Best British Short Stories 2020 Page 6

  I came up behind Cherri while the other girls were changing. Her back twitched but she didn’t turn around. She was sitting on her own, already dressed, her rucksack next to her. It was tough today, wasn’t it? I said. She didn’t reply. I sat down. It took me years to get where I am. And I’m not even qualified yet! Would speaking to your father help? We could all get together, talk about your confidence. She shrugged. You could try. She said it in a disembodied way, like a ventriloquist’s dummy, repeating it with an exaggerated slump of her shoulders.

  I had often seen Mr Smithley – or John, as he said to call him – waiting in his car for Cherri. He had never looked across to see me staring. But calling would feel like we were carrying on a conversation, because he had been on my mind since I had first spoken to him, his smile with its even white incisors, and the way my hand burned. After class, I scrolled through the emergency contacts list on my phone. My heart beat faster. My nerves were unexpected. I had to swallow several times for fear that I would run out of air when he answered.

  The ringing stopped. John, he said, as though he was going to be the subject of the conversation. It’s Vashti, Cherri’s teacher? Don’t worry, nothing has happened. I feel we need to talk about Cherri’s confidence. Obstinance, he said. Confidence, I repeated. Maybe her mum would want to come along. She died when Cherri was five. I’m so sorry. Is there anyone she might have for feminine guidance? I waited, cupping my mouth. Fiona, my wife. Of four years. But let’s say there are many ways in which a marriage can be over. It’s hard to be on your own, I said, before he had to explain further. You’re very supportive, Vashti. Sometimes the most potentially able students are the least self-assured, I replied. He murmured yes, maybe we could talk about that over dinner. I laughed, because I didn’t want him to think that I was naive. It would be deeply unprofessional of me, I said, thinking of how I had never been so compromised as to say those words before and how I might never be again.

  The walls of Bonita’s were mounted with muddy macros of flowers. Candles in dimpled red jars glowed on every table. The mid-tempo music was evocative of beaches and tropical weather, even though all I could see out of the big windows was the movement of the empty escalators. I was in Lakeside Thurrock, a giant shopping centre off the motorway. On the phone, John had said he liked its atmosphere – and that it was nice to get out of Wakesea for the evening. But he looked flustered when he came in, despite being early. The wet wrinkled half-moons of his underarms slid into view as he took off his unscuffed leather jacket. He sat down and looked around. I like to see what the big boys are doing, he said. Who are the big boys? I asked. The big boys of franchising. I’m in the franchising business, he said. Anyway, tell me about yourself.

  The room went dark, light, dark as the candles flickered. I felt as though we were in a play and had to perform ourselves. Everything looked like a prop. I became nervous, the way I always did when anyone asked me to talk about my life. I had established facts about myself – I was once a dancer, now a modern jazz instructor for children. I was nearly twenty-seven. He slapped the table, so the cutlery jumped. I thought about being an actor when I was your age. He said your age dismissively, as if he had beaten me to my age in a race. I can do great impressions, he said. I don’t watch television or the news, I said. You won’t know who I’m impersonating then, he said, raising his eyebrows.

  I might go back to dancing, I said. He examined the bowl of guacamole near my plate. You’ve been at the school a long time, he said. Have you heard of YouTube? I asked him, my mind racing. I didn’t know anything about YouTube but it sounded impressive, like I was thinking big. We could film the girls dancing. Cultivate them as personalities. I just need to convince Barbara. The Tube, it’s on the computer, isn’t it? I’m not a computer guy, he said. Anyway, I can’t really leave her, I said. She’s given me a lot of opportunities. She built the dance school from the ground up. I recited what I had written on the funding application earlier that year: Barbara’s is the most successful touring dance school in the eastern region.

  I’m fascinated by you, he said. It was hard to explain to a self-made businessman that some of us got satisfaction from being needed in ways that didn’t always confer authority. If everyone put themselves first, we’d be doomed. What do you want? he asked. It was the way he said you, as though I had never thought about myself before.

