Five years earlier
The brush tickles the top of Rachel’s cheek, feathery light in a way that makes her squirm. She’s the make-up artist, not the model, but this is what they always do on Fridays. They sit on the bed in her room, they drink their cheap toilet-cleaner white wine – £6.98 for a litre and a half of Frascati Superiore from Mr Hakimi’s corner shop – and they practise their make-up techniques.
It’s always Rachel’s room, not Cleo’s. Rachel’s is bigger and warmer, despite the fact that it’s downstairs and right by the front door, which is always crashing open and shut when their housemates troop in and out.
They used to hang out with the other housemates, back when they first moved here. They used to cook meals together and spend all night in the kitchen. Freddie on the top floor, always complaining how hot it was in his room. Lisa, Katie and Cleo in the middle, Rachel at the bottom. They had parties sometimes too, until Simon would shout at them to shut up because he had to work in the morning. Those were the best days. But then Freddie moved back home and Lisa and Katie fell in love and got a place together in Clapham and everything changed.
New people came in and they tried to be friendly, but no one stays long any more. Not that Rachel can blame them. Now it’s Efe on the top floor, who doesn’t speak much English. Then a stoner in Lisa’s old room, who always forgets to shut the front door properly, and Jess, who steals their milk and never replaces it.
The house is run-down, battered by the rolling turnover of tenants who don’t care. Rachel’s room is shit too, even with the photos on the wall and fairy lights draped over the mirror. The double bed is cheap and lumpy, and the bedside table, wardrobe and drawers are all painted a mucky brown that’s chipped in places to show plywood underneath. The armchair in the corner is in no better shape and used solely to throw her clothes on at the end of the day. There’s a random sink in the room with a cold tap that only gives out hot water, no matter how many times Simon tries to fix it.
The room looks better at night, like it is now, when the soft glow of the lamp hides the patches of mould creeping up the walls and they’ve been in the house long enough not to smell the damp any more.
‘Will you sit still!’ Cleo’s voice is stern but her lips twitch and they laugh. ‘You are the worst model.’
‘OK, sorry. It’s taking forever.’
‘I’ve got to get the blend right.’ Cleo studies the eighteen-colour palette in her hand. It looks straight out of a Halloween dressing-up kit, with gleaming white, yellow, and then reds and blues and blacks. ‘You can’t rush it.’
‘Can I just check my phone?’ Hope balloons in Rachel as she reaches towards the bedside table.
‘Definitely not.’ Cleo bats her away. ‘It’s sat right there. We’d have heard it.’
‘Maybe I should text him again.’ The hope disappears. She sighs at her own lameness, hating herself for liking Nick so much, for being this desperate. Something flickers inside her. A question. A worry – what is she doing here? Darkness clouds Rachel’s thoughts, inky black. It sinks through her, heavy and hollow all at once. She can’t carry on like this. The thought pushes into her head along with another – something needs to change.
‘Hey,’ Cleo says. ‘Rach, are you OK? Really?’
Rachel takes a breath and expels the thought before it can properly take hold and plunge her into its depths again. Then she forces a smile, drinking the last inch of wine from her glass. ‘Yeah, I’m fine.’
‘He isn’t worth it,’ Cleo says, squeezing Rachel’s shoulder. Rachel can’t tell her the truth, that this feeling inside her is more than Nick. It’s more than anything.
‘I just don’t get how this keeps happening to me. I made Nick take me on five dates before we slept together, and only then because he said he was falling for me. I really thought he was different, you know? But he was just the same as the others. The minute men sleep with me, they lose interest. I don’t get it.’
‘It’s shit,’ Cleo says, the brush tickling beneath Rachel’s eye again. ‘But like I’ve said before, you’re a magnet for commitment-phobes.’
‘You say that, but remember Tom? I dated him in our second year. Remember how I bumped into him at Abacus Bar on your birthday night a few months ago? He told me he was engaged and so I asked him outright what it was about me that stopped men wanting a relationship. Remember what he said?’
Cleo nods. Of course she remembers. Rachel has told her fifty times, but she says it again anyway because the wine is slinking through her veins and ranting makes her feel better.
