by Judy Astley
‘Look in there, lovely grub!’ Sue whispered loudly, prodding Jenny in the back as they went towards the murmur of voices in the lemon-and-white-stippled sitting-room. Plates of teeny smoked salmon sandwich wheels, cheesy scones and other savoury bits and pieces sat, elaborately garnished and forbiddingly clingfilmed, on Carol’s best lace tablecloth, hovered over longingly by a collection of Close residents, clutching schooners of sherry. Then Jenny caught sight of the policeman, her second that day, sitting importantly on one of Carol’s mahogany carvers, and whispered back to Sue, ‘I think you’ll have to wait till the floor show’s over; you’ll have to make do with a drink for now.’
‘No problem!’ said Sue, picking up the two fullest glasses of sherry from the silver tray.
Polly wasn’t sure if it was a knock on the door that she’d heard, so she assumed someone else would answer it and carried on watching the television. Eventually, lured by the sound of male voices in the kitchen, she crept up to listen at the door. It wasn’t her father, she realized, and it wasn’t just Ben talking to the cat. She slid in through the door and sat at the table, unnoticed by the gaggle of teenage boys gathered together round the kitchen scales. The boys were very big, two were wearing expensive puffa jackets and another, who looked slightly familiar in a pulled-down baseball cap, had a biker’s leather jacket with patches sewn on it. Ben was looking pale and nervous, not like when he was with his usual mates.
‘What are you doing? Is it homework? What are you weighing?’ Polly asked all her questions at once, before they could throw her out.
‘What’s she doing here? You said there wouldn’t be anyone . . .’ a gingery boy was staring coldly down at Polly.
She stared back, and gave him her best smile. ‘I’m Polly. I live here,’ she said. ‘What are you doing? It looks like you’re weighing out Oxo cubes. Is it homework? Have you got Home Economics?’
‘Polly, get out, would you? Please?’ Ben looked at her with an unusual amount of appeal in his voice.
‘Well, I was just thinking about making some hot chocolate . . .’ she said slowly, enjoying being infuriating. The audience of boys, menacing though their expressions were, didn’t bother her. She was on home ground, bugging her brother and liking it. There might be something in it for her.
Ben broke away from the group, got hold of her wrist and marched her to the door. ‘Just this once Polly, please will you do as I ask?’ he said.
‘And what if I do? What do I get?’ she smiled confidently up at him.
Ben sighed, but knew the solution. ‘If you look under my pillow, there’s last month’s Playboy. You can go up and borrow it if you like. And then I won’t tell the parents if you don’t tell the parents, OK? Deal?’
‘OK, deal!’ Polly squeaked, making for the stairs. With any luck he’d forget about the magazine and she could take it to school and show Harriet. Together they could try to make sense of the letters page, and try to find out more about oral sex. Harriet had said she was sure there was more to it than just talking. Polly, magazine in hand, darted into her room, grabbed her hand mirror and took off her knickers. While Ben, in the kitchen, bulk-bought enough cannabis to supply the lower sixth for a month, Polly lay happily among the soft toys on her bed comparing her fanny with that of the Playmate of the month, wondering if her own pudenda would ever be so glamorously photographed.
Jenny sat on Carol’s squeaky beige leather sofa, listening to the police constable and trying to stay awake. The room was hot, crammed with Close residents, and Jenny wished there had been something more thirst-quenching than sherry to drink. In the yellow-and-white room, on the pastry-coloured sofa, Jenny was beginning to get the queasy feeling that she was inside a lemon meringue pie, baking stickily. The high turnout of residents was a surprise. Even Fiona Pemberton, whose evenings were usually filled with parents’ meetings, school fund-raising sessions and curriculum seminars, had turned up. Jenny didn’t much like meeting Fiona socially. At the school they were always Mrs Collins and Mrs Pemberton to each other. It probably didn’t do, Jenny assumed, for the headmistress to be seen to be on first-name terms with mere parents, not at a school as fiercely competitive as Polly’s and Daisy’s anyway. So on home territory, Jenny tended to wait, schoolgirl-like, till she had been addressed, still half formally, as ‘Jennifer’ and take her cue from there. She had always thought that, by the time she got to forty, she would no longer have that feeling that there was homework she’d forgotten to do, nor would she be intimidated by headmistresses, but she now realized it would probably never happen, at least not while she had children of her own being educated.
