So you must be good, I persist.
You know what? She sits up. Im not even that interested in it. And, leaning back, she wiggles her red-painted toes, admiring her handiwork.
For a moment, I can hardly speak. Butbut, why are you here, then?
Oh, darling! She smiles at me indulgently. Who in the world wants to get a job? And besides, I know Ive got some sort of talent; its just I havent really found my milieu yet. Its all simply a matter of time. Never mind.
She lights a fresh cigarette, the glow of the flame illuminating her porcelain skin. So, what Im wondering, Raven
I flinch. That sounds really odd to me.
Youll get used to it. So what Im wondering is, I have this great date with Hughey Chicken and hes got a friend hes supposed to meet tonight in Camden. So Im thinking that maybe youd like to come along too. A kind of double date.
You mean a blind date.
Yeah, well. I guess, if you want to look at it that way
What other way is there to look at it?
Actually I have a boyfriend. Hes a graphic artist at CMU.
She looks at me. And?
Well, Im not into being unfaithful or anything. I mean, were probably going to live together when I get back.
Relax! I wasnt suggesting you offer him bed and breakfast. We were just going to hang out. After all, its London! Dont you want to meet people? Have fun?
I hesitate.
Obviously the cool thing to do is say yes. But what if he turns out to be ugly? Or weird? Or even not ugly and weird but out of my leaguehandsome and cool? I think of Jonny; of his funny, crooked smile. If its only to hang out, I guess it doesnt matter. Hes not possessive. And its not like Im going on my ownBut what would I wear? Ive only just got here; I havent even unpacked.
Robbies smiling at me, swinging her legs. So, what do you think? Were going to meet in this pub and then go on to see a band at the Camden Palace.
II dont know.
Rave Shes already shortening it. I now have a nickname from a name that isnt mine. Rave, the thing is, I dont know Hughey either. See? So itll be fun. An adventure!
I dont know why this makes sense but it does. (The sidecars may have something to do with it.) OK, sure. To keep you company, thats all. But if its all the same to you, I think Ill use my own name tonight.
She shrugs her shoulders. Fine. But I wouldnt mention your last name if I were you.
The front door opens.
Hello!
Were in here! Robbie calls. Getting drunk!
A young girl in an ill-fitting brown coat peers in. She looks about fifteen, with heavy, straight, shoulder-length hair pinned back from her face by a bright pink barrette, and enormous round blue eyes. Shes carrying a stack of booksa thick, leather-bound reprint of Shakespeares first quarto, a Penguin guide to Romeo and Juliet, a copy of The Seagull and a well-thumbed edition of Chekhovs short stories.
Hi. She crosses the room and holds out her hand. Im Imogene Stein.
I stand up. Evie Garlick. Pleased to meet you.
Evies coming with me to meet Hughey Chicken! Robbie beams, raising her mug.
Better you than me, Imogene carefully places her books on the floor and shrugs off her coat. Underneath, her dress is a drop-waisted pinafore affair, at least two sizes too big and her shoes are the kind of solid, brown oxford lace-ups my grandmother favoured. What are you drinking?
Sidecars. Want me to make you one?
Yes, please.
Robbie gets up and Imogene collapses onto the sofa. I dont suppose youve got a fag? she pleads. Robbie chucks her the packet before heading into the kitchen.
I watch as she lights up. Theres something wrong with this picture. She looks like a Laura Ashley poster child but sucks deeply and greedily, throwing her legs over one another like a forty-year-old prostitute after a long night.
So, I take a stab at conversation. Youve been out?
Nothing like stating the obvious.
She passes a hand over her eyes. Rehearsing. The Seagull.
Yeah? Which scene?
The last one. You know, Im a seagull. No, Im not. Yes, I am. She takes another drag and for a moment it looks like she might inhale the whole thing in a single go.
Thats a great scene. I try to sound encouraging. And a killer speech.
She nods, exhaling a stream of smoke from her nose. Yep. I am a seagull. I am definitely a seagull.
We sit in silence.
Maybe shes a method actress. Method actresses take their work very seriously.
I catch her eye and smile.
She stares at me. And then, to my horror, her eyes begin to fill with tears.
Shit. If she thinks shes a seagull, were in real trouble.
