Trio - [53]

‘Something might turn up,’ he said. ‘You live in hope.’

‘Aye, you live in hope and you die in despair.’

‘Keep doing the pools, lass.’

She watched the streets rattle past. Houses in darkness, streetlights still casting everything in an orange wash. It was perishing. They hadn’t had the heating on all winter. Just using the gas fire in the lounge. They were living on beans and toast. She still tried to keep the kids looking nice but it was hard. Aidan only had to look at a pair of shoes and they started dropping to bits and Francine growing so fast they couldn’t keep up. She’d even got them some stuff from the Oxfam shop in town. That was a real no-no. You were meant to give your kids the best, only the best, all new. Never cast-offs or if you absolutely had to then only in the family. She pretended they’d come from Woollies, they all had ladybird labels in and you couldn’t tell they’d been worn.

Brendan had taken her to task for it, thinking she’d been spending what they hadn’t got, so she’d had to tell him the whole lot had only cost a couple of bob. She’d seen the fleeting look of shame cross his features and fought against the same feelings in herself.

‘It doesn’t matter, Brendan,’ she said gently, ‘it’s just another way of keeping our heads above water.’

With no joy at the factory she now had four cleaning jobs and still they were spending more than they brought home. If she earned any more they’d dock his social. Two of the jobs were cash-in-hand as it was. Some fool somewhere had decided how much a family of five needed to live on. They must have forgotten to add a nought on the end because the amount barely fed them never mind all the rest – cleaning stuff, soap, plasters, tampons, school things, repairs, birthday cards.

Brendan had helped out on the Driscoll’s stall for a couple of months but they all knew it didn’t add up. People were holding on to their money and takings were rock bottom. Now and again he’d get a day or two labouring, on the motorway. Digging and lifting. He’d come back shattered, the sun or the wind peeled his nose and his shoulders and he’d have cuts on his hands and arms and sometimes was half-deaf from the drills but he’d have a note or two in his pocket. Enough for a bit of shopping or towards the gas or the electric. It didn't happen often. Too many after the same chance and besides it was wise not to push it, too many snoopers eager to catch them out and stop all their benefits.

Her stop next. She finished her cigarette and trod on the tab. Her day stretched ahead like an endurance test. Two and a half hours at the office block in town; five floors they covered, just the three of them. And that included everything from emptying paper bins and hoovering to cleaning toilets and polishing the big entrance hall with the industrial machines.

Then on to the nightclub, where it was clearing up tab ends and broken glass, wiping last night’s beer from the bar and often as not someone's vomit from the floor. The carpet was past saving. Years of spills creating the dark, tacky residue that made your soles stick as you walked on it. Made her skin crawl, that carpet. Third job was a private house in Prestwich where she did a different floor each weekday and always the kitchen and bathroom. A consultant lived there, working at the hospital. She’d never met him, only his wife, who acted like minor royalty. She was often out, going off to coffee mornings and exhibitions and trips to Stratford or up to London, which was where they were from originally. How could you go up to London, Megan thought? The place was 300 miles south. It wasn’t so much a direction thing, she’d said to Brendan, she reckoned it was more like a snob thing: London was better than everywhere else so London was up and everywhere else was down.

Once she’d done the big house she had to get two buses back home, squeeze in her own housework and fetch the kids. Sometimes Brendan went for them and she had half an hour with her feet up. Then it was three hours of bedlam while they were fed and did their homework and little Chris was got ready for bed. At seven she set out again to the comprehensive school. If she really pushed it she could do her section in an hour and a half but most nights she hadn’t the energy to tear about. By the time she got back the kids would be asleep, Francine and her Dad watching telly. She’d join them for a cup of tea and a final fag before turning in, the alarm set for four-thirty.

Nina

‘Nina, Nina, there’s no one meaner! Nina, Nina, there’s no one meaner!’

The four girls surrounded her, their faces curled in snarls as they chanted their latest taunts, careful to have their backs to the staff supervising the playground. She could feel herself getting hot and the red bubbles growing inside. Wanting to smash their faces and pull the hair from their heads.

‘Shut up, pigs!’ she retorted.

‘Takes one to know one!’ Sophie Broom, the leader of the gang threw back.

‘I know you are, I said you are, but what am I?’ Veronica said. Veronica was the coward. Nina knew last time she had lashed out Veronica had run calling for teacher, leaving her three friends to cope with Nina’s furious reaction, kicking feet and slashing arms. Veronica never came near Nina when she was on her own.