Calendar Girl Read online

  Stella Duffy was born in London and brought up in New Zealand. She has lived in London since her early twenties. She has written thirteen novels, ten plays, and forty-five short stories. She won the 2002 CWA Short Story Dagger for her story Martha Grace, and has twice won Stonewall Writer of the Year in 2008 for The Room of Lost Things and in 2010 for Theodora. In addition to her writing work she is a theatre performer and director. She lives in London with her wife, the writer Shelley Silas.

  Other titles by Stella Duffy and published by Serpent’s Tail

  Wavewalker

  Beneath The Blonde

  Fresh Flesh

  ACCLAIM FOR CALENDAR GIRL

  “There’s a lot of lesbian lore and sex in it, but it is also a fast, witty and clever crime story, with cracking dialogue and exuberant characters” The Times

  “Steamy erotic moments, some smart one-liners and a few digs at lesbian stereotypes … Stella Duffy is definitely a name to watch” Forum

  “Lends a new dimension to trips to the supermarket” Literary Review

  “A highly atmospheric, rhythmic narrative … a stylish book which also warns of the destructive power of lies and half-truths” Gay Times

  “Unusual, cleverly constructed recital of deception in relationships … The downbeat denouement packs an unexpected, morbid wallop” San Francisco Examiner

  “Each chapter is satisfying in itself, but leaves you on a cinema noir knife-edge. Don’t start it at bedtime or you’ll wind up with bags under your eyes” Phase

  CALENDAR GIRL

  Stella Duffy

  Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 99-63578

  A full catalogue record for this book can be obtained from the British Library on request

  The right of Stella Duffy to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988

  Copyright © 1994 Stella Duffy

  The characters and events in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.

  First published by Serpent’s Tail 1994

  4 Blackstock Mews, London N4 2BT

  website: www.serpentstail.com

  First published in this five-star edition, 1999

  Printed in Great Britain by Mackays of Chatham, plc Chatham, Kent

  For Shelley — of course

  Thanks to Shelley Silas for her faith, love and for having green eyes, Yvonne Baker for her great enthusiasm and support, Jo Stones for having a life, Dolores Hoy, Len Baker, Emma Hill, Ruth Logan, Luke Sorba, Veronica Tattersall and Ilsa Yardley for assistance along the way, and to Pete Ayrton and Laurence O’Toole at Serpent’s Tail for persistence in the face of alarming negativity.

  CHAPTER 1

  Lunch

  She had long legs, big brown eyes, great tits and cheekbones to cut bread on.

  “A Kelly McGillis body” I was to say later to anyone who’d asked. And to lots who hadn’t. She’d been brought by a friend to see me perform. A mutual friend. And there I was all post-show bounce and cleavage and over the top and there she was all legs and eyes and cheekbones. Impossible already. We flirted mildly, talked a lot, both made our jobs sound a little more glamorous than they were and then we parted. I turned down her offer of a ride home. Well, I’m obvious, but not that obvious. Besides, Vauxhall, via Richmond (to pick up her car from Esther’s) on her way to Golders Green seemed a bit more demanding than was warranted by a first meeting. And this way I could rush home to tell the assortment of ex-lovers that I live with about the Woman with the Kelly McGillis body.

  The woman I live with, with the Kelly McGillis body.

  “No Esther” I said, “I do not want another lesbian virgin. I do not want to talk anyone else through coming out. I don’t want to hug anyone else through career-trauma. I cannot take on the sexual responsibility, I do not wish to be, yet again, someone’s First Lesbian Sex.”

  I paused for effect.

  “Sexually liberated I may be, but the Beginner’s Guide to the Joys of Lesbian Sex I’m not.”

  “Not any more anyway,” sotto voce from Dolores which resulted in me pinching her thigh in what I hoped was a playful yet painful manner.

  “But Maggie she isn’t a lesbian virgin,” slightly angry from Esther who certainly was and probably thought the idea of a lesbian virgin was kind of sweet, if not a state of being it was my solemn duty to eradicate.

  “She’s been with a woman – several – she’s told her family, she’s done girlsex.”

