THE HUSBAND HUNTERS

by LUCY LAING

  ‘I can’t believe this is finally it,’ she whispered. I squeezed her hand.

  ‘It’s not too late to change your mind,’ I said, quickly. Rach rolled her eyes at me.

  ‘Bee, I can’t wait to be a mum,’ she said. ‘It’s what I’ve always wanted.’

  The doctor came over and started to rummage under Rach’s gown. ‘OK, here we go,’ he said.

  I felt even queasier and stood crossing my legs. I didn’t even like having a smear test done. I imagined all the little George Clooney-like sperm making their bid for freedom, swimming towards Rach’s womb. It was a weird thought. Rach gripped my hand a bit tighter.

  ‘Nearly done,’ said the doctor looking up, with a smile. ‘Almost there.’

  A few seconds later he straightened up. The syringe in his hand was empty. It was all over. I looked down at Rach. She could be getting pregnant right now, I thought, lying alone on an operating table, and not a post-coital cigarette in sight. She has completely missed out on the fun bit, I thought sadly, as Rach got up and straightened her gown.

  Half an hour later, we walked out of the clinic.

  ‘Do you feel any different?’ I demanded, as we crunched down the gravel drive. ‘Do you feel pregnant?’

  ‘Of course not,’ said Rach. ‘I feel excited, but nervous too, in case it hasn’t worked.’

  ‘You’d better keep to those ten commandments if you are pregnant,’ I said sternly as we battled through the traffic towards home.

  ‘Oh, Bee, of course, I will,’ she said, laughing. ‘Having a baby is going to change my life, there’s no doubt about that, but my friends will always be important to me, especially you.’ She reached over and squeezed my hand. A selfish part of me hoped it hadn’t worked - that all the little George Clooneys would have suddenly forgotten how to swim - but I knew Rach would be devastated.

  I sat at work the following morning, wondering how soon Rach would find out if she was pregnant. I knew it couldn’t be possible, but I jumped every time the phone rang, imagining that it was her with some news.

  ‘What's up?’ said Nick, perching on my desk. ‘You look really glum.’ I told him about Rach having her insemination yesterday.

  ‘Aren’t you happy for her, then?’ asked Nick.

  ‘I am, but I know it’s going to change everything,’ I said, mournfully. ‘It’s what she wants, and I’ve not seen her as happy for ages, but it will be like two’s company, three’s a crowd.’

  Then I told him about Soph, the traitor – and I couldn’t believe it – Nick was completely on Soph’s side.

  ‘There was no hope for you and Paul,’ he pointed out to me. ‘Paul had already decided he was going to stand you up, before he met Soph at the reunion.’

  I didn’t really need to hear this from Nick. I already felt about an inch high due to Paul standing me up, I didn’t need to feel any smaller.

  ‘Okay, it was a bit childish of him to do that because of what happened last time, and realistically he should have given it a fair shot,’ he added, ‘but he didn’t, and you need to get over it. And if he and Soph have hit it off, then you should be pleased for them.’

  That was the annoying thing about men. Their world was so black and white - there were no grey areas in the middle, full of ‘what-ifs’, and ‘perhaps’ and ‘maybes’. It was easy for him to say forgive Soph, but in my book, she had committed a hideous crime, and there was no going back.

  I looked at Nick. His hair was particularly wild today - I was just itching to put some wax into it and give it a bit of style. And he was wearing a particularly hideous, blue jumper with grey swirls on it. I made a mental note to cross him off Jen’s list. I couldn’t inflict that on the poor girl.

  ‘Have you made a note of the photo shoot in a fortnight’s time?’ Nick asked, looking at his diary. Maria had asked me yesterday to go on a photo shoot at a local National Trust property with Nick, as his usual photography assistant was away on holiday.

  I liked going on picture shoots, but not with Nick, as he always bossily ordered me around, as if I were his dogs body. I liked his company in the office, but to work with on a shoot, he was awful. He was good, and got the job done, but not before he’d bitten my head off a trillion times.

  ‘Yes, but if you start ordering me about this time – I’m off, and I don’t care what Maria says,’ I said, firmly. ‘I’m not some little servant girl that you can boss about and throw your weight around with.’

