by Sue Margolis
‘Easy,’ Beverley repeated. She took a glug of her kir. ‘Easy bloomin’ peasy.’
‘I know I could make a good mother,’ Naomi said, almost pleadingly. ‘I’d try to be the exact opposite of ours. I just want a chance to prove it.’
She paused and stared into Beverley’s eyes.
‘Please, Bev,’ she pleaded, ‘I know I’m asking for the moon, but please be the one to give me that chance.’
Beverley took another sip of her drink. For a moment Naomi looked like the needy, vulnerable little girl she used to collect every afternoon from Gearies School.
‘Look, Nay, I have a pretty good idea what it must feel like to be told you can’t have children, but you said it - what you’re asking of me is absolutely huge. I mean, to carry a child - and using my egg, it would technically be my child - to give birth to it and then give it up... I’m just not sure I could...’
‘But will you at least think about it?’
‘Yes, I will. Promise.’
Beverley decided to change the subject in order to give herself time to think.
‘So, tell me about this Tom, then,’ she said, ‘who is he? Someone famous?’
Naomi dabbed her under-eyes with her napkin and gave a half-smile.
‘Fairly. He’s Tom Jago, the drama director. You know, did that amazing production of Blue Remembered Hills for the BBC last summer - won all those awards.’
Beverley nodded, but was none the wiser.
‘We’ve been together just over a year. I tell you, Bev - not only is he amazingly talented, but he’s also a bit of a dish.’
‘They’ve all been good-looking, Nay - and rich. The bit you always seem to find difficult is hanging on to them for more than three months.’
‘I know. It’s the job. I’m always working. How can you make a relationship work when one of you is constantly putting in fourteen-hour days?’
Beverley knew full well it was her sister’s personality which put men off rather than the hours she worked, but she decided to let it go.
‘Funny,’ she said instead, ‘I suppose I always imagined you settling down eventually, but it never occurred to me for one minute that you might want children. You’ve never shown the remotest interest in them. For God’s sake, Nay, you bought Natalie a Prada handbag for her first birthday.’
‘Oh God, didn’t she like it?’
‘Well, she didn’t say she didn’t, but then again she couldn’t speak yet. She did love playing with it, though. She kept her Duplo men and bits of soggy old biscuit in it.’
‘I suppose she was a bit on the young side. I’m no Maria Von Trapp, am I?’ Naomi said. ‘But what do you expect? I don’t know how you did the mothering thing, Bev - I mean, what sort of maternal role model did we have? I’ve always been so scared that I’d repeat our mother’s mistakes. Then, a year or so ago, things began to change. Whenever I went out, I found myself gazing into prams and getting all soppy and tearful. Did you know, Beverley, new-born babies have this heavenly smell about them?’
‘Yeah, I know, that kind of delicate blend of shit and vomit,’ Beverley said.
Lance arrived with their second round of kir royales.
‘No,’ Naomi said, picking up her glass and taking a sip, ‘I mean the smell of their skin. It’s so soft and pink. Look, Bev, you wouldn’t breathe a word of this, would you? If the press find out they’ll have a field day, but I’ve even been seeing a shrink. I know how hard I can be and Renate’s been brilliant at forcing me to confront my feelings about Mum. I mean, getting angry in therapy is so different from getting angry with people in the office. It’s just so cathartic, you wouldn’t believe it.’
‘Does all this mean you’re ready to do some emotional bridge-building with Queenie, then?’ asked Beverley. ‘Originally I thought that’s why you got us together. She’s dying to see you. It’s been ages.’
‘I know. It’s unforgivable of me to have left it this long. I’ll give her a ring, Bev, as soon as I’ve got an hour or six to kill - I promise.’
Beverley laughed.
‘That would be wonderful,’ she said gently, taking her sister’s hand again.
There was a pause while Naomi gathered her thoughts.
‘Look, getting back to the surrogacy,’ she said, ‘you know, I wouldn’t expect you to do it for nothing...’