  “Which is more than can be said for Esther.” At which point I pinched Dolores again in what I hoped was a purely painful manner. Sometimes being good buddies with your ex-lover can be a pain in the thigh. Dolores’ thigh. Esther looked at me with the imploring eyes of a straight, single, Jewish woman trying to matchmake a Catholic and happily celibate dyke. It’s an unusual position to be in and not an easy one to say no to.

  The Woman with the Kelly McGillis body has long, taut thighs.

  And so there she was. Brought along to see me at a gig by a mutual friend. And me being funny and witty and charming, which is of course nothing like my real neurotic, terrified self. Because doing stand-up comedy is ACTING – but tell that to someone who’s just seen you perform for the first time, someone who has big dark eyes and olive skin, someone who looks older than their thirty-one years, someone who looks like a grown-up. Already it was impossible. We were doomed –I by her physiognomy, she by the first time I made her laugh – that she had achieved her cheek bones genetically and through no fault of her own and that I was getting paid to make her laugh mattered not at all. We were both available, and I managed to ignore all the usual warning signals, as I usually do:

  “Don’t do it just because she’s the first good looking dyke you’ve seen in a year.”

  “Don’t do it just because you fancy some sex and she looks like she might know how to do it.”

  “Don’t do it just because you can” (Joelene).

  The next day she called to ask me out.

  Dolores gave me the message two Tuesdays later.

  We arranged to meet for lunch.

  I ironed a hole into Dolores’ favourite shirt.

  It’s been weeks since I had lunch with the Woman with the Kelly McGillis body.

  We had pasta.

  I got up at 10am to get ready. I usually work until lam, get to bed around three or four, so anything that can get me out of bed before the one o’clock news has to be special. I bathed and washed my hair to make my long, red curly curls curlier. I panicked and realised I was the ugliest woman in the world. I breathed into my crystal and took a large gulp of straight whisky. I realised I wasn’t ugly, only plain and homely. I made three positive affirmations and about five negative ones. I smoothed myself into Dolores’ brand new and as yet unsagging at the knees, jet-black leggings, and added a lycra vest (hint of underarm hair and more than a hint of Eternity). I figured I looked all right really, and I do have good eyes. I put on my cotton jacket, bouncy red basketball boots and got on my bike so that I would arrive flushed, breathless, a little late and just a little gorgeous.

  She likes bodies to be virtually hairless.

  As I said, we had pasta.

  She hadn’t said she’d pay so I added up my meal as we ordered, hoping she wouldn’t choose expensive and that when it came time to split the bill my share wouldn’t go over £15.1 say £15 because that is all the money I had in the world, until Thursday’s dole cheque. I exaggerate. Fifteen pounds and thirty six pence. Poetic licence. Halfway through lunch I had my second glass of wine, decided I wanted dessert and that owing her money wouldn’t necessarily be a bad thing. It would at least give me a reason to see her again.
r />   We talked for two and a half hours and I thought she must be important in her job to be allowed such a long lunch hour. We talked about families and growing up and travel and because we wanted to impress each other we didn’t say much that was completely true, we embellished and gilded and stored up trouble for ourselves.

  We talked and I realised I was blind, she had green eyes and wasn’t especially tall and her tits weren’t that big, though her legs are long and shapely. I altered my video image of her slightly and to “cheekbones to cut bread on” added “hip bones to pierce me on”. For a modern lesbian feminist I can be disgustingly Catholic.

  When the bill came it was over £40 so I discreetly went to powder my nose so she could discreetly pay the bill. I noticed she also discreetly asked for a receipt for expenses. She filofaxed me for easy reference. I wrote her number on an envelope I was carrying. The envelope contained the negatives of some photos of my ex-lover and me two summers ago in Brighton. I’d torn the photos up in winter, but held on to the inverted versions.

  We arranged to meet in ten days time.

  “Maggie, you’re mad. Don’t do it. I can’t take it. The house can’t take it. You can’t afford the therapy. Maggie honey, ain’t no nice Jewish girl from Golders Green gonna love you all the way through Yom Kippur.”

