Playing with the Grown-ups (17 page)

She knew that Honor did as well, because when they went out on their own, and boys asked their names, Honor was automatically
Lola and she Miriam. With new alter egos they were different creatures, the sort of girls who broke boys' hearts and never
waited for a phone call. As Lola and Miriam their jeans didn't give them stretch marks, they hung confidently from protruding
hipbones. Their large breasts were suddenly not cumbersome and matronly, they were pert and tiny, little question marks of
sexuality.

Honor's mum did not like Lola. She thought she was common.

Marina loved her. They smoked cigarettes together, wearily, each puff easing the burden of being so beautiful, so wanted.
Lola told them of her boyfriend Benny, who loved her so much he sat outside her house in his Golf convertible, just to be
sure she wasn't out with anyone else.

'Sometimes,' she said to Marina, 'sometimes when we do it, he cries.'

Her mother roared with laughter.

'God, how sweet,' she said.

Kitty thought it was, but didn't say anything.

'I think it's really gay.' Lola gave a hard laugh.

Poor Benny, Kitty thought. If it were me, I would have cried back and asked him to marry me.

Lola called Hanover Grand 'Hand-over-a-gram'. She and Kitty went on models' night. Entrance was free if you were a model.
The bouncer tried to charge Kitty twenty pounds but Lola told him strictly that she was with Elite New Faces.

He looked her over, sighed and said, 'Oh all right then.'

Honor and Miriam were already there sitting by the bar in the VIP room.

'Did they think you were a model?' Honor whispered.

'Yeah,' Kitty said.

'Me too. So is Nicky coming?'

'I don't know - I heard him tell Dylan he was.'

'He's a wanker. I can't believe he never rang you after you snogged him,' Honor said.

A boy with long hair, who looked like a girl, walked over and said to them, 'I'm James. Nice to meet you.'

'Angela.' Honor flicked her hair.

'Amber,' Kitty said.

They smiled at each other guiltily.

Lola had some ecstasy that weeping Benny had given her.

'They're doves,' she said. 'Really pure.'

She shifted her Wonderbra, so her cleavage had more of a V.

'I'll do it with you,' she said.

Honor scowled at her.

'You need to keep drinking water, yeah?' Lola said maternally.

'OK.'

Kitty put the pill in her mouth with a swig of Bacardi and Coke. She could never swallow pills dry. Down it went. She immediately
had the urge to go and throw up. What if she died? Dying whilst pretending to be a model at Hanover Grand would be a truly
sad end.

In the bathroom she put her fingers far down her throat. She retched but nothing else happened. She did it again and again.
She did it until her throat felt raw. 'Fine fucking bulimic you'd make,' she said out loud to herself.

'Kitty?' She heard Lola outside. 'Kitty, can I come in?'

'I'm coming,' she said.

She noticed outlines of cocaine all over the cistern. Smeared like snail tracks, marching down the porcelain, the ghost of
so many strangers' fun.

'I wanted to be with you when you came up,' Lola said. 'Let's go and be by the music.'

Kitty had never been able to dance properly to hardcore before. She felt awkward and chalk white. The electronic opening of
Candi Staton's 'You Got the Love' pumped into the room and filled it like smoke. Tendrils of feeling went shooting up her
arms and down her legs. Her veins coursed with her very aliveness, the crown of her head felt like it had been opened and
was suddenly a direct conduit to everything that was divine and perfect in the world. She felt seamless and liquid and sexy.

Kitty grinned at Lola like a maniac.

'Your eyes are enormous. You look like a gorgeous alien!' Lola said, laughing.

James the boy who looked like a girl whirled over and danced next to Kitty.

'Are you all loved up, babe?' he shouted.

'Yes,' she mouthed back at him. 'I think so.'

She thought she saw Nicky among the crowd, but she didn't care. She didn't want to find him; she wanted to keep dancing this
strange dance, just her arms weaving in the air, leaving trails of phosphorescence in their wake. She was inside the song
inside herself and she never wanted to leave. Kitty wanted to ring her mother and tell her that religion didn't need to be
so complicated. You could find it in a nightclub, in a seething snaking damp mass of strangers, people who for that moment
loved each other with the ferocity of the world.

'Are you out of your fucking mind?' her mother said. 'You could have died! I'm taking you to see Dr Cartwright. You've probably
got brain damage.' She was shaking with anger, her already white skin blanched with rage.

Kitty started to cry again.

'Can you keep you voice down? I know you're angry but I've got such a headache.'

'Yes!' her mother said. 'That's what's left of your brain melting!'

'I'm just having a comedown,' Kitty said. 'It's textbook.'

'Textbook?! Why can't you lot take coke? Why do you have to take mind-altering drugs that could kill you?'

Kitty put her head on the table, which was cool and steady.

'How do you feel?' her mother said, wringing her hands. 'What are your symptoms?'

'Mummy, I don't have an illness. I did something really stupid, which I really, really regret, and I'm tired and I just need
to go to bed.'

It was the evening. They had been having this discussion since her return home, where she had blissfully thrown up on the
doorstep, and confessed everything. She had not yet slept.

'Fine. Not fine. But -you will sleep in my bed, and we're calling Lola to see where she got these bloody pills.'

'Please don't,' Kitty said weakly.

'No. I will. I think she's clearly a VERY BAD INFLUENCE. You should spend more time with Honor. I never liked Lola . . .'

Kitty banged her throbbing head against the table.

