by Laura Kemp
Frankie
‘I was thinking, we’ll do your usual set but why don’t we go for a bigger curl?’ Frankie said as she combed through Phyllis’ wet hair.
‘As long as you don’t make me look like Maggie Thatcher, couldn’t stand that woman, what she did to those miners.’
‘I promise! It’ll be a softer look, more glam. It’s nice to try something new every now and again.’ Frankie felt the words roll off her tongue as if she had always been so adventurous.
‘I’m only going to the Harvester!’ Phyllis laughed, then she waved her hand and told her to go for it – she was meeting Norman’s daughter for the first time and she didn’t want to look fuddy-duddy.
‘Ooh, so you’re being introduced to the family, sounds serious!’
‘He only wants us to get a double unit so we can live together.’
‘Never!’ It seemed quite daring seeing as they hadn’t been dating or ‘courting’ long – but then time wasn’t on their side. It was rather romantic actually.
Phyllis pointed to a photo on top of the TV which showed her and a silver-haired man both in whites holding a trophy. ‘That’s him there, it was taken when we won the bowls last week. Norman had it framed. You can see he would’ve been a looker in his day.’
‘What are you going to do?’
‘Stay put! I’m not doing another man’s smalls! No, I’m happy as I am, thank you very much. I’m very fond of him and he can stay over as often as he likes, but that’s as far as it goes.’
‘He stays over?’ Surely she didn’t mean they slept together?
‘Of course he does! You don’t stop wanting a cuddle just because you’re old.’
‘Oh, right, yes! For a second I thought you meant—’
‘I do,’ Phyllis said. Frankie had to put her hands on her client’s shoulders to steady herself.
‘I thought that sort of thing… dried up when you…’ She fought the urge to pull a face because the image of them at it, doing the things her and Floyd did, well, it was a bit urgh.
‘God, no, desire never fades, it’s the glue that holds a relationship together, otherwise it’d be a friendship. It’s true all your life, although you might have to take it more slowly when you’re getting on. Going to bed isn’t something to be ashamed of or embarrassed about, it’s an act of love, respect and trust between two people; you bare your soul when you bare your bum!’
Frankie nodded at every single word Phyll said. That was exactly it. She’d discovered this for herself. The act of letting go was liberating because when you were letting someone inside your body, you were letting them touch your heart too. Not that Floyd had done that, of course.
‘It’s weird because I’ve only just sort of realized that,’ Frankie said before she understood what her confession meant. But that couldn’t mean she liked Floyd more than she knew… could it?
‘Ah, has Jason come to his senses then? Are you back together?’
‘No,’ she whispered, before clearing her throat. ‘Jason wasn’t the one who taught me all that.’
‘Oh, it’s like that is it!’
‘Not exactly,’ she said, truthfully because how could Floyd be that ‘someone else’, ‘it’s complicated.’
Phyll raised her left hand to her shoulder and put it on Frankie’s. ‘Let me tell you this: if you don’t know what your true feelings are, then sit on them. Ignore them, bury them. That’s how you’ll know what they are, because one day they’ll out.’
Frankie wasn’t sure what she meant, but she squeezed her hand anyway because she was a treasure. Then Frankie noticed Phyll’s modest gold band which she’d worn for 50 years was gone. ‘Where’s your wedding ring? You haven’t lost it?’
‘I’ve taken it off, it didn’t seem right when I’m with Norman. It’ll be buried with me, I’ve made sure of that. Life moves on and while I love Dai and always will, I felt I was living in the past.’
The old lady’s honesty struck Frankie then and all the way on the drive to Dad’s, where she dropped half of Phyll’s home-made Welsh cakes. He wasn’t in but he must’ve guessed she’d call by because there was one of his notes, which he always left her if he was going out on the off-chance she’d visit. Gone to the butchers xxx, it said. It made her sad to think she was so much in his thoughts: of course, it was lovely to be loved, she was very lucky, but how she wished he had someone special in his life.
Back at hers, she unwrapped her half with Phyll’s words ringing in her ears. ‘They’re nothing fancy, not showy. But they’re made from the heart and perfect with a cuppa,’ Phyll had said, so Frankie made a brew and gave Leonardo a fuss.