  Dolores sometimes thinks she’s Tennessee Williams. But most of the time she thinks she’s Gertrude Stein. I’m a great cook and hate recipe books. Dolores’ mother was Catholic, her father is a rampant socialist, and she was named for the Spanish Civil War heroine Dolores Ibarruri before her father departed leaving her mother to bring up Dolly alone. When Dolores was twenty-eight she discovered her paternal grandmother. Her paternal grandmother was Jewish. That Dolores was therefore not strictly Jewish, that her grandmother’s Judaism was limited to the names of the holidays (and not their dates), that her grandmother was a cantankerous, bigoted old bat, all mattered not a whit to Dolores who embarked on a study of her chosen religion with a fervour matched only by her devotion to the early writings of Rita Mae Brown. (Pre-Martina, Dolores hates sport, she doesn’t like to sweat.) When Dolores discovered the infamous “Thank God I was not born a woman” prayer, her ardour cooled a little. Now she mostly confines her Judaism to celebrating the holidays and the Book of Ruth.

  I kept Passover with the Woman with the Kelly McGillis body.

  She called me that night and said she couldn’t wait and could I come over on Friday night?

  Dolores suggested taking a challah.

  I took pink champagne.

  I always take pink champagne. It looks spontaneous and cute and is just expensive enough to suggest first-date abandon. It took me even longer to get ready this time because, as I was due to arrive at 10pm, it was rather unlikely that I’d go back home on the Northern Line before midnight, so I needed clothes I could wear the next day. I needed clothes I could be seduced out of. I sat outside her house for fifteen minutes before I rang the bell. I sat there and told myself that this didn’t have to mean anything and that I was a grown up and could even just go home now if I really wanted to.

  Time’s winged chariot drove past and I realised I was late. I climbed the stairs, put on a brave and expectant face, rang the bell and handed her the champagne.

  Champagne makes her throw up.

  CHAPTER 2

  Running for fun

  Saz Martin woke up, rubbed her eyes and wished she didn’t like gin quite so much. Or that she liked straight tonic a lot more. Sun was shafting its way through her cane blinds so she knew it had to be between 7 and 8am, the only time her fifth floor council flat received its dose of vitamin D. She rolled out of bed, retrieved her track suit bottoms and sports bra from the washing machine where they had been pointlessly thrown the morning before, stripped off the T-shirt she’d worn to bed, dressed and put the T-shirt on again. Socks and trainers added, she ran out the front door, pausing only to lock it with three different keys. Down five flights of stairs and out into the delights of early morning Camberwell. Rubbish and broken toys doing their best to hold back the greenery which threatened to cheer the place up. Only after she’d been running for a good couple of miles did she consult her watch – 7.45am.

  “Not bad Martin, not bad at all. Four hours of dancing and revelry, two of which were unadulterated flirting, home all alone with not even a video to put you to sleep and now this after only three hours of dreamtime. Brown Owl would be proud!” She ran for half an hour, cold morning air hurting the back of her throat and stinging at the deepest pits of her lungs. She headed for the river and a semblance of rural idyll.

  Saz turned at Vauxhall Bridge when the lead fumes became too heavy and made it home in time, via the new bagel bakery (two jam doughnuts), Safeway (fresh ground coffee) and newsagents (The Guardian, Time Out) in time to abuse the breakfast news the second time round.

  After breakfast, sweet doughnut mingling with salt sweat on her lips, she showered, dumped all her clothes in the washing-machine, turned the washing-machine and answerphone on and the telephone off. Then she went back to bed.

  When Saz got up at midday, the sun had long gone, not only from her flat but from the whole of London and it had started to drizzle. Three years earlier Saz had discovered that the only really nice weather happened before other people went to work, so she started getting up to run in it. Running for fun. Unlike answering the phone. Answering the phone was not fun. Judging from the severity of the flashing light there were several messages waiting for her.

