A Few of the Girls (15 page)

As soon as she had planned the little gathering Lorna felt better. She had written to them all, four couples, their best friends. Nothing tacky like a printed invitation, but a warm handwritten note, saying that they would have a sensible celebration to mark the passing of the last ten years. With all the nonsense and the ballyhoo there was bound to be, Lorna thought that her little celebration would be the one they would all talk about, look back on—and remember.

How like Lorna and George they would say, to have a
sensible
celebration. Nothing over the top like poor Anne and Kevin did with their theme party, which nobody understood. Nothing vulgar like Doris and Jim had done, with all that game which nobody could eat properly and the dessert with all the liqueur in it that had made everyone feel ever so slightly ill. And then Brian and Hilda had done that frightfully worthy party where they asked everyone to give money for starving children, which had been a teeny bit of a downer since it had made them a bit uneasy about approaching the buffet supper that Hilda had been slaving over all week. And then, of course, there had been that awful time—you couldn't call it a party, really—that evening when Teddy and Lola said let's play the Truth game and almost everyone had been lured into the most unwise revelations, and almost everyone had ended up very hurt. That had been
such
a foolish thing to do. Lorna remembered Anne's face when Kevin had said that she was no fun anymore. And she would never forget Lola's face when Teddy listed how many ladies he had…er…well,
known
in his life.

She remembered how Jim had gone a dull shade of red when Doris had said that, truthfully, she had always expected him to be a success in life and might not have married him had she known how often he was going to be passed over at work. And there had been that moment when Hilda had said in answer to one of those silly questions that kept going around, that Brian loved the poor and the needy in the world much more than he loved his own family, whose names and birthdays he often had difficulty in remembering.

Lorna and George had been very quiet after that party, a year ago. They had driven home in near silence. She had managed to turn all the questions into little jokes and answer them with a loving pat on the knee to her husband. George had done the same. But in the car there had been nothing to say. The emptiness seemed to hang between them like a curtain. All those questions that the other eight had battled with, trying to find honest answers and ending up red-eyed and angry, Lorna and George had managed to ignore. But the questions themselves could not be taken back. What sense of disappointment did they feel? Had there been any great letdowns? Did they still feel excited to see each other? Did they ever look lingeringly at any others?

Lorna had always told herself that she and George had escaped unscathed from that silly,
silly
party that Lola and Teddy had been mad enough to dream up. The others had all endured a public humiliation—George and Lorna may have been a little more silent and withdrawn at home than they were already, but at least in the view of their friends they were still what they had always been, a very well-suited couple. In fact, they had weathered the decade very well, Lorna thought, no terrible high-flying brought down by the whims of a stock exchange as had been the case with Kevin and Anne. Well might Kevin complain that Anne was no fun these days—it can't have been fun to have had so many lovely things repossessed, such a change in lifestyle. And then of course they had been luckier by far than Doris and Jim. Doris should never have said it of course, but Jim
was
a bit of a plodder, always satisfied with the very lowest position in the office, the cheapest car, the really awful furniture and decor. Jim never seemed to notice that all the others had gone far ahead of him. It would have been somehow more acceptable, Lorna thought, if he had been just a little bit apologetic about things, acknowledged somehow that he hadn't climbed as far up the tree as the others.

And Lorna often told herself that even though her George was very silent, no one could deny that it was better by far than all the prattle that Teddy and Lola went on with, especially since it had led to all that business at the party, counting the number of ladies there had been, listing their names. Oh, dear me, Lorna would much,
much
prefer a little silence than that sort of thing!

It wasn't even as if George's silences were moody like Brian's and Hilda's were, he wasn't always worrying about Society like they were, or about the Third World, things you could do nothing about. No, indeed. If George and Lorna were silent, perhaps it was because they had everything said by now and it was normal for people who were in their early forties in the late eighties to keep their views to themselves. It wasn't like the silly sixties when people had been talking about Love and Flowers and Hippies, nor the seventies when they had all been working so hard, long,
long
hours at the office in order to get noticed and get on, and then when they
did
relax they had all drunk far too much.

In those days too, of course, they had eaten the wrong things, all the time! No wonder there was so much cholesterol and stress and obesity even in their little group of friends. The eighties had meant that they had taken care of themselves at least. Now no long happy chats with George across a dinner table, of course, no snuggling up with a snack to watch television together.

To be strictly honest, and even to be a teeny bit selfish, Lorna did rather miss those times when they had so much to talk about. In those times, the days were just not long enough to say all that had to be said. They tumbled over the words, and they had never known a silence. Still, Lorna would always give herself a shake when her thoughts went down that kind of road.

It was deeply silly to get worried about little things like long silences. After all, look at what all the others had to put up with! And really and truly, one could only measure one's life by comparing it with everyone else's.

