Something Good (8 page)

H
annah perched on the blue canvas sofa in the foyer of Nippers Nursery—“Quality Day Care From Three Months To Five Years”—trying to blot out the incessant whooping that was coming from the main play area. Someone was squawking about her picture not drying fast enough. A nursery song tape struggled tinnily in the background.

Hannah had never been a nursery song kind of kid. Like the fairy stories her dad had chosen for her, with their tales of princesses with shattered glass hearts, they'd made her yearn to run out of her nursery class and pull on her elastic eye patch and do some cutlass-waving. Now it sounded like every kid in the nursery was running on the spot. Imagine, she thought, spending seven hours a day here, as her mum did. Imagine coming home from work with face paint smeared on your trousers, glitter in your hair and your voice hoarse from all that storytelling and singing. Hannah couldn't help pitying her.

Would she ever reach a point when she'd want a child of her own? Hannah doubted it. Anyway, to get pregnant you had to have sex, a concept that she found faintly intriguing, yet represented a potential minefield of blundering embarrassment. Unlike Amy's mother, Jane had never subjected her to “the big talk.” She'd merely dispensed little nuggets of info over the years; enough for Hannah to decide that, even if some boy ever wanted to do it with her, she'd be sure to use at least five methods of contraception at once.

A couple of mothers had wandered into the foyer and squished their blubbery bums on to the sofa on either side of Hannah. One had a mole on her chin with a wiry hair poking out of it. Hannah's thoughts of sex had brought her neatly round to Ollie Tibbs. At seventeen, surely he'd done it. He certainly looked like he had. He had this air about him—an ease with himself. Hannah imagined him kissing her and touching her. The two of them, all lips and limbs on his bed this Saturday night, with his friends all gone home and his mum not back for hours.

One of the mothers bent to prize a drawing pin from the sole of her clumpy shoe. The other was using a matchstick to gouge dirt from under her fingernails. They were sitting so close to Hannah they could probably tell she was daydreaming about a boy. They'd be having those
young people today
kind of thoughts. Hannah tried to focus on more mundane matters, like the process of osmosis that they were doing in biology. One substance absorbing another. Even that made her think of sex. Hannah blinked at the door to the play area, willing her mother to come through it.

They were singing now, a great swell of kids' voices:

Happy birthday to you,

Happy birthday to you,

Happy birthday dear Jay-ayne…

Christ, her mum's birthday. How could Hannah have forgotten? “Come to work after school,” Jane had said that morning, “and we'll go somewhere nice for dinner.”

Hannah had thought it was weird, this dinner-out-of-the-blue. Then she'd figured: end of the month. Jane would have just been paid. What hadn't registered was that September 30th was her birthday. She was thirty-six or thirty-seven or thirty-eight. Bloody hell.

Hannah checked her watch. Jane would be out any minute. She scanned the foyer hoping that, by some miracle, she might spy something to pass off as a lovingly chosen present. Her eyes flitted across multi-colored backpacks that hung from pegs like scrunched kites. A jumble of slippers and elastic-fronted plimsolls were heaped under a bench. The two mothers' kids were ferried out by a whey-faced day care nurse who looked about fourteen and was busily swamping them with coats and hats. They all clattered out, letting in an icy gust and leaving Hannah alone on the sofa.

She delved into her jacket pockets, the crumby remains of some long-forgotten Kit Kat embedding itself under her nails. She rifled through the schoolbag that lay at her feet. Nothing remotely giftlike in there: just a dog-eared biology homework jotter, a leaking green gel pen and a half-eaten packet of Starbursts. To her embarrassment, she realized she must have absent-mindedly combined her name and Ollie's in Biro on the inside of her schoolbag:
Hannah Tibbs.
It was time she grew up, got a grip on herself. She made a mental note to erase it—with bleach, maybe, or Wite-Out.

