by Adele Parks
‘I got food poisoning last time I ate there.’
‘They don’t have a late licence.’
‘I’d like somewhere with a dance floor.’
‘The loos are filthy.’
‘How about we hire the upstairs of the Ship pub? You know, on Lottfield Road,’I suggest. ‘The food is decent and reasonably priced. There’s a small dance floor. We’d be able to let our hair down. We can buy our own drinks, so that personal budgets can be managed.’
I realize that I’ve come up with a decent idea when no one says a word. No doubt everyone is searching for an objection (more fun than searching for a solution, often as not) but they can’t uncover one.
‘I take that silence to be agreement,’says Mr Walker. ‘Good. Brilliant idea, Mrs Phillips.’
I feel extremely pleased to be praised by Mr Walker. This must date back to my being a girly swot, when I lived for the praise of my teachers. However, I can’t help feeling a little offended that Mr Walker called me Mrs Phillips. Not Rose. He calls Wendy, Wendy and Lyn, Lyn. But he maintains a formality with me. Does he think I’m some sort of geriatric and therefore I command the respect of a title? How infuriating.
We agree some action points regarding who should book the venue, hire the DJ and communicate with the parents and then the meeting draws to a close. Lyn and Lesley rush off, as they do Pilates on a Thursday night. Wendy Pickering says she needs to dash because she wants to get to Tesco’s. The other two mums are going to the cinema as they’ve got a late pass. They invite me along but I don’t want to take advantage of Daisy.
Mr Walker and I find ourselves left alone to wash cups and return the chairs to the classrooms we borrowed them from.
‘Good of you to stay behind and help, Mrs Phillips.’
‘No problem. I have a few minutes and many hands make light work.’I carefully replace the mugs in the staffroom cupboard. Despite a thorough wash they are all stained with years of tea drinking. They need to be soaked in Steradent.
‘You came up with some great suggestions at that meeting. There were moments I thought we’d still be debating the venue for the Christmas party until past the Lent term.’
I smile. ‘The same thought passed my mind.’
‘Thanks for backing me up on the school meals, too. I appreciate your support.’
‘No problem.’
‘You are always so much help, Mrs Phillips. If there is anything I can ever do for you in return, don’t hesitate to let me know.’
I look at the beaming young man. It’s past six and I’m surprised to note his chin is shadowed with whiskers. In this light he looks quite rugged. Noting this comes as a bit of a surprise, as the image I have of him is eternally boyish.
‘You could do something for me.’
‘Name it.’
‘You could stop calling me Mrs Phillips.’
‘But you call me Mr Walker, even though I’m always asking you to call me Craig.’He blushes. Poor man, it must be a curse to be a man that blushes, particularly when you’re faced with 250 kids every morning. Although a bit of colour suits him. It shows up his sparkly blue eyes to quite an advantage. I wonder what he looks like with a tan. I can’t remember. He must have had one last summer, I just never noticed.
‘OK, I’ll call you Craig, if you call me Rose.’
‘I’d love to. Great name. I’ve always liked it.’
‘Was it your mother’s?’I ask.
‘No.’Craig looks confused.
I laugh. ‘Sorry. I think I’m getting paranoid. Yesterday I was pulled over by the traffic police because one of my brake lights was broken. The younger policeman was so thoroughly polite and charming. He clearly took a shine to me. It struck me that I must have reminded him of his mum.’
‘He probably fancied you, Rose.’Now it’s my turn to blush. Craig notices and is mortified. ‘Sorry. I shouldn’t have said that. None of my business. I’m clearly mixing with Wendy Pickering too much.’He’s trying to joke but he’s still scarlet. ‘I just meant if a guy is nice to you it doesn’t necessarily mean that you remind him of his mother.’Craig turns away and starts to gather up the papers that are scattered on his desk. He knows that he’s been a little over-familiar and he’s nervous that he’s offended me.
‘Actually, I went on a date with a younger man recently.’I bravely offer this fact to let him know I’m not offended. We’re both adults after all. The school bell rang long ago, surely we can have a grown-up conversation after hours?