He swished his tail though when she announced she had to get her laptop because she wanted to email Jason to explain her wall of silence had been because he’d slept with someone else. Keeping the communication going was essential if she was going to get inside his head again.
She opened her emails and scanned through the offers of hair product discounts and messages from customers; she’d deal with them first so she could devote herself to Jase. There was one from Floyd, which was strange, he normally texted. She knew she should get on with her work but the subject line of ‘Lessons Five and Six’ was too intriguing. ‘Dear student,’ it began.
As you know, we previously agreed to combine lessons five and six. I would like to take you on a field trip on Saturday night to educate you about Dressing Up and Erotica. There is a link beneath my signature to a website from which you should choose an outfit. Please confirm your attendance ASAP. Kind regards, your teacher.’
She smiled at his silly tone and wrinkled her nose at the thrill of a night out. Clicking on the URL, which was www.frenchfancies.com, she wondered what the heck cakes had to do with it. Absolutely nothing, it turned out as the screen went black then flickered into life.
A short film showed a series of women who were apparently getting ready for a glamorous evening. But instead of getting dressed, they were peeling off their clothes to reveal some of the most breathtaking underwear Frankie had ever – or more aptly, never – seen. Extravagant but tasteful, erotic but elegant, the luxurious lingerie hit her right between the thighs.
These women weren’t size-zero clothes horses; they were all shapes and sizes. Voluptuous dark-skinned beauties, petite pale redheads and boyish blondes were posed artistically, opposite to the straining chests and bulging booties that you couldn’t avoid on billboards, in magazines, online and on TV.
Her breathing quickened as she scrolled through peephole bras, panelled surprise knickers, barely there playsuits, sheer baby-dolls, boned basques, elbow-length gloves, sequinned masks, diamanté paddles, old-fashioned stockings, ornate suspenders and stern hold-ups.
Teasingly shot, you might think you could see a nipple or two, but it was the design of the underwear playing tricks on you. This was all about what you didn’t see; it was about the power of suggestion, the art of conceal and reveal. Floyd had understood what would appeal to her. The pouting vamps and showgirls were as far from her tacky and synthetic ‘let’s play naughty nursie’ nightmare as you could get.
But what to buy? Frankie decided to let her body decide: whatever aroused her, she would go for.
Clicking through the images, she went deeper and deeper inside herself, seeking a fit for her desire.
When her legs squeezed together she knew she’d found the right pair of knickers. Low-slung and black, they were see-through at the sides with a fan of lacy embroidery over the crotch and the backside was dotted with miniature feathers. The throbbing grew when she saw a waspie, a delicate ribbon-tied black corset which began below the bust and sat on the hips, giving the illusion of a dramatic hourglass shape. Frankie picked a strapless sheer scallop-edged peek-a-boo black bra which made her mouth go dry. She thought she was done – until she spied something so beguiling, she had the urge to touch herself. Called pasties, two circles of fabric covered just the nipples, giving a false sense of modesty. What’s more they gave a lift to the brea
st’s silhouette in a nod to old-fashioned glamour.
There were tassled ones, heart-shaped ones and sequinned ones, but the pair she fell head over heels with were more delicate: simple on first sight, when she zoomed in she could see an ornate lace trim centred with a tiny ribboned bow. What she loved about pasties was their surprise element: you might think that once the bra was off, that would be it. But no, the illusion remained with another unexpected layer of torment.
Aroused and pulsing, she exhaled as she closed her laptop; she couldn’t possibly do her work now, she needed a lie-down. As she did, she realized this had been a lesson all by itself. The act of blending into one person with another wasn’t an act of confinement to the boundaries she’d always lived by; those of seeking approval and taking care of others’ needs. She was discovering a sensuality of her own.
Saturday
Letty
I do not fucking believe this, Letty said through gritted teeth, as the state-of-the-art buggy jammed yet again.
State of the art? she thought, trying not to ram it so hard over a bump in the pavement that Eddy would be bouncing about. Like bollocks it was: the pushchair seemed to jar at the hint of a bird fart.
