‘Confidentiality means nothing, not between you and me,’ says her mom dismissively. ‘Besides, I paid for that place—’
‘No, you didn’t!’ says Keera, shocked at the outright lie. ‘I paid for it.’
‘With money we earned together!’ shouts back her mother.
For a second, Keera stares at the path down to the beach. Everyone else has moved on.
She can see India up in front, tiptoeing across the toasty, warm sand, holding her flip-flops in her hand. Bernard and Grazia are moving at a much slower pace and Dan, lovely, gentlemanly Dan, is helping Dianne.
It’s unusual to see anyone touch Dianne because she’s the sort of person who doesn’t like physical contact. This morning, Keera had automatically reached to hug her and had seen Dianne actually wince.
‘You still there?’ shrieks Keera’s mom down the phone.
‘Yes.’
‘Where the hell are you?’
‘Are you in LA?’ asks Keera, not answering the question.
‘No, I’m in Vegas. It’s gone downhill, to hell in a handbasket,’ her mother says dismissively.
If Dr Bobbi was in Vegas, it was fine for Keera to say where she really was.
‘I’m in Greece.’
‘Greece where? Greece the country?’ Her mother sounds stunned.
‘Yes, Greece the country. The island of Corfu, in fact.’ Keera decides to give her mother a bit more information given that Dr Bobbi is both thousands of miles and ninehours away. Plus, their credit cards are pretty much maxed out. Some of her mother’s jewellery would have to be sold speedily to pay for any more flights, not that Keera would put it past her mother. But Dr Bobbi does love her diamonds. The bigger the better.
Keera’s living on the money she stashed in her own private account, one Dr Bobbi doesn’t know about.
‘I’m on a retreat.’
‘What do you mean by retreat?’ her mother asks suspiciously. ‘A retreat where you rest your voice so you’re able to sing?’
It always comes back to work and, through work, to money, Keera realises. Her mother hasn’t asked her how she is or evenwhyshe felt the need to go to Greece.
She’s less like a mother and more like an employer checking up on a recalcitrant member of staff.
‘No,’ says Keera flatly.
‘Well, people are looking for you,’ Dr Bobbi informs her daughter. ‘You’re hotter than ever since you’ve vanished, although I don’t suppose you know that because you’ve apparently turned all your socials off,’ she adds crossly. ‘It’s real easy to get forgotten in this business, Keera, and don’t you forget it. One minute you’re somebody and the next, you’re a nobody waiting tables in a dive telling people who you used to be. I’ve worked too hard to let that happen, missy.’
Keera isn’t sure whether Rose would approve or not but she can’t let this last jibe pass her.
‘You’veworked too hard?’ Keera says, disbelief colouring her words. ‘What about all the workI’vedone? What about the hours I worked when I was a kid and I really should have been in school or playing with friends? What about then? The problem with you, Mom, is that you still think that I’m your creation!’
As the words fly out of her with passion, Keera realises that she’s wanted to say this for a very long time.
But it seems her mother hasn’t even heard her.
‘Honey, we’ve all worked very hard to get you where you are now,’ says Dr Bobbi, sighing, ‘but the time for holidays, retreats and all that crap is over. Remember that producer, Santi, he’s ready to work with you again. He definitely didn’t like it when you were drinking too much and the whole thing with his ex-wife and her son and the coke – well, that didn’t look good. It was trashy behaviour, Keera. But he’s on board now. Honey, you have no idea the favours I had to wrangle to get this to happen.’
There’s the pause.
The pause where Keera’s supposed to reply with how fabulous her mother is, how much she appreciates all the hard work, how she can’t thank her enough.
Keera’s been trained to say these things like a seal in the aquarium is trained to jump for fish.
