Читать книгу One Summer In Paris - Sarah Morgan - Страница 13

Audrey

“How did your exams go, Audrey, dear?”

Audrey adjusted the temperature of the water and directed the spray so that it ran over the hair and not near the eyes. If there was such a thing as an exam in hair washing, she’d ace it.

“They weren’t great, Mrs. Bishop.” She’d started working in the salon for a few hours on a Saturday when she was thirteen. She’d done it to give herself an excuse to leave the house and had been surprised by how much she enjoyed it. The best part was chatting with customers, and they were startlingly honest with her. After five years, many of them felt like family. “The thing I hate most is when you come out of the exam and the other kids are all talking about what they wrote for each question and you know you totally messed it up. Is that temperature right for you?”

“It’s perfect, dear. And I’m sure you didn’t mess it up.”

Audrey was sure she had. She knew for sure she’d gotten at least two of the questions muddled up on that last paper. She’d got confused between discuss and define.

Whichever way you looked at it, exams sucked but at least they were done now.

She pumped shampoo into her palm and started lathering Mrs. Bishop’s hair. The woman’s hair was thin on top, so Audrey was very gentle. “I’m not going to do a second shampoo, Mrs. Bishop, because your hair is a bit dry. I’m going to use a moisturizing treatment if that’s okay.”

“Whatever you think, pet. You’re the expert.”

“How is Pogo?” Audrey struggled with facts when they were in a textbook, but she had no trouble remembering the smallest detail of people’s lives. She knew all about their pets, their kids and their illnesses. Pogo was Mrs. Bishop’s Labrador, and the love of her life. “What did the vet say about the lump?”

“It was nothing serious, thank goodness. A cyst. He removed it.”

“That’s good. You must be relieved.” Audrey rinsed carefully.

“What will you do now your exams are over? Will you work here full-time this summer? We’re all hoping you do.”

It was tempting. Audrey loved the people and she enjoyed the work. For some of the women who came to the salon, their ten minutes at the basin with Audrey was the only time they relaxed during the week. Her high point had been when customers started asking for her because her scalp massage was so good.

No one had ever said Audrey was good at anything before.

But staying at the salon would mean living at home, and Audrey couldn’t wait to leave.

“I’m going traveling.”

She sprayed the treatment onto Mrs. Bishop’s hair and massaged gently.

“Oh, that’s bliss, dear. You always use just the right amount of pressure. You should do a massage course.”

Audrey used her fingertips on Mrs. Bishop’s forehead. “The clients would probably all be dirty old men.”

Mrs. Bishop tutted. “I don’t mean that kind of massage. I mean real massage. For stressed people. There are plenty of those around.”

“Yeah, I should probably start with myself.”

“You’d be fantastic. You could do makeup, too.” Philippa Wyatt, who came in every six weeks to have her color done, joined in the conversation from her chair in front of the mirror. Her hair had been segmented and was currently wrapped in tinfoil. She looked like a chicken about to be roasted.

“How are the preparations going for the wedding, Mrs. Wyatt?”

“My daughter changes her mind every five minutes. One minute the cake is going to be fruit, and the next it’s sponge.”

“I love sponge.” Audrey finished the head massage and rinsed off the product. She wrapped Alice Bishop’s head in a warm towel, changed her gown and guided her back to the basin.

“Thank you, dear.” The woman pressed a note into Audrey’s hand.

“That’s too much! You don’t have to—”

“I want to. It’s my way of saying thank you.” She sat down in the chair, and Audrey pushed the note into her pocket and stuck her head around the staff room door.

“Ellen? Mrs. Bishop is ready for you.”

Ellen owned the hair salon. There was a lot Audrey liked about her, not least the fact that she didn’t make Audrey split her tips. You earned it, you keep it, she always said.

“Right.” Ellen was finishing a cup of coffee. “Want to grab lunch together later? Milly can cover for us.”

“I thought I’d go for a quick walk. I need to clear my head after all those exams.”

It was a half-truth. The other half of the truth was that the fridge had been empty again and Audrey hadn’t realized until it was too late. Her mother, in a drunken state, had thrown everything away claiming it was “off.”

It wouldn’t hurt not to eat for a day, but she didn’t want to draw attention to it.

An hour later she grabbed her bag and took a walk to the local park.

It was teeming with people enjoying the sunshine. Some sat on benches, others sprawled on the grass, shirtsleeves rolled back.

