Life Swap

by Jane Green

  And then there are the notes on her life, her routine, where she goes, what shops she uses, even her pin number for her cashpoint card, which she types through gritted teeth, having been trained never to give that number to anyone.

  Oh God, she thinks. What if Amber’s a psycho? What if she seems completely normal but in fact she turns out to be a single white female who comes over here and takes over my life? What if she steals all my money, not that there’s that much to steal, sleeps with Jamie Donnelly, fucks up my job, rips up my clothes… okay, okay, Vicky takes a deep breath. Now you’re being ridiculous. And she goes ahead and writes down her pin.

  Meat comes from the butcher round the corner. Cheese from the cheese shop over the road. Anything else, go to Waitrose on the High Street (and look out for Madonna, I have spotted her in there a couple of times). I’m incredibly lazy about cooking, although every now and then I’ll catch Nigella on the box and be inspired. Mostly in the evenings I’ll just eat crackers and dips with some vegetables. Basically anything that doesn’t need cooking, although to be honest I’m very rarely at home in the evenings. The only things that are always in my fridge are wine, Diet Coke, and chocolate if I get a craving.

  Providores does fantastic coffee, and the Orrery is across the street, which is delicious but v. expensive – recommend it highly but only for work dinners that you can expense!

  I know you’ll have a fantastic time discovering the shops here. VV Rouleaux has amazing trim, although can’t think why you’d need it. Nice place to browse, though. Kate sends me to Rachel Riley for the children’s clothes – she’ll probably put an order in with you as the sale starts while I’m away, and Kate can resist everything except a Rachel Riley sale. Oh, also Kate will be demanding you bring her taramasalata from Waitrose. Only do it if it’s okay. She won’t mind if you say no.

  Selfridges is up the road, and any time I feel a bout of compulsive spending coming on, it’s up to Selfridges I go – you’ll definitely find your fill of Balenciaga bags in there, but remember, you’re using my month’s salary, and I definitely can’t afford to buy designer stuff very often! (I, however, will thoroughly enjoy shopping in Highfield, although don’t worry too much – I did listen when you said Richard wanted you to stop spending!)

  And a tip at work: befriend Stella, the fashion editor. She’s always got freebies lying around the fashion cupboard. I haven’t bought make-up in years, and half my wardrobe is leftover from shoots that they’ve just forgotten about. Very unethical, I know, but if you won’t tell anyone I won’t…

  Speaking of clothes, I’ve been sorting out my wardrobe, because I’m completely embarrassed having been to your house and seen your palatial dressing room with colour-coordinated clothes.

  On a good note I’ve thrown away all my greying underwear – not that you’ll be wearing my underwear, don’t worry! – but it’s forced me to finally get rid of it. I’ve also been ruthless and got rid of anything I haven’t worn for a year, but unfortunately that’s left me with not an awful lot.

  I do tend to wear flat shoes for work, and heels in the evening. You’ll notice I have a bit of a fetish for shoes and bags, but then again, what woman doesn’t? Thankfully, I finally cleaned out all my handbags – I didn’t want you to come over and find a pile of handbags all stuffed with rubbish, and I’m bloody pleased I did. I think I found enough crumpled tissues to stock a third world country (why they’d need dirty crumpled tissues I don’t know), seven lipsticks, three camera films which must be about a hundred years old because I’ve had a digital camera for three years, £67 and a bra. God knows. Don’t ask. So now you have lots of super-clean, empty handbags from which to choose, although unfortunately no Birkins like yours! (That’s what I’m most excited about – going out and actually carrying a real-live Hermès Birkin!)

  I always oversleep, and it’s always a rush to get into the office. The alarm clock next to the bed does work, but I always sleep through it; hopefully you’ll be better. Sometimes I walk if I’m up early enough, or I get the tube from Baker Street, and I’m leaving you my Travelcard. They never look at the picture, but if you feel guilty about it you can always get your own Travelcard and they’ll reimburse you at the office.

  I have breakfast at the office – a bagel, a yoghurt and some fruit. It sounds ridiculous saying you have to eat the same as me, but the sandwich bar on the corner has lots of different options if that sounds horrible. Although how horrible can a bagel, yoghurt and fruit be? Leona and Ruth have all my notes about work – I’ve left them separately at the office – and you’ll be at the editorial meetings, but I don’t think Janelle will expect you to contribute.

