Sixty Summers Read online

  She stood at the living-room window and watched a grey dawn emerge from the darkness. She sipped her tea from the mug that had been her favourite for a decade, bought at the V&A Museum on the occasion of an exhibition long since forgotten. It was bone china with a smooth, fine lip and decorated with an elaborate William Morris design. In those years, she had looked over its rim at a few different lovers, all of whom offered potential at the time. It had graced four different addresses. The mug was the constant. But now she saw it had a hairline crack. Louis. He always rinsed out the cups in a slapdash way, sloshing water around in an effort to draw attention to his helpfulness. She felt a pang that this would be her last cup of tea from this mug. If he didn’t want to upset people, he shouldn’t be so careless.

  The big drawback with this flat was its proximity to the main road, although that was the only reason she could afford the rent in this location. Originally a grand Victorian house, it had been hacked up into a dozen flats in the seventies and every flat was a different shape and size, depending on the original rooms. Fran’s was a large high-ceilinged drawing room on the first floor with a tiny kitchen off the living room, and a bedroom built into one corner. It was quaint and antiquated, with floorboards that creaked, sash windows that rattled and an odd smell, close and intimate, like the inside of a shoe. The escalating rents meant she had been forced to move further out every few years. It was hard to know where the next downgrade might land her but hopefully somewhere quieter, more peaceful. Somewhere she could open the windows without feeling the traffic was driving right through her living room. She longed to look onto trees or a garden.

  In the meantime, she had her indoor garden. Every surface spilled with pots of plants. Some she had grown from cuttings, like the begonias, African violets and baby’s tears. She grew sage, mint, parsley, coriander and thyme in old tins on the windowsill. In the larger pots were plants she’d had for years: Zamioculcas, Peperomia, palms, yukkas and orchids. She made containers from found objects and rescued plants wherever she could, but Louis often commented that her obsession with plants was a drain on her finances. He had a point. She was infatuated with the idea that she could make something grow. These plants satisfied her desire to nurture, they rewarded her care with a new bloom or the unfurling of a bright-green frond, and masked the peculiar smells of this old building.

  Today, as she stood at the window and sipped her tea, her view of the swarming cars surging towards the traffic lights was overlaid by a holographic reflection of someone she barely recognised. The shadows cast by the silvered morning light traced vertical lines down her cheeks like delicate scratch marks. She pondered the idea of being clawed by time. She imagined herself as one day becoming a linocut version of herself, depicted entirely in vertical and horizontal lines. Perhaps that’s why Louis had left in the night lately – he couldn’t bear to see her crumpled morning face. Never mind that his face was creased and worn and his whiskers bristled in every shade of grey. His hair seemed to be getting darker, so he wasn’t beyond vanity. She didn’t mind any of that. She loved the soft folds of his cheeks, his pliable skin, his smoky laugh and the way he teased and flirted with her sometimes. She did love him. Not the intoxicated, possessive love of youth. More a deep and forgiving affection. She’d never told him. It was impossible to know how he might react, and she didn’t want to put him to the test. The accumulated knowledge acquired from other relationships had made her cautious, hesitant.

  It was good that she was up early today. On the other side of the world, in Sydney, Maggie and Rose were meeting up for dinner and would be calling her soon. She would be a remote guest. They did this every year, and she always had a niggling anxiety that once they opened the wine, they might forget about her and just celebrate the anniversary of their friendship with each other. It was silly, she knew. They were the oldest and most devoted friends she had – just so far away.

  Fran had met Rose in high school. They were in different classes, but she’d known Rose by sight and reputation. Tall and lanky, she was the girl who accepted dares, gave both boys and teachers cheek and hitched up her gym slip higher than anyone else.

  Fran, however, lived in fear of after-school detention, regarding it with the same trepidation as arrest, while Rose had managed to set a record for her consistent attendance there. She was rough and loud, a country girl who lacked finesse and never stepped back from a fight. Fran was in awe of her.

  It was Miss Gordon, the deputy headmistress, who brought the two of them together, both pulled out of assembly for chatting, and sent to sit outside her office to await her return. As they watched the hallway for Miss Gordon’s lumbering approach, Fran asked Rose, ‘Do you think we’ll get detention?’

