There’s a girl crying by the Chanel counter in Fraser’s. At first I can’t be sure that it is not an accident. I think perhaps her tears are directed towards the Elizabeth Arden counter but she just happens to be standing slightly closer to Chanel. But then I realise there is no mistaking it. She is facing the Chanel counter head on. She cannot be any more than five feet from the counter itself and is staring directly at the shelves. She is not overly dramatic, her tears are subtle and sincere. I only notice them because I notice most things. It’s my only talent. I watch her and wonder why she could possibly be crying. I come up with these possible reasons, although I’m sure there are more.
Firstly…
She applied for a job with Chanel recently. At the interview everything had seemed so promising. They liked her. She had lots of relevant experience. She made them laugh with customer service related anecdotes but did not overstep the mark into dominating the conversation. She said what was necessary and only a little more. This tiny bit more acted like the tiny layer of foam on top of the perfect latte (she liked that analogy). She listened intently to everything that was said to her. She asked an appropriate amount of questions: enough to appear interested but not so many as to seem retarded. She had dressed smartly that morning but not stiffly. It’s difficult to impress women through clothes. She knew this. There are unwritten rules on the interview dress-code. It is not necessary that the unwritten rules are followed strictly in everyday life. This is because you never know what has happened to a person on The Average Day. A girl may have no clean clothes on The Average Day. Or maybe she has slept in and has just grabbed the first things that came to hand before rushing out. These are allowances one must always make for people on The Average Day. But on Job Interview Day things are very different. You know you have to create some sort of impression with your outfit. You are only in the room for fifteen minutes, so you must present yourself positively in every way possible. The interviewers know this and so are aware that you have carefully considered your outfit. They know you probably chose it at least a few days ago, in order to make sure it would be clean in time, and you probably laid it out the night before. They are aware that you have deliberately chosen to portray yourself a certain way with this outfit and therefore the outfit itself is a very important part of the assessment process. In the broadest of ways, if you arrive in jogging bottoms and a hooded jumper, it is clear you have made no effort and are obviously lazy, disorganised or a non conformist. And, likewise, if you arrive having made a lot of effort you will come across as someone who makes a lot of effort in life, a planner and do-er. A real Go Getter. And, being a girl seeking employment at the Chanel counter in Fraser’s, you must present yourself in the correct manner in order to be considered for the position. You must always be hovering over that very fine line between frumpy and slutty. Fitted but not tight. Feminine but not frothy. Skirt length is very important. If it is too short women will hate you, especially if they are middle aged and too fat to wear short skirts themselves anymore. Too long, however, is slightly worse. A lot of people find this information surprising. The reason is that if you wear a long skirt it puts some women on the defensive. In wearing a long skirt it can give the impression that you are taking the long skirt high-ground; that you find more than an ankle’s worth of skin on show vulgar. This in turn implies that you frown upon women drinking, premarital sex and have a general air of moral superiority. The same rules apply to the neckline of your top. A polo-neck is equivalent to a long skirt and a low cut number is tantamount to a mini skirt. The best option is a top that shows collar-bone and possibly a little chest-bone, but certainly no cleavage. And, likewise, a skirt that sits on the knee and rises no higher than the top of the knee when sitting is ideal. So on interview day, she had adhered to every single rule in the book. When it was time for her to leave she stood up to shake hands with both of her interviewers. They smiled and the chubbier one said “Thanks for coming, I’m sure we’ll meet again very soon” with a wink. She tried not to look too pleased by this statement and thanked them for their time. As soon as she was safely out on the street she took her phone out of her bag, switched it on and giddily called her mother and two of her best friends with the good news. Two weeks later she still had not heard from Chanel. Subconsciously, she found herself walking into the same store she had left with such high hopes only two weeks before. The woman who had interviewed her was coaching a young girl on the desk, explaining the till and the chip and pin card system. The woman glanced up and caught her eye with a definite look of recognition. But as quickly as the look had come it was shoo-ed away and the woman casually looked around the rest of the store before walking away, as if she just remembered something she had been meaning to do. It was at this point that the girl started crying, rooted to the spot. Not because she wanted this job more than any other job, or because she had liked the woman and was upset to be so obviously scorned. She was crying because for the first time in her life she thought she had gotten something right. She had tried her very hardest in every possible way and invested more energy in that interview than she had ever invested in anything before. Then she had spent two whole unemployed weeks (which are significantly longer than employed weeks) telling everyone how it was almost certain that she had a job. That the woman had pretty much guaranteed in her parting comment and wink combo that the job was hers, that she had impressed them so much that they had given her the job before they had even met the rest of the applicants. Her mother had cooked her a special dinner to celebrate and her dad had did that thing to her head with his knuckle that dads do and said “Good on ya pet, I’m proud”. And when they still didn’t call she buried her head in the sand, unwilling to admit the possibility that she was unsuccessful in her application. But standing there, in front of the Chanel counter, there was no denying it: her very best just wasn’t good enough. Not even for a shitty job in a shitty shop and maybe it never would be.
