Free Best Supporting Role by Sue Margolis

six.”
    “What? Where?”
    “You’ve got the two you were born with. Then you’ve got two more spilling over the top of your bra and two more spilling out at the armpits. That makes six. Women like you, with large breasts, always make the mistake of buying bras that are too big in the back, when in fact what they need is a larger cup.”
    I looked. She was right. I was spilling out of the bra. And maybe it did feel a bit loose at the back.
    “Now then, stretch—like you’re reaching up to a high shelf.”
    I stretched. “OK, you win. It’s riding up.”
    “Huh! Of course it is. OK, now take a look under the bed.”
    “What? Why do you want me to look under the bed?”
    “You’ll see. Just take a look.”
    I bent down. There must have been half a dozen clear plastic crates, packed with bras.
    “It’s surplus stock from the shop. There isn’t room to store it all. Right, look in the box marked
Ophelia
and see how many thirty-four double Fs you can find.”
    I rummaged through the box of black and white lace bras and found three.
    “OK, let’s try one on. Take off your bra.”
    I hesitated.
    “Oh, come on. Get on with it. I’m dying here.”
    I did as she barked.
    “Right—put the straps over your shoulders and let your breasts fall into the cups. That’s the correct way to put on a bra. Now fasten it. What do you think?”
    I adjusted the straps and went to look in the mirror again. My breasts were fully enclosed and supported. “Blimey. I don’t knowwhat to say. That’s amazing. And it’s really comfortable.” I began moving and stretching. The bra didn’t budge.
    “What did I tell you? So how many breasts do you have now?”
    “Just the regulation two.”
    Aunty Shirley said I should keep the three bras.
    “And don’t you dare start offering to pay for them. Think of them as your inheritance,” she said.
    I pulled on my top; then I went over and gave her a hug.
    “Thanks, Aunty Shirl. I don’t know what to say. That’s really generous of you.”
    She harrumphed and said she was still cross with me for never letting her fit me before.
    “So . . . look at me,” she went on. “What do you think? I finally made it to a size zero. That’s the one good thing about cancer—the weight loss. You remember how fat I was before I got ill? I used to sit in the bath and the water level would rise in the toilet.”
    I sat back down on the bed and took her hand. “How do you manage to keep laughing?”
    “I’ve done my crying. I’m nearly eighty. I’ve had a good life and now I’m ready to meet the guy upstairs. The question is . . . is he ready to meet me?”
    “Possibly not,” I said.
    “Do you think God speaks English? ’Cos I’m telling you, if I get to heaven and find I have to point at pictures on menus, I’m going to be seriously pissed off.”
    Now we were both laughing. “You know what?” I said. “I think I can safely say I’ve never had this much fun talking to a dying person.”
    “I wish I could joke around like this with your mother. She just weeps and wrings her hands the whole time.”
    “She doesn’t want to lose you.”
    “I get that, but it’s not like I have any say in the matter.” She paused and started to look thoughtful. “Sahara, I’m glad you came, because I want to talk to you about the shop.”
    “What about it?”
    “As you know, it hasn’t been doing so well these last few years.”
    The truth was it hadn’t been doing well these last few decades. The heyday it had enjoyed while it was being patronized by Hollywood royalty, not to mention actual royalty, had ended in 1992. In March that year, Clementine Montecute, a young lingerie designer, who just happened to be the Queen’s third cousin, returned from Paris—where she had been designing bras and corsets for the likes of Chantelle and Pérèle—to open her own Mayfair atelier.
Vogue
,
Tatler
and
Elle
attended the launch along with dozens of A-listers and a sprinkling of minor