‘Heavens, Nay. If I agreed I wouldn’t want paying. It didn’t even occur to me.’
‘Well, it occurred to me. Look, I’ve got a fair idea how things are financially with you and Melvin, and I thought two hundred and fifty sounded about right...’
Without thinking, Beverley let out an uncharacteristically sardonic laugh.
‘Great,’ she said, ‘that should just about cover the milk bill.’
‘Bloody hell, how far does it go back - 1485?’
‘No, June.’
‘Hang on. I think we’re at cross-purposes here. I mean two hundred and fifty thousand.”
Beverley sat blinking at her sister. It was a few seconds before she could speak.
‘What, as in a quarter of a million?’
‘The very same.’
‘Pounds?’
‘No, cocktail gherkins, you dope. Yes, of course pounds.’
Beverley knocked back the rest of her kir in one gulp.
***
While Beverley was on the Tube, still desperately trying to take in the enormity of what she was being asked, not to mention offered, Benny Littlestone was sitting on his bed, ripping into a pile of bubble packs and tipping their contents on to his duvet: one twenty-five-millimetre butterfly hose clip, six thirty-two-millimetre rubber washers, twelve clear plastic shower curtain rings and half a dozen inlet hose washers.
He picked up a couple of the inlet hose washers and gave a short soft laugh. Why on earth had he bought them? They had a diameter of less than half an inch. They wouldn’t fit over his middle finger, let alone his penis. A thirty-two-millimetre rubber washer, being lightweight and slightly stretchy, might on the other hand be just the business. He would try it much later when his sister wasn’t around and everybody was asleep.
He turned back to the print-out Lettice had given him last week from the Foreskin Reclamation Web site.
The six pages of information and instructions had been written by Dr Dwight Lafayette, founder of the San Francisco-based foreskin reclamation self-help group, Recover. Lafayette was a Christian vegan and former missionary who had spent much of his professional life converting ‘primitive peoples’ to Christianity. Having spent thirty years watching members of African tribes distend various body parts with the aid of weights, he had become an expert in the art, and on the plane home to the US after retiring from his post had a vision of the Almighty standing by him in the aisle commanding him to apply what he had learned about earlobes and mouths to heathen Jewish penises.
In order to carry out Dr Lafayette’s instructions, Benny had on his way home from school that afternoon got off the bus two stops early and visited the Plumbing and Bathroom Accessories department at Homebase.
As a teenager who regarded himself as passably cool, Benny felt distinctly uncomfortable among all the DIY-savvy dads. He wandered bewildered and awkward past shelves full of planer blades, spigot adapters and sanding discs and headed towards a huge brightly coloured ‘Plumbing and Bathroom Accessories’ sign suspended from the ceiling.
Twenty paces later he came to an area thickly colonised by bent tank connections. These immediately gave way to quiet ball valves (side fed), compression nuts and anti-syphon units. Still no penis girth washers or metal rings. Then, out of the blue, next to some mahogany loo brushholders, he spotted the shower curtain rings. Finally he came upon a row of shelves brimming over with packs of different-size washers. He picked up three packs and headed towards the checkout.
There were three tills open, each operated by a man. Shit. There was no chance of him making it through without the cashier, purely by way of matey, blokish conversation, asking him what
he was planning to do with all these washers. On a scale of one to ten his plumbing knowledge was about minus fifteen. He didn’t stand a hope in hell of bluffing his way through such an inquisition. Such was his panic, it didn’t occur to him that all he needed to do was to shrug, admit he knew nothing about plumbing and say they were for his dad. As far as Benny was concerned, he only had two choices, of which just one was viable, since he wasn’t about to explain the essential role of a washer in his mission to reclaim his foreskin. He took a ten-pound note from his back pocket, about five pounds more than the cost of the washers and shower curtain rings. If the cashier asked him any technical questions, he would simply chuck the money at him, pick up his packages and make a run for it.