Then there’s possibility number two.
Maybe she had been a bit of an asshole in high school. Not especially thick or clever, she had invested her time in becoming especially well regarded amongst her peers. Instead of attending classes she smoked bongs down by the river with her massive gang of girlfriends. When she was supposed to be sitting her Chemistry exam, which with a little effort she could have passed, she was shoplifting in boots for outrageous make-up she would never wear. So upon leaving school at 16 there were few career options open to her. She got a job in a local campsite and spent her days cleanings caravans. When she was 17 she met a boy and fell pregnant. At the time he was nothing special but, years later, it would turn out that he was a pretty great guy. Within three years they had two kids together, a girl and a boy. They were beautiful children: he was quiet and inquisitive, she was loud and brash. The council were good to them, they got a house almost immediately. She never regretted having these kids or having them with this man, but life wasn’t easy. When she woke up in the morning, he was already out at work. And then in the evening he’d come home and she’d hand over the kids so she could go out to work herself. By the time she got home he was in bed asleep and that was it until the next day. But although they seemed to work every hour of the day between them, they never seemed to have enough. Bills mounted up and they could never spoil their kids the way they wanted to. She’d meet friends in the street with shopping bags. They’d tell her how they’d had such a good spree in whatever shop, only ten pounds for this dress and those shoes, and how she should pop in herself. See what she could snap up. But she’d always walk away angry. Not at them, mind you. Just at the fact that if she wanted to spend ten pounds she’d have to really think about it. She’d have to sit down on a Friday, when they both got paid, and work out their incomings and outgoings. She’d consider whether it was really feasible for her to spend this unnecessary money. Then she’d weigh up how much she wanted whatever it was she was buying against the guilt she would feel for weeks for buying it. And, time and time again, the guilt would win and the money would be set aside for emergencies like school trips and broken boilers. This day, however, she thought “fuck it”. They’d manage on however much money they had but she needed a luxury. She would go to Fraser’s and pick herself out something that for one day would make her feel carefree and pampered. She wouldn’t spend a lot. It might only be a couple of testers. Maybe if she looked respectable enough they’d think she had money and give her a free makeover. She strolled through the department’s double doors and glanced around. She gave herself a fake identity which would bring with it absolute confidence. She was the wife of a well to do city banker who spent her days lunching and trying on ridiculous shoes in Nine West: a lady of leisure. She marched down the aisle and envisioned herself hosting a dinner party in a West End townhouse. She was a lady. She deserved luxurious skincare products as much as anyone. The women with orange skin looked over at her as she walked but she didn’t falter. These bitches could go fuck themselves. She was the wife of a successful city banker after all. She approached the Clinique counter first. There was nobody there to serve her to begin with. This was mildly irritating. Did they assume that she was not worth serving? That she had no money to part with on this particular day? She was a fucking baroness. The assistant appeared behind the counter, asked if she could help. She said maybe she could. Did they sell anything for wrinkles, she asked. The woman said yes, they did. She brought out a couple of bottles, no testers. The girl picked them up, turned them around in her un-manicured hands, studied them intently. She asked if they were suitable for dry skin. The assistant said they were. Then she added that they were quite expensive, twenty six pounds for a tiny bottle. The girl glared at her. Don’t you think that is within my price range, she demanded. The girl apologised but Too Little Too Late. In her tiny statement she had made massive insinuations. This assistant had taken one look at her and had assumed that she had no money, that she lived in a council house, that she and her partner didn’t even get half an hour awake together on any day so they could take care of their unplanned children. Well fuck her. She was Diana, Princess of Wales. How dare this woman suggest otherwise? She explained very curtly that she did not require petty shop assistants to make petty assumptions of her and she would much rather spend her money somewhere that would grant her a little common courtesy and provide her with the respect that any other customer would receive. With this she stormed off in the direction of the Chanel counter. She pulled her recently settled credit card out of her purse, just to be sure it actually existed. She would buy a bottle of perfume from this counter because she could, no matter what that bitch had implied. But a bottle of perfume on it’s own would not be substantial enough. From the perspective of the Clinique assistant, the bottle of perfume could be a sample or a sachet. One item does not a victory make. So she would buy a range of things. Yes she would buy the perfume. And she would buy the