‘He told me that I looked like I was up for it. I think he’s right. I think I’ve got “one-night stand” printed on my forehead in invisible ink. Or it’s my nose. It’s a bit squished, isn’t it? A bit piggy.’
Cleo huffs and looks for a second like she’s going to smack her. ‘You do not have a piggy nose, and you do not have a sign over your head that says “sleep with me and dump me”.’
‘It’s all right for you. Every guy you date wants to take you home to meet his mother.’
‘Which I hate just as much as you hate being ghosted.’
‘It’s not the same.’
‘I know.’
‘Maybe I should be a redhead, like you?’ Rachel fiddles with the ends of her dark-brown hair, and there it is again – the despair, the burning need to change something. Anything.
‘Dark hair suits your complexion,’ Cleo says, before fixing Rachel with a wicked grin. ‘Could you be crap in bed?’
She laughs. ‘No way. I am awesome in bed.’ Rachel reaches up to prod her friend but Cleo yelps and waves her brush in the air, and as they collapse into giggles like they’re schoolgirls, Rachel thinks how good it feels to have this friendship. It’s the only good thing about her life. Before moving to London, the closest thing she had to a best friend was her big sister, but that was always Beth bossing Rachel around, thinking she knew best.
‘Stay still. I’m almost done.’ Cleo leans close and Rachel can smell the tang of wine on her breath and the lingering scent of the sickly perfume that’s kept below the make-up counters at Selfridges. The one they’re expected to spritz all over – hair, neck, body – before their shift starts. Even after a double shampoo and a generous dollop of shower gel, Rachel can still smell it.
‘There.’ Cleo stands back. ‘I just need to add a touch of translucent powder, and …’ She dabs at Rachel’s left eye a final time. ‘Done.’
Rachel leaps up and looks in the mirror by the door, gasping at her reflection. ‘Oh my God. My eye looks actually swollen. I look like I’ve gone ten rounds with Mike Tyson.’
Cleo’s grinning face appears beside her in the mirror. ‘It’s all about adding the darker colours to the soft areas and leaving the bony parts skin tone.’
‘You are a genius.’ She stares again at her left eye. The bruise is deep purple in places and yellow in others, and even though Rachel knows that Cleo has done this, she still can’t believe it isn’t real.
Rachel lifts a hand to touch her eye but Cleo smacks it away.
‘You’ll smudge it,’ she shrieks.
Rachel turns to face Cleo and grins. ‘You are totally going to make it. I just know it. This time next year, you will be painting bruises on Daniel Craig’s face.’ Rachel means every word. It’s her own future she’s not so sure about.
‘And you’ll be doing Shane Richie’s make-up for EastEnders.’
‘Or Coronation Street. I’m happy with any soap, actually.’ Rachel laughs, but inside, her stomach twists.
They stand for a moment staring at their reflections, the desperation wafting around them as thick as the store perfume. A weight returns to Rachel’s chest. Like a metal chain being wrapped around her heart. That feeling again of sinking into the darkness. Her eyes move to Cleo, absorbing the glow of her friend, the energy Rachel wishes she felt.
‘You OK?’ Cleo asks, their eyes meeting.
‘Yeah,’ Rachel says, repeating the word in her head until she can almost believe it’s true. ‘We totally need to show this to someone.’ Rachel points at her face. ‘Test it out.’
‘Who?’ Cleo frowns as she draws on the start of a bruise around her lower lip.
Before Rachel can answer, the front door slams and there’s movement in the hall. She grips Cleo’s arm and they fall silent, eyes finding each other. Simon is back from another work trip.
‘We should say hello,’ Rachel whispers.
‘Don’t,’ Cleo hisses, reading her mind. ‘He already thinks we’re nutters.’ Cleo raises her eyebrows and narrows her eyes exactly like Simon does when he looks at them, making Rachel snort. ‘Plus, he knows we’re make-up artists. He’ll know it’s fake.’ Cleo pulls a face. ‘And we said we wouldn’t keep bothering him.’
‘But I want to ask him about the hot water again. I can’t keep having cold showers.’
‘You wouldn’t have to if you got up earlier.’
‘Like that’s ever going to happen.’
‘True. But let’s leave him now. He’s such a grump.’
‘You wouldn’t say no, though, would you?’ Rachel winks then smiles, pretending to be happy, to be playful. Fake it till you make it – isn’t that what people say?
