Growing Pains of a Hapless Househusband

by Sam Holden

'You seem a little nervous.'

  Sally was right – I would have made a crap spy.

  'Do I? Oh, it's because I've got the Joseph and Mary show today. Have you seen me on it?'

  'Oh yes,' she said. 'I thought you were wonderful! Very funny. Mind you, I don't care much for Mary, but he is almost as handsome as you!'

  'You're too kind!'

  The kettle switched off. I poured myself a thick cup of instant, realising that it was highly unlikely I was going to drink it.

  9.11.

  I looked into the garden. Everything seemed peaceful and normal. I noticed the bird table had fallen over, and had sent a load of nuts and seeds all over the terrace. I would have to clear that up, I thought. I couldn't quite believe that Blue Switch, whatever it was, would be here in seven minutes.

  At twelve past nine, I heard a dim thudding sound.

  'What's that noise?' Halet asked.

  'What noise?'

  'Listen,' she said. 'That one. That sort of bdbdbdbdbbdr . . .'

  I stayed still, pretending to strain my ears.

  'Oh yes,' I said. 'I dunno.'

  I did know.

  It was a helicopter.

  'It sounds like a helicopter,' said Halet.

  'Do you think so? I think it could be some sort of funny car on the main road. Maybe it's a combine.'

  'A combine?'

  'You know, a combine harvester. Gathers up the crops. It's harvest time, so it's probably one of those. They're huge noisy buggers.'

  'I don't think it's one of those,' said Halet.

  I pretended to listen again.

  There was no doubt that it was a helicopter, but what the hell was it going to do? It couldn't land here – we were in the middle of the village.

  'No,' said Halet, her mind very much made up. 'It is a helicopter.'

  'Yes,' I said. 'I think you're right. Probably the air ambulance.'

  'The air ambulance?'

  'Yes. Have you not seen it before? Sometimes, when there's a bad crash on the main road, it takes the injured people back to hospital.'

  'I see,' said Halet.

  She looked very ill at ease. And then she did something that scared the shit out of me. She reached into her handbag. Oh fuck, I thought, she's getting her gun. She's going to take me hostage and I'm going to die. This was it, I kept thinking, my last day on the planet.

  She pulled out a small bag, from which she removed a little compact mirror. What was this? Poison? Was she about to commit suicide?

  'You are staring at me, Mr Holden! Have you never seen a lady check her make-up?'

  I laughed awkwardly.

  'Sorry, I've got the morning stares.'

  'Ah yes – my late husband used to have those.'

  9.15.

  Three minutes.

  The helicopter was right overhead now, and it was making a fearsome racket.

  'Perhaps there has been a crash in the village?' Halet asked.

  'Maybe,' I said.

  'We should go and look! We could help. I used to be a nurse, you know.'

  I knew it was imperative that Halet should stay in the house. I had to delay her.

  9.16.

  'A nurse?' I said. 'Well I never knew that! How long were you a nurse for?'

  'Fifteen years,' she said. 'Back in my home country. But never mind that! We should go and see what the helicopter is doing.'

  The helicopter was so loud now we could barely hear each other. Something was about to happen, I just knew it, or at least my body knew it, because my heart was going nuts.

  'Your home country,' I said. 'Remind me what it's called again? I can never remember how to pronounce it!'

  Halet gave me a quizzical look. Why was this crazy Englishman asking questions like this when there was a helicopter buzzing about a hundred feet above the house?

  She opened her mouth.

  I won't ever know what she was about to say, because at that moment our front door exploded. Then, if I've got the sequence of events right, I heard the words 'Armed police! Do not move! I repeat do not move!'

  At the same time, the entire kitchen filled with this acrid white smoke that stung my eyes as if bottles of shampoo had been poured into them. My throat tried to turn itself inside out, and I threw up my breakfast.

  I was aware of black figures, torch lights, and Halet screaming, as well she might. Strong arms picked me up and took me through the back door out into the cool fresh air, where I gulped lungfuls of the stuff. It tasted so nice compared to the puke and what I now know was tear gas.

