The Wisdom of Sally Red Shoes

by Ruth Hogan

  Chapter 51

  ART

  Aretha Franklin’s ‘Who’s Zoomin’ Who?’ is the soundtrack to the chaos in my bedroom. Marc Bolan has already ridden a white swan, got it on and loved to boogie, but still I am no further forward. This is my ‘getting ready to go out’ playlist, but it’s not usually the cue for a pile of clothes on the bed that looks like an explosion in a launderette. Haizum is surveying the scene of sartorial pandemonium from the doorway with a bemused expression on his handsome face. The Kaiser Chiefs are now predicting a riot.

  ‘Too late!’ I say to Haizum, as I throw yet another rejected outfit onto the growing pile. ‘Looks like it’s already happened.’ It’s not that I’m nervous. Well, I am a little. But I’m more excited. I just want to get it right. Kitty Muriel’s advice on what to wear was ‘Knock him dead!’ I bet she was probably thinking along the lines of Madonna’s conical Jean Paul Gaultier bra, but that’s more likely to take one of his eyes out. ‘He’ is the Olympian. Gideon. And ‘he’ has asked me out for a drink so that we can exchange insurance details. I do hope that’s a euphemism. Edward’s outfit advice was not to wear a dress just in case I come back from the loo with the skirt tucked into my knickers. But then he very kindly said that I always look ‘original’, whatever I wear. I’m pretty sure that was a euphemism. Bono is now reminding me that I still haven’t found what I’m looking for. Well, quite. I just want to feel comfortable, look nice – well, ‘hot’ actually – and not get cold on the walk to the pub. Eventually I settle on a pair of black skinny jeans, a red silk kimono top (shades of The Mikado!) and a pair of scarlet biker boots. Eddi Reader and Fairground Attraction proclaim it to be perfect. Normally I would take Haizum with me. They know him in my local pub, and he’s always made very welcome, but tonight is something of a reconnaissance date. If it is a date at all. The Olympian may not like dogs, and if he doesn’t and it is a date then it will be our first and last. Finally dressed, I must now attempt to do something with my hair. Up or down or somewhere in between? After a couple of minutes wrestling with my unruly locks, I decide to simply let them be. As I check in the mirror for stray dog hairs on my jeans and lipstick on my teeth, Marvin Gaye promises sexual healing. Lady T would be aghast!

  ‘So, tell me something about yourself that I wouldn’t guess.’

  The Olympian is sitting opposite me, leaning forward and awaiting my answer. It’s very distracting to be this close to him in the flesh.

  ‘I’ve got a very large dog.’

  This is definitely progress for me. Until very recently, my response to a question like this, on a date, would have involved Gabriel. ‘I had a son, but he died’ or ‘I used to be a mother’. I would never go into details, even if asked, but I couldn’t separate myself from him. I didn’t exist as an individual entity. It always felt disrespectful not to acknowledge him at the earliest opportunity. And besides, it’s a hell of an icebreaker. But that was the old Masha.

  The Olympian smiles.

  ‘Ah, but I do know that.’

  ‘How, exactly?’ I’m thinking Kitty Muriel.

  ‘Flo told me that she found a dog hair in her birthday cake.’

  I’m mortified, and I can imagine Lady T covering her mouth with her hanky in revulsion. The Olympian sees the look of horror on my face and takes pity on me.

  ‘I’m joking! Flo gave me a piece of that cake and it was delicious. Kitty Muriel told me about your dog. Haizum, isn’t it?’

  He was obviously paying close attention.

  ‘And what else did she tell you?’

  He leans back in his seat and grins. His teeth are astonishingly white.

  ‘Not a lot. She told me that if I wanted to know any more, then I’d have to ask you myself.’ He takes a sip from his wine glass. ‘But she did tell me that you were single.’

  I silently thank the Lord – and Kitty Muriel. But now it’s my turn.

  ‘And what about you? Tell me something about you that I wouldn’t have guessed.’

  He thinks for a moment and then replies, ‘I used to be a lifeguard.’

  I remember his strong, muscled arms and legs scything through the water and his Daniel Craig trunks.

  ‘I might have guessed that. You’re a very good swimmer.’ I want to kiss you. Shit. I hope I didn’t say that out loud.

