Then, a couple of Fridays ago, I got a call from Julie. It was a crackly mobile, but I could tell she was in tears. For a second I thought Mum! and my stomach went down a mine shaft, but it wasn’t that; the factory where Jules does piecework had gone bust. Manager done a bunk, receivers called in. They were putting padlocks on the doors. All the women who had still been at their machines were now shivering out in the yard. Could I come down?
No, I said. Ben needed his lunch and, besides, I really didn’t know what use I could be. When Julie answered, it was in a voice I recognized from childhood, the one my little sister had when she asked if she could get into bed with me as the raging voices of our mother and father came through the floorboards. “But I’ve told everyone you’re a businesswoman, Kath, and you’ll be able to tell us what’s what.”
Combed my hair, put some lipstick on and dug out Armani jacket from the wardrobe in the spare room. I wanted to look like the woman Julie had described to her colleagues. When I slipped the jacket on, it was like being back in uniform: the gray wool impregnated with the smell of power, of money being made and things getting done. I wrestled Ben into the baby seat and drove down to the industrial estate. It wasn’t hard to find Julie’s place. The notice on the fence said TRADITIONAL ENGLISH DOLLS’ HOUSES and over that was a sticker: Liquidation Sale—Everything Must Go! In the yard, there were about forty seamstresses, many wearing the most amazing saris. They parted as I arrived, and it was like walking through a flock of tropical birds. I waved my old Platinum Amex at the guy standing by a side door, told him I’d come up from London and was looking to buy some stuff. Inside, the dollhouses were abandoned in mid-decoration: tiny sofas, footstools, velvet pelmets, porcelain toilets awaiting their wooden seats, grand pianos the size of a powder compact.
“What can we do, Kath?” asked Julie when I came out.
Absolutely nothing. “I’ll try and find out what’s happened.”
The next day, I dropped Em at school, left a delighted Ben with his equally delighted grandmother and got the train down to London. Cab across town to Companies House: it didn’t take long to get the dollhouse people’s accounts for the last five years. You should have seen them. The business was a wreck: disappearing margins, no investment, piles of debt, a complete financial basket case.
On the train back up north, I tried to read the paper, but the type wouldn’t stay still. There were plenty of ethical funds out there under instruction to invest in women-only companies; I knew that better than anyone. Money for the taking, really. But when the train shuddered to a halt at Chesterfield, it shook some sense into me.
Kate Reddy, I can’t believe you are even having this thought. Take on something like that? You’d have to be out of your mind, woman. Out of your bloody mind.
* * *
7:37 P.M. Bedtime. Brush teeth, four recitations of Goodnight Moon, three Owl Babies, visits to the bathroom (four), attempts on potty (two), time taken till lights out: forty-eight minutes. Must improve.
8:37 P.M. Call to Candy Stratton in New Jersey to discuss mail-order market and distribution with view to global dollhouse business.
“I knew it,” she hollers.
“I’m making inquiries for a friend.”
“Yeah, right. Tell her to wear that red bra when she goes to get the financing.”
9:11 P.M. Call to Gerry at Dickinson Bishop in New York. Sussing out funds specifically designated to invest in women-only companies. Gerry says it’s a steal. “Ethical’s the new Viagra, Katie.”
10:27 P.M. Ben has accident in bed. Change sheet. Try to find pull-up nappy. Where are nappies?
11:48 P.M. Wake Momo Gumeratne at home to talk about possibility of wooden dollhouse frames being made by workers employed by Sri Lankan aid agency she’s been advising.
“Kate,” she says, “can I do it with you?”
“I’m not doing anything. Go back to sleep.”
MIDNIGHT. Take glass of water up to Emily. The great gray eyes stare up at me in the dark.
“Mummy, you’re thinking,” she says accusingly.
“Yes, love, it’s allowed, you know. How would you like to help Mummy build a palace?”
“Yes, but it’s got to have a tower where Beauty sleeps.”