I love him. I love him and he doesnt even know Im alive! She buries her face in her hands.
Is she in character? Should I be improvising with her? I stand up. I think Id better unpack orsomething
But I love him! I know hes the one! I just know it!
Robbie comes back in and hands her a teacup minus a handle. Hes gay, Imo. Everyone knows it. Sorry. Were out of mugs. She refills my drink from a tarnished silver gravy boat.
Hes not gay! Imo hisses. Just English!
He wears cashmere socks, thinks football is violent and lives with a man named Gavin. Whos an organist, Robbie adds. Face it. Hes gay. Of course, you dont have to believe me but I did grow up in the Village and if I cant spot a gay man then I must be blind.
Who are we talking about?
Imos scene partner, Lindsay Crufts. Hes very handsome, extremely well-spoken and a total ass jockey
Robbie! Imo glares. Ass jockey is not a term I want to hear again to describe the love of my life!
Robbie winks at her. Golly but youre cute when youre angry!
You knowImo shakes her headfor a girl whos about to shag some loser by the name of Mr Chicken, youve got a lot of nerve!
Robbie giggles. You are so jealous!
Yeah, right!
Im on the edge of this conversation, dying to join in. I raise my mug grandly. And while youre shagging Mr Chicken, Ill be stuck shagging Mr Chickens mysterious friend!
They both look at me and laugh.
I laugh too. But I dont know why.
Imo pauses for breath. You dont have any idea of what shagging means, do you?
Sure, I flounder. Its dating, right?
Fucking, Robbie explains. Shagging is English for fucking. Makes it sound like a carpet.
I dismiss it like its old hat. Yeah, I knew that. I just gotconfused.
They exchange a secret smile.
Im not sure I like them. I hate the way they both know how to smoke and mix drinks and the bathrooms disgustingmaybe I should find my own place.
Theres a knocking, or rather a pounding, at the front door. Hello! Hello!
Shit! It Mrs Van Patterson, the landlady. Have you met her?
I shake my head.
Shes a total nightmare. Dutch. And tight as they come. Robbie prods Imo with her big toe. You get it. She likes you.
Does not! Imo pushes her foot away. You go.
She hates me! At least you look like a virgin.
I am a virgin. Imo sighs. She puts down her teacup and pulls herself off the sofa. Fine! Send the virgin. The virgin will do it! And she grumbles her way to the front door.
I lean across to Robbie. Dont you think shes a little young to be drinking?
Robbie shakes her head. Shes nineteen. Not that youd know it. Her fathers this big Hollywood agent. Bags of money. But her mothers a total freak. Dresses her like a twelve-year-old, insists that she calls her every day. Shes a Born Again. Really into Jesus. Its so sad, really
But her names Stein. Thats Jewish, right?
Robbie nods. Ever heard of Jews for Jesus?
I havent. But Im tired of being the odd one out.
I give an all-purpose response. Fuck!
Exactly! she agrees.
We can hear the front door open and she signals to me to be quiet.
Hello, Mrs Van Patterson. How are you this afternoon?
You girls are using too much hot water! The electricity bill is enormous! Its outrageous how much water you use! The boiler is on a timer! You must not press the immersion button. Ever!
But the hot water runs out every time we do the dishes. Or if one person has a shower.
Really! Ive never seen anything like it! What are you doing? Bathing every day?
Its been known to happen.
Listen, dont you get smart with me! Twice a week is more than enough.
Where I come from, its completely normal to bathe every day
Where you come from, people are spoilt! Americans think the world is made of money! You girls dont know how lucky you are! Gloucester Place is one of the finest addresses in London. Have you ever played Monopoly?
Yes, Mrs Van Patterson, I have.
Well, its like Park Lane. Its not on the Monopoly board but it could be.
Humm
Theres a weighty silence.
Have you girls been smoking in there?
No, Mrs Van Patterson! Of course not! Why? Can you smell smoke?
Yes, I can smell smoke!
Imo lowers her voice. I think its the guys upstairs. I mean, its none of my business. But Im pretty sure Ive caught them lighting up in the hallway a few times.
