Chapter Nine

The summer I sat my school exams resembled a car crash. How could I concentrate on French verbs and simultaneous equations while struggling to survive? Waking up every morning wondering if my brother would still be alive. Waiting for the police to bash down the door, or social services to come and take me away. How could I find the time or energy to revise when I worked five nights a week, spending my nights off and weekends cleaning up filth, washing my clothes in the bath, and trying to stretch pennies into pounds so I could quell the constant hunger?

When all I thought about was avoiding the Snake.

My exam results were a disaster. I spent the summer washing pots, trying not to think about my prospects, and sinking deeper and deeper into a murky pit of despair.

At some point during the summer, I caught Snake’s attention. He started offering me drugs or alcohol. I declined. Any flicker of temptation I may have felt at the chance of temporary oblivion was quickly stamped out by the up close and personal knowledge of what that oblivion cost.

So he backed off a little, and began making me cups of tea. Or a sandwich. Bringing me a take-away. More than a little weird – cosying up in front of a rom-com and sharing a curry with my spaced-out brother and his dealer.

Sometimes I would come home to find he’d cleaned the kitchen. He paid me compliments – not creepy ones, but crafty ones about my smile, or how clever I was, or how he wished he had a sister like me. He told me time and time again that I wasn’t like the other girls – he admired my choice to stay clean and work hard. He would give me a lift to the pub if the weather was bad, and wait for me at the end of a late shift in his rusty car.

It took weeks, months even, but my life had shrunk to a very small world with few inhabitants. At nearly seventeen, desperate for any kind of meaningful connection, woefully starved of affection, with no idea of what a real man was like, no compass to assess normal behaviour, I slowly let Snake twist his evil lies around me.

I hated myself for it, but I began to enjoy the feel of his arm when he casually draped it around my shoulders, like Sam had once done. I let him hug me, squealing as he span me around when feeling playful. A couple of times he stuck a CD on and cajoled me into dancing with him in the living room while Sam beat time on the table. I had never danced with a boy before. Never really danced before. He started kissing me goodbye on the cheek before he left, or held my hand as he pulled me out of the pub door and into his car in a rainstorm, knowing my poor, starving heart would take the fake love of a wicked man if it meant I could for a few moments believe somebody actually cared about me.

As Sam grew worse, Snake shared his concern. My brother barely left his bedroom, rarely ate, or changed his clothes. He had lost any remnant of control, and my worry for him was a gnawing beast on my back. Snake suggested he take him to a doctor. I agreed, anxious beyond words to do something, anything. I don’t know what he said, or even whether it was the right decision or not, but Sam got admitted to hospital. I now lived alone with Snake.

It was November. The week of my seventeenth birthday. Snake was thirty-two.

For three days I got up, went to work, tried to eat and sleep. My lodger lay low, made sure there was food in the house, and kept the chaos to a minimum. He invited me to eat with him at lunchtimes, which I did, on edge but still pathetically grateful for the attention.

He’s not so bad, I thought.

Wrong. He was worse.

On the fourth day, I had an early shift. I came home to find dinner on the table. Not a sandwich this time, a proper meal. There were candles and a vase of flowers. He had laid out napkins and a bottle of wine.

My heart began to thump, either with nerves or anticipation, I had no idea.

“Happy birthday, Faith.” He entered the kitchen, holding out a gift bag.

“How did you know?” I took the bag with trembling hands.

“How could I not know? I care about you, Faith. Open your present.”

I obeyed him, unwrapping the tissue paper to find a dress. Bottle green, stretchy, short, and strapless. A dress those other girls would wear – the ones Snake said I was better than.

“Don’t you like it?”

“No, it’s really nice. Thanks.”

He smiled, appearing genuinely pleased. As if it mattered to him what I thought.

“Well, food is nearly ready. Why don’t you go and put it on, and I’ll dish up?”

I took my time removing my worn jeans and sweatshirt, pulling the dress on and zipping it up before wriggling out of my bra. I shut my brain off, not able to comprehend what Snake might be expecting from all this. Knowing he always took what he wanted, but still desperate to keep pretending that I was different, that I was special. He might even love me. I might even be loveable.

Brushing out my frizzed-up hair, I heard a sound behind me.

Turning, I found him leaning on the doorframe, a smile playing at the corners of his mouth.

“Well, well. Look what’s been hiding under those jumpers. You’re gorgeous.”

