Friends for Life Read online

  At eleven-thirty Sam called it a day and went upstairs to his own room, nestling under the eaves with a friendly view over the Kensington rooftops toward the Cromwell Hospital, which people said was like a miniature Bahrain. He tried to read but the beer finally got him so he rolled over, switched off the light, and drifted away.

  • • •

  Sometime during the night he awoke abruptly with a raging thirst and a bursting bladder. He was running with perspiration in the clammy night air. He rolled over on damp sheets and groped blindly across the room to the bathroom on the landing. When he returned, still half-asleep, to his bed, he saw for the first time that the reason for the excessive heat was that he was not alone. In the dim light from the open window he could make out the form of another body lying where he had been, white dawn light gleaming on a naked thigh. He reached the edge of the bed and fumbled around. Sure enough, smooth skin, an uncovered shoulder, a riot of honey-smelling hair.

  He found his way back between the crumpled sheets and continued moving his hand until he found her breast.

  “Sal?” he whispered tentatively, unable to believe his luck.

  She didn’t speak but rolled over into his arms as if she’d been waiting for him, burrowing her head into his neck like a child, opening herself to him as his body jerked awake. For a moment he lay there stunned, electrified out of his senses, then allowed his instincts to follow their natural course.

  After a while the storm subsided and they lay there passively, limbs interlocking, her long legs around his waist, her hair in his mouth and across his eyes. She was wide awake but motionless and he lay there in a state of consummate bliss, feeling her regular breathing, inhaling her delicate scent of fresh air and lemon soap. Then slowly, gently, he disengaged himself and propped himself up on one elbow to look at her face.

  “Sal?” he tried again but she simply raised one hand and stroked her hair away from his face.

  • • •

  Later, Sam woke again to find her gone and the sunlight streaming through the uncurtained window. Downstairs he could hear the sound of voices and the clink of china. His watch told him it was almost noon. He slid into his jeans and T-shirt, splashed cold water on his face, and went down to join them, apprehensive yet hopeful as he had never been before.

  “And about time too!”

  Dave was leaning back with his boots on the table, rolling a joint, while Jeremy was hunched over the weekend papers, a Bloody Mary in his hand. The kitchen was full of smoke and Sally, bright as a new-minted penny in a man’s white shirt, her hair wet, stood at the stove, turning sausages and bacon in a greasy pan, smiling a radiant cat’s smile.

  “Hi, Sam,” she said softly as he entered the room. “How do you like your eggs?”

  And that was that. No mention of last night, no meaningful look or special sign or any indication at all that things had changed. Nothing except a general feeling of bonhomie as the others argued amiably about the day ahead.

  Sally plonked plates of burned sausages and underdone eggs in front of each of them, then went back to sit alongside Jeremy, who continued to ignore her. When the meal was over and Jeremy finally bestirred himself, setting off to meet some fellows from the rowing club, she tagged along too, even though she had not been asked.

  “Odd pair,” remarked Dave as he piled greasy plates in the sink and swirled detergent onto them.

  • • •

  The following morning, Sally emerged at around eleven, which was her usual time while she was working on bar shift, and slopped down to the kitchen for a cup of instant tea. It was a working day and the boys were all gone, leaving the kitchen neat as a pin. She pulled out the loaf and hacked herself a thick slice of bread which she covered with orange marmalade, then settled down to the local paper which someone had left on the table. A small ad was circled—“Part-time waitress required for private caterer in Ladbroke Grove” it read—and she smiled and pushed it aside. Good old Sam, always looking out for her. She might follow it up if she felt like it later, but it was a fair way from here, so then again she might not. That was the glorious thing about Sally’s life, she was free—free to do whatever she damn well liked as and how the mood took her.