‘Really? Was it fun?’
‘Not especially. Kevin swore a lot and was rude to me. If I’d wanted that I could have gone cycling in rush hour.’
Craig laughs and I’m encouraged beyond my normal strict boundaries. ‘It was a blind date. Then I met an alcoholic through internet dating. It’s my friends’idea. They are worried about me.’
And so they should be. I seem to have lost my mind. What on earth made me tell Mr Walker – Craig – that? I don’t want him to think I’m the sort of mother who desperately trails the net looking for sex, like some porn addict.
‘I see.’He nods, and there’s something about him that suggests that I have not shocked him and that he really does understand. But how could he? He’s male and young. He’s just got himself a new girlfriend. It’s unlikely that his friends are desperate for him.
‘It appears that if there’s a man in his thirties who lives in London and is single, it’s for a very good reason. He’s too fond of a drink or he’s psychotic, boring, a loser, a loony or a combination of all of the above,’I announce.
‘Oh, right,’says Craig. Unaccountably he’s blushing again.
‘Still, in some ways it’s better than sitting in on my own.’
‘Quite.’
‘And I’ve discovered the comfort of strangers is rather liberating.’I hope this explains my verbal incontinence.
‘Really.’
‘I’d better get going; my sister’s babysitting the boys.’
‘Yes, yes, I mustn’t keep you. It’s been nice talking to you, Rose.’
I smile and leave the headmaster’s office. Over the years I’ve visited various headmasters’offices to be awarded gold stars and merits, which was always a thrill, but I’ve never left feeling quite as spectacular as I do this evening.
Peculiar.
24
Monday 9 October
Rose
‘Where are you going?’Henry is standing in the doorway of my bedroom. Notably he’s still not wearing his pyjamas, even though bathtime was over forty minutes ago and I’ve repeated my request that he gets into his pyjamas about a dozen times. He is dressed in an assortment of costumes including Woody’s boots (the Sheriff, rather than the film director), Buzz’s trousers, a policeman’s jacket, a builder’s tabard and, finally, Darth Vader’s mask, which is propped at a jaunty angle on top of his head. He looks like a contender for a Village People tribute band.
Although the question is seemingly innocent enough, I know it’s full of resentment and simmering anger so I choose to go on the attack, instead of responding directly.
‘Why aren’t you in your pyjamas? It’s getting late.’
In turn, Henry chooses to ignore my question and follows his own line of enquiry. I’ve noticed that our family can communicate for hours like this.
‘Are you going out again?’He sounds like my father and he’s rolling his eyes with a frightening similarity of manner. ‘You’re always out.’He’s hanging on to the door handle with his full weight. I tell him not to loll and consider my defence.
It isn’t true that I’m always out and yet, undoubtedly, my social life has been a veritable whirl since I started my mechanics course. I have been ‘out’on seven occasions in twenty days. Previous to that, on average, I’d manage seven trips out approximately every two and a half years. I’ve attended the mechanics course three times, twice staying late to have a coffee with Susanne and Helen, I’ve been ‘out’to a Parents’Association meeting, twice, and I’ve
been on two dates. Tonight is my third date. I’m due to meet Ian. Ian was the only one of the eighteen responses to my internet profile that I was prepared to take seriously. Approximately sixteen of them contacted me to say ‘Get a life,’although not always in such polite terms, one suggested I needed sex (ideally with him and specifically on Wednesday afternoons between two and three o’clock), and the final response was from Ian, who said he also has an interest in antiques.
Yes, this weekend I took the plunge and posted my own profile on to that webpage Connie found. What was it called? www.youtoocanfindloveifyoulookhardenough.com, or something like that. Connie insisted that it was the next logical step after responding to Chris’s profile. Daisy pointed out that I had in fact found the date with Chris rather helpful. Luke reasoned that I would be in control if I placed a profile. Simon mumbled that I didn’t have to answer any of them anyhow. It was Simon’s argument that swung it for me.