Several were eating lunch. Huge slabs of crusty bread, fresh ham, packets of crisps, chocolate bars.

Audrey’s stomach growled.

Had anyone ever been mugged for a sandwich? There was a first time for everything. She could grab it and run. A whole new definition for fast food.

Maybe she should use the tip Mrs. Bishop had given her to buy food, but she was saving everything she earned to put toward her escape fund.

Trying to ignore the food around her, she pulled out her phone and carried on her search for summer jobs in Paris.

That morning she’d narrowed it down to two.

A family who lived in Montmartre wanted an English-speaking au pair with childcare experience. Audrey had never looked after children, but she’d looked after her mother and she figured that more than qualified her for the job although she still had to work out how to convince a potential employer of that without revealing more than she wanted to.

She lifted her head and stared across the park. There was a faint hum in the distance and she could see someone cutting the grass. It was June and the air was sweet with the scent of flowers.

In the distance she could see the running track. Audrey used it sometimes. She liked running. Maybe it was because it felt as if she was getting away from her life.

She imagined herself wandering around Paris in the summer sunshine with two adorable children in tow. Or they might be two annoying children. Either way, the life she could see ahead of her was so much more appealing than the one she was living now.

No more wondering what state the house would be in when she arrived home.

No more worrying about her mother. That would be Ron’s job.

Audrey felt dizzy at the thought of handing over responsibility and being liberated from it all.

The man on the grass closest to her put his half-eaten cheese sandwich down.

Not reaching out to grab it required more willpower than Audrey knew she had.

She slipped her feet out of her shoes and turned back to her phone.

A dental surgery needed someone to answer the phones and book appointments. True, Audrey didn’t speak French but there would be advantages to not understanding the inner workings of dentistry.

She was about to close the app when a photograph caught her eye.

She lifted the phone closer and peered at the text.

A bookshop on the Left Bank was looking for someone to help out part-time during the summer.

Audrey let out a snort of laughter. Working in a book-shop? If a worse job existed, she couldn’t think of it. She hated books. She hated reading.

She was about to scroll past the job when something caught her eye.

Did that say accommodation included? Yes, it did.

Audrey stared at her phone. That side of things had been worrying her. How was she going to find somewhere to live when she didn’t speak French, didn’t know Paris and had limited funds?

Her pulse raced forward, taking her imagination with it.

A job with accommodation would solve all her problems. Still, a bookshop? She saw now that it was a used bookshop. Did that mean it was full of books people had given away? That was a concept she could get behind.

What sort of person would they be looking for?

Someone brainy and serious. Audrey was neither of those things, but she could fake it if necessary. She was used to presenting a fake self to the world. She’d tie her hair back. Maybe buy a pair of glasses to make herself look more intelligent. Try not to talk too much or crack jokes. That way she’d be less likely to reveal her real self.

“Hey! Audie!” Meena appeared in front of her. “I was wondering if you’d be here.”

Meena worked at the supermarket in the high street and sometimes they managed to coincide their lunch break.

“You’re late.”

“I was being verbally abused by a customer who couldn’t find his favorite brand of canned tomatoes.”

Audrey didn’t see how a can of tomatoes could be the cause of friction, but she did know people got all revved up about different things. “Tomato rage.”

“Don’t even joke about it. I was afraid he was going to throw it at me, and it was a multipack. That would have been the end of me.” Meena sat down next to her and opened her lunch box. “Where’s your lunch?”

“I ate it.” Audrey put her phone on her lap. “What’s that?”

“I don’t know.” Meena investigated. “Pakora, rice, yogurt—that’s to absorb the heat from the chili.”

“It smells good. What’s in it?”

“Vegetables and love.” Meena grinned. “That’s what my mum told me. When I was little I thought you bought love in the market, along with carrots.”

“I can’t believe your mum makes all that for you every day and works as a doctor.”

“Yeah, well, home-cooked food is a big deal in my house. Mum says she finds cooking calming. I do, too. Sometimes I think my whole family is glued together by food.”

Audrey felt no envy that her friend had a place at Oxford University, but she envied Meena her family. “Is your sister still good at French?”

“My sister is okay but my cousin is better. She gets top marks in everything.” Meena ate a spoonful of yogurt. “It’s annoying how good she is at languages.”