  I do have a gym membership, but I haven’t used it in six months. I started out with fantastic intentions, went five times a week for two months, then skipped a week because I was ill, and haven’t managed to motivate myself to go back since. Still, I know that you exercise a lot, so it’s there if you need it. The membership card is in my purse next to the AA card.

  Janelle says we’re not allowed to talk during the swap, which I think is probably the right decision – it would be awful if you hated everything and were really unhappy, or vice versa. I’m sure the other one would then feel so guilty it would bring the swap to an end.

  I hope I haven’t overlooked anything although I’m sure I’ve forgotten loads. How do you put your whole life down on a few pieces of paper? But I know you’ll be fine, and I so hope this is everything you expect it to be. I have this morbid fear that you’ll find my flat tiny and grotty, and everything a bit small and pointless, while I live it up in your palace with your beautiful kids and nanny. Okay, I’ll shut up now, just in case I’m making you miss them. So, remember to call Kate when you feel homesick, and good luck!

  Vicky has finished all the piles in her office, filing papers that have been waiting to be filed for the best part of a year, cleaning the desk that hasn’t seen Pledge since its long-gone days in the Ikea showroom, making sense of the mess of paper clips and elastic bands in the top drawer of her desk.

  She has tackled her computer, defragmenting and cleaning the disk, wiping off any porn sites she may have visited – just out of curiosity, of course – over the past year, and cleaning off all the cookies.

  She has rearranged her wardrobe, cleaned everything that needs to be cleaned, wiped down all the cupboards – no longer will Amber find any skeletons in there.

  In short, Vicky will now be presenting her life as the quintessential single girl about town. With the exception of the number of Manolos in her closet (and yes, there are a few, but only a few), Vicky could now give Sarah Jessica a pretty good run for her money.

  It just remains to be seen whether Amber can do the same thing.

  Chapter Nineteen

  Amber suppresses a giant yawn as she shuts the car door and heads over to the ballet school, clutching a Starbucks grande skim latte in her hand. Thank God Starbucks opens so early, she thinks, then stops in shock as she rounds the corner and sees a gaggle of women, all clutching similar cardboard coffee cups, waiting in line outside the ballet school.

  Amber checks her watch. It’s 6.23 a.m. Jesus, she thinks, walking up to join the end of the line. Registration doesn’t even start until 8 a.m. and Amber was convinced she’d be the first woman there, although evidently twelve other women had exactly the same thought.

  Amber hesitates for just a moment. In the line she can spot several women from the League, although this shouldn’t surprise her, because Miss Cynthia’s Ballet Academy is the one everyone wants to go to, and the competition is fierce.

  There are two ballet schools in town. Miss Cynthia’s Ballet Academy, and the Highfield Academy of Ballet. Amber has never actually been to see the Highfield Academy of Ballet, but she knows that the girls who go there are generally the girls who didn’t get into Miss Cynthia’s.

  For Miss Cynthia takes her ballet very seriously indeed. The curriculum is that of the Royal Ballet School in England, and most of the mother
s believe Miss Cynthia to be English, and rumour has it she is a distant cousin of the Queen. Deborah, however, being English herself, realized upon meeting Miss Cynthia that her accent, familiar though it was, had a distant ring to it that almost certainly wasn’t English.

  This was at one of Miss Cynthia’s group meetings, for prospective parents of prospective star ballerinas to come and see the school and meet Miss Cynthia. Unlike the Highfield Academy of Ballet which will take anyone who phones up and registers their child, Miss Cynthia insists on vetting the parents first, followed by the children.

  She holds these meetings at 4 p.m., serves English Breakfast tea, cucumber sandwiches with the crusts removed, and scones, and she speaks in upper-crust tones that would put Camilla Parker Bowles to shame.

  Still, Deborah, clutching her cup of tea in one hand and her crustless cucumber sandwich in the other, concentrated fiercely as Miss Cynthia gave her speech, and suddenly, when Miss Cynthia was in the middle of describing the dress code for ‘her ballerinas’ – the girls are never girls, always ballerinas – Deborah got it.

