by Amanda Coe
But I’m bawling. The door opens, and I think I’m going to get in trouble for making a noise, but Julia wants to say something to Pam and registers my distress only remotely.
‘Oh dear.’
She nods the lady away and says something to her. When we get back to the hall, Pam says me and Michelle and Maria can wait outside for our mums and dads to collect us. She asks Pauline to wait with her. Pauline looks worried, as though she might be in trouble. I can’t bear to tell her the opposite, that they want her and don’t want me, but when I see Mum in the playground, that’s what I sob, incomprehensibly – they want her, they don’t want me. Eventually, she makes sense of it.
‘They must have made a mistake.’
When I assure her that they haven’t, that they really do want Pauline, Mum goes in search of an authoritative adult to confirm this, and is passed up to the nice lady. I can see them talking together, the benign head shake that fends Mum off, all too quickly. She has to content herself with an impotent, audible ‘Ridiculous!’ as she stalks back to me.
‘She can’t tell us much – supposed to be in charge, you’d think they’d get someone who knows what they’re talking about …’ She aims this mainly at Michelle’s mum, who smiles warily and continues to leave. Briskly, Mum takes one of my bunches and makes it do the splits to tighten the bobble on my scalp. ‘They haven’t made any final decisions, apparently, but you’re right, they’re seeing Pauline now. Is that chocolate?’ She rubs at a stain on my dress, adjusts my second bobble.
In the car, my snorts convulsively subside. ‘Knew she’d get het up,’ says Mum to Ian, who suggests pancakes at the Copper Kettle, and refuses to believe me when I say I’m not hungry. He insists on ordering my favourites, and I joylessly post sweet, claggy forkfuls into my mouth so Mum can’t get irritated about my lack of gratitude for the treat.
‘Even if they use her, it won’t be anything big,’ she reassures me. I’ve reached the point of not wanting to talk about it any more, in the hope it might go away.
‘Course it won’t,’ says Ian. ‘You have to be trained, like, to take a star part. Go to stage school – that’s where they’ll look for the speaking parts. Down in London.’
‘It’s a funny way to go on, getting kiddies’ hopes up.’ Mum raises her voice, hoping for an audience, and manages to catch the manageress’s eye as she stands by the till. Ian goes to the toilet, and once he’s left us Mum seems to lose interest in her indignation. Her sipping of her coffee becomes inward and complicated. I exploit this slackening of attention to stop eating, and cut the rest of my pancake into cunning shreds that can be dispersed over my syrupy plate and abandoned. I remember that I’ve seen Lallie, and haven’t even bothered to tell Mum, but I can’t quite bear her lack of interest. Then I wonder if Pauline has seen Lallie now, met her even, and the possibility revives the crucifying injustice of it all. I know that even if she has, Pauline won’t care. That’s almost the worst of it.
‘Mum?’
Elbows on the table, she lowers her coffee cup slightly. I don’t know what I’m going to say.
‘Can I, can I see Dad?’
The cup comes all the way down to the table, like I’ve pushed a switch. I think she’s going to be very angry.
‘What d’you want to see him about?’
‘I don’t know. I just want to see him.’
Mum’s head writhes elaborately, as though I’ve put a cord round her neck.
‘Because … well, I hope you’re not expecting much.’
‘I’m not,’ I reassure her. I haven’t got a clue what she means.
‘He doesn’t pay a penny for you, you know. Ian’s taken it all on.’ Dumbly, I wait for her to stop. She’s definitely very angry, but at the moment, it doesn’t seem to be at me. She takes a punctuating sip of coffee, rattles the cup back into the saucer, slopping. This helps her find what to say next. ‘Not many men would, a woman with a child. Everything he’s got. You should thank your lucky stars, Gemma.’
Tears stab the back of my throat but it feels crucial now not to shed them. Ian is coming back from the toilet. He drops hugely on to the banquette next to me, making me seesaw up.
‘Oh dear, oh dear,’ he says. ‘Man walks into a bar, there’s a horse having a drink, he says to him, “Why the long face?”’
