“What would you like to do?” asked Jo, hoping the little girl would say “Find you a new job while you call your boyfriend and make him the happiest man in the world.”
“I’d like to paint,” announced Tallulah.
“Right,” said Jo. “What would you like to paint?”
“A Kandinsky.”
Jo smiled. She was talking funny again. “A Kan-whatsky?”
Tallulah giggled. “Kandinsky, silly.” With that, the little girl took Jo by the hand and led her into the living room and pointed at the brightly colored picture over the fireplace that had clearly been painted by a four-year-old. “That’s a Kandinsky. Not a real one, obviously, a copy,” explained Tallulah.
Jo knelt “Do you know,” she confided. “I only understand every third word you say.”
Tallulah nodded and sighed. “I know how you feel,” she said quietly.
Half an hour later, with Kandinsky Technicolors sprayed delicately all over her, Jo answered an insistent ring on the doorbell. She heard the buffalo horde racing down the stairs, and braced herself for the one remaining experience yet to be savored at her new household. She was almost looking forward to it. As yet, she had missed meeting Toby’s mother, the notorious Mrs. Fitzgerald the First. Two Fridays ago, Jane Fitzgerald had been in such a rush to get away for a spa break that all Jo saw of her was the back of her Peugeot, and the previous Friday Jo had been busy with Tallulah in the toilet at the precise moment Jane had arrived, so Zak had let Toby in. Jo opened the door. There stood a scowling Toby and a concave-woman in shades that must have weighed more than her body. Toby rushed past Jo without a word, where he was greeted noisily by Zak in the hall.
“Bye bye, darling,” Jo heard the woman say behind her. “I’ll miss you, too.”
Jo turned back to the woman and was about to say hello when the woman took off her shades, revealing two sharp blue eyes and said, “Is the bitch in?”
Jo’s jaw dropped.
“Are you the latest nanny?” asked the woman.
Jo nodded and watched as the woman slowly looked her up and down. She shook her head and tutted. “I give you a week,” she said with a shark smile. “How are you enjoying it so far?”
Jo shrugged.
“One week,” repeated the woman. “The only reason they’re still married is because she won’t do anything I had to do. I’m in therapy, you know, eleven years after the divorce.”
Jo blinked. Jane crossed her arms across her cagelike chest. “So how d’you like Dick-brain?” she asked.
“Um—”
“And Pamela Ewing?”
“Um—”
“I see they hired you for your brains then,” she muttered, and started to walk away. At the front of the garden, she turned briefly back, and said, “Good luck with Toby. He’s a shit. Like his father.”
And with that, she was gone.
Jo watched her go and slowly closed the door behind her. She stood for a while in the hall.
By the time she had followed Zak and Toby into the conservatory, Zak was dealing badly with the poignant truth that after life’s peaks come its inevitable dips. He was stamping his feet, saying “It’s not fair,” and sobbing ineffectually while Toby, the playmate he’d longed to have all to himself since Sunday night to right all the world’s wrongs, was coolly indifferent to him, and had now wandered over to Tallulah.
“What’s your favorite Teletubby, Lulu?” he asked.
Tallulah sighed and without taking her eye off her painting, replied, “My name is Tallulah. Not Lulu.”
“So Tallulah, do you like Poo-poo or La-de-la best?”
“I’m not a baby,” responded Tallulah almost inaudibly.
“Oh, I see. So what do you watch, now that you’re such a big girl?”
“The Tweenies.”
Toby snorted and muttered “lame.” Then he turned to Cassandra, who was frowning over her math homework.
“You’re in a bad mood. Is it your girl’s period, Catastrophe?”
Cassandra spoke in a monotone.
“Your daddy left your mummy for a girl half his age, then fell in love with ours,” she said.
Toby shrugged. “Your mummy’s a selfish bitch.”
Then suddenly all the children jumped at the sound of a piercing scream. They stared at Jo. She finished screaming and stared back at them, such disgust on her face that they all began to feel a little ashamed. “Right,” she whispered menacingly. “Any more comments like that, and I’m shooting the lot of you.”