  'Are you all right, Mr Holden?'

  I nodded, and then squinted at the questioner. He was wearing a balaclava and was in the process of removing his gas mask. He looked the fucking business, and I desperately wanted his job there and then. In his right hand he held a black pistol that looked unspeakably cool, and so unlike the type of shitty thing you see in a film.

  'I'm fine, thanks.'

  'Hey, I know you!' he said. 'You're that chap off the telly! What's your name?'

  'Sam Holden,' I hacked.

  'You're that bloke who tells people how to look after their kids!'

  'That's right!'

  'Can I have your autograph?'

  'With pleasure. But listen mate, you've got this all wrong.'

  'How do you mean?'

  Fuck, my eyes stung.

  'You're not meant to be in awe of me, I'm meant to be in awe of you. Which I am!' I broke off, a hacking cough grasping my breath.

  The policeman laughed and patted my back.

  'Nasty stuff, eh? I'm sorry about that.'

  'That's OK, I understand. Where's she gone, anyway?'

  He looked up into the sky.

  'She'll be halfway to some spook house by now.'

  Another policeman joined us. He was dressed as awesomely as his colleague.

  'There's a car here for you, sir.'

  'For me? Am I being taken in as well?'

  'No! He says he's from the Joseph and Mary show. He's to take you up to town.'

  It should come as no surprise that I had quite forgotten.

  'Could you tell him to wait ten minutes?'

  'Of course!'

  One has to be a pro about these things, I thought. Even if you've just been tear-gassed in your own kitchen and had your nanny choppered out to some interrogation centre, the show must go on.

  Wednesday 24 September

  Lots of fallout from Monday. Obviously it never made the papers, and the official line for the village – for those who didn't see Halet being bundled off – was that the police had made a cock-up. They thought a local drug dealer had taken refuge in our house, but they had been given the wrong intelligence. Most of them seemed to swallow that.

  More importantly, Halet was indeed a spy. I still can't believe this, but Sally told me she buckled under interrogation. Apparently she had turned against the West when her husband had been killed in an American airstrike some years back, and she had been recruited by her country's intelligence service to come over here and inveigle herself into British society. She had been amazingly lucky to get work with Sally's colleague, and then even luckier to get work with us, because being more senior, Sally had access to far more sensitive information. It was Halet's spying that had blown all the department's networks. It seems incredible to think that while she was looking after Peter and Daisy so brilliantly and so kindly, she was simultaneously responsible for the deaths of dozens of people.

  As was to be expected, Sally was severely reprimanded for poor security with her laptop. I thought she would have been sacked, but she had defended herself by saying that Halet had been given security clearance in order to work with Sally's colleague.

  Peter and Daisy are very sad about what has happened to Halet, and the official line as far as they are concerned is that she had to rush back home in order to see her sick mother. 'When is she coming back?' Peter keeps asking, and Daisy provides her usual refrain. When I tell them she might not come back, there ar
e lots of tears. They miss her so much and, to be honest, so do I.

  Friday 26 September

  Although we're still in a state of shock, I've been trying to get things back to normal. As we no longer have any childcare, I've resumed my househusband duties. It's fun being back in the saddle, and it's putting money where my WonderHubby mouth is. I got special dispensation to take the children out of school, and I took them shopping for toys. We bought the most disgusting amount, and I further spoiled them rotten by taking them for a pizza.

  'Can we do this every day?' Peter asked.

  'I'd love to,' I said. 'But I think if you bought toys all the time you'd get a bit bored.'

  'I wouldn't be bored,' he said.

  All this talk about toys made me worry about Emily. Obviously, with the drama of Halet's arrest, she had been firmly dispatched to the back of my mind, but toys had reminded me about money (toys always remind me about money) and that in turn made me dwell on Emily's threat. Would she really carry it out? And would anybody believe the drunken drawlings of a mad dipso from the Shires?

  Yes they would, probably.

  So I've resolved to see her once more. I'll go round tomorrow morning and try and sweet talk her. It's my only option.