‘It’s a running buggy,’ Lance had said when he wheeled it in to the flat. It was the size of a tank and stupidly heavy. It wouldn’t do to leave it in the communal hallway, oh no. ‘I’m worried it’ll get nicked,’ he’d said. By whom? she’d asked, the British Army? But Helen would go mad, he had pleaded, and, as Letty was learning, What Helen Wanted, Helen Got. Whenever her name was mentioned, Lance seemed weaker and less of his own man. It broke Letty’s heart every time. This woman wasn’t an earth mother, she was a sergeant bloody major, not just in charge of Lance, but now her too.
How apt it was that Helen ran a fitness class for new mums. Letty could just imagine her bellowing at ‘Buggy Body’, which invited poor victims to bring their babies along in their prams. The clever thing about it, Lance had said, was that not only did the little ones get some fresh air but the mums could use the weight of their buggies as part of their training. Letty though couldn’t understand why new mums couldn’t just enjoy tea and cake for a while rather than have to get their bodies back. What was the rush and the obsession with that? Why couldn’t people just let them be?
And how exactly had she ended up spending her Saturday afternoon looking after Eddy by herself? she wondered, as she made her way to the kids’ play area up the road from her flat.
She stomped the rest of the way, harrumphing with every step, until a little hand appeared, dangling a chewed-up bunny. Stopping to check Eddy was okay, Letty squatted down at the front of the pushchair and was rewarded with a smile.
‘Hello, little fella,’ she said, softly nipping his nose with her fingers because he was a lush little thing, ‘we’re nearly there, it’s not far.’
The adorable little cherub, who had his dad’s eyes and mouth, began jabbering at her and then pulled at the straps holding him steady. ‘Up! Up!’
‘We’ll be there very soon, babes, don’t you worry.’
The interruption gave her a pause for thought: she’d been spitting venom because she was tired. She felt bad for her damning stream of consciousness just a few minutes before – she hadn’t even met Helen so how could she say she was an ogre? And Lance was just trying to do his best. Give everyone a fair go, she thought.
Lance was working so hard, that was why she was in charge now. Weekend PT sessions were a fact of life: he’d told her this would be how it was, and she’d taken him on knowing it.
And it wasn’t as if he didn’t make her feel appreciated – he bought her flowers and chocolates and paid for everything when they went out.
This afternoon was a chance to get to know Eddy – a good job because it hadn’t started off well. Even before she’d set eyes on him she hadn’t felt reassured by Lance that it would go well. He was touchy as if he was preparing to welcome Prince George. In the week leading up to his visit, Lance had become obsessed with getting everything ready. Disinfecting everything within reach, moving ‘dangerous’ things out of harm’s way. Plug sockets were sealed, cupboards were screwed with locks, corners were cushioned with foam guards, and the doors had bumpers to stop fingers getting trapped. He’d put up baby gates and put together a kiddy workbench and a kitchen – because Helen didn’t like gender-specific toys – both of which took over the lounge. Baby-proofing, he called it, but it seemed more than that: like he wanted to make up for leaving him. She had tried to tell him that love was all Eddy needed, but he would always answer her with the undeniable fact that ‘how could she know seeing as she wasn’t a parent’.
Something had altered in their relationship, she could see that now. The intimacy had disappeared. Her cup of coffee was still waiting for her when she got out of the shower, but he never was. They hadn’t had sex for a week – she’d tried to initiate it, to tell him it would bust his stress but he’d given her the line ‘is that all you think about?’ She’d been hurt because that wasn’t it at all – sex was how they soothed and supported one another, there was nothing wrong with that.
So when Eddy turned up, Letty was hopeful that it would mark the end of Lance’s worry: his son would be here, right, the wait was over, therefore he’d relax. But that was when Letty discovered how unprepared she’d been.
Stupidly, she’d rushed to the door and been too in his face when he’d arrived last night. She’d only wanted to make a good impression, but it had backfired with Eddy bawling.
Had she left it there, it might have improved. But no: she waved toys at Eddy like a moron and tried to pick him up before he was ready. Cue more screaming.