“It absolutely does.”
1:01 A.M. Still time to go over the figures from the factory—what is required is a proper marketing plan and some diversification. How about a range of buildings instead of the traditional Georgian townhouse? A New York brownstone, maybe, a cottage, offices, castles, ships, Emily’s palace. Richard could design them.
1:37 A.M. “Kate, what do you think you’re doing? It’s two o’clock in the morning.”
My husband Richard is standing in the doorway of the kitchen: Rich, with his acres of English reasonableness and his invincible kindness.
“Darling,” he says, “it’s so late.”
“I’m just coming.”
“What is it?”
“Nothing.”
He squints curiously at me in the light. “What kind of nothing?”
“Oh, I was just thinking about, you know, homemaking.”
He raises an eyebrow.
“Don’t worry. Warm my side of the bed, I’m just coming.”
The kiss he plants on my forehead is a question as much as a gift.
Seeing my husband go upstairs, I long to follow him but I can’t leave the kitchen in this state. I just can’t.
The room bears signs of heavy fighting; there is Lego shrapnel over a wide area. In my absence, three apples and four satsumas have been added to the big glass bowl, but no one has thought to discard the old fruit beneath and the pears at the bottom have started weeping a sticky amber resin. As I throw each pear in the bin, I worry about the cost. After washing and drying the bowl, I carefully wipe any stray amber goo off the apples and put them back. All I need to do now is get Emily’s lunch box ready for the morning, check the time for Ben’s appointment at the surgery, see if I can get from there to the bank to talk to my manager, convene a meeting of workers at the factory, call the receivers and still get back in time for school pickup. Chicken out of freezer. Chicken out of PTA meeting. Emily wants horse. Over my dead body; who will end up cleaning out the stable? Rich’s birthday—surprise dinner? Bread. Milk. Honey. And there was something else. I know there was something else.
What else?
Acknowledgments
This book could not have been written without my beloved friend Miranda Richards, who taught me not to be afraid of the Dow Jones and so much else.
I want to thank Hilary Rosen for her heroic research into the subject of this novel and for the e-mails which make me laugh out loud whenever life got too Kate-like. There are so many Kate Reddys out there who offered up their disasters with incredible good humor; they know who they are and I salute them.
Episodes from I Don’t Know How She Does It first appeared in the Daily Telegraph. I am indebted to Sarah Sands for giving Kate her big break and to Charles Moore for his forbearance and kindness.
Nicola Jeal, at the London Evening Standard, was a constant support, and now that she has a baby herself she can find out if I’m telling the truth.
As a first-time author, I was very fortunate in my agents, Pat Kavanagh in London and Joy Harris in New York. My editors—Jordan Pavlin at Knopf, Alison Samuel at Chatto and Caroline Michel at Vintage—brought the baby into the world with loving care. Norman North at PFD and Miramax’s Lola Bubbosh ensured that one day Kate will have a second life on the big screen, while Nicki Kennedy at ILA sold her around the world with reckless enthusiasm.
Others offered moral support and practical criticism: Adam Gopnik, Martha Parker, Quentin Curtis, Anne McElvoy, Kathryn Lloyd, Claerwen James, Richard Preston, Philippa Lowthorpe, Prue Shaw, Tamsyn Salter, Justine Jarrett, Naomi Benson and Niamh O’Brien.
A book about mothers naturally owes a great deal to the writer’s own. I want to thank my Mum for giving me a love of song lyrics and babies, and
for her precious time, the value of which I am somewhat belatedly starting to appreciate.
The character of Ben would not have been created without the lovely hindrance of Thomas Lane. Emily’s observations were inspired by the wit and wisdom of Eveline Lane, Isabelle and Madeleine Urban and Polly, Amelia and Theodora Richards.