The policeman spoke slowly and carefully, repeating points about window locks and car alarms as if he wasn’t sure they were capable of taking in all the information. Jenny, who didn’t particularly want to meet the eye of the law again that day, stared at the figured cream carpet and was amazed to hear Sue’s voice breaking in with a question.
‘All this advice about security locks and burglar alarms,’ she said. ‘Are the police generally of the opinion that if we choose not to have these things, then we have only ourselves to blame for a break-in? Would it be what you’d call “contributory negligence”?’
Jenny stared across at Sue, who had her head tilted at an interested angle, and a smile of great charm aimed like a crossbow at the policeman. Jenny took a closer look at him. He was undoubtedly attractive, and Sue was twice-divorced, currently alone with her two teenage boys, and constantly prowling. Jenny paid close attention to his reply, interested for Sue’s sake.
‘No of course not,’ the constable said, meeting Sue’s smile with an equally charming one of his own. ‘But our opinion is that there are precautions the householder can take, if he or she so chooses, and it’s my job to point these out. Some of them are even free – for example, anyone can make sure they close their curtains when rooms are lit. There could be a potential felon hanging around outside: you think you see a bloke walking his dog a bit slowly, and what you’re really looking at is some thief pricing up the paintings on the walls.’
There was a distinct shuffling in the room. Most of the residents had such elaborate and showy arrangements of window drapery, flounced, fringed and swagged-and-tailed curtains, arranged to fall in artistic pools of excess fabric on the floor, with bowed and rosetted tie-backs, that they found it tedious to close their curtains, and tended to leave their windows prettily exposed day or night. It hadn’t seemed to matter, with the Close having no casual passers-by.
‘Shall we have a little break now, and then more questions later perhaps?’ Carol suggested firmly, already reaching across and tearing the first strip of clingfilm from the spinach and ricotta filo rolls. ‘And I’m sure we could all manage another drink . . .’
‘I’m surprised she wasn’t trampled in the rush,’ Jenny said to Sue as they collected plates full of Carol’s dainty delicacies.
‘Hmm . . .’ Sue replied vaguely, gazing past Jenny across to where the young constable was being cross-examined by Fiona Pemberton.
The rest of the meeting passed briskly. Leaflets and window-stickers were issued, and Paul Mathieson was voted the Close co-ordinator. He volunteered to take charge of the ‘Neighbourhood Watch’ boards that had to be fixed to a few lampposts and get in a couple of handymen to put them up.
Jenny, relieved to be out in the fresh air but dreading going home alone to face Alan and his adultery, turned to Sue. ‘Coming back with me for a drink? A proper one this time?’
But Sue had a look of girlish anticipation about her, and a big, pleased grin. ‘Not just now, thanks, I’m being taken in for questioning!’ she said, indicating the constable unlocking his Metro. ‘Come to the tennis club tomorrow morning for coffee and I’ll tell you what it’s like being grabbed by the fuzz!’ Sue winked lasciviously, and left Jenny to accompany the infuriatingly slow and mildly tipsy old Mrs Fingell to her front gate.
Alan’s grey BMW was parked out in the road instead of in the driveway. Another
quick getaway in the morning, Jenny assumed, wondering what and who he was really getting away to and from. Slowly she unlocked the front door, reluctant to confront a relationship that, once the accusing and excusing was done, would now be shifted, changed for ever. But there, in the warm hallway, Alan was coming towards her, arms out and innocently welcoming. He looked very big, almost filling the space between the stairs and the wall. All that scrumptious food he’s always cooking, she thought, he’s getting too bulky to be a good accountant. Clients with money problems want to see someone lean and mean.
