The Time of Their Lives

by Maeve Haran

‘I wanted to say I’m still paying money into the joint account for the moment, so don’t worry about that.’

  ‘Thanks.’ OK, no mention of divorce or selling the house. ‘Well, if that’s it, I’ll be off. I’d appreciate it if you kept in touch with Bella and Sam, even if they don’t agree to see you yet. For their sake I’m trying not to make this any harder than it has to be, even if personally I’d like to slap your selfish face.’

  Simon winced as if she had. ‘Laura . . .’

  Laura had stood up and was reaching for her shoulder bag.

  ‘It’s Suki. She’s three months pregnant.’

  Laura sat down again. Sal had been right.

  ‘I’m sorry about this. It wasn’t deliberate, I assure you. At least Sam and Bella aren’t children any more, they’ll understand in time. But I can’t pay the mortgage forever. We both need to go and see a solicitor and sort this out.’

  It took all Laura’s strength of character not to cry. She was trying so hard to hold on to her emotions for the children’s sake, but the cost to her was that she felt powerless.

  Even if it was the last thing she felt like doing she needed to find out what rights she did have. Probably not many. Unless you could afford to take your husband to court like the fur-coated millionaires’ wives in the gossip columns, most discarded spouses seemed to go quietly.

  Would she be one of them?

  To say that the location of New Grey magazine wasn’t exactly flashy was like saying the Queen was only a bit posh.

  To be precise, it was in Kensal Green, an area of North-west London Sal had never even visited before. In fact, the only reason she’d ever heard of Kensal Green was because of the famous cemetery there and the equally famous poem by G. K. Chesterton about going to paradise ‘by way of Kensal Green’.

  At least, Sal noted, it was near a tube station and a very large Sainsbury’s. The cemetery she would rather forget.

  Unlike for her last interview, this time Sal had been doing her homework. She knew the magazine’s circulation, that it was owned by a famously eccentric family business, and that it had a reputation for being rather old-fashioned, an image which its owner prized and which the current managing director was desperate to dump. This might make the editor’s job a poisoned chalice, but Sal was so desperate for this job she’d swallow weed killer and ask for a refill.

  The exterior of the building put Sal in mind of a workhouse, all forbidding red brick blackened by soot, but once inside it was a revelation. That any offices could conceivably be cosy was a minor miracle, but somehow New Grey’s were.

  Clearly the eccentric owner had raided her own home for the décor. There were chandeliers, Turkish rugs, nests of tables with lights on them, bookcases stuffed with what looked like wonderful old books. In fact, the look that immediately came to Sal’s mind was the Orient Express, for which she’d once blagged a freebie from London to Venice.

  The only touch of modernity was in the gleaming laptops on every desk.

  As she waited, the previous candidate emerged. It was the successful editor of a rival magazine, renowned for being sharp and clever, and who was at least twenty years younger than Sal. They nodded warily.

  As soon as she was ushered into the managing director’s office the difference in style between owner and MD became even more obvious. It was like stepping from the nineteenth century into the twenty-first. Here all was pale and minimalist with sisal flooring, wheat-coloured sofas and, no doubt, state-of-the art software. A man in his mid-forties sat behind an enormous metal desk shaped like an ammonite. He stood to shake hands. ‘Michael Williams, MD, welcome to New Grey. You know Rose McGill, I’m sure.’

  A flamboyant octogenarian in an orange fitted suit waved regally at Sal.

  ‘Actually,’ Sal held out her hand, ‘we’ve never been officially introduced. I know you by reputation, of course.’

  ‘That I’m a cantankerous old cow, no doubt.’

  ‘That you invented the magazine market for older people.’

  ‘Older people!’ Rose McGill huffed. ‘God, I hate that expression. It’s like calling people mildly obese. They’re not mildly obese, they’re fat! Do you know I visited a friend in hospital and the man in the next bed weighed twenty-six stone? They carried him in with ten paramedics and had to have a specially reinforced bed. That’s what comes of calling people mildly obese. We’re not “older” we’re old and we should be old and proud of it!’

  Sal could see this was going to be a challenge. ‘But the thing is people aren’t proud of it. None of my generation – the baby boomers—’

  ‘And there’s another bloody stupid expression,’ interrupted Rose McGill. ‘It makes me think of infants flying through the air like rocks from catapults.’

