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‘And now she hasn’t seen him for dust?’
Renewed sobbing from Cristal. ‘I thought he loved me.’
‘Can’t you call him?’ That’s what modern women are supposed to do, right?
‘I can’t remember his name,’ she sobs again.
I shrug at Nina and she shrugs back. I don’t dare point out that in my day we used to call that a one-night stand and if you were stupid enough to do it, you knew that you’d never hear from him again.
Nina reads my mind. ‘It was different in our day.’
Too right, I think, even though ‘our day’ didn’t seem all that long ago. Things change too quickly, if you ask me. How would I fare now? I didn’t sleep with Paul for months when we first met and there wasn’t any pressure to. What would I do if someone I didn’t know wanted to get me into bed on the first date? Even the thought of it makes me shudder.
‘I need to look at these,’ I say, showing Nina the iPod. ‘Photos from Mrs Silverton’s latest trip.’
‘Lucky bitch,’ Nina concludes. ‘Who does she think she is? Bloody Judith Chalmers?’
‘Who?’ Cristal wants to know as she sucks in another sob.
I flick to Mrs Silverton’s photos. Stunning scenes of immense, cloudless blue skies flood the small screen and take my breath away. I don’t think that I’ve ever seen colours so vivid. Scanning with my finger, I take in shots of lakes pink with the wings of thousands of flamingos, wildlife so close that you feel you could reach out and touch it, the dazzling monochrome madness of zebras, the sad soulful eyes of lions, plains stretching as far as the eye can see, dotted with artistically sparse trees.
‘Wow,’ I say, half out loud.
‘Let’s have a look,’ Cristal says, sniffing now.
I show her the screen.
‘Where is it?’
‘The Maasai Mara.’
Her face registers disinterest. Perhaps not enough discos. ‘Where’s that then?’
‘Kenya,’ I say. ‘Africa. Mrs Silverton’s just been on safari there.’
‘I’ve always fancied going there,’ Nina says, ‘but Gerry says he’d be bored.’
In my humble opinion, way too much of Nina’s life is influenced by what Gerry wants and doesn’t want. Greedily, I scan more of the photographs. I don’t think I’d be bored. I think that I’ve never seen anywhere quite as beautiful.
Then a pinger goes. ‘That’s Mrs Silverton cooked,’ I say and go to take out her foils.
Chapter Three
‘Come to ours for dinner,’ Nina begs. ‘I knocked up a spag bol before I came to work this morning. It’ll only need reheating and there’s plenty to go around. We can open a nice bottle of plonk too.’
‘I’m fine,’ I say. ‘I just want to go home and put my feet up.’ My legs are throbbing from being on my feet all day and I keep trying to put off the day when support tights begin to sound like a fine idea.
‘You shouldn’t spend so much time alone,’ she insists.
‘I have a wild night in front of the telly planned.’
My friend tuts at me.
The truth is that I’m not very keen on Nina’s husband and try to spend as little time with him as possible. Sometimes Nina’s not very keen on him either.
If I want to see Nina out of work, then I try to make sure that we go out on our own. Whenever Gerry’s around, Nina can’t get a word in edgeways and he’s the world’s best at ignoring everyone else’s viewpoint. He’s too much like hard work in my book. I don’t say anything though, what friend would? I just try to support her as much as I can when the going gets tough. They’ve been together since they were teenagers and have been married for about fifteen years. They’ve no children – needless to say, Gerry’s choice. Nina would have loved to be a mum. Instead they have two dogs of indeterminate breed, Daisy and Buttons, who are the apple of Nina’s eye.
Frankly, I don’t know what she sees in Gerry any more. He’s always been loud, opinionated and he’s not getting better as he grows older. What happens to men over forty to turn them into grumpy old buggers? When he was a teenager, I have to say that he was quite a looker, the heartthrob of our year. Nina was a much-envied young lady when she caught his eye. Now the same Gerry, while still a handsome man who can turn on the charm like a tap when he wants to, more often than not has the personality of a bad-tempered wasp when it comes to Nina. Their marriage is not exactly the stuff that dreams are made of. He seems to give out just enough to keep her hanging on in there. Which is not what it should be about, surely? But then Paul and I were hardly Burton and Taylor so I’m not one to talk. So for the sake of our friendship I’ve never mentioned my misgivings to Nina and, even though I might have given up on the idea of ever warming to Gerry years ago, I tolerate him as best I can.
