by Carmen Reid
And yet, maybe Gwen had spent years nursing the hidden hots for Simon. . . and, well, much as Jo found it hard to believe, maybe Simon had been carrying a torch for Gwen for all this time.
Or maybe not.
Maybe it wasn’t so surprising that after the bruising break-up, her husband had chosen to move in with a younger, svelter version of his mother.
‘Don’t worry,’ Bella had said as she’d left a comforted and two-glasses-of-wine-happier Jo later that night: ‘You’ve got your children, your new house and you’ve got your job.’
‘Yup and that’s enough,’ Jo had replied. ‘Don’t know how I coped with a husband as well.’
Tonight, here in the kitchen of the home she’d been in for barely two months, Bella thought Jo was looking all right. Divorce phase one: weight gain, sackcloth and ashes (or saggy grey tracksuit and un-dyed hair) seemed to be over.
The house sale was behind her, along with the dreaded house clearance – when every shred of Dr Simon Dundas had been taken out, wept over, boxed up, chucked, or, in the case of exceptionally emotional items, stored.
And now Jo was ready to emerge anew from the rubble of her ten-year marriage.
The week away with her daughters had done her good. The colour was back in her cheeks, the downward turn her small mouth had adopted lately seemed to have lifted and there was new hair: shortish, highlighted, feathery and flattering, not too post-break-up drastic.
‘So, it was relaxing, then?’ Bella asked, meaning the holiday.
‘Yeah, we had a great time – beachy, but bracing,’ Jo said as she spooned chicken salad onto their plates. ‘But I’d hardly got back to London before it all kicked off again: work harassing me, phone calls from the dreaded Hugo Hemburrow . . .’ Jo rolled her eyes.
‘Is there still a lot to sort out?’ Bella liked to keep a watchful eye on friends’ divorces, to make certain they weren’t ripped off. Hugo Hemburrow, family law expert, came with her personal recommendation. Bella had already warned her husband that if D-Day ever came for them, Hugo was on her side.
‘But I knew him first,’ Don had immediately argued.
‘This is why we can never get divorced,’ Bella had told him straight back. ‘Because we’d even fight over the lawyer. We both have the contacts, our divorce would be armed: Kalashnikovs and anti-aircraft guns at first, but then it would escalate to an international nuclear conflict and the UN would have to come and negotiate. Far better we stick to the same side.’
‘Far better,’ Don had agreed, wiping bits of his younger son’s breakfast from his jumper and shooting her a very particular teasing smile, the one that got her every time.
‘We’re never getting divorced, are we?’ Bella had asked him, with a particular look of her own.
Don had just shaken his head and carried on smiling.
‘The pension,’ Jo was telling Bella. ‘We’re having a good old fight about Simon’s big, fat NHS pension. Hugo thinks I should be entitled to half of it. When the day comes.’
‘And what does Simon think?’ Bella asked.
‘I think the words “stick it” and “you know where to” formed a large part of the conversation. We may have to settle for a portion.’
‘A portion is good.’
‘I think a portion will be fine.’
‘How is this affecting post-marital relations, though?’ Bella asked. ‘It can’t be very easy having to see him twice a week, discuss the children and everything.’
‘We’re both trying very hard,’ Jo managed as generously as she could. ‘We don’t ever talk about the finances. We let the lawyers deal with that. We just stick strictly to the children, make polite conversation and try to keep it as friendly as possible.’
She bit back the long list of complaints she would like to have added about her ex-husband, the man who was rapidly turning into the cliché of a divorced dad. He was overdoing the Grecian 2000, he’d upped the gym routine, grown a goatee, bought a swanky riverside bachelor pad, moved in his doting girlfriend and even got himself a red BMW convertible that Jo knew he could barely make the repayments on, even though he was one of London’s top colon consultants. Oh yes, as she’d always loved to tell people, what Simon didn’t know about shit wasn’t worth knowing.
He was in charge of their daughters for three days every week: Thursday, Friday and Saturday. In her opinion, he didn’t do nearly as good a job of looking after them as she did, of course. He forgot their homework, he didn’t make packed lunches, he lost socks, pants, hats and scarves, let them watch far too much TV, relied on Gwen to do the cooking – but Jo was determined not to whine about it.