  And that, she reminded herself, was how it was going to remain. It was convenient here, living with the boys, and she was fond of them all, particularly Jeremy, but Sally Brown was far too worldly-wise to allow anything like emotion to cloud her vision of who she was and where she was going. She hadn’t done the things she had done and traveled all these miles to be caught in the old familiar sex trap. No, indeed. There were plenty more where these guys came from and Sally had never had any trouble finding them. Shaking them off was the hard part, but she was pretty expert at that too. She got up and slopped back upstairs, leaving the loaf and her marmaladey knife for the boys to clear up.

  Yes, her earlier instinct had been on target. Time to be thinking about moving on, but first there were one or two things she had to do.

  Chapter Five

  The ride in from the airport was uninspiring and Georgy was disappointed. She had visited London years ago as a child with her parents and the other kids, but then they had traveled first class and a limo had magicked them from Heathrow to Claridge’s, which was where her father habitually stayed. Riding in on the Underground like today, along with a mass of chattering, sweaty tourists with their cumbersome baggage and plastic carriers from the duty-free shop, was pathetic, though she was forced to acknowledge that this time she was, in essence, a tourist too.

  It was October and London was already well on its way to winter, with a leaden sky and skeletal trees in the tedious little suburban gardens they passed on the way into the center. Sure, the ride from Kennedy was nothing much to shout about either, but there you did at least get the adrenaline fix, once you were past Shea Stadium, of that truly amazing skyline. Native New Yorker though she was, that was one sight that never failed to catch at Georgy’s throat. Whereas this ride was tacky in the extreme. Apart from the amazing greenness of everything, something visiting Americans always marveled at, apparently, this might be any drab ride to nowhere special. Even Frankfurt, with its fir trees and open fields, had more to offer.

  Georgy unzipped her canvas holdall and dragged out the A to Z street guide she had had the foresight to pick up at the airport. Friends from New York were lending her their house in Fulham so she had to get off at Earls Court and then drag her baggage down to the Fulham Road, which shouldn’t be too much of a hassle since she had got these nifty little wheels attached to her suitcase. Georgy Kirsch was nothing if not organized. Very few details escaped her meticulous mind.

  The train gathered speed out of Barons Court and she started to assemble her things. Suitcase in the doorway, ready to be towed; bulging camera bag which weighed a ton but which she would simply have to heft; hand luggage from the plane containing passport, traveler’s checks, credit cards—all the vital props without which she would be stranded in this foreign land. No return ticket, for, as of now, Georgy had no firm plans for ever returning home. These last few months in New York had been almost more emotionally draining than her fragile spirit could sustain. Besides, in London she had more important aims to conquer. She would wait and see how things panned out here. With luck and a little Machiavellian cunning she would find a way to stay on and make herself a new life in the UK.

  She swung her pristine Burberry over one shoulder along with the camera bag, toted the hand luggage, and grabbed hold of the suitcase, which trundled along behind her like a little dog. The platform at Earls Court was dark but luckily the automatic elevator was working. That was one blessing; from what she knew of London it might well have been out of order and she would not relish having to wrestle this lot up an escalator without help. A taxi was waiting at the lights when she emerged into the Earls Court Road and she hailed it with relief. She piled herself and her baggage into the back and rode the last few blocks in style.

  The sun was almost gone and the
temperature was dropping fast. The Earls Court Road reminded her bleakly of Forty-second Street with its crowds, its litter, its row of tacky little eateries of varied nationalities, all crammed together. Even its drunks and beggars, something she had not expected over here, not in this part of town. Suddenly a great cloud of despondency descended on her. She felt lonely and disorientated and not a little depressed. She had come a long way on what was really just a silly whim and knew scarcely anyone in this huge and dismal city.

  Her driving motivation, if she were honest, had been to get away from her loving, suffocating family whose glorious summer had driven her mad with envy and a dark sense of personal failure. London had seemed as good a refuge as any. This assignment had come up out of the blue, just when she badly needed it, and, for many reasons, she was determined to make it work. They might have their happiness, her sisters, with their solitaire diamonds and happy-ever-afters, and she shared their joy, of course she did, as any elder sister would. But she had her career stretching out ahead of her and to Georgy that was far more challenging. This was the breakthrough she had been waiting for and she was determined not to fudge it. Then maybe she could at last turn to her parents and tell them: See, there is more to life than catching yourself a husband. Ballet might have let her down; let them see what she could achieve with her camera.

