Anybody Out There - Marian Keyes Read Free Page B

euro."

"Give it to me," Maggie ordered. The eldest one--he said his name was Hedwig, but it couldn't
really be--handed it over, looking at her nervously.

Maggie checked the coin was real by biting it, then she'd said to me, "Ten percent for me, the
rest for you. Okay. Show them."

So I'd shown them--obviously not for the money but because I realized I had no reason to feel
ashamed, what had happened to me could have happened to anyone. After that they always
called me Frankenstein, but not--and I know this might sound strange--not in an unkind way.

Today they noticed that Mum had left off some of the bandages. "You're getting better." They
sounded disappointed. "All the ones on your forehead are nearly gone. The only good one left is
the one on your cheek. And you're walking faster than you used to, you're nearly as fast as JJ
now."

F or half an hour or so we sat on the bench taking the air. In the few weeks we'd been doing
this daily walk, we'd been having un-Irishly dry weather, at least in the daytime. It was only in
the evenings when Helen was sitting in hedges with her long-range lens that it seemed to rain.

The reverie was broken when Holly started screeching; according to Maggie, her nappy needed
to be changed, so we all trooped back to the house, where Maggie tried, without success, to get
Mum, then Dad, to change Holly. She didn't ask me; sometimes it's great having a broken arm.

While she was off dealing with baby wipes and nappy bags, JJ got a rust-colored lip liner from
my (extremely large) makeup bag, held it to his face and, and said, "Like you."

"What's like me?"

"Like you," he repeated, touching some of my cuts, then pointing at his own face with the pencil.

Ah! He wanted me to draw scars on him.

"Only a few." I wasn't at all sure this was something that should be encouraged, so I colored in
some halfhearted cuts on his forehead. "Look." I held a hand mirror in front of him and he liked
the look of himself so much, he yelled, "More!"

"Just one more."
He kept checking himself in the mirror and demanding more and more injuries, then Maggie
came back, and when I saw the look on her face, I was filled with fear. "Oh God, Maggie, I'm
sorry. I got carried away."

But with a funny little jump, I realized she wasn't angry about JJ looking like a patchwork quilt
--it was because she'd seen my makeup bag and got The Look, the one they all get, but I'd
expected better from her.

It's been the oddest thing--despite all the horror and grief of the recent past, most days some
member of my family would come and sit on my bed and ask to see the contents of my makeup
bag. They were dazzled by my fantastic job and made no effort to hide their disbelief that I, of all
people, had landed it.

Maggie walked toward my makeup bag like a sleepwalker. Her hand was outstretched. "Can I
see?"

"Help yourself. And my wash bag is on the floor here. There's good stuff in there, too, if Mum
and Helen haven't cleaned me out. Take anything you want."

As if in a trance, Maggie was removing lipstick after lipstick from the bag. I had about sixteen of
them. Just because I can.

"Some of them haven't even been opened," she said. "How come Helen and Mum haven't stolen
them?"

"Because they already have them. Just before...you know...everything, I'd sent a consignment
of the new summer products. They already have most of these."

Two days after my arrival Helen and Mum had sat on my bed and systematically gone through
my cosmetics, discarding almost everything. "Porn Star? Have it. Multiple Orgasm? Have it.
Dirty Grrrl? Have it."

"They never told me about the new stuff," Maggie said sadly. "And I only live a mile away."

"Oh. Maybe it's because with your new practical look they think you wouldn't be interested in
makeup. I'm sorry. When I go back to New York, I'll make sure to send things directly to you."

"Will you? Thanks." Then, a sharp look. "You're going back? When? Get a grip. You can't go
anywhere. You need the security of your