The Rise and Fall of a Domestic Diva

by Sarah May

  ‘D’you mind?’

  Margery opened her eyes, trying to get her bearings. She couldn’t have blacked out because she was still standing upright, but she couldn’t for the life of her remember where she was. The walls around her were painted a funny colour, there was a sweet sickly smell in the air, and a rack opposite full of coats that she had no memory of ever having worn.

  ‘Margery?’

  She concentrated hard on the face in front of her. It was Kate. Kate was married to Robert. Robert lived in a house in London.

  ‘D’you mind giving this to Flo?’

  Margery stared blankly at the puddle of baby rice in the Peter Rabbit bowl and carried on staring at it as the bowl was transferred from Kate’s hands to hers. ‘Where are you going?’ she said, hoping she didn’t sound helpless.

  ‘Upstairsto check on Findlay and wake up Robert.’

  ‘It’s Saturday,’ Margery protested.

  Ignoring this, Kate jogged upstairs, leaving Margery stranded in the study doorway, staring at the bowl of baby rice.

  One teaspoon to be taken at bedtime. Margery’s mind automatically read out the words painted round the side of the dish then she went off in search of Flo. Where was Flo? She turned round and checked the study, but there was no sign of her there. Next, she went into the kitchenthen the lounge.

  She perched slowly on the edge of the sofa and leant forward with the spoon, but Flo just turned her head away. Margery managed to get the next mouthful in, but that was dribbled back out and, as she leant forward to scoop it off the carpet, she felt another rush of vertigo. Afraid, she sat still, waiting for it to pass, then started to slowly, methodically eat Flo’s baby rice.

  I’m going to have a stroke, she thought, sucking the red plastic spoon. I’m going to die.

  She looked up, the spoon in her mouth, as a car pulled up outside.

  Kate’s mother, Beatrice, had arrived.

  ‘Look,’ Findlay said as Kate went into his roompointing to his radiator, which was crawling with Lego men.

  He’d Sellotaped the green magnetic strips from his Geomag kit to the back of all his Lego people and stuck them to the radiator, turning it into an overcrowded rock-face that was being erroneously scaled on Findlay’s orders. In the past fortnight, Findlay had become obsessed with all things magnetic.

  ‘That’s fantastic, Finn.’

  Crouched in front of the radiator, he rubbed his chin on his knee. ‘You don’t mean it.’

  ‘Finn, I do,’ she insisted. ‘I think what you’ve done with your Lego people is fantastic.’

  ‘I know,’ he agreed, semi-appeased, then pulled a Lego fireman off the radiator and started to fly him through the air.

  Kate went into their room. ‘Robert?’

  A sigh and the sound of the bed sheets moving as the body under them turned.

  She moved slowly over to the bed, the room bright with the broken bars of sunlight making their way through the blinds.

  ‘I’ve got a migraine.’

  Robert looked awful, but then he looked awful all the time at the moment.

  ‘Well, do you think you can get up?’

  Next door, in the throes of a game with his newly magnetic Lego men, Findlay let out the sort of triumphant shout that signified a cruel triumph.

  ‘I don’t knoware people with migraine meant to get up?’

  That was unpleasantly said, but then most of their attempts at communication latelyverbal, non-verbal and even the silenceshad become unpleasant. She felt that every time he opened his mouth or touched her at the moment, it was to inflict pain.

  Then it came to her, driving through sunlight and slow traffic one afternoon that, without either of them being aware of it, their marriage had been up against some huge, lumbering adversary for some time now; one they were meant to join forces against and fight together. She wasn’t entirely sure what the adversary wasit was too endless and indistinct to identify. It could be their children, their mortgage lender, the education system, their parents, their friends, TV, London, the twenty-first century…or a combination of all these things. It wasn’t clear. What was clear was that they’d subconsciously decided to face the adversary alonenot togetherand that Kate had won her fight, without meaning to, while Robert had lost his, also without meaning to.

  Was one survivor in a marriage enough to keep a marriage going?

  Ros would have said ‘yes’, but Kate never thought to ask her. Firstly, because she presumed this wasn’t something the Grangers had any experience of and, secondly, because Ros and she weren’t really on speaking terms since Ros had put in her offer on the Beulah Hill house. Despite the fact that Mr Jackson had since decided to take the house off the market….