facial cleanser, the toner and the moisturiser. She would buy the exfoliating face-mask for special occasions. She would buy cream for her cuticles and serum for her T-zone. She would splash out and ask for the Chanel assistant to reach up and pass her down a tiny little tube of gunk that would reduce the bags under her eyes. The kind of stuff that costs fifty times more than gold per gram. Yes, that would be visible to everyone in the shop. Then that whore at Clinique would see what a big sale she had missed out on and how she would be lucky if she was not fired for offending such a valuable customer. She was excited now, this was great. The Chanel assistant waited graciously for her, anticipating this massive purchase that could quite possible earn her employee of the month. Maybe even year. But just as she approached the counter a middle-aged woman skipped the queue. So much so that the girl not only had to stop, but she had to take a step backwards. She waited impatiently, watching the generously proportioned housewife discuss her troublesome laughter lines with the unnaturally orange girl behind the till. Then she caught herself. She wasn’t a baroness. She wasn’t even a housewife. She was a servant to two small children. She earned the price of a Chanel facial cleanser in one night of wiping tables and ignoring leers. If she bought even one of these items the three of them would have to walk everywhere that month. Bus fares would be spent. If she bought two, her son would have to take a month off karate lessons. What was she thinking? The middle-aged woman had gone, the woman at the counter looked at her expectantly. And she looked back an equal before looking up and letting go. She tried to maintain her stern demeanour, but could not prevent those few tears leaking out and falling down her face. Partially because she felt stupid in front of the women she would never see again, partially because she had very almost bought a load of unnecessary items that would cripple her family financially for months and partially because she deserved to wear Chanel as much as, if not more than, the fat middle-aged woman who spent over the odds on something that could never reverse the effects that nature had already had on her. And probably mostly because these things shouldn’t matter to her. She should have bigger fish to fry.
And option number three.
The girl had been born into the ideal family. She had two brothers, both older, and a mother and father who loved each other very much. No, better: they actually enjoyed each other’s company. They had lived in a hamlet not far from the city. Her dad worked as a very successful architect in the city centre and would commute daily. They were never spoiled but never had to worry about money either. Her mother was primarily a full time mother, the best and luckiest kind, but was heavily involved with a charity who provided respite for young carers. She taught her and her brothers many things: how to draw, how to settle arguments, how to bake cakes and how lucky they all were, amongst other things. And her mother’s favourite perfume was Chanel No.5. Although she never wore it all the time, only on special occasions, her clothes always had at least a slight scent of it. Her scarves especially. But then when she was seven her mother had died suddenly. They’d said she was sick and they weren’t wrong. She had later learned that she had taken her own life with a couple of dozen paracetmol. But how do you tell a 7 year old that her mother had wanted to die? So one day this girl had a mammy and the next she didn’t. After that everything was different. It wasn’t that her dad or brothers didn’t love her enough, or that she was neglected in any way. But it just wasn’t the same. And as time went on, her memories slipped away. Had she known that she was going to be so unceremoniously robbed of her beautiful mother she would have tried to create better ones. Stronger ones. She never resented or blamed her mother for what she did. She never blamed herself either, but that was something she did regret.She would have asked her more questions about what she liked, like colours and songs and cakes and books, so she could know her more as a person and not just a mother. She would have sat and listened to her when she was out hanging up the washing instead of messing around in the garden. She would have cuddled her more and never would have whined. And she would have studied her face so she had a picture of her in her mind that was her own, not given to her in the form of a photograph. But, as it was, all she had were fragments and moments with no context. She remembered a cold hand being held against her hot forehead. She remembered Patsy Cline playing in the car and her mother’s soft, tuneless voice singing how she too was crazy for feeling so lonely. And she remembered getting dressed up for something and her mother wrapping her Chanel No.5 scented shawl around her tiny shoulders as the finishing touch. So now she was grown up these little things were very important. When she was sick she wished her mammy was there to touch her forehead with the back of her hand. When she heard that Patsy Cline song played over the radio, she wished it was being ruined by that soft, tuneless voice. And when she caught a hint of Chanel No.5 in the air she was always floored, and wished that she hadn’t been so careless as to let her mum leave her life so abruptly and without a trace.