  ‘Any questions?’ Miss Cynthia asked at the end, with a gracious smile, her feet perfectly turned out in first position, her head cocked just so, the chic chignon at the base of her head just visible.

  Deborah raised her hand. ‘Where are you from?’ she asked pleasantly, in her much less grand, but distinctly English accent.

  ‘I was trained at the Royal Academy of Ballet in Richmond,’ Miss Cynthia said, although the more perceptive among the audience noted the tension in her voice. ‘Any other questions?’ She looked around the room, but Deborah wouldn’t be put off.

  ‘Sorry, I meant where were you born? It’s just that someone told me you were English but I definitely hear some kind of an accent and I can’t figure it out.’

  ‘I spent most of my life in Richmond,’ Miss Cynthia said, through gritted teeth.

  ‘But you sound ever so slightly Australian,’ Deborah said. ‘Or am I completely wrong?’

  Miss Cynthia sighed. She’d never been publicly outed before, but now this irritating English girl had put her on the spot, and what was she supposed to say?

  ‘My grandfather was English,’ she said. ‘But yes. I was born in Sydney.’

  ‘Ha! Knew it!’ Deborah whispered to Amber. ‘Anyone who speaks with that many marbles in her mouth is definitely a fake. Cousin of the Queen indeed. Her grandfather was probably a burglar.’

  ‘So will you be sending Molly to Miss Cynthia?’ Amber asked Deborah after the tea, noting the filthy looks that Miss Cynthia was shooting over at Deborah.

  ‘Are you joking? So that pretentious old bitch can victimize her because I’ve got her number? No chance. I’m signing up for the Highfield Academy tomorrow. What about you?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ Amber frowned. ‘I think Gracie would love it here, and I do kind of like how seriously she takes it, how she refers to all her girls as “ballerinas”.’

  ‘It’s up to you,’ Deborah shrugged, ‘but Molly is never going to be a ballerina anyway, not with that bottom of hers. Gets it from her mother, I’m afraid, nothing I can do, but the last thing I want is for her to feel inadequate at four years old because her ballet teacher makes her be a tree or something in the recital.’

  ‘A tree? What are you talking about?’ Amber started laughing.

  ‘Look at these thighs.’ Deborah gestured at her legs. ‘Even when I was four they were the same, only, obviously, smaller. I was about a foot taller than everyone else and chubby. I was desperate to be a fairy ballerina but my ballet teacher made me feel like a fairy elephant and, to make it worse, every year at the recital I had to be a tree. All the other girls got to wear pink sparkly tutus and tiaras and dance around prettily, and Harriet, who was also rather large, and I had to stand at the back dressed in green tutus, with crowns made of branches and tissue-paper leaves. It was a fucking nightmare.’

  ‘Oh my gosh, that’s terrible,’ Amber said, wiping the tears of laughter away. ‘No really, I mean it’s funny, but it’s awful. What a horrible thing to do to a child. But honestly, I don’t think Miss Cynthia would do that. I heard that everyone’s in pink at their recitals.’

  ‘Okay, so maybe she wouldn’t make Molly be a tree, but I’d still rather she went to the other one. I’ve heard it’s much more creative, and they focus more on the kids having fun than on the serious ballet stuff. Gracie’s little and delicate and Miss Cynthia will love her.’

  ‘I am probably going to put her into Miss Cynthia’s,’ Amber nodded, ‘but I do agree Miss Cynthia seems like a bit of a cow. Maybe for Christmas I’ll give her a jar of that disgusting Australian stuff that they all eat. What’s it called? Marmite?’

  ‘No, not Marmite, that’s English. It’s Vegemite!’ Deborah started laughing. ‘Oh God, would you, please? Give her a jar of Vegemite and a didgeridoo to remind her of home.’ And with that the two of them started shaking with laughter, until tears were streaming down their faces.

  Meanwhile Gracie does love her ballet classes. And Molly does love hers. Amber has her reservations about Miss Cynthia, particularly after one of the little girls, Hannah Greenberg, disappeared in the middle of last term. She had been getting a little chubbier, and Suzy said she’d bumped into Hannah’s mother, Rachel, who said Miss Cynthia had asked her to try and watch what Hannah was eating, and Rachel had been so horrified she’d pulled Hannah immediately from the class.

