The Trials of Tiffany Trott

by Isabel Wolff

  “No. We’re Lone Rangers,” she reiterated. “There’s nothing desperate about us. We don’t even need Tonto, because we’re bright, independent, happy career women, who are having it all.”

  “All, that is, except for the husband and children.”

  “Yes. But we don’t need a husband and children, Tiffany. We’re the generation of women who can take or leave all that. Who can be perfectly fulfilled without it. And better a self-reliant single than a sad divorcée.”

  “Yes, that’s right,” I said. “We’re single-minded.”

  “Quite.”

  “I mean, better sadly solo than miserably married.”

  “Er . . . yes,” she replied uncertainly.

  “Better suicidally solitary, than dismally divorced.”

  “Er . . . sure,” she said hesitantly. There was a sudden lull in the conversation. Quite a long lull, actually. And then Frances said, “Anyway, men are so boring.”

  “I know,” I said.

  “Complete and utter bores. All of them.”

  “Oh yes, Frances.”

  “I mean, what is marriage, Tiffany, but the triumph of hype over experience?”

  “Absolutely. Frances, did you know Sharon Stone didn’t get married until she was thirty-nine?”

  “Didn’t she?”

  “And Jenny Agutter was thirty-eight.”

  “Really? Oh well, I must say that’s rather encouraging,” she replied. “Anyway, I’ll see you here for Christmas drinks next Monday, from seven P.M. OK?”

  “I’ll be there,” I said.

  Frances’s parties are always jolly, even though a lot of her lawyer friends are frankly rather dull. All they ever talk about’s the law. You try and get them onto some neutral subject such as the price of tomatoes, and before you know where you are you’re knee-deep in European Directives and Common Agricultural Policy legislation and test cases before the European Court of Human Rights on conditions for workers in the Italian tomato industry. Frankly, it’s a bit of a bore. Still, at least Kit’s going to be there, I thought to myself, and Lizzie, and amazingly Martin’s going to come too. I don’t think he’s ever been to one of Frances’s parties before. He and Kit can carry on bonding. Maybe bang a few drums together. Or chop up the furniture. Or perhaps offer each other some voluntary body contact. But, before then, I’ve got to gen up on babies. It’s Sally’s first ante-natal class on Saturday morning. In Highbury. I told her I didn’t mind coming over to her local group in Chelsea, but she felt it was unfair on me to have to travel that far.

  “But it’s not just that, Tiffany,” she told me over the phone. I really don’t want to go to a group in Chelsea.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because the other day I went to an introductory evening at a house in Royal Avenue, off the King’s Road, just to check it all out, and some of them weren’t very nice to me.”

  “What do you mean, they weren’t nice to you?” I said. “How could anybody not be very nice to you?”

  “Hang on, Tiffany—can I put you on hold a sec, Washington’s on my other line—sorry about that, where was I? Oh yes, well, one or two of the husbands—and some of the wives—but especially the husbands were rather, well, disapproving. They kept staring at my left hand and saying things like, ‘I suppose your husband’s too busy to come this evening—away on business, is he? Tied up in the City?’And when I told them that I didn’t have a husband, they looked absolutely appalled. And then when I said I didn’t even have a partner, they looked at me as though I were Myra Hindley. And then this fat bloke who works for Morgan Grenfell said that he thought it was a ‘damn shame.’ So I said, ‘What do you mean, “damn shame”?’ And he said, ‘For the brat, of course.’ ”

  “Outrageous,” I said, outraged.

  “I know,” she said. “So that was it. I left. And all the other local groups are fully booked. But I’ve found one I like the sound of in N5 and that’ll be easier for you.” To be honest, this was true.

  “I’ve had an EDD confirmed,” she added excitedly.

  “EDD? What’s that?”

  “Expected Date of Delivery,” she said. “It’s the first of May.”

  “Labor Day,” I said.

  On Saturday morning I met Sally at a house in Ronalds Road, just off Highbury Corner, not far from where she used to live before she moved to Chelsea. Sally’s really keen on this whole pregnancy thing—really, really enthusiastic. But the funny thing is, although she’s eighteen weeks, she doesn’t look pregnant at all.

  “Are you sure you’re pregnant?” I asked her as we stood outside the tall, Victorian house at ten A.M.