‘You look tired, Pudding. Come and have a drink,’ he said, pulling her towards his cosy, familiar body. Impossible to imagine him calling someone ‘Darling’. Jenny relaxed against him, automatically. Alan smelt of home, of family. Whatever would she say to him? And when? ‘I’m afraid there’s a spot of bad news,’ he said. Jenny stiffened, wondering if he was going to get in first. Tell her he had just packed a suitcase and that the quick getaway would be for ever, not just the duration of the next audit. She looked up at him coldly, waiting. He laughed, maddeningly. ‘Hey it’s not that bad! Mrs McKinley phoned. She says she’s terribly sorry, but the twins are giving up the flute lessons. They’ve decided to have a go at the violin. Pity, losing two pupils in one go like that.’
Jenny sighed, and headed for the wine bottle on top of the fridge. ‘I’ve now lost four in a month,’ she said glumly. ‘I’ll have to advertise.’
‘What about Fiona? Why don’t you ask if she needs another music teacher? Schools are usually pretty desperate.’
Jenny fidgeted around by the sink, still unwilling to look at him properly. ‘Who’s been weighing stuff?’ she asked, noticing that the scales were drying on the draining board. ‘Have you or the children been cooking?’
‘Well, I had some pasta with the rest of your tomato sauce. It wasn’t bad, in fact it was pretty delicious. Did you get those new season fresh plum tomatoes I told you they’d just got in at the Italian deli?’
Jenny smiled at him, indulgent of his hobby. ‘No, of course I didn’t! We don’t all have time to stand around peeling and deseeding tomatoes! I opened a tin of them like most people do!’ Good thing, she thought, as she reassembled the weighing machine, that he hadn’t found the empty Sainsbury’s pasta sauce jar guiltily hidden away at the bottom of the rubbish bin. It had added a certain piquancy to her own recipe. She started nervously wiping the draining board.
‘Why don’t you stop fussing and come and sit down?’ Alan leaned back in his chair and patted the seat next to him. ‘I think we’ve got something else to talk about.’
Jenny felt her stomach tighten again, churning Carol Mathieson’s filo rolls and lukewarm sherry. He looked so comfortable, so guilt-free sitting there, a bit like an over-large elf in his baggy old sweater and with his hair curling at the ends. Biggles purred contentedly on his lap. If he doesn’t tell me this time, Jenny promised herself, I’m not going to mention it, not ever. She was surprised by her decision that was on the side of cowardice. It was also, though, on the side of maintaining domestic survival, the security of her family. The question of whether or not the family collapsed into miserable fragments could be all down to her, or could depend on what Alan said next. She sat down next to him, picked at the white azalea plant on the table in front of her and took a long sip of wine while she waited to see if her marriage was about to come to an end.
‘Daisy told me what happened,’ Alan said.
The moment passed, and Jenny joined in the discussion about Daisy’s arrest with something like relief. Perhaps, if she said nothing, it would all just go away, like she always thought with the first throat-rasping symptoms of a cold. In either case, it would be as well to buy a large box of tissues.
Chapter Three
‘Well, if he’s up to anything there must be some sort of clue,’ Sue remarked the next morning. ‘Are you two still doing it? Or is he avoiding sex? Does he suggest things like why don’t you ever wear purple tasselled knickers or gold stiletto heels? He wouldn’t be just the same as usual; you’d just know. I always did.’ Recalling the past deceits of men, Sue allowed a flash of gloom to cross her face, and then took a packet of cigarettes from her bag. ‘Let’s go and sit on the balcony,’ she said, tugging at Jenny’s shirt. ‘I’m dying for a cig.’
The two women took their coffee out onto the tennis club balcony, and sat looking down at the courts, where women enjoying off-peak membership and crèche facilities were firming their bodies and their backhands for the approaching spring.
‘Sorry, I know it’s a bit cold, but I hate it in there,’ Sue said, lighting her cigarette. ‘They’re all blonde. When I first joined I thought it was a condition of membership. No offence,’ she added, with a quick look at Jenny’s hair.