Mum tuts. She doesn’t like jokes, even Ian’s jokes. Ian squeezes my thigh with his vast chocolate-Brazil-eating hand. It hurts, like a pinch. ‘You’re a star, you’ll see. Isn’t she, Mum?’
‘I don’t know where they’re looking, if they want Pauline Bright. Everyone knows, that family …’
Dad has been erased from the conversation, as he always is around Ian. I can see that this is the way it will always be now, unless I do something. I remember, sickly, how easily I myself erased Dad when I was telling them about our holiday in the audition. Maybe when I replaced him with Ian, that was the moment God decided that I didn’t deserve to star in a film with Lallie. Ian gives me one more heavy pat on the leg, jabs a tickle at my stomach, then takes up the flimsy bill for the pancakes and hoists himself out of the seat to pay.
‘What do you say?’ prompts Mum.
‘Thank you, Ian.’
He does a bow, as is his way. ‘My pleasure, sweet ladies.’
I force a smile.
‘That’s better,’ Mum says.
FRANK DENNY GOT the phone call from America bang in the middle of his lunchtime sandwich. It was only twenty minutes he took at his desk, on the rare days when he wasn’t lunching a client, and Veronica knew the sanctity of that time, which included a fifteen-minute forty winks with The Stage draped over his face. Calls from the Yanks were the sole permitted interruption to this ritual, since the time difference made them oblivious to the inconvenience. However dazed he might feel, Frank was expert at vamping until his brain caught up, which it did like a psychic act narrowing the possibilities by firing general questions until the audience member unconsciously revealed all, sometimes helped by his mark in the form of Veronica posting scribbled notes on his desk and miming additional details. But today it was easy, since there was only one female Quentin on his mental Rolodex.
‘How’s it all going up there? Pleased with my lovely little girl, I hope,’ Frank beamed into the phone, whose ancient mouthpiece hummed with years of his own breath. He realized, with a practised repression of annoyance, that although Quentin was a Yank, she was actually in the country. Veronica wasn’t to know.
‘She’s terrific—’
‘Isn’t she? I always say, a star’s a star, whatever the age.’
There was a silence down the line, inexplicable as a time delay.
‘What can I do for you, my love?’
‘I just wanted to get a little background, about Lallie …’
Uh-oh. Unless it was just financial stuff, fees and precedents. ‘Fire away.’
Veronica, realising her help wasn’t needed, disappeared to make him his post-forty-winks cup of tea.
‘Well, I met her and her mom—’
‘Katrina, yes.’
‘Yeah.’ There was a little pause. ‘Quite a lady.’
‘Oh darling, if it’s the mother you’re worried about, I have to say you could do a lot worse, believe it or not. I mean, she’s protective, but she does let Lallie just get on with it—’
‘Yeah, I can see that, that’s not a problem for me.’ In the fractional gap before Quentin launched her next sentence, Frank’s mind tumbled through the possibilities like a safe cracker: puberty? The nose (they’d fix it, why not)? The decision to go with American talent instead (despite it being an English part)? Her being too common to play a princess (elocution lessons – the kid was a mimic, for Christ’s sake)?
‘I just wondered … if, given the mom and all, she’s being pressured to work.’
Fuck me, so that was it. Frank burst through. ‘God, no! Have you spoken to her? She’s born to it, darling, absolutely. I mean, I’m not denying Mummy has a big hand in it, you can s
ee that for yourself, but Lallie, heavens – she loves the business, absolutely eats, sleeps and breathes it.’
Again, a little silence. Maybe there really was a delay – it was still long distance, even if it was only Yorkshire.
‘She seems a little … joyless to me.’
Bloody hell. He’d have to have a word, pronto. What had Katrina been doing up there?
‘I’m sorry about that, it doesn’t sound like my girl at all. She might be tired, to be honest – she went on to the film straight off her telly job and it’s been a long stretch. They do still get tired, kiddies, even though they restrict the hours. It’s only natural.’
‘OK.’