  We stood in the car park facing each other. What’s going on? I asked, because I had been telling myself not to ask. He moved forward, so I had to stare up at him. You intrigue me, he said. It seemed a strange thing to say after I had told him about myself. He wanted to pretend that he didn’t know what was happening between us. I knew that meant we would see each other again. But the only way I could be sure of what he was thinking was to make him think the same as me. I grabbed his neck, drew him closer. He began kissing back after a few seconds. Hoo, he said afterwards, I wasn’t expecting that. He looked at me sideways. It reminded me of how I had been told to look at goats in the petting zoo when I was younger, but I think he was trying to show me that he was shy or that it was his best angle.

  Barbara seemed to know that something had changed. She called me to her office for a catch-up session. While I had never purposely kept anything from Barbara, I thought it best not to tell her about John. It was nice not to share something with my boss, as though I had a lurid piece of gossip about myself. He had called me the previous night. He spoke on the phone with a different voice and I pretended not to know him as he told me his sexual fantasies.

  During summer, Barbara and I relocated the school to various coastal towns in Essex. The rest of the year, we had a small studio in Colchester. Barbara drove back every night, and because I still hadn’t learnt to drive, I rented a place in whatever town we were staying in and sublet the little flat I had in Colchester. But her office felt the same wherever we went. The scent of clary sage which she pumped into the air every few hours to relieve her tension. The blinds always down.

  Have you heard of YouTube, Barbara? Pardon? she said, adjusting her glasses and then the golden orb she wore around her neck. Whenever I suggested anything new to do with the business, she became tired or her hearing went, so that it was embarrassing to repeat myself. Nothing, I replied. I’ve seen you moping, Vee. I’m not going to be around for ever, she said, again. The first time, I’d thought she had cancer or some other terminal illness, but she had been saying it for a year now.

  You have to empower yourself. She reached for the clary sage. Long walks, flower-arranging, learning Italian, weightlifting, decoupage, kick-boxing – pick one, she said, when I asked her how. Empowerment sounded lonely. She was trying to hand me my freedom in the way that people do – teasingly, haltingly. But I was afraid, so I said I was happy.

  John and I went to another restaurant in the shopping centre. I called our dates parents’ evenings and he thought it was because of his age, not because he was a parent. At the restaurant, he made notes, asking me to rate it on a five-point scale for service, presentation and ambience. I kept thinking of what Barbara had said, about empowering myself. Pasta kept falling out of my mouth, like I couldn’t concentrate on doing two things at once: eating and looking normal. What’s wrong? he asked. We both watched my unchewed gnocchi land back onto the plate. My jaw snapped the empty air. Work, I said. Afterwards, we drove back to Wakesea, the water flat and black below us, the town’s outline sawtoothing the sky.

  White lozenges of motorway signs dissolved into the dark and we were finally in the town, winding past the tiny houses. He put the radio on, a song that had been playing from every car and shop all summer. The chorus went carry on having fun, fun, fun/never stop being young. This is such an odd place for a lone woman to move to, he said. He said ‘lone woman’ in a quavering voice like someone might say ‘lone killer’. I’ve always wanted to move around for my work, I said. But it probably wouldn’t have happened if Barbara hadn’t called the day after the psychic. I stopped speaking, changed the radio station. What
psychic? He glanced at me, and then looked away swiftly, as if he was worried I would answer. I shook my head. Nothing. My road came into view. It was always quiet, as though the other residents had fled.

  I lived in a rented house at the end of the terrace. John peered out at its lit windows. He didn’t turn the engine off. Why are the lights on? I do it to put off the burglars, I replied. I’ve told you that. He had never come into my house before. I asked him nervously whether he was going to get out. He leaned over and kissed me, mouth pursed. And then he moved back and stared ahead, seemingly waiting for me to leave. Well, I’ll hear from you soon, I said. I got out and slammed the door. The night air was cold coming in from the sea. It tapped my chest and my bare arms. I searched for my key, hoping it wouldn’t take so long that it looked like I was waiting for him, but also that I wouldn’t find it so quickly that I would disappear into the house and he would forget about me, about us.