Ahhaa. I see. Right. You are a good girl, Imogene Stein. A nice, well-mannered girl. Much better than that roommate of yours. But you must not use so much hot water, OK? Right?
The door shuts and we can hear Mrs Van Patterson stomping upstairs.
Imo comes back in and sits down. Well, another near miss for the House of Chekhov She raises her teacup.
Robbie and I look at each other, then raise our mugs too. Im a seagull! we chorus.
Imogene smiles. Shes young and old, all rolled up at once.
Yeah, thats me. Im a seagull. Soshe taps another cigarette on the side of the box and lights it, propping her legs on the coffee table. Anyone fancy a nice, long bath?
Standing on the front doorstep in the wind and rain, I fumble in my jacket pocket for my keys. And then I turn and check one last time.
No, shes definitely not there. Not hovering behind the laburnum or waiting on the other side of the gate.
Not that I really believe in ghosts.
But seeing Robbie is different.
She wasnt filmy or white or in any way vaporous or ghostly. In fact, she looked normal, solid, wearing a pair of jeans and one of those ugly orange sweaters shed knitted when she thought her true calling was as a knitwear designer. (She never stopped searching for her calling; every year there was a new one. And that year we all got jumpers. I still have a coupleone in fuchsia and another in a kind of toxic-waste green. They manage to be both too tight and too loose all at once; I think the neck hole is really an armhole and the armholes neck holes. She called it her signature piece.)
By the time class ended she was gone. I looked for her, walking to Covent Garden tube station; I half expected to see her trailing behind me, lingering in the shadows of Drury Lane or even standing on the train platform, reading a copy of Vanity Fair. She used to like Covent Garden, was forever picking up Australians in one of the bars in the market.
But she wasnt there.
And she isnt here now.
Of course, I mustve imagined it. Its amazing what a little insomnia and a few missed meals will conjure up in a girl. I should be relieved. But instead, strangely, Im disappointed. The older you get, the more friends you lose to marriage, children, work; to adulthood. Friendship itself becomes an apparition; a fleeting spectre, too quick to evaporate in the glaring light of day.
I turn my house key in the lock of the enormous scarlet-painted door.
Number seventeen was once a formidable, cream-coloured, stucco-fronted Georgian property, very similar to all the other formidable, cream-coloured, stucco-fronted Georgian properties of Acacia Avenue, north London. Now, its seen better days. Its the only house on the street whose garden gate squeals like an angry piglet each time it opens, or whose vanilla exterior is peeling away like shavings of white chocolate on a posh wedding cake. And, in a neighborhood where neat little box hedges and topiary bay trees are de rigueur, the garden has definite romantic, wild, overgrown tendencies; much more Brontë than Austen. In summer, the fig tree drops its heavy fruit to form a thick, gooey compote on the pavement below and each autumn the towering chestnut launches conkers at passers-by with eerie accuracy. A defiant, shabby grandeur has replaced its once impeccable façade. But in the five years Ive lived here its only grown more intriguing.
Its not your average house share. But then again Bunny Gold, its owner, is not your typical landlord either.
When Bunnys husband, Harry, died unexpectedly ten years ago, it came to light that hed been, in addition to a loving husband, father, a respected pillar of the Jewish community and owner of an extremely successful accountancy firm, also a chronic gambler.
Hed already cashed in his pension, life insurance and a great deal of their personal savings to meet his debts. Bunny, whod spent her entire life in a cosy bubble of shopping, socializing and raising their only child, Edwina, was devastated. An affair wouldve been one thing. But leaving her in financial ruin was much worse. Above all, she was unprepared to part with her beloved home.
So she began to rent out rooms, although shed be shocked to hear it described as a house share. To her, our living arrangements are the result of an intimate form of artistic sponsorship; shes a patron rather than a landlord and will only let rooms to performers or artists whose work she admires. And, at seventy-two, her enthusiasm for almost any form of music, painting, dance, or drama, along with her remarkable appetite for the avant-garde, is nothing less than inspiring.
So, theres me, the actress/teacher, Allyson, an Australian opera singer/teacher and our latest arrival, Piotr, a concert pianist/teacher from Poland.
And, of course, the love of my life, Alex. We share a couple of rooms and a private bathroom at the very top of the house, overlooking the garden at the back.