The Ugly Sister (33 page)

‘We’re shooting the ads for Bargain Hunters in a couple of weeks and I … well, I feel bad about you having to leave your job because of everything that happened with Richard and … anyway, we need to cast the woman in it. Young mum. Friendly, attractive, approachable, someone you can trust. I was thinking you’d be great.’

Abi is so taken aback she laughs. The girls on the other hand go from nought to sixty on the hysteria scale in under a second.

‘Oh. My. God. Auntie Abi’s going to be on TV.’

‘Can I come and watch?’

‘You have to do it, Mum. It’ll be awesome.’

Jon shushes them and says, ‘The money’s not bad.
I mean it’s not great either. The ads are for cable, but they’ll be on a lot so after the first buyout runs out there’s a chance you’ll get repeat fees. Plus there’s a bit of a print campaign so you’ll get paid for that separately. Like I say, it’s not a fortune, but …’

‘I don’t know,’ she says. It’s so sweet of him to think of her. He knows she’s short of money and this is his way of trying to help her, trying to make up for her losing her job in the bookshop. She runs through the adjectives that describe the character, adjectives that Jon thinks apply to her: friendly, attractive, approachable, someone you can trust. Attractive. She says it over to herself in her head a couple of times, relishing the moment. She can’t believe that she is conveniently the best woman for the job, though, and she really doesn’t want Jon compromising Bargain Hunters’ undoubted integrity by forcing her onto them. Not to mention the fact that she has never in her life wanted to push herself into the limelight, to be the focus of everyone’s attention. She knows they’re talking about a downmarket ad, which will be shown on various TV channels with a combined
viewership of about six, but that’s beside the point.

‘Just let me put you forward,’ Jon is saying as he puts the finishing touches onto a home-made pizza ready to go into the oven for the girls who have made their feelings very clear about the squid rings the adults are having. ‘If you get it, it’ll be a proper shoot in a studio with a full crew,’ he adds as if she might be
thinking he’s trying to get her on her own so he can take dirty pictures of her. Now there’s a thought. She waits for a blush and is rewarded with the tiniest flicker of one.

‘Go on, Auntie Abi,’ Tara insists.

Abi looks over at Phoebe and Phoebe gives her an encouraging smile.

‘Oh, OK, then. I suppose so. Maybe.’

‘If they like the look of you, you’d probably have to come in and meet with them for a few minutes,’ he says casually, not looking at her, as if by making this remark throwaway she might not actually take it in.

‘No. Jon … I’m not sure I could do that.’

‘Of course you could,’ he says briskly, and then he turns his attention to the girls as if to say subject closed.

Abi decides to push the whole thing to the back of her mind. It’s not worth worrying about. The chances are so slim that the clients will pick her and, even if they do, there’s no law that says she has to take the job. She wonders briefly if she should be scouring the area for another part-time position – even a full-time one, because she’s sure Phoebe would happily entertain her cousins if Abi had to work – but she’s going home in just over a week and she can’t imagine who’s going to take her on knowing that. Besides, once she’s back in Kent she’s always managed to keep her head above water perfectly well working part time in the library. There’s even scope further down
the line to go full time if she wanted. Money has just never been that important to her. As long as she can get by. She certainly doesn’t want to turn into the family charity case.

‘OK. I suppose so.’

‘I’ll just need a snapshot of you to show them.’ God, this gets worse. ‘Have you got anything?’

All the photos there are of her that aren’t in the attic in Kent – actually, in storage now – are either pictures of her and Caroline when they were kids or the few jokey snaps Jon or the girls have taken since she’s been here. ‘Not really.’

Phoebe comes to her rescue. ‘I’ve got my camera upstairs. I can take some.’

‘After dinner, then,’ Abi says. The last thing she wants is for Phoebe to bring it down here and for her to have to pose in front of Jon. She’s bad enough at having her picture taken as it is. She doesn’t know if it’s a reaction to Cleo’s job, but every time anyone points a camera at her she feels compelled to cross her eyes or stick her tongue out. She thinks it’s the need to make it look as if it’s a bad picture by design rather than that she tried her hardest to look good, but it came out rubbish anyway.

