The Savages by Matt Whyman Page A

do?’ asked Maisy.
    â€˜I wouldn’t want to let Jack down this soon in your relationship,’ warned Faria, before sucking on the cigarette like an asthmatic with an inhaler in the midst of an attack. ‘There are girls out there who would literally kill for a piece of him,’ she finished, on exhaling. ‘Let’s just say that if you fail to make it to his supper at the weekend I don’t suppose he’ll be dining alone.’ Faria took another hit on her hidden cigarette, seemingly unaware that Sasha was looking at her incredulously.
    â€˜Jack wouldn’t cheat on me,’ she said eventually. ‘He wouldn’t
dare
.’

7
    In her teens, Lulabelle Hart had crossed catwalks from London to Milan. Her height, frame and freckles were perfectly suited for modelling, as was her tumbling red hair that she had learned to flick over her shoulder just as the camera shutter opened. For several years, Lulabelle lived a lifestyle that many would envy. Then the next generation of girls began to attract the attention of designers and magazine editors, and slowly the work took a slide. Now in her mid-twenties, Lulabelle’s last fashion shoot featured clothes most people had since passed on to the charity shop. Still, her agent continued to find her work, and though she no longer graced front covers you could still find her advertising sofas and conservatories in the back pages. Sadly, Lulabelle’s A-list days were long gone. What remained was her attitude.
    â€˜Explain this to me,’ she said, having just swept into the Savage house on the morning of the shoot. She was standing in the front room, where a crew worked hard to set up lights and cameras. The shoot, an advert for a plug-in air freshener, required Lulabelle to play the role of a beautiful but harassed mother who finds escape in the synthetic aroma of a tropical seashore. Lately, Lulabelle had played a lot of beautiful but harassed mothers. Given her dislike of other people’s children touching surfaces and door handles, she found it all too depressing for words. ‘What is that?’
    â€˜What is what?’ asked the production manager, a young woman with a clipboard and earpiece. She turned to see what Lulabelle was looking at. ‘It’s a mirror,’ she said, and stood beside the model to admire the framed vintage glass that hung above the fireplace. ‘Gorgeous, isn’t it? A work of art.’
    Lulabelle leaned forward, narrowing her eyes.
    â€˜But it’s mottled and blotchy.’
    â€˜It’s antique. That’s what happens. The silver backing peels away from the glass over time.’
    Puzzled by this, Lulabelle turned to address the production manager directly.
    â€˜What’s the point of a mirror when you can’t see your own reflection?’
    Ivan Savage peered through a crack in the door. He watched the model in conversation with the production manager, and wondered who would be first to see the dead vole he had planted in the grate of the fireplace. He had found the creature in the yard that morning, disembowelled and abandoned by next door’s cat, and slipped it in just as his mother finished cleaning. Ivan held his breath, waiting for the first one to shriek, only to exhale in disappointment as several crew members placed a large flood lamp right in front of the fireplace. It was a shame because the cat had done a great job in teasing out the vital organs from the mouse, as well as removing its head.
    â€˜Ivan! Come away from there.’ From the top of the stairs, Angelica Savage was forced to hiss at her son one more time before he closed the door. ‘We’re not here to disturb them!’
    â€˜I’m bored already,’ he complained, and made his way back to the landing. ‘There’s nothing to do.’
    â€˜You say that every time.’ Angelica ruffled his hair as he passed. ‘It’s only for the day.’
    As Ivan