  The streets were grimy and not getting any better. Georgy realized with a sinking heart that she had based this dream on little more than a childhood memory. Traveling with her father was not the world as it really was, she had learned that lesson long ago. It was foolish to imagine that all London would be like Mayfair, with its elegant houses and ornate doorways and liveried doormen to protect you.

  They were on the Fulham Road now, going west toward the football stadium, and Georgy’s anxiety grew as she saw a council estate, a college building, and a high stone wall with huge iron gates that turned out to be Brompton Cemetery. Oh, great! Just the thing to come home to at night, especially in the winter. Then they swung off to the right and pulled up outside a friendly-looking pub called the Fox and Pheasant and all of a sudden Georgy’s anxieties evaporated in a wonderful release of tension. For facing her was a quiet cul-de-sac of two-story artisans’ cottages, painted in subtle pastel colors and reminding her vividly of San Francisco, one of her favorite cities. As always, the Hunters had come up trumps; how could she ever have doubted them? He was a Time-Life photographer, recently seconded to the Paris office, and his wife had always had impeccable taste, witness their pretty apartment on East Sixty-third Street.

  “All right, love?” inquired the driver as he hefted her cases to the doorstep and waited while she located her keys. She nodded, once more in control. This was more like it; this actually looked like home. The Hunters’ house was painted white, with a plain varnished pine front door and window boxes of hardy green perennials, flourishing as if they had just been watered. Georgy sorted through the keys and managed to undo all three brass mortise locks, ranged in a row down the woodwork.

  Once inside, she was not disappointed. It was small but furnished with taste and care to take full advantage of the open-plan interior. Clean rush matting covered the floor and French windows led to a tiny patio at the rear. Being the last house in the row, it shared a wall with the graveyard, so her neighbors on that side at least should give her no trouble. Then she wandered to the windows at the front and saw the looming outline of the stadium against the darkening sky. What was it Betsy Hunter had warned her, something about Saturday afternoons and Wednesday evenings? Well, adapting to your surroundings was the name of the game, especially when you were living in someone else’s space.

  The kitchen was in the basement, down a dark flight of stairs with a strong rope in place of a rail and lit at both top and bottom by attractive art nouveau lamps made of opalescent glass. The large fridge-freezer was packed with goodies—milk, orange juice, eggs, a French baguette—and a bottle of champagne waited in the cold compartment with a note round its neck saying “Happy Landings!” How sweet. Upstairs there were bronze chrysanthemums on the coffee table, plus Time Out and another copy of the A to Z. Georgy was thrilled. This place was really neat and welcoming and she planned to stay here for at least six months.

  Up a narrow staircase, with another rope handrail, she found two bedrooms—a large one overlooking the street with clean sheets, towels, and duvet cover piled on the double bed, and a smaller one at the rear that she saw immediately would easily adapt into a darkroom. The bathroom was compact but charming, fitted out in pine, with a polished cork floor and large wall mirrors that were properly lit. An old pub sign, advertising Worthingtons Bitter, hung over the lavatory, complemented by a row of wood-mounted paintings of game birds lined up above the rim of the tub.

  She dumped her bags in the larger room, then unearthed a coffeemaker in the kitchen and set about making a restorative pot of coffee with her own Colombian beans. And then, in an action as reflexive as brushing her teeth, she reached for the phone on the kitchen wall and dialed home.

  • • •

  The highspot of the Kirsch family summer had been the wedding of Risa, daughter number two, while Baby Lois, just nineteen, gave signs of following right behind her. The aunts and uncles had gathered in force to crow and congratulate and Myra Kirsch had rinsed her hair a bolder shade of bronze and held her head that much higher in temple. Georgy had joined in with the celebrating but deep in her soul she was weeping. It was no use trying to ignore the truth, even to herself. She was single, alone, and almost twenty-seven, and the way she felt these days, twenty-seven was pushing thirty. No matter what she might have achieved on her own account, in the eyes of the world—that is, the world according to Myra Kirsch—she had failed.