Just as he was about to join the queue nearest to him and fall in behind a particularly capable-looking woman in baggy fawn cords who was paying for a tumble dryer venting kit and two cans of T-Cut, a fourth till was opened by a pretty Asian woman wearing a waist-length plait and an armful of gold bangles. Benny raised his eyes heavenwards and muttered his brief but heartfelt thanks to the God he didn’t believe in.
He moved swiftly towards the Asian woman’s checkout, but the venting kit woman pushed in front of him and he was forced to wait while she hunted for her chequebook and filled out the cheque with the speed of a dyslexic tortoise. Then, after spending a full minute wrestling the venting kit into a Homebase brown paper bag, she realized she couldn’t find her receipt. Another couple of minutes passed while she accused the cashier of failing to hand it to her. In the end she found it in her coat pocket. After mumbling a less than heartfelt apology, she stuck her nose in the air and strode off towards the automatic doors.
Benny smiled at the cashier, partly as a show of solidarity against the obnoxious venting kit woman and partly because he was confident that he had escaped any possibility of being subjected to a plumbing oral.
The woman smiled back at him and began passing the bubble packs over the electronic swipe.
‘Oooh, I see someone’s got a leaky gland nut then,’ she said with the confidence of a person who could plumb for Europe. ‘They’re buggers. I had one last week. How you gonna tackle it? Are you going to remove the capstan head before you have a go at the verdigris and scale or detach the spindle completely so that you expose the waste flange?’
Benny stood blinking at the woman.
‘Er, yes, probably,’ he blurted out as he slammed his ten quid on the counter, picked up the bubble packs, which had by now all been swiped, and bolted towards the doors.
***
Having congratulated himself on what he was positive would be the excellent fit of the thirty-two-millimetre rubber washer, he began rereading Dr Lafayette’s instructions, a complicated procedure involving stretching some of the loose skin on the penis, holding it in place with a ring, and then letting good old Mr Gravity do the Lord’s work - with the help of some fishing weights. Benny flinched when he read about the weights; his visit to Homebase had been traumatic enough. A trip to an angling supplies shop was unthinkable. Instead of using the fishing weights recommended by Dr Lafayette, he decided to improvise. It came to him immediately. Earrings. That was it. He went on to the landing, checked he could still hear his sister tapping away on her computer and headed towards his mother’s bedroom.
***
‘Ooh, I love the cracked paint effect,’ Beverley said, walking into Rochelle’s kitchen and admiring her newly decorated walls.
‘Yeah, I’m pleased with it,’ Rochelle said. ‘I was going for the distressed look. Mind you, Mitchell’s not so keen. He walks in last night, grimaces and says if you ask him it doesn’t look so much distressed as bloody tormented. Still, what does he know about interior design? The man sells smoked salmon for a living... So, how was lunch?’
‘I’d forgotten you were seeing Naomi today. I only remembered when my taps began running with blood.’
‘God, you’re worse than Melvin,’ Beverley said, sighing. She pulled a chair from under the table and sat down. ‘Why won’t either of you believe me when I say she’s changed?’
‘’Cos she hasn’t,’ Rochelle said in a matter-of-fact tone as she poured boiling water into the cafetière. ‘Look, hardly a week goes by when Mitchell doesn’t show me something in Private Eye about her. Apparently she struts round the Channel 6 offices like Machiavelli in drag, sacking people who look at her in the wrong tone of voice. They’ve got this brilliant cartoon of her with 666 tattooed across her head.’
She brought the cafetière and two mugs over to the table.
‘I know. I’ve seen it,’ Beverley said, watching Rochelle push down the plunger. ‘It’s horrible. But that’s just the media being jealous and malicious. Look, maybe she was like that in the past, but the woman’s in therapy, for Christ’s sake...’
‘Is that what she told you? God, she’s good. She’s very good.’ Rochelle began filling their mugs.
‘You’re saying she’s lying?’
‘OK... I could be wrong, but it sounds like part of some elaborate buttering-up exercise to me. She wants something from you, doesn’t she? I can smell it. Come on, tell me I’m wrong.’
Beverley didn’t say anything for a few moments. Then she took a deep breath.