He stepped inside, carefully closing the door. My breath jammed in my throat. Snake, in my bedroom, his eyes glinting. Would I do what he wanted? Would I have any choice?

“I thought dinner was ready.”

“Not yet.” He sat on my drooping single bed. “Come here.”

All those touches, the kisses, the compliments, the gifts tumbled around my brain like litter in a storm. With the twisted logic of a neglected child, I felt I owed him this.

I sat down. He put out one hand and stroked my face. “Don’t be afraid of me, Faith. I’m not going to hurt you.”

He lied.

Wednesday, I went round early to Sam’s to drop off some shopping and clean up a bit before taking April to choir practice.

When I let myself in, the flat appeared tidy. Slightly disconcerted, I went into the kitchen. The Formica work surfaces gleamed. New tea and coffee pots lined up smartly next to the sparkling kettle. Even the floor had been mopped.

I dumped the shopping on the table, and opened the tiny fridge door. It was already full. A half-eaten cottage pie took up one shelf. The others were stuffed with salad, vegetables, a packet of chicken breasts, cheese, fresh juice, eggs, and a chocolate cake.

Oh.

A prickle of irritation skittered up my spine and lodged at the base of my skull.

Squeezing a box of cereal and some tins into a well-stocked cupboard, I left the rest of the shopping and went to find Sam, ducking my head into a spotless bathroom on the way.

I found him in bed, conked out.

“Sam.” Shaking his shoulder, not a little roughly, I woke him up.

“Faith. What time is it?”

“Nearly one. Have you been in bed all morning?”

“No.” He pulled himself up to a sitting position, running his hand over thick beard. “I went out with April.”

“Where?”

“For a walk. The nurse told April I need to get out the house every day, so we walk now. To the river and back. It knackers me out.”

“Maybe you shouldn’t go so far, then?”

He shrugged. “I like it. It’s peaceful by the water. And if I didn’t I’d still be knackered.”

I tried to squish down my annoyance.

“Have you eaten? I brought some bacon.”

“Uh, yeah.” He rubbed his head, as if trying to get his mind going. “We had a salad thing, with fish. April’s been reading about a diet that can help your mood.”

“I think your illness is a bit more than a bad mood, Sam,” I snapped. “If food was the issue, someone would have mentioned it by now.”

“She’s trying to help.”

“I can see that.”

Sam’s girlfriends, if they could be called that, fell into two camps – those that joined him and those that tried to change him. The ones who tried to change him generally lasted a couple of weeks, maybe a month at the most. None of them had the patience, the selflessness, or the strength to persist. That was my job.

“Do you want a cup of tea? Or some cake?”

“No. Thanks. I really need to sleep.”

“Where’s April now? I’m meant to be taking her to choir practice.”

“Oh, um, yeah. She said something about that. She can’t come. She’s got a job interview.”

Right. And how long will the lovely April stick around if she gets a job?

“Where did the flowers come from?” A vase of yellow roses stood on the bedside table.

“I sold a painting.” He rolled back over, with his back to me.

He was painting again?

“Don’t tell April. She thought I should hold out for a higher price,” he mumbled through the duvet.

“Since when did you care what anybody else thought?”

He was painting?

So why did I feel peeved rather than pleased?

A couple of weeks later, Rosa came round for the first bridesmaid dress consultation. I had taken an alarming chunk out of my Avoid Returning to a Bedsit at All Costs emergency savings, and also borrowed a couple of hundred pounds from Marilyn. This would cover the price of the bridesmaid dress fabric, a good second-hand sewing machine, and all the extras like dressmaking scissors, buttons, and thread. Compared to the kind of outfits Catherine and Natasha would expect if we bought them new, it was a bargain.

I could have asked Perry to pay for the dresses. Or used the credit card he had given me. The teensy, tiny microdot of pride I had left, along with my deep reluctance to feel indebted to a man, ever, forbade it.

Rosa had taken Marilyn’s vital statistics at a previous choir practice. She arrived at mine with a bag containing a mocked-up dress in cheap material, a sketch book, and a tape measure.

Catherine and Natasha arrived soon afterwards in a gaggle of flowery perfume, overlarge designer handbags, and pumpkin-spice coffee. I made Rosa, Marilyn, and me supermarket-own-brand cups of tea.

