Swansea Summer Read Online Free Page A

layered petticoat. ‘What do you think of this?’ As Judy took it from her, she glanced at Katie and realised she had been very quiet, but then Katie never had liked talking about sex. Not even when they were twelve and had first found out about it. She wondered if she’d embarrassed Katie by saying the little she had about herself and Jack. She wouldn’t have minded a girl talking about Joe that way. At least it would prove he was human underneath the coating of self-righteous prig.
    ‘It’s gorgeous.’ Judy turned back the layers.
    ‘Matching bra and suspenders.’ Helen lifted them out and held them up for inspection.
    ‘They for you or Jack?’ Judy queried artfully.
    ‘My honeymoon present to both of us. They’re part of a new range. Alice – she’s the buyer in the warehouse – thought they’d be too fancy for most people in Swansea but I persuaded Dad to stock them and they’ve been so successful he, or rather Katie – who is the best secretary my father’s ever had according to him – had to reorder.’
    ‘They’re stunning. Are they still in stock, Katie? I would love a set in green …’
    ‘Sea-green, rose-pink, lemon and sky-blue,’ Katie recited knowledgeably, ‘and last time I looked, which was yesterday afternoon, we had a couple of sets left in each colour.’
    ‘Katie and I splashed out after we saw Helen’s and bought sets in pink.’ Lily handed round plates and napkins.
    ‘Then they’re not too dear.’
    ‘Depends what you mean by “dear”,’ Lily qualified. ‘The bra’s seven and six, the suspenders twelve and six but the petticoat was three pounds nineteen and eleven.’
    ‘Ouch.’
    ‘The lace is real and quality costs.’ Helen folded the petticoat and bra back into the bag.
    ‘That’s just what the wardrobe mistress in work says.’ Judy helped herself to a ham sandwich. ‘She’s always complaining about the cost of trimmings. She says she has to pay more for a yard of two-inch lace than thirty-six-inch-wide plain cotton.’
    ‘How you can envy me when you work with famous people in London, Judy, I’ll never know.’ Helen wouldn’t have switched places with Judy for all the money in Swansea but, bursting with happiness, she wanted her friends to feel just the way she did.
    ‘The senior make-up and hair stylists work on the famous ones. I only get the people who come in for news interviews, or extras from the dramas.’
    ‘But you’ll get promoted.’ Lily put a pasty and sausage roll on her plate.
    ‘Possibly, when I’m a hundred and twenty and on the verge of retirement,’ Judy said gloomily.
    ‘Come on, Judy, it can’t be that bad,’ Helen admonished.
    ‘I should never have gone up there.’
    ‘But I thought you were having a great time. Your letters …’
    ‘I could hardly write “Dear All in Carlton Terrace, London is a horrible, filthy city plagued by pea-soup smogs you can’t breathe in, the hostel food is worse than the pigswill that used to be left over from school dinners, the warden makes the wicked queen in Snow White look like a nice old granny and by the way, the job’s not up to much either. It’s bloody hard work – pardon my French – and boring. A junior make-up and hair stylist is at the beck and call of the entire department, gets the blame for every single thing that goes wrong and none of the thanks when it goes right. Love Judy. P.S. In case you haven’t guessed, I’m homesick and miserable as sin.”’
    ‘But after work you have Brian,’ Lily protested.
    ‘We barely see enough of one another to ask, “How’s it going?” I work late afternoons, evenings and every other weekend; he works shifts so we’re lucky if we get together a couple of hours a week, and as I said earlier, there’s nowhere we can go except the common rooms in the hostels, a café or, if they’re open at that time of day, the pictures. And the rest of the time I’m so bloody lonely I could cry. Sorry, swearing’s getting to be a bad