On the plus side, he picked the girls up promptly from school and childcare on Thursdays and Fridays and he spent all his Saturdays with them.
These were things he’d never done during their married life. So Jo could see that shared care was the best way forward for them all.
On Sunday morning, seven-year-old Mel and three-year-old Annette came back to her so they were together for the best part of her two days off – Sundays and Mondays – and then her less frantic workdays, Tuesdays and Wednesdays.
Jo had three nights a week to herself, which was still a strange novelty. No one had warned her how silent her home would be without the girls, how desolate the little pink bedroom would feel, especially if last thing at night she went in to check on them as usual, forgetting that they weren’t there.
She coped with those nights in another way now, staying in the office late. Then going out, to renew a long-forgotten acquaintance with smoky, poky nightclubs, the cocktail menu, the dawn taxi home and, for the past few weeks, she had been falling into bed with a man she didn’t know very well.
It wasn’t exactly healthy, but after ten years of marriage to a doctor, a little unhealthiness was perhaps an understandable reaction.
‘Let’s not talk about Simon any more,’ Bella decided. ‘I think you should tell me much, much more about Marcus. The new boyfriend . . .’
‘Well, no, no, he’s not a boyfriend.’ Jo held up the wine bottle. ‘You want some more?’ she asked her friend.
But Bella shook her head: ‘Well, what is he then?’
‘He’s a date . . .’ Jo tried.
But Bella wasn’t going to be put off: ‘He’s more than that! Please at least tell me that he’s a fantastic shag.’
‘He’s a gift,’ was Jo’s response and she couldn’t help smiling. Because it still seemed too ridiculous. To be neck high in all this ‘D-I-V-O-R-C-E’ crap – she couldn’t think about it without breaking into Tammy Wynette – and yet to be granted the wonderful, distracting gift, there really wasn’t any better word, of Marcus: funny, scruffy, carefree, significantly younger, unstoppably physical, distractingly physical, Marcus, who could single-handedly remind her of the meaning of the phrase ‘can’t keep their hands off each other’, who was unashamed about the three great loves of his life: cooking, eating and having fun in bed, who could whip up a hollandaise just as easily as he could whip off his clothes.
‘Look at you, you’re blushing,’ Bella teased. ‘If your readers could see you now, the hard woman of Fleet Street all smitten-kitten for a handsome young chef.’
‘Oh ha ha.’
‘When do I get to meet him, by the way?’
‘I’ve no idea.’ Jo took a sip of her drink. ‘I’ve no idea what I’m doing with him . . .’
‘I think the rest of us do, though,’ Bella interrupted.
‘It won’t last, you know,’ Jo said. ‘The chef. Very soon he’ll melt away into the night. . . like ice cream. Mint chocolate chip, his favourite. . .’ she gave a laugh. ‘Well, this week anyway.’
‘He’s obviously doing you good,’ Bella told her. ‘You’re looking well, losing the fresh out of divorce school look, edging more towards “boy bait”. I like the day dress thing you have going on here. You never wore dresses before, did you?’
‘Oh God, am I totally obvious?’ Jo asked, secretly anxious about the new make
-up and the above the knee shirt-dress, voicing the little internal crisis of confidence that seemed to strike at her more than she would like. ‘Should I just get a badge saying “I’ve dumped my husband” and be done with it?’ she asked.
‘No. No. You’re fine. What am I saying? You’re gorgeous,’ Bella soothed her.
‘I’m slightly worried that Marcus is . . . well. . .’ Jo looked up and met her friend’s eyes: ‘Bella, am I not doing what divorced men are supposed to do? I’m being totally mid-life crisis predictable, trying to relive my youth, feel young, or at least feel up young. . .’
‘He’s a natural reaction,’ Bella assured her. ‘Simon became sensible and boring. Your once wonderful sex life withered on a stick . . . this is what happens when you’re set free. But, anyway, Marcus isn’t that young,’ Bella reminded her. ‘Although maybe you’re giving in to a natural, primeval urge to rejuvenate yourself with a young fuck.’
‘Bella!’
