But Toto, I’m not in Kansas any more.
‘Terrible about what happened to you last week, Jessie love,’ says Mrs Foley kindly. ‘Big fuss over nothing if you ask me. And they really fired you just for doing that? For taking the offer of a free car?’
‘Yes, they really did.’
‘But sure I watched the whole thing myself. They made it very hard for you to say no. Nearly forced it on you, they did.’
‘Yeah, you’re right, they did,’ I agree, touched and grateful to her.
‘Well, if you ask me, you should have had more sense, Jessie Woods,’ snaps Mrs Brady, treating me exactly like I’m still the kid she used to give out to for sitting on her front wall and damaging her geraniums. ‘You big roaring eejit. No such thing as a free lunch, sure the dogs on the street could tell you that. You should have told them where to go with their flashy car and then you’d be on the telly tonight, wouldn’t you? Instead of walking the streets, looking like a refugee.’
I’d forgotten that about Mrs Brady. She has a very nasty side to her.
‘So what’ll you do now, love?’ says Mrs Foley gently. ‘The papers all said no one would come near you for work, you poor pet.’
‘Emm…well, I’m actually hoping to take a bit of time out and just, emm…you know, reassess my options,’ I manage to say, weakly.
The pair of them look completely unconvinced, so I try changing the subject instead.
‘So how’s Psycho, Mrs Brady?’ Psycho is her son. He’s my age, we were in junior school together and from what I heard, he went on to spend most of his teenage years in juvenile prison. Everyone calls him Psycho, ever since he was about three. Even his mother.
‘Ah, he’s grand, love. Thanks for asking,’ she smiles proudly, instantly brightening. ‘He’s getting out on TR tomorrow, so we’re having a bit of a knees-up for him. You should drop in if you’re still around. He was always very fond of you. And I happen to know that he’s single at the moment.’
‘Ehh, sorry…TR?’
‘Temporary Release. Please Jesus, with a bit of good behaviour, he could be out before the summer. Only a short stretch this time, thank God.’
I ooh and aah about how brilliant that is and am just about to make my excuses when the gang of kids, led by Omen-boy,spots me.
Shit.
Next thing, there about eight kids all clustered around me, demanding to know whether or not I’m your one off the telly?
‘Go on,’ says one. ‘Take off the baseball hat and sunglasses till we can get a decent look at your face!’ says another one, while a third, who can’t be more than about eight, whips out a camera phone, shoves it right under my nose and starts taking photos.
“Cos if you really are Jessie Woods,’ he says cheekily, ‘then I’m emailing this to the Daily Star.Might make a few quid.’
Which serves me right of course. I should have remembered that round here the only safe, harassment-free time to walk down this street is in pitch darkness, preferably between the hours of 2 a.m. and 5 a.m., when it’s a kid-free zone. They really should have a sign up, warning people.
‘Leave the poor girl alone, you ignorant shower of pups!’ says Mrs Foley, shooing them away with her apron. ‘How would you like it if you got the sack and then your fella dumped you, all in the one week?’ Then she realises that I’m still standing right beside her and claps her hand over her mouth, mortified. ‘Oh, Jessie love, I’m sorry. I hope I didn’t embarrass you, pet. It’s just that it’s been all over the news ever since yesterday. About you not going out with that good-looking businessman any more, what’s-his-name.’
‘Imagine getting dumped and the first thing your ex does is go running off to the papers,’ sneers a third neighbour who’s just joined us. She’s leaning on a yard brush and has a perm so tight that it’s almost as if someone poured a tin of baked beans over her head. I haven’t the first clue who she is, but she seems to know more about my own private life than I do myself. Sam and his bloody, bollocking press release included. He warned me he was going to do it, ‘Put a full stop to this,’ as he’d said during our last, nightmarish phone call, so I knew it was inevitable. But it still somehow feels like someone’s physically taken a shovel to my insides. Right. Officially had enough. Got to get outta here.
‘Sorry, but I’m afraid I really should get going…’ I say lamely in an attempt to make a run for it. No such luck though.
‘You should have married that Sam Hughes when you had the chance, Jessie,’ pontificates Mrs Brady. ‘Then at least you’d have a few quid to show for yourself. Or you could have had a baby with him, then maybe he’d think twice about running to the press to tell everyone it’s all off with you. Plus you’d have the child maintenance coming in every week, which would have come in very handy, now that you’re jobless…’
‘The secret to a long and happy marriage’, says Baked Bean Head, leaning on her yard brush, ‘is that the man has to be scared shitless of the woman. They only really respect you when they’re completely terrified. You must have gone far too easy on him, Jessie…’
OK, it’s at this point I officially can’t take any more. ‘I’m really sorry, ladies, but I have to get going.’
They turn to glare at me, like I’m being rude to just walk away when they’re all busy throwing out their pearls of relationship advice, but at this point I’m beyond caring. I take a deep breath and turn into our tiny front yard. And almost fall over when I see the state of it. I’m not messing, there are actual statues of stone angels blowing into trumpets dotted around the tiny grassy bit, the original agony in the garden. Trying my best to keep my stomach from dry-retching at the very sight of it, I knock firmly on the front door.
And wait.
And wait again.
A kafuffle from the TV room inside, followed by a clearly audible row about who’s going to get up and answer the door. Which is followed by another glacier-slow wait before the door is eventually opened. By Joan, my stepmother. Dressed, and I wish I were joking here, pretty much like Cher on the Reunion tour. It’s almost scary the way everything matches; her suit is deep purple and so are the nails, lipstick and shoes. With, the final touch, tights the colour of Elastoplast. Honest to God, there are mothers of brides out there who’d blush to be seen in this get-up.
‘Jessica!’ she says, with a horrified, icy smile so fixed that it almost makes her look embalmed. That’s another thing about her; she’s the only person in the northern hemisphere who calls me Jessica. ‘What in God’s name are you doing here? It’s not Christmas Eve, is it?’
‘Emm, I did phone to say I was calling today, do you not remember, Joan? About an hour ago? You told me to be sure to call after Britain’s Got Talentbut before American Idol.’
Now coming from any other family, that might sound pig rude, but the thing about these people, certainly when I lived with them, was that their lives entirely revolved around the TV schedules. And clearly that hasn’t changed.
‘Oh, did I? I really have to start writing things down. I also have to have a drink. Right then,’ she sniffs, looking down at me like I’m about as welcome as a fungus. ‘Seeing as you’re here, I suppose you’d better come through to the drawing room.’
By which I’m assuming she means the TV room, which is the only reception room in the house, apart from the tiny kitchen. But then that’s Joan for you, everything gets talked up. In fact, I’m surprised she doesn’t refer to the minuscule patch of grass in the front garden with the ludicrous gakky stone angels as the ‘meditation and contemplation’ area.
So in I go and am instantly struck by just how garish the place looks. So utterly different to when it was just me and Dad living here. The hallway, which is minute, dark and poky, now has a patterned cream Axminster carpet with loud polka-dot wallpaper in pink, blue and green. The overall effect of which is to make me feel like I’m trapped inside a bottle of prescription pills. No trendy, ‘less is more’ minimalism going on here; this has turned into the house that taste forgot. Joan catches me staring gobsmacked into the kitchen, which is straight ahead of us, and completely misinterprets my dropped jaw.