Lorna had been very good at the measurement game. Even from the start. They had always been richer than Doris and Jim, they had been more practical than Brian and Hilda, more cautious in business than Kevin and Anne, more circumspect in talking about their past than poor Teddy and Lola. How else did you know how you were doing unless you had some yardstick? There had been a time when she used to discuss this with George. Not very satisfactorily, though. George had always missed the point slightly, he kept bleating like a sheep, “But they're our
friends,
Lorna!” as if she didn't know that for heaven's sake. He always made it seem as if it was some kind of sacrilege to say anything that showed their friends to be less than perfect.

Lorna had asked George what he thought about a party. “Yes, fine, if you like” was what he had said.

“Just our friends?” she had said.

“Well, yes.” George had seemed surprised that there might have been anyone else. It had irritated Lorna slightly. It seemed to imply that they only knew eight other people, which was ridiculous—they could have fielded a huge team if they had wanted to.

“And I think we'll call it a Sensible Celebration?” she had said, waiting for his nod of approval.

“Why?” he had asked.

“To let them know what it's going to be like,” Lorna had said, surprised.

“Oh,” George had said.

The evening seemed very long. She made list after list of what they would eat, crossing things out as reasons presented themselves why shellfish wouldn't be a good starter—too many nervous tums these days; no hot puff pastry—too fatty, too much waist-watching. Nothing eggy in case cholesterol watchers had had their quota of eggs for the week. Soup was rather ordinary and it did encourage the feeble of spirit to overdose on crunchy French bread. Avocados were so predictable, and simply chockablock with calories for those who counted such things—which was anyone with a brain these days.

Lorna patted her neat little rump and wondered how so many of their friends had let themselves go. I mean, did one really wonder that Teddy had looked elsewhere so often—Lola wasn't exactly an oil painting. And after they lost all that money Anne had looked positively geriatric for a long time. It was so
easy
to keep oneself trim, Lorna thought, pausing in front of the mirror to admire herself. All one needed was a little discipline and some practical good sense.

Lorna had always prided herself on being sensible. Every single year she went down to the big store and had a makeup lesson from one of the girls demonstrating cosmetics. That way you kept up with the trends and didn't look silly drawing big heavy black lines around your eyes like they did in the fifties as poor silly Doris still did.

Lorna always said that one owed it to oneself to keep oneself looking well. She glanced once more to reassure herself about the success of her efforts. In the mirror she saw the troubled face of her husband no longer buried in his newspaper, but looking at her. Not admiringly, as she looked at herself. The only word to describe the expression on George's face was
sad.
He looked as if something very,
very
sad had happened. The years of self-control had taught Lorna a lot, she believed. She certainly knew not to rush into questions she might regret later. She pretended she hadn't seen the look on George's face: the look of an unhappy man.

She must get him more involved, Lorna decided.
That
was what the look showed her, he wasn't
sad,
he was just a little left out. How could George be sad? He had everything he could possibly want. A happy marriage, a beautiful home, two successful children, a wife who looked after herself.

Perhaps poor George had just begun to feel a
little
bit redundant in this life that went on around him like clockwork. He must thank his lucky stars every day that he didn't have to help constantly with chores as did his friends. Kevin, Jim, Brian, and Teddy didn't return home in the evening to perfectly run homes. They spent time chopping logs and carrying in coal, even cleaning grates. George never had known the need to do that; Lorna had seen that all fireplaces were walled up immediately and tasteful arrangements of dried flowers placed in front of where they used to be. When Jim, Brian, Teddy, and Kevin finished a day's work there had been endless problems with children. As toddlers, as schoolchildren, and as rebellious teenagers. All this Lorna had been able to circumnavigate as well. From the start she had insisted on boarding school because it made the children independent, and there were always plenty of courses and camps and projects during the holidays. Now they were away again, one doing nursing in a far-off city, one learning word-processing skills even farther away.

Lorna had never listened to the concerned questions of her friends, Doris and Anne, Hilda and Lola, when they had wondered was it wise to let the children go so early and so far.

Lorna would smile to herself and reflect that in her home at least there was calm, there was tranquillity—and an absence of family dramas, something that could not be said for the homes of Lola and Hilda and Doris and Anne.

So Lorna didn't meet George's eye in the mirror; instead she walked purposefully back to the sofa where George sat. Lorna had read in a magazine once that loving couples didn't have chairs, they always had small sofas instead. More cuddly, the article had said.

For years now they had been sitting on separate sofas, George with his newspapers, Lorna with her books on entertaining, etiquette, and lifestyles of the rich and famous. This time she squeezed in beside him.

“We
have
been lucky, George, haven't we?” she said.

Slightly startled, George moved to make room for her and said, “Yes…oh yes.”

“No, I mean it, we've had everything, and so many of our friends—well really,
most
of our friends—have had nothing. It's only right we should try to share what we have with them by having a party like this, but I want
you
to help me, help me to do it right, make it sensitive as well as sensible.”