Frank was not used to dealing with Americans of this ambling, considered kind. Women, yes, but they tended to be hyperactive New Yorkers who condensed any conversation into its essence and shot it straight into your bloodstream. This girl sounded almost dopey.
‘Maybe you saw her at the end of the day?’
‘We had breakfast.’
‘Ah …’ He chuckled. ‘She’s not one for the early starts, I could’ve told you that. Did she say she was keen?’
‘She said. Mom did most of the talking. She doesn’t know the book – she liked my pitch, I think.’
This sounded better. Solid ground. Veronica put his tea on the desk. Frank became brisk.
‘Terrific. It’s a wonderful opportunity for her, I’m sure she can see that. I’ve mentioned to the mother about booking a holiday once she’s finished on this one, that should set her right. I’ll insist, Quentin, you’re quite right. She’s only human.’
This was a favourite technique of his. We’re all in this together, working on a problem slightly to the left of the one you thought you had before we started the conversation. He pressed his advantage.
‘And are you thinking about screen tests at this stage? Might that help, to get her out at the studio, see how she looks in costume, down to action as it were? That might be a thought, if you wanted – she could do the holiday first for a week – I know she’s mad to go to Disneyland, like they all are. It’d really set her up.’
‘Oh. Yeah, that could work for us. I’ll talk to Clancy in the office.’
He wasn’t there yet, that was for sure. There was still this hesitation, this gap on the line. And he didn’t buy that it was just because Lallie hadn’t done a song and dance when she met her – although why the hell not, he had no idea, considering she was a song-and-dance machine whenever he saw her. Maybe she really was tired. He scribbled a curve of zeds on his notepad, next to where he had written and underlined ‘holiday’.
‘I hear the rushes on this one have got everyone talking.’ He hadn’t, but they always had.
‘They look terrific.’
‘What about Lallie?’
‘I think she’s going to be amazing.’
That, at least, sounded genuine. So what was the problem? Everyone wanted more than they should: his clients from him, the producers from the clients, it wasn’t right, really. There had to be limits.
‘Well, that’s all that matters, isn’t it, at the end of the day – what you’re getting?’
‘I guess so.’ Pause. Frank had given up. ‘She is a child. I mean, just a little kid.’
And Lassie’s just a collie, darling, but it’s a bit late in the day … which reminded him. Frank wrote ‘worming tablets’ next to his doodles on the pad and triple-underlined it. Kenneth had been dragging his arse along the carpet when he’d left that morning, and if he had them it was only a matter of time before Charles succumbed.
‘Well, she is and she isn’t. She’s got a gift, that’s plain as the nose on your face.’ He wished he hadn’t mentioned noses; it might bring Lallie’s to mind, and for all he knew Quentin herself might have a problematic schnozz. ‘And let me tell you, the first time I met her, she told me that the thing in the world that makes her happiest is working. This is from a nine-year-old girl. It’s born in her.’
In the gap, he pencilled in the loop of the ‘b’ in ‘tablets’. Come on, Frank. ‘But can I say, I think it’s wonderful to come across someone in your position who’s really concerned about these things. Hand on heart, it’s something I’ve thought about a lot, but also hand on heart, I’ve got to tell you that she’s not one of those kiddies who’s forced into it – I wouldn’t be looking after her if she was, couldn’t live with myself. But it’s good to know that if she does go to the States, she’ll have someone apart from me looking out for her.’
Quentin actually laughed at this, an unpleasant, gentle little chuckle which took him by surprise.
‘Do you know Hugh Calder?’
Where was this going? He felt uneasy.
‘Of course. Best in the business, Hugh.’
‘Do you think he’s a nice guy?’
Frank stopped doodling, banjaxed. Never for long, though.
‘What can I tell you? The man’s charm itself. You’ve met him …’
Now he thought he heard a sigh down the line. He amended his approach.
‘I don’t know about nice, but he’s a true gent. Tough, mind – well, you have to be, don’t you? He wouldn’t be doing what he’s doing if he was a pushover, but, let’s say, honourable.’
That was over-egging it a bit, but you never knew what got back to people. He could hear Quentin breathing, as though she had come up a flight of stairs.