‘Actually, let’s get it over with.’ The girls all follow her upstairs where they fuss about with her hair and Tara insists she put a bit more mascara on. The first couple of attempts run to type. At the last minute she can’t stop herself pulling stupid faces. Megan
doesn’t help by laughing every time she does it, because Abi really can’t resist an appreciative audience. Phoebe does her best to direct her, but she’s a lost cause so after a while Phoebe resorts to snapping her when she’s off guard and actually gets a couple of good shots, not that Abi would admit it.

‘That’ll do,’ she says. ‘It’s not going to get any better than that. Thanks, girls.’

Phoebe emails the best two pictures to Jon. Excitement over, back to the real world.

Abi forgets all about Bargain Hunters until, two days later, when they’re all sitting down for dinner – all six of them, Cleo is still spending every evening at home – and Jon says, ‘So, the people at Bargain Hunters like the look of you, Abi.’

The girls all scream and Abi is sure she sees Cleo’s ears prick up.

Abi feels sick. ‘Oh god. Really?’

‘They want to meet all the potentials on Thursday week. Can you do that?’

‘What’s this?’ Cleo says. ‘Meet for what?’ She’s all wide eyes and nervous tension and it suddenly occurs to Abi that Cleo might not like the idea of her going in to meet for an advert. Downmarket and shoddy as it is, she might see it as Abi encroaching on her territory.

‘Oh, it’s nothing.’ Abi tries to brush the subject away, but, of course, the girls are having none of it.

‘Auntie Abi’s going to be in an advert,’ Megan squeals, and Abi says, ‘No, I’m not, not necessarily.’

‘An advert?’ Cleo says with all the haughty frostiness of Lady Bracknell.

‘It’s nothing,’ Abi says. ‘Just some silly thing that Jon’s put me up for. It’s very low rent and I won’t get it anyway.’

‘It’s Bargain Hunters,’ Jon chips in. Abi wonders if he’s picked up on the icy atmosphere that’s beginning to swirl around the kitchen. ‘I showed them Abi’s picture because they’re looking for a young mum to front the campaign and I know she needs the money.’

Cleo ignores him, turning the full force of her steely gaze onto Abi. ‘I didn’t know you were interested in doing adverts.’

‘I’m not. I mean I wasn’t.’ She desperately doesn’t want to break the lighter atmosphere that has made the house such a different place recently, but she also doesn’t want to give up this opportunity just because Cleo might not like it. Whether she wants to go up for the ad or not is immaterial. It’s the principle. She should feel like it’s her choice. ‘But it can’t hurt to go and meet them, I suppose. It might be a laugh.’

‘I didn’t know you were looking so close to home for casting, Jonty.’ Cleo’s voice contains a hint of accusation that Jon immediately picks up on.

‘It’s not something you would have been interested in.’

‘How do you know if you didn’t ask me?’

The three girls are looking between Jon and Cleo like they’re watching an episode of Jerry Springer. Abi recognizes the signs: Cleo’s imperious look, the flared nostrils, the pursed lips. She sighs, knows she has to sacrifice herself for the greater good. Like the Cheshire Cat, the new, improved Cleo is disappearing before her eyes.

‘I was only kidding,’ she says. ‘Of course I’m not going to go for it.’

‘Mum …’ Phoebe says, but then she stops when Abi nudges her foot under the table.

‘I thought you must be joking,’ Cleo says, her tone implying that she thought anything but. ‘So, Jonty, what did you say it was for?’

Abi can see that Jon can barely contain his anger, but she knows he’ll do everything he can to hide it in front of the children. ‘It’s for Bargain Hunters. By all means I’ll suggest you for it if you want, but you’re completely wrong for it.’

‘God, no,’ Cleo says, secure she’s won a victory. ‘That doesn’t sound like my kind of thing at all.’ She laughs a dismissive laugh. As if I’d lower myself. I only do beauty, don’t you know.

Abi finishes her meal in silence, can’t bring herself to look at her sister.

Upstairs, later, Phoebe’s indignant. ‘She’s pathetic,’ she says, banging the pillows around as she makes her bed. ‘It’s so obvious she just didn’t want you to go to
the casting because she has to be the only star in the family. It’s a few little ads for Bargain Hunters for fuck’s sake …’

‘Phoebe,’ Abi says, although she’s not so naive that she really thinks her daughter hasn’t learned to swear yet.

‘Sorry, Mum, she just makes me so angry. She’s so … selfish.’

‘She’s just insecure,’ Abi says. ‘It was a stupid idea anyway.’

Cleo appears at her bedroom door again. Phoebe, sensing trouble, makes herself scarce.