  Harriet would have given a despotically optimistic ‘yes’despite what Kate had witnessed in their kitchen on the night of the last PRC meeting.

  But then, Staying Married was all part of Harriet’s Plan, and if Staying Married was an Applied Art, she intended to excel in it.

  Robert was staring at a corner of radiator where rust was bleeding through the chipped paintwork. Kate thought about sitting down on the edge of the bed, but knew she couldn’t bear to be that close to him. There was an overwhelming smell of unwashed bed linen, unwashed hair and bad dreams in the room.

  Kate stayed where she was and looked out of the window instead.

  Outside, on the street, Evie and Joel and Ros were starting to set up the stalls. Soon she’d have to go down there and help them.

  ‘You’ve got to resolve this Jerome thing,’ she said absently.

  Robert laughed. ‘What?’

  ‘I said, you’ve got to resolve this Jerome thing.’

  He laughed again. ‘KateI’ve got migraine.’

  ‘I know.’ She stayed by the window with her back to him. ‘You said you were going to speak to the head.’

  ‘I spoke to the head,’ he said after a while.

  Kate turned round. ‘Why didn’t you say?’

  ‘She told me to pray for Jerome.’

  The blinds started to rattle lightly and Kate lifted her head instinctively to catch the morning breeze coming through the open window.

  ‘Les told me that the LA are currently investigating her for fraudulent activity.’

  ‘What sort of fraudulent activity?’ Kate asked, semi-interested.

  ‘Using school funds to launch her career as a prophetessthere are posters of her on the sides of buses. Have you got any idea how much an advertising campaign like that costs? Simba, who’d eat glue if she told him to, reckons she’s got enough followers to fill a small arena. The prophetess has got a disciplinary hearing and is threatening to sue the LA.’

  ‘For what?’

  ‘I don’t knowbusiness damages? Ellington’s on the verge of special measures and they want her to go quietly. So she’s putting together a package that includes a six-figure sum and full pension benefits.’

  Robert didn’t sound like a man with a migraine as he said this.

  ‘You’ve got to get out,’ Kate said, more harshly than she’d intended. When he didn’t respond to this, she added, ‘And right now you’ve got to get upyou’ve got to, Robert. I can’t do today on my ownyour mum’s downstairs, my mum’s on her way and we’ve got this street party.’

  Robert groaned and pulled the duvet up over his head.

  ‘And we’ve got to talk about the house.’

  ‘Shitplease don’t bring up the house thing now,’ Robert mumbled from beneath the duvet.

  ‘Well, there’s never a right time to bring up the house thing.’

  A car pulled up on the street outside and, downstairs, Margery was yelling something.

  Kate left the bedroom and went out into the hallway. ‘What’s that?’

  ‘I said, your mum’s here.’

  Kate went downstairs past Margery, who was hovering in the lounge doorway with the red plastic spoon in her hand, and got to the front door just as Beatrice was about to ring it.

  ‘Good
God,’ Beatrice said, her eyes running all over her daughter. ‘What have they been doing to you?’

  ‘I knowI know,’ Kate said, resisting the urge to burst into tears.

  Mother and daughter hugged.

  ‘Margery,’ Beatrice said, in her usual irately enthusiastic way.

  Margery and Beatrice didn’t hugprimarily because Margery, who tended to only hug people she actually liked, was too busy eyeing her suspiciously to even contemplate moving from the lounge doorway. She was fairly certain Beatrice had had liposuction done in the past six months.

  Beatrice pushed past hernoting the red teaspoon in Margery’s handin search of Flo and, with a cry of delight, found her poised, juddering on her limbs, on the rug in the lounge. ‘Oh, Kateshe’s trying to crawlyou never said.’

  Kate smiled, uninterested, as Flo was scooped up by Beatrice and placed professionally on her hip.

  ‘She’s been doing that for weeks now,’ Margery put in.

  ‘Where’s Finn?’ Beatrice asked.

  ‘Upstairs. How was the journey?’ Kate asked her.

  ‘Traffic wasn’t too bad. How’s it all goingwith the house?’