  ‘Well, I wasn’t a lifeguard for long. It was a summer holiday job while I was at university. But it’s always a good line to impress the ladies.’

  ‘It’ll take more than a fantastic front crawl to win me over.’

  He laughs. ‘I somehow thought it might.’

  I’m really enjoying myself. He’s easy company and the fact that he’s ridiculously handsome hasn’t tainted him with the arrogance that sometimes accompanies such dazzling physical perfection.

  ‘So, come on. What else have you got to offer?’ I tease him.

  ‘Well, I’m a photographer, so I could take your picture.’

  I pull a face that clearly conveys my lack of enthusiasm and he laughs.

  ‘And I can do this.’

  The movement of his hands and fingers is so fast I wonder if it’s a tic. Maybe he has Tourette’s. He repeats the actions more slowly this time.

  ‘I can sign,’ he explains. ‘When I was a kid, I had trouble hearing. The doctors were worried that it might get worse and I’d end up completely deaf, so I was taught to sign.’

  ‘But it didn’t?’

  He cups his ear and raises his eyebrows questioningly. I laugh dutifully and dig him in the ribs with my finger.

  ‘No, it didn’t. I’m still completely deaf in one ear, and I’d struggle to hold a conversation in here if it was busy, but otherwise it’s fine.’

  Strangely, I like him even more now he’s turned out not to be so perfect. I really do want to kiss him. Lady T would definitely not approve. She advises that public displays of affection anywhere and at any time are beyond the pale. She also says staring is inappropriate. I fear I am both staring (at the Olympian) and – therefore – clearly behaving inappropriately. But I’m beginning to think that as role models go, Kitty Muriel might be a lot more fun than Lady T, and I’m seriously considering switching allegiance.

  ‘So, I know it’s really boring and everyone probably asks you the same question, but how do you sign my name?’

  He grins and then with one hand mimes mashing potatoes. Ha ha! I suppose I asked for that one. But there’s one more question I really need to ask. It’s the deal-breaker.

  ‘Do you like dogs?’

  As Gideon walks me home, I realise with a jolt that I’ve barely thought about Gabriel all evening and I haven’t mentioned him once. Not yet. But I don’t feel bad about it. For once I am just being Masha, the woman, instead of Gabriel’s mum – Gabriel’s mourner. And actually, it’s okay. Gideon takes my hand. I’m tempted to take a circuitous route home, just to make this feeling last. This feeling of ridiculous excitement and the promise of all kinds of possibilities. Because when we get to my front door, he might just say ‘Thanks’ and ‘I’ll be in touch’, and mean about Edith Piaf, and it won’t have been a date at all. What would Kitty Muriel do? As we head up the garden path towards the door and Haizum begins to bark, I think I know the answer. I kiss him.

  If you cry when you are lying on your back, the tears trickle down the sides of your face and into your ears. Which is why I’m awake in my bed, in the dark, with wet ears. I’m not sobbing – it’s just that a few tears have escaped. I’m not even sure why. Relief that I still know how to be with a man in bed? Shock that there is a man in my bed? Or fear that now I’ve allowed this man into my bed, I’ll never see him again. Nice girls never sleep with a man on a first date, let alone only a ‘possible’ date, and I daren’t even begin to think about what Lady T would have to say about it. On the other hand, I’m fairly sure I know what Kitty Muriel would say, and I smile in spite of my tears. Now I have a runny nose and to avoid a snail trail, I either have to sniff – not very attractive – or get up and blow m
y nose and risk waking the man in my bed. Gideon. I fumble for the box of tissues on the bedside table and succeed in knocking the alarm clock onto the floor. Bugger.

  ‘Hey,’ a hand reaches across and touches me, ‘are you trying to escape?’

  ‘No.’ And now I don’t need a tissue because in the kerfuffle I’ve sniffed. I hope he didn’t notice.

  ‘Good,’ Gideon replies, in a voice smoky with sleep or maybe (hopefully!) lust, as he winds his hard-muscled swimmer’s arms around me and draws me close.

