesturing at Bob, our financial manager, who is hovering over the buffet table with an anxious look on his face. He reaches for a little sausage, reconsiders, peers doubtfully at a quiche, then takes two crisps and places them on his plate. (Bob Stringer: Most Cautious Man in the World.)

  “Bob!” says Uncle Ned as though this makes everything plain. “Fine man, Bob! Bob keeps you going.”

  I feel another dart of indignation. Bob’s helpful—of course he is—but he doesn’t “keep us going.”

  “Bob’s great,” I say. “But Mum’s in charge—”

  “Every organization needs a ‘Man of the House,’ ” Uncle Ned cuts me off. “A Man of the House,” he repeats, with weighty emphasis. “And since poor Mike left us…” He pats Mum’s hand. “You’ve coped marvelously, Joanne.”

  I can see Mum flinching slightly at the hand-pat, but even so, she doesn’t confront him. And although I’m seething, nor do I. I’ve tried in the past, and it doesn’t achieve anything; it only upsets Mum.

  I got really angry last Christmas, when Uncle Ned started patronizing Mum yet again during lunch. This time, I challenged him. He instantly got red-faced and after-all-I’ve-done-for-you, and Mum soothed the situation by telling him I didn’t mean it.