I gaped at her in amazement. ‘But I wanted to be a cook, it was nothing to do with pissing Mum off!’
‘Fine, marvellous, be a cook, marry Harry, but it’s the abruptness of it all that takes everyone around you by surprise. You don’t think anything through, Rosie, it’s always a spur-of-the-moment decision that makes absolute sense to you but not to anyone else. A bolt comes from above, you’re temporarily blinded and – SHAZAM! – that’s it, off you go, generally from the sublime to the ridiculous, which was certainly the case with Rupert and Harry.’
‘There was nothing sublime about Rupert,’ I snapped. ‘He was a rat of the first order.’
‘Yes, well, all right, maybe he did turn out to be a bit rodent-like but there were plenty of other sublime ones circling predatorily around you before he came along, although most of the time, I’ll grant you, you didn’t seem to notice. Didn’t seem to realize that when you lost your car keys at the end of a party and were standing about helplessly there were at least four men overturning sofas and hurling chairs out of the window in an effort to find them for you. I’ll give you that, you’ve always been blissfully unaware of your seductive powers, but take it from one who watched with envy, those guys were there, Rosie, panting to get at you.’
‘Bollocks.’
‘Trust me, as one who’s suffered in silence.’ She cradled her mug, narrowing her eyes. ‘But to get back to Rupert, or rather what happened next, after Rupert. D’you remember, Rosie?’
‘Oh, spare me,’ I muttered.
‘Can’t do that, I’m afraid, it’s too crucial to my argument. No, no, next is far too interesting. Next, you put on a teensy bit of weight, Rupert comes out of the closet as a double-dater and knocks your confidence for six and suddenly the whole world goes black. Suddenly you’re incredibly ugly and no one will ever fancy you again. Suddenly you’re going to be alone for the rest of your life. Suddenly the only solution is to marry a fat git like Harry with a diametrically small brain.’
‘Alice!’
‘No, no, you’re right, maybe he wasn’t so fat when you married him, that came later, didn’t it, when you both got pregnant together, the only difference being that you shed your load nine months later and he carried on parading his around, filling out those maternity smocks, billowing around like a ship in full sail. His mind was always small, though, you can’t argue with that.’
I stood up. ‘Alice, how dare you! This is outrageous, this is my husband you’re talking about!’
There was a pause. Suddenly she felt her forehead, went a bit pale. ‘God, you’re right, you’re right,’ she muttered. ‘I don’t know what came over me.’ She stretched out an arm. ‘God, I’m so sorry, Rosie. Sit down, please, I’m sorry.’
I stood over her for a moment, then sat, shaking slightly. There was a silence.
‘I must be mad,’ she muttered at length. Her hand went to her mouth, then it flew to her forehead in horror as another thought struck her. ‘Oh God, Rosie, I’m not going to have to take all this back, am I? You’re not going to ask us round for supper next week and I’ll have to back-pedal like mad and say how much I’ve always admired him? How I adore cuddly men? You are going to leave him, aren’t you?’ she said, aghast.
I stared at her for a moment. Then I got shakily to my feet and went to the window. I rested my hot cheek on the cold glass, staring out at the dull winter grass, the swings, the climbing frame, wet and abandoned for the duration. My God, she hated him. Despised him. My best friend, and I never knew. I felt slightly sick.
‘I don’t know,’ I said without turning round. ‘I was, and then I wasn’t. When I came here and saw you in your nest, I thought I couldn’t go through with it, but now …’ Oh God, what now? Why should it matter what Alice thought? What anyone thought? Why should that have any bearing on anything?
I stayed like that for a while with my face pressed to the windowpane. Its coldness was something of a comfort. I could hear Molly and Lou behind me, pretending to read nursery rhymes to Ivo, their shrill little voices ringing out, confident and sure. Wee Willie Winkie was being rattled through now, a character I’d always regarded with the utmost suspicion. Quite apart from his spectacularly pervy name his penchant for running around in his nightie questioning people on the whereabouts of their children would have been enough for me. I’d have had him up for harassment. Ivo, though, was entranced. I turned to look as he gazed adoringly at Molly, open-mouthed with wonder as she pretended to read from an upside-down book, her small rosy mouth bossily forming the words. She flipped over the page and took a deep breath.