  ‘Ooh, I love it when you get all firm with me,’ said Nick, laughing. He got off my desk and shut his diary.

  ‘I thought your little bit of student fluff came to watch your picture shoots,’ I said cattily. ‘Won’t school let her out for this one?’

  ‘Meow,’ said Nick, sharpening his claws on an imaginary bit of wood. ‘No, she’s on a full day course that day. She doesn’t come with me all the time anyway – only when she hasn’t got lessons.’

  ‘Can’t keep away from you,’ I said tartly.

  ‘Obviously not - I am irresistible after all,’ teased Nick.

  ‘Oh, I find you very resistible,’ I assured him, turning back to my computer.

  ‘There was one thing I meant to ask you,’ said Nick, coming back to sit on my desk again. I sighed and turned round.

  ‘What now?’ I said. ‘Some of us do have work to get on with you know. And as irresistible as you are, I really need to crack on.’

  ‘What was that monster of a thing that rolled out of your handbag the other day with a load of pins stuck into it?’

  I had thought Nick had forgotten about that. I might have known that he wouldn’t let it go.

  ‘For one horrible moment, I thought it was a voodoo doll or something,’ said Nick, laughing.

  ‘Actually it was, but it wasn’t mine,’ I added quickly, in case Nick had some big -headed thought that I’d made a voodoo doll of Clare for some reason. ‘It was Kaz who fancied a guy at work, but he had a girlfriend.’

  ‘So she made an effigy and stuck pins in it?’ said Nick, starting to laugh. ‘Is there no limit to the depths that you girls will stoop to? What happened to the poor girl? – I’m surprised she is still alive considering the amount of pins that were stuck in that thing.’

  I saw Nick look at my open handbag. In a split second I tried to reach across and grab it but he was too quick for me. He pulled the doll out. He turned it over in his hands, whistling through his teeth at the venom, which had been inflicted on poor Caroline.

  ‘Whoever she is, she doesn’t look much of a catch,’ he said, and I had to agree with him. Judging by the doll, Caroline wouldn’t win any beauty contests. It had one arm shorter than the other, the left eye was pointing out at an angle and was lower than the right, and the body was far longer than it should be, with two short stumps for the legs.

  ‘I don’t think it is a particularly lifelike version,’ I pointed out, although Kaz did say that Caroline did have one lazy eye, so that bit was right.

  ‘Well, she’s obviously as tough as old boots,’ said Nick, with a laugh, chucking the doll back in my handbag. He picked up his camera and headed for the door. ‘Do you fancy coming round for dinner? You kind of cooked for me that time, so I want to return the favour, although I can’t promise anything as appetising as that duck.’

  ‘Okay,’ I said, quite enjoying the thought of someone else cooking for me, ‘When?’

  ‘Saturday night?’ he said, ‘and don’t forget to bring your fire extinguisher, just in case,’ he added over his shoulder.

  ***

  My phone rang the following afternoon. It was Rach’s mum.

  ‘Hi, Wendy, how are you?’ I asked. It was a bit odd, as Rach’s mum never spoke to me much. She hadn’t ever forgiven me for trying to ram a slug into Rach’s mouth all those years ago in the sandpit. Her voice was tight.

  ‘Bee, I need to speak with you. Can you come round after work?’

  At 6 p.m. I found myself knocking on Rach’s front door, not knowing quite what I was there for.
Wendy led me into the lounge. Rach was already sitting on the sofa, looking tearstained.

  ‘What’s happened?’ I asked her.

  ‘Rachel has just told us that she wants a baby and she has already been for artificial insemination,’ Wendy said, looking at me coldly. ‘We are completely shocked and don’t think it’s the best thing for Rachel. She has a career, for goodness sake, and no husband.’

  I didn’t realize that Rach hadn’t told her parents of her plans.

  ‘Mum, it has nothing to do with you,’ pleaded Rach. ‘It’s my life, and before the baby is born I’ll move out and get myself somewhere for us both. I want to do this.’

  ‘And why didn’t you stop her?’ said Wendy, rounding on me. ‘I thought the purpose of this club of yours was to find each other sensible husbands, not to fill your heads with nonsense like this.’ I tried to reason with her.