  Rose shrugged and, to demonstrate her indifference, got up from her chair, positioned herself in the open doorway of Miss Gordon’s office and farted loudly.

  Fran heard the squeak of Miss Gordon’s rubber-soled shoes advancing down the corridor and, almost fainting with fear, begged Rose to sit down.

  A moment later Miss Gordon rounded the corner and was upon them: ‘Yes, girls?’

  ‘You sent for us, Miss,’ said Rose.

  Miss Gordon looked from one to the other. ‘Just refresh my memory.’

  Fran was about to speak up when Rose cut across her, ‘We came top in the English exam. We’re here for our merit certificates.’

  Miss Gordon looked puzzled for a moment and Fran couldn’t believe she would buy it. ‘Well done, girls. You’ll need to get them from the office and bring them for my signature.’

  ‘Thanks, Miss. We’ll do that,’ said Rose.

  The teacher nodded and dismissed them. Rose grabbed Fran by the hand and tugged her down the corridor, breaking into a run as soon as they were out of sight. Rose was laughing at the success of her ploy. Fran was laughing with relief. It remained a mystery to Fran how they then became friends, but she was eternally grateful for Rose’s friendship – it had changed everything for her.

  Later, in their early twenties, Fran and Rose had come over to London from Sydney together to have their ‘overseas experience’, as it was known before the term ‘gap year’ was invented. They stayed in a run-down B&B in the Hogarth Road near Earl’s Court tube, sharing a saggy bed while they searched for a flat. Both found jobs within a few days, Rose as a barmaid in a nearby pub called the Marquis of Dewberry, and Fran in the accounts office of an advertising agency.

  It wasn’t long before they realised that they looked like country hicks in their high-waisted flares and platform shoes. They picked up a couple of Laura Ashley floral dresses on sale and immediately felt demure and English, convinced they now fitted in. Every shop they entered was playing Blondie’s ‘Hanging on the Telephone’. Rose, whose hair was frizzy and untamable, threw out her straightening tongs and adopted a dishevelled Debbie Harry mop. Fran’s dark hair was fine and straight and didn’t lend itself to many styles other than the short bob that she still wore today.

  London was a spinning blur of sights, sounds and smells, overloading their senses with exotic fragrances of spices and curries and the garlic-drenched sweat of hundreds of doner kebabs turning menacingly on the spit; a delicacy they had been warned guaranteed food poisoning and likely death. Exploring the West End, they had clutched each other every time they found themselves on a street familiar from childhood games of Monopoly. Rose even remembered the prices: ‘Regent Street £300, Park Lane £350, Mayfair £400.’

  Fran felt strangely at home in this cosmopolitan city where English was one of a hundred languages spoken, although sometimes it was difficult to understand their own language. Rose had a talent for mimicry and quickly built up a hilarious repertoire of British accents.

  Music flooded their senses, from the eerie wailing of Kate Bush to the shrill harmonies of the Bee Gees (both preferred their old stuff) and everywhere they went they heard the throbbing pulse of steel drums and reggae music. 10cc’s ‘Dreadlock Holiday’ became their anthem, christening anyone they took a
shine to as a ‘brudder from the gudder’. It was the only time in her life that Fran could remember not caring that she didn’t have a boyfriend. Instead she had Rose, who was brave and forthright and decisive, and didn’t take shit from anyone. Everything was sharp and vivid and funny. They wore themselves out laughing.

  Fresh out of home, they were unprepared for the ordeal of flat-hunting in this huge and labyrinthine city. Every day they checked the papers and perused the handwritten notices in the window of the corner shop. In the evenings they queued up with twenty or more other hopefuls: a few Brits and Irish but mostly Pakistanis, Indians and West Indians. At the lower end of the market, landlords would give the place to the first person who could hand over cash for two weeks’ rent. The rest were turned away. They soon realised they couldn’t afford Earl’s Court and instead moved their search to Shepherd’s Bush and Acton and then in the other direction to Battersea and Clapham. It was hard to find the time to fit flat-hunting in with work. It was exhausting being constantly lost, their London A to Z directory soon crushed and creased from use.

