The Photographer's Wife (6 page)

“When we get bored?” Sophie repeats, hesitating between being offended that he assumes that they
will
get bored and feeling flattered that he thinks there will be a later.

“Look, do you want this back-rub or not?” Brett asks.

And Sophie really
does
, so she nods and crawls onto the bed, then because her back hurts, she rolls to her side momentarily so that she can wedge a pillow beneath her belly, effectively lifting up her haunches just enough that the pain stops.

“Hum, nice,” Brett says, running a hand up her inner thigh.

“You promised me a
massage
,” Sophie comments, speaking through the pillow.

“Yes, right. Sorry Mistress. Massage,” Brett says with spoof seriousness as he slathers his hands in massage lotion and starts to work Sophie’s shoulder blades.

“Ooh, that’s cold,” Sophie tells him. “But don’t stop. It’s good too.”

As soon as Brett’s bulge presses through his boxer shorts against her bottom, Sophie knows that neither of them is going to be satisfied with a back rub for long.
Well, at least we’re not bored yet,
she thinks.

1944 - Shoreditch, London.

It is only ten o’clock but Barbara is walking home. Her teacher, Mrs Pritchard, has failed to turn up and the rumour amongst the children is that she is dead.

Above her, in the blue spring sky, Barbara is vaguely aware of the buzzing of a doodlebug, another of the hundreds of daily flying bombs that have been raining destruction on them for months now. The air-raid warning sounded just as Barbara was passing back out of the school gates but she doesn’t care. The sirens are almost constant these days and unlike the bombers, which needed the cover of nightfall to do their dirty deeds, the doodlebugs fall day and night. No one seems to care about the air-raid warnings anymore because caring about them simply isn’t compatible with any other activity. It’s impossible to go to the shelter every time and once that pattern has been broken, there doesn’t seem to be any point in going there at all.

The buzzing above continues and the frequency of the sound peaks overhead then begins to drop away, which means that the danger is now heading into the distance. Someone else will be listening for the splutter when it runs out of fuel. Someone else will have ten seconds to throw themselves to the ground, hands over ears. Someone else will feel the blast rip overhead and then will stand and carry on walking down the street, perhaps exchanging a raised eyebrow with a passerby at the fluke of having survived yet another near miss. Or they won’t. Or they will join the ranks of the dead and maimed.

All of this passes through Barbara’s mind but she is barely even aware of it, because war, which has been going on now for almost half her life, seems normal. She doesn’t imagine that it will end because she can’t even picture what that might mean.

When she gets to Willow Street, she finds her friend Jean sitting on the wall. Jean never goes to school and Barbara has never thought to ask her why.

“You’re back quick,” Jean says.

“Teacher didn’t come.”

“D’you want to play?”

Barbara looks up the staircase and imagines her mother in the darkened interior. She will be sitting in the armchair and Barbara knows exactly what she will be wearing, the position she will be sitting in, and the expression she will have on her face. She knows because since the factory got bombed and Minnie stopped working, none of these things change anymore. Minnie’s silent presence makes Barbara feel funny these days – sort of queasy. She thinks she should probably do something to help her mum but other than cooking and cleaning and running errands, she doesn’t know what. “OK,” she says.

“Shall I get my skipping rope?”

“OK.”

Jean runs into the dark interior of the house and then reappears with her skipping rope. She is closely followed by Yasmin.

“You not at school either?” Barbara asks Yasmin.

She stares at Barbara with her huge brown eyes and dolefully shakes her head.

“Shall we go to the gap?” Jean asks.

“Why not?” Barbara replies nonchalantly. The gap is the rubble-strewn space left by three bombed out buildings in the next street where they like to play. It’s extra-exciting because it’s totally forbidden.

“I’m not allowed,” Yasmin says.

“Then stay here, chicken,” Jean tells her. To Barbara, she says, “Come on.”

As they start to walk, Yasmin hesitates, then predictably, runs to catch up with them.

“Benjamin got hit by shrapnel,” Jean says. “They took him to the hospital. But he’ll be alright, Mum reckons. It’s just his leg.”

“His funny leg? Or the good one?”

“I don’t know,” Jean says. “I s’pose it’d be better if it’s the funny one.”

“Yes, I s’pose it would. Otherwise he’ll have two funny legs, won’t he?”

