by Anna Hope
Wow. Lissa greets her on the concourse with a hug. Louise Brooks. I love it.
Really? says Hannah, touching her hand to the nape of her neck.
They wait outside King’s Cross station for the bus, and when it arrives Hannah follows Lissa as she runs up the back stairs. The seat at the front is free and Lissa grabs it, swinging her plimsolled feet up on to the rail, chattering away, as the bus takes them through the wastelands behind King’s Cross, where Lissa points out warehouses where she has gone to parties, a club that she goes to most weekends. She tells Hannah about her new boyfriend – Declan – an Irishman ten years older than her. Of how he took her to Rome, where he is filming a series, and they wandered the sound stages of Cinecittà, and stayed in an apartment in Trastevere and saw medieval paintings and religious shrines.
Declan says he’s going to get me an agent, says Lissa. So I can go up for things in the holidays.
She says this with no particular surprise, just a happy acceptance of her lot.
And Hannah watches Lissa as she speaks and thinks she is more beautiful, if possible, than before. Lissa will be a successful actress. This is clear. She might even be a star. She has talent and looks and insouciance and golden things fall into her lap. And there is no point envying her, for this is simply how it is.
Outside the bus window the industrial land gives way to council estates as the bus climbs a long hill. They get down opposite a Tube station, and Lissa leads the way through streets where tall houses are set back from the road and Hannah can hear music practice through open windows. These streets are quiet, the city softened. They stop at a house with hollyhocks in the front garden and a battered green front door.
Your room’s at the top of the stairs at the back, says Lissa, letting them in. You can put your bag up there, if you like.
The stairs are covered with an old Moroccan carpet. There are things piled on almost every step, either on their way up or down – it is not quite clear. A collection of pictures line the wall: framed cartoons, postcards, and other larger paintings – a big canvas at the top of the stairs of Lissa as a girl. Hannah stares at it; she recognizes the style – there was one in Lissa’s room in halls. She puts her bag down in a narrow room with a single bed, which looks out on to a long garden with a greenhouse at the bottom. The sound of a radio comes from somewhere up above.
She sits on the bed for a while then goes to use the bathroom, which is large and grubby and painted a dark grey-green. Magazines are strewn in haphazard piles on the floor. She picks up a wrinkled copy of the New Yorker, which is open at the fiction page. It is over four years old.
Downstairs, the living room has been knocked through and one whole wall is taken up with bookshelves. The window on to the street is covered in vegetation and lets in a greenish light; the effect is a little like being underwater. Ashtrays in various states of overflow are set on side tables. There seems to be no order to the books on the shelves: Tolstoy, Eliot, Atwood, Balzac. Hannah takes down one of them, Eliot, Four Quartets. Its margins are filled with writing, a looping scrawl. There is a movement behind her and she jumps.
A woman is standing at the bottom of the stairs. She is tall and wears a long brown apron which is covered in paint, and her long greying hair is caught up on top of her head in two combs. She is arrestingly beautiful.
Who are you? the woman asks.
Hannah, says Hannah. Sorry.
Why are you sorry? says the woman, her head on one side. She looks both curious and dangerous, like a bird of prey. She comes closer, peers at the book in Hannah’s hand.
Ah. Eliot. Are you a fan?
Hannah looks down at the text, with its spidery marginalia. What is the right answer?
I think so. I mean – I did The Waste Land. I liked that. But … wasn’t he horrible to his wife?
He was, unfortunately. He was an absolute shit. But he could write.
I’m Sarah, by the way, she says, holding out her hand. Borrow it. But don’t worry if you don’t enjoy it. Eliot is wasted on the young.
They go into the large, messy kitchen, where Sarah takes over lunch from Lissa, insisting that she is starving and a sandwich isn’t nearly good enough. When the food is ready, Hannah watches Lissa and Sarah as they eat, alert to the ease with which they attack their food. The salt is not in a cellar but in a mortar bowl, into which the women reach with their fingers. They pour oil liberally over their salad, then dunk with their bread to mop it up. When the salad is finished they suck their fingers dry. They eat like animals, but in doing so they are more elegant than anything she has ever seen. She thinks of her parents; of her mother in her M&S cardigans, the salad cream poured on to pallid lettuce: their politeness, their serviettes, their insistence on manners.