  ‘Wendy, the club hasn’t suggested to Rach that she has a baby. That was completely her decision. We are supporting her through it because it’s something that she wants to do.’

  ‘I can’t believe a daughter of mine is trying to get herself pregnant all on her own,’ screeched Wendy.

  ‘Rach is nearly 30 years old, Wendy,’ I reminded her. ‘She is a grown woman and can make her own decisions about her life. It would be nice if you could support her.’

  ‘I don’t agree with it,’ said Wendy, her lips in a thin, straight line. ‘In my day, you were shamed if you gave birth to a bastard – and that is what it’s going to be.’ She burst into tears and ran out of the room. I looked at Rach.

  ‘I didn’t know you hadn’t told them,’ I said to her, giving her a hug.

  ‘I put it off because I knew what Mum’s reaction would be – but she found a pregnancy test in my room and confronted me with it. I had to tell her the truth then. I’d been hoping to move out and get a flat before I told them what I was doing, but now it’s too late.’

  ‘Do you want to stay at mine until all this cools down?’ I said.

  ‘Yes, please,’ she said, gratefully, giving my hand a squeeze. ‘I’ll go upstairs and pack a bag.’

  A few minutes later, Rach came down the stairs carrying a holdall and we went outside to where my mini was parked.

  ‘I’m sure Mum will come round eventually,’ she said as we drove off. ‘It was a shock for her, that's all.’

  ‘Are you pregnant?’ I asked her, thinking of the pregnancy test that Wendy had found.

  ‘It’s too early to tell yet. I’d bought it to do in a few days’ time,’ said Rach.

  I had been dreading Saturday. Not because of going around to Nick’s for dinner. I was quite looking forward to that. No, it was because Rach had persuaded me to come with her to her cousin Alison’s house for the afternoon, to celebrate her son Ned’s third birthday party.

  ‘C’mon, it will be good fun,’ persuaded Rach. In the end I said yes. I didn’t want to let Rach down, but ‘fun’ was not how I would describe the thought of a three-year-old child’s birthday party, with thirty little monsters all off their heads on E numbers. Picking the pins out of Kazza’s voodoo doll and sticking them in my eyeballs, seemed more appealing.

  Rach and I arrived at the house at 3 p.m. and the party was already in full swing. It was full of predatory mums who were each convinced that their offspring was the cleverest child ever to be born in Britain.

  ‘Amelia is already learning her alphabet and she’s only twelve months old,’ one mum gushed.

  ‘Well, Henry is already potty training himself at 18 months, which is unbelievably advanced,’ the other mum shot back.

  I groaned inwardly. Through the glass patio there was a scene of complete bedlam in the garden. Ten little bodies were mushed together in a bouncy castle erected for the occasion, bouncing off each other and screaming. The rest were running wild over Alison’s flower beds, climbing the wrong way up the slide, and two boys were pulling at each other’s hair to get control over the swing. It looked like a scene from Lord of the Flies. I expected to see one running up with a pig’s head on a stick. It was total madness. No one was still for even a second.

  ‘Aren’t they adorable,’ one of the mums said, coming to stand beside me by the smeared French windows. It was Amelia’s mum, who was also balancing a young baby on her hip.

  I couldn’t say anything back without sounding very rude. So I smiled at her and said nothing.

  ‘Which one is yours?’ she asked. Before I could answer, one little boy came running past us, with a piece of chocolate cake in his hands. He put out his hand, and smack – the cake smeared itself all over my white jeans.

  ‘Never mind,’ said Amelia’s mum. ‘They are only having fun. It will come out.’ I wanted to shout at her that we weren’t in a zoo, and in the 1950s children were seen and not heard. They certainly weren’t allowed to run wild like a bunch of savages, so why was it okay to do that now.

  ‘Which one is yours?’ she persisted, ignoring my attempts to wipe the cake from my trousers.

  ‘I don’t have any children,’ I told her through gritted teeth. I wanted to add ‘not in a million years would I ever put myself through hell like this’. She looked at me as if I’d suddenly dropped in from another planet.

  ‘Well, why are you here, then?’ she asked me.

  ‘Good question,’ I wanted to say back. ‘Why on earth would I want to spend my Saturday afternoon in this utter madhouse, when I could be curled up on my sofa at home with a good book, or shopping in Karen Millen.’ I was saved from answering by Rach, who came up with a plate of food.