  ‘I had a little boy. Gabriel. He died.’ Excellent! Where the hell did that come from? I was doing so well. It’s as though he squeezed the words out of me with his embrace. I hold my breath, waiting to see what effect my blurted confession will produce. His hold on me doesn’t loosen. He nestles his face closer and kisses the nape of my neck.

  ‘I know.’

  How does he know?

  ‘How do you know?’

  ‘I used to work for a local newspaper. I’d just started there when Gabriel drowned. It was such a tragic story that I never forgot it. And I never forgot your face. It’s my job, you see. It’s all about faces.’

  He kisses me again, very softly.

  ‘The paper ran the story with a picture of you and Gabriel. It struck me at the time how alike you were; same eyes, same hair. I didn’t recognise you at the pool. Your face seemed vaguely familiar, but I couldn’t place you in any context. Then you told me your name on the phone and it sparked a memory. Your surname – it’s quite unusual.’

  I sense his hesitation, and wonder what’s coming next.

  ‘I’m afraid I Googled you,’ he admits sheepishly. Thank God for that! He knows. And he still asked me out – I’m definitely counting it as a date now – and he’s still here. It hasn’t frightened him off like it has some of my previous would-be suitors.

  ‘I didn’t know what to do,’ he continued, ‘whether to say anything or not. In the end, I decided that if you wanted me to know, you’d tell me.’ He squeezes me tightly. ‘I’m glad you did.’

  ‘I’ll tell you all about him, one day. What he was really like. But not now.’

  ‘Whenever you’re ready,’ he whispers, nuzzling the back of my neck. I’ll never get to sleep now. I arch my newly toned body to press back against his naked skin, and although he can’t see it, I’m smiling.

  Chapter 52

  ART

  The circle of gigantic salmon pink cranes looks like a group of prehistoric creatures having a coffee morning. The glass gherkin glitters in the pale winter sunshine and the mud-coloured Thames crinkles beneath us as the train chunters slowly on through central London. Mum and I are on our way to Brighton. Haizum is staying with Edward and Lord Byron, and I’m taking her away for the weekend as a belated birthday present, and to escape from Dad for a couple of days. The prospect of his forthcoming court appearance is making him increasingly irascible, and even more difficult to live with than usual.

  ‘Sixteen since the last station.’

  Mum likes to count things. And people. She counts them in restaurants, the cinema, the theatre, in church – in fact just about anywhere where they keep still long enough to be counted (she should come to the cemetery – that would keep her occupied all day). It’s a bit like trainspotting, I suppose, except that she’s not at all interested in the make or model, just the quantity. I think perhaps it’s a nervous habit. She does it when she’s feeling anxious, which is a lot of the time. If her head is full of counting, it leaves no space for worrying thoughts to sneak in. Is this the right train? (She asked the guard and another passenger before we boarded.) What will happen if she loses her ticket? (I have it in my bag for safekeeping.) Will Dad remember to turn off the gas cooker? (Who knows?) Will anyone guess that she’s wearing a wig? (I doubt it – it looks completely natural.) But we know for certain that there are sixteen people in our carriage.

  It is early afternoon but already the late November sun is languishing, slipping down the grey mottled sky towards its twilight. A young woman gets up and heads off in the direction of the toilet. She is obviously blessed with a more robust constitution than I am. I’m not good with any kind of public lavatory. I have to spread at least four layers of toilet paper on the seat, and even then I try to avoid any actual physical contact with it by adopting the skiing position, which is great for the thigh muscles, but not a very relaxing way to spend a penny. Frequently the downward draught caused by the squatting motion will blow away the paper, and then I’m back to square one again. I usually wait until I get home.

  ‘Fifteen.’

  Mum will be fully occupied soon enough as the commuters begin their Friday exodus and the train fills with weary-looking souls clutching coats, laptops and hopes of a quiet weekend; the bright young things of the selfie generation armed with energy drinks and iPhones. One stop later and I am being squashed by a businessman doing the Telegraph quick crossword, although ‘quick’ is rather a misnomer in his case. I can tell because there are some really very easy clues that he hasn’t solved yet. I can’t help but see because he’s taking up all the room; spreading himself out as far as possible, legs akimbo and elbows flapping. ‘Look how important I am that I require all this space,’ he is thinking. I am thinking that it is simply because he is rude and arrogant. I wish I’d brought a hat-pin to poke him with.