  Rose’s boss, Mr Ainsworth, who was like a caricature of a British publican with glossy red cheeks, a bulbous nose and a big round belly, mentioned that he knew a Mrs Bishop with a flat to rent nearby. She didn’t advertise the place because she didn’t care for strangers, which was hardly encouraging. He told Rose he would give her the address and a reference, if she gave him a kiss. Rose declined, explaining that she had infectious mononucleosis (one of her proven strategies) and it could infect him through his pores, so he should be careful not to make skin contact with her at all. He must have felt sorry for her because he gave her the address anyway. Sometime later, he offered her ten pounds to kiss a customer he had a grudge against, which she did, finding an excuse to give the man a smacker on the cheek. She spent the tenner on a pair of high-heeled leather boots that concertinaed flatteringly around the ankles, and Fran felt a bit jealous, never quite sure whether she envied the boots themselves or Rose’s chutzpah.

  Mrs Bishop wore her hair in tight grey curls pinned flat to her head with bobby pins and further reinforced by a hair net. She looked Fran and Rose over suspiciously and stood back to allow them entry to her hallway which was dark, the air dense with the smell of pine disinfectant. She opened the door into a dark downstairs bedroom. There were twin beds covered with faded green candlewick bedspreads, a combined dressing table and wardrobe, and a small hotplate on a table. ‘Share bathroom’s on the landing. You can use the laundry out the back on Saturdays, otherwise there’s a laundromat round the corner,’ said Mrs Bishop.

  ‘What do you think, Frances?’ Rose asked, her tone artificially polite.

  Fran found it difficult to believe it was such an effort to rent something so awful. They currently shared a bathroom with other guests at the B&B, so weren’t as put off by this inconvenience as they might have been a few weeks earlier, but the room was so dreary.

  ‘It’s quite nice,’ said Fran, concerned about offending both Mrs Bishop and Mr Ainsworth.

  ‘There’s plenty of others who’ll take it in a flash,’ said Mrs Bishop, nodding her head towards the imaginary queue outside her door. ‘I prefer English people, but I don’t mind Australians. No Jews, though. I don’t take them. And no men allowed in the place. You can smoke in your room but no drunken parties. That’s the problem with Australians. They’re as bad as the Irish with the drink.’

  Later, over a pint at the Marquis, Fran wasn’t so much angry as repulsed by the thought of sharing a house, let alone a bathroom, with such an odious person.

  Rose seethed with indignation. ‘Is it even legal to discriminate like that, and so brazen about it too? I’m pretty sure back home you could report someone like that to … I don’t know … someone. It’s disgusting.’

  Mr Ainsworth came over to their table, his eyes roving over Fran hungrily. ‘How did you go with Mrs B?’

  ‘No luck, I’m afraid,’ said Rose. ‘She didn’t care for Fran’s religious affiliations.’

  He nodded as though this was perfectly reasonable. ‘She’s a character. Shame. She keeps a clean house, that one. I’ll put my thinking cap back on,’ he said, winking at Fran.

  As he walked back to the bar, Rose murmured, ‘Why doesn’t he just keep his thinking cap on all the time. I mean, why take it off and act like a dickhead?’

  ‘He makes my skin crawl. Are they X-ray vision glasses, do you think?’

  Rose laughed. ‘That would explain a lot. He’s not very subtle. Easy to outsmart, though. His stupidity is his finest quality.’

  Fran knew that she couldn’t have worked for Ainsworth; Rose had a higher tolerance for bad behaviour. The people Fran worked with were more sophisticated – of a different class, as the British would say. The account managers at the advertising agency were dashing young men who wore double-breasted suits and bold neckties that flagged them as creatives types. They swaggered about as if they imagined all the females in the office worshipped them, but they didn’t salivate the way creepy Ainsworth did.

