by Shari Low
Motherhood–situation normal.
I smiled at Sam. ‘Thanks, Sam, they’ll love it. So where are we going to spot Spidey then–one of the theme parks?’
‘Movie lot–Sony are shooting Spiderman 3. Tobey Maguire’s a mate and he said it would be cool if we stopped by.’
Like I said, this would be a shite life. ‘Oh, okay then. Great,’ I said casually, doing my best to act like I bumped into Tobey Maguire twice a week in the chip shop.
‘Eh, actually, you’re not going.’
‘I’m not?’
Oh, I immediately got it–it was the whole paparazzi thing. He didn’t want to damage his reputation by being snapped with someone who looked like she modelled her look on Lisa Simpson.
‘Nope, you’ve got a meeting. A breakfast meeting actually. The Peninsula Hotel, 9 a.m., with Ike Tusker–über agent and all-round Hollywood player from TDA.’
I gasped. Ike Tusker. Sam’s agent. From TDA! Talent Development Agency–the top agency in the world. The company that represented Catherine Zeta-Jones, Cameron Diaz, Julia Roberts, George Clooney, Brad Pitt, Tom Hanks…and perhaps me!
This was huge. HUGE! And I was ecstatic for a whole five minutes before I began to panic. My one and only decent suit had just spent 24 hours in a suitcase. My roots were showing. My nails were hacked. My eyebrows were sending out mating signals to all caterpillars within a ten-yard radius. I had nothing prepared–no pitch, no presentation–and I’d spent so long in the company of children and isolated from the cut and thrust of corporate life that I wasn’t sure I still had the capacity to speak in words of more than two syllables, let alone have an intelligent, informed conversation.
But HOW exciting! The adrenalin pumped around my blood vessels and switched my brain straight on to ‘hyper’ setting. I was scared to death, but this, this was what I’d been missing for so long–the excitement, the thrill, the sheer bloody madness of feeling wild and reckless.
Just then, Eliza appeared. I was relieved to see that she wasn’t brandishing a grey bra and a Victoria’s Secret catalogue.
‘Sam…’
I liked it that she called him by his first name–it reinforced Sam’s lack of pretension and disregard for ego-boosting bollocks.
‘I’m just nipping down to the store, can I get anything for anybody?’
She leaned over and ruffled Mac’s hair as he opened his mouth. Never one to miss an opportunity for E-numbers, I could tell he was about to chance his arm and ask for one of everything on the sweet shelf. I unleashed the wrath of the main source of discipline in our family–my right eyebrow–and raised it as far as it would go. Mac spotted it and immediately closed his mouth and looked sheepish. God help us if I ever had Botox because behaviour in our house would run out of control.
‘Thank you, Eliza, but we’re fine,’ I said, then realised that I’d forgotten to pack possibly the most essential item of all–pull-up pants for Benny. We had mastered the daytime potty training many months before, but overnights were yet to be tackled.
‘Actually, Eliza, could I come with you–I need to get some pull-up pants for Benny.’
You see, I’d be rubbish at being rich. While it would take me a whole five minutes to get used to first-class travel and ostentatious spending, I felt really uncomfortable with servitude.
‘Not at all, sit where you are–I’ll pick them up for you. You’re talking about trainer pants, right?’
‘Right. Size: large. Let me just get my purse…’
‘That’s not necessary. We have an account at the store.’
Oh. How do I get one of those? As she wandered away, leaving me to lounge and generally work hard at soaking up the sun’s rays and sipping a cocktail, it did cross my mind that maybe I could get used to this after all.
‘Right, guys, who’s coming in for another swim?’ Sam leapt up, grabbed Benny and ran off with Mac chasing behind him, all three of them squealing with laughter.
He wasn’t stuck in his office debating fine points of law. His head wasn’t stuck in a newspaper. He wasn’t asleep. He wasn’t sulking. He was fun, exciting, and fantastic with my boys. Yep, this really would be a crap life.
By seven o’clock that evening I was falling head-first into the pizza Sam had phoned in for dinner. You can’t beat a balanced diet: extra-large pepperoni in one hand, garlic bread in the other. The boys were exhausted too. Benny was lying across the sofa with his head in my lap and a piece of pepperoni stuck to his chin, while Mac was lying on the other sofa, trying to keep one eye open as he pretended to be able to read the words in a comic. Sam lay on the floor, head propped against Mac’s sofa.