“You can’t,” tutted Toby.
“Except Tallulah,” continued Jo, “who was perfectly within her rights.”
“You’d be taken to prison,” continued Toby, “where they’d probably beat you up.”
“I don’t care,” said Jo. “It would be worth it to leave you lot.”
The children looked at the floor.
‘Toby, Zak, get upstairs,’ she continued. ‘I don’t want to hear another peep out of you until I say ‘peep.’”
Toby and Zak went upstairs, Toby with a nonchalant air that told the world he had been about to go upstairs anyway. Cassandra and Tallulah stared at Jo as she went back to making their tea.
After a while, Cassandra spoke. “Would you really shoot us all?”
“No.”
“Thought not,” she muttered, and returned to her homework.
Jo counted to ten very slowly. “Right,” she said. “I’m going to make a phone call. Cassandra, please watch that your sister doesn’t get paint everywhere. I won’t be long.”
Jo heard Cassandra grunt as she left the kitchen and slammed shut the bedroom door behind her. She was just about to get her mobile phone out of her bag to phone Shaun—no, Sheila—no, her mum, when the other phone rang. She sat heavily on her bed, swore even more heavily, and picked up the phone on her beside table. It was the first time she’d ever taken a call in this mad place without being scrutinized by someone. She felt wild with the risk of it.
“Hello?”
There was a click and a funny echo sound and for a moment Jo thought it must be Sheila calling her from her office and putting her on speakerphone, like she did when her office buddies wanted to join in the gossip. She felt a moment of intimidation at the prospect of putting on a performance for Sheila’s gang. She wasn’t up to it. Then the sound of Josh’s voice came on the line.
“Good afternoon,” he said in a loud voice. “Please may I speak to Mary Poppins?”
Jo felt her jaw lock. “No,” she said bluntly. “You can’t.”
“Oh,” said Josh and stopped. “Why?”
“Because she’s out on the tiles. Literally. With Dick van Dyke.”
There was a pause. Jo heard voices in the background.
“Who is this?” asked Josh.
“This is Jo Green. The soon-to-be-ex nanny. I’m not Mary Poppins, I’m not wearing a pinny or a hat, and I’m not here for your amusement. I’d love to chat, but unlike you I don’t have time to make puerile phone calls at my boss’s expense. Or worse, to crowd round someone else’s phone and listen to his puerile calls, like the rest of your office.” And she slammed the phone down and threw herself back onto her bed.
Josh stared at his phone. Around him, the gang shifted, some scanning the room for hidden cameras, others making their way back to their desks quickly.
“I think you owe me fifty smackers, mate,” said Rupert. Sally was gone.
Josh blinked a few times at the phone, then swore with more gusto than imagination.
Chapter 7
On Sunday morning Jo discovered that all advice from her new friend Pippa would prove invaluable. She woke before her alarm, but forced herself to stay silent in bed. She could hear the children in the kitchen, pouring breakfast cereal somewhere near cereal bowls, breaking the toaster, shushing each other and bickering over who had the remote control, while Sunday morning television blared out obliviously. Miraculously enough she must have dozed a bit, because the next thing she heard was
Dick trying to compete with the television for his children’s attention, failing miserably, making himself a coffee and arranging on the phone to meet up with Josh for lunch. When she next awoke, Vanessa was the one shushing the children with the surprising words. “If you wake Jo, she’ll leave, and I’ll have to send you into care.”
Jo was quite flattered when this worked. At nine, she dragged herself out of bed and into the shower. She stayed in longer than she’d have chosen, out of principle, and when she came out she used the highly effective drying method of lying on top of her duvet and waiting. As she lay there, she glanced over at her half-full suitcase and still-packed rucksack and box. She’d got used to living out of them, she knew she still wasn’t ready to put up any photos of her loved ones, and there was some comfort in knowing it would take less time to pack then unpack. However, if she didn’t do it soon, her clothes would be unwearable. She turned moodily away from them and lay curled up on her bed, drying.