Writing the profile was very difficult. Chris had told me that he’d found it tricky to reduce his life to a couple of paragraphs, but my problem was the opposite. I struggled to fill more than a couple of lines. Of course, it turned into a group effort so my dignity wasn’t spared.
‘I think you could pass for thirty-five which is practically early thirties so you should probably tick the 25–30-year-old box,’said Connie, slicing more than a decade of my life away in one untruthful click.
Daisy bristled. ‘I think she should tell the truth. What sort of relationship can she have with anyone if it starts off with a deception?’
‘There won’t be any relationship if she admits to pushing forty,’muttered Connie ominously. ‘At least not with a sexy man. She said she didn’t want to be giving bed baths and pushing wheelchairs around Bournemouth, didn’t she?’
‘She did. Can you just remember I’m here?’I pointed out. ‘Look, I don’t mind knocking a couple of years off my age if it helps,’I said, surprising myself and the others.
‘You’ll only attract shallow men,’warned Daisy. I don’t believe there is any other kind so I’m not perturbed.
‘OK, so what do you want to say about yourself?’asked Con. Bitter and twisted from Holland Park is accurate, but not, I fear, what she was after. I stayed silent. ‘OK then, what are you looking for in your ideal man?’
‘I don’t want a womanizer.’
‘They are unlikely to admit to that,’Luke pointed out.
‘I don’t want a drinker, or a smoker or an actor.’Connie started to type. ‘I don’t want him to have too much baggage – no children or divorces. I don’t want any ambivalence when it comes to sexuality. I so don’t want to be the lifebuoy for a closet homosexual who can’t tell his parents the score.’
‘You watch too much TV,’said Daisy.
‘I don’t want anyone with food allergies, it’s boring. I don’t want anyone who still lives at home. I don’t –’
‘Are you sure a list of “don’t wants” is the best way to go about this?’asked Luke.
‘All the men’s profiles were quite specific about what they didn’t want,’I pointed out. ‘I don’t want anyone who lives miles away; I can’t bear long-distance relationships. I don’t –’
Simon interrupted. ‘Isn’t this supposed to be about you putting your personality forward?’
‘She is putting her personality forward,’said Daisy glumly. ‘Why don’t you just cut to the chase and write, “intolerant, judgemental thirty-something looking for an unrealistic ideal”?’
‘That is so nasty,’I countered with little passion or vehemence, because she was spot on and I don’t tend to argue when I agree with a point. I leave that up to men.
Simon, Connie and Luke looked a little startled, no doubt wondering if a row was about to kick off, but Daisy is my sister and we’ve said much worse to one another over the years. Believe it or not, I know she means well.
‘Perhaps it would help if we read some of the other female profiles, to give us an idea of the competition,’suggested Connie.
It sounded like a good idea but, oh God, the women’s profiles were heartbreaking. Unlike the men, who had largely gone down the overly demanding, offensively brash and boastful route, the women’s profiles were self-deprecating, touching, desperate. The women had all included a photo. We are intelligent enough to know that no man will take a punt on a blind profile. Besides, it’s better they know about the extra couple of pounds or the frizzy hair up front, rather than have to see the disappointment in their face if it gets as far as a date. They were all sorts of shapes and sizes. Many of the women were actively pretty; all were attractive, more attractive than the men on the site. The average age was thirty-two. This didn’t bother me too much because I felt sure lots of the women were being forced into playing the numbers game; most looked as though they had once danced to Nick Kershaw and Paul Young. My guess was that they were on average four years older than they admitted to. Without exception each woman said she was cheerful and looking for honesty. Their incessant hunt for this quality suggested it was rarer than black diamonds and harder to mine.
There appeared to be two different types. Nervous, shy women who looked as though they wouldn’t say boo to a goose (these women professed to be outgoing and humorous) and women who tried too hard – they struck semi-provocative poses or madcap I’m-a-wacky-girl poses (these women professed to be intelligent and sincere). None of the women seemed confident enough to say what they really were. Irrespective of the photo style all women claimed to be happy, which seemed unlikely to me.