  Risa had known David nine months, a suitable length of time, and his father was a dentist in Queens, which was entirely acceptable, assuming you couldn’t catch a doctor. David was five years older than Risa and therefore the same age as Georgy, and Myra had been tasteless enough to remark that it was a shame he had seen Risa first and not had the decency to hang around for her eldest daughter. Still, it felt good to be marrying off one daughter with the other practically stepping on her train, particularly since Emmanuel Kirsch, who was already two partners and an extra child ahead of her in the marital dance, was the one who had to foot the hefty bill. Myra was enjoying a temporary renaissance with all these arrangements to make so that Georgy, to her infinite relief, found the heat for once diverted from her while all attention focused on The Wedding.

  There was no denying they made a handsome couple and seemed ideally suited. Risa worked in the travel business, which meant they got a discount on their honeymoon trip to Palm Springs, while David was a tax lawyer, doing very well on Wall Street with infinite prospects, or so his mother said. They met at a family bar mitzvah, introduced by cousins, and now Myra saw his parents on a regular basis and joined them for bridge when they needed a fourth. It was all very cozy and correct. Just thinking about it gave Georgy claustrophobia at the same time as she was bleeding inside.

  The ceremony took place at Tavern-on-the-Green and the bride arrived in a flower-festooned hansom cab with rosebuds plaited into the horse’s mane. With her tiny waist and delicate features, Risa was breathtaking in her grandmother’s lace and the press were there in force with their cameras as her handsome, famous father helped her to dismount. Lois, as maid of honor, had made her own dress and those of the tiny flower girls while Georgy, the eldest, managed to escape attention by appointing herself official photographer, thus having to weave in and out of the guests and not being forced to appear in most of the family shots. They were very talented, the Kirsch girls, she could imagine them saying. Pity the two youngest had won the race to the altar.

  Myra was at her most resplendent in russet silk, which set off her complexion, and a tiny mink hat with a coquettish eye-veil which had sounded the essence of petit bourgeoisie when described but was actually rather effective. And the presence of Emmanuel, f
lown in specially from southern California where he was involved in a much-headlined wife-murdering trial, put the seal on the occasion and brought them fleetingly together again as one family.

  Georgy’s heart swelled with love and pride as she stood among the guests and watched her father escort the bride to stand beneath the silk canopy next to her groom. In his expensive suit, with the black silk yarmulka setting off his silver hair, he looked more like an actor than a criminal psychologist and she knew the eyes of the congregation were focused upon him as the rabbi began to speak.

  As a child, Georgy had always been the closest to her father, his firstborn and therefore his confidante while the babies came toddling far behind. They had shared a special relationship until she was thirteen, when he left them abruptly to live with another woman, and the bitterness of the divorce had meant he was rarely around anymore, especially since he had changed partners once again and moved permanently to the West Coast.

  Sylvia, his fourth wife, was actually rather nice and had provided him with the much-longed-for son, but at least she’d had the good grace to stay away today. The pain of the original betrayal had faded in the light of Emmanuel’s later misdemeanor, so that these days Myra was able to meet him in public without wanting to gouge out his eyes or dissolve into the hysterical weeping Georgy had always found so distasteful.

  The vows had been exchanged and the wineglass ceremoniously crushed, and now the rabbi was pronouncing the couple man and wife. Violins began to play and as David swept his bride proudly into the dance, Emmanuel turned courteously to her mother and led her onto the floor. They still made a fine couple as they whirled away in a waltz, their bodies fitting quite naturally together in the ease of longtime familiarity. Again, Georgy felt her throat swell. She missed her daddy dreadfully and grieved for the loss of proper family life.