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Fashion

My favourite book when I was growing up was called The Little White Horse. There were two things about it I remember particularly. One was the sugary biscuits that were left in a silver tin in the heroine’s tower bedroom. Some even had little pastel flowers iced on them. The other was the heroine’s journey to the castle to stay with her unknown uncle. She was nervous, but still able to get pleasure from her beautiful laced-up boots tucked away under her long skirts. Even though no one else could see them, she knew they were there, and that was enough.

It gave me a thrill of recognition. It probably shaped my life. Made me see the strength you could get from having the right kind of secrets.

I spend a lot of time shopping. I search out clothes which have special things about them only I will know. I hug these to me. A certain colour that makes me want to eat it; a lining of soft plum silk; the Liberty print trim to a denim pocket; a perfectly shaped pleat which kicks up the edge of a skirt.

Coco Chanel knew all about this. She used to sew a gold chain invisibly into the hems of her jackets so they would be ideally weighted around the bottom.

I think if I could have a jacket like that I would die happy. I would be buried in it.

See Codes, Underwear, Women’s Laughter

Fat Women

I am the last person to judge anyone else based on appearances alone, but I wonder if anyone else notices how difficult it is to see a fat woman and a small thin man together and not think of them having violent, needy and possibly perverted sex?

See Indecent Exposure, Sex, Toys, Voyeur, Weight, Wrists

The Fens

Every time I tell people I come from the Fens, the only thing they can think of to say is, ‘Well, there’s certainly a lot of sky there.’ But here are three other things to know about the Fens:

1. A lot of the children I went to school with had webbed feet. In the Fens, this is quite usual. They weren’t heavy like duck feet, but just a sliver of thin skin, so transparent as to be like silver, between each toe and the next.When these children flexed their toes, it was the most beautiful sight I could imagine, especially after swimming when the drops of water would glisten and sparkle.

2. The roads in the Fens are long and straight and run alongside treacherous dykes. They look even straighter because the houses on either side are slipping lower and lower back into the soil. If I was quiet, I could almost hear it sucking at me. Anyway, because it gets so dark at night – all that sky – a lot of people have accidents and drive into the ditches and die. Often when we were driving in the Fens during the daylight, we would see bouquets of flowers by the side of the road from the night before.

A doctor and his wife once had a terrible accident in the ditch opposite our house. He managed to get out of the car before it got submerged but she drowned. He was so grief-stricken that he sat on the side until he was sure she had died. It became a craze for many months afterwards, imagining just what it must have felt for the wife with all that water pressing against the car window, and being able to see her husband through the waves, watching her scream.

3. Not many people appreciate that if you lie in a field of broad bean plants in flower, just as the sun is going down, you will find yourself surrounded by the smell of Chanel No 5. It just goes to show that if you know where to look there is beauty in even the most unlikely places.

See Fat Women

Firefighting

Sometimes when I’m busy at work, I think of Sally’s new life as a mistress, and wonder how she is keeping herself occupied. When we left school and started work, we had so many plans. We were going to start a business together and although we could never decide what to do we had lots of ideas. We were going to train in martial arts and hire ourselves out as bodyguards. We’d look like classy dates, but if someone tried to kill our partners, we’d be able to high-kick our way out of trouble. We were going to run a truly caring removal company, make novelty cushions, revamp people’s wardrobes. In the meantime I went to work for a bank and Sally got a job selling advertising space for the local newspaper. That’s when she persuaded me to follow her into the media, although I was worried at first because my personality has never been as bouncy as hers. I could never cold-call like Sally could.

For example, one summer holiday Sally got us both a job selling fire extinguishers. We were supposed to walk into shops and while one of us distracted the shop assistant, the other would start a small fire that we would then put out with the fire extinguisher to show how efficient it was.

My father found out what we had to do on the day we were supposed to start, and banned me from joining Sally on safety grounds. Although she kept telling me how much fun she was having and how much I was missing out, I was secretly relieved. Sometimes the things Sally makes herself do frighten me.

See Attitude, Danger, Impostor Syndrome, Sex

Forehead

Sally asked me what I thought of Colin.

I said he was OK. Nothing special. Nothing worth throwing your life away for. But then Sally said that Colin had told her I was a bit intense. Apparently I keep staring at him.

At first I didn’t know what he was talking about. But then I realised. Colin plays rugby. He’d come to the pub with a group of his friends after they’d been playing in the park. It was true. I couldn’t stop looking at them. They all had the same foreheads. A bulging shelf that hung over their eyes and made them look unfocused and brainless. Other men didn’t have this. The rugby players even shared the same wavy wrinkles across their foreheads. It was as if an empty space had been badly filled with cement and then someone had made patterns on it with a comb when it was still wet.

I wanted to ask why rugby players look and sound permanently concussed, but they were all busy talking to each other and ignoring Sally and me. I didn’t think Colin had seen me looking.

See Nostrils, Vendetta, X-rated, Youth

Friends

Every time I go out now with the girls, we talk about Sally.

I think that nowadays we spend more time thinking about her than we ever did when she was spending time with us. We wonder if she’s really happy, if she thinks Colin is genuine in his desire for her, what it must be like to have such a one-sided relationship. We agree we only have her best interests at heart.

We are supportive even though Sally doesn’t always deserve it. I know that Miranda hasn’t forgotten the time we were talking about making love and she was explaining the importance of truly caring for the other person and how necessary it was to be treated as if you were someone precious.

‘I could never have inappropriate meaningless sex,’ Miranda said finally. She was so earnest that Sally was the only one round the table who didn’t nod.

‘I could,’ Sally said, staring at the businessman on the next table, and ignoring Miranda’s frown. She left the restaurant with the businessman, and afterwards she wouldn’t tell anyone what had happened. Not even when we begged. She said we wouldn’t approve.

It was so typical of her, but even so, the last thing we all want is for Sally’s relationship not to work out.

Whenever I ring Sally to pass on everyone’s best wishes, she laughs.

‘We’re here waiting for you if things don’t work out,’ I tell her but she says that’s just what she’s worried about.

See Outcast, Vendetta