The five of us silently read the profiles.
‘You don’t have to do it if you don’t want to, Rose,’said Connie. She was clearly uncomfortable grouping me in with their hopeful but hopeless cases. Articulating what we all know – that I’m just like them – was extremely painful.
‘I want to do it,’I said. And suddenly I was sure I did want to post up a profile.
‘You do?’asked Daisy, not bothering to hide her disbelief.
‘Yes.’I didn’t elaborate.
It was not that I was suddenly and miraculously desperately interested in attracting a man through this site (or indeed by any means, if push came to shove), but I had an overwhelming urge to show solidarity with these women. These brave and optimistic, wonderful, spirited women who still believed in honesty and still hunted for love deserved my support. I decided to put an absolutely truthful account of myself on the website and see what happened. Of course, I realized that an absolutely truthful account of myself was unlikely to attract anyone at all, but I would be doing the other women a favour. Even the weepy-looking lady from Wiltshire – who rather misguidedly described herself as ‘funny, decent and good’– looked like a sparkly offer by comparison.
‘Why are you always leaving us?’asks Henry. As inaccurate and unfair as this observation is, it stings.
I crouch down next to him and steal a quick kiss. Open affection from the boys is now limited. They are growing up and away whether I like it or not. I have to accept it.
‘Darling, Mummy hardly ever goes out. Practically never in seven years, that’s why it seems as though I’m out a lot recently, but when you compare it with how often you are out at sports clubs or on play dates, it’s really not so often.’
I return to my seat at my dressing-table wondering how much make-up to apply. If I choose to go on the date wearing just lipstick will it give the impression that I’m über-confident or just lazy and lacking in self-respect? That’s the horror of dating – nothing is simple, everything has meaning and significance, even down to how much lipstick I wear. I carefully apply a pale lipstick and mascara. I’ll do. I turn to Henry, hoping he’ll tell me I look pretty, as he sometimes does. He glares at me, still angry that I’m about to abandon him.
I hold my arms wide open to invite Henry in for a cuddle. He hesitates for a moment and then capitulates and throws his little body at me. The idea is for me to comfort him, but as he nuzzles into my shoulder I am calmed and reassured by the fe
el of his breath on my neck. I wonder whether I should bother with this date at all. Is it worth disrupting the boys? Is it worth hauling Daisy over from north London to babysit? Is it worth the effort of finding unladdered hosiery? Surely I could date in another ten years or so, when the boys are grown. That way I’d catch the freshly widowed market, a very respectable market to be in, much better than the tired divorcee market.
‘Don’t go,’whispers Henry. ‘I’ll miss you.’
‘But Auntie Daisy is coming to look after you.’
‘I know, but I want you to look after me.’
I remember this scenario from over five years ago when I first attempted to date. The twins were less articulate in those days but they were able to clearly communicate their desire to have me around twenty-four/seven by screaming at full throttle whenever I left them with a sitter. If I was ever foolish enough to try to make a dash for the door they would cling to my skirt hem like leeches. They were so all-consuming and so needy I began to concede the battle before it was even fought, cancelling arrangements almost the minute I made them, rather than upset the boys by leaving them. The truth was I enjoyed being needed. And with Peter having made it so damn transparent that I was the last thing on earth he needed, I found the boys’clingy ways rather delightful. But a child is for life and not just for Christmas.
‘OK, sweetheart. Mummy will stay in with you and Sebastian. Don’t worry,’I say, finally.
‘Really?’Henry instantly brightens. ‘And can we watch Pop TV, pleeeese?’
I nod and sigh and pick up the phone. Ian sounds mildly disappointed when I explain I have babysitting problems. He mentions that he’s been looking forward to showing me his antique pen nibs and old Rupert Bear annuals. I cannot bear Daisy’s anger or irritation so I tell her that Ian cancelled. Her disappointment is acute, and while the boys and I have a very pleasant evening playing battleships and building Meccano models I can’t help but share some of her regret.
