Facing the Light Read Free Page A

to others. Ivan, for instance, had a really rather remarkable resemblance to a vampire and played it for all it was worth. He was foreign, he was tall and skinny, he had lots of teeth and very pale skin and eyes he himself described as ‘hypnotic’. He went in for Hammer Horror decor in his flat, which Rilla tried to avoid as much as she possibly could by managing to contrive that they always ended up here. She smiled again at her own reflection in the mirror. Her house was not exactly Ideal Home, but even if it was as flamboyant as Ivan’s, it was also cosy and there was nothing remotely Gothic about it.
    â€˜You are happy now,’ he said. ‘You are remembering last night.’
    â€˜Don’t flatter yourself, sweetie,’ Rilla said sharply, and instantly regretted it. He wasn’t the best lover in the world, but he was better than nothing. ‘I’m sorry, Ivan. It’s just that I’m a bundle of nerves about going back to my mother’s house. I can’t help it.’
    â€˜You smile,’ Ivan continued, ‘while I am weeping. What will I do without you? How will I bear it? How will I live?’
    â€˜Oh, do grow up, darling, honestly! It’s only a few days. There’s no need to be melodramatic about it.’
    â€˜You do not love me. You could not speak so if you had love in your heart.’
    She couldn’t deny it. She didn’t love him, of course she didn’t, but it was quite sharp of him to have spotted it. Rilla thought she put on a reasonable show of affectionand certainly she was always wholehearted about the sex, but her heart, well, that was foreign territory, and had been out of bounds for years. It was sometimes hard to square the way she was now with how she’d been in the days of Hugh Kenworthy, her first love. Months would go by and Hugh would simply never enter her mind, but when she
did
turn her thoughts to that time (sixteen years old, feeling everything so passionately that it seemed as though her skin were missing) she experienced something like a flood washing through her, a mixture of that old desire that made it hard for her to catch her breath. Rilla pulled her thoughts round to the present.
    â€˜It’s nothing to do with love,’ she explained patiently. ‘I’ve told you all about it. Mother’s seventy-fifth birthday party is strictly a family affair, otherwise of course I’d take you. You know that.’
    Rilla outlined her mouth with a colour called Sepia Rose, and added lipgloss, believing that one couldn’t glitter and shine too much. She had no time at all for matte and beige and the whole less-is-more philosophy. Cream cakes, red wine and prawn Bhutans with extra naans were what she craved. She hadn’t been quite truthful about the family affair. Partners, husbands, boyfriends, girlfriends were all invited, but Rilla never for a moment considered taking Ivan. She knew exactly how her mother would react to him. She’d be oh so polite, and smile the smile that made the Mona Lisa look positively open by comparison and say something like,
Welcome to Willow Court, Mr Posnikov
, but her greenish eyes would take in the slightly grubby fingernails, and her nostrils would dilate almost imperceptibly and her eyes would strip away all the pretences and discover who knew what awful truths about poor old Ivan. What would be made entirely clear to him, without so much as a word being spoken, was the feeling that he was not, in Leonora’s phrase,
one of us
.
    â€˜Do get up, Ivan, please,’ said Rilla. ‘I have to decide what to take. I really want to get to Willow Court as soon as I can.’
    She began to throw garments from the wardrobe on to the bed. Why was almost everything she owned either silky or satiny or feathered or beaded or somehow like a costume from a show? Whenever she visited Willow Court, she felt the need to find a disguise, a costume which wouldn’t