Chapter 5 Zoe Spring 2025 #3
I stare at the bruise. The foundation smooths on easily even though I haven’t used it for years.
I blend it in around my jaw, moving up to my eyes, muscle memory taking over.
The purple gradually disappears under layers of skin-coloured liquid.
I’m putting on a mask. A good-mother mask.
I don’t want Fiona and Sara seeing this.
And especially not the school mums. I add eyeliner and mascara, and by the time I stand back and admire my reflection, you’d never know there was a bruise there.
The person in the mirror smiles back at me.
Uncertainly at first. I try harder and the smile is almost genuine.
In my bedroom mirror I clip on the pearl necklace and add the Cartier ladybird for extra armour.
The clock marks seven. I need to wake up the girls. At least Steph’s school is on a Baker Day so I don’t have to face her yet.
I’m hit by the sound of loud music as soon as I walk through the front door after dropping Fiona and Sara at school.
That never bodes well. But I can’t just let yesterday be forgotten.
I need to talk to Steph calmly about it.
And I want to see if I can find out who P is.
If she’s got a boyfriend, then we need to have a chat and take a visit to the doctor in town.
Mum was always so coy about those things, but I’m not going to be like that.
I want my children to have all the information they need, not words wrapped up in euphemisms.
I knock on the door and open it to a wall of noise. ‘How can you possibly concentrate with music on that loud?’ I know I shouldn’t start off in this way, but honestly, the music is deafening. It makes my pulse race.
‘You’re supposed to knock. You promised,’ she says, not looking up.
Oh yes. I did knock, but I bite my lip. ‘Sorry.’
‘Anyway, it helps me concentrate,’ Steph says, focusing on whatever she’s doing at her desk.
‘I don’t know how it can help you “concentrate”.’ I realise I sound like my own mother. I even did those stupid inverted commas in the air that used to annoy me so much.
‘Well, it does.’
I sigh. Steph looks at me like she wants to kill me. I take a step back without meaning to. She sits on her hands. This is not going as planned. I take a deep breath and remember the good-mother mask.
‘What are you doing?’ I say, forcing a jolly note into my voice. I edge closer to her desk and lean over her shoulder. It’s some kind of poster.
‘I’m making a poster for the lab protest,’ she says.
‘Close Down Manning Farms,’ I read. ‘What’s Manning Farms?’
‘It’s a laboratory a few miles away which is importing primates to sell to other places for animal testing.’
Animal libbers. How involved is she?
‘Oh.’ I’m not sure what to say but I want to keep the conversation going. ‘Michael Jackson has a monkey,’ I say. ‘It’s called Bubbles. I read about it in the newspaper. I guess that’s wrong too.’
She looks up at me, her eyes like slits. ‘Of course it’s wrong. People shouldn’t have monkeys as pets.’ Her voice drips with sarcasm. ‘They belong in the wild.’
This really isn’t going to plan. I watch her for a minute as she colours in the curve of the S. My heart’s rhythm feels like it’s changed to match the beat of the music.
‘You know, Steph, you can always talk to me about anything. Anything at all. I’m your mum, I’m here to help you. Whatever you do.’ Please talk to me about what you’re doing with these people, with P.
She grunts and doesn’t look up. She starts drawing something clinging to the letter S. What is it? The felt tip screeches across the paper, making me wince.
‘We need to talk about what happened yesterday evening. I think it’s important that we do.’ I’ve said it, thank God.
She swivels round to face me properly and looks taken aback. ‘Why are you wearing so much make-up?’
‘Why do you think?’ I say, staring her straight in the eye. It feels oddly confrontational. I want to start again.
She shrugs. ‘I dunno. You feel you look old? That’s why most older women wear make-up.’
Stay calm, breathe. Stay calm, breathe. Get back to the topic in hand. ‘You hurt me last night.’
She shrugs again and looks back to the poster, starting to colour in the other monkey.
‘I think you should apologise.’ I pull air into my lungs, but it’s jerky, difficult to fill them up.
‘Apologise for what? What have I done now?’ She glances up.
I stare at her. Does she really not remember?
It was yesterday evening, for God’s sake.
‘You hurt me, Steph. I know it was an accident but . . .’ I touch the bruise and wince.
‘What were you doing with that sheep-marking fluid anyway?’ With everything that happened, I hadn’t even thought to ask that question.
‘We were targeting a vivisector’s house. Not that far from here actually.’
‘A vivisector?’ Whenever I have a conversation with Steph, it always goes off on such a tangent.