‘Bedtime, guys,’ I declared with a yawn. I checked my watch and did a quick calculation–three in the morning UK time. If I was a shallow, narrow-minded person I just might give Mark a call to irritate him. But no, I was being very mature about the situation now. After all, I was an adult and a responsible mother of two–I had to deal with things in an efficient, intelligent manner, so a few hours before I’d sent Mark an efficient, intelligent text.
‘DAD, WE’RE HAVING THE BEST TIME EVER! THE POOL HAS A FOUNTAIN AND I KILLED AN ALLIGATOR TODAY. WE MISS YOU BUT MUM SAYS SHE DOESN’T. LOVE M&B XX’
Very dignified, I’d thought. A beep alerted us that a text had come straight back.
I MISS U GUYS TOO. WL CALL YOU 2MRW. LOVE YOU. DAD. PS: WELL DONE ON THE ALLIGATOR. XX
There had been a knot in my stomach ever since. There was no use denying it–private pools and cocktails aside, I missed my husband. Uuuurgh, and that made me even more furious. Imagine how great it would be if Mark were here–just perfect. Instead, it was…well, it felt like winning a medal at the Olympics, then discovering that the whole family had nipped out for a fag at the podium/national anthem bit. I wanted him here.
I gave myself a shake. He wasn’t. End of story. Work was far more important to Mr Mark Barwick and I’d better get used to it. Oh crap, my eyes were filling up again. Jetlag. Definitely bloody jetlag.
‘You okay?’ Sam asked.
I nodded. ‘Just…just wish…’ Hold on a minute, what about Sam? Let’s get some perspective here. This bloke was one of my oldest friends, he had facilitated the chance of a lifetime and he’d welcomed us here with open arms–the last thing he deserved was me moaning and dripping snot on his cashmere carpet. How pathetic was I, face like a wet weekend when I should be damn well revelling in every minute of this. I owed it to Sam. I owed it to myself. And I owed it to my boys. After all, how many people got a chance to escape the monotony of life for an all-expenses-paid stay in the swanky pad of an A-list movie star? Mark Barwick, eat my shorts. I was going to grab Hollywood by the throat and squeeze it till it sang. Or if that didn’t work I’d fall at the feet of every movie mogul and lick his boots until he realised my genius and got his chequebook out. Or had me arrested. Either way, I was going to make this worth it.
‘Heeelloo?’
I snapped out of my deliberations. Sam was looking at me with an expectant, amused expression.
‘Sorry, Sam, I was just wishing that…’ Quick recovery required. I gave myself a mental shake. ‘Just wish that I looked slightly more groomed and slightly less like someone who’s been backpacking through the Third World for a year.’
He eyed me up and down. Ah, sweet, he was going to say, ‘Don’t worry, love, you look great,’ and my fragile ego would soar.
‘Don’t worry, love…’
How well did I know that man?
‘I know a make-up girl who can work wonders. She should be able to get you looking half-decent in no time.’
Hear that banging noise? That was my fragile ego thudding its head on the marble coffee table.
Sam reached over and grabbed the phone, then pressed speed-dial. ‘Hey, Jojo,’ he said, ‘I wonder if you can do me a huge favour?’
I decided not to stick around to listen to him explain the gargantuan scale of the task. ‘C’mon, gorgeous,’ I whispered to Mac, while picking up Benny an
d heading for the bedroom. We were in the guest suite. Or, more accurately, a bloody great big room that could have my whole house deposited in the middle and still have space round the edges. Sam had offered to put in a couple of extra beds, but since the main bed in the room could accommodate Tottenham Hotspur, I declined. Besides, I liked snuggling up to my boys. I wanted all the hugs I could get.
Mac stripped and pulled on the pyjamas that Eliza had left at the end of the bed. If Sam asked if I’d like to take home a souvenir of my Hollywood experience, I was going to ask for Eliza. Pushing my luck, I know, but for this level of pampering I was prepared to risk it.
I stripped Benny while he slept and cast around for the pull-up pants. When I spotted them I shrieked with laughter.
‘What, Mum, what?’ giggled Mac, clueless to what was going on but happy to join in with any excuse for hilarity.