Hannah's entire body was rigid with panic. She had about ninety seconds to concoct some kind of excuse. Any old lie would do. She'd bought a present ages ago and lost it—or had left it at Amy's because it was too big to hide at their house. When had Hannah ever bought her mother anything
big?
Last birthday it had been a turquoise leather purse from Camden Market. She couldn't remember the present before that, but recalled the childish junk she'd bestowed upon her over the years. A coffee jar covered with ripped sticky paper—“for your pens, Mum!”—and a beaded bracelet made from self-hardening clay. Hardly the most alluring of gifts, but Jane had always seemed ridiculously pleased. She'd worn the clay bracelet for months until the elastic had snapped on the Roman Road and the beads had bounced down a drain.

“Hi, Han,” Sally said, bundling a little girl toward the toilets.

“Hi,” Hannah said dully. A string of snot was dangling from the child's nostril. The sight of it caused bile to rise in Hannah's throat. How could Jane deal with these kids and all their bodily fluids without puking? Sally had paused by the loo door and was studying her intently. “Looking forward to your night out?” she asked.

“Yes, thanks.” Hannah forced herself to produce the expected smile. There was something faintly comforting about Sally's round, cheery face with its flushed cheeks and cherry-colored lips. She looked like the kind of friendly auntie who'd always have something delicious baking in the oven. “Do me a favor,” Sally added. “Remind your mum to use her present before it runs out.”

“What is it?”

“A voucher for an aromatherapy massage at Serene. She could do with a treat, don't you think? It's got a three-month use-by date, so make sure—”

“Need
toilet,
” the child protested, jerking Sally's arm.

Shit, thought Hannah. A massage. Her best friend had arranged for her to be slathered with exotic oils and Hannah hadn't even got it together to buy her a fifty pence nail buffer. Her gaze rested upon a pile of cards on the front desk. It was probably intended for some art project or other. The cards were pale blue and an off-putting lobster color and looked as if they'd spent years slowly fading on a windowsill. Just one: that was all Hannah would need to make a card. She hadn't made one since primary school. Jane would be so surprised and delighted, it might detract from the absence of gift. Hannah watched her own arm slide forward, as if mechanically controlled, her fingers pluck at the top sheet—a lobster one, as bad luck would have it—and jab it into her bag.

By the time Sally and the child had emerged from the loo, Hannah felt reasonably confident that she looked normal. Moments later, Jane was saying her goodbyes and hurrying in the reception area. “Hi, darling,” she said, kissing Hannah's cheek. She pulled out her ponytail band and dragged her fingers through her hair like some primitive comb. “So,” she said, “all set?”

Hannah rose awkwardly to her feet. “Happy birthday, Mum.”

“Thanks, love. Where shall we eat? I haven't booked anywhere. Didn't think I'd need to this early.”

“I don't mind,” Hannah said, wondering when she should bring up the lack-of-present issue.

“Shall we just walk, see where looks good?” Jane swiped her coat from its hook.

“Okay.”

After the heat and squall of Nippers, the outside world felt pleasantly cool. They walked without talking, passing a noodle bar with black-and-white portraits evenly spaced along its white walls. Trees were shedding their leaves. In the window of a Russian restaurant sat an enormous gilded tureen. “I think your dad's seeing someone,” Jane ventured.

“Who?”

“That neighbor of his, the one I told you about? She brings round meals, is worried he can't take care of himself.”

Hannah giggled. “God, how pathetic.”

“She answered the phone last time I called,” Jane added.

“Not living with him, is she?”

“Of course not,” Jane said quickly.
I hope not,
was what she meant. Hannah could tell that she really minded this woman answering the phone. Her mother's eyes and voice revealed her every thought; she was virtually transparent.

“Let's try down here,” Jane said, turning down a side street. The blue-and-white lettering of the Opal's sign came into view.
Please, no,
Hannah thought.

They stopped outside, and Jane perused the menu on the wall. Under the ‘light suppers and snacks' section a dish caught Hannah's eye: pan-fried mushrooms with garlic and parsley on toasted ciabatta. She was aware of a staggering sensation in her stomach.

