Free You Don't Have to be Good by Sabrina Broadbent Page B

in a cab.
    ‘Oh God, it’s the estate agent. I’d better take this!’ shouted Katharine. She waved the door keys over her shoulder. ‘Adrian! Keys! Bea, I’ll ring you later. Sure you’re okay?’
    Bea hesitated between the house and the car as the children trooped up to the front door. ‘Hey!’ she said.
    They turned and looked at her and she held out her arms. Adrian loped towards her and let himself be enveloped by her embrace.
    ‘Maybe see you at Granny’s birthday,’ she said into his hair.
    ‘Do you think she’d like fireworks?’
    ‘Definitely.’
    She let him go and looked at Laura, who was feigning indifference by the sundial. Her face was pale and blotched. Spots threatened beneath the skin of her forehead and her brow was furrowed. Bea smiled and took a step towards her. Laura frowned, pulled out one earpiece and reached for Bea in a sudden clumsy movement. She dropped her head on to Bea’s shoulder and leant against her, arms hanging passively down by her sides. Bea hugged her soft form and kissed the side of her head. She smelt of shampoo and chewing gum.
    ‘Goodbye, my beautiful girl,’ she said. The tears rose up in her then and she concentrated on not sobbing. Laura brought her arms up and gave her aunt a fierce squeeze. Hair slides and clips pressed painfully into Bea’s cheek.
    Laura pulled away and looked at the ground, her mouth tugged downwards like a clown.
    Katharine’s voice sailed out of the car. ‘Absolutely not. Absolutely out of the question.’
    ‘Say goodbye to your mum for me.’
    Laura spluttered a laugh. Bea smiled and turned away.

Rip
    F RANK SAT back on his heels and admired Wanda’s bottom. She lay face down on the couch before him, naked apart from her blouse. He had the letter from Lancashire Arts in one hand and a glass of Scotch in the other. Joy flooded his body, chased by a riptide of fear. Joy that his literary career might be about to be resurrected; fear that, like his early success, this moment in the sun would be just that, a moment. He looked again at the letter. There was to be a performance of his play by the Burnley Amateur Dramatic Association as part of the council’s Winter Arts Retrospective. Lancashire Arts would be delighted if he would attend the first night and take part in a short question-and-answer session on stage beforehand. Wanda was impressed.
    ‘You must be very clever,’ she said, raising herself up on her elbows and flicking through the pages of The Seagull in the Cherry Orchard . He had written it in his final year at university, and his parents had spent their holiday money getting five hundred copies printed and bound. It was a gesture that Frank had appreciated, although the cover had always irked him. An enormous seagull, sketched by Lance, had been pasted on top of a cherry tree (found in his mother’s gardening catalogue). Frank had, not very kindly, explained that the title was not literal; the play was not about a seagull in a cherry orchard, it was an exploration of the Chekhovian understanding of all our sorrow – that neither love nor work will rescue us. This comment was lost on his parents because love had indeed rescued them – for the time being.
    Wanda said, ‘What is the seagull sitting on?’
    Frank raised his eyes to heaven and took a slug of Scotch. He felt the spasm in his back relax a little and asked whether she would like a signed copy. He had four hundred and seventy of them in a box under the couch. Wanda was delighted and tried to turn over but Frank told her to stay as she was because, in all honesty, he found the front of a naked woman rather – what? Offputting? Intimidating? Demanding was the word he was looking for. Roughly he took the copy of the play from her, rested it on her bottom, and began to write an inscription. ‘For Wanda,’ he wrote, then hesitated. Thank you for cleaning my house? Don’t be ridiculous. My Masha? No, she’d probably never read Three Sisters . The pearl in my