“Right.” Rosa beamed at us, perched on my little armchair. “I have some very exciting designs to show you. Marilyn’s dress is already begun, but first I need information. Like – what colour is this wedding? What is the theme – the flowers or invitations or location? And – most of all – what is the wedding dress? Otherwise, I cannot make good match.”

They all looked at me with expectant smiles. Natasha clapped her hands together a few times with excitement.

I pretended it wasn’t weird meeting one of my bridesmaids for the first time.

“Right. So. I haven’t really thought much about that stuff yet. I thought it would be nice to have a colour that suited all of you, then we can choose everything else to match.”

Three pairs of eyes goggled at me. “You don’t have your colours yet?”

“Nope.”

“I have my colours picked and I don’t even have a boyfriend!” Catherine said. “Everyone has their colours, don’t they?” She looked at Natasha for confirmation.

“Mint, sea foam, and yellow.”

“Fig, camel, and blush pink,” Catherine said. “See? What about you, Marilyn?”

Marilyn grinned. “I had old man underpants and rancid chicken.”

“Pardon?”

“Yellow and pewter.”

“Right!” Catherine looked back to me. “So, what are you going to choose?”

I looked at my three bridesmaids. “Umm… what colour dresses would you like?”

An hour later, Rosa had taken all the essential measurements, and they had decided they liked blue.

We chose navy for Marilyn as matron-of-honour, as it flattered her mid-brown hair and paler skin, and “dusty aqua” for the others, as they preferred a colour with a fancier name.

“That is good,” Rosa said. “I will make beautiful navy dress make Marilyn look like she very sexy lady, and dusty aqua dresses, give you girls shape. We give you nice round hips so men think you make good babies.”

“Um, I don’t think men are really bothered about that.” Catherine frowned, glancing at Marilyn’s ample frame.

“Hah! That what you think. Men all modern now, talking about feelings, wearing guyliner and leggings, don’t give up seat on the bus any more. But it there in old bit of brain. What you say? Caveman bit. I don’t know proper word for this. Anyway, first we need see wedding dress so Faith look more gorgeous than rest of you. Faith – you go get dress and I pin Marilyn’s sample while we wait.”

“Actually, I don’t mind if their dresses don’t match mine.”

“What? That make no sense. I’m top-class seamstress. I make match and still look good on these skinny women.”

“I know, but I don’t think it’s fair to make my dress look better than theirs.”

“Of course fair! You the bride! Stop being so nice. Go and put dress on.”

“Okay, but the other dresses will have to be quite ugly if mine’s going to look nicer.”

“Fine. Whatever. I don’t understand you now. We want see dress please.”

I trudged up the stairs and took the Ghost Web out of the wardrobe in my tiny spare room. Yanking it on, I didn’t bother looking in the mirror before returning to the living room.

Marilyn shook her head. “It gets worse every time I see it. I always think it won’t be as bad as I remember, but my mind can’t actually retain how awful it is.”

She, on the other hand, looked incredible, having borrowed my bedroom to change into the tight-waisted, three-quarter-length-sleeved sample dress. It had a huge, floor-length skirt of floaty material that would have made me appear like a child drowning in her mother’s party frock.

“You look incredible, Marilyn.”

“Wish I could say the same to you.”

The others stared at me, mouths open.

“I’m trying really hard to think of something positive to say, like, ‘It’s not that bad; with a couple of alterations we can make it fabulous.’” Catherine screwed up her face. “I’m sorry, Faith. I know we just met, and Larissa is your mother-in-law. But, honestly? That is the worst dress I have ever seen. It doesn’t fit you, or suit you. Your shape, style, or your complexion. You cannot wear that dress on your wedding day. You can’t wear that dress to empty the bin. I think it might be too scary for Hallowe’en.”

I was starting to quite like Catherine.

Rosa had turned the colour of pickled cabbage. One of her country’s national dishes.

“That is not a dress!” she choked. “It is a… a… I cannot even find the words!”

“It’s a Ghost Web,” Marilyn said.

“I don’t give a rakia what it is! Take it off!”

The doorbell rang.

We froze, caught like nuns in their underwear.

“I’ll get it.” Natasha stood up. “I’ll think of an excuse to get rid of them.”

Too late. The front door opened and somebody stepped in.

“Hello?”

Oh dear. My nearly mother-in-law.

“Faith?”

And Perry.