  Saturday 27 September

  7.30 p.m.

  Today has been even more dramatic than Halet's arrest day. An utter rollercoaster. I'm in dire need of the stiffest of drinks, but first I want to get everything down. It needs to be recorded for posterity, if that doesn't sound too self-important.

  I went round to Emily's house just after nine o'clock, having told Sally that I was going to the ironmongers to get some handles, knobs etc. for the front door. (The police said they would pay for the damage, but so far no joy. The kitchen also stinks of tear gas, which keeps making me want to throw up.)

  At first I thought all was well, because the car was in the drive and one of the upstairs windows was open. I knocked and waited, and then I knocked again.

  'Hello!' I shouted through the letter box.

  Still nothing.

  I peered through. The place was even more of a tip than it was last week.

  'Hello!'

  Silence.

  For some reason – a logical one, probably – I decided to walk round the house to see if everything was OK. As I did so, I looked through the ground-floor windows, which revealed scuzz everywhere – unwashed crockery, leftover food, toys scattered, laundry piled up on the kitchen floor. It was like a dosshouse, but somehow worse, because I knew children had to live in it. (We used to have a neighbour who lived like this, and it constantly amazed me that her children were able to emerge unscathed without some sort of deadly bacillus.)

  I reached the back door and knocked.

  'Hello?'

  I tried the handle. It turned. Should I go in?

  'Hello?'

  Why did I keep saying that?

  I walked into the kitchen, and was struck by the smell of the unwashed laundry and the dirty dishes, an olfactory combination that took me straight back to bachelorhood. Aaah – carefree, hygiene-free days.

  'Emily?'

  I made my way up the stairs. I could hear nothing, but the smell was getting worse.

  I couldn't remember which one was her bedroom, so I tried the first door I came to. It was a child's room, festooned with toys and clothes. The second door was another child's room, a little tidier than the first, probably because it was a girl's room.

  'Emily?'

  It was becoming obvious that there was no one here. They must have all been picked up by someone and taken away for the weekend. There was one more door to try, which had to be her room. I gently pushed it open.

  I was met by darkness and a smell of vomit. Jesus, I thought, this was getting out of hand.

  'Emily?'

  No reply. My eyes grew accustomed to the gloom.

  'Emily?'

  A figure on the bed.

  'Oh my God!' I shouted.

  I rushed in, my brain struggling to cope with what my eyes were relaying to it. Emily was sprawled on the bed, her body messily arranged like a rag doll.

  'Emily?'

  A bottle of vodka lay empty by the bed, and her hair was matted in a pool of half-dried sick. God knows how many hours she'd been like this. Then a flood of panic came over me as I realised she might not be breathing – she could have choked on her vomit.

  'Oh God no!'

  I slapped her face. Nothing.

  'Emily! Wake up!'

  A stir. A very weak mumble. She heaved and I jumped back, fearing she'd be sick again. She briefly opened her eyes and then they lolled back up in her head again. I thanked a non-existent god that she wasn't dead. I couldn't believe things had got so out of control. Why hadn't I realised how depressed she was? I shouldn't have left. I should have helped more. Silent tears rolled down my cheeks as I shifted her into the recovery position, away from the sick. The stench was making me gag.

  And then I spotted the pills, or rather the empty bottle of pills, neatly placed on the bedside table. I felt my heart skip, a lump of guilt and despair rising in my throat.

  'Oh shit oh shit,' I think I went.

  Medically, I had no idea what to do, so I covered her up with the duvet, recalling that warmth was always important in these scenarios.

  'Phone,' I shouted to myself, 'where's the fucking phone?'

  I looked around the bedroom. No phone.

  I raced downstairs, nearly tripping over.

  'Come on! Where the fuck is it?'

  I scrabbled through the mess in the drawing-room. No phone. Into the kitchen, and after what seemed like decades, I found it under a cereal packet. I pressed 999. Nothing. I looked at the screen. Blank. The wretched battery was not charged up!