‘It’s like in those Swiss beauty clinics, you know, where they inject you with sheep embryo. You’ve got yourself a cheap and obviously far more fun-filled version of that.’
‘Please!’
‘Oh don’t be shy about him,’ Bella added. ‘He’s in his twenties at least, isn’t he?’
‘Twenty-six.’
‘That’s not young,’ Bella exclaimed: ‘I’ve a far worse confession to make. I’m secretly in lust with one of my neighbour’s sons. Whenever I hear the sound of his skateboard whizzing down the pavement, I peek out of the window and watch him glide past, long hair ruffling in the wind. I used to joke about it to Don until one day his response was: “He’s still underage, you know.” I mean . . . yeurgh!’
They both pulled a face.
‘Imagine if it was Don looking out of the window whenever a certain 15-year-old girl walked past,’ Bella added, ‘I’d be horrified . . . the police would be called. Neighbourhood Watch would run him out of the square. . .’
The women had abandoned the kitchen for the cosy comfort of one side of the sofa each and further intimate, gossipy chat, when the phone began to ring. Jo took a glance at the chunky, leather-strapped watch on her wrist and uttered the word: ‘Arse.’
‘What is it?’ was Bella’s response.
‘It’s work.’ Jo put her glass down. ‘Again.’
‘How do you know?’ Bella asked.
Jo didn’t answer, just shook her head and picked the offending receiver.
‘Jo Randall,’ she said as crisply as she could manage after the ill-advised foray into a third bottle of wine.
‘Hi Jo, Declan here,’ came an Irish voice on the other end of the line, as if she hadn’t already guessed. By 9.50 p.m., her newspaper’s doggedly efficient night news editor would have had the first editions of tomorrow’s papers for about seventeen minutes, just long enough to speed-read every single one and start harassing reporters, even though it was only Monday night, still a full five days away from the next edition of their paper.
‘Just thought you’d want to know before the morning,’ Declan went on. ‘The Mirror has a fifteenth case of whooping cough confirmed, in a new area, so it’s starting to look like an epidemic.’
‘Hello Declan,’ Jo pretended to gush. ‘Lovely to hear from you too. What about: “So Jo, how are you? Did you have a good holiday? How are the girls?”’
‘Yeah, yeah, whatever. Glad you’re back. Your department’s cack without you,’ was all the graciousness Declan could manage.
‘Charming. Look, fifteen cases of whooping cough is not an epidemic,’ she reined him in. ‘I’ve already had a conversation about whooping cough cases with Rod and my verdict is, we’ll be over it like a rash in the morning, OK?’
‘Just thought you should know soon as,’ Declan said.
‘Much appreciated,’ she managed, although it totally wasn’t. She bade him good night, replaced the receiver and turned back to her friend.
‘Nothing urgent,’ Jo explained. Still, retrieved wine glass in one hand, TV remote in the other, she flicked on the television and tuned to the 24-hour news channel, volume low, to keep just a slight eye on it.
‘Where were we?’ She brought her attention back to Bella and for about the twentieth time that evening alone, wondered how her friend managed to keep it so together. There she was, raven hair pinned up in one of those effortlessly stylish things she did, sophisticated brown and butter button-through summer dress, making the most of the honey tan her usually Snow White complexion had taken on. Personal trainer-perfect stomach. Breezy, cheerful and funny, despite working relentlessly in a tough job.
‘Where were we?’ Bella repeated, a smile breaking over her face. ‘We were deep in all the usual overworked women in the 21st century shit. How tired we are, how busy we are, how overworked and underpaid we are, our latest totally neurotic worries about our children, how our men never clean the sink . . .’
‘Your nanny cleans the sink,’ Jo broke in.
‘She does, God bless her,’ was Bella’s reply.
‘Anyway, we weren’t talking about all that.’
‘No,’ said Bella, ‘we weren’t, because it’s Monday, so I’m not too tired or overworked yet.’
‘Or underpaid,’ Jo couldn’t help adding.
‘No. Things are going well, at the moment, touch wood.’ Bella looked round momentarily for something to touch. ‘But it’s not always like this. You know that. God knows what’s going to hit us next. I’m always suspicious when things are going as well as this. I think I prefer to be dealing with a crisis and looking forward to the good times.’