“We heard you were having a bridesmaid fitting. Mother thought she’d join you. Hope that’s –”

I didn’t wait to hear any more. As Larissa’s pointy heels tapped down my tiled hallway, no doubt preceded by Perry’s Italian leather brogues, I frantically searched for a hiding place. There was only one way into my tiny sitting room, I wasn’t going to squeeze into the television cabinet, and if I hid behind the sofa it would end up pushed into the middle of the room. In a moment of crazed panic at the thought of Perry seeing me in my wedding dress – not for superstitious reasons but for hideous ones – I dove under the only available cover: Marilyn’s enormous poofy sample skirt. She rapidly shimmied back into the space between the armchair and the window, to provide maximum concealment. I curled into a ball, and waited for the most embarrassing moment of my life to be over.

There was a tap on the door. It squeaked open.

“Oh. Hi, ladies. Is Faith not around?”

“Perry!” Natasha said, judging by the squeal-like tone. “This is a dress fitting, you cheeky man. Get out!”

“Yes!” probably Catherine added (the voices were quite muffled underneath the net petticoat and I was trying not to breathe too deeply due to hiding between a person’s legs. Thank goodness it was November and Marilyn had kept her chunky tights on). “What would Faith say if she heard you came bursting in here, knowing full well there were likely to be young women in a state of undress?”

“My apologies.” I could hear the smile in Perry’s voice. “I didn’t think. As you know I only have eyes for one woman.”

Somebody snorted. Somebody else said, “Ooh. That’s soooo sweet!”

“Is she here?”

“She’s upstairs getting on her wedding dress, so you’d better scram.” Catherine. I could tell by the way she rolled the r.

“Ah! Best had. As tempting as it might be. Don’t want to ruin the big surprise.”

Larissa sniffed. “It’s hardly a surprise, Perry. A photograph of me in the dress has been hanging on the wall at home for forty-eight years.”

“That may well be the case, Mother, but I don’t look at you and Faith in quite the same way. I’ll be off then. When will you ladies be done here?”

“Ten minutes at most,” Rosa said. “No point you staying now. We chose colour and everything, did measurements. Tried sample. Just looking at Faith’s dress to make sure it match. Then done.”

“Well,” Larissa said, “I hardly think you should have made those decisions without me. What if the colour clashes with my outfit? I insist on being filled in on everything. Perry, you can pick me up in an hour.”

Sweat pooled in the back of my knees as I tried to remain balanced in a squatting position. The air hung thick and humid like a hothouse, only without any plants to replenish the oxygen. As Perry said goodbye and left, leaving an awkward silence, cramp began burning up my calves.

“She’s taking her time,” Larissa barked. “One of you go and help her.”

“Would you like a cup of tea, Aunt Larissa?” Natasha asked. “Why don’t you come into the kitchen while I make one?”

“Why indeed?”

Marilyn, who must have been struggling as much as me from having to balance in one position with a person crouching almost between her legs, began to wiggle her hips, bending her knees as her muscles twitched.

“I’ll go and get Faith,” she said. “Perhaps she’s got stuck in her zip or something.”

“Please do!”

No, Marilyn. Please don’t.

She took a tiny, exploratory step away from the wall. I jiggled two inches after her, biting my knuckles to stop me groaning as the cramp shot up my legs.

“I’ll come with you.” Catherine came and stood behind us. “Help you not to trip in this beautiful dress.”

“Not beautiful – it is a sample!” Rosa said.

“Well, we don’t want her falling down the stairs in it, do we?” Catherine bent down and pretended to hold the skirt up out of the way, in actual fact trying to hide the woman-like shape underneath while not lifting it so high that you could see the woman was me. This obviously failed, as Natasha came to join her as we shuffled forwards, both of them surrounding the dress like geese following a farmer with a bucket of corn.

What Catherine failed to notice, as we bizarrely waddled out of the room, was the bottom of the Ghost Web trailing out from under the thick folds of Marilyn’s dress. Marilyn began to speed up as she reached the exit. As I hurried with her as best I could in my squatting position, the hem of the Ghost Web snagged on the bottom of the living room door. I pulled against the resistance, without realizing what it was, and a distinct ripping sound erupted from the bottom of Marilyn’s skirts.

“Sorry,” she said, nearly falling through the doorway in her haste. “I had cauliflower cheese for lunch.”