  'Must be a normal phone! Come on! Give me a normal fucking phone!'

  I ran around the house, panicking. I knew that panicking would achieve nothing, and I made myself calm down. I went back to the drawing-room, and tore it right up. No phone.

  No phone in the dining-room, but just off the dining-room was a small door, which I all but kicked in. A study! There had to be a phone in here, there just had to be.

  And there was. And it was a normal, batteryless phone.

  I dialled 999, reflecting that the only land-based emergency service I had yet to encounter this week was the fire brigade.

  'Which service do you require?'

  'Ambulance please!'

  After an age, I was routed through to some control centre in Djibouti.

  'She's had an overdose,' I shouted. 'Please come quickly.'

  I ran back upstairs, back into Emily's bedroom, and checked on her. I became angry and upset, feeling that this was somehow all my fault, and yet knowing that it really wasn't. Emily was in a far worse state than I – or perhaps anyone else – had imagined.

  'You stupid girl,' I said. 'You stupid bloody girl.'

  Once again, that strange feeling of paternalism. I felt like she was my daughter, and that I had to do my best to protect her. At that moment I felt a very real and deep love for Emily, the love of a father for a child.

  When the ambulance came I felt a sense of relief, but also a sense of loneliness. I needed someone here, and that could only be one person.

  Sally clutched my hand reassuringly while we watched Emily being loaded into the ambulance. When the police arrived Sally carried on holding my hand as they satisfied themselves that I wasn't some failed murderer. Afterwards, as I sat numbly at Emily's kitchen table, remembering happier times when we had shared glasses of late-morning wine and chatted about the children, Sally went about cleaning Emily's bedroom and the general carnage. What a woman.

  Then we left, grateful to return to our warm, happy home. It still amazes me that Sally asked no questions. We both knew that what had happened had gone beyond jealousy and marital tiffs.

  After leaving Peter and Daisy with Kate, we went to see Emily in the hospital. I couldn't believe that Sally wanted to come, but sh
e insisted.

  'The woman's ill, Sam,' she said. 'She needs our help. I'm not going to let the fact that she is in love with you stand in the way of that.'

  'Thank you,' I said.

  We arrived at her bedside, where we found Jim, her ex-husband. He looked terrified.

  'How is she?' I asked.

  'She'll make it,' he said. 'I expect her liver will be a bit ropy from now on.'

  'No more booze for her,' I said.

  'Quite.'

  We all stared down at her in silence. She was asleep, and she looked peaceful. There was some colour in her cheeks, and, strangely, she looked better than she had done in weeks. It was as if all the vomiting had purged her of her demons. Jim looked up and caught my eye.

  'I gather you found her,' he said.

  'That's right.'

  'Thank you,' he said simply.

  He looked down again at his ex-wife. He had both love and tears in his eyes.

  'Do you think she wanted to die?' he asked.

  I paused.

  'No,' I said confidently. 'I think it was a cry for help.'

  'I hope so,' he said.

  'She's not been well,' I continued. 'You know she's been . . .'

  'I do,' Jim said immediately. 'That's why I've just been awarded custody of the children.'

  Sally and I exchanged glances.

  'I hadn't realised,' I said.

  'She only found out yesterday. I convinced the courts that she was no longer fit to be a mother. Too much drinking. Too much, you know, running around.'

  I knew what the euphemism meant.

  'But it's created a vicious circle,' he said. 'Made her worse.'

  Jim's bottom lip started quaking. Sally walked over and put an arm round him. I stood there hopelessly while he wept.

  'Would you like a cup of tea?' I asked.

  'How brilliantly British,' said Jim through his tears. 'And do you know what, yes I bloody well would. A good cup of thick black English builders' tea.'

  I went off, knowing that the chances of finding a decent cup of tea were minimal.

  As I walked down the corridors, vainly searching for a vending machine, my mobile rang. I cursed that I had forgotten to turn it off, but I nevertheless answered it.

  'Hello?'

  'Hi Sam, it's Toby Andrews here.'