by Sue Margolis
“With all due respect, Mr. Mugford, you can stall as much as you like, but the bottom line is that the lease is about to be transferred into my name. If you refuse to pay for the necessary repairs, I won’t be signing. And I suspect that with the building in its present state, you won’t find people queuing up to take it over.”
Mugford grunted. “So how much are you looking for?”
Huh. I’d managed to reel him in.
“I won’t know the exact figure until I’ve had a quote for the work.”
“Two grand. That’s my final offer.”
“Three.”
“Two-five.”
“Done.”
Yesterday I’d done a deal with the aunties, today with old man Mugford. I decided that I was getting rather good at this negotiation lark.
Mugford asked for my bank details, which I had to repeat several times because the sour old duffer was hard of hearing. Afterwards I panicked. How could I have been so stupid as to hand over that kind of information to a sleazeball like Mugford? But half an hour later, the money hit my account. When I called to tell Aunty Bimla, she could scarcely believe it.
“Sarah’s got the money from Mugford,” she called out to Aunty Sylvia.
Sylvia shouted back: “Tell her to make sure his check isn’t made of rubber.”
“Your Aunty Sylvia says—”
“I know. I heard. Tell her it’s fine. He paid by cash transfer.”
Aunty Bimla relayed the information.
“I still don’t trust him. Shirley used to say that man was so cheap, he wouldn’t spend Christmas.”
• • •
Mugford insisted I sign a two-year lease. If he was paying out for repairs, he wanted to make sure it was worth his while. The good news was that I wouldn’t be paying rent for the rest of the year, as Aunty Shirley had paid him up front. Where she had found the money, I had no idea. It was only after I’d signed that I told the children I had given up my job at the nonemergency helpline. If I’d let them know while things were still up in the air, Dan would have started fretting. Being that much older than his sister and more aware of our reduced circumstances, he would have worried about how I was going to earn a living. Now that the shop was officially mine, breaking the news seemed much easier. I told them over dinner.
“So do you have a new job?” Dan leaped in, before I’d had the chance to explain about the shop.
“I do and I start on Monday. It’s going to be very exciting. I’ve decided to take over Aunty Shirley’s shop. Do you remember the time I took you there? We’d been to Harrods to see Father Christmas and we called in at the shop to see Aunty Shirley … and you met the aunties.”
The children nodded.
“They were nice and they gave us sweets,” Dan said.
“That’s right. Well, the plan is for the aunties and me to run the shop together. It needs doing up first, so we won’t be reopening it straightaway.”
“What does it sell?” Dan said. “I don’t remember.”
“Ladies’ underwear.”
“What, knickers?” Dan said, pulling a face. “Yuck.”
“Actually it’s mainly bras.”
“Double yuck. I’m not telling anybody at school.”
“One day,” Ella said, “when I’ve got boobies, I’m going to have a bra. I want a pink shiny one with tassels.”
“Excuse me?”
“Tara—you know, Cressida’s mum—well, she’s got one like that. I saw it on her bed. The tassels were black. And she’s got these tiny knickers with fur on the front that’s shaped like a heart.”
Tara? Marc Jacobs’ Tara was secretly a cheap slut? Good Lord. Who’d have thought?
“Can I have some like that?” Ella said.
“Some like what?”
“Knickers with a furry heart.”
“What? No. Absolutely not.”
“Why? They’re pretty.”
Until now, I’d been thanking God that my six-year-old daughter appeared—temporarily at least—to have lost interest in discussing her clitoris. Now this.
“I know, but they’re meant for women.”
“OK, so maybe I can have a pair when I’m bigger—like when I’m ten.”
“No, you can’t have a pair when you’re ten.”
“But why? Ten is practically grown-up. That’s so mean.”
“Jasper’s dad runs a shop,” Dan broke in, “and they’re rich. Will we be rich?”
“I very much doubt it. And anyway, Jasper’s dad doesn’t run a shop. He owns a car dealership and he sells Jaguars. That’s why they’re rich.”