  But who knows whether it was actually true or not, and until Miss Cynthia did or said something unforgivable to Amber, Gracie was going to continue going there, even if it did mean getting in line at the ungodly hour of 6.23 in the morning at the beginning of every term to ensure your spot.

  ‘Amber!’ Amber looks up and spies Nadine from the League standing a few people in front of her.

  ‘Hi, Nadine!’ Amber says. ‘How are you?’

  ‘I’m great,’ Nadine says. ‘How are you?’

  ‘Incredibly busy,’ Amber laughs. ‘Life is going crazy.’

  Nadine smiles and there’s a long silence which always makes Amber feel uncomfortable, and she does what she always does when people just stand and look at her silently, as if in expectation: she gets verbal diarrhoea and starts talking, nineteen to the dozen, just to fill the silence.

  ‘I’m off to London tomorrow,’ she says. ‘For four weeks, which is completely insane, but I’m doing this Life Swap piece for this English magazine where I swap lives with a single girl and she comes and sees what it’s like to be married with children, and now I can’t believe how much I have to do and I haven’t even packed although frankly I’m not even sure what I’m supposed to bring because I’m meant to wear all the other girl’s clothes and she’s supposed to wear mine, and now I just don’t know what I’ve let myself in for.’ Amber takes a breath. Shit, she thinks. As usual, too much information.

  ‘You’re doing what?’ Nadine says, as the other women in between them also turn round and look at Amber.

  ‘Did you say you’re doing a life swap?’ one of the other women says, and suddenly they’re all riveted.

  ‘You’re leaving your husband and children for four weeks?’ says a blonde woman in a green cable cashmere sweater who Amber doesn’t know, and Amber suddenly has an incredibly strong temptation to turn around and run away.

  ‘I am so jealous,’ continues the woman in the green sweater. ‘Oh my gosh, you are so brave! You get to go to London and pretend to be single for four weeks? Can I come with you?’ And she laughs as Amber exhales in relief. For a moment there she was terrified they’d all start berating her: how can she leave her children, what kind of a mother must she be, what is she even thinking of, letting her husband share a house with a single woman, doesn’t she know what kinds of thing happen in situations like this?

  Not that any of these women have ever had a situation like this, but Amber thinks she knows what they’re thinking because she’s been thinking all these things herself, and even now, now that Richard is drivi
ng her to Kennedy tomorrow lunchtime to get the flight to London, she still can’t quite believe it is happening.

  The line of women, who a couple of minutes before seemed to be half asleep, sipping at their Starbucks and trying not to catch one another’s eye, now comes alive as they all turn to one another and repeat what they’ve heard, and soon they are all gathered around Amber, shooting questions at her, wanting to know what made her do it, what her husband thinks, whether she’ll miss the children.

  ‘Of course!’ Amber says. ‘That’s the hardest thing about all of this. I’m going to miss them enormously, but I just want to remember who I was before I had a husband and children. When I think back to before I met Richard, when I worked in the city and had an apartment, it’s not even that it feels like a lifetime ago, it feels like it happened to someone else. I’ve always said I’d love, just once in a while, to be reminded of who the real Amber is, who she was before she was defined as solely a wife and mother, and now I have this great opportunity. Does that make sense?’

  And everyone agrees. Everyone agrees, and is clearly envious, and for the first time Amber stops feeling guilty and starts to feel excited. This is finally going to happen.

  ‘I’ve come to say goodbye.’ Deborah walks in the back door and comes straight into the kitchen carrying a box wrapped in Union Jack wrapping paper.

  ‘What’s that?’ Amber asks, eyeing the box warily.

  ‘This is your London Survival Kit,’ Deborah says gleefully. ‘Come on, open it now and I’ll explain.’

  Amber opens the box and pulls out first an A to Z. ‘That’s your map of London,’ Deborah says. ‘So you’ll never get lost.’

  Next comes a phrasebook of cockney rhyming slang. ‘Trust me, there’s much more to it than just apples and pears, but this is for you to understand when the cabbies talk to you. Don’t, whatever you do, try and incorporate any of it yourself because it’s just unspeakably naff when Americans try and speak cockney rhyming slang.’