  “Absolutely sure,” she said happily, tapping her tummy which was as flat as a Dutch bulb field inside her size ten jeans. “I had another scan last week,” she added. “And guess what?”

  “What?”

  “It’s a girl!”

  “Well, that’s wonderful. If that’s what you want.”

  “Yes I do, actually, I was really hoping for a girl. They say boys are a lot more work, so a little girl would be easier for me to manage as a single parent.”

  “What are you going to call her?”

  “I don’t know. Laetitia, possibly. Or perhaps Lydia. Or maybe Laura.”

  “Something beginning with ‘L’ then,” I said. “How about Lois? Or Lycra?”

  Just then the door opened. A large, gray-haired woman dressed in a loose-knitted tunic of an indeterminate shade of buff smiled at us beatifically. I found myself staring at her feet. She was wearing open-toed Birkenstock sandals, with no tights. In December.

  “Hallooooo,” she said. “I’m Jessie. Please do come in out of this bitter cold.”

  “Sally Peters,” said Sally, extending her hand. “And this is my birthing partner, Tiffany Trott.” Inside, about ten pregnant women had already gathered, with their partners, and were sitting around on beanbags in the large, double drawing room. “Desarts of vast maternity,” I said to myself as I surveyed their mountainous forms. They sat there, sipping herbal tea and babbling about babies and bumps.

  “—when are you due?”

  “—morning sickness was awful.”

  “—chorionic villus sampling.”

  “—nuchal translucence, actually.”

  “—yellow nursery.”

  “—no, Johnsons’ are supposed to be better.”

  “—pre-eclampsia is a nightmare.”

  “—very good offer this week at Mothercare.”

  Jessie clapped her hands, as though to attract the attention of small children at a dancing class, and the session began. The point of these classes, she said, was to prepare mother and partner for the baby’s birth. The main activity would be yoga, in order to improve breathing to facilitate an easy delivery.

  “The first thing I want you to do, is all introduce yourselves,” she said.

  “I’m Sally Peters, and I’m eighteen weeks!” said Sally happily, after everyone else had spoken up.

  “You don’t look one week!” said a rather vast woman to her right impertinently.

  “Well, it’s very hard to tell whether you’re pregnant yourself,” I said, “perhaps it’s all blubber under that attractive marquee you’ve got on.” Actually I didn’t say that at all, I just glared at her.

  “Oh I am pregnant,” said Sally with a good-natured laugh. “It just doesn’t show much yet, that’s all.”

  What a mixture of people—most of the women were in shapeless khaki tunics and ubiquitous black or gray leggings. Sally, by contrast, was in a pink silk shirt and fitted stonewash jeans. And I couldn’t help noticing that some of the men were looking at her. In fact, they couldn’t take their eyes off her. And then they looked at me, out of narrowed eyes, with a somewhat prurient air.

  “Er, I’m Tiffany. Tiffany Trott,” I said when my turn came to speak. “I’m a copywriter and—”

  “Go To Work On An Egg!” shouted one of the men, with a guffaw.

  “Well, you obviously have!” I qui
pped back. “Anyway, as I was saying, I’m a copywriter and I’m Sally’s birthing partner. But I’m not her partner partner, if you see what I mean, ha ha ha ha! Certainly not. No. Not that she isn’t, of course, extremely attractive.” And then I felt really annoyed because why should I feel I had to explain my relationship to Sally? It was none of anyone else’s business. After all, we might be lesbians, and that’s perfectly fine, because that other same-sex couple, Pat and Lesley, they certainly were. Lesley was having the baby, and Pat was, well, her other half. I knew that because when it came to the first yoga exercise, and we all had to get into the appropriate positions with our partner, I saw Pat give Lesley a discreet but tender kiss. Well that was entirely their own concern. Nothing to do with anyone else. Nothing at all. Though I did find myself wondering whether they’d got a friend to donate, or if Lesley had had a one-night stand, or maybe they’d gone down to the sperm bank, and if they had, who they had asked for? Peter Mandelson? John Prescott? Or maybe The Leader himself. Or possibly Seriously Successful . . .? His offspring would be very high quality, I was quite sure about that. And then I thought, perhaps, if Seriously Successful’s sperm was available for the purposes of self-insemination, I might go it alone after all . . .

