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Allie smiled. “You know she’s a lot like you, right?”
“She looks nothing like me.”
“I didn’t say she looks like you, I said she is like you.”
He just shook his head.
Bea pranced in, her hair now piled on her head and her face obscured by the soup-bowl-sized coffee cup she stored in his cupboard.
“I should get dressed.” Allie stood up. Winston suddenly felt unaccountably annoyed that their morning on the patio had been spoiled by it no longer being last night, the sun, the terrible hedges, and his daughter.
Bea put her mug down on the glass-topped table too sharply, and Winston started to feel feral. Rosemary had been getting after this child to set her cups and mugs down on the table since she was in primary school.
“I’ll come with. Girl talk.”
He expected Allie to protest being joined in her chamber by a stranger, and was horrified by Bea’s manners, but Allie just shrugged and let Bea trail after her like a street mutt.
He dressed himself, and they were still in the spare bedroom. He could hear their voices.
He got out a yogurt, ate it at the counter. They were still in there.
He watered the plants, following the directions left by the estate agent.
He called and canceled the dinner reservation. Called Jean to ask him to bring pizzas around eight, helping himself to the same mental lecture he’d just given his daughter about Jean’s time.
How long did it take to get dressed? He’d had an entire day already. In London, his habit was to get up at five, go for a long run, shower and kit up, and use the car mobile to set up all his tasks for the day on the way to the office. It was soothing. Efficient. He even had a very expensive no-spill tea mug that kept his tea hot all the way to his desk.
“Cool. I’m on it like a pigeon on a french fry.”
“Thanks, Bea.”
They came into the kitchen with more clamor than two people should have been able to produce.
“Dad, I have to go, could you think about canceling those—”
“I’ve already. What are you wearing? Did Allie give you clothes? Did you accept clothes from Allie?”
“Look at this, Dad. It’s fucking amazing. It’s from the forties. Allie said it suited me much better than it ever suited her.”
Bea twirled. She was wearing sort of puffy tweed shorts with a button-up schoolgirl top, or like the uniform top she’d had to wear when she was a Girl Guide. With a tie. A men’s tie, nicer than any Winston owned, in a perfect trinity knot. It was ridiculous. It did suit her.
“Hm.”
“I always overpack. She’s welcome to the clothes.” Allie was tilting her head, smiling at Bea, putting in an earring that dangled to her shoulder.
She wore…
There was a skirt. Long and flowing, with several layers, decorated with gold and jewels in paisley shapes. There were a lot of jewels. The waistband, and then her bare stomach, and some sort of bra top like a stage performer would wear, sparkling with gold and crystals, fake roses at each breast, beaded fringe. She wore a necklace, bracelet
s, and bands around her upper arms.
Looking at the two women, beaming at each other, side by side, he felt boring, old, and old. Also, he didn’t even know how to tie a trinity knot.
“Well. I think perhaps I’ll be going to work. Allie, do you need Jean?”
Allie took his elbow and pulled him out to the patio, tossing over her shoulder to Bea to “give us a minute.”
“What’s up?” she asked.
