Oxford Street's mad. He says nothing would drag him to Oxford Street. He says wild horses couldn't bring him here. He says Oxford Street's London's version of ...I can't remember, but it's not good."
Dante's Inferno, no doubt, Barbara thought. Some circle of hell into which women like herself - loathing fashion trends, indifferent about apparel in general, and looking dreadful no matter what she wore - were thrust for their fashion sins.
"But I love it," Hadiyyah said. "I knew I would. Oh, I just knew it."
She zipped inside. There was nothing for Barbara to do but follow.
THEY SPENT A grueling ninety minutes in Topshop, where lack of air-conditioning - this was London, after all, where people still believed that there were only
"four or five hot days each year" - and what seemed like a thousand teenagers in search of bargains made Barbara feel as if she'd definitely paid for every earthly sin she'd ever committed, far beyond those that she'd committed against the name of haute couture. They went from there to Jigsaw, and from Jigsaw to H & M, where they repeated the Topshop experience with the addition of small children howling for their mothers, ice cream, lollies, pet dogs, sausage rolls, pizza, fish and chips, and whatever else came into their feverish minds. At Hadiyyah's insistence - "Barbara, just look at the name of the shop, please!" - they followed these experiences with a period of time in Accessorize, and finally they found themselves in Marks & Spencer, although not without Hadiyyah's sigh of disapproval. She said, "This is where Mrs.
Silver buys her knickers, Barbara," as if that information would stop Barbara cold and dead in her tracks. "Do you want to look like Mrs. Silver?"
"At this point, I'll settle for looking like Dame Edna." Barbara ducked inside. Hadiyyah trailed her. "Thank God for small mercies," Barbara noted over her shoulder. "Not only knickers but air-conditioning as well."
All they'd managed to accomplish so far was a necklace from Accessorize that Barbara thought she wouldn't feel too daft wearing and a purchase of makeup from Boots. The makeup consisted of whatever Hadiyyah told her to buy although Barbara sincerely doubted she'd ever wear it. She'd only given in to the idea of makeup at all because the little girl had been utterly heroic in facing Barbara's consistent refusals to purchase anything Hadiyyah had fished out of the racks of clothing they'd seen so far. Thus it seemed only fair to give in on something, and makeup appeared to be the ticket. So she'd loaded her basket with foundation, blusher, eye shadow, eye liner, mascara, several frightening shades of lipstick, four different kinds of brushes, and a container of loose powder that was supposed to "fix it all in place," Hadiyyah told her.
Apparently, the purchases Hadiyyah directed Barbara to make were heavily dependent upon her observation of her mother's daily morning rituals, which themselves seemed to be heavily dependent upon "pots of this and that ...She always looks brilliant, Barbara, wait till you see her." Seeing Hadiyyah's mother was something that had not happened in the fourteen months of Barbara's acquaintance with the little girl and her father, and the euphemism she's gone to Canada on holiday was beginning to take on a significance difficult for Barbara to continue to ignore.
Barbara groused about the excessive expense, saying, "Can't I make do with blusher by itself?" To this, Hadiyyah scoffed most heartily. "Really, Barbara," she said, and she left it at that.
Once in Marks & Spencer, Hadiyyah wouldn't hear of Barbara's trailing off towards racks of anything the child deemed "suitable for Mrs. Silver ... you know." She had in mind that staple of all wardrobes - the aforementioned A-line skirt - and declared herself content with the fact that at least as it was high summer, the autumn clothing had just been brought in. Thus, she explained, what was on offer hadn't yet been picked over by countless "working mums who wear this sort of thing, Barbara. They'll be on holiday with their kids just now, so we don't have to worry about having only the pickings left."
"Thank God for that," Barbara said. She was drifting towards twin sets in plum and olive green. Hadiyyah took her arm firmly and steered her elsewhere. She declared herself content when they found "separates, Barbara, which we can put together to make suits. Oh, and look, they've blouses with pussy bows. These're rather sweet, aren't they?" She lifted one for Barbara's inspection.
Barbara couldn't