  ‘No one’s put an offer in yet.’

  ‘They will.’

  ‘I told them they don’t want anyone putting an offer in till they’ve found somewhere to go.’

  ‘I thought you had.’ Beatrice turned to her daughter.

  ‘It fell through. The vendor took it off the market.’

  ‘Well, this is London,’ Beatrice said expansively, rubbing noses with Flo. ‘Plenty of housing stock. And I suppose you could always take a short-term let or something if somebody wanted this and you had to move out.’

  ‘They can’t rent,’ Margery cried out, ‘it’ll cost a fortune. There’s four of them,’ she added, pointlessly. ‘And what about all their furniture?’

  ‘Storage,’ Beatrice said. ‘Margerythere’s no need to panic.’

  ‘But storage costs a fortune. And Robert’s got enough on his plate without worrying about where you’re all going to be living.’

  ‘Where is Robert?’ Beatrice asked.

  ‘Upstairs in bedexhausted,’ Margery said.

  ‘Migraine,’ Kate put in.

  ‘Exhausted,’ Margery said again.

  ‘Has there been any resolution with that boy?’

  ‘What d’you think, Mum? The school’s going onto special measuresnobody cares.’ She sighed. ‘I said I’d help put up the stalls.’

  ‘Well, off you gowe’re fine here,’ Beatrice said confidently.

  Flo started to cry, and Beatrice walked over to the window with her and watched Kate disappear up the street.

  ‘I suppose we should go and start to get the cakes ready for the stall,’ Beatrice said after a while, peering through the window. ‘They’ve got a lovely day for it.’

  Margery joined her. ‘Um,’ she agreed irritably.

  ‘I’m glad you’re here,’ Beatrice said suddenly. ‘There was something I wanted to talk to you about.’

  Margery waited, interested.

  ‘They’re going through it at the moment, aren’t they?’

  ‘Who?’

  Beatrice hesitated. ‘WellKate and Robert.’ Why was conversation with Margery like only being able to find reverse in a car backed up against a wall.

  Margery didn’t say anything.

  ‘What with the house and everything…the incident with RobertI think they’ve “done” their London stint, don’t you? It’s time for some fresh air and more metres-square of real estate for their money, or who knows what might happen…’ Beatrice finished ominously as a van towing the council’s recycling centre drove slowly past the window. It had been booked by Ros and was handing out information on composters as well as a limited number of hessian ‘Bags for Life’. Ros was part of a local campaign to make their postcode the first plastic-bag-free-zone in the UK.

  ‘East Leeke,’ Margery said. ‘There’s a house for sale in East Leeke that would be perfect for them.’

  Ignoring this, Beatrice said, ‘Okehampton School’s looking for a deputy head at the moment. I’m chair of governors there. Robert would be ideal…’

  Margery stared blankly at her, trying to grasp what she was saying. London was bad for Robertshe didn’t need Beatrice to tell her that. But at least while they were still in London, there was the possibility that, when they left, which was now looking more and more inevitablethey would move to East Leeke. If they moved to Okehampton, they’d never come to East Leeke, and Margery would die alone.

  Beatrice’s voice carried on. ‘D’you think there’s any way I could persuade him to apply? Or should I let Kate do that?’

  Margery remained silent, lost in her own thoughts. Fate threw things at you that were either fair or unfair. You reacted against them and got luckyor unlucky. It had never occurred to Margery to attempt to control fate; to activate it. Margery was going to die aloneand Beatrice wasn’t.

  Beatrice remained by the window holding Flo, who was now dropping off to sleep, waiting for Margery to respond to what she’d just said, while wondering if she’d even understoodwhether she wasn’t, after all, senile. ‘Margery…’

  Margery was staring straight past her, her eyes fixed on the house opposite. ‘She’s still therelook.’

  Beatrice followed her gaze. There was a woman in a Disneyland Paris T-shirt standing at an upstairs window, holding a sign: Pleese help 02081312263

  ‘She was there last time,’ Margery said.

  ‘Last time?’

  ‘Last time I was here. She was holding the sign then as well.’

  ‘What did you do?’

  Margery hesitated. ‘Nothing.’

  Beatrice swung round. ‘Nothing?’