‘Look at Benny’s new pants,’ I whispered.
Mac searched around and gasped when his eyes fell on them. These were no ordinary pants. These were to little boys who pee in their sleep what Ferraris are to grown men with small genital organs. They were the haute couture of the incontinence world. The jewel in the crown of the preschool wardrobe. They were…Buzz Lightyear pants.
‘Benny, Benny, it’s Buzz, it’s Buzz!’ shrieked Mac, jumping up and down. Ah, the great Mr Lightyear–the intergalactic space ranger who had once been the love of Mac’s life–right up until Spiderman muscled in and replaced him. Toddlers–so fickle. Anyway, I have to say I was relieved because, while it lasted, Mac’s obsession with Buzz Lightyear had resulted in a compulsion to spontaneously jump from a great height shouting ‘To infinity and beyond’, resulting in two split lips, a dislocated elbow, suspected concussion and more bruising than Rocky at the end of ten rounds.
Benny opened one eye, and then went from sleep to hyperactive in three seconds. ‘Buzz Lightyear, Buzz Lightyear!’ he shouted.
Oh yes, I could tell already that my boys were going to be serious conscientious academics, perhaps scientific geniuses who would no doubt go on to discover the cures for many of today’s terminal diseases. Right after they put on glass helmets and saved the world from the Evil Emperor Zurg.
Benny yanked off his clothes and put his pants on. I would have been impressed if he didn’t have both legs through the same hole. I rearranged him and he strutted across the room, one fist held aloft. ‘To infinity and beyond,’ he yelled.
I grabbed him by the buttocks. ‘To your bed and beyond, little man,’ I told him as I tickled him furiously and he squealed with laughter.
It was only later, as the two of them lay beside me breathing softly in their sleep, that I realised I hadn’t washed faces, brushed teeth, or prepared clothes for the next day. Was this some laidback LA downward slide–within a week would I be feeding them hot dogs for breakfast and having competitions to see who could spit the furthest?
I made the executive decision that for just one night I wouldn’t give a flying fart about such trivialities as personal hygiene and grooming. I kissed them both on the forehead and whispered goodnight. I was in LA. I was on the cusp of fame and fortune. And I was having a threesome with two gorgeous males–life didn’t get much better than that.
Sam shook me awake about ten minutes later. Actually, it was early morning but it definitely felt like ten minutes later. My eyes were swollen shut and my mouth had all the moisture of a desert-dweller’s flip-flop.
‘Sorry, Carly, but Jojo’s here,’ he whispered.
Groan. ‘Morning,’ I slurred. Since the boys were born, I hadn’t quite mastered mornings. I’m sure that one side of my head looked like it had collapsed and there was definitely drool–a clue, perhaps, as to why Mark had lost the urge for a pre-dawn shag.
I grabbed the robe Eliza had very kindly left over the chair at the side of the bed and pulled it on, before padding through to the kitchen.
‘Well, hi there!’
Aaaargh! Christ Almighty! It was some ungodly hour in the middle of the night, I felt like I’d been stroked to sleep by a jackhammer, I was struggling to remember my own name, and now I was being assaulted by Heidi Klum in yoga gear.
Jojo was Amazonian. She had long blonde hair that belonged in a Pantene advert, the smile of an Osmond, her body had been carved out of marble and her breasts were in their correct anatomical position. I hated her on sight.
‘Great to meet you,’ she grinned, dilating my pupils with the gleam from her molars. ‘Here, I brought you a skinny mocha chocca decaf cappuccino with a vanilla shot.’
Suddenly it was all clear. She wasn’t human. No one this bright, shiny and perfect could be made from flesh and blood. She was an android on an advance party from the Planet Starbuck.
I took the coffee and did my best to muster a smile and a greeting. I took shallow comfort from the fact that she was an enemy creature from outer space and as soon as Buzz Lightyear and his lightsaber woke up she was toast.
‘Okay, so what do we need here this morning?’ she asked in a singsong voice, but clearly eyeing my general appearance with trepidation.
‘Jojo, have you heard the story of the loaves and the fishes?’ I asked her.
She nodded. Good to know they taught religious education on Starbuck. ‘Think that scale of miracle, then double it. Make me gorgeous.’
