In smoggy 1960s Yorkshire, a world away from the psychedelics of London, Mo arrives at the dingy building in Dewsbury where she is going to be a temp. She is not welcomed, instead she is ridiculed – a fat stupid girl running about like a frightened mouse. Merv though, the charismatic co-Director of the company, sees something in her that he needs and takes her aside to be his PA. He uses his power and smooth transatlantic charm to shape her to his needs, letting her into his high flying world where there is glamour she has only seen in black and white on the TV, and showing her off against the hair-sprayed, stiletto heeled PAs of big companies. But he also shapes her with his brutality and so Mo must learn how to be right when it matters, to second guess his moods, and to survive without friend or family to turn to because in 1971, she is the one who is wrong.
*** “Mo, despite mousing up and down her bench with staplers and paperclips, has put on weight. Now her belly pushes out the front of her skirt, and her breasts look like large woollen puddings under her sweaters. They overflow her bra so that just above each one there is a wobbling eyebrow and Mo has taken to walking hunched over in an effort to hide them. ‘Bet she’s up the duff!’ goes the gossip. ‘By who, for God’s sake? Who’d be that desperate?’ ‘Not me,’ says one of the candidates, a single man in his forties with no front teeth. He has flirted with, or rather at, Mo in the past and implied by lascivious gesture that she was willing to let her knickers down pretty much at the drop of a hat. She was a ‘right little goer’, according to him, although now he seems less keen on maintaining the illusion. ‘Anybody’s for a bag of chips, that one,’ he says now. But Mo is not pregnant, instead she has sunk into a nihilistic, black dog hole that even a long soak with Devon Violets bath cubes and Morecambe and Wise on the TV will not sort out. It is a full-on crash landing upon realising that everything her teachers said about her was true - that she would never amount to anything so she had better just hope she can find a halfdecent man to keep her. It has dropped her like a stone into a dank dark cellar where it is carving out cracks in the brickwork for her to climb into. Mo cannot tell her parents what is wrong because she does not know where to start, and they cannot ask because their mouths do not know how to make the right words. ***
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“She marches along to room 312 and hesitates; it will be locked, of course, because Merv is there, but now she wonders if she should have been here earlier herself. Did she make a mistake about the time? Stupid. She knocks. There are footsteps within and Mo holds her breath as the door opens. It moves softly in the oiled manner of rich woodwork and Merv is silhouetted in a stream of late sunlight from the windows. He fills the doorway; blocking the entrance as though he is not going to let her in, as though he is reconsidering. Mo stills herself, a tape recording on pause but with a rattling internal rolodex zipping through a list of possible problems. What could it be? Perhaps he disapproves of something. Her appearance? He said nothing before and she has been careful to be fashionable, not frumpy. She has even got rid of the mousey brown cast in her hair that so annoyed him earlier in the week. ‘You should take a tip from Marley,’ he had said, ‘She looks like a classy Dusty Springfield.’ The hair was a wig but Merv did not know that, so replication of Marley’s style took six hours and a lot of Merv’s money, but at least it would not come off in his hands. What was she missing? She waits and finally Merv steps back, the moment - or his appropriation of it – over, and Mo makes her way into the room with her bags. ‘What do you have for tonight?’ he asks. There is a cool edge to his voice and Mo begins again searching her catalogue of scenarios for something to explain it. ‘For the Playboy Club?’ She is checking, no longer certain what she remembers. ‘That’s what I said.’ Merv is touchy but at least she is right, now she needs to work him around. ‘A whisky and ginger would be nice,’ she says, inching off her coat, ‘in the bath, maybe?’ She gives him a sideways look under black-lined mascara-stiffened lashes. Merv likes to wash her in the bath, soaping her all over and paying attention to very particular parts. He also likes to stay fully clothed while he does this, and so Mo hopes he is not wearing the suit he has in mind for the evening; he will be easier to persuade without that inconvenience. But Merv does not take her bait. ‘Let me see your outfit.’ He takes the carrier bags from Mo and tips the contents onto the bed, pushing them around, giving each a cursory glance. He picks one up between finger and thumb, ‘This one,’ he says. ‘Be in the restaurant at nine thirty.’ ‘Where are you going?’ Mo looks from the dress to Merv and back. Did something about it upset him? He has picked the black one; floating chiffon over a silk base, and she has been careful to purchase new black underwear to avoid getting caught out by any ultra violet lights. Will he know how wise she has been to do that or will he just see a sleazy cheap tart? Why has he not picked the white one with the bat wing sleeves, meant to evoke virginal unattainability? Could he see through it? Surely not, she had held it up to the light in the shop and there was a taffeta slip stitched into it. What then? Mo is churning over possible meanings because, with Merv, everything means something. *** “At nine twenty-eight, Mo is in the restaurant, Dubonnet untouched, her hands in her lap. At
nine thirty, Merv arrives. He has a companion, a man in Arab dress, and they pull out seats to sit at the table with Mo. Merv chats to the man as if he is a friend although he cannot possibly be, and the Arab chats back. Mo watches, a flightless bird in the presence of cats, scanning for clues that will tell her how to behave. The Arab has the grace and ease of manner that Mo 2
associates with wealth – perhaps he is a client and this has become a business meeting. If so, her job will be to soften him up over dinner with coy smiles and fluttering eyes before they go on to the casino, then to retreat while Merv clinches whatever deal is on the table. A waiter comes along and begins setting an extra place, but Merv brushes him away. He smiles at Mo and her stomach ices – it is one of his public smiles and now she is sure she has done something wrong.” *** “Mo pulls the curtain closer; the pattern dances
and the fabric crackles and scratches but she wraps it tighter, peering down at the rows of jade green leaves through rat tails of sticky hair. The leaves shrink and flutter at their edges and then expand; blinding explosions of colour. She shuts her eyes and pulls at the material again. One end of it is trapped under her knee so she tugs. It shifts slightly. She tugs again, stretching her neck up and back and expelling a plume of icy breath towards the ceiling. She topples sideways; the rat tails drape across her face, limiting the range of her one good eye. She pulls her knees up into her chest and tightens the curtain around her. Maybe when she was drunk she told Merv one of her bricked-up secrets. Or maybe she told someone else about one of his. No, Merv would have interrogated her and he had not, so all of this was because of a smile. ***
Fat Mo is available from Amazon. All proceeds go to Respond, a UK charity that supports adults with intellectual disabilities who have experienced sexual abuse and exploitation.
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