  ‘Rose,’ interrupted Michael Williams with barely concealed irritation, ‘please let Ms Grainger explain.’

  ‘My generation just don’t see themselves as old,’ Sal continued. ‘They may be sixty plus but I call them the “Young-Old”.

  ‘Sounds like a mountain in Switzerland.’

  ‘You notice them everywhere. They’re an entirely new phenomenon. Fit, energetic, well-dressed people who’ve decided that age is irrelevant.’

  ‘Like you,’ pointed out Rose McGill. ‘But then, when you look more closely at their jeans and their Lycra and their short skirts, you see they’re old after all.’

  Sal, in a sensible jersey wrap dress, was doubly grateful she’d decided against the animal-print jumpsuit. She had to admit Rose’s observation was true. Once or twice she’d seen someone she assumed from behind to be thirty and they turned out to be seventy. ‘But they’re your market,’ she insisted. ‘And what they want to read about is the things that interest them – gardens, auctions, clothes, even rock concerts by people their own age like Leonard Cohen and the Rolling Stones. Take cars: women over fifty are supposed to be lovers of safe little hatchbacks, but have you noticed how many sports car drivers have grey hair? New Grey should ask Jilly Cooper or P. D. James to test-drive cabriolets. Why leave all the fun to blokey blokes like Jeremy Clarkson?’

  Rose McGill was quiet for a change and Michael Williams took over.

  ‘What circulation should a magazine like New Grey achieve, in your view, given the competition?’

  ‘Your ABC is what – half a million?’ Thank God she’d done her homework.

  Michael Williams nodded. ‘Give or take fifty thousand. But the readership surveys tell us it’s read by a million.’

  ‘I’d aim to add twenty thousand.’

  ‘You’ll be lucky when everyone else is losing out to their rivals online.’

  Sal had wondered when they’d get to platforms. But she was blowed if she was going to mention the word. Rose McGill would say platforms were where trains came in, and Sal agreed with her. ‘Online is where you’ll pick up more readers. Plus social networking sites. Reader events. Roadshows. Maybe even speed-dating for the over-sixties. It all helps the circulation.’

  ‘And costs a bomb, as well as shooting ourselves in the foot.’ Rose McGill was not a huge Internet fan, clearly. ‘Online is expensive and it still isn’t replacing circulation. I’m not sure I believe you can put on twenty thousand.’

  ‘Neither am I,’ Sal admitted, ‘so why don’t you pay me by results?’

  It was a risky strategy in an industry that was in decline, but she needed a bold stroke.

  Rose McGill and Michael Williams exchanged a startled glance.

  ‘I’m assuming,’ Sal decided to press the advantage while she had it, ‘that my own age is not going to be a factor.’ Sal had never before admitted her age in a job interview, indeed, as Ella had advised, she’d often taken twenty years off. ‘I’m sixty-two.’

  ‘Sixty-three,’ corrected Rose McGill, enjoying Sal’s stunned expression. ‘I looked you up. I’m eighty-one, so I think we can discount age discrimination in this company. You are only as old as your ideas, in my view. You will be hearing from us, Ms Grainger.’ She held out her h
and, suddenly reminding Sal of Barbara Cartland dictating her five hundredth novel from her sofa. They shared the same terrifying energy. ‘It shouldn’t take long. Old age has made me value the need to act swiftly.’ She smiled faintly. ‘While there’s still time.’

  On the walk back to Kensal Green tube station Sal called Ella. ‘Well, I have no bloody idea how that went!’ she admitted. ‘But what an extraordinary woman Rose McGill is. I couldn’t decide if I liked or loathed her but I tell you one thing, she makes you wonder what the hell it means to be old. The woman is over eighty and one of the sharpest people I’ve ever met. I hope to God I’m like that.’

  But Ella had stopped listening. Thanks to her friend she had just decided on the title of her latest blog and couldn’t wait to get off the phone and start it.

  HOW THE HELL DO YOU KNOW

  WHEN YOU’RE OLD?

