The Secret Life of a Slummy Mummy

by Fiona Neill

  ‘Actually, I was here before you and we’re both after the same thing, I think,’ I said, holding up my underwear display.

  ‘I can’t decide whether I am a medium or a large,’ he said.

  ‘Medium, from what I remember,’ I said. He laughed. Sometimes when you meet a former lover, there is an ease of communication that cuts through the years. There can be a corresponding sense of loss because that same degree of intimacy can never be replicated. I was relieved to feel only the former.

  ‘I fell into that one,’ he said warmly. ‘Do you fancy a coffee?’

  I think that inviting a woman out for coffee is the twenty-first-century equivalent of a Victorian man asking a woman to come and view his etchings. It is a seemingly innocuous invitation, propelled by apparently innocent intentions, yet the underlying issue is about being alone together. So we both put down our underwear haul a little too quickly and headed off to a small café where tea was served in proper china cups on white tablecloths. Over the next hour he told me the following. That he was on holiday in Norfolk with his wife and their two children. They had rented a converted barn somewhere outside of Holt along the coast at considerable expense. He was directing an independent film set in Bradford about a love affair between an Asian girl and a white boy. He was on the board of the British Film Institute. He spent a lot of time travelling. His wife was fine. Being apart so much made it even more difficult being together because they lived separate lives. He had never told her about us and nothing similar had ever happened again. I wasn’t sure that I believed him, but it said something about how he wanted to view himself. Typically, because I had forgotten how self-obsessed he was, he asked nothing about me until the tea in the pot was cold and it had started raining again outside.

  ‘So what are you up to, Lucy?’ he asked finally.

  ‘Married, three children. I’m a stay-at-home mum,’ I said. ‘There’s a job title that ends a conversation in its tracks. I gave up Newsnight a couple of years after you left. I worked for a while after our first son was born.’

  ‘Why did you do that, you loved that job?’ he said. ‘You had so many plans, so many ideas. I thought you were destined for greatness. I’d give you a job any day.’

  ‘Work–life balance proved too elusive. So I thought I’d take a year out, then I got pregnant again and then again and suddenly eight years rolled by,’ I explained.

  I wanted to ask him whether he could remember any of my great ideas, because I certainly couldn’t and they might come in useful now. Like all the excess sleep that I took for granted before I had children. I wished I had banked all that for future reference.

  ‘So does it suit you being a full-time mother?’ he asked.

  ‘Giving up work is a bit like moving from the city to the countryside,’ I said. ‘Once you’ve done it, it’s difficult to go back. I was sucked into the parenting vortex. The pace of life changes, it’s wild and unruly terrain, contemporary culture passes you by, and you go to bed earlier and earlier because it’s so exhausting, but you learn to live by the seasons again. And I think my children like having me around and I like being there for them. Now I’m obviously utterly unemployable and have less status than a lap dancer.’

  He laughed. And we smiled at the irony of our shared aspirations and their wildly different outcomes, because feminism might have come a long way, but women are still the ones who make the difficult decisions.

  ‘Lap dancers are powerful people,’ he said. Then he paused. ‘And how is married life?’ The question hung in the air because this was dangerous territory. I stared into my cold cup of tea.

  ‘Fine, bumpy at times, tragi-comic at others, I suppose,’ I said with the kind of honesty that is permissible when you are with someone you know you won’t see again. The kind of honesty that travelling in foreign lands allows. ‘Having children pushes you to extremes, and relationships can get lost in the domestic quagmire.’

  ‘Tell me about it. I sometimes think it is easier to be in love with people before you really get to know them and they topple off their pedestal,’ he said. ‘When I moved in with my wife and saw her cutting her toe and then eating the nails, a little bit of me died. That’s why those old relationships that never evolved beyond the lustful stage have such a hold on memory.’

  ‘Very true,’ I said unthinkingly.

  ‘That’s what my next film is about, it’s more commercial, based on this man and woman who meet each other again on Friends Reunited and end up trying to rekindle an old affair,’ he said. ‘It’s got American backers, so it has to have a Hollywood ending.’

  ‘So does she stay with her husband or go off with the old boyfriend?’ I asked.

  ‘She leaves her husband,’ he said.

  ‘But how is that a happy ending?’ I asked.

  ‘I didn’t say it was a happy ending, I said it was a Hollywood ending,’ he said.

  ‘But surely it would be more romantic if she stayed with her husband?’ I persisted.

  ‘Lucy, it would be a bit of a slow boiler if she did that,’ he argued.

  ‘So what happens to her husband?’

  ‘He ends up with someone else,’ he said a little impatiently.

  ‘And what about the wife of the old boyfriend?’

  ‘She’s dead,’ he said, yawning. ‘It’s more convenient that way. Old relationships don’t make good films, it’s the early stage, the sexual tension and the excitement that people want to see.’

  ‘I think long-term love is more about an attitude than a state of mind. It’s about how much you can give each rather than what you get from each other. Actually, in some ways it is more interesting than an immature relationship,’ I said. ‘At least that’s what I’m hoping.’

  ‘A slow, steady return on your investment over the years?’ he asked.

  ‘Something like that,’ I said.