  Mum is more fortunate. She is now sitting beside an elegant elderly gentleman. He is very tall, and slim almost to the point of skeletal. His bony, hollow-cheeked face is illuminated by a pair of piercing, bright blue eyes behind gold-rimmed spectacles. He is wearing a striped shirt, a sleeveless cashmere sweater, and a beautifully cut sage green tweed jacket. He smiled charmingly at Mum when he asked if the seat next to her was taken, and was most solicitous about ensuring that he didn’t disturb her in any way. He too is studying the Telegraph crossword, although I’d bet my hat-pin (if I had it with me) that it’s the cryptic option that is causing him so little difficulty. Within fifteen minutes his gold-nibbed fountain pen is returned to the top pocket of his jacket, and his long, slender fingers are quietly folded in his lap while he watches the landscape fly past the window. In the meantime the space-hogging businessman has only filled in nineteen across. I’m pretty sure it’s wrong.

  The train is lumbering through dark tunnels punctuated by brief shafts of daylight in the black, high-walled sidings. The walls are covered with graffiti art that looks like some sort of modernist cave painting. The tunnels, offices and blocks of flats eventually give way to the back gardens of terraced houses. Some have neat little squares of lawn, plastic tables and chairs, and the occasional flower bed, but more are filled with rubbish and broken furniture jettisoned through the back door – out of sight, out of mind. These gardens look like an extreme version of the cupboard that most houses have, where clutter is hastily hidden from the judgemental eyes of unexpected guests. But the inhabitants of these houses have forgotten about the people on the trains – the uninvited visitors who can see it all. Perhaps they are beyond caring. In some places there is a bordering strip of land between the bottom of the gardens and the railway track that has ended up as a dumping ground for every kind of commercial and domestic rubbish. As we pass by one of these, I see a bedraggled pink teddy bear sitting in a muddy puddle. It looks unbearably forlorn.

  The businessman gets off the train at Haywards Heath, jettisoning his copy of the Telegraph in his wake. The old gentleman remains seated and I really hope he is going all the way to Brighton. As the train pulls out of the station, I check. I knew it: nineteen across is wrong.

  Chapter 53

  ART

  ‘That which we consider to be true art, is that which appears not to be art at all.’

  Castiglione’s words welcomed us to Brighton. They are written on the wall of Grand Central, one of the first buildings you see when leaving the train station. When we arrived, Mum was tired from the journey and the counting, so we are spending the evening at the hotel. While Mum unpacks her things
and changes for dinner, I stand at the window of my room staring out at the fairground lights twinkling on the pier and wondering whether or not I should ring Gideon. We have been on five official dates now: twice out for dinner, once to the cinema and twice to the pub. And the sex is amazing. I know everyone says that at the start of a relationship, but I’m positive this is even more amazing than the usual start-of-a-relationship amazing sex. I can’t believe I’m dithering over ringing him. I’m about to pull up his number on my phone when it rings. It’s Gideon.

  ‘Can you see the sea?’ he asks.

  ‘I’m gazing at it right now.’

  ‘I wish I were there with you.’

  By the time I have collected Mum from her room and we have made our way downstairs, she has rallied sufficiently to inform me that there were eleven people drinking in the bar where we enjoyed our pre-dinner Martinis, and forty-seven falling to thirty-two fellow diners in the restaurant during the course (or should that be courses?) of our spinach and ricotta cannelloni, and steamed chocolate sponge pudding with custard.

  This morning is cold, clear and sparkling. Having eaten a variety of things for breakfast that we would never eat at home (in the company of twenty-three other guests) we are taking a bracing walk along the promenade. The waves are bubbling and frothing over the stones, and the wind is cold enough to make our faces sting. It is the kind of day to make your soul fly and your heart dance. But Mum is clearly anxious, as ever, about the effect of the wind on her hair, and keeps checking it with her hand.

  ‘Perhaps I should have worn a hat,’ she worries. I take her arm.

  ‘It’s fine, Mum. That wig wouldn’t come off in a hurricane! Don’t forget, the saleswoman told you that you could swim in it if you wanted to.’