“But could we be a bit rich?”
I couldn’t help admiring his persistence. “You never know. It’s possible, I guess.”
Dan cheered up. “OK, then I don’t mind you selling knickers and bras.”
“Thanks, Dan. I appreciate that.”
“So could I have a pair of furry knickers when I’m fourteen? That’s really old.”
“No, not even when you’re fourteen.”
“So when can I?”
“I don’t know.”
“What about when I’m thirty? Thirty’s really old. I’ll be almost dead.”
This conversation was getting tedious.
“OK, you can have some when you’re thirty.”
“Cool.”
With that, Ella jumped down from the table and disappeared. Ten minutes later she was back with her Hello Kitty notebook. Inside she had written: I promis that Ella can have fury hart nikers when she is therty. Cross my hart and hope to di.
“Right, go on, you have to sign it.”
She handed me a pink glitter coloring pencil and I signed.
• • •
On Saturday afternoon both kids had birthday parties. Once I’d dropped them off, I drove to the shop. I wanted to take another look around and remind myself what needed doing repair-wise. I made a few notes and decided that since there was probably all manner of damp and decay lurking behind the old fittings and piles of junk, there was no point in getting estimates for the renovation work until the place had been cleared. I was capable of doing most of it on my own—all I needed was to hire a Dumpster—but the heavy stuff, desks, filing cabinets and whatnot, would be a problem.
When I got home, I Googled house clearance firms. Being Saturday, nobody was answering the phone. Eventually I found a bloke called Dave, who quoted me seventy-five quid.
“Ten o’clock Monday morning suit you?”
I said that it would suit me very well.
After speaking to Dave, I called a Dumpster company and arranged for a “five-yarder” to be delivered. This would take the rest of the junk, the stuff that was light enough for me to lift. I had no idea if a five-yarder was big enough, but the Dumpster guy said that as soon as it was full, all I had to do was call and he would arrange for it to be removed and replace it with a new one.
“So how many parking bays have you reserved outside the shop?” the Dumpster guy asked.
“Parking bays?”
“To park the Dumpster?”
“Ah. Right.”
“A five-yarder needs three. I take it you’ve called Parking Services and got it all sorted.”
“Parking Services … right. I haven’t actually called them as such.”
He muttered something about useless bloody women.
“So you’re expecting my blokes to deliver a five-yard Dumpster first thing Monday morning and you haven’t organized anywhere to park it?”
“I’m really sorry. I wasn’t thinking.”
The chap let out a sigh. “Call them now. They work until four on a Saturday. It’s ten to now. You’ll probably just catch them. Then get back to me.”
“Brilliant. Thanks. Will do.”
As I put down the phone, an image of Steve popped into my head. He was laughing at me and telling me how irresponsible I was.
• • •
The good news was that Parking Services were still picking u
p. The bad news was the nice lady there charged me four hundred quid to park the Dumpster for the week.
Determined to avoid further cock-ups, I spent most of Sunday making a to-do list. This included calling the bank to set up a direct debit to cover the rent, buying heavy-duty refuse sacks to take all the paper rubbish, finding somebody cheap, reliable and competent to do the renovation work and calling my parents in Spain so that they wouldn’t think I was neglecting them.
In the evening I cooked the kids’ favorite dinner: roast chicken, roast potatoes and honey carrots. I bought strawberries and Ben & Jerry’s for dessert. I meant it purely as a treat, but as we sat down, Dan announced that this was “Mum’s good luck dinner.” It was a sweet, lovely thought that brought tears to my eyes.
“Aw … thanks, hon.”
“Yeah, good luck, Mum,” Ella said. “Tomorrow when I’m in school, I promise to spend the whole day thinking about you. It might be hard in art ’cos I like art, but it’ll be easy in humanities ’cos Mrs. Warboys is so bor-ing.”
“Thank you, sweetie. All good luck thoughts greatly appreciated.”
I didn’t mention that despite my excitement about what the future might hold, I was praying that this good luck dinner didn’t turn out to be my Last Supper.
