Elizabeth Is Missing by Emma Healey Read Free Book Online

thanks, Doug.”
    We ate quickly, not wanting our chips to get cold. Dad told us about a change in his rounds since another worker had come home from the army, comparing his new postal routes with Douglas’s milk rounds, and Ma complained about the queue at the butcher’s. I only half listened, distracted by Sukey, and then by Douglas. I couldn’t help trying to anticipate where he would put in the next bit of American slang. It tended to come out strangely twisted by his Hampshire accent.
    “I was thinking of going down to Tub Street, to the movies ,” he said, when he’d finished eating. He was looking at Sukey, and the last of the light showed the places on his face where his stubble didn’t yet join. There was a C-shaped patch of smooth pink skin on his cheek, and another under his chin.
    “Bye, then,” Sukey said, opening her compact and pressing the puff to her nose.
    She swiped it expertly across her forehead, reminding me of her promise to teach me how to use make-up, and Douglas watched her for a moment before going off to get his coat from the hall. If only there was a kind of make-up for Douglas, I thought, a compact with powder to fill in his beard.
    When Ma got up to clear the dishes and Dad went to put the greasy newspaper in the outside bin I leant towards Sukey. “Are you going to stay tonight?” I asked her. I’d been thinking during dinner and had come up with several possible explanations. “Has something happened between you and Frank?”
    She shook her head. “I told you, Mopps, I need to think. In fact, I’d better be getting back now. Bye, Ma, Dad. See you.” She was nearly at the door before I remembered.
    “I got you a gift, Sukey.”
    She smiled, properly, genuinely, for the first time.
    “It’s for your hair,” I said, spoiling the surprise slightly. I’d bought two matching combs on Saturday at Woolworth’s, one for her, one for me. They were fake tortoiseshell and covered with crudely moulded birds, but when I’d held them up to the light the wings had almost seemed to flutter.
    “It’s beautiful. Thank you, darling,” she said, opening the tissue paper and sliding the comb into a wave of hair above her ear.
    She kissed me before she slipped out the door, and I still had her lipstick on my forehead when Douglas came back from the pictures. He laughed as he smudged it off with his thumb. I remember thinking it was funny, because when he teased me about it he mentioned the exact shade: Victory Red.
    “Can I help?”
    The girl at the make-up counter is dull against the lit-up glass, dressed in white, her face various shades of beige. All around her are gold and see-through powder compacts, open like clams. What I need is the bottom half of a blue and silver one, but I won’t find it here. “I want some lipstick,” I tell the girl.
    She nods and waves limply at a plastic display.
    “Victory Red,” I say.
    “I’m sorry?”
    “I wanted Victory Red.” The sweet wet smell in these places is overwhelming. I feel like I’m breathing through molasses. Helen and Katy are trying on various perfumes a few feet away, making faces and coughing. They are looking for a gift for Carla, because she did something, or didn’t do something, or because I did something.
    The girl looks at the stand, pulling out several little tubes and replacing them roughly. They clack against the plastic. “I don’t think we do that one,” she says. “How about this?” She holds up a shiny, squarish cylinder. The sticker on it says “Seductive Scarlet.” Sounds promising. I take it from her and draw a streak over my hand, the colour seeping into the wrinkles.
    “Yes, that’s nice,” I say, handing it back. “But I’d prefer Victory Red. Do you have that?”
    “Sorry we don’t do that one.” She smiles and slouches against the counter. There’s a sour smell under the perfume that makes me think the shop uniforms are all nylon.
    “Really? What a nuisance. Why’s that?”
    “It’s