  ‘Well, mine is doomed then, because I am a selfish bastard,’ he said. ‘What about your husband?’

  ‘He’s very detail-orientated, which can be maddening, but actually he isn’t structurally selfish,’ I said, ‘not in the way you are. But perhaps that’s why you are so successful.’

  ‘The trouble with success is that you are always meeting people who are even more successful than you are. When I made my first film I thought that would be enough. Now I realise that unless I can produce a consistently successful body of work, I will feel as though I have underachieved. There are moments of euphoria, but I rarely feel content. Contentment has eluded me.’

  I know that I missed obvious clues, but this man was no longer attractive to me. My curiosity was that of someone who had been there at the beginning of a story. I wanted to know what happened in the middle to work out whether there would be a happy ending.

  As I glanced at my watch, I realised with horror that I had been sitting in this café for almost two hours. The shop was now shut and I had forgotten to buy the pants. To return to the campsite without pants was inconceivable. I rummaged in my bag in search of my purse. It was then that I discovered that I had accidentally pilfered the bra and knickers I had tried on in the shop. This was the first time in my life that I had ever stolen anything. I decided immediately that I would keep them. I didn’t feel any remorse because the theft was not premeditated. It was permissible to engage in rash acts of dubious morality as long as they were unconscious.

  ‘Do you know that you have always been at the back of my thoughts, Lucy? I always wondered how it might have been, if we had evolved together,’ he said suddenly. ‘Whether you might have been the answer.’ His teacup looked tiny gripped between his hands.

  ‘Did you?’ I said, in astonishment. I noticed one of his hands moving towards my own and abruptly got up from my chair. It tipped backwards until it rested precariously against a radiator. I left it there.

  ‘I wouldn’t have been. It’s always a mistake to expect other people to make you happy. It helps, but it’s not a panacea,’ I said. ‘I think I’d better leave now.’ I left a fi
ve-pound note on the table, knowing that he wouldn’t have any cash because he never did. ‘It was really nice to see you again.’ He got up awkwardly and told me to get in touch, but I knew that he didn’t really mean it. We had covered too much ground and it would be difficult to see each other again.

  In a sense it was a fortuitous meeting, because for me it closed a chapter. But the repercussions of forgetting Tom’s pants and stealing underwear for myself endured. When I got back to the campsite he was furious, even before I told him that it was a fruitless endeavour.

  ‘What have you been doing all afternoon?’ he demanded. ‘Fred fell into the mud and cried for about an hour. Joe thought he was shrivelling up because the saltwater made his skin go wrinkly. And I found that passport in the car, so Sam cried because he was worried that you would think he had told me.’

  I looked at Fred. His hair was caked with bits of seaweed, hard dried pieces of mud and the odd small feather. On his face there were a few clear gulleys amidst the mud where I imagined pools of tears had fallen down his cheeks.

  ‘Why didn’t you wash him?’ I asked, holding his little face in my hand.

  ‘I thought you would be home to help,’ Tom said disapprovingly. I looked at him, then said to Sam, ‘We’re just going to have a small argument. Keep an eye on Fred and Joe, please.’

  So I told Tom that I had bumped into an old colleague. He remembered him with unusual clarity and asked whether I had ever slept with him, because he had always suspected that there was something between us. I made a bad decision. I failed to see the situation from Tom’s point of view and assumed because it was unimportant to me that it would hold similar currency for him. So I told him the truth about the first encounter, because I thought that it had happened so long ago that it didn’t matter and I was pleased to discover this man meant so little to me. But of course it mattered. So I didn’t mention the second. And then I told Tom that he was being a hypocrite, because he was the one who had slept with Joanna Saunders and that he had done it much more and for longer than me. His account was in arrears. And all those raw wounds were reopened. Forgetting is sometimes easier than forgiving.

  18

  ‘If you can’t ride two horses at once you shouldn’t be in the circus.’

  WHEN I GET a text message from Robert Bass a month after the party saying, We need to talk. Can you meet me for a coffee? Have finished book, I recognise, that whatever my reply, it constitutes a big top of the pyramid-type decision. After what had transpired at the party, contact between us had become loaded with specific undertones. There was nothing impressionistic about the encounter in the coat cupboard. The attraction was explicit, which now means that I have to assume greater responsibility for my actions. It is the difference between consciously and unconsciously stealing underwear from the shop in Holt. This is what happens when fantasy spills over into reality.

  I force myself to wait at least half an hour before replying, and then I write, Congratulations but not a good idea I think. By tacitly acknowledging what occurred, I am not only curtailing the chances of anything happening again but also derailing the possibility of even a little harmless flirtation. I try to feel self-congratulatory about having made what I know rationally is the right decision. If there had been no forbidden fruit in the Garden of Eden, then Eve would never have had to decide whether to eat it, I tell myself. There is little doubt in the tone of my message to Robert Bass, but it is not written with utter conviction. Being rational is one of those long-term investments with few immediate dividends.

  Although I have felt guilty, it isn’t the kind of acute guilt that is alleviated by dramatic confession. It is more the chronic variety that I think might fade in time. I console myself with the fact that nothing had really happened. A tangle, not even a knot, which means there is nothing to unravel and still less to confess. So no one, apart from Celebrity Dad, is aware that we were even alone together. I ignore the obvious fact that secrets give oxygen to fantasies.

