Second Chances (44 page)

'Look.
Come
to
me,'
Grace
suggested.
'On
the
way
back.
I'll
need
a
sane
voice.
Nick's
just
bailed
on
Til
again.
Or
rather
that
brain-free
zone
he's
shacked
up
with
has
got
other
plans
that
don't
include
his
daughter.'

‘Total
sod,'
Alice
muttered
without
surprise.
'Okay,
I'll
try.'

She
switched
off
her
phone
and
gazed
with
a
frown
along
the
length
of
the
road
packed
on
both
sides
with
parked
cars,
to
where
it
curved
round
and
eventually
reached
her
flat.
She
should
be
grateful
she
wasn't
Grace.
She
knew
that.
But
it
didn't
help.
Grace,
her
best
friend
since
they’d
met
stacking
catalogues
in
a
museum
when
she
came
back
from
Paris,
left
holding
the
baby
in
every
sense,
when
the
dreadful
Nick
had
heard
Tilly
was
on
the
way.
Hs
freedom,
he
apparently
believed,
was
not
to
be
compromised
by
family
life.
He
had
left
that
night.
Poor
Grace.
Well
over
him,
of
course
for
which
Alice,
who
had
loyally
put
up
with
him
for
Grace’s
sake,
was
relieved,
but
it
still
didn’t
put
her
own
life
into
perspective.

‘Trouble
is,’
she
muttered
to
herself.
‘Even
if
you
were
the
kind
of
person
who
was
virtuous
enough
to
be
grateful
for
what
you’ve
got,
and
you
my
girl
are
clearly
not,
it
doesn’t
make
not
having
what
you
want,
any
better.’

*

In
the
upstairs
front
bedroom
of
her
home,
an
identical
one
to
all
the
others
in
the
street,
Nora
Sheraton
peered
carefully
through
the
brown
plastic
venetian
blinds
to
where
she
could
see
a
great
deal
more
each
way
the
length
of
Farnham
Street
than
she
could
from
downstairs.
It
was
from
here
she
saw
Alice
as
she
came
into
view
round
the
bend
that
led
to
her
house
opposite.

Nora
instinctively
stepped
back.
The
shady
side
of
fifty,
twice
divorced,
with
dyed
blonde
hair
and
more
tracksuits
to
her
name
than
was
logical
for
a
woman
who
rarely
ventured
further
than
the
shops
five
minutes
away.
Nora,
the
eyes
and
ears
of
the
road
and
quite
pointlessly
-
since
no-one
took
a
blind
bit
of
notice
of
her
-
dictated
the
code
for
living
in
Farnham
Street.
She
hated
all
these
flats
the
houses
had
become.
And
flats
lived
in
by
young,
single
people.
Coming
and
going
at
all
hours.
And
beer
cans.
Stuck
in
her
hedge.
Not
to
mention
those
two
across
the
street.

In
Elsa’s
case,
Nora’s
interest
in
her
was
limited
to
writing
her
off
as
a
right
little
trollop.
All
that
hullabaloo
that
time
when
she'd
been
carted
off
in
that
ambulance
with
Alice
climbing
in
behind
her
and
only
been
living
there
for
a
week
as
well.
Drugs,
Nora
had
decided.
Had
to
be.
All
those
studs
and
coloured
hair.
On
the
other
hand,
Alice
fascinated
her.

It
hadn’t
taken
Nora
long
to
work
out
who
Alice’s
father
was,
indeed
the
whole
family.
When
he
died
they
were
pictured
in
all
the
tabloids.
Until
then
Nora
had
had
no
idea
that
Alice
was
the
daughter
of
a
multi-millionaire
which
was
riveting
enough,
but
the
fact
that
her
sister
was
that
soap
star
was
more
than
enough
to
ratchet
Nora’s
interest
in
Alice
well
above
anyone
else’s
in
her
narrow
little
world.

'Lives
opposite,'
she
had
started
to
say
at
the
bar
in
the
Magpie
in
the
evening.
'No,
'
she
would
raise
an
imperious
hand.
'Don't
ask.
I've
said
to
God
knows
how
many
of
those
scumbag
reporters,
or
anyone
else
for
that
matter,
you
won't
get
a
word
from
me
about
Victoria.
Or
Alice.
And
Alice
knows
it,'
she
would
end
with
a
familiarity
that
would
have
astonished
Alice
adding
the
only
truthful
fact
in
the
whole
claim:
'She's
a
very
private
girl.
Alice.'
And
then
ruined
it
by
adding:
'Like
me.'

At
that
moment
Alice
reached
her
gate.
Nora
watched
as
Elsa
emerged
from
her
flat
at
the
same
time.
She
saw
them
speak
to
each
other
and
then
look
quickly
round
to
where
Nora
was
standing
framed
in
her
window.
Hastily,
Nora
grabbed
something
from
a
pile
of
laundry
next
to
her
but
too
late
realised
that
she
had
started
cleaning
her
windows
with
a
pink
nightie
and
in
full
view
of
those
two
across
the
road.