  CHAPTER 9

  It might have been the shock of Simon’s revelation, or the fact that it put a brutal end to any fantasies of happy reunions, but Laura felt overwhelmed by quite astonishing pain. She had, she saw now, been living in a kind of suspended animation, sheltering herself from the worst as she tried to protect her children. And now that protection had been brutally stripped away.

  Simon was going to have a baby with somebody else.

  The other dream that had been lost forever was one she hadn’t even been conscious of having – growing old together. By the time you got to sixty and you were, or thought you were, reasonably happy, you expected it to be permanent. By that time, you had already navigated the choppy waters of child-rearing, and even the Scylla and Charybdis of extramarital affairs and mid-life crises. The days of wine and roses might be over but you could at least look forward to the nights of cocoa and hot-water bottles.

  Laura found herself, for the first time since Simon had told her about his affair, dissolving into sobs of self-pity. And what was wrong with bloody self-pity when you had something worthy of feeling sorry for yourself about?

  Outside it was beginning to get dark. Laura lay on their bed and looked out at the sky, feeling bleaker than she had ever felt before. The familiarity of the room she’d loved no longer brought her comfort.

  Beside her, on the bedside table, her phone rang.

  ‘Laura?’ Claudia knew at once that something was very wrong. ‘Laura, you sound strange. Are you all right?’

  ‘As a matter of fact, I’m not,’ Laura admitted, hardly able to rise out of the depths of her misery. ‘I had a bit of a shock this afternoon. Simon wanted to meet up . . .’

  ‘And? He’s not demanding a divorce already?’

  ‘No. He wanted to tell me that the woman he left us for is three months pregnant.’

  ‘Oh my God, Laura, the stupid shit! Come to think of it, he probably can’t believe it either – Laura? Laura?’

  But Laura had dropped the phone. In the corner of the room, just as she unburdened herself to Claudia, she had noticed the shadow of someone opening the door and coming in.

  It was Sam.

  Just as quickly he disappeared.

  ‘Sam, darling! Stop!’ In her stockinged feet Laura ran downstairs in pursuit of her son. ‘Sam!’ she kept yelling. ‘I’m coming. Wait just a minute.’

  But she wasn’t fast enough. By the time she got to the middle landing the front door banged shut and Sam had run out into the darkness of his private pain and misery.

  Ella sat at her screen and thought about the blog Sal’s comment had prompted. While her first attempt had been inspired by anger at how Simon was treating Laura, this time she thought she’d have a go at something lighter.

  TEN TIPS TO SPOT YOU’RE OLD

  1. Forget what you went into a room to get?

  Don’t worry, it happens to us all.

  2. Reading obituaries

  Once upon a time you skipped over these. Now you read them with a sense of deep gratitude at still being alive.

  3. Deciding the tunic is an acceptable fashion item

  No more needs to be said.

  4. Saying goodbye to modesty

  Who needs a changing room? Just try it on here.

  5. Deciding you quite fancy David Attenborough

  Go on, admit it!

  6. Forgetting your mobile number

  Especially in moments of stress.

  7. Needing to pee

  At least three times a night.

  8. Loathing technology

  Not all of us are silver surfers.

  9. Talking about illness

  Every conversation now starts with an organ recital.

  10. Wearing popsox without shame

  And send posts of all of yours!!!

  Ella laughed and sent it off into the blogosphere. She was really enjoying writing these, even if no one else on the planet got to read them.

  ‘Is good to see you smiling,’ Wenceslaus commented when she went down to the sitting room.

  ‘I’ve just done another blog!’ Ella informed him. ‘I’m finding it great fun. Like writing a diary.’

  ‘But now you should learn to tweet. Then you can tweet about blog and more people read it.’

  ‘Read it?’ Somehow the idea seemed almost bizarre to Ella. She was just enjoying the fun of writing her posts.

  ‘But surely that is idea?’ Wenceslaus asked, puzzled. ‘People read blog all over world and leave post of what they think. Is global conversation. But first you need to buy new phone.’

  ‘Hang on, Wenceslaus, I’m perfectly happy with my old phone.’

  ‘Yes, but old phone is for children and very old. Now you are Internet expert you need better one.’

  ‘Me? Internet expert?’