Afterwards they smoke. Sarah has a similar leather pouch to Lissa’s, uses the same dark tobacco papers. Sarah and Lissa speak about films they have seen, plays. There is an edge to these conversations, a competition. When Lissa talks about the art in Rome, Sarah grows silent, listening with her head to one side. Before she went to Rome, Sarah says to Hannah, Lissa thought a Bellini was a cocktail.
It is, says Lissa, reaching over and putting out her cigarette in the remains of the olive oil. Art and life aren’t mutually exclusive. You taught me that.
Touché, says Sarah, raising her glass.
Hannah feels herself like a plant, tendrils reaching out, hooking on to this house, these women, this life.
You should stay a few more days, says Lissa, when Hannah’s time is almost up. My mum likes you. She thinks you’re good for me. She’s got an exhibition opening next week. Declan will be back. You can meet him too.
Hannah calls her mum, who sounds small and tentative on the other end of the phone. If you’re sure, love? Are you sure they’re happy to have you? You won’t be in the way?
The house is huge, Mum.
Oh, in that case. Well, you thank her mum from me, won’t you?
It is hot the night of the opening. Hannah wears a slim vest, some wide trousers. She touches her hand to the newly shorn place at the back of her neck. The gallery is tiny, on a cobbled street in East London. Sarah’s canvases are displayed in a stark white room. There is wine and barrels of beer. The crowd stands on the street outside, mingling with the crowds from the other galleries.
Hannah looks at the people and thinks, Here – here is life. It is as though all along a part of her has been hard at work making a skin for herself in the dark and the silence, and now she is ready to wear it, to step into the light.
She loses Lissa for a while, and when the crowd thins she sees her again, further down the street, speaking to a tall young man in a flannel shirt rolled up to the elbows. Lissa is telling a story, gesticulating, and the man is laughing, leaning in to hear. She watches as they pass a cigarette between them. So this is Declan, Lissa’s boyfriend. Hannah feels a strange shifting at the sight of him. A recognition, almost, and a disappointment that threatens to prick the evening’s magic and let in something darker. Lissa sees her and waves, and Hannah makes her way slowly towards them.
The tall young man turns towards her and takes her hand in greeting.
Somehow, he does not seem like an actor.
Hey, says Lissa. Hannah, this is Nath.
2010
Lissa
She does not contact Nathan and he does not contact her. Often, though, she replays the kiss in her mind – taking it out when she is alone in bed at night, or in the morning, as she comes to consciousness. She has not heard from Hannah for days. She trusts Nathan has said nothing – still, she hears it, a faint yet shrill alarm, ringing somewhere at the edge of thought.
She throws herself into the life of the play. Klara’s approach is starting to work – they are indeed becoming less English, their acting is raw, there is blood in it and sinew and bone. And as Klara grows happier with her cast, the cast, in the way that happy casts do, is becoming a living, breathing entity of its own. The actors arrive earlier and stay later, t
aking pleasure in watching each other’s scenes. They begin to run the play from start to finish, feeling its rhythm, the places where it needs pace, the moments when it needs to slow down and feel itself breathe. When a scene becomes sticky, or does not feel alive, the actors step out of the play text and use the Meisner technique to observe each other, keeping in character, repeating what they see, before moving back into the scene again.
Michael suggests they sing together – an idea taken up enthusiastically by the rest of the cast – and so they learn a Russian folk song and rehearse it in the morning before they start work, Michael strumming a few chords on the guitar while they sing.
As they move towards opening night, Lissa can feel her own performance improving; her body feels different, there is indolence in it: heat and sadness and sway. Even Johnny is softening. Since the day he made her cry, something has shifted between them, and Lissa finds with surprise that she looks forward to their scenes above all.
The evening before her technical rehearsal, her phone rings – Hannah.
Lissa stares at the name and waits. After a moment there is the buzz of a message. She picks it up, calls voicemail, brings it to her ear.
‘Liss?’ Hannah’s voice is soft. ‘Can you call me? I need to speak.’
