clearing away. As she carried things into her mother’s bedroom she wrinkled her nose at the stale smell. She threw open the window and looked down into the street, at children playing and women gossiping, and took in a good deep lungful of London air. Leaving the window wide open, she picked up her mother’s large make-up bag and went back into the kitchen. She gathered up the make-up and unzipped the bag. Inside were several packs of French letters. Closing her eyes, she took a deep breath. Then, taking one of the packets, she slipped it into her own clutchbag.
If she was going to lose her cherry, at least she’d do it with proper precautions.
She made herself a cup of tea then began cleaning the lounge, putting all her mother’s dresses on hangers and arraying her shoes in neat lines around Madge’s bedroom walls. The handbags she stacked in the wardrobe, checking them first for change as she always did. Finally she pulled her mother’s bedclothes over the bed and, using the carpet sweeper, cleaned the floor.
Afterwards she made herself a coffee, lit a cigarette and listened to the Beatles on the radio, wondering if she’d ever have the chance to be part of the wild sixties - though, she admitted to herself ruefully, her mother had practised if not exactly free love, then certainly promiscuous love for years. In a funny way she envied her mother. Everything was cut and dried with Madge. You either did something, or you didn’t. There was no middle ground.
Cathy sighed. She rinsed out her cup and then began sorting through the washing basket. As she worked she dreamed of washing clothes in a nice kitchen, like the one on the Tide advert, and cooking elaborate meals for her husband Eamonn. In her dream her mother and Eamonn Senior were miraculously dead and buried, leaving their two children to live the good life with no painful reminders of the past.
Thinking of Eamonn she imagined him taking her sexually and the thought made her breath come in quick jolting gasps. He was right, she admitted. She was ripe for it. What she wasn’t ripe for was a child, a flat like this one and the hard life of the women around her: old before their time and knocking out children like Ford assembly lines.
Smiling, she decided that she, Cathy Connor, would have her cake and eat it too.
As she scrubbed, she sang along happily with the Crystals.
‘What on earth is that sitting at the end of my bar!’
Jessie Houston’s voice was scandalised and Madge’s face hardened as the words intended for her rang out over the small bar.
‘Are you off your fucking head, Ron? I’ve seen better-looking things in bombed-out houses!’
He wiped a hand across his sweating face and tried to placate his sister-in-law. ‘Leave it out, Jess.’
Jessie, eight stone of pure malevolence, looked into his face and shrieked: ‘Leave her out, more like! Outside with the bleeding rubbish. I know some of our girls are a bit long in the tooth, but at least they’re not dock dollies. And she’s a dock dolly from head to foot. I smelt the fucker before her beak came round the door.’ She looked along the bar to Madge and said in a quieter voice: ‘No disrespect, love, but I can’t have you here, sorry. The other girls will be here soon and they’ll go spare.’
Madge swallowed down her humiliation and stared challengingly at Ron.
‘She stays and that’s my final word,’ he put in.
Jessie thumped the bar. Turning on Ron, she screamed, ‘Then you run this place yourself! I ain’t being made a laughing stock. Even if we employed her, who’d have her? Look at her, Ron, for Christ’s sakes.’
Ron, used to letting the fierce little woman in front of him have her own way, said through gritted teeth, ‘She stays, Jessie - all right? I own half this club and you’d better remember that.’
Jessie’s face was white with fury. Since the death of her husband, she had come into the whoring business, and both she and Ron had been relieved
If she was going to lose her cherry, at least she’d do it with proper precautions.
She made herself a cup of tea then began cleaning the lounge, putting all her mother’s dresses on hangers and arraying her shoes in neat lines around Madge’s bedroom walls. The handbags she stacked in the wardrobe, checking them first for change as she always did. Finally she pulled her mother’s bedclothes over the bed and, using the carpet sweeper, cleaned the floor.
Afterwards she made herself a coffee, lit a cigarette and listened to the Beatles on the radio, wondering if she’d ever have the chance to be part of the wild sixties - though, she admitted to herself ruefully, her mother had practised if not exactly free love, then certainly promiscuous love for years. In a funny way she envied her mother. Everything was cut and dried with Madge. You either did something, or you didn’t. There was no middle ground.
Cathy sighed. She rinsed out her cup and then began sorting through the washing basket. As she worked she dreamed of washing clothes in a nice kitchen, like the one on the Tide advert, and cooking elaborate meals for her husband Eamonn. In her dream her mother and Eamonn Senior were miraculously dead and buried, leaving their two children to live the good life with no painful reminders of the past.
Thinking of Eamonn she imagined him taking her sexually and the thought made her breath come in quick jolting gasps. He was right, she admitted. She was ripe for it. What she wasn’t ripe for was a child, a flat like this one and the hard life of the women around her: old before their time and knocking out children like Ford assembly lines.
Smiling, she decided that she, Cathy Connor, would have her cake and eat it too.
As she scrubbed, she sang along happily with the Crystals.
‘What on earth is that sitting at the end of my bar!’
Jessie Houston’s voice was scandalised and Madge’s face hardened as the words intended for her rang out over the small bar.
‘Are you off your fucking head, Ron? I’ve seen better-looking things in bombed-out houses!’
He wiped a hand across his sweating face and tried to placate his sister-in-law. ‘Leave it out, Jess.’
Jessie, eight stone of pure malevolence, looked into his face and shrieked: ‘Leave her out, more like! Outside with the bleeding rubbish. I know some of our girls are a bit long in the tooth, but at least they’re not dock dollies. And she’s a dock dolly from head to foot. I smelt the fucker before her beak came round the door.’ She looked along the bar to Madge and said in a quieter voice: ‘No disrespect, love, but I can’t have you here, sorry. The other girls will be here soon and they’ll go spare.’
Madge swallowed down her humiliation and stared challengingly at Ron.
‘She stays and that’s my final word,’ he put in.
Jessie thumped the bar. Turning on Ron, she screamed, ‘Then you run this place yourself! I ain’t being made a laughing stock. Even if we employed her, who’d have her? Look at her, Ron, for Christ’s sakes.’
Ron, used to letting the fierce little woman in front of him have her own way, said through gritted teeth, ‘She stays, Jessie - all right? I own half this club and you’d better remember that.’
Jessie’s face was white with fury. Since the death of her husband, she had come into the whoring business, and both she and Ron had been relieved
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