Page 46 of We All Live Here
“Oh, God,” says Lila out loud. “Now I’m repulsing myself.” DELETE.
I met Richard at a nightclub, where I had spent most of the night dancing, letting my cares disappear on the thumping beat. I had danced until sweat stuck my dress to my body, and my hair dripped with it. He grabbed my wrist as I was walking out to the Ladies and something about his burning eyes
Jean-Claude was a poet from Paris
Vince was a builder, his whole body covered with tattoos and his muscular torso
She has been trying to invent sexy escapades for three days now, and none of them sound like anything but the worst, cheesiest pornography. Sometimes she thinks it’s because distant griping means it’s impossiblefor her to get her head into a place that is sexy and real. Sometimes she blames Gabriel Mallory, who failed to respond to a simple request for a drink and whom she has avoided by asking Bill to do the school pickup this week.
Sometimes she thinks it’s because it’s so long since she had any kind of sexual contact that she cannot imagine what it involves anymore.
Lila puts her head onto her keyboard and lets it rest there.
Vince was a builder, his whole body covered with tattoos and his muscular torso sdfffffffffffhjjjkjkjkjkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkllll lllllllllsdffffffffffffhjhjkhkhjkhkjhjk
•••
“So here arethe lists of the costumes we need.”
Lila has finally braved the school pickup, and of course Gabriel Mallory is not there and of course Mrs. Tugendhat is. She is wearing a pair of maroon paisley dungarees and thrusts a sheet of paper into Lila’s hands. She looks like a vaguely malevolent children’s television presenter.
“Ideally we’d like them by the start of term, but I understand that’s not always possible, given the numbers. If you can’t do them all, just do the lead eight.”
Lila gazes at the list, having completely blanked on what Mrs. Tugendhat is talking about.Peter Pan and the Lost Boys, it says. And suddenly she remembers, six weeks ago, the request for costumes. “Eight?” she echoes.
“There’s plenty of time really,” says Mrs. Tugendhat. “We say homemade is best, but…” she lowers her voice and gazes behind her “…if you look on eBay you can often find second-hand ones that are just as good. Lots of parents get rid of their old school-play costumes that way.But you didn’t hear it from me!” She taps her nose, and grins conspiratorially, before walking off to collar someone else on her list.
Lila is staring so intently at the list as she walks out—green tunic and tights for Peter, large fake mustache, pirate jacket, hook for Captain Hook—that she walks straight into one of the school mums.
Except it isn’t a school mum.
“Hey!” Gabriel Mallory says, as she blinks in shock. “How are you doing? Long time no see.”
“I’m fine,” she says quickly, and goes to steer Violet around him.
“What’s that?”
She doesn’t want to talk to him, but it’s too difficult to move with Violet standing resolutely in front of her, suddenly engaged in conversation with Lennie. She cannot turn left because that would involve walking straight into the group of mothers, and she can see Marja’s glossy blonde hair out of the corner of her eye.
“Oh,” she says, not looking at him, “just something for the school play.”
“The school play. Yes, Lennie has a part. I can’t remember what she said. Maybe a Lost Boy. She’s excited, anyway.”
“That’s nice,” she says, still not looking at him. She feels as if the entire expanse of her skin is prickling. It is too hard being near him, too humiliating. She keeps staring at his vegan trainers. “We’d better go, we’re…late.”
“For what?” says Violet, the traitor.
“Uh…Grandpa is going to take you out,” she says, quickly.
“Grandpa Gene?”
“Yes.”
“Where?”
His jacket is crumpled linen and looks expensive. She is too close to it, too close to him.
She can feel Marja’s presence nearby, can smell the fruity scent shesometimes wears, something melony and fresh. Lila is basically the unwanted filling in the worst sandwich in the world. “He didn’t say, sweetheart,” she mutters.