  A few weeks after sending this text message, the Easter holidays now a distant memory, I wander into the local café, after dropping the oldest boys at school and Fred at nursery, for a meeting convened by Alpha Mum to discuss the forthcoming school fete. It is the first time since the party that I will be in such close proximity with Robert Bass because I have, so far, successfully managed to avoid all but the most superficial contact with him.

  Yummy Mummy No. 1 waves at me as I stroll through the door. She proprietorially pats a space beside her and I walk over to sit down, relieved to find that I am early and Robert Bass has not yet arrived. I am grateful and anxious in equal measure. On the one hand I fade into the scenery beside her brightly coloured fifties-style tea dress and massive sunglasses, on the other she will inevitably want to talk about Guy.

  ‘Hello, Isobel,’ I say.

  ‘That’s the first time I’ve heard you use my name,’ she says, looking pleased.

  I look back nostalgically, to a period not so long ago when I was lucky if Isobel threw me a few crumbs of attention and even those were drained of any emotional content. Now my feelings towards her are composed of an uncomfortable blend of incompatible flavours, like a culinary experiment where an amateur cook throws improbable ingredients together in a hopeless attempt to produce a memorable new dish. Curry powder, sugar and salt. Admiration, sympathy and guilt. Admiration for the way in which she has elected to deal with the situation, because she has carried the emotional burden alone, without infecting her children with her anxiety, and has faced the world with the same blend of humour, detachment and impeccable dress sense. And these characteristics enhance my sympathy.

  Guilt is, however, the predominant emotion. My loyalties are deeply divided. From the outset, I felt it would be wrong to betray Emma. The breadth and depth of my relationship with her are incomparable to my burgeoning friendship with Isobel. But now I feel guiltier about deceiving Isobel than I do about my own brush with Robert Bass. If I remain resolute, there will be no repercussions for me, just a return to the status quo. Her situation is much less predictable and inevitably involves a good slice of pain.

  The first few weeks after the party I had several awkward phone conversations with Isobel, about the possible identity of her husband’s lover and new facts that she had uncovered about the scale of Guy’s deception. The fact that these calls have diminished can only mean she is closer to discovering Emma’s identity under her own steam or that she feels I am part of the conspiracy, which I am.

  Also I am increasingly frustrated with Emma. I have tried to explain to her that the longer the relationship between Guy and her endures, the more entrenched the pain and anger become for Isobel and the more difficult it will be to repair their marriage. Each time I speak to her, she promises that she is close to ending the affair. She is using a method she describes as ‘slow withdrawal’, which I have said sounds like a tantric sex technique, but she maintains is part of her campaign to leave the situation in a position of strength.

  It is tempting to unmask Emma, but at this juncture it is hardly likely to help the situation. Isobel’s dignity has been maintained in part by her detective work, which gives focus to her anger and allows time to work out an appropriate response.

  So my reserves of anger are directed towards Guy. Most surprisingly, I have had several phone calls from him, wanting reassurance that I won’t tell his wife what is going on or persuade Emma to leave him. I wonder whether Isobel is still monitoring his calls and what she will conclude from this new clue on the phone bill.

  I look at her. Worry suits her, I decide. She is glowing.

  ‘You look like Jackie Kennedy, when she was on her honeymoon in Acapulco,’ I tell her.

  ‘That is an unfortunate analogy from a number of angles,’ she says, peering over the top of her glasses, ‘although at this stage, shooting Guy is one of many options that I am considering. Particularly since I have discovered that the night of that dinner in the restaurant he wasn’t in France at all.’

/>   ‘I was referring to your look. Anyway, JFK probably wasn’t having affairs at that stage,’ I say, trying to be at once reassuring and direct her away from talk about her husband.

  ‘I wasn’t thinking about his affairs,’ she whispers tersely. ‘The reason I’m wearing these glasses is because I have a sports injury.’

  ‘I didn’t realise that you could tone facial muscles,’ I say in genuine amazement. ‘Wouldn’t that cause wrinkles?’

  ‘Are you being deliberately contrary, Lucy?’ she asks, but I know she finds this kind of conversation pleasantly distracting.

  I would like to tell her that I am deeply uncomfortable with the enforced intimacy of our relationship and want to get back on to the kind of ground that we used to cover. But it is too late. We are bound together by circumstance.

  She lifts the sunglasses to reveal a massive black eye extending from her left eyebrow down towards her cheekbone.

  ‘I accidentally punched myself in the face during my kick-boxing class,’ she says. ‘It’s because I’m so preoccupied.’

  ‘Having such a fine arse must entail some element of suffering,’ I say.

  ‘Lucy, you have two choices in life,’ she says, sighing. ‘You either decide to save your face or your bum and I have chosen the latter.’

  I must look puzzled, because she continues, ‘If you exercise a lot you get wrinkles, if you are overweight your face looks younger.’

  ‘But surely your husband sees more of you from the front than from behind?’ I ask. ‘Wouldn’t it make more sense to invest in that?’