  Margery shook her head.

  ‘Did you go over and knock? Have you tried ringing the number? Here.’ Beatrice passed Flo gently to Margery, found her bag and came back with her mobile.

  The woman remained motionless in the upstairs window of No. 21 as Beatrice stood in the downstairs window of No. 22 and rang the number.

  ‘Don’t,’ Margery said suddenly. ‘It might be a trap.’

  ‘What sort of trap? The woman clearly needs help…’ Beatrice broke off. ‘It’s ringing.’

  ‘Kate says it’s a brothel.’

  Beatrice stared at her. ‘Hello? Hello, I’m phoning from Prendergast Road in London. Hello? A woman gave us this number. From Londonyes. It doesn’t matter who I ama woman gave us this number. I think she needs help. I don’t knowit’s difficult to tell. She’s got dark hair and…Prendergast Road. She’s inside a house on Prendergast Road. Waitthere may be more than onewe’re in south London; southeast London, and…’ Beatrice stared at her phone. ‘They rang off.’

  ‘Who were they?’

  ‘No ideaforeign. Sounded Eastern European, maybe Russian. I don’t know.’ Beatrice looked up at the woman again. ‘She’s pregnant. Look at the line of her T-shirt.’

  Margery was just about to look when the silver BMW pulled up on the pavement opposite and the woman disappeared from the upstairs window. The same man and woman as before got out.

  ‘Nice car,’ Margery said pointedly, watching it pull up outside the houseas though the neighbours’ BMW somehow reflected well on Robert.

  Beatrice stared at her. It was difficult to know how to respond to these irrelevant and misjudged comments Margery made, other than to put them down to something medical. ‘I’m going over there,’ she said.

  ‘You can’t.’ Margery was horrified. ‘You can’t,’ she said again, but by then Beatrice was at the front door and the next minute Margery was watching her cross the road and start talking to the Lithuanian woman.

  They talked for about two minutes. The Lithuanian was nodding and smiling. Then Beatrice made her way back over to No. 22 as the man and woman disappeared inside No. 21.

  ‘She said the girl’s a cousin of hers. Her English wasn’t great, but she seemed to insinuate the girl was simple in the hea
d or something.’

  ‘Oh,’ Margery said, relieved.

  ‘I didn’t like her,’ Beatrice announced. ‘And I didn’t believe her either. Did you notice the bag she was carrying? There was a ph indicator inside and swabs for taking blood tests.’ Beatrice paused. ‘Those are the sorts of things a midwife paying a house visit would carry.’

  ‘A midwife?’ Margery said in disbelief. ‘I had her down as a Lithuanian prostitutealthough she could probably pass as an air hostess. The landlord at the Fox and Hounds has a girlfriend who looks just like herand she’s Lithuanian.’

  Beatrice turned to her. ‘Margery…’

  Margery felt herself start to go dizzy as small black sunspots exploded in front of her eyes. ‘I think I’m going to have a stroke.’

  Chapter 45

  Upstairs in No. 236, Casper was steering his remote control Raptor vehicle backwards and forwards across the floor under the bed while Miles tried to get dressed. Miles was a man who not only felt comfortable wearing a suit; he actually preferred wearing a suit to anything else. Monday to Friday, Miles got dressed in under ten minutes while at the weekend he came down to breakfast in the old three-quarter-length swimming trunks and oversized T-shirt he wore to bedand was often still wandering around in them at midday. He found a safety net of sorts in sourcing his entire ‘casual’ wardrobe from one labelit was Harriet who set him on this trackand for a lot of years, his steadfast casual label had been Hackett. But then a few weeks ago, while visiting a development of new-builds that Lennox Thompson were selling, he’d noticed that most of the builders on the site were wearing Hackett. There had been a man laying bricks in the exact same outfit he’d barbecued monkfish kebabs in the Sunday before.

  So now he was in a post-Hackett, pre-anything-else casualwear limbo land. Sighing, he got slowly dressed in an old pair of jeans to the continual electronic snarl of Casper’s Raptor.

  ‘Be careful on the walls there, Cas,’ he said, as the back-flipping Raptor left two faint tyre tracks just above the skirting board.