‘OK, you’re right. She does want something.’
‘I knew it,’ Rochelle said triumphantly.
‘She’s asked me to have a baby for her,’ Beverley said softly, ‘… to be a surrogate mother.’
Rochelle almost choked on her coffee.
‘Come again.’
Beverley simply nodded.
‘Blimey,’ Rochelle said, clearly at a loss for words.
‘That was pretty much my reaction.’
Rochelle sat thinking for a couple of moments.
‘Oh, right,’ she said eventually, beginning to laugh as her thoughts took shape, ‘I get it. Heaven forbid La Gold should risk losing her figure getting pregnant. So she reckons she’ll get good old Bev to get fat and have her stretch marks for her. I tell you, Bev, she only wants a child for spare parts in case she gets terminal one of these days.’
‘God, you’d smell flowers and ask where the coffin is,’ Beverley said, starting to get irritated. ‘Look, I dashed over here as soon as I got back because you’re my best friend, I’m shocked and confused and I needed to talk to somebody. But if you’re just going to be cynical and make a joke of the whole thing, then...’
‘Oh God, Beverley, I’m sorry,’ Rochelle said. ‘I didn’t mean it. Honest. It’s just that after everything you’ve told me about Naomi - about the way she’s treated you and your mother - I find it hard to believe she’s not out to get you in some way, that’s all. Look, she’s your sister. You know her better than I do. I’ll take your word for it that she’s undergone some kind of personality change.’
Beverley gave a half-smile.
‘So,’ Rochelle said, ‘I take it she’s been told she can’t have children.’
‘Yes. She’s living with some film director guy and they’re desperate to start a family. She’s offered me two hundred and fifty thousand pounds if I agree to have a baby for her.’
‘Christ, she doesn’t mess about. So, what did you say?’
‘I said I’d think about it.’
‘And...’
‘And nothing. I’ve only been thinking for three hours.’
‘OK, so what are you thinking?’ Rochelle stood up and fetched a plate of M&S Belgian biscuits from the worktop.
‘Well, for starters, I’m thinking another pregnancy would give me about as much pleasure as an all-over body wax. I’m forty-two years old, I’ve already spent eighteen months of my life up the duff, undergone two excruciatingly painful labours, the second of which was so traumatic the midwife needed gas and air.’ She reached out and took a biscuit. ‘What’s more, I now have a permanently leaking bladder, an episiotomy scar so hideous that by rights the obstetrician should be doing a five stretch, and veins in my legs which look like they once starre
d in a lump of Stilton. Then again, Naomi is my sister, she is desperate for a child and I can make that happen. Despite all the bad feeling there’s been between us, I still care about her. I don’t think a day went by during that five years when I didn’t think about her and wonder how she was.’
‘And there’s also the question of the money,’ Rochelle said.
‘I know,’ Beverley said, munching on her biscuit. ‘All the way home on the Tube I did my best to keep the money outside the question. I mean, if I did agree to have Naomi’s baby I’d want to do it for love, not simply for financial gain. But I kept coming back to it. Over and over again. Just think what Melvin and I could do with two hundred and fifty grand. We could pay off all our debts, have a holiday, buy a new car. He could set himself up in a new business - I know he could be a success, Rochelle, I just know it. You remember me telling you how Tower of Bagel was his idea all those years ago - and now that’s more successful than McDonald’s. It just has to be something that excites him and is light years away from dishing out Senacot and elasticated stockings to old ladies in Buckhurst Hill.’
‘You think he might be up for the surrogacy deal, then?’
‘Mel? I dunno. He might be tempted by the money, but then again, the thought of his wife carrying another man’s child...’
‘God, if Mitchell thought I was doing that, he’d go berserk. You know how jealous he is. The au pair had to chaperone me when I went to see Braveheart. Runs in the family. He gets it from his grandfather. When his grandmother was on her deathbed she told him she’d been unfaithful during their marriage. He leaned over her and said, “I know. That’s why I poisoned you.”’