Or maybe she just had something in her eye.
Firstly…
She applied for a job with Chanel recently. At the interview everything had seemed so promising. They liked her. She had lots of relevant experience. She made them laugh with customer service related anecdotes but did not overstep the mark into dominating the conversation. She said what was necessary and only a little more. This tiny bit more acted like the tiny layer of foam on top of the perfect latte (she liked that analogy). She listened intently to everything that was said to her. She asked an appropriate amount of questions: enough to appear interested but not so many as to seem retarded. She had dressed smartly that morning but not stiffly. It’s difficult to impress women through clothes. She knew this. There are unwritten rules on the interview dress-code. It is not necessary that the unwritten rules are followed strictly in everyday life. This is because you never know what has happened to a person on The Average Day. A girl may have no clean clothes on The Average Day. Or maybe she has slept in and has just grabbed the first things that came to hand before rushing out. These are allowances one must always make for people on The Average Day. But on Job Interview Day things are very different. You know you have to create some sort of impression with your outfit. You are only in the room for fifteen minutes, so you must present yourself positively in every way possible. The interviewers know this and so are aware that you have carefully considered your outfit. They know you probably chose it at least a few days ago, in order to make sure it would be clean in time, and you probably laid it out the night before. They are aware that you have deliberately chosen to portray yourself a certain way with this outfit and therefore the outfit itself is a very important part of the assessment process. In the broadest of ways, if you arrive in jogging bottoms and a hooded jumper, it is clear you have made no effort and are obviously lazy, disorganised or a non conformist. And, likewise, if you arrive having made a lot of effort you will come across as someone who makes a lot of effort in life, a planner and do-er. A real Go Getter. And, being a girl seeking employment at the Chanel counter in Fraser’s, you must present yourself in the correct manner in order to be considered for the position. You must always be hovering over that very fine line between frumpy and slutty. Fitted but not tight. Feminine but not frothy. Skirt length is very important. If it is too short women will hate you, especially if they are middle aged and too fat to wear short skirts themselves anymore. Too long, however, is slightly worse. A lot of people find this information surprising. The reason is that if you wear a long skirt it puts some women on the defensive. In wearing a long skirt it can give the impression that you are taking the long skirt high-ground; that you find more than an ankle’s worth of skin on show vulgar. This in turn implies that you frown upon women drinking, premarital sex and have a general air of moral superiority. The same rules apply to the neckline of your top. A polo-neck is equivalent to a long skirt and a low cut number is tantamount to a mini skirt. The best option is a top that shows collar-bone and possibly a little chest-bone, but certainly no cleavage. And, likewise, a skirt that sits on the knee and rises no higher than the top of the knee when sitting is ideal. So on interview day, she had adhered to every single rule in the book. When it was time for her to leave she stood up to shake hands with both of her interviewers. They smiled and the chubbier one said “Thanks for coming, I’m sure we’ll meet again very soon” with a wink. She tried not to look too pleased by this statement and thanked them for their time. As soon as she was safely out on the street she took her phone out of her bag, switched it on and giddily called her mother and two of her best friends with the good news. Two weeks later she still had not heard from Chanel. Subconsciously, she found herself walking into the same store she had left with such high hopes only two weeks before. The woman who had interviewed her was coaching a young girl on the desk, explaining the till and the chip and pin card system. The woman glanced up and caught her eye with a definite look of recognition. But as quickly as the look had come it was shoo-ed away and the woman casually looked around the rest of the store before walking away, as if she just remembered something she had been meaning to do. It was at this point that the girl started crying, rooted to the spot. Not because she wanted this job more than any other job, or because she had liked the woman and was upset to be so obviously scorned. She was crying because for the first time in her life she thought she had gotten something right. She had tried her very hardest in every possible way and invested more energy in that interview than she had ever invested in anything before. Then she had spent two whole unemployed weeks (which are significantly longer than employed weeks) telling everyone how it was almost certain that she had a job. That the woman had pretty much guaranteed in her parting comment and wink combo that the job was hers, that she had impressed them so much that they had given her the job before they had even met the rest of the applicants. Her mother had cooked her a special dinner to celebrate and her dad had did that thing to her head with his knuckle that dads do and said “Good on ya pet, I’m proud”. And when they still didn’t call she buried her head in the sand, unwilling to admit the possibility that she was unsuccessful in her application. But standing there, in front of the Chanel counter, there was no denying it: her very best just wasn’t good enough. Not even for a shitty job in a shitty shop and maybe it never would be.