The alarm in her head sounds louder, more shrill. She rolls herself a cigarette, goes to the kitchen door, and calls Hannah back.
‘Hey.’ Hannah answers after the first ring. ‘What are you doing?’
‘Just getting ready. It’s my tech tomorrow.’
‘Oh shit. Of course.’ There’s a catch in Hannah’s voice. ‘Can you come over? There’s something I need to ask you.’
Fuck.
‘Sure.’ Lissa tries to keep her voice steady. ‘Now?’
‘Please. And Lissa? Maybe – will you bring a bottle of wine?’
She pulls on her parka and makes her way towards Broadway Market, stopping to buy wine and chocolate at the Turkish off-licence on the way.
Hannah buzzes her in through the metal door and Lissa climbs the old external staircase, to where her friend is waiting at the top. Hannah looks pale, slight in the dusk, infused with a restless, spiky energy. ‘Did you bring wine?’
Lissa holds it up. ‘Rioja.’ She tries a smile. ‘Old times’ sake.’
Hannah takes it from her, goes inside, to the kitchen counter, opens the wine, pours two glasses and hands one to Lissa. ‘Cheers,’ she says grimly.
‘Cheers,’ says Lissa, taking her wine, keeping her coat on.
‘Are you cold?’ says Hannah.
‘No – I can’t really stay. I’ve got to get up early. We’ve got tech.’
‘Lissa. Please. I need to talk.’
She takes off her coat, which Hannah hangs behind the door. Outside, dusk is settling over the park, over the lights of the city beyond. A vase of flowers stands on the table. Small lamps are lit. It is the flat of an adult, and yet sitting before her, on the blue sofa, with her legs folded beneath her, her hair tucked behind her ears, Hannah looks like a lost child.
‘What’s happening, Han? Where’s Nath?’
‘Working, I guess. I don’t know. We had a row.’
‘What about?’
‘He doesn’t want to do another cycle. The IVF. He said no. I thought he would change his mind. But he didn’t. And now he says he wants a break.’
‘From what?’
She can feel the way her breath moves, in and out, shallow and high.
‘From everything.’
‘What does he mean by that?’
‘I don’t know. I went back to Manchester for a few days. I thought things would be different, but we’ve hardly spoken since I’ve been back.’
‘Maybe he’s right. Maybe you need a break from it all for a bit. Don’t they say that? That it’s often when you give up that it actually works?’
‘Do you know how many fucking times people have said that to me?’ Hannah throws her cushion to the other side of the room, where it bounces and falls still. ‘Too many.’ And then, quite suddenly, Hannah folds in on herself. ‘Why?’ she says. ‘Why is this happening to me? Am I cursed? I feel like I’m cursed.’
Lissa moves towards her, sits beside her on the sofa. ‘Hey. Han. You’re not cursed.’
Hannah lifts her face from her hands. ‘Will you speak to him?’
‘I can’t—’
‘Please.’ Hannah grips her arm. ‘Get him to change his mind. He’ll listen to you, Lissa. Talk to him. Please.’
She takes the bus down to Bloomsbury, gets off at Southampton Row and walks up towards Russell Square, where the trees flare orange and red, the sky an iron grey.
When she contacted him she said she needed to speak to him, but was only free in the morning on Thursday. He texted back immediately: Sounds intriguing. I’m in uni on Thursday. Come and see me there?
It took her five changes of outfit to get out of the door. In the end she put on an old faded sweatshirt, jeans and her parka. Trainers. No make-up, hair scraped on top of her head.
At the reception they direct her to the third floor – she climbs the stairs, pushes her way through double doors into his corridor. His door is closed, but as she approaches it opens and a young woman emerges. She is tall, her hair loose. Long limbs in tight jeans. She walks past Lissa without a second look.
There are posters on his door, in the manner of academic offices: one advertises a talk, another a union meeting about the tuition fees. She raises her hand and knocks.
‘Come in.’
He is sitting at the desk with his back to her. ‘Hey,’ he turns. ‘Liss.’ He looks pleased to see her.
‘Hey.’ She steps inside, closes the door behind her. The room is pleasant, a high window through which the trees of Russell Square are just visible, a wall lined with books, a small sofa, his desk. Him. He is wearing a soft-blue T-shirt with a wide neckline. ‘So this is where the magic happens,’ she says.
