Another Life Altogether: A Novel - By Elaine Beale Page 0,27

father grimaced, looking from me to Amanda and back to me. It was obvious that he couldn’t understand what she was saying, but what he clearly understood was that he’d been shown up in public for a second time that evening. He turned to the women in the queue. Their mouths were pressed into outraged little O’s. My father appeared to mutter some kind of apology, while they all scowled and shook their heads sorrowfully. There was no doubt about it. I was going to be in terrible trouble when I got home. Still, instead of trying to restrain Amanda I felt liberated by her laughter. Behind the glass barrier of the shopwindow, everything seemed too bright, filled with adults who were eager to judge, and whose world seemed as confined as that little village shop. Outside, in the cool evening, the rain spattering off the pavement and soaking everything, where sensations were real and nothing was protected, this was the place I wanted to be.

“Oh, my God,” Amanda said. “Look at them. Anybody would think they’d never seen someone knock on a window before. Boneheads.” Then she rapped on the window again. “Come on, get a move on,” she said, wagging a finger toward my father. “If you leave her out here much longer, her feet are going to go moldy.” She giggled.

“I’ll grow mushrooms on my toes,” I added, laughing a little myself.

“You’ll have fungus feet,” Amanda said, turning from the window to grin at me.

I wrinkled up my nose and then pointed toward the checkout lady, who was now standing, hands on hips, her angular face creased into a simmering frown. “Yeah, but at least I won’t have a fungus face like her,” I said.

At this Amanda let out a sudden gale of laughter, amusement rippling across her features, leaving her limbs loose and causing the umbrella to veer at broad angles above us. She laughed hard, a convulsion of sound that crinkled the edges of her eyes and left her mouth open, gasping, as she placed a hand on my shoulder. I watched her, for a moment stunned by the delight on her face and the fact that I had put it there. I had never made anyone laugh like that before. It warmed me, flowed through me. I began to laugh myself, leaning into Amanda so that, as I laughed, I found myself gulping her damp leather, smoke, and perfume smells.

“Oh, my God,” Amanda said when she had regained her composure. “You are bloody hilarious.” She slapped my shoulder with the hand she had placed there. “Hilarious,” she repeated. I stood there grinning as she tried to recover her breath.

Just then a car horn sounded from across the street. I looked over to see her boyfriend roll down the window of the waiting Cortina, lean out, and yell, “For fuck’s sake, Mandy, get a bloody move on!” I couldn’t see him well because of the rain, but I imagined him spotty-faced and ugly.

“Christ, if I’ve told him once I’ve told him a thousand times. I don’t like being called Mandy.” Then, turning toward him, she shouted, “All right, Stan, I’ll be over in a minute!”

“We’re gonna miss the flick if you don’t get your fucking fat arse over here soon,” he shot back.

I expected Amanda to yell back angrily. Instead, she gave a resigned little shrug. “Men,” she said, taking in the boy in the car and my father, behind the window, still gathering his shopping, in a single, sweeping look. I nodded, as if I agreed with this assessment. But, really, I didn’t understand why she would ever have to put up with someone who talked to her like that. That stupid boyfriend of hers should be grateful that a girl as beautiful as Amanda would even give him the time of day.

“Look, I’ve got to go,” Amanda said. “But it looks like your slowcoach dad is just about ready to leave.” She pointed at my father, who stood next to his packed carrier bag carefully mulling over the change that the checkout woman had put into his palm. A couple of the other customers were still glaring in our direction. Stan hit the horn again. “Bloody hell, I’ve a good mind to make him wait longer. That’d show him,” she said. “Only thing is, I don’t want to miss the film.” She pulled a wide grin and shrugged. “Bye, then.”

“Yes, bye!” I called as I watched her run across to the Cortina, her