‘You know, we could avoid these awkward meetings,’ the raven says. ‘If you ever told me when we were going to bump into each other.’
‘He toldme,’ Pippi chimes in.
They both look down at Pippi. Over the top of her ginger pigtails, they now look at one another.
‘I did tell her I was coming,’ Frankenstein’s monster says.
‘You two are keeping secrets from me now?’
The monster looks like he might smile.
‘So, you’re back above the pub?’ the raven asks.
‘The flat is part of the property,’ the monster replies. ‘The rats, too.’
‘Is it still a single bed?’ she says, picking at one of the black feathers on the tight sleeve of her dress.
‘I’ve got a new bed.’
The only sounds are that of the rushing tube and Pippi’s legs kick, kick, kicking the seat beneath her. The bird gets to work nervously on another feather, right at the hem of where her short dress meets her dark tights.
‘Do you like our costumes?’ Pippi asks.
The monster nods. ‘I do.’
‘Mummy’s a very pretty bird.’
There’s a silence. Very briefly, the monster’s eyes flicker upwards, to the girl’s mother.
‘She is,’ he says.
The raven is staring down at her heavy black boots. Beneath her dark lipstick, her smile is conspicuously bright.
a fellow guest
A cocktail bar, high above the city. It’s Maisie’s fortieth birthday, the grandparents are here as childcare, and she and Nimesh are making the most of it. The venue is a fancy one, high above the city in which they used to live. It’s filled with guests milling about dressed as Mad Hatters and mediocre Gatsbys, Little Women and large white whales.
The guest and her husband did NCT classes with Maisie and Nimesh a few years ago, and have been firm fixtures at the same local soft-plays ever since. And because she and her husband don’t want to break a streak that has lasted their entire marriage, they are once again in matching costumes. Their twins, Thing #1 and Thing #2. Her husband, the Cat in the Hat. And she, making the most of her pregnant belly, is the Fish in its Fishbowl.
‘Thanks for coming,’ says Maisie, after removing her Sherlock Holmes pipe from her mouth. ‘Sorry you can’t plunder the open bar.’
Nimesh, Maisie’s own Doctor Watson, is already co-opting the Cat in the Hat to make plans for their next Tough Mudder, so Sherlock takes the Fish to meet some of her friends: ahalf-arsed Willy Wonka, a sexy Jane Austen, a Lord of the Flies who clearly hasn’t read the book in question. Her kids are busy overstimulating a Dracula-fanged Finn and a fretful-looking Pippi Longstocking, so the Fish gets talking to a pair whom she presumes are Pippi’s parents.
‘Where did you get so many feathers?’ the Fish asks.
‘She works in films,’ Sherlock chimes in.
‘You’d be surprised what a good costume department can get their hands on.’
The raven is called Clara. The monster over her shoulder is called Seb. And it’s because Seb won’t take his eyes off Clara, because of the way in which Clara inclines her head towards Seb’s broad chest, that the Fish has made her assumption.
‘So, are you two—?’ she begins, intending to ask if they’re local.
‘No,’ Seb says, too quickly.
‘God no,’ Clara says, just as suddenly.
‘God no?’ Seb repeats, sounding offended.