When she was sure she was as dry as she could possibly be, she decided what to wear while hanging up a few of her favorite outfits and everyday necessities, careful not to use the word “unpacking” and trying to look the other way while doing it. Afterward, her rucksack and box were surrounded by most of their contents, her suitcase was wide open and the entire floor was covered with her clothes. It made her feel that the room was truly becoming hers.
Finally, she went into the kitchen.
“Hi!” exclaimed Vanessa.
Jo gave her boss a timid smile.
“Fancy a coffee?” sang Vanessa. “I’m grinding!”
“No thanks,” said Jo. “Another time.”
“We were just watching Bewitched,” explained Vanessa, busying herself with dark rich weekend Costa Rican coffee beans. “Want to join us?”
“Actually,” said Jo, more timidly than she would have liked, “I’m meeting a friend in the village at eleven. I’ll be out all day. I’ll have to start walking soon or I’ll be late.”
Vanessa stopped what she was doing. “Oh,” she said.
“I’m not paid for today, am I?” asked Jo suddenly, worried.
“Oh no,” rushed Vanessa. “You—you’re not. I just thought…of course—”
“God, I’m really sorry,” said Jo, moved by Vanessa’s disappointment more than she expected. “I assumed today was mine. I met this girl at Tallulah’s nursery. She’s a nanny. We sort of made plans, but if you need me…”
“No, of course, the day is yours, and I’m glad you’ve met someone,” said Vanessa. “Good for you. Hope you have a nice time.”
There was a moment’s silence. Vanessa went to sit on the sofa with the children. “By the way,” she said suddenly, turning back to Jo. “Dick and I are planning to go out on Thursday evening. Would you mind babysitting? If you’re able to? Otherwise, I’ll get the baby-sitter. Or see if my mum can do it.”
Jo nodded slowly, as if considering. “Thursday should be alright,” she said. “I’ll go and put it in my diary.”
She went into her bedroom and sat on her bed, a slow grin beginning to form on her face.
By the time Jo arrived at the café on Highgate High Street, she was in high spirits. Just having someone to meet had settled her enough to feel able to investigate her new village. She’d turned off the main street and wandered up through Waterlow Park, where she’d gazed in awe at the view over central London. Then she popped into shops that took her fancy—she spent half an hour in one before even realizing it was a charity shop—and strolled round the picturesque, tiny green. In some ways it reminded her of home, but in other ways, it was vastly different; her village didn’t have a shop full of different-flavored chocolates, a grocer’s with genuine Italian delicacies, a beautician, a Chinese herbalist, and all manner of foreign restaurants and cafés. And all this on only one, quaint village street.
She popped back into the park to phone Shaun. He was at work.
“It’s me!” she greeted him.
“Bloody hell! They let you have a five-minute break, eh?”
She laughed. “I’m in one of the most beautiful parks I’ve ever seen and I’m meeting a new friend in ten minutes.”
There was a fraction of a pause.
“Right,” he said. “Well, I won’t keep you.”
“I-I just—”
“How are you?”
“Fine!”
“Enjoying it yet?”
“The children are lovely,” she said. “Really lovely.”
“Good.”
“How are things in Niblet?”
“Hectic. I’m on-site now.”
“Thought so.”
“But it’s not that bad.”
“Will you be able to pop down and see me?”
“Well, you know what they say, if Mohammad won’t go to the mountain…” She knew he was smiling.
“Sorry, I’m just exhausted by the weekend.”
“It’s alright. Once I’ve got a couple of things sorted out, I can spend at least one night away.”
“Oh great!”
“One of my suppliers is playing silly buggers, and they said they’d be here at ten. I’m going to have to phone them soon. In fact I’d better do it now.”
‘Okay.’
“Have a good day. I’ll try and get down there next weekend—if not the one after.”
“Fantastic! Good luck with the suppliers.”