‘Is he into women?’
Crikey. What had he heard? This and that, nothing to frighten the horses. He’d certainly never gleaned an atom of queerness around him. The breathing continued, awaiting his answer. If he hadn’t known better, Frank would have believed that Quentin really was ringing him from what was for her the middle of the night, wanting him to keep her company. He got those calls from clients every so often, the ones he had to give his home number, although of course it was the line in the office; he wasn’t mad. It still drove Lol to distraction, that interruption to sleep so Frank, dressing-gowned, could coax them through when they told him they’d taken pills, or wept for their marriages, or more usually their careers. In his experience, the pill-takers weren’t repeat callers, and he didn’t resent a genuine emergency, but the ramblers, the lost souls who wanted hand-holding in the sozzled small hours, they were a piece of work. And this woman wasn’t even a client. Besides, he had a meeting with bigwigs from Anglia at two. Is he into women, indeed.
‘As far as I know,’ he said maliciously, and started to wind up the call. He thanked Quentin again for her concern over Lallie, emphasizing its rarity and re-emphasizing their common values, lauded her non-existent non-brainwave about Lallie taking a holiday, and finessed the ending by pressing her to suggest a time when the studio might want Lallie to fly over. October, she proffered. Such provisional motes were all Frank needed to accrete the solid pearls of business: the next time they spoke, he would tell her that October was OK for Katrina and Lallie, and they’d be going ahead with booking tickets, unless the studio preferred to arrange it? With any luck this would be a conversation he’d have with Quentin’s assistant, who more likely than not would oblige, already presuming October to be a done deal. And by then it more or less would be – Quentin’s seniors would hear that Lallie was coming over, their minds would be concentrated on her as their lead and they’d want to make it work, bar her not delivering the goods. It took a stronger soul than this girl evidently was to face Frank Denny down.
‘Call me any time,’ he signed off. His tea was by now just on the wrong side of warm, so he asked Veronica to bring him another cup and warned her about further calls from Quentin. If she called again today, he was right, and she was a nutter. If it was tomorrow, she still probably was. By Friday, he’d be prepared to talk to her again. It was no skin off his nose. There he was with the nose again. Of course the Yanks were superb at all that malarkey – none better. That was another conversation to have with Katrina; Frank made a note.
PAULINE WAS SUPPOSED to fill in a form. In fact, her mum was supposed
to fill in a form, but even if she hadn’t been in Leeds, Pauline couldn’t imagine approaching Joanne with the daunting sheaf of printed pages the hard-eyed woman had given her after she left the classroom. She’d tried to explain that her mum was away working, and they’d said in that case her dad would do. Dave was the closest in the house to a dad, but he’d just tell her to fuck off if she went anywhere near him with a piece of paper. Anyway, Pauline knew better than to let him or anyone else in the house know about the film, let alone needing permission, even though she had half a mind herself to rip up the typed sheets and dump them before it all went wrong. But somehow she couldn’t. Instead, she kept the form in her bedroom, flat in a drawer, and checked on it from time to time, as though writing might have germinated on the pages in her absence.
Gemma wasn’t talking to her. The last day of school, she’d run away from her in the playground and told a teacher when Pauline tried to catch up. Pauline had got a keyring she’d swiped from a place in town that mended shoes and cut keys, a really good keyring with a rubbery stupid-faced doll on the end whose arms and legs you could twist into shapes, but Gemma refused to take it. It had occurred to Pauline that Gemma might be able to fill in the form, since she had far neater writing than Pauline could manage, and proper spelling. But it seemed impossible, now, to get her to do it.
The night before Pauline was supposed to turn up at school with the completed paperwork, she turned over the blank, grubbying pages and thought of money. What if she offered Gemma money, instead of things; lots of money? It was risky, but she steeled herself for it, knowing that Dave would knock seven bells out of her if he caught her going through his pockets (which she’d have to do while he slept or had passed out). She didn’t care, really. Since Joanne had gone, her life had been so lonely that getting knocked about a bit would be a welcome acknowledgement of her existence. She could always kick him back, and run.