He smiles and she realizes she can’t really look at him, so she goes over to his bookshelves and looks at them instead. They are neat, arranged alphabetically.
‘Coming of Age in Samoa?’
‘Classic. You should read it.’
‘What’s it about?’
‘Sex.’
‘Oh.’ She can feel herself turning red.
He is grinning. Is he teasing her?
‘How’s the play?’ he says.
‘Better. We open tomorrow.’
‘That came round quickly. Can I come?’
‘Of course. But you need to book.’
‘Then I’ll do that.’
‘Good.’
‘Why don’t you sit down?’
She sits on his sofa. It is still warm. She thinks of the young woman who was in here before her.
‘You look like a student,’ he says.
‘Thanks, I think.’
‘You want a drink? Tea?’ He gestures to a small tray, a kettle, cups. ‘I have whisky in the drawer.’
‘Seriously?’
‘Only for emergencies.’
‘Student emergencies?’
‘Academic emergencies.’
There is a pause, a stillness in the room. She realizes it is her turn to speak. ‘I’m here for Hannah,’ she says.
‘Ah,’ he says, ‘right. And why is that?’
‘I promised her I’d come.’
‘Why?’
‘Because she seems to think I can influence you.’ Lissa looks away, down at her hands. ‘And I feel bad. I should never have said that thing, that day in the pub. About not doing IVF. I was wrong.’
‘Really? But you seemed quite clear. You told me not to do it.’
‘But I didn’t mean that.’
‘Then what did you mean?’
‘I meant I wouldn’t do it. I only spoke for myself. Not you and Hannah – I didn’t think—’
‘What? You didn’t think what? That you influence me?’
His gaze is steady. He does not flinch. ‘Please,�
�� she says. ‘Please don’t say that. It’s not fair. I didn’t realize what I was saying. I didn’t think of Hannah.’
‘You know,’ Nathan says softly. ‘I have spent most of my adult life thinking of Hannah. Of what she wants. Of how to make her happy. And for most of my adult life, that was what I wanted to do.’
The curve of his cheek, the swell of his Adam’s apple as he swallows.
‘Why did you really come, Lissa?’ he says.
‘For Hannah. I told you.’
He nods, then, ‘Can I tell you something?’ he says.
‘Yes.’
‘Can I lock the door before I do?’
She nods, watches him stand. Feels her heart, the thrum of her blood. His hands on the key. The sound of the lock. He comes and kneels in front of her. ‘Liss,’ he says. ‘The thing is that lately I keep thinking of what you want. Of what might please you.’ He reaches out and takes her hand. ‘Your hand’s cold,’ he says.
‘Yes,’ she says, although now it is hard to speak.
He takes one of her fingers and puts it in his mouth. His mouth is warm. She can feel pleasure radiating from her fingertip, into her breasts, her crotch, the backs of her eyes. She closes her eyes, leans her head against the sofa.
‘Can I do this?’ he says.
‘Yes,’ she says, although it is hard to speak.
She keeps her eyes closed, and now his mouth is on her stomach, very light, and now he is unbuttoning her jeans and easing them down and she is lifting herself, helping him. And now his finger is inside her, and she hears a sound, quite low in the room, and then she realizes the sound is coming from her. And his thumb is rubbing her, and his finger is inside her, and the sound carries on.
‘Can I do this?’ he says.
‘Yes,’ says the sound of the voice that is hers. ‘Yes, please, yes.’
Cate
‘So the second rule of Mum Club is …’
‘What?’
‘We have to do something that scares us.’
They are sitting on a bench in the cathedral gardens, or rather, a flint-walled secret garden in the grounds of the cathedral. Dea had asked Cate to meet her at a small car park on Broad Street, where a small booth was cut into a thick wall, behind which a man waited, and Dea had flashed her university card and the guard waved them through. And it is quiet here, the walls crenellated and fortress-thick, as though the city outside with its traffic and its buses and its shopping and car parks and tourists has momentarily ceased to exist. It is cold, but the sun is out and the sky is blue and clear.