“There’s a job I want to apply for, but my French isn’t good enough. Do you think she’d help?”

“Yes. If she doesn’t, I won’t help her with physics.” Meena leaned across, trying to read Audrey’s phone. “What’s the job?”

“It’s a bookshop in Paris. The pay is crap, but it comes with a studio apartment.”

With the money she’d saved from working in the hair salon she’d be able to afford to get herself to Paris and keep herself for two weeks, maybe three if she ate only one meal a day. Then she’d need to find a job.

True, she didn’t know anything about the Left Bank or the Right Bank and would definitely get them muddled up because knowing her left from her right was one of her biggest struggles, but she’d find a way.

“Wait.” Meena stopped chewing. “You’re going to have your own apartment and a job in a bookshop? That’s cool. But if your French isn’t good enough to apply for the job, how are you going to manage when you get there?”

The same way she’d lived her whole life. “I’ll muddle through.”

“You’re so brave. What do they want you to do?”

“I was hoping you could tell me that. Your French is pretty good, too.” Audrey thrust the phone toward her friend, and Meena read it quickly.

“You need to write a piece on why books and reading are important.”

“Crap.”

Meena wiped her fingers. “I thought you hated books and reading.”

“I do. I prefer movies.” Her secret passion was watching animated movies, but she’d never admit to anything so childish. “Obviously I’m not going to tell them that. Does your cousin like books?”

“Yes. She’s always reading.”

“Great. So if she could write why she loves books, in French, I’ll send that off. Can you ask her tonight?”

“Sure.” Meena peered into her lunch box. “Why does my mum make me so much food? If I ate it all I’d be the size of a small office building. Every day I have to throw it away in case she finds out I didn’t eat it all and gets offended. I don’t suppose you want some, do you?”

“Sure.” Audrey had to stop herself from falling face-first into the lunch box like Hardy and his dog bowl. “Anything for a friend.”

She consumed the rest of Meena’s food and tried to figure out a way to persuade Meena’s mother to adopt her.

She was on her way back to the salon when her mother texted.

Come home. It’s an emergency.

Audrey stopped in the doorway. Ellen was cutting hair. Milly answering the phone. The salon was heaving with people. And there was Mrs. Dunmore, who always booked on a Saturday because she liked Audrey to wash her hair.

She glanced at her phone again, torn.

Her mother’s idea of an emergency was running out of gin.

Saturday was the busiest day of the week at work. She was part of a team. She wasn’t going to let them down.

She switched off her phone and walked into the salon.

By the time she eventually arrived home, her mother was waiting for her at the front door, her face ravaged by grief and her breath smelling of alcohol.

“Ron and I have broken up.”

Audrey’s heart hit the ground. “But the wedding is in a week. What happened?”

She walked into the house and closed the door, keen to keep their problems firmly inside.

“I drove him away. Everybody leaves me. No one loves me.”

Audrey struggled to stay calm.

It was her worst nightmare. She’d put all her faith in Ron. “What did you fight about?”

“Nothing!”

“It must have been something.”

“I can’t even remember.” Linda waved her hand. “Something small. I said it was obvious that he didn’t love me and that he might as well just leave right now, so he did.”

“Did he—” Audrey swallowed. “Did he actually say he wanted to break up? Maybe he just needed some air.” She needed air all the time when she was around her mother. “Have you called him?”

“What’s the point? He was always going to leave at some point, so maybe it’s better that it’s now.” Her mother sank onto the sofa. “You’re right, I have to take control of my life.”

Audrey felt a flutter of hope. That was something, at least. “Right. We’ll make an appointment with the doctor. I’ll come with you, and—”

“I started with your room.”

“What?”

“Your room was a mess. Normally I overlook it, but I decided that from today we’re both turning over a new leaf.”

Audrey’s heart started to pound. She wasn’t the one who needed to turn over a new leaf.

“You tidied my room?”

“Not only tidied. I had a clear-out. You’re an adult now, Audrey. You don’t need all that rubbish around you. I filled two black sacks with things you should have thrown out years ago.”

Audrey stared at her mother, and a horrible premonition washed over her.

Surely her mother wouldn’t have—

She couldn’t—

She left the room at a run, taking the stairs so fast she stumbled twice.

Please no, no, don’t let her have done it.

She pushed open the door of her room and stared at her bed. “Mum?” Her voice was hoarse. “Where’s my teddy bear?”