Kate O’Mara - Good Time Girl

‘Have I missed the end? Damn. What happened?’ Sal demanded, entering and plonking herself down on the end of the bed. ‘Soup won’t be a moment.’

‘Nothing much,’ replied Claire, trying to sound normal, ‘Billy cut his hand and was carted off to hospital. The preceding forty-five minutes were so dull I nodded off.’

‘Dear God, it’s getting more like The Archers every week – what’s the matter with you?’ Sally interrupted herself to look at her friend suspiciously. ‘You haven’t been blubbing again, I hope?’ There was a painful pause as Claire tried to regain control of her feelings to no avail.

‘I miss him,’ she whispered miserably. ‘Oh, Sal, I loved him so much,’ and she burst into uncontrollable sobbing.

Sally was apparently unmoved by this spectacle. ‘Really?’ she said dryly, ‘I suppose it’s possible to love a turdfaced piece of shit –’

‘Don’t speak about him like that,’ protested Claire between sobs. ‘He’s beautiful …’

‘Handsome is as handsome does,’ observed Sally sagely, relenting and putting her arms round her friend’s shoulders. ‘What he did wasn’t very pretty, though, was it?’ she asked gently.

‘No,’ agreed Claire, brokenly trying to overcome her sobbing. Eventually she said, ‘Sal …’

‘I’m here.’

‘Sal, I wish I could have had the baby.’

Neither of them said anything for a long while.

Claire’s childhood had been almost idyllic. Generous, strong, loving parents had given her a splendid education. She had responded to her happy upbringing in kind. A hardworking, lively intelligent girl, she had done well at school, always coming among the top of her class. She was well-mannered, considerate and charming, and, being an only child, learned to amuse herself. She was an avid reader and loved good music – in every way the perfect child. Until she reached her teens. Still hardworking and ambitious, but now moody, temperamental and a rebel, she flouted her parents’ authority on every occasion, slamming doors, screaming at the top of her voice for no apparent reason and disappearing for days on end. On her return, she would refuse to inform them where she had been. Indeed, she hardly communicated with them at all. Her mother bore this transformation in her adored daughter with true Anglo-Saxon stoicism, was patient, kind and tried to understand. Claire’s father, however, retreated, literally and metaphorically. He withdrew into a hurt silence and increasingly shut himself away in his study. Communication became a problem between all three. Claire conversed with her mother only in monosyllables, and when on rare occasions, Beatrice Jenner tried to elicit from her daughter what was troubling her, she became totally silent and would then disappear again for several days. Her mother would fret and then pretend that nothing had happened when Claire returned.

Her parents were not surprised when Claire announced that she would not be sitting her A levels, but instead was joining a group of friends on a trip to Turkey. Her mother was horrified, her father outraged, that their daughter should throw away her education and chance of university for a whim. Claire argued that a trip in a Land Rover exploring new lands would be an education in itself. But unchaperoned? There would be other girls, well, one other. And three men. But why not sit her exams and go in the summer? Because they were going now, and in any case, she didn’t want to go to university. She had no desire to teach, for God’s sake! Well, what did she want to do then? Beatrice made every effort to get through to her daughter. Her husband sat silently staring at the arrangement of dried flowers that occupied the hearth during the summer months.

‘I want to be an actress,’ Claire announced.

Both her parents were stunned. It was the first intimation they had ever had of it.

‘But you know nothing about acting or the theatre, dear,’ her mother had protested.

‘I don’t care. It’s what I want to do. It’s what I’m going to do.’

A strained argument followed, which continued through the evening. Eventually a compromise was reached. Claire would forgo Turkey. She would sit her exams, and her parents would pay for her to go to drama school. If she could get in, of course. Claire was jubilant. Her ruse had worked. Did they really think she would not sit her exams? She’d worked so damned hard for them. She was not about to be thwarted of the brilliant results she knew she would surely get. And she was going to drama school, a closely kept dream come true.

She had never told anyone about it, even her best friend, Debbie. Claire knew that her parents imagined that she was indulging in every vice known to man or woman when she disappeared for days on end. Nothing could have been further from the truth. She would go off into the country and hide away in a caravan belonging to Debbie’s aunt. They would go for long walks, revelling in the freedom, and work quietly at their A levels. Admittedly, Claire did feel the odd pang of guilt knowing that her mother would be worried about her, but she would quell it hurriedly. She half confided her dream of being an actress to Debbie, but didn’t reveal the whole truth. She casually mentioned that she might like to become a photographic model. Debbie was thrilled and lost in admiration. It sounded so glamorous and so unattainable. Claire shrugged it off as though it were unimportant, and decided not to tell anyone of her secret longing, not until it became a reality.

Claire’s mother, although initially shocked by her daughter’s revelation, comforted herself with the hope that perhaps all the pent-up emotion that seemed to be locked in Claire’s bosom would now find an outlet. And so it proved. Claire had sailed through her auditions and been accepted at one of the leading drama colleges. And she had done well there, too, winning the Shakespeare prize at the end of her three years. It had not been easy to get work when she left, but she had managed to attract the attention of an up-and-coming young director in a workshop she’d done for schools and filmed for television. It had been just the break she needed, getting into TV and innovative theatre work simultaneously. There followed a season with one of the more prestigious repertory companies. A critic whose opinion was respected tipped her as a young actress to watch. She was on her way. And then she met Roger.

It was three days since Claire had had her abortion. She had known at the time that it was probably the only sensible course. Roger no longer loved her – if indeed he had ever loved her. She had wanted the baby for his sake. A small thought had crept into the back of her mind. She had tried to brush it away, but it kept coming back. Had she wanted the baby just to keep Roger, to make Roger love her again? If so, his reaction could hardly have been worse.

‘Well, I hope you don’t think it’s mine,’ he had said furiously when she had broken the news to him.

Claire had looked at him stunned. ‘I haven’t slept with anyone else,’ she had cried. ‘I love you. Why should I want to fuck anyone else?’

‘Oh do try to be adult, Claire,’ Roger said baldly.

‘What do you mean “adult”? I trust you are not trying to tell me that you have fucked someone else?’

‘Well, of course I have.’

It had been said. There was a long frozen silence. She’d half suspected it for months. It wasn’t much of a shock, but it was numbing nevertheless. She felt icy inside. It explained everything – why he’d been ignoring her phone calls, his behaviour on the infrequent occasions they had been together. His lovemaking had been perfunctory; expert but almost clinical. Claire sat there appalled, not looking at him for ages.

Finally she said, ‘I’d better go.’