  ‘Yes, El-la. Today blog, maybe tomorrow own website.’

  ‘No, no, Wenceslaus. The thing is, I don’t want anyone to know who I am!’

  A rap on the French window of the basement startled her until she saw that it was Julia.

  ‘Hello, Mum, I’ve brought you some more of those biscuits you liked.’ Julia was proffering two more packets of Walnut Crunch.

  It was freezing outside, yet Julia was wearing a rather pretty flowered dress that reminded Ella of the 1940s fashions her mother wore. The look suited Julia’s dark hair and pale skin. There was something else different about her. Ella tried to put her finger on it.

  Then she worked it out. For the first time in about five years, Julia was wearing eye make-up.

  ‘Thank you, darling,’ Ella took the biscuits, glancing across rather nervously at Wenceslaus, ‘but we’ve haven’t even finished the last lot yet.’

  ‘Hello, love, good news.’ Don paused a beat. ‘At least, I’m hoping you’ll think it’s good news. We’ve had an offer on the house.’

  Claudia, who had been sitting at her father’s bedside when her mobile phone rang, felt a jolt of shock. She had only just decided to move. But then, she had to be realistic. If neither of her parents were well and both needed her, how could she balance that with working in London? There would be hospital visits, not to mention ferrying them both about and making sure their house was clean, their shopping done and bills paid. She would end up having a nervous breakdown. And she knew the school wanted her to go.

  ‘I hope it wasn’t the people who were going to build the glass extension.’

  ‘Thankfully not. The thing is, and if you’re not up for this I’ll understand, but they want to move by Christmas.’

  ‘Christmas!’ Claudia realized just how far she’d had her head in the sand. ‘But it’s November already.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Was that Don on the phone?’ her dad asked. ‘You seem a bit thrown by it.’

  Claudia looked across lovingly at her father. He had moved out of the bed to a chair and there seemed a little colour in his cheeks instead of the awful hospital pallor.

  ‘I didn’t tell you this, Dad, because it seemed rather a long way off and things could still go wrong . . .’

  ‘What’s that?’

  ‘Don and I are mo
ving to Surrey. We’ve found a place we like in Little Minsley. That was Don saying someone’s offered for our London house. So it looks as if it’s really happening. Maybe even by Christmas.’

  ‘That’s wonderful.’ She could hear the uncertainty in her father’s tone. ‘But is it what you really want? You seem to like London so much. This isn’t because of my hip, I hope?’

  Claudia got up and gave him a big hug. Being near him would make the whole thing worth it. ‘Don’s been wanting to downsize for decades. He’s a Surrey man through and through. Always thought Londoners were a namby-pamby lot. Couldn’t wait to get back to green fields and real ale.’

  ‘He’ll be pushed to find either of them these days. Surrey’s all commuter belt now.’

  ‘Well, don’t tell Don that. He thinks you all sing folk songs and do Morris dancing.’

  The door opened to reveal Olivia carrying a walking frame. ‘Come on, Leonard dear, time for your amble down the corridors.’

  ‘Olivia, have you heard Claudia’s wonderful news? She and Don are coming to live in Little Minsley.’

  ‘Are you now?’ Her mother turned gimlet eyes in Claudia’s direction. ‘First I’ve heard of it. Nothing to do with me or the stupid questions that doctor was asking?’

  ‘No, no, nothing at all.’

  ‘Good, because if it is, you can go straight back to London.’

  Claudia felt her spirits, already drooping, droop further. She would be giving up the job she loved. And keeping an eye on her parents was going to be no picnic.

  When Sal saw the email in her Inbox from New Grey, she took a deep breath before opening it. If this didn’t work out, she might as well get a job stacking shelves – if there were any jobs left.

  ‘Dear Ms Grainger,’ read the email. ‘We would like to offer you the position of Acting Editor at New Grey, subject to terms mutually agreeable to both parties. This is a six-month position with no guarantee of further employment after that period.’

  Fair enough. She’d always known it was a fixed term. She’d just have to wow them so much during her six months that they couldn’t go on without her.

  How utterly amazing! Champagne was definitely called for. She’d love to gather the girls together but Laura wasn’t speaking to her and Claudia was stuck in deepest Surrey looking after her parents.