  ‘Oh good,’ I told her sarcastically. ‘Do you want to throw it all over my jeans and then I can have a full buffet on them.’ She looked down at my white jeans in horror and saw the remains of the smeared piece of chocolate cake all over them.

  ‘I’m so sorry, Bee, it will come out in the wash.’ I shook my head at her. Why on earth she wanted to do all this in nine months’ time, I’ll never know – but Rach looked like she was having the time of her life. She wiped chocolaty hands and faces, and peeled bodies off the floor of the bouncy castle and wiped away tears. I had to admit she would make an amazing mum. Suddenly instead of being worried about the whole artificial insemination thing, I wished from the bottom of my heart that it would work for her. She was a natural.

  I managed to stay another two hours, then feeling like I deserved the Victoria Cross, I finally made my excuses and left. I opened the door of my flat in relief; bliss; perfect peace and quiet. My ears were still ringing from the party. It was worse than if I’d been at a club dancing in front of the speakers all night. I peeled off my white jeans and put them in the wash. Then I flopped down on the sofa. Scarlett was watching TV.

  ‘You look shot to pieces, Bee,’ she said. ‘What have you been doing all afternoon?’

  ‘I’ve been in a war zone,’ I groaned, covering my face with Heat magazine and shutting my eyes.

  ‘I thought you were going to that birthday party with Rach,’ said Scarlett, puzzled.

  ‘I did,’ I muttered from underneath the magazine. ‘I’m surprised I’ve come out alive.’

  It took two hours of lying completely prone on the sofa with Scarlett bringing me tea and biscuits, before I felt ready to face the world again and go to Nick’s for dinner. I threw on a pair of jeans and a sweatshirt and headed for the front door.

  ‘Where are you going?’ asked Rach, who had just back from the party.

  ‘To Nick’s, for dinner,’ I told her, grabbing my handbag.

  ‘Do you mean the photographer guy? I didn’t know you had a date with him,’ she said, in surprise.

  ‘God no, it’s not a date,’ I said quickly. ‘He’s cooking me some dinner because I tried to cook him that duck thing, that time I nearly burnt the flat down. He’s probably going to whip up some culinary masterpiece, so he can wind me up about it afterwards.’

  ‘He probably fancies you,’ said Rach.

  ‘No way,’ I told her, grimacing at the thought. ‘We
have a love/hate relationship that is far more hate than love. Anyway he’s still going out with the pert-boobed student –he thinks I’m an ancient old crone in comparison. I’m only going because it’s a free dinner.’

  Two days later we were sat around our usual meeting table at the restaurant - although it seemed very strange without Soph there. Instead there was one empty chair.

  ‘Anyone got any news to report?’ asked Kaz, who was sitting at the head of the table.

  ‘Bee had a hot dinner date on Saturday night,’ said Rach, giggling, nudging me hard in the ribs. I was suddenly faced with several pairs of raised eyebrows.

  ‘And?’ asked Tash.

  ‘It wasn’t a dinner date,’ I said, hastily. ‘It was only Nick who cooked me dinner because of my disastrous attempt the other week.

  ‘It was still dinner,’ said Tash. ‘It could constitute a date.’

  ‘Well, it wasn’t,’ I reassured her, ‘but I must admit that guy can cook.’

  I hadn’t been able to believe it when I’d rolled up at Nick’s house that evening. It was surprisingly tidy inside and also really tasteful. I couldn’t imagine that Nick of the eighties’ disco wardrobe had managed to decorate and furnish a house in such a fashion. There were cream carpets and wooden venetian blinds at the window, a big brown leather sofa and white walls.

  ‘I like your house,’ I had called to him, as he was busy stirring pots and pans in the kitchen. I felt a stab of resentment. There was no smoke billowing out of his kitchen and he hadn’t run to meet me at the door completely panic-stricken, because he was about to burn to death. Everything seemed calm and in control. And the food was gorgeous. He’d cooked prawns in a lovely butter sauce with rice with stir-fried vegetables, and then a baked Alaska, which is my favourite pudding of all time. I ate every single bit and even mopped up my sauce straight from my plate with a bread roll.