  “Sarah, it’s your mother. Darling, why don’t you ever answer your phone? Daddy and I were hoping you’d come home for dinner some time this week. A little celebration for your birthday. Do you have a job at the moment? Because if not, we’d love to see you. I don’t really know what to get you, Cassie just said maybe you could do with some money? But it seems so cold to me, anyway dear perhaps you could give me a call, um and … Cassie said she didn’t think you were seeing anyone, but if you are then maybe you’d like to bring them … I mean her … home too? That is, if you are … well I’d best be off now, take care and hope you’re not suffering with hayfever like Dad. God Bless darling.”

  “Ms Martin, it’s Colleen from the Enterprise Allowance office. Perhaps you could come in some time next week – it’s almost the end of the first six months of your business and I’d like to go through your quarterly accounts with you. Please call to arrange an appointment as soon as possible.”

  “Saz, it’s Cassie. Mother’s been harassing me about your birthday, I don’t know what you want, I said they should give you cash, hope that’s OK. Look do you fancy babysitting this Wednesday only Tony wants to go out, get completely pissed and then ravish me and you wouldn’t want to stop us from enjoying anything as married and juicily heterosexual as that would you? Let me know, only quickly cos otherwise I’ll have to pay someone which would be distressing and probably mean you’d only get a cheap and shoddy birthday present, instead of merely a shoddy one! Bye.”

  “Saz, Claire here, was I pissed last night or did I make a complete fool of myself sober? I’ll stick to the former if it’s all right with you. Let’s do something civilised tomorrow like walking in the park and having tea, don’t worry, I’ll pay, and then I can tell you all about the damn fine sex I had last night. Hah!”

  “Cassie again, Mum also wants to know if you’re doing it with anyone. So does Tony. I don’t. I think eleven months of celibacy is wonderful and healthy and all I want to know is, will you babysit? Call me quickly, my loins can’t stand the suspense.”

  “Hello, Miss Martin, ah … you don’t know me but I was given your number by a friend, well an acquaintance really, and you see the thing is, oh God I hate these machines, don’t you? … actually I’m ringing to see if you could help me, I mean I’d like to employ you, that is if you still do the sort of work my friend said you do … I mean I’ve never employed anyone to … spy on anyone before, well it’s not spying is it, more like checking up … well, perhaps you could cal
l me – John Clark, ah … and maybe you could be discreet … it’s a work number …”

  He waffled on a bit more, left the number and apologised again, Saz wrote his number on the back of her hand as the answerphone bleeped four times signalling the end of the messages. She poured fresh coffee.

  “Thank God for continuous tape.”

  She then dialled her sister’s number.

  “Cassie, it’s me … no, I just woke up … no, I was not having sex, I gave that up remember? I went dancing and drinking and slept for three hours, ran for one and then slept for another three. I now feel fresh and alive and willing to commit myself to several hours of torture at the sticky fingers of your three brats … yes, I thought you’d be happy for me. Look, will you tell Mum, I do definitely prefer cash to anything else she might think I need, it’ll make my Enterprise Allowance ‘supervisor’ very happy – I’ll tell her it came from some old lady who needed me to find her long lost son … well, whatever – I need cash and I have enough tupperware and ‘nice linen’ to last me several millennia in suburbia, let alone the single lesbian life in the inner city … yes, I said single and I did mean single, anyway I think I might have a job … I don’t know yet, I have to call him back … yes, it’s a man … well, of course I won’t do it if it’s an ex-husband. Look babe, I’ve got to go and call this bloke back, when you speak to Mother don’t tell her I’m working, I think she’s prefers me unemployed and poor to unsafe and working … No, I’m not unsafe, it’s just that’s how she sees it. OK give my love to Tony, tell him not to worry, I prefer my brothers-in-law bald. Bye.”

  Saz hung up and dialled Claire’s number.

  “Smart, Holland and Swift, Solicitors, can I help you?”

  The idea of Claire Holland, old school friend, dizzy blonde, raving pisshead and the first of Saz’s friends to come out, as a really truly grown up solicitor (with receptionist and secretary) never failed to stun Saz.

  “Can I speak to Ms Holland, please?”

  “I’m sorry, Ms Holland’s in a meeting at the moment, can I take a message?”