'Are you having a flashback?' Marina asked anxiously.

'Mum, please!'

'Day off school tomorrow. You can help me do my book-keeping - we're besieged by bills. And - you're grounded for six months.'

'OK.' She was in no mood to argue. She never wanted to go out again. Her mother woke her in the middle of the night.

'Kitty?' she said.

'Yes, Mummy?' Kitty sat up. She heard the familiar old inhale of a cigarette.

'Nothing, I just wanted to be sure of you.'

After her cigarette was extinguished, and she was sure, her mother fell asleep in the crook of her arm like a child.

'Hello?'

There was a crackling silence. Then a voice, a husky old sad voice.

'Kit-kat?'

Her heart speeded up.

'Jenkins, is that you?'

'Yes. I'm in Hawaii. You'd like it here.'

She didn't tell him what time it was because she didn't want him to hang up.

'How are you?' Kitty whispered.

'Not good. Very bad in fact. I miss you all, I miss your mummy.'

'We miss you too.'

'How's school? Does Nora still hate me?'

'She doesn't hate you. School's fine, boring.'

'I miss you all,' he said again.

'Jenkins, why don't you ring Mummy? It would make her so happy.'

'You have to come to Hawaii with me one day, you'll love it. Sam and Violet could learn to surf. Your mummy could drink from
a coconut and sit under a big umbrella so she doesn't burn her lovely skin. We'll go, I promise . . .'

'I'd like that. Jenkins, please call Mummy, she's so sad now. She cries a lot.' Kitty felt disloyal as she said this.

'I can't, you won't understand but I can't, but I do love her more than anything in the world, I need you to know that. I
need you to believe me.'

'I believe you.'

She heard a woman's voice, playful in the background: 'Who are you talking to, baby?'

'I have to go. Don't tell your mother I called.'

'Jenkins? Jenkins?'

Then there was nothing but a smug-sounding voice telling her to please replace the handset and try again.

Nora did.

'Are you skiving school?' she said to her. 'You seem to spend very little time there.'

'No. It's GCSEs - they let us do our coursework at home, they trust us, they know we're mature.' Kitty smiled at her, and
buttered her toast.

'More fool them,' Nora said.

She liked to go to the Portobello Road and delve into the antique clothes shops, buying dresses, black lace sheaths and little
Edwardian jackets. She bought records from Gaz, compilations of ska and roots, that sang of nights interrupted, jelly rolls
and cocaine running around the brain.

'You look lovely, babe. I wish I had the guts to wear stuff like that.'

Candy lay on her pink sheets, wearing a man's shirt and marabou slippers. Kitty wondered whether the other residents of the
Admiral Crichton knew of the splendour in which she lived.

'I'm so pleased you're here,' Candy said. 'I'm exhausted. I just had to kick this guy out. I came back with him after my friend
Luca's party and he stayed for FOUR days. He seemed great for the first two; I even thought it could be love. After day three
I couldn't get rid of him, I found him in the bathroom putting on my make-up, and that was it . . . I told him to piss off.
I'm not THAT modem. He was very attractive for a homeless man though.'

'How do you know he was homeless?' Kitty took a long drag on one of Candy's Cartiers.

'Maybe he really liked you,' Kitty said. 'Maybe he was incognito rich.'

'Nah,' Candy said, but she smiled. She handed Kitty an envelope. 'Can you give this to your mum?' she asked.

'What is it? Is it drugs?' Kitty stared into Candy's spiky brown eyes. She was shocked by her question; she didn't know where
it had come from.

Candy looked injured.

'Sorry,' Kitty said, feeling ashamed. 'I was joking.'

She heard someone in the hall calling, 'Candy . . .' There was a faint shuffling of fingers rubbing against the wood. It sounded
like a secret knock.

'That's Johnny,' Candy said.

'Can you give him this through the door? I can't be bothered to see him, and I'm not wearing any make-up.'

'Hello, darling,' he said.

Kitty handed over the envelope and jumped when his fingers brushed against hers.

'There, there,' he said, as if he was talking to a child.

'It hurts so much,' her mother said.

'I know. This will make it all go away, and you're going to have a sleep.'

As he stuck the needle in, Kitty wondered if he was poisoning her. Her mother gasped, and Kitty thought it was with pain,
so she held her breath, but then she looked at her mother's face, which had dissolved, and was calm and peaceful.

'She'll sleep for a long time,' he warned, whispering.

'All right,' Kitty said.

When he left Kitty climbed into bed next to her, but not under the covers, because her mother didn't like clothes that had
been in the street touching her sheets. The darkened room flickered with candles like a church. Her mother was still and waxy
like a novelty Madonna. Kitty rested her head on her mother's breast to hear her heart, but somehow it felt wrong, this position,
she felt big and awkward, like she might crush her, so she slid up, and cradled her mother's head in her hands, stroking her
hair rhythmically until it was almost like a prayer, soothing in its repetition.

When they asked Shone what his father did, he shrugged and said, 'Business, I think.'

On the train they ordered gin and tonics and watched England rush by. Dylan's mum was meeting them at the station. She had
been in Wales for a week already with her boyfriend, Lester. Dylan told them that Lester was twenty-five to his mum's forty-five,
and he was a DJ.

'They're massive puffheads,' he said. 'They keep it in a box in their bedroom.'

Honor looked scared.

'This is the problem of going to a progressive school,' she whispered to Kitty. 'It's always the parents you have to worry
about.'