Finally, I send all my love and gratitude to Anthony Lane, who can take credit for most of the commas in this book and for all of the semicolons. While the fictional life of a harassed working mother was being created in our house, he loaded the washing machine, cooked dinner, read Owl Babies three hundred times and even found time to write the odd film review. I don’t know how he does it.
Allison Pearson
London, April 2002
PERMISSIONS ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Grateful acknowledgment is made to the following for permission to reprint previously published material.
CANDLEWICK PRESS, INC.: Excerpts from Owl Babies by Martin Waddell, illustrations by Patrick Benson. Copyright © 1992 by Martin Waddell. Illustrations copyright © 1992 by Patrick Benson. Reprinted by permission of Candlewick Press, Inc., Cambridge, MA.
IRVING MUSIC, INC. OBO ITSELF & BUGGERLUGS MUSIC CO.: Excerpt from the song lyric “I am Woman” words and music by Helen Reddy and Ray Burton. Copyright © 1971 by Irving Music, Inc. OBO Itself & Buggerlugs Music Co. (BMI). International copyright secured. All rights reserved. Reprinted by permission of Irving Music, Inc. OBO Itself & Buggerlugs Music Co.
PRICE STERN & SLOAN: Excerpts from Little Miss Busy by Roger Hargreaves. Copyright © 1990 by Mrs. Roger Hargreaves. All rights reserved. Reprinted by permission of Price Stern & Sloan, an imprint of Penguin Putnam Books for Young Readers, a division of Penguin Putnam Inc.
WARNER BROS. PUBLICATIONS, INC.: Excerpt from the song lyric “Night and Day” by Cole Porter. Copyright © 1932 (Renewed) by Warner Bros. Inc. Excerpt from the song lyric “Someone to Watch Over Me” music and lyrics by George Gershwin and Ira Gershwin. Copyright © 1926 (Renewed) by WB Music Corp. Excerpt from the song lyric “Where or When” by Lorenz Hart and Richard Rodgers. Copyright © 1937 (Renewed) by Chappell & Co. Rights for extended term in U.S. controlled by The Estate of Lorenz Hart (administered by WB Music Corp.) and The Family Trust U/W Richard Rodgers and The Family Trust U/W Dorothy F. Rodgers (administered by Williamson Music). All rights reserved. Reprinted by permission of Warner Bros. Publications, Inc., Miami, FL 33014.
WONDERLAND MUSIC COMPANY, INC.: Excerpt from the song lyrics “A Spoonful of Sugar,” “Sister Suffragette,” and “Feed the Birds” words and music by Richard M. Sherman and Robert B. Sherman. Copyright © 1963 by Wonderland Music Company, Inc. All rights reserved. Reprinted by permission of Wonderland Music Company, Inc.
A NOTE ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Allison Pearson, named Critic of the Year and Interviewer of the Year in the British Press Awards, is a weekly columnist in the London Evening Standard and a member of the BBC’s Newsnight Review panel. She lives in London with her husband, the New Yorker writer Anthony Lane, and their two children.
THIS IS A BORZOI BOOK
PUBLISHED BY ALFRED A. KNOPF
Copyright © 2002 by Allison Pearson
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. Published in the United States by Alfred A. Knopf, a division of Random House, Inc., New York, and in Canada by Random House of Canada Limited, Toronto.
Distributed by Random House, Inc., New York.
www.aaknopf.com
Originally published in Great Britain by Chatto & Windus, London
Owing to limitations of space, all acknowledgments for permission to reprint previously published material may be found at the end of the book.
Knopf, Borzoi Books, and the colophon are registered trademarks of Random House, Inc.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Pearson, Allison, 1960–
I don’t know how she does it: the life of Kate Reddy, working mother / by Allison Pearson.
p. cm.
1. Working mothers—Fiction. 2. Children of working mothers—Fiction.
3. Mother and child—Fiction. 4. London (England)—Fiction. I. Title.
PR6116.E17 12 2002
823'.92—dc21 2002066104
eISBN: 978-1-4000-4012-4
v3.0
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