Then – 6th March – evening
‘Ella, hi.’ The man stuck his hand out for her to shake and when he didn’t get an immediate response took it as an invitation to drag her into a hug. ‘It’s so good to see you again.’
She stiffened as his arm went around her shoulder, and patted him on the ribs. He was six inches taller than her, dressed in jeans and a plaid shirt, smelling of a long day’s work not fully covered by a potent spritz of body spray.
He caught on at last and dropped his arm, stared at her with a horrified expression.
‘Shit, you don’t remember me, do you?’ His face crumpled and he looked towards the small group of people he’d just peeled away from, as if they would vouch for him, but they were deep in conversation around the trestle table where the Prosecco was being poured.
Ella didn’t recognise them either. Backers, she guessed, definitely not residents, not members of any of the local action groups either. Bloggers or press, maybe; she’d sent dozens of invites out to people she barely knew, hoping to stoke up some more buzz, spread the word.
‘Manchester. . .’ His hand turned in the air, encouraging her to finish the sentence.
‘Of course, yeah,’ she said, smiling a duchess smile. ‘Lovely to see you again. I just have to go and check on someone, but let’s chat later. Have another drink. Food’s ready soon.’ She pointed towards a couple of guys in black aprons sweating over a grill on the other side of the roof, the smell of burgers and falafels wafting over. ‘And thanks for coming out and showing your support. It means a lot to us all.’
He started to speak again but she was already moving, heading for a circle of old milk crates they’d found in the basement this morning and carried up to the roof, the best they could do for seating on the limited budget. Molly was sitting there swaddled in a red fake-fur coat, a woman about her age but much older-looking, rolling a joint next to her. Carol was one of Molly’s friends from way back. Ella had met her at a vigil last year. Afterwards, Ella took them both to the pub and listened as they shared their war stories: Greenham Common and Reclaim the Streets, road protests where they’d chained themselves to diggers, incursions into animal-testing labs.
Since then Ella had attended sit-ins and marches with Carol, drunk with her, been to her house, been taken into her trust and lost it again, and still she couldn’t decide if Carol cared about everything or nothing. If protest was just a way of life she’d fallen into and now had nothing to replace it with. She was fifty-seven and had been doing this since the mid-eighties. No partner or children, just like Molly, but a network of people she considered family. And one man, in particular, she regarded as a son.
He was the reason Ella hadn’t expected to see her here, why she’d not invited her.
Evidently Molly had decided to play the diplomat, take this opportunity to encourage two of her closest friends to make peace. Judging by the sour expression on Carol’s face, she wasn’t in a forgiving mood.
As Ella approached them, Carol lit her joint, took a quick drag and held it out to her, giving her a challenging look. Daring her to reject the deliberately inappropriate olive branch.
‘You know Ella doesn’t.’ Molly plucked the joint from between Carol’s fingers. ‘She’s a good girl, aren’t you, sweetheart?’
‘It makes me paranoid.’ She drew up a crate. ‘And I’m already nervous as hell about giving this speech.’
‘Just tell them what you think they want to hear,’ Carol said. ‘That’s worked out well for you lately.’
Ella glanced at Molly, who gave her an apologetic shrug then tucked her chin down into the collar of her coat. ‘How many are you expecting?’
‘We’ve got fifty people who took the patron option – they’re the only ones who paid enough for an invite.’ Ella warily eyed Carol, who was staring at the guests with open contempt. ‘Then we sent out another eighty invites to locals and some of the other people who’ll be involved in the book, but you know how it is, not everyone who says they’re coming comes.’
‘People are so unreliable these days,’ Carol said coldly.
Ella scanned the crowd, perhaps sixty strong now and mingling well. She spotted Derek from 309 talking to a young reporter from the local paper. No sign of the other remaining residents she’d invited but it was still early. They were the people she needed to be here. Human stories commanded column inches and, while Derek would happily talk even the most patient reporter’s ear off, one man wasn’t enough.
She recognised a couple from the local residents’ association, waved at the man when she caught his eye. They’d cornered a freelance journalist and were, no doubt, explaining how the homeless shelter they both volunteered at was currently fighting closure. They’d get their coverage, Ella thought. They were young, photogenic and fiercely committed, just the kind of people she’d wanted involved. He was doing a series of shorts for the book, putting regulars at the shelter to the Proust questionnaire. She was contributing a piece about the shutting down of historical gay bars in the area.
‘What’s all this lot cost?’ Carol asked.
‘We managed most of it with volunteers and donations,’ Ella said, knowing why Carol disapproved. ‘Nothing’s come out of the main fund.’
She could have asked who paid to get Carol to Sizewell B all those years ago, who bought her bolt croppers and the fabric for her banners, but she wanted tonight to go well so she changed the subject.