Then there’s possibility number two.
Maybe she had been a bit of an asshole in high school. Not especially thick or clever, she had invested her time in becoming especially well regarded amongst her peers. Instead of attending classes she smoked bongs down by the river with her massive gang of girlfriends. When she was supposed to be sitting her Chemistry exam, which with a little effort she could have passed, she was shoplifting in boots for outrageous make-up she would never wear. So upon leaving school at 16 there were few career options open to her. She got a job in a local campsite and spent her days cleanings caravans. When she was 17 she met a boy and fell pregnant. At the time he was nothing special but, years later, it would turn out that he was a pretty great guy. Within three years they had two kids together, a girl and a boy. They were beautiful children: he was quiet and inquisitive, she was loud and brash. The council were good to them, they got a house almost immediately. She never regretted having these kids or having them with this man, but life wasn’t easy. When she woke up in the morning, he was already out at work. And then in the evening he’d come home and she’d hand over the kids so she could go out to work herself. By the time she got home he was in bed asleep and that was it until the next day. But although they seemed to work every hour of the day between them, they never seemed to have enough. Bills mounted up and they could never spoil their kids the way they wanted to. She’d meet friends in the street with shopping bags. They’d tell her how they’d had such a good spree in whatever shop, only ten pounds for this dress and those shoes, and how she should pop in herself. See what she could snap up. But she’d always walk away angry. Not at them, mind you. Just at the fact that if she wanted to spend ten pounds she’d have to really think about it. She’d have to sit down on a Friday, when they both got paid, and work out their incomings and outgoings. She’d consider whether it was really feasible for her to spend this unnecessary money. Then she’d weigh up how much she wanted whatever it was she was buying against the guilt she would feel for weeks for buying it. And, time and time again, the guilt would win and the money would be set aside for emergencies like school trips and broken boilers. This day, however, she thought “fuck it”. They’d manage on however much money they had but she needed a luxury. She would go to Fraser’s and pick herself out something that for one day would make her feel carefree and pampered. She wouldn’t spend a lot. It might only be a couple of testers. Maybe if she looked respectable enough they’d think she had money and give her a free makeover. She strolled through the department’s double doors and glanced around. She gave herself a fake identity which would bring with it absolute confidence. She was the wife of a well to do city banker who spent her days lunching and trying on ridiculous shoes in Nine West: a lady of leisure. She marched down the aisle and envisioned herself hosting a dinner party in a West End townhouse. She was a lady. She deserved luxurious skincare products as much as anyone. The women with orange skin looked over at her as she walked but she didn’t falter. These bitches could go fuck themselves. She was the wife of a successful city banker after all. She approached the Clinique counter first. There was nobody there to serve her to begin with. This was mildly irritating. Did they assume that she was not worth serving? That she had no money to part with on this particular day? She was a fucking baroness. The assistant appeared behind the counter, asked if she could help. She said maybe she could. Did they sell anything for wrinkles, she asked. The woman said yes, they did. She brought out a couple of bottles, no testers. The girl picked them up, turned them around in her un-manicured hands, studied them intently. She asked if they were suitable for dry skin. The assistant said they were. Then she added that they were quite expensive, twenty six pounds for a tiny bottle. The girl glared at her. Don’t you think that is within my price range, she demanded. The girl apologised but Too Little Too Late. In her tiny statement she had made massive insinuations. This assistant had taken one look at her and had assumed that she had no money, that she lived in a council house, that she and her partner didn’t even get half an hour awake together on any day so they could take care of their unplanned children. Well fuck her. She was Diana, Princess of Wales. How dare this woman suggest otherwise? She explained very curtly that she did not require petty shop assistants to make petty assumptions of her and she would much rather spend her money somewhere that would grant her a little common courtesy and provide her with the respect that any other customer would receive. With this she stormed off in the direction of the Chanel counter. She pulled her recently settled credit card out of her purse, just to be sure it actually existed. She would buy a bottle of perfume from this counter because she could, no matter what that bitch had implied. But a bottle of perfume on it’s own would not be substantial enough. From the perspective of the Clinique assistant, the bottle of perfume could be a sample or a sachet. One item does not a victory make. So she would buy a range of things. Yes she would buy the perfume. And she would buy the facial cleanser, the toner and the moisturiser. She would buy the