  The car idled outside as I stood in the hallway and stared into the mirror. My make-up had run. I looked like a child’s drawing of a dangerous stranger. Lipstick bleed, mascara pitted around my eyes. Was that why he hadn’t come in? No one withheld for that long. When I went into the kitchen, the floor was covered in slugs. They must have come in when it rained. But it was now so hot again that they had dried up. I didn’t have any cutlery, or anything sharp, apart from a nail file that I had left on the counter. I knelt down on the floor and scraped up one greying slug with the file and threw it into the bin. Then I walked back into the living room to draw the curtains. The halogen bulb made the fat pink roses on them swim. I switched it off and lifted a curtain. John was watching me from the car, his face grainy in the darkness. I imagined him as a strange man compelled by my every move. I walked to the door slowly and waited for him to knock.

  At the end of each class, the girls practised their routine for the show. There were two weeks left before the finale. The better dancers had solos, the less good ones were part of the general chorus. Cherri danced by herself in a corner of the room. She had not come to resemble John, but sometimes I could see him crouched behind her eyes, watching me. It made me want to reach an uncomplicated part of him. Cherri, shouldn’t you be over there? I pointed to the other back row dancers who were watching us. I realised that the abrupt movements that she was making were part of a sequence that she had devised herself.

  You said that you wanted to see me dance, she said. Cherri had not yet learnt how to synchronise her arms and legs. She could still only move one set of limbs at a time. My self-parenting guide had taught me that handling such moments wrongly could be permanently damaging, that my words could one day pound in her head like blood. You have to practise a lot to do a solo, I said. People have expectations, not just me but all the people who will watch you. I know, she said, as if that was unimportant. We could dance together after class. Just you and me, I said.

  She peered down at her new-looking trainers. The soles lit up and were inappropriate for dancing. I can do it myself, she said. But you can help if you want. Will your dad come to the finale? I asked, after a few seconds, as if it was an afterthought. She nodded. We could work on a dance that will impress him, I said. She looked up sharply. I don’t want to impress him, she said, I just don’t want to be in the back row.

  Have you been with an older man before me? John asked a few days later. I said yes. He looked disappointed. I picked up the oil bottle from the side of the bed and put it into the cupboard, which was mostly empty, apart from a few toys I had bought in anticipation of tonight. He lay on the bedsheets, his head behind his hands, his body stiff, like he was imitating someone relaxing. This house is so unlived in, he said. What’s your house like? He didn’t answer. Will you put pictures up if you stay? he asked. He kept looking around at the bare walls. No, I don’t think so, I said. I hadn’t noticed before that they had nothing on them. I lay down next to him and put my head on his chest. Staring up at the ceiling, I noticed for the first time that someone had traced a smiley face with the gloss paint. Terrible things happened to you once, he said. Before we met, he added. I didn’t know how he knew, but it made me think that we could connect. When people shared their most awful and life-changing experiences, they were more likely to fall in love. It wasn’t just a coincidence Barbara found me when she did, I said.

  I thought about it every day but when I told it, gaps inserted themselves. The order became confused. I left home and moved to a bedsit in London where I spent every night circling job adverts in Loot. I stopped dancing because classes were too expensive. Something had to change but I didn’t know who could change it, I told John. And then a business card came through the letterbox. It was from a real psychic called Nebula. I called and made an appointment. I went to Nebula’s place in Camden. She stood in the hallway, vest top sliding down her shoulders, cargo pants falling off her skinny hips. She led me through beaded curtains that kept on swinging and knocking against each other as we walked down another corridor. There were laminated pictures of ethereal, pastel women on the walls. She took me into a small, dark room with a white plastic table and two chairs, which looked like garden furniture.