Sam laughed in the corner. Jojo glanced from me to Sam then back to me again. Then burst into giggles.
‘Hey, I’ll give it a shot. You know, I always wanted to put on my CV that I’d worked on Mission Impossible.’
I nearly choked on my skinny mocha bollocksy thing. The irreverence. The cheek. The bare-faced bloody insult. Suddenly I felt…I felt…like I was back at home in the metaphorical bosoms of my girlfriends. Maybe I was going to like Jojo after all.
Cancel that last statement. There was no maybe about it: I bloody loved Jojo. By the time she left, nearly three hours later, I was fervently hoping that she was a lesbian so that I could offer to have her babies in thanks for the wonder of her talents. I was a woman transformed. Gone was the hair of Billy Idol, and in its place was a blonde Hepburn elfin cut. Gone was the face that had been put through a mangle, replaced by cosmetic perfection. Even my eyebrows had been reduced from insect status to immaculately groomed arcs. And my nails? Well, they weren’t strictly mine any more, they belonged to a Chinese plastics factory, but they were so brilliant I wanted to spend the whole day in a crowded street just waving.
I gave her a hug as she left. Very LA. ‘Thanks, Jojo, you’ve been a godsend.’
‘Hey, no problem. I’ll catch up with you guys later.’ She leaned over and kissed Sam, then jumped into some kind of flash convertible thing and whizzed off.
I nudged him in the ribs. ‘She likes you,’ I grinned.
‘Nah, that’s just Jojo. She overflows with the cup of human kindness to everyone. She lives with Cameron King–big-shot director.’
Strange, I was sure I’d detected a definite longing there, but obviously not. Anyway, whatever. Jojo came, Jojo went, and I wanted to drop to my knees and thank God and space travel for her visit. I glanced at myself in the hall mirror. I was ready. I was so ready. Now there was just the matter of two little boys to get ready. We were scheduled to leave in an hour. The plan was that Sam would drop me at the hotel, take the boys to the shooting location a few blocks away, then come back for me when I called him after my meeting. Sam Morton. Hollywood A-lister. Demigod. Richer than a small Arab state. And my taxi driver.
I wandered back into the bedroom, no resemblance whatsoever to the creature from the black latrine who’d left it only a few short hours before. The boys were still sleeping–Mac in the shape of a starfish, and Benny curled up, but clutching the waistband of his Buzz pants. I shook him awake first. He opened one eye, then the other, then gaped.
He immediately spotted that something was different. Jeans and stained T-shirt mum had been replaced by chic, suited, lipsticked mum. Only one person could have accomplished this transformation. H
e gazed down at his pants in wonderment–it was amazing what Buzz Lightyear could do in just one night.
I scooped both boys out of bed and deposited them at the breakfast table, holding them carefully in the underarm position so that no snot or any other fluid could find its way from them to my smart togs.
Sam wandered off to his study to make some calls while I, with one eye on the clock, shovelled their breakfast down them. So far, so good. We were just about on schedule, with no surprises, minimal resistance (but Mum, I hate cornflakes, I want pizza for breakfast), and no casualties.
Then I was ambushed. By Buzz Lightyear.
‘Okay, Benny, time to get dressed now, honey.’
Silence.
‘Come on, babe–time to get dressed.’
‘Nope.’
‘What, pet?’
‘I’m not taking off my Buzz pants.’
‘Come on, honey, Mummy’s in a big hurry today, you have to get ready to go.’
‘Nope. Not taking off my Buzz pants.’
Hell. The enemy was engaged.
It was an unanticipated hitch in the battle plan. I checked the clock–almost time to leave. I had two choices: surrender, let him keep the pants on and make my meeting in the grown-up world on time, or fight it out and risk being trounced.
I made a split-second decision, based on years of experience at the front line. As all mothers know, once you get them out of daytime nappies there’s no going back. Weakness is fatal and likely to result in once again having to lug extra-large boxes of Pampers back from Tescos and a twenty-pound-a-week dent in the shopping budget. I had to stick to my guns. Besides, he’d had the pants on all night and they were sagging down to his knees.
The way forward was clear: Buzz was coming off and nothing would deter me from my mission. Except, that is, a small boy who bolted to the bathroom like his Buzz-clad buttocks were on fire. And, of course, proceeded to lock the door.