‘Humpty Dumpty –’
‘I think I am,’ I said quickly, suddenly. ‘I mean, yes. I am leaving him. Definitely.’
Alice had been watching me intently. Her face relaxed visibly. She sank back in her seat and sighed. Then she beamed. ‘Good for you. Go for it, Rosie. Go for it like you go at your mistakes, single-mindedly, blinkered and purposefully!’ She raised a clenched fist in salute.
I blinked. ‘Wow, thanks,’ I muttered. Blimey, with friends like these … I shook my head. ‘I honestly had no idea you felt so strongly about him.’
‘Oh, never mind about all that,’ she said quickly. ‘I said much too much and got carried away by the momentum. In all probability he’s not nearly that bad.’
‘He’s not,’ I said earnestly. ‘He’s honestly not a bad man at all, Alice, he’s –’
‘Yes, okay, but he’s not a particularly good one either, is he?’ she snapped back. I stared at her. My lip wobbled, tears threatened. I threw my head back to keep them at bay.
‘So why did I marry him then?’ I blurted out to the ceiling.
She sipped her coffee thoughtfully and eyed me over the rim. ‘Well, I’ve got a pretty shrewd idea. How about you were twenty-nine, slightly desperate, all your friends were married and your mother pushed you into it?’
I opened my mouth to protest, but suddenly couldn’t be bothered. I blinked away the tears and silently sipped my coffee.
‘So,’ I said at length, forcing a smile. ‘Tell me, Alice, how does a girl go about getting a divorce these days?’ There. It was out. I’d said it. And it wasn’t so bad.
‘Well, the first thing you do,’ she got up and went to the fridge, ‘is have a drink.’ She brandished a bottle with a grin.
‘Steady on, it’s only half past nine.’
‘I know, but it’s a momentous decision and not one to be taken without alcohol. And anyway, it’s either this or a Mars Bar and if you’re going Out There again,’ she jerked her eyes expressively to the window, ‘better to ruin your liver than your thighs. Here.’ She poured me a glass. ‘Apart from anything else,’ she went on more gently, ‘I can tell you’re a bit shaken.’
‘Thanks.’ I took a slug gratefully. ‘I am a bit.’ I grimaced. ‘God, you didn’t make this, did you?’
She looked surprised. ‘I did actually. It’s rhubarb and elderflower, why?’
‘Oh, Alice, it’s filthy. Throw it away and give me some of that Sainsbury’s wine box I spotted nestling in there.’
She tasted it, pretended to look hurt but couldn’t help screwing her own nose up. ‘Yeuch.’ She threw it down the sink and poured a couple of fresh ones from the wine box.
‘Now,’ she said, setting the glass in front of me. ‘First things first. Have you got a solicitor?’
‘Er, no, not to my knowledge. Harry uses Boffy – Edmund Boffington-Clarke – but they’re best buddies, I can’t possibly go to him.’
‘Edmund Boffington-Clarke,’ she muttered. ‘That’s not a name, that’s a sentence. No, well quite, if he’s a buddy he’s definitely out. I think the best thing you can do is to go to a Citizens’ Advice Bureau or – no, I know, we’ll look up a few local solicitors in the Yellow Pages, but when you get there, for heaven’s sake don’t forget to ask about legal aid. I’ll come with you,’ she said quickly, seeing my face go pale.
‘But shouldn’t I, you know, tell Harry first? Ask him how he f
eels about it, that sort of thing? Aren’t we supposed to drag it out a bit, toddle off to Relate together, discuss our most intimate sexual problems with a complete stranger? Cry on some busybody’s shoulder? It all seems a bit deceitful somehow to go off and do it on my own, like a backstreet abortion or something. And so final. It’s the end, isn’t it?’
‘Or the beginning,’ she said briskly. ‘A new life. One you want, too. That’s how you should look at it, Rosie. No good looking back.’