Cleo pauses. ‘I …’ Then she shakes her head. ‘Nope, and neither would you.’
‘Lucky he’s not interested, then,’ she says.
‘Lucky we said he was off-limits. We’d never let a man come between us,’ Cleo replies, and Rachel smiles at that because Cleo is right. Nothing will come between them, but Rachel throws the door open anyway. ‘Simon,’ she trills, voice loud in the big hallway.
He steps back, eyes narrowing first on Rachel, then on Cleo appearing beside her with a sheepish smile on her face.
‘Been playing dressing-up again?’ he says, half amused, half something else.
There are dark smudges under his eyes and a line of stubble on his face and yet he is still achingly hot.
‘It looks good though, right?’ Cleo gestures to Rachel’s face.
Simon flicks another look at Rachel before returning his attention to Cleo. ‘Yes, it does.’ He nods. ‘I’m knackered. I’m going to …’ He points at his door further down the hall.
‘Sure,’ Rachel says, disappointment prodding her insides. What did she think was going to happen? ‘By the way, any chance of a bit more hot water in the mornings?’
His eyes linger on Cleo before he walks away without a glance at Rachel. ‘Any chance you could let me walk through the door on a Friday night without jumping out at me?’ he calls over his shoulder. ‘Do you have any idea how many hours I’ve worked this week? How much pressure I’m under?’ He shoves his key into the lock and pauses. ‘But yeah, I’ll look at the boiler settings over the weekend.’ And with that he’s gone, disappearing into his own flat with its living room and kitchen separate from theirs. Rachel has never seen inside Simon’s part of the house, but she’s certain it’s better than the rest of the house too.
Rachel closes the door, deflated, empty.
‘What a grump,’ Cleo says. ‘Hey, are you sure you’re all right tonight? You seem a bit—’
‘Totally fine,’ Rachel lies before Cleo can finish her sentence. ‘I was just thinking that we need new people to see us. People who don’t know we’re make-up artists.’
‘We can’t go to the pub like this, if that’s what you’re thinking.’ Cleo frowns. ‘We have no money, for starters.’
A familiar frustration slices through Rachel.
‘Hey, we’ve got that wedding tomorrow.’ Cleo’s voice is still low, but soft now too. She knows what Rachel is thinking. ‘Cash in hand. We should treat ourselves to a takeaway. Chinese?’
‘I hate weddings,’ she groans. ‘They make me feel like a sell-out.’
Cleo rolls her eyes, returning her gaze to the mirror.
By the time she’s finished making herself look as beaten up as Rachel, the wine is almost gone, but Rachel doesn’t want the evening to end yet. She doesn’t want to lie on the bed with Cleo and watch a stupid Friday night comedy.
‘We need to test this out,’ Rachel says again.
‘How?’ Cleo shrugs.
And then it hits her. An idea so perfect Rachel can’t believe she hasn’t thought of it before. A smile stretches across her face. This is going to be so good.
‘Why do I suddenly feel nervous?’ Cleo turns to her, arms folded. ‘You’ve got that look in your eye, Rach.’
‘What look?’ She raises an eyebrow.
‘It’s the same look you got when you tipped a pint of blackcurrant cordial over that bloke after he groped me on the dance floor at that club – what was it called, that place?’
‘Strawberry Moons. And that was so funny. The look on his face.’
‘Sticky.’
‘Exactly. It was worth the life ban. Plus, you’re too much of a goody two-shoes to have done it yourself.’
‘Oi!’ Cleo laughs. ‘But that’s the look, anyway. Like you’re gunning for something.’
Rachel laughs, and for the first time in ages she feels exactly that. Gunning for something.
This is what she needs, what she’s needed for so long – to do something different. Be someone different. She doesn’t want to be the twenty-four-year-old girl who gets ghosted. The girl with £38 in her bank account to last nine days. The girl who has to pretend to her best friend that she’s happy and normal because telling Cleo the truth is just too damn hard. Cleo is gunning for something too, even if she’s looking at Rachel with weary concern, always so sensible, but Cleo is just as desperate as she is to do something.
‘Trust me. This will be fun,’ Rachel says as she throws open her wardrobe.