Through the frosted glass door she could see and hear people chatting and laughing: people like Ollie and those rhyming-name girls—Lara/Cara—who could negotiate wine lists and never threw up. “I don't like the look of it,” Hannah murmured.

“Why not? It looks cosy—”

“I just…” Fragments of excuses jerked around her head. “It'll be smoky,” she said firmly. “I can smell it out here.” She felt lousy, playing her asthma card.

“Oh,” Jane said, “sorry, Han, I didn't think. Anyway—” she glanced at the menu again “—it looks a bit poncey. Let's go for a blow-out Indian.”

“That sounds great,” Hannah said, trying to keep the swell of relief from her voice as they wandered off down the street.

In the restaurant Jane squinted at the menu. She was taking an age to decide, as if this were some Michelin-starred place and she was revving herself up to savor every bite. After much deliberation—“Ooh, this sounds lovely, what are you having, Han?”—she'd always go for the same viciously hot lamb dish with pilau rice and a naan bread filled with almondy stuff. To Hannah, that tasted all wrong—like a marzipan sandwich.

She stole glances at her mother as she tore into her meal. She really could pack it away—even that horrible belly pork at Granny Nancy's with a thick slab of fat round its edge. It was a wonder she wasn't twenty stone. She had a lovely figure, Hannah reflected, at least for someone of nearly forty: a narrow waist, a slightly rounded bum and perky breasts. In double art last week, Ritchy Harrison had leaned over and growled, “Hey, Han, I saw your mum the other day. She looked hot.” Hannah had refused to respond to a crass comment like that. She'd scowled at his sagging lips and turned back to her Still Life With Trainer.

Watching Jane shovel in rice, Hannah felt a stab of guilt. She burrowed in her bag for the card. “Oh, Han,” Jane enthused, taking it from her, “that's lovely. You haven't made me a card since you were—”

“Yeah, Mum, I know.”

“Remember the last one you made? You'd cut out all these tissue paper shapes and stuck them on a—”

Hannah fazed off, wondering why parents were so fond of reminiscing about their children's younger days. It was if they wanted to keep you that way, frozen in time, still clutching Biffa and driving your pedal car.

“Han,” Jane was saying, “did you hear what I said?”

“Sorry, what?”

Jane smiled uncomfortably. “Your dad's having a housewarming party. That new girlfriend's helping with the food and stuff.”

“When?” Hannah asked.

“Saturday, around seven.”

The announcement rolled over Hannah like a horrible wave. “But I can't,” she stumbled, “it's—”

“Not busy, are you?”

Hannah's head milled with excuses. She'd arranged to go shopping with Amy…no, extra rehearsals for
Little Shop of Horrors
…Damn, she didn't even have a proper part. “Just a couple of hours,” Jane added. “Veronica has a daughter around your age. Dad seems to think you'd get on.”

This was getting worse, if that were possible. Instead of spending a long, virtually endless Saturday night at Ollie's house, Hannah would be forced to make friends with some spoiled-princess-stranger. She glared down at her rice. She usually loved it—the grains colored orange, yellow and green—but now it looked fake and unappetizing. “Do I have to?” she asked weakly.

Jane nodded firmly. “We'll escape early if it's awful. We'll have a code.”

Poor Mum, Hannah thought; this can't be much fun for her either—feeling obliged to show up at a party arranged by her ex-husband's new woman. She knew she still had feelings for Max. Her parents weren't exactly how you'd expect a divorced couple to be. They weren't even legally divorced. “We haven't got around to it,” Jane had said casually when Hannah had asked, as if she was referring to having the front door repainted.

Jane ripped off a hunk of naan the size of a mitten. She looked pretty with her lovely clear skin and peppery freckles across her nose and cheeks. She deserved more than a crappy card scrawled in the restaurant's toilet cubicle. Hannah was seized by an urge to tell her about Ollie: how she could hardly sleep for thinking about him, and even when she'd finally drifted off she'd wake at weird times like 5:37 a.m. with eerie light creeping into her room. Yet telling her would change everything. It felt too fragile to share.