• • •
On Monday morning, after dropping the kids at school, I drove home, parked the car and walked the two minutes to the train station. There was no way I was driving into town on a weekday. Half an hour later, I was heading out of Bond Street station.
I picked up a latte and a Danish in Pret. I walked past Selfridges, took a left and headed towards Manchester Square. A couple of turnings later I hit Villiers Mews—its crested and brass-plated shops daring anybody without a title to cross their thresholds. It struck me what an idiot old man Mugford really was. If he’d been prepared to put his hand in his pocket and spend some proper money renovating the shop, he’d be getting five times the amount that I was paying him in rent. On the other hand, if he had decided to do up the shop, I couldn’t have afforded five times the rent. I could only be grateful for his stupidity.
I unlocked the door of Shirley Feldman Found Garments and picked up the mail, which was scattered, along with a few dried-up leaves, over the shabby mat. As I sipped my coffee, I wandered around, tearing idly at bits of wallpaper and dislodging lumps of loose plaster. With only a few thousand pounds to keep me going, I needed to get the business up and running fast. For the umpteenth time that morning, I started to panic, but before the churning in my stomach had a proper chance to take hold, there was a tap on the door.
It was Dave, the house clearance guy. He had brought his mate Declan with him. They were a pair of chirpy, salt-of-the-earth types who spent an hour schlepping ancient storage units, filing cabinets and broken desks up from the basement. When he realized that there was no way that the Formica shop counter would go out through the front door in one piece, Dave obliged by going at it with a large hammer and a chisel. Dave and Declan even agreed to take down the shop awning and the sign. I was so grateful that I gave them fifty quid on top of the seventy-five we’d agreed. They seemed more than happy. “I bet they were,” I imagined Steve snorting. “They saw you coming. Sarah—don’t you get it? You’re on a budget. You don’t have money to throw away.”
Not long after Dave and Declan had gone, the Dumpster arrived and slotted neatly into the three parking bays that I’d booked for the week. I paid off the delivery guys and spent the next couple of hours sifting through junk—in case there was anything worth keeping, which there wasn’t—and lugging it up from the basement. There were battered box files spilling over with papers, stray mannequin limbs, roll after roll of stale faded satin, supermarket bags full of crisp, yellowing invoices and receipts. (The aunties had called me to say that they’d put recent ones in the safe.)
Everything was covered in dust, which rubbed off onto my clothes and skin. There were no windows in the basement. The more I gathered up junk, the more I disturbed the dust and the thicker the air became. Soon I was coughing and my eyes started to itch. I made the mistake of rubbing them with my hands, which only made it worse.
The current stock—the ready-to-wear range of bras, panties and corsets—was stored upstairs in the wall of “brown drawers.” The overflow was packed into large, flat boxes. These were stacked to head height in one of the fitting rooms. Later in the week, I would load the boxes into the car and take them home. I couldn’t risk leaving them to the mercy of drilling builders.
At three thirty I was back at the school gates, dusty, red-eyed and aching. All I wanted to do was get out of my filthy sweats and shirt and soak in a hot tub. I was in no mood for making mummy small talk. I was certainly in no mood for Tara and Charlotte, who were sashaying towards me.
“Sarah. Haven’t seen you in ages,” Tara cooed. “How are you?”
“I’m fine.”
“Good. Good. Funnily enough, Charlotte and I were just talking about you. Weren’t we, Charlotte?”
“We were.”
“And we were wondering if your cousin Rupert has been in touch with Greg Myers.” She put “cousin” and “Rupert” in heavy italics. The woman so didn’t believe my story. When the truth came out, the summer fair committee would force me to be the target on the wet sponge stall.
“As far as I know, he’s e-mailed Greg,” I said. “And he’s still waiting for a reply.”
“Really?” Charlotte said. “Seems odd that he’s still waiting, bearing in mind your cousin knows him.”
“Oh, you know how busy these people are. Greg probably hasn’t even opened Rupert’s e-mail yet.”