Fair do’s, Lance was brilliant, understanding that in spite of reason, she was taking it personally. ‘He’s just a bit unsure,’ he had said gently, over his shoulder so she was out of Eddy’s eyeline, because for fifteen minutes just the sight of her made him cry. The plan had been to settle him in, put him to bed at 7 p.m. then for Letty and Lance to share a bottle of red over paella. But it took two hours of children’s telly – ‘Don’t tell Helen, it goes off at 4 p.m. at hers,’ Lance had said – for Eddy to chill out. Thankfully, he went out like a light by 9.30 p.m. – she didn’t care by this point that he was in their bed she was so tired – so they reheated their tea, wolfed it down then called it a night by 10 p.m. A cuddle, of course, was out of the question.
Eddy was up twice in the night, and by 3 a.m. Letty decided to sleep on the sofa. Then she was awoken by a pudgy finger in the eye three hours later, which on a weekend was practically still the middle of the night for Letty. Maybe it was because she was sloth-like and didn’t leap up for him, but he went up to her face and gave her a big sloppy kiss. She had felt as if she had been forgiven, that things would be okay. Thank you, God, she’d thought, as he pulled her out of the duvet and spoke mumbo-jumbo, which Lance translated as him wanting to play hide-and-seek.
Over and over, he’d hidden in the exact same spot, behind the floor-length curtains and laughed hysterically each time she found him, the cherub. There was a minor altercation when he didn’t want to go in his high chair, but when he finally relented he ate up all of his breakfast. Although, by the taste of the spoonful of organic sawdust posing as porridge he shoved in her mouth, she wouldn’t have blamed him if he’d chucked it on the floor.
She got a chance to tidy up and recover when Lance took Eddy swimming for a couple of hours. They had lunch, Eddy had a nap and then, as Lance left for work, he strapped Eddy into the tank so Letty could take him to the swings.
And that was where she found herself now, in the sunshine with a rabble of other knackered-looking mums and dads pushing their poppets.
Eddy’s little legs kicked with excitement as she got him out of his pushchair. Immediately he ran towards the rising and falling legs of children who were going as high as possible. She almost had a heart attack and rushed to get him. He had a meltdown when she scooped him up – luckily she had some chocola
te buttons in her bag for bribery purposes. Undisclosed chocolate buttons, that is, because Lance would’ve gone nuts if he’d known. ‘We don’t reward bad behaviour,’ he’d said yesterday, ‘we believe in positive reinforcement of good behaviour.’ Whatever the hell that meant.
In to the swing seat he went and she began to relax. At least he was caged in there and couldn’t come to any harm. The responsibility of looking after a child was all-consuming, Letty thought, God knows how Mum had managed with two of them by herself. And Em had this all to come.
Eddy was shouting out in happiness now, and she accompanied every shove with a ‘weeee!’. It made her feel less useless.
Once he’d had enough, they went for a snack. But only after he’d gone rigid when she’d tried to crowbar him back into the buggy. So they walked to the cafe hand-in-hand.
Inside, his little face beamed when the waitress brought chocolate cake.
‘I’m sorry, this isn’t for you, babes,’ she said, looking through the enormous changing bag that contained nappies, wipes, cuddly toys and probably the cure for the common cold if she looked hard enough. ‘Daddy has packed something for you.’
Finally, she found it – an organic gingerbread sweetened with grape juice. What a disappointment for Eddy. His bottom lip quivered as he threw the biscuit on the floor. I’d do the same if I was you, fella, she thought.
‘Dat!’ he said, angry and sad and covetous all at the same time, as he pointed at her double chocolate fudge cake brownie.
Letty sized it up. She knew she shouldn’t let him have any. But she didn’t want a scene, seeing as she’d never know how to stop the screaming. And she wanted to make him happy. She broke off a bit of her brownie and handed it to him. His watery eyes lit up and he beamed his sunbeam smile at her. Then he proceeded to wipe most of it over his face.
‘Jesus H Christ, little man,’ she said, ‘try not to get it on your shoes, will you?’
He giggled then and slapped the table with a mucky hand, clearly on a sugar high. But this would have to do – these would have to be the building blocks of their relationship. She couldn’t become a stepmum overnight. This seemed a much more attractive and instinctual option than being a role model. And it was pretty much guaranteed he’d like her more for it than if she stuck to Lance and Helen’s boring rules. So she handed him a bit more of her deliciously squidgy cake.