***

Barbara uses her hip to push open the door.

Minnie, looking up from the sewing machine, exclaims, “Tea! Thank God. I could eat a ‘orse.” The bombed out factory has just started sending out piecework and her mood has begun to improve.

“No horses, I’m afraid,” Barbara says, “it’s corned beef fritters.”

“Cheeky,” Minnie mutters, releasing the section of uniform that she has been sewing and stretching her arms by linking her hands behind her head. “Where’s your sister, then?” she asks.

“She’s eating downstairs,” Barbara says – a lie. As often these days, Barbara doesn’t know
where
Glenda is, and as this will either make Minnie angry or upset depending on her mood, Barbara has got used to covering for her.

Minnie scoops a finished pile of khaki collars from the table to the bed so that Barbara can put the plates down. “No greens?” she mutters when she sees the plates.

“We’ve got carrots,” Barbara offers.

“Since when were carrots green?” Minnie says. “I’m starting to wonder what Mildred is doing with everyone’s rations. Because she certainly isn’t cooking with them.”

“There’s nothing in the shops, Mum,” Barbara says. “It doesn’t matter what rations people’ve got. These carrots came from someone’s garden. A friend of Sylvia.”

“It’s not right,” Minnie says. “No potatoes, no greens, no eggs, no cheese. I don’t know how we’re supposed to win a war if there ain’t any food. It wouldn’t surprise me if Mildred is keeping the rest for herself.”

“She really isn’t, Mum,” Barbara says, lifting a slice of fritter to her mouth. “And we’re doing better than most.”

“Carrots, carrots and more bleedin’ carrots,” Minnie says. “We won’t even need streetlights by the time the war’s over.”

Once they have eaten, Minnie returns to her piecework and Barbara carries the plates back downstairs. Three women are eating similar plates of food at the kitchen table: two of them, Agnes and Sylvia, are residents of the house whilst the other, sporting a black eye, is no doubt one of Mildred’s “waifs and strays.”

“Are you sure your Glenda’s coming back to eat that?” Agnes asks as Barbara moves Glenda’s plate to the side and begins to wash her own.

“I’m here,” Glenda says breathlessly, from the doorway. “So keep yer hands off!”

Barbara turns and smiles at her sister. “I saved you some.”

“And I’ve got pudding,” Glenda says, producing a brown tube of M&M’s from her pocket.

“Sweets!” Sylvia exclaims.

“Don’t tell us what you had to do to get
those,”
Agnes comments and Sylvia nudges her and mutters,
“Agnes,”
under her breath.

“Well...” she mutters. “It ain’t much better than whoring.”

“You won’t be wanting any then,” Glenda says sourly, but with steely self control.

“You’re right,” Agnes says. “I won’t.”

“Scoot over,” Glenda says, removing her hat, then sliding onto the bench seat behind the table. “Corned beef again, is it?” she asks, as Barbara places the dish before her.

“Don’t you start,” says Sylvia. “Not unless you want to try shopping yourself.”

“Oh, I ain’t complaining,” Glenda replies. “I don’t mind the stuff, I don’t.”

Once she has eaten, she hands all of the women, Agnes included, a single M&M. Sweets are considered such treasure these days that no one even imagines that they might be given two.

“Ooh, these are good,” Sylvia says.

Even Agnes manages a nod.

“Mum sewing?” Glenda asks, once the M&M has finally dissolved in her mouth.

Barbara nods. “She’s got a whole pile to do. Collars. I should go and help her, really.”

“We both will in a bit,” Glenda says. “But first come out back so we can have a natter.”

Barbara, keen to hear her sister’s adventures, follows her down the steps to the small yard, now transformed, like most yards, into a vegetable patch.

“Our boys took somewhere in Greece,” Barbara says. “And the good guy won the elections in America.” Minnie leaves the radio on almost twenty-four hours a day, so Barbara unconsciously collects thousands of mini-facts about the war, facts which for the most part mean little to her.

“Roosevelt?” Glenda asks.

“Yes. That’s the one.”

“Well, that’s good then. Harry will be celebrating,” Glenda says. Harry is Glenda’s latest boyfriend.

"What’s he like?”