  “Tiffany, wake up!” hissed Sally.

  “Sorry,” I said. All the mothers-to-be were removing their shoes for the foot massage and the air was suddenly filled with the warm tang of unshod, sweaty feet. At least Sally’s feet were nice, I thought, as I massaged them for her while she went, “Oooooooooohhh! Hummmmmmmm . . . ooooooooooooh! Hummmmmrnmmm . . .” like a mantra in a Buddhist temple. I glanced around the class. There were some really ghastly feet—thick, cheesy heels, dirty nails, cracked and calused soles, and toes, undulating with corns. But then I suppose your feet—are rather difficult to get at when you’ve got an enormous protuberance in front. I made a mental note to get Sally to have a pedicure when she got too big to attend to her feet properly. She could afford it. After the foot massage it was time for the break.

  “Now, all you chaps, and you ladies who are partners, I want you to make the herbal tea for your other halves,” said Jessie. “And your task is to make it while simultaneously holding, under your left arm, one of these soft toys. Do you think you can manage that?”

  Well, it was going to be touch and go. We all snatched a toy from the pile—I just managed to get Peter Rabbit—and went into the kitchen. To be honest, making a herbal infusion one-handed isn’t easy. And Peter Rabbit was absolutely no help. When I took the mug of fennel tea back into the drawing room the expectant mothers were all busily bonding, although the air crackled with catty competitiveness and a kind of bitchy solicitude.

  “—oh you do look tired.”

  “—do you have a problem with water retention then?”

  “—well of course we’ll be getting everything from Osh Kosh.”

  “—we prefer Jacadi in Harrods, actually.”

  “—I wonder whether your breasts will stay like that—”

  “—varicose veins are so unsightly, aren’t they?”

  “—I’ve heard they can go like empty bags afterward.”

  “—you must be, what, eight months?”

  “—four and a half, actually.”

  “—what are you having, Sally?”

  “A girl.”

  “Oh, bad luck!”

  “Oooh . . . hummmm . . . oooohh . . . hummmmmmm,” Sally intoned as we walked down Ronalds Road in the crisp mid-morning air. “That was brilliant,” she said. “I think I’m going to go for the natural approach, Tiffany. No drugs. Nothing. I want it to be a real experience, an epic, unforgettable event.”

  “Er, well, I wouldn’t do that actually . . .”

  “No really, I’ve decided. I’m going to give birth at home, in a warm pool.”

  “But I’ve heard hospitals are really wonderful places, Sally, with lots of nice drugs and epidurals and lovely gas and everything . . .”

  “I don’t mind how long it takes.”

  “Not too long, I hope.”

  “I want to bring Lauren into the world in a memorable way,” she said as she climbed into her soft-top BMW.

  “But I’m sure Lucy would prefer a nice, neat Caesarian,” I said, although I don’t think she heard me. Natural childbirth? Twenty-five hours of crawling around on her hands and knees bellowing like a bull? You have got to be joking! I thought. Especially if I’ve got to be there.

  “Yes, I’m going to have Lottie naturally,” I overheard Sally say to someone at Frances’s party the following Monday. “I really think it’s the best approach. I don’t want to be some anonymous body on a production line in a hospital.”

  “Which is your local hospital?”

  “The Chelsea and Westminster.”

  “Oh, I’ve heard that’s wonderful.”

  “Yes. Yes it is. It’s fabulous. Like a five-star hotel. But that’s not the point, is it?” she continued.

  “Isn’t it?”

  “No. I want to give birth at home, in a pool, with soft music playing.”

  “Well, my specialty is medical negligence and let me tell you that I have to handle a lot of cases where home deliveries have gone horribly, horribly wrong.” Sally shifted uncomfortably from one foot to another. She didn’t want to hear this. “Now, let me just give you the background to one particularly fascinating case I handled in 1989,” the man carried on. “It really was gruesome—in fact the baby died. Now the midwife in question . . .”