God, those phrases. They sounded so tired, so hackneyed out in the open like that. But then it was a mistake that had been made many times before, wasn’t it? There was nothing trail-blazing about extracting oneself from a rotten marriage, so inevitably the advice became hackneyed. Go forward, don’t go back. Look to the future, not to the past. I sank into my wine and Alice got up from the table, knowing it was necessary for me to plunge into some serious gloom now. Knowing it was necessary for me to go down before I could come up. And there was probably nothing very revolutionary about that, either. I watched morosely as she moved around the kitchen, tidying up, picking up toys, wiping Lou’s nose, handing round biscuits, getting on with normal life. She began shoving a pile of dirty washing into the machine, cramming it too full as usual.
‘Speaking of Sainsbury’s,’ she said, slamming the door and straightening up. She fixed me with a beady eye.
‘Were we?’ I said warily.
‘The wine box. I was in there yesterday and that bloke was asking after you again.’
‘What bloke?’
‘That totally gorgeous one with the blond hair and the strangely educated accent. Wanted to know if I’d seen you lately. Quite heartening, don’t you think?’
I stared at her in disbelief. Finally I found my voice. ‘Alice, my marriage is over. I’m leaving my husband, the father of my child. My life as I’ve known it for the past three years is coming to an abrupt halt. Do you really think I want to hear that some toy boy of a shelf-stacker has got the hots for me?’
‘He’s not a shelf-stacker, he’s a Cambridge graduate doing a holiday job and all I’m trying to do here, if you must know, is instil a little confidence. Let you know that people notice you, that you’re still very attractive to the opposite sex!’
‘Oh, right. Well, stroll on down. Someone in Sainsbury’s fancies me, glory hallelujah. I’ll get shot of my husband right away then, shall I? Quick, give me a decree nisi and I’ll sign it now, why hang about?’
‘Okay, okay,’ she muttered, ‘that was pretty ham-fisted, I admit. I just … well, I just feel that someone like you, Rosie, should have the world at your feet, but for some reason you never have. You’ve gone from a domineering mother to a domineering husband –’
‘To a domineering friend.’
‘Oh!’ She looked startled.
‘I’m joking,’ I laughed, seeing her shocked face. I stood up and hugged her. ‘You couldn’t have been a better friend, actually.’
‘I’ve said too much,’ she said unhappily.
‘No, you haven’t.’ I bent down and scooped Ivo up off the floor. ‘You’ve been brilliant. Made me see I’ve got to do it. Made me see sense. Come on, Ivo.’
‘Are you going?’
‘I’ve got to get him back for his nap. Thanks, Alice. I mean it.’ I hugged her again and she squeezed me very hard back.
‘Those things I said,’ she said anxiously. ‘It’s because I care, you know that, don’t you?’
‘I know.’
We released each other and she trailed me thoughtfully to the front door.
‘What was it that finally pushed you over the edge then?’ she asked, opening the door.
‘What d’you mean?’
‘What made you decide to leave?’
‘Oh! Oh, nothing really, he just – well, if you must know, he peed in the baby-sitter’s coat pocket.’
Her eyes grew round with horror. ‘You mean he just strolled up, got it out – and peed on her?’
‘Oh no,’ I said quickly, ‘no, she wasn’t wearing it. Happily, even Harry’s not that gross. No, it was in the cloakroom and he took a wrong turning in the dark, that’s all.’ I shrugged and put Ivo on my bike. ‘These things happen, I suppose,’ I ventured hopefully.
Alice raised her eyebrows. ‘I suppose they do,’ she said slowly. ‘Mostly at nursery school, though, I believe.’
I sighed in weary acknowledgement as I got on my bike, then pushed off down the road, giving her a backward wave as I went.
Chapter Three
The following day was Friday, which in the normal run of things meant packing up the car after breakfast and going down to my parents for the weekend – Harry always took an official break on Friday as opposed to the unofficial break he took the rest of the week. Never in my life had I seen so much of my parents until I married Harry. Oh, I used to pop down for the odd weekend, mostly to have a chat with Dad or see my sister, Philly, who lived fairly close by, but since I’d got married it seemed to me we practically lived with them, and all at Harry’s instigation. As far as he was concerned, it was social death to be seen in London at the weekend and since his parents were dead and his only living relative, Uncle Bertram, lived miles away in a huge baronial hall in a godforsaken spot on the Yorkshire moors – a house, incidentally, that Harry was destined to inherit on Bertram’s death, yet another good reason for breaking the marital contract, as far as I was concerned – and since we didn’t get asked away to house parties nearly as much as Harry pretended, we invariably found ourselves on the M40 of a Friday morning, beetling off to Oxford again. A strange twist of fate really, considering how desperate I’d been to get away from home.