“Thanks, babe.”
There was a pause.
“Right then,” he said. “Speak soon.”
“Thanks for coming.”
“I haven’t yet.”
“You know what I mean.”
“Yeah.”
Another pause.
“See you soon then.”
“Yeah. See you soon.”
Another pause.
“Right,” she said.
“Right.”
Another pause.
“Bye then, babe.”
“Bye then,” she said, and clicked off her phone.
She walked back up the hill without breaking into a sweat. At the café door, she scanned the room and saw Pippa in the back corner, sprawled on a sofa, her eyes shut, two mugs of steaming coffee on the little table in front of her. Jo walked past the armchairs and sofas, intrigued by the sight of individuals instead of groups, leisurely reading their Sunday papers while drinking coffee and eating croissants as if they were in their own homes. She was growing used to the fact that no one glanced in her direction as she passed them, although half of her still expected to see a face she recognized from kindergarten.
She beamed down at Pippa. “Did I wake you?”
Pippa opened one eye and slowly grinned. “Not really.” She yawned and made room for Jo on the sofa. “I got you an Americana,” she said.
“Thanks,” said Jo, “but I’ve already got a boyfriend.”
“It’s a coffee.”
“Oh, right.”
“So.” Pippa looked her squarely in the eye. “How’s it going?”
“You were so right about this morning,” Jo started.
“Of course,” said Pippa. “I’m a pro.”
Jo bowed her head. “I have traveled a long way to be your pupil.”
Pippa bowed her head in response.
An hour later, Jo’s head was buzzing. She bought breakfast and another coffee for her and Pippa, and was then tested on all she had learned that morning.
“Who brought up every monarch this country has ever had?” asked Pippa.
“The nanny.”
“Correct. Who won us the Second World War?” asked Pippa.
“Churchill’s nanny.”
“Correct. Who saved the Von Trapp family from extinction and originated the first national post-Christmas-Day lunch experience?”
“The nanny.”
“Correct. What was the name given to the family dog in Peter Pan to show how much he was loved and respected by everyone?”
“Nana.”
“Correct. What is the name
given to a government seen to be all-knowing and all-controlling?”
“The nanny-state.”
“Correct. Who has helped the cause of women’s equality in the workplace more than any politician?”
“The nanny.”
“Correct. You are at a party. A pompous twat approaches. He asks what you do. What do you say?”
Jo stuck her chin out proudly. “I am the lynchpin of the modern family. I make it possible for today’s woman to fulfil her potential whatever that might be, while enabling her to enjoy the perks of a family life that her partner enjoys guilt-free. I give today’s children belief in themselves, teach them discipline in the context of a fun, warm, loving home, and provide them with a healthy, balanced diet. I’m a diplomat, a listener, an enabler, an organizer, a juggler. I come up with fresh, new ideas every day to keep the toughest audience in the world happy. I please a stressed mother, I accommodate a tired father, I love every child. I cook, I clean, I iron, I wash, I tidy—but I am no one’s slave because I do it for a wage.”
“What are you?”
“I’m a nanny!”
Pippa smiled. “God I’m good.”
“Blimey,” said Jo. “I never realized how brilliant I was.”
“Well don’t forget it now you know.”
“Okay.”
Pippa looked at her watch. “I said we’d meet the girls over at the Flask at one.”
“Oh. Right.”
“We usually have lunch and then at about four, we go to the pub up the road where we drink ourselves stupid. It’s a tight schedule, but we manage.”
“Who are the girls?”
“Rachel and Gabriella. They’re lovely. Bet you miss your friends from home.”
Jo smiled, tucking her legs under her on the sofa.
“Yeah, my best friend, Sheila, and my boyfriend, Shaun. I haven’t had that many chances to phone them.”
Pippa nodded.
“I remember not being able to phone my boyfriend for about six weeks after I moved here, even when I did have the time.”
“Actually, it is a bit like that,” admitted Jo. “I have to steel myself to do it, I don’t know why.”
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