I was petrified that they were going to press the issue, but by now they’d noticed my clothes and were busy looking me up and down.
“Goodness, I had no idea you were into Dumpster diving,” Tara said. If the woman were any more of a bitch, she’d have puppies.
Charlotte started to titter.
I glared at her and turned back to Tara.
“Not diving. Loading.”
“Sorry, not with you,” Tara said.
Noting her friend’s confusion, Charlotte’s dainty brow formed a supportive furrow.
I explained that I’d spent the day clearing out Aunty Shirley’s shop. “She died recently and I inherited it. I’m hoping to have it open again in a few weeks.”
“I’m guessing grocer’s? Hardware store?”
Another titter from Charlotte.
“Actually it’s a lingerie shop—specializing in bespoke bras.”
“What? I don’t think you’ll find there’s much call for bespoke bras where you live.”
“Who said anything about it being where I live? Actually it’s behind Selfridges.”
“Really?”
“Yes. Villiers Mews.”
“Villiers Mews? Are you sure?”
“Absolutely positive.”
“Goodness. In that case, we might have to pay you a visit—don’t you agree, Charlotte?”
“I do.”
“OK—here’s the thing,” I said, looking straight at Tara. “Whereas I can see my little atelier being up Charlotte’s street, I think you might be just a tad disappointed.”
“Oh? Why’s that?”
“Well … I’m not planning on doing a line of thongs with furry hearts.”
I watched Tara’s face turn the color of a furry heart. Then I caught sight of Dan and Ella running towards me.
“Sorry,” I said, smiling at the two women. “I have to go.”
“Omigod,” Charlotte shrieked at Tara, apparently unaware that I was still within earshot. “I had no idea you wore tarty underwear for Hugo. But how on earth does she know?”
“One of her kids must have come into my bedroom and found it. Nasty snooping brats.”
“So … come on … what else does Hugo like you in? Crotchless panties? Rubber? I bet you’ve got handcuffs and a whip.”
“As it happens, I do… . But who said anything about th
em being for Hugo?”
“No!”
• • •
There was no point asking the mothers at school to recommend builders, because they all used people who cost the earth. Employing workmen from Kensington and Chelsea—gentlemen builders who’d quit working in the City for shorter hours and less stress—was just another way of outposhing one another. Smart vans with their understated lowercase lettering constantly dotted the neighborhood—especially in spring. Their arrival heralded the end of winter as surely as the cherry blossoms.
When Mike and I had been about to start renovating the old house, I’d inadvertently called several gentlemen builders to give me estimates. Umpteen Oscars and Benedicts had arrived in their striped rugby shirts with the collars turned up, their wrists covered in ethnic string-and-bead Shambhala bracelets, and demanded two grand just to paint and paper the boxroom. I was in no doubt that they would do an excellent job—I simply wasn’t prepared to part with an arm, a leg and several bits of offal for the privilege. In those days I may not have been good with money, but I wasn’t reckless. I told them I would let them know and started shopping around. I ended up hiring a small local firm. Although they didn’t have pictures of Gwyneth Paltrow’s loft extension in their glossy brochure—in fact they didn’t even have a glossy brochure—they did an excellent job and charged a fraction of what the Oscars and Benedicts had wanted.
Battersby and Son may not have been fashionable, but even so, I got a kick having builders’ vans parked on the drive for months. It gave me a sense of belonging, that I had a place in the neighborhood. The old me. I winced.
I must have spent an hour Googling builders and trawling through the customer reviews. In the end I made appointments with six, who appeared to be cheap and reliable.
They came with their notepads and bits of chewed pencil. Some had gone home first and changed into clean pressed shirts; others arrived in paint-spattered tees and jeans. They pulled bits of plaster off the wall, stuck the ends of their screwdrivers into architraves, prodded at damp patches. Heads were shaken. Air was sucked in between teeth. There was talk of new dampproof courses and ceilings, which sounded expensive. They all agreed that the place was rotten, subsiding, terminal. Had it been human, they would have instructed it to go away and get its affairs in order.