‘Oh, don’t get all anxious,’ Jo told her. ‘Enjoy. You’ve got really good times ahead.’
Bella had just been outlining her plans for the expansion of her software virus protection empire.
‘There are no women in computing!’ she said in outrage. ‘The whole techie world is a glamour-free zone. It’s full of barely pubescent geeks who couldn’t wow a conference even if you employed Hugh Grant’s tailor, David Beckham’s eyebrow plucker and Jude Law’s hairdresser. Although,’ she confessed, ‘he’s actually very good. I make Don go to him now.’
And before Jo could mouth the words: ‘How on earth?’ Bella added: ‘I pay in advance, so he need never know how much it costs. I’m telling you,’ she said and drained her glass, ‘the techie world is mine for the taking. But anyway, you were just about to tell me more about the chef.’ Bella’s eyebrow arched in a sly and teasing way: ‘The handsome, talented, outrageously good in bed young chef. Weren’t you? You were just about to tell me much more about that.’ Bella reached over to top up Jo’s glass with another big glug of wine.
‘Oh wait. . .’ Jo’s eyes fixed on the telly, she felt for the remote and turned up the sound.
They caught the very end of the report: ‘. . . in the light of this news, the Chief Medical Officer is urging parents who have not yet had their children protected with the new Quintet vaccine to come forward as soon as possible.’
The bulletin cut to tonight’s footage of the Chief Medical Officer, on the steps of his building, intoning the mantra: ‘Quintet is the best possible way to protect your child against whooping cough, mumps, measles, rubella and chickenpox. All our research indicates that this injection is totally safe.’
‘Balls,’ Jo said to the screen. ‘What research? The government has not conducted one single piece of research into this injection. They’ve taken everything on trust from the manufacturers. Maybe if he came out and said that, we might believe him a bit more.’
She turned to Bella: ‘Have your boys had it?’
‘Quintet?’ Bella asked.
‘Yeah.’
‘Well. . . you know Don.’
Jo did know Don, very well. She’d known Don, the news editor on her paper’s daily sister title, for about two years longer than she’d known his wife. He was sound. Very good at his job. Straight. Honest. An honourable man in a fucked-up business. Also an inescapably attractive man. A Scottish George Cloone
y. Hearts had broken right across London when word got out that Don had finally met his match and was marching her to the registry office before she could get away.
‘Don is pretty straightforward about doctors,’ Bella told her. ‘Not one tiny bit alternative. I’m not either, really. Hell, I even work for some of the drug companies. So even though the boys had all their injections when they were tiny, Don’s quite keen to let them have Quintet as an added precaution against this outbreak. Why?’ She wanted to know, ‘Do you think it’s going to turn out to be risky?’
‘I don’t know yet,’ Jo replied. ‘I still don’t know if children were damaged by the last set of combination vaccines I investigated. I’m not a scientist and I’m not a doctor, I just interviewed an awful lot of parents who were absolutely convinced of it. But it seems to be almost impossible to prove.’
‘But this whooping cough is pretty bad,’ Bella added. ‘The children are in hospital, really ill.’
‘I know, I know.’ Jo could have said more. Could have said a lot more. Vaccination had been one of her areas of expertise for several years. But she felt tired of this. Deflated. All her hard work, all her hours of research, all the heartbreaking interviews and here was the Chief Medical Officer on screen in front of her, declaring an injection which had only been available in the UK for two months ‘totally safe’.
Nothing in life was totally safe. Not even lying fast asleep in your own bed. She’d once done a story on a couple who’d been crushed to death by their chimney, which had fallen through the roof on top of them in the middle of the night.
But that was the problem with news reporting. You spent most of your life on the bad stuff.
‘What about Mel and Annette?’ Bella asked.
‘If they were babies, there is no way I’d let them have Quintet. No way. All combination vaccines are suspect to me now. Mel’s had some single vaccinations and Nettie . . .’ Jo paused, knowing what kind of reaction this would get, ‘Nettie hasn’t had anything yet. I’ve been putting it off. . .’