“He’s lovely,” Glenda says, pulling an almost empty packet of Target cigarettes from her pocket. In fact, Harry, in his late thirties, is a little old for a fifteen-year-old – her mother certainly wouldn’t approve. But in wartime London where everything, including men, is scarce, she is enjoying the perks.

“He gave you cigarettes, too?”

“No, I nicked these,” Glenda replies, sending her sister a wink. “But he won’t mind.”

“Where did you go?”

“To a dance at the Red Cross club,” Glenda tells her, lighting up the cigarette with studied panache.

“Ooh lovely.”

“The music was American songs. Jive. And there was hundreds of them doing it. Ever such good dancers, they are.”

“Were they all GI’s?”

“Yeah. And hardly any girls, so...”

“You had your pick.”

“I could have. But Harry was the best one there. He’s ever so good looking,” Glenda says. “Looks lovely in his uniform. He’s a sergeant. And then we went down the West End.”

“Did you, you know...” Barbara says.

“First base,” Glenda says.

“First base?”

“That’s what they call it. It means just kissing.”

"So, you kissed?”

“What do you think?” Glenda says, laughing to cover her embarrassment, because she went far further than first base. In fact she’s concerned that she may still have the imprint of the door on her buttocks. She chokes briefly on the cigarette fumes – she has only just started to smoke and it doesn’t always seem to go down the right way. But she’s determined to get used to it.

Barbara checks over her shoulder that no one is listening, then asks, quietly, “Is he a good kisser, then?”

Glenda nods knowledgeably. “They all are,” she says. “Much better than the local boys. I think I might marry myself a GI when the war’s over.”

“You could marry Harry,” Barbara says. “You’d have chocolate every day.”

“I might just do that.”

Barbara bites her bottom lip and restrains a naughty grin. “Don’t let Mum hear you say that though.”

“Over-paid, over-sexed and over-‘ere,” Glenda says, mocking Minnie’s voice as she offers Barbara another M&M from the tube.

Barbara takes one and hands back the packet. “These are smashing,” she says. “Are they from America?”

“Of course they’re from America.”

“Save some for Mum,” Barbara says. “She said she’s still hungry. And you know how she loves chocolate.”

“I can’t. She’ll want to know where it come from, won’t she.”

“Oh,” Barbara says, frowning. “Can’t you tell her Maisie got ‘em or something?”

Glenda nods vaguely. “I s’pose. But she might not believe me.”

Somewhere to the east, they hear the trademark double supersonic boom of one of the new rocket-bombs, followed, almost immediately, by the sound of the explosion.

Over the last few weeks, the doodlebugs have all-but ceased as the allies have overrun the launch-sites in France, but their particular, almost familiar terror has been seamlessly replaced by new bombs arriving from farther afield. Unlike the buzzing, spluttering doodlebugs, the supersonic rockets provide no warning – even the air-raid sirens sound afterwards, not before. Faced with such invincible technical prowess, the government is at a complete loss to even suggest what people should do and so all official channels have been pretending that these explosions, up to ten a day of them, are being caused by exploding gas pipes. But no one is really fooled.

“Bloody flying gas-pipes,” Glenda says, which has become the most common nickname for the rockets. She drags on the cigarette, then coughs again as she stubs it out on a rock.

“Ben says they’re rockets,” Barbara says. “New German rockets. The air-raid warden told him.”

“Harry told me that too,” Glenda says – a lie. “So it must be true.”

As they climb the stairs to the room, the air-raid warning belatedly sounds. It’s almost certainly a response to the explosion they just heard rather than a warning of anything to come. This lack of warning, this new impossibility, when faced with missiles that travel through space and announce themselves at the moment of explosion, this impossibility of doing anything whatsoever to protect oneself has produced a new kind of terror, so acute, so unmanageable, that there seem to be only two ways left to react. The first, opted for by a few, is to go mad. These people can be seen wandering the streets talking to themselves or sitting in corners rocking gently. But for most people, the V2 attacks have pushed them to adopt a new form of fatalistic determination that these things are beyond control. Enjoy yourself while you can, is the philosophy of the day.

“When are you seeing Har–”

“Shh!” Glenda says. They have almost reached the door behind which Minnie is sewing.

“When are you seeing him again?” Barbara whispers.

“Tonight,” Glenda says.

“Tonight?”

Glenda shrugs. “There’s another dance on over in Pimlico.”