But it wasn’t just the stigma of weekends in London that made Harry head for the wide open spaces; there were other, more cynical factors at play here. Money was tight in the Meadows household and our Harry had very expensive tastes. The obvious answer was to indulge them at his in-laws’, where everything was free. Here the wine flowed, the roast beef appeared as if by magic and there was a far more obliging waitress, in the shape of my mother, than the one he was used to at home (who, frankly, had got a bit mutinous lately).
Ah yes, Mum. Amazingly enough, three years spent in close proximity to her son-in-law had not diminished the dazzle that shone from his backside, and she was only too delighted to accommodate him on a full board and lodging basis with morning coffee and afternoon tea thrown in too. The latter of these rituals Harry liked to take in the drawing room, so while Dad and I slunk off and slurped our mugs of tea in the potting shed or the kitchen, Harry would be presented with the full scones and crumpet complement by the fire. At this hallowed hour my mother was lucky enough to take off her pinny and join him, and then what a happy time was had by all. The two of them would sit for hours discussing titles, nobility, acreage, lineage, cheerfully dissecting the social pages of The Times or the Tatler and dropping names so thick and fast the carpet must have been knee-deep in peers of the realm. At length, though, exhausted by all this social climbing and having scaled heights so dizzy he practically needed crampons and an oxygen mask, Harry would give a subtle little flicker of the eyelids to indicate that the audience was over, and that my mother was free to leave him. Balancing a tray of teacups and empty plates, she’d tiptoe from the room, a finger to her lips, whispering to anyone who was interested, ‘Shhh … Poor lamb, let him sleep, he’s quite worn out. Works so hard during the week, you see. Quite exhausted.’
Well, that suited me fine, and although it amused me that Harry insisted on spending his weekends in the country but never stuck his nose outside the back door, I was very happy to put Ivo in my backpack and take him for long walks over the hills or help Dad in the garden. Together we’d weed our way round the beds or slowly pick fruit from the canes, chatting a bit, but mostly in companionable silence, with Ivo at our heels, trailing a miniature trowel or a bucket. But not today, I thought as I packed a changing bag for Ivo on the kitchen table in London. Today, the walks and the weed
ing could wait, because today I had a different agenda. I crammed a few bibs and muslins in the side and zipped the bag up with a flourish.
‘There.’ I smiled at Harry who was eating his breakfast. ‘That’s all Ivo’s things ready. I’ve put loads of nappies in, don’t forget to change him when you get down there, will you?’
Harry looked up from his double candelabra of soft-boiled eggs and blinked his pale blue eyes in surprise. He’d never changed a nappy in his life, and there seemed to be a puzzling lack of the plural in that sentence.
‘What d’you mean, when “I” get down there. What are you doing?’
‘Oh, didn’t I say?’ I said airily. ‘I’m coming on later, after lunch. I desperately need to go shopping this morning, there’s loads of things we need for the house and I must get to John Lewis. I rang Mum this morning and told her.’
‘Well, you might have told me!’
‘Sorry, I forgot. Anyway, it doesn’t matter, does it? You can take my car with Ivo in his seat and I’ll see you later, okay?’ I swung my handbag over my shoulder and gave him a dazzling smile, feeling braver by the minute.
‘You’re going shopping now?’
‘Might as well. The sooner I get started, the sooner I’ll be down – oh, and don’t forget to take his Blinky Bill koala, will you? Otherwise we’ll never get him to sleep tonight.’
I bent down to kiss my son who’d abandoned his wooden bricks on the floor and was beginning to look aghast at the prospect of being left with Daddy, who was looking equally aghast at being left with his son. I had to make a speedy exit now or tears would surely follow.
Rosie Meadows Regrets... Page 5