  “I’d love to hear about it, but could I just get a refill first,” I heard Sally say. “Back in a sec,” she fibbed as she escaped toward the kitchen. Sally’s always so tactful. It’s one of her nicest qualities. That’s what I noticed most when I first met her ten years ago. I’d been commissioned to write a brochure about her bank, Catch Manhattan, and she was chosen to brief me about the options and futures market. We’ve been friends ever since then. And I’ve never, ever seen her lose her rag, or swear, or show even the slightest irritation with anyone. Ever. She’s got fantastic self-control.

  Suddenly, the doorbell rang and there was Kit, with Portia. Oh why didn’t I marry Kit? I thought, yet again, with a pang.

  “Tiffany!” He gave me a lovely, enfolding hug. Why didn’t I?

  “Hallo, Kit,” I said. “Hallo, Portia.” Portia smiled at me. Very warmly. And this was unusual. And she looked . . . different. On the few occasions she’d agreed to come to my parties with Kit, she had stood around with a patently bored air, rudely tugging at his sleeve, or rolling her eyes at him in a conspicuous fashion to indicate that she’d had enough. This evening she looked more—animated. And she was holding Kit’s hand. Quite possessively. I’d never seen that before.

  “Sorry we’re late,” said Kit. “We just popped in to the Blow Coward Spank party for half an hour.” That’s why Portia was smiling, I thought—she’d obviously had a couple of drinks already.

  “What a wonderful Christmas tree, Frances,” Kit exclaimed. And it was. It barely cleared the ceiling, and it was beautifully dressed—no vulgar swags and bows in carefully coordinated colors, but a polychromatic confusion of pretty glass baubles and spangly beads, covered by a cobweb of white, twinkling lights. On the top was a porcelain angel with huge, gold chiffon wings.

  “Kit, will you give me a hand in the kitchen?” said Frances. “I need someone to help me mix the cocktails.”

  I was left standing with Portia by the Christmas tree. She was so tall. She and Kit always looked a bit comical together, because he’s five foot nine and she’s almost six foot. Six foot three in her heels. But today she had flat shoes on. That was unusual. While she leant her elbow on the mantelpiece to steady herself, I subtly scrutinized her face: cheekbones you could stand a tray on, luminous skin, and large, gray-blue eyes which looked almost turquoise in the flickering half-light of the fire. It’s not hard to see why Kit loves her. She’s beautiful.

  “I’m bleeding pissed off, Tiffany,” she said in her native Stre
atham. “I’ve just done this awful shoot for Harpers & Queen. At Longleat.”

  “But it sounds fun.”

  “Well, it wasn’t.”

  “Why not?”

  “It was for swimwear, that’s why. I’ll be lucky if I don’t get pneumonia. And that bloke who owns it, Christopher Thynne, he was hovering around.”

  “Perhaps he’s looking for another ‘wifelet,’ ” I suggested.

  “Oh darlin’, thank you,” said Portia, as Kit brought us a couple of enormous Martinis and then slipped away into the crowd.

  “In fact, Tiffany,” she continued, knocking back half her cocktail, “I’m pretty fed up with being a model.” Gosh. I mean, Portia had never really bothered to talk to me at any length before, let alone confide in me. “I’m thirty-two,” she said, “I’m burning out. I’m much too old for it—the other girls all call me ‘Grandma’—and the shoots are boring as hell.”

  “What about the catwalk?” I asked. “Isn’t that fun?”

  “I ’ate the bleeding catwalk,” she said vehemently, taking another mouthful of Martini. Gosh, she was really loosening up. “All that getting up at five-thirty to be at some airport. All that hanging around backstage with the other girls, bitching about the designers. I’ve made enough money,” she added. “I want to do something more meaningful. I want to use my brain.”

  “Won’t that be rather academic in your case?” I said. Actually I didn’t say that at all. I just said, “What would you like to do?”

  “Maybe work for the Samaritans,” she said with another large swig. “I’d like to help other people. I’d reely enjoy that. Sorting out their troubles. I’ve listened to enough problems from other girls over the last fifteen years to last a lifetime—drugs, drink, anorexia, bulimia, boyfriend problems, divorce, domestic violence, custody battles . . . the things I’ve heard. You’d hardly believe it. I’ll ’ave to do a course, of course.”

  “Of course,” I said, astonished. Gosh, this Martini was really, really strong.

  “But the most important thing of all,” said Portia, “is that I want to spend more time with Kit.”