  Nebula sat me down, drew my arms into the centre. She closed her eyes, squeezed my fingers. We held hands until the table started shaking and she began digging her nails into my skin. The whites of her eyes became so big it was like they’d been boiled. You’re cursed, she said. I need £50 to lift the curse. That was the exact amount that I had saved from my dole for next month’s rent. I don’t have £50, I said. She sighed, got up and switched the light on. Started opening one cupboard after the other, leaving them ajar. We were in a kitchen but there was no food anywhere or anything that might be useful: no plates, no cups, just a polystyrene container with dried noodles hanging from its lip. When she turned to me, she had an armful of green candles. She bundled them towards me: Take these, burn as many as you can, she said.

  I went back to my bedsit with the candles in a carrier bag. I drank three cups of lumpy instant coffee and lit each candle, watching until they burnt to nubs. I fell asleep before the last one. The next morning Barbara called me on my phone and said that she had a job for me. I had applied for so many that I didn’t know who she was or what she was talking about, but I said I’d take it.

  I didn’t tell John about the fire. When I stopped talking, he was sitting upright, staring at the door. It was past midnight. You should speak to someone, he said. About what? I asked. The curse, he said. By someone, he meant a professional. Not him. After a few minutes, he got up and started looking for his trousers. I need eight hours of sleep every night, he said. I always need eight hours, whatever happens. He laid out his trousers on the bed before going to the bathroom, clutching his white pants in his fist. His peeing was loud, as if he were pouring water out of a bucket into the toilet. It went on for ages. He came back into the room and sat down next to me. His underwear sagged below his rounded stomach. I wanted to reach out and stroke the soft hairs tufting in the dough. There’s no such thing as a psychic, he said. Just charlatans. I know, I replied. I wondered what it would be like to be Cherri, and whether he patted her head in the same way.

  John stopped pretending to be a stranger. He said that he wanted to see me in person only, me as me. In the meantime, Barbara was away and I was in charge of the school. I had never been in charge, not in seven years of assisting her. I paid the rent on the hall, I checked in with parents, I updated our website. My anxieties were being stealthily replaced by new ones, like when people’s homes get made over on weeknight television by well-meaning friends and neighbours. What if I stayed in one place? What if I pursued my own dream of dancing in front of adults?

  There was a week left before the finale. I went to the little room at the back of the building where I liked to get ready after class. It had been a dressing room when the building was a theatre. Everything was stripped out but a small table and a mirror with lightbulbs around it, the kind you imagine an actress would use in a melodrama. There we
re framed posters on the wall for amateur performances of Grease and West Side Story. Boxes of abandoned props stacked against the walls. I felt the emptiness of the whole place behind the door, as though I might step out into nothing. I started taking my day make-up off, putting my night make-up on. I was seeing John that evening. There was a knock, as I began swiping my cheeks.

  I had watched the last girl leaving, waited for the clang of the front entrance shutting behind her. There should have been no one left. Cherri’s snot-bubble voice came through the door: are you there? Can I come in? I thought you’d gone, I said. I opened the door. She stood, coat draped over one arm, milky thumbprints on her glasses. Dad says he’s going to be late, she said. She wriggled onto a patchy velvet stool in the corner. We had never been alone together for any length of time since the first day of the summer school.

  In the mirror, I watched her twist around and look at the boxes. Are you getting dressed for something? You look so beautiful, she said, digging her fingers under a glove. I like to be ready for anything, I replied. I didn’t want her to think that she had to wear make-up to look beautiful. But it was important to be prepared. Beauty on the inside is fine, but it’s not going to last for ever, I said. The world can make you feel terrible about yourself. I glued on my lashes. Can I ask you questions? she said. I made a noise that could not have been construed as either yes or no, in an attempt to politely deter her. I had been careful not to pay too much obvious attention to Cherri, but I had not thought that she was paying attention to me.