‘How are things going with your community centre?’ she asked.
Carol grunted. ‘Developers are saying they “no longer have the requisite funds” to build it. It’s a hundred and fifty grand, for fuck’s sake. They think we’re idiots. It was a condition of their planning permission and the council are doing nothing to force them to comply.’
Ella nodded, half listening as Molly started questioning Carol on the details, avenues she might go down and people who could help.
Two guys came over and sat on the crates opposite her, started tucking into their burgers and talking animatedly about an exhibition they’d just come from at the Damien Hirst gallery on Newport Street. No sense of irony, Ella thought. Happy to spend an evening going from one site of gentrification to an event trying to help the very people pushed out by the process. Still, they’d have a copy of the book when it was finished, could put it on their coffee table next to the gallery catalogues they’d collected and enjoy the playful juxtaposition.
Behind them the Rise 1 tower thrust arrogantly into the night sky and she noticed a lone figure on one of the balconies, watching this party. It must look like a sad gathering from so high up, a celebration for a non-victory, because this building would come down and a bigger, shinier one would go up in its place. They were causing the owners only minimal disruption with their refusal to take the offers that kept coming in, upped by a couple of thousand pounds a time. While the real estate itself increased at a much faster rate. Even in this economic climate.
The words of her speech, which she was running through in her head once again, sounded hollow and naïve. This crowd would cheer, they would raise their glasses in drunken defiance, but tomorrow morning the same choice would be facing Molly and others: go now or go later.
She looked at Molly, bent double with laughter, and knew she must realise that too. Every fight she’d taken on had been lost – roads got built, power went nuclear and women were no safer on the streets – because the system was too huge to fight and it had stopped allowing the little people their small victories, because even the stingiest concessions led them to believe they deserved better and that belief was too dangerous to be tolerated.
‘If you give them an inch, they’ll take a mile.’ One of her father’s favourite sayings, now seemingly a global policy.
Ella shook her head, told herself not to think like that.
People were still fighting and, one thing she knew for certain, fought all the harder when their backs were against the wall.
More guests had arrived during the last half hour and, without her noticing, the background chatter had become a babble. She saw the man who had approached her earlier talking to a young woman who exhaled her e-cigarette vapour into his face, watched him wave it away, refusing to read the signal she was giving. The man went to fetch two bottles of beer and by the time he turned back to her the woman had joined another group, obviously friends because they circled her protectively.
Molly elbowed Ella, holding out a bottle of bourbon she’d brought from her flat. ‘For your nerves.’
‘Do I look that scared?’ she asked, trying to make a joke of it.
‘Only because I know you.’
Ella took a small mouthful and forced herself to swallow. She wasn’t a big drinker, especially neat spirits. But it started some warmth spreading through her chest and into her belly and the second go wasn’t quite as unpleasant.
‘We’ll corrupt you yet,’ Carol said humourlessly.
They passed the bottle around between them and Carol rolled another joint, the smoke diesel-smelling and heady when she blew it out. Ella was sure she was aiming it in her direction on purpose, as if she could get her high like that. They thought she was a puritan and Ella wouldn’t correct them. They didn’t need to know how much she’d smoked at university, how she’d bought weed rather than food during most of her first year, blasted through it alone, because nobody seemed to want to be around her at Trinity, not her housemates, or her classmates; not even the couple of other girls who’d come from her old school, bringing the childish barbs and gossip and the nicknames along with them.
If they could see her now, she thought, watching the crowd begin to coalesce at the centre of the roof between the drinks and food, as if they knew the evening was reaching its purpose.
The alcohol had silenced the negative voice at the back of her head, the one that had been dogging her all day, reminding her how bad she was at public speaking. She would not forget her lines. She’d been through the speech two dozen times; it was seared on her brain. This was important, it was the right thing, it was what people wanted from Ella Riordan.
‘Now?’ she asked Molly.
‘If you’re ready.’
‘I am.’
Molly and Carol shoved a few crates together, placed one on top to create a platform.
A police helicopter passed overhead and Carol paused to shout at it, raising her fist with the joint between her fingers. A few other people followed her example and a bottle went sailing over the edge of the roof, missing the helicopter by thirty metres or more, but it got a cheer and something shifted in the air, a new edge of menace creeping through the crowd, a chaotic ripple that momentarily stopped her from taking the makeshift stage.
The small, scared voice inside her wondered if they might turn on her next.
‘Come on, sweetheart,’ Molly whispered, holding her by the elbow. ‘You’ve worked hard for this, enjoy your moment.’
The crates wobbled slightly as she stepped up on to them, but she kept her footing.
‘Everyone!’ Molly shouted. ‘Your attention, please.’