We all tumbled after her, barely making it to the bottom of the stairs before collapsing in a pile of giggles. Scrambling up and into my bedroom, the laughter died in our throats as we saw the state of my wedding dress. A three-inch-wide section had torn away from the bottom, and now dangled by a thread. The pressure had caused the skirt seam to detach from the low waistband (hip-band, in my short-legged case), leaving a gaping, jagged hole. Never mind the sweat patches on the overly tight underarm sections, or the stretched seams where my hunched-over back had pushed the fabric further than it was ever designed to go.

“Hooray!” Marilyn whispered. “The Ghost Web is destroyed!”

“Not hooray,” I hissed back. “Larissa is downstairs waiting for me to come down in it.”

“Just tell her it doesn’t fit,” Catherine said.

“She’s already seen me in it. She knows I can get it on.”

“Well, you have to do something.”

“I thought you were putting on the dress? Don’t tell me. You’ve changed your mind and decided to wear jeans!” Larissa glowered at me as if to say I wouldn’t put it past you, given the rest of your decisions regarding this wedding.

“Yes. Well. There is a slight problem there.”

She raised her Botoxed brow as far as it would go.

“I seem to have put on some weight since I last tried it on, so, um, it doesn’t actually fit me at the moment.”

She scrutinized me for a moment, scanning me up and down as if I were a horse at the county show.

“Are you with child?”

“No! No. Definitely not. I’m not walking as much since I stopped working at HCC. It must be that.”

“Hmmm. Well. I’ll give Anton a call. Set something up. We can’t have this continuing for much longer or we’ll have to cancel Nottinghamshire Life. It’s bad enough that…” She glanced at Marilyn and pursed her lips.

“Excuse me!” Marilyn stood grandly in her sample dress. “I am in the room, and I do have two perfectly functioning ears.”

“I’m sorry. Did I say something to offend you? I don’t recall mentioning your name.”

I said nothing. Be “set up” with Anton, Larissa’s brutal personal trainer to lose pretend weight I hadn’t even put on, so I could squeeze into the ruined Ghost Web and feature in Nottinghamshire Life? Or alternatively I could conjure up some personal power and tell Larissa where to stick it.

I swallowed, hard. “Thank you, Larissa. I’ll think about it.”

“There’s nothing to think about. Nobody wants a fat bride. Especially Perry. Now, could you please call him to come and pick me up? It’s going to be a nightmare trying to find something blue that doesn’t make me look like I’m old enough to be a grandmother. But what do I matter? I am just the mother of the groom!”

As soon as she left I ran upstairs and brought the Ghost Web to show Rosa.

“Can you mend it?”

“No!”

“Oh. Maybe if I took it to an alterations place, they could do something?”

“No, no, no! Of course I have the skills to mend it. I could make this dress look as if it never happened.” She started packing her sewing equipment away.

“But you said you can’t mend it.”

“That’s right.”

“But you can mend it?” I squinted at her, confused.

“Yes.”

“I don’t understand. Are you going to mend it or not?”

“Wait for one moment.” Rosa took out her Bulgarian/English dictionary and did some flicking about. “Here we are. Technicality I can mend it. No problem, easy peasy lemon is squeezing.” She flicked some more. “Morally I cannot.”

“Pardon?”

“I am an artist! A professional! The best Bulgarian seamstress in UK! I will not repair that terrible, ugly, horrible dress. It does not fit you, Faith. It is made for woman of no boobs and no behind and no tasteful. How can you think of wearing” – she picked up a fold of the dress between one forefinger and thumb as if it was covered in slime – “this? On your wedding day?”

“It’s only a dress. Please, Rosa. Even if I don’t wear it, I can’t give it back to Larissa like this. Can’t you do something?”

Rosa thought for a few minutes, pacing up and down my tiny living room, tapping a pencil against her forehead. Eventually, she stopped.

“Okay. You doing me big, big favour, buy me machine and all these other things. Trust me to make dresses for your wedding. It breaks my heart, but I will do this: mend horrible dress, alter to fit. Also make you dress I design, free of charge. Then you can choose what dress you want.”

“Yessss!” Marilyn fist-pumped the air.

“Okay.” I am not usually a hopeful woman. I think that’s understandable, all things considered. Yet the glimpse of optimism scampering across my peripheral vision wore ivory antique lace and a flower in her hair. There were nine months until my wedding. Larissa could change her mind, or get run over by an HCC golf cart. I could keep on singing, breathing out my fear and sucking in personal power until I told Larissa what she could do with her Ghost Web. Maybe, just maybe, I would find a way to be an Upperton wife and still be me. Once I figured out who that was, of course.