‘You weren’t really interested in that thing, were you? Bargain Hunters?’ Cleo says, sitting down on the bed without being invited. ‘I suddenly thought I hope I didn’t put you off going up for it if you really wanted to?’

Abi thinks about saying, ‘Actually, yes you did. You sulked and pouted until I felt I had to back down,’ but she decides she can’t be bothered. She and Cleo have been getting on better than they have in years and, even though she knows that just below the surface her sister is still the same self-obsessed and spoilt madam that she’s been her whole adult life, she also knows that this version, the one that will play family games and apologize when she’s in the wrong, is a much enhanced model.

‘No, of course not.’

Cleo leans back against the pillows. ‘Do you know that when you got your place at Kent Mum wrote me a letter saying how proud she was that you were the first of the Attwoods ever to get into university?’

Did she? All Abi can remember is Philippa making a fuss about the fact that Abi wanted to move into halls rather than stay at home and commute, and telling her that they wouldn’t be able to afford to top up her grant so she was going to have to think about getting a job the minute she got to Canterbury or she was never going to survive.

‘Really?’

Cleo nods. ‘I’ve probably still got it somewhere, buried in the attic. I remember thinking maybe she was having a dig at me for not being clever enough.’

‘As if.’

Cleo smiles. ‘Remind me to tell Tara and Megan they’re both brilliant at everything tomorrow. You can help me make a list.’

‘Maybe it’s a good thing I only had the one,’ Abi says. ‘She has no one to be forced to compare herself with.’

‘That’s true. But no one to share all her memories with either. That’s kind of sad. I always wanted my two to have what we had.’

Did she? ‘Did you?’

‘Of course,’ Cleo says. ‘Wouldn’t you?’

The summer is over. August has turned into a wet and windy month of storms and floods. The hill is already papered with brown and orange leaves that turn slushy and treacherous underfoot. Abi feels like it’s symbolic, an end or a beginning, she’s not sure which. Both maybe. She forces herself to put her practical head on, making lists, emailing her solicitor, arranging for her furniture to be moved out of storage once her new home is hers. Her plan is to give the place a quick coat of paint, freshen it up before she moves anything in there. Phoebe has promised to help. Abi thinks that between them they can cover the whole flat in two days if they ignore the woodwork. She has already arranged a cheap deal with a friend who runs a B ’n’ B up the road for the two of them to stay there for a couple of nights. On the third day her furniture will hopefully arrive and then her life can settle back into its normal
routine again except that her daughter will be gone.

Entertaining small girls in rainy weather is a whole different ball game to keeping them occupied in the sunshine. To give her credit, Cleo tries to help when she’s home. Although no one is really talking about it,
her castings seem to have got fewer and further between, and they all spend wet mornings playing Monopoly or Mario Kart. They can’t stay in all the time, though – there’s a danger they’ll all kill one another – so on the Tuesday before she’s due to go home Abi decides to take the children on the train to Hampton Court where she’s read they are staging reconstructions of one of Henry VIII’s weddings and allowing kids to dress up in Tudor costumes to play the part of guests. It sounds like fun and the girls are fired up about doing anything so long as it gets them out of the house. Jon is at work and Cleo has a go see she seems very excited about, so Abi, Phoebe,
Tara and Megan set out for Waterloo station and the short train ride to the suburbs.

Phoebe has been complaining of period pains all morning, but, dosed up on Feminax, she has elected to go on the trip rather than remain home alone. By the time they have negotiated the Northern Line, though, she is practically doubled over, clutching her stomach and moaning that she should have stayed in bed. Tara and Megan watch her in wide-eyed horror while Abi is torn between alerting them to the fact that this is their future or allowing them to think something is seriously wrong with their cousin and traumatizing them in a whole other way. In the end she decides that it’s better to persuade Phoebe to cut her losses and head home. Phoebe graciously allows herself to be persuaded and manages to put on a big
show of feeling much better before she leaves, which goes some way towards assuaging the girls’ fears.

By the time they get off the train at the other end, and battle their way across the river in the driving rain, all of their umbrellas blowing inside out on the bridge, Phoebe has left a message that she’s already home and that Elena is making her a cup of tea, a sandwich and a hot-water bottle for her to take up to her room. Abi breathes a sigh of relief, relays the good news to the two younger girls and then throws herself into giving them a fun day out at the palace.