exfoliating face-mask for special occasions. She would buy cream for her cuticles and serum for her T-zone. She would splash out and ask for the Chanel assistant to reach up and pass her down a tiny little tube of gunk that would reduce the bags under her eyes. The kind of stuff that costs fifty times more than gold per gram. Yes, that would be visible to everyone in the shop. Then that whore at Clinique would see what a big sale she had missed out on and how she would be lucky if she was not fired for offending such a valuable customer. She was excited now, this was great. The Chanel assistant waited graciously for her, anticipating this massive purchase that could quite possible earn her employee of the month. Maybe even year. But just as she approached the counter a middle-aged woman skipped the queue. So much so that the girl not only had to stop, but she had to take a step backwards. She waited impatiently, watching the generously proportioned housewife discuss her troublesome laughter lines with the unnaturally orange girl behind the till. Then she caught herself. She wasn’t a baroness. She wasn’t even a housewife. She was a servant to two small children. She earned the price of a Chanel facial cleanser in one night of wiping tables and ignoring leers. If she bought even one of these items the three of them would have to walk everywhere that month. Bus fares would be spent. If she bought two, her son would have to take a month off karate lessons. What was she thinking? The middle-aged woman had gone, the woman at the counter looked at her expectantly. And she looked back an equal before looking up and letting go. She tried to maintain her stern demeanour, but could not prevent those few tears leaking out and falling down her face. Partially because she felt stupid in front of the women she would never see again, partially because she had very almost bought a load of unnecessary items that would cripple her family financially for months and partially because she deserved to wear Chanel as much as, if not more than, the fat middle-aged woman who spent over the odds on something that could never reverse the effects that nature had already had on her. And probably mostly because these things shouldn’t matter to her. She should have bigger fish to fry.
And option number three.
The girl had been born into the ideal family. She had two brothers, both older, and a mother and father who loved each other very much. No, better: they actually enjoyed each other’s company. They had lived in a hamlet not far from the city. Her dad worked as a very successful architect in the city centre and would commute daily. They were never spoiled but never had to worry about money either. Her mother was primarily a full time mother, the best and luckiest kind, but was heavily involved with a charity who provided respite for young carers. She taught her and her brothers many things: how to draw, how to settle arguments, how to bake cakes and how lucky they all were, amongst other things. And her mother’s favourite perfume was Chanel No.5. Although she never wore it all the time, only on special occasions, her clothes always had at least a slight scent of it. Her scarves especially. But then when she was seven her mother had died suddenly. They’d said she was sick and they weren’t wrong. She had later learned that she had taken her own life with a couple of dozen paracetmol. But how do you tell a 7 year old that her mother had wanted to die? So one day this girl had a mammy and the next she didn’t. After that everything was different. It wasn’t that her dad or brothers didn’t love her enough, or that she was neglected in any way. But it just wasn’t the same. And as time went on, her memories slipped away. Had she known that she was going to be so unceremoniously robbed of her beautiful mother she would have tried to create better ones. Stronger ones. She never resented or blamed her mother for what she did. She never blamed herself either, but that was something she did regret.She would have asked her more questions about what she liked, like colours and songs and cakes and books, so she could know her more as a person and not just a mother. She would have sat and listened to her when she was out hanging up the washing instead of messing around in the garden. She would have cuddled her more and never would have whined. And she would have studied her face so she had a picture of her in her mind that was her own, not given to her in the form of a photograph. But, as it was, all she had were fragments and moments with no context. She remembered a cold hand being held against her hot forehead. She remembered Patsy Cline playing in the car and her mother’s soft, tuneless voice singing how she too was crazy for feeling so lonely. And she remembered getting dressed up for something and her mother wrapping her Chanel No.5 scented shawl around her tiny shoulders as the finishing touch. So now she was grown up these little things were very important. When she was sick she wished her mammy was there to touch her forehead with the back of her hand. When she heard that Patsy Cline song played over the radio, she wished it was being ruined by that soft, tuneless voice. And when she caught a hint of Chanel No.5 in the air she was always floored, and wished that she hadn’t been so careless as to let her mum leave her life so abruptly and without a trace.
Or maybe she just had something in her eye.
1 comment:
Brilliant! Simply brilliant!
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