  The novelty of the Hogarth Road B&B was wearing off. The house was tall and narrow with six rooms rented out and people tramping noisily up and down the stairs half the night. It was run by an elusive and nervy woman who lived in some unseen room behind the kitchen. Or perhaps in the kitchen itself, since she only ever opened the door a crack to answer queries. Every morning she delivered the breakfasts on trays outside the guest rooms. Two slices of toast with jam, a boiled egg and a cup of milky tea. She would tap tentatively on their door, as if afraid to wake them, and they soon became used to cold tea and soggy toast. Rose and Fran both loved to sleep and on Sundays would sometimes doze until early afternoon and feel groggy for the rest of the day, only coming right at dinnertime. They had the same dinner every night at a pub on the Cromwell Road: sausages and mash washed down with half a pint of Guinness, which Rose insisted was nutritious.

  A couple from Perth, who lived above them, invited Fran and Rose to a party at a house in Chelsea. The ratty-looking terrace house didn’t seem all that big from the street, but turned out to be a large share house tenanted by nine Australian dentists, all male. They were packed in, two and three to a bedroom, with a couple of fold-out beds in the living room for new arrivals.

  Despite the proliferation of men, it was Maggie who first caught Fran and Rose’s attention. Wearing a loose shirt and faded jeans, she wasn’t dressed to attract attention, but Fran had the sense that every man in the room was acutely aware of her. She had a tawny mane of hair, a strong profile with high cheekbones and a wide, generous smile. She wasn’t just beautiful, she radiated an energy that was deeply attractive. Rose later described her as ravishing. It felt as though Maggie was the central point of that room and everyone revolved around her.

  Noticing Fran and Rose, Maggie came over and introduced herself as a fellow Sydney-sider. ‘I’m so relieved there’s a few more girls here,’ she said, glancing around. ‘These guys are getting on my nerves.’ She indicated one of the fold-out beds. ‘That’s my room, for the moment.’

  ‘You live with all these men?’ asked Rose, who obviously found the idea appealing.

  ‘I’ve only been here a week. They’re all dentists working for the National Health. That one’s my cousin,’ she said, pointing to a curly-haired fellow sculling beer from a yard-glass. ‘He’s got me a job as a receptionist at his practice. Now I’m looking for a place to live. I need to get out of here.’

  ‘We’re living in a poky room in a B&B in Earl’s Court,’ said Fran. ‘At least this is a nice big house —’

  ‘And there’s no shortage of blokes,’ added Rose. ‘Wanna swap?’

  Maggie laughed out loud and heads turned in her direction. ‘These guys have all bought tax-free cars to take home to Australia – that is the only topic of conversation … oh, apart from football and cricket.’ She grimaced. ‘The place is an absolute tip and no one cares.’

  ‘You wouldn’t be short of a date, though,’ said
Rose, unconvinced by the negatives.

  ‘Er, it’s more like being harassed day in, day out. One of them, I’m not sure who, but I have my suspicions, tried to feel me up while I was asleep.’

  Fran shuddered. ‘Oh, how awful for you.’

  Noticing Rose checking out the talent, Maggie said, ‘If you’re looking for a good time, Rose, there are rich pickings here. These guys are all making about four hundred quid a week.’

  ‘Far out!’ said Rose. ‘That’s ten times what we make!’

  ‘And you’ll be chauffeured about town in style.’ Maggie pointed out various dentists around the room. ‘He’s got a Porsche 911. That one’s got a Ferrari. The stocky, drunk guy there has a BMW. Another Porsche. Austin Healey … they’re all desperate for a date. Take your pick!’

  Fran was less than enthusiastic. ‘But what if you get the bad apple?’

  Maggie agreed. ‘There’s a house in the next street, full of Aussie veterinarians. Personally, I think they’re a better bet.’

  To illustrate the point, the stocky drunk, clutching a can of Fosters in each hand, shirt hanging open to his waist, wandered over, planted himself in front of Maggie and gazed longingly at her breasts. After a moment, he gathered his wits and said, ‘Show us your tits, gorgeous.’

  Maggie’s face went blank. She looked away as though she hadn’t heard him.

  Rose turned to him. ‘Show us your doodle, pal. We need a good laugh.’

  He looked around in confusion as if he hadn’t noticed Rose until that point. But before he could retaliate, Rose said, ‘No? Okay, fuck off then. We’re busy here.’