‘Someone who experiments on live animals.’ Her voice has a rising inflection.
‘I know what a vivisector is,’ I say. ‘I checked my face cream. It didn’t have the bunny logo so I guessed it was tested on animals. I threw it away.’ I thought it might help get her on side.
She nods and I sit down on the corner of the bed. This is going better. I must try to stay calm, whatever she says or does. ‘So when you say “target”, what do you mean?’
‘We throw paint at their house and their car. Red paint, to be like the animals’ blood. Sometimes we’ll write things on the house with the paint.’
Oh my God. She could be arrested, charged, get a record that would affect the rest of her life. ‘Steph, you can’t do things like that. You could get in serious trouble with the police.’ Thank goodness Paul doesn’t know. And Mum.
She snorts. ‘Last night was good because they were actually inside. The man was screaming at us as we covered his sports car, but he was too chicken to come out. He knows what he’s done is wrong.
’ She’s animated, her colour high, slightly smiling.
She must have been terrified. But then something she said hits me with a jolt.
Sports car? ‘Whose house was it?’ I ask, a heavy feeling in my stomach. Do I want to know?
‘Andrew Wilson’s place. Near Patching.’
Oh God. ‘But he’s dad’s friend. He’s not a vivisector. He works in a science laboratory trying to find cures for cancer.’
‘He’s testing stuff on animals, Mum.’
‘But to cure cancer. Surely that makes it okay.’ I lean forward and hold her arm. ‘He’s one of Dad’s closest friends, Steph. He’s a good, hard-working man. You can’t be doing stuff like that to our friends. If you’re caught, you’ll be locked up, sent to prison.’
She curls her lip at me and tries to shrug off my hand.
‘He’s our friend. You used to go over there all the time, and their kids have come here. Fiona’s really close with his younger daughter.’ How can I tell Paul? That poor family. It must have been so frightening for them, especially if their children were home.
She shrugs. ‘And?’
I can feel the heat rising in me. ‘And? You hurt me last night. I’m wearing all this make-up to cover the bruises.’
She looks at her hands. ‘I didn’t mean to. You got in my way. I was just trying to get out the front door.’
Is what she did okay then? Because she didn’t mean to do it? Maybe it’s true. I just need to get over it.
‘What did you expect to happen? You jumped in front of me. If you don’t want to get hurt, stay out of my way.
I’m old enough to go out when I want, and with who I want.
’ She’s looking up now, staring at me. She tries again to shrug off my arm.
I stroke her hand. Stay calm, stay calm. I need to keep close to her.
She reaches down with her other hand and twists the skin on my wrist hard, like we used to do as kids in the playground. It burns and I snatch my hand away. There’s a small smile on her face, her eyes are a deep grey.
I jump up, my heart pounding and rush out of the door and down the stairs. What just happened then?
The library door is open. I walk in, flustered and confused, and sit on the side of Paul’s desk. He smiles up at me. ‘All okay?’
‘I need to tell you something. It’s not good.’
His eyes tighten. ‘Stephanie?’ He looks at my face. ‘You’re okay?’ A vein in his forehead starts to pulse.
I nod. He’s worried that she’s hurt me. I put my wrist, red from the Chinese burn, behind me.
‘What now?’
‘She told me what she was doing with that paint.’
‘Oh?’ There’s the beginning of a frown in his eyes.
‘Andrew’s place. They threw paint all over their house and car. Steph said Andrew and his family were inside at the time. Imagine how terrifying . . .’
I don’t need to say any more. His face is in his hands. ‘Oh my God. But why?’
‘Steph says he tests things on live animals.’
‘He’s a scientist. He’s trying to find the cure for cancer.’ He massages his temples.
‘That’s what I said to her.’
‘I wonder if he saw her, recognised her. This is awful. I’m going to have a bloody word with her. We need to sort this out once and for all.’
I wish I hadn’t said anything. I should have kept it to myself. The last thing Steph or I need is him going in shouting.
The phone on his desk rings and he stares at it, and then at me. It carries on ringing until eventually he picks it up. ‘Hambrough 233.’ His face relaxes immediately. ‘Oh Peter, thanks for calling back. I need to talk to you about that land over by the Cornfords’. Have you got a few minutes?’
I turn away; he’s back in his world again. Hopefully he’ll forget about Steph. ‘Woody, come on. Walkies,’ I say quietly.
The dog thumps his tail, still muddy from his earlier walk to school, and gets up, stretching. We slide out of the room, and head towards the wood.