Amanda Robson - Envy

My body sings as you come into sight. Walking past, coated in skin-tight Lycra. I am ready for you, ready and waiting, blood pulsating through my body. Waiting for you to drop Tamsin off. Waiting for you to get in my car and talk.

I slip into the passenger seat of his car, Georgia fast asleep in my arms.

‘Jonah, I’m ashamed about what happened on Saturday night. We both made a terrible mistake. I expect you feel the same about our one-night stand. That it was a total one-off.’

He leans towards me, eyes gleaming. ‘I was rather hoping we could go on seeing each other. When you’ve had a taste of perfection it’s good to make it last as long as possible.’

I sit looking at his fine-boned face. His slightly effeminate good looks. How much had I had to drink? I have never previously found him attractive, but somehow suddenly he seemed so empathetic on Saturday night. Being with him felt so right.

‘Please, Phillip’s your friend too; neither of us want to hurt him. I love him very much. Let’s just forget what happened.’

His mouth twists. ‘Funny way of showing your feelings, shagging his best friend.’

‘I know. I’m appalled by my behaviour.’ Tears fill my eyes. ‘And I don’t want him to know what happened.’

Brown eyes darken. ‘It’s really not going to be that simple. I can’t just let this drop. I’m in love with you, Faye.’

Where are you going? Why are you turning in the opposite direction to my flat? I need to watch you even more carefully now I know how irresponsible you are. Where are you taking Georgia? She needs stability. She’s used to the crèche at your leisure club.

I reach for my coat, slam the door, and race down the stairs to follow you. The pedestrian crossing slows me down. The lights take so long. I wait at the crossing and see you walking in the opposite direction, further and further away from me. A car is trailing you. A shiny lilac Jag with a personalised number plate. You stop. The car stops. A blond head of hair leans out of the window. Your boyfriend, the blond guy from the party. Why is he meeting you at school? Is your relationship serious? Are you going to put your children through the trauma of coming from a broken home?

Back in the changing room, after my spinning class, reaching into my locker, I hear my iPhone buzzing. A new message. An electric current burns through me. Not him. Please not him. I told him I didn’t love him. I warned him if he told Phillip I’d deny it, and Phillip would trust me over him. But as I stepped out of the car eyes shining into mine, he said, ‘I like it when you play hard to get.’

My whole body stiffens when I remember the wolf-like look on his face, his usual veneer of sophistication dissolved away. I take a deep breath. If he causes trouble I’ll just have to deny it. Deny. Deny. Deny. No one can prove that he is right. The phone continues to buzz. I sigh with relief as I reach across and pull it towards me, and press green. The agency.

Mimi wants to see me.

As soon as I arrive, she ushers me in. Mimi is dressed down today. Her hair, although still purple, is not gelled into a Mohican. She has forgotten to put the safety pin in her nose. I sit opposite her wondering why she’s taken it out. Does it get in the way when she makes love, when she kisses? She smiles at me, and the skin around her eyes crinkles.

‘I’ve got a job for you,’ she says.

I open my mouth and close it again.

‘Don’t look so surprised, I do place people sometimes,’ she says.

‘What is it?’ I ask.

She leans back in her chair and folds her arms as her smile widens. ‘An assignment for the local ice-cream company.’

It’s not a national campaign, but it’s a start. Just the start I needed. A reputable local company. My heart soars.

‘What do they have in mind?’ I ask.

‘A photoshoot. Two days at most. You walking in the local woods wearing a floaty dress licking one of their ice creams, soft-focus lens. “ Dreamy and creamy ”, will be the tag line, “ Making you feel as if it’s summer all year. ” They’re intending to run an ad on the back page of the Richmond Magazine , and make a film advert for local cinema.’

‘Dreamy and creamy sounds fine to me. I accept.’

‘Don’t you want to know about the money?’

‘Of course I do, just didn’t like to ask.’

‘Four hundred pounds.’

Four hundred pounds. Not a lot but a job. Something beginning to happen at last. This is a big step up. Maybe my career will take off at last. Maybe one day, in the scale of things, my problem with Jonah will seem irrelevant.

‘What’s the matter?’ Mouse asks, as I sit at his breakfast bar sipping a cappuccino. ‘Your lips are curling downwards. Are you in a mood again?’

‘Sorry.’

‘Don’t apologise, just tell me what’s wrong. That’s what’s supposed to happen, isn’t it? You worry. Then you tell me about it because I am your friend.’

‘It’s just that life’s so unfair,’ I say with a shrug of my shoulders.

He laughs, his strange laugh, like a braying donkey. ‘There’s nothing new about that.’

‘Is that supposed to make it any easier?’ I ask.

He puts his arm cautiously around my shoulders, as if he wants to be friendly but is not quite sure how to be.

‘Please try and explain.’

‘It’s the children. Faye’s children. How come she’s been able to have them when she can’t even look after them properly?’

He looks at me intently and his eyes widen. ‘Is that what’s happening?’ he asks.

Yes, I think, but don’t reply. It is too painful to speak about. A tear begins to trickle down my face. Yes. These children, who’ve had such a good start in life, will not get the backing they need because Faye has become distracted.

Look at what happened to me. Did my life start to go wrong, the minute I was born to a mother who couldn’t look after me? Or was it always a disaster from the start?

No. My mother loved me. She looked after me as well as she could, for as long as she could. As a young child I remember her sweet scent as she held me. Sitting, snuggled up on the sofa together, watching Disney films.

‘Erica,’ she would say, ‘always remember, there is nothing as strong as a mother’s love.’ Then she would pause, and hold me against her more tightly. ‘I want to wrap you in cotton wool and protect you for ever.’

If only she had.

Once upon a time, my mother cooked a mean spaghetti bolognaise and knew how to dip strawberries in melted chocolate. I never had a dad. Mum just had lots of boyfriends who came and went. Mike, Steve, Francis, Robert, Sam, Jake and Rod. Rod was my favourite – funnier and kinder than the rest. He built a Morgan car with a kit, and sometimes took me for a ‘spin’ around the block in it.

I was happy back then. But happiness is a funny word. What does it mean? Is it an idea? A feeling? Is it real? Was it the warm contentment that began in my stomach and radiated through my body, because I had my mother and I knew she loved me? She was the pivot of my life. Maybe she still is, even though she is only a memory now.

The first day my life began to fragment I was walking home from school with my friend Geoffrey. He lived near me and every afternoon when school had finished we ambled along the road together on our way home until we parted at the third corner. Memory plays tricks. I remember sunny afternoons; frost, wind, and rain, all dissolve into oblivion.

On one such sun-dappled afternoon, we heard shouting behind us and turned around to see two boys from the year above marching quickly towards us, shouting, ‘Slag. Slag. Slag.’