‘That’s OK,’ said Jenny, grinning. ‘I’m only hanging on to the blondeness by what’s left of my fingernails these days. I’ve just progressed to that stuff that “Covers All Grey”. And no, honestly, there’s nothing I’ve noticed about Alan that’s different. He’s just the same, just the usual, comfortable, very much husband-type person. I feel disloyal,’ she added guiltily. ‘I shouldn’t be talking to you about him like this. I’d hate it if he did the same about me.’
‘Probably does,’ Sue said, inhaling happily. ‘We’ve all got to talk to somebody, otherwise we’d all end up in therapy, like in America. I’m going to tell you about what I did with Constable Barry last night, parked up the lane by the end of the Common, and I’m not going to feel guilty in the least. After all, he’s probably in the canteen right this minute telling everyone round the formica table that the suspect proceeded in a southerly direction till her mouth made contact with the victim’s extended truncheon . . .’
‘Sue you didn’t! In a police car?’ Jenny felt a vicarious thrill. Sue seemed to have the sex-life of a free-ranging teenager. Jenny realized it was years since she had had sex anywhere but in a comfortable bed, and it felt like another lifetime since she’d had it with someone other than Alan. Perhaps that was what he had realized too . . .
‘Well why not? There’s nobody at home who wants it. Besides, he bought me three large ones down at the White Swan, and a prawn sandwich. It was the least I could do.’
‘You make it sound very business-like, bordering on prostitution!’ Jenny said.
Sue laughed. ‘Of course it is! Most sex is prostitution, isn’t it? One or the other partner repaying a favour. Perhaps especially the cosy husband and wife sort. Even the producer of Woman’s Hour thinks that’s what marriage is. On past experience I think she’s probably right.’
Jenny changed tack slightly. ‘Are you sure you should? I mean, is it safe these days?’ she asked quietly as the waitress hovered about, dealing with their coffee cups.
‘What, AIDS, do you mean? You can use a condom for a blow-job too, you know, though I think it only matters if your gums bleed a lot. Anyway I never did like the taste.’ Sue raised her voice slightly for the benefit of the waitress who had flicked her hair behind her ears in order to listen better as she wiped the next table.
Jenny giggled and could feel herself blushing. ‘Long time since I did that in the back of a car,’ she said with a slight sigh.
‘Are you sure it’s not a long time since you did “that” at all?’ Sue asked her, with an intensely questioning look. ‘That might be part of the problem . . .’
‘I suppose sex is a bit samey, as it were. But then if you always do it with the same person, and you do more or less the same sort of thing, in the same bed, it’s bound to be, isn’t it?’
‘Well that’s probably where the purple tasselled knickers come in,’ said Sue. ‘Never mind him being at it with someone else, perhaps that’s what you need – a little of who you fancy.’
‘But I don’t fancy, that’s the thing.’ Jenny gathered her bag and her jacket together. ‘I used to feel quite smug about that, you know. I used to think, oh well I did all that stuff, putting it about a bit too much before I got
married, well, we all did then, it was that time, few health worries, all that. I used to reason that it was better that way round, than wondering later what I’d been missing. Imagine being a virgin when you married. You’d always want to know . . . No I think my days of doing it in cars are well and truly over. Just something to read about in old diaries!’
‘You don’t know what you’re missing!’
‘But that’s just it, Sue, I do!’
Ben, Luke and Oliver were taking a cigarette-break during a free study period. They sloped along the path behind the tennis club and sprawled on their favourite bench under the trees, overlooking the courts. Ben realized it was becoming quite a ritual, just checking to see if Carol Mathieson, with her unexpectedly schoolgirlish legs, was out there playing. Oliver didn’t usually come with them. A bit adolescent for him, sneaking out of school to leer at half-dressed housewives. He didn’t look as if he needed to, Ben thought. Oliver had looked 35 since early puberty, his solid, hairy, rugger-playing body overnight resembling that of a prosperous lawyer somewhere in the prime of life. He never had trouble being served in pubs, and on Mondays he bragged about girls from the High School who couldn’t get enough. In the showers after games he so intimidated the others by his swarthy manliness that Ben, for one, felt no girl at a party would ever be pleading with him for anything more than a light for her cigarette.
