There Should Be More Dancing by Rosalie Ham Page A

Margery grinned at Pat’s bittersweet humiliation.
    But Pat had her revenge. At the time Margery outwardly dismissed the spiteful words Pat delivered to her as just that – vengeful – yet they caused a chasm that took two decades to bridge. In those twenty years there were further minor rifts – short, violent skirmishes that took place in the supermarket or at Mrs Bist’s front gate over principles and opinions. But eventually the vitality in the women began to wane with waxing age, and they found themselves one day watching despondently as yet another strange couple moved in and demolished a perfectly good home that had taken someone they had known well a lifetime to build. Margery shook her head and said, ‘ Tsk ,’ and Pat said, ‘What’s past help should be past grief,’ and this signalled a start to breach the chasm.

You’ll come to understand why I have good reason to dislike Anita, but at the time I was impressed that she took an interest in me. On that second visit, she was dusting the photos on top of the telly when she got to the personal questions. ‘How old are the kids?’
    â€˜Walter Miniver Blandon is my first-born. He’s sixty now,’ I said. ‘The talented one. A champion athlete and very musical. Then there’s Morris Lancelot Blandon who’s fifty-eight, and Judith’s fifty in November, though she tends to celebrate six weeks later because she was premature. You can’t tell now. She looks quite normal, though she’s overweight.’ I was working on a tapestry at the time for Pat, and I remember starting the second ‘gossip’ in Who gossips to you will gossip of you and saying to Anita as I threaded the needle – it was double thread, one of my favourite reds, number 817 – ‘My husband worked at the brickworks for thirty-five years, but my children have all done wonderfully well.’ At the time I truly believed they were all successful. They all had jobs, and if you passed them in the streetyou’d see they were neat and clean. But cast in the glare of betrayal, I see now that they’re not much chop at all, and I’m really trying to understand why.
    I bet Pat would have something to say on the subject.
    I know for sure Walter’s a sweet boy at heart, easily led, especially by loose women, but you don’t want to upset him these days. He was always an affable sort of chap but after that last fight Morris started saying, ‘His fists’ll go up and you’ll go down.’ He’s broken a jaw or two over the years, but only when he’s provoked.
    â€˜Judith, well, she wasn’t planned,’ I continued. ‘She bawled every day until she went to school. Lance used to put beer in her bottle to shut her up. She and Kevin from over the road were friends with little Sylvia in the wheelchair from around the corner. Sadly, she’s dead now. They used to take her to the park, and one day she fell off the swings and landed awkwardly over on the cement path. Kevin and Judith told the policeman they were playing on the slippery-dip at the time and didn’t see it happen. The family moved to Queensland after the funeral. These days Judith’s very successful. She has a mobile business, a beauty shop.’
    Anita stopped dusting then and looked closely at the photo of Judith. ‘ She’s a beautician?’
    â€˜And she’s expanding into psychiatric counselling as well,’ I said. ‘At the moment, though, she drives to people’s places and does their hair and make-up. She got top marks for nail enhancement at the beauty school and her little pink-and-green van says “Judith Boyle – mobile beauty, finesse and panache in all your needs for skin, nails and hair”. Walter says it looks like it’s advertising a knackery. When Walter retired from boxing he became a manager of a lodging house and now he’s studying as well.