Gawd you're a harsh task master Hully...
Betty
Betty is a name given to a rotund, middle-aged woman who is quietly pleased that she's mastered yorkshire puddings after all these years. She's endured a vanilla sex life with Barry for 17 long and beige years and is wondering just how to ask him if he'd like to give spanking a go
Dakota
Dakota lives in LA. This is what her agent says she has to do if she wants to make it big. She moved away from her entire family and everything she's ever known for a career that consists of appearing in forgettable commercials and a series of boyfriends who can't even remember her name
Dolly
Dolly isn't her real name. It's what she tells her friends she is called to make herself sound more interesting. She also lies and says she once met Danny DeVito when really the only celebrity she's ever accidentally brushed up against in a Costco is Noel Edmonds and even then she hadn't recognised him until her mother had pointed it out
Dulcie
Dulcie would have pigtails if her hair was long enough. But it isn't. And it's too fine anyway so she teases it into kerazee tufts and captures it in bubblegum pink hair clips. Her friends aren't really interested in her as a person but like the clubs she can get them into for free. Only it isn't free, it's sinking to her knees in an alleyway and wishing the friendships were real
Idalia
She smokes because it's cool and if she didn't live in Paris, she'd live in Venice. It took money and years to look that good and while it's slipping away in increments that as yet only she has noticed, she knows that she has enough on the inside to ensure a happy dotage. That money didn't buy
Isolde
Was born too late. By about 40 years. And while on others her style would be dismissed as ageing hippy, on her it's just like the clothes wove themselves to her lifestyle. And while she's not really romantic, she can't help falling in love with strangers sometimes just because of the way they quirk their head when they hear a particular song
Eden
Didn't ask to be born into this family any more than she asked for her name. Her life is like a film poster. The background a burning skip; the foreground children with hardened eyes and even harder stares. The title is Displaced
Ella
Is legion. When a new and much talked about film director makes the creepiest film since Children of the Corn, when the stars are all blonde-haired and blue-eyed and move as if one, the name they will call them is Ella
Layla
Has been called a two bit whore and probably worse. But she likes her life fast and looses, she likes the promises written on lumpy mattresses and dancing round the wet spot. And if she dies tomorrow, she dies happy. But if she has years left, then there is always the glimmer of hope that one day somebody will first want to hold her hand
Lola
Isn't a showgirl. She isn't even sure she wants anybody to look at her. When they laugh, she assumes it's at her but it never is. She is loved by a shy boy who will never pluck up the courage but will adore her from afar until it's too dark to see
Marnie
Worked hard to lose her accent. It's still there when she drinks a shade too much but when she whips her sleek bob and throws back her head in laughter, exposing the sleek column of a marble white neck, people forget that she wasn't born into this. But she earnt it and that's why it counts
Poppy
She lies as easily as she breathes. Her life is comfortable if false. If she gets it, it's because she stole it from somebody else. She is always in the right place at the right time because she planned it that way. And if she has any regrets, she'll deny them later and leave you empty-handed
Rosa
Looks like wisdom. The lines on her face are memories of the good times. She's never happier than when holding hands with the love of her life. She doesn't even remember a time when he wasn't there and knows that he doesn't even see the lines. He just remembers the good times
Valentina
She isn't really elusive, it's just that nobody asks the right questions. She didn't want to be an artist, she just was one. Even when it was wax crayons in a determined fist and acres of white paper on a polished floor, she did what the moment told her to do
Verity
Lived hard, laughed much and at the very end when she fell off the back of that boat, even through the shock of knowing it wouldn't end well, she managed to laugh
Better?