Girls' Night In

by Jessica Adams

  ‘Right, then, wonderful.’ Carys dropped her grown-out fringe and patted her on the shoulders. ‘Let me just get back to my other lady and I’ll be right with you. Coffee?’

  ‘Please.’

  There seemed to be a fluttering noise somewhere very near her and when Maura looked down, she saw that Hair Now was trembling up and down like a butterfly in her old lady’s shaky hands.

  Maybe it’s a real holiday I need, not highlights, she thought, trying not to meet her own gaze in the mirror.

  When Carys came back, Maura was washed, towel-dried and floundering around in the sticky memory of her last holiday with Phil, cycling in the Aran Islands, wondering whether the seeds of her overthrow had really been sown by insisting on matching him Guinness for Guinness and being carried home on a donkey cart.

  How embarrassing. Maura blushed for shame at the thought.

  She didn’t notice Carys start combing out her hair.

  Well, said a distant voice (possibly her mother’s), she only had Phil’s word for it that she’d been embarrassing.

  As far as she knew, she’d been a grand laugh.

  Maura glared at herself in the mirror, trying to identify which part of her face was making her look like someone else.

  Since when had she allowed someone else to decide what was embarrassing for her?

  Oh nag, nag, nag.

  ‘It’s almost too gorgeous here to go abroad at the moment, isn’t it?’ Carys’ face was kind and enquiring in the mirror.

  Maura blinked hard. If she’d been drinking it was only because he had no conversation.

  ‘Yes, it’s been lovely. I haven’t … been out much in the sun though.’

  Hadn’t been out at all for a week, in case someone she knew saw her in Vauxhall when she was meant to be in Cyprus, sadly unable to make the wedding of the year due to ‘prior holiday commitments’. Following which she would reappear, bronzed, sun-kissed and untouched by the finger of condemnation for not Being A Woman and going to the wedding. And that wasn’t counting the vague references to holiday romances she could casually chuck into conversations later. After the bride and groom were safely in Montego Bay.

  The Great Escape Plan.

  Now, for some insinuating reason, seeming slightly stupid.

  ‘Well, you wouldn’t with your colouring,’ observed Carys, snipping neat zig-zags into the nape of her neck. ‘Gorgeous natural blonde hair, you’ve got. Now, my other lady’s going for a complete transformation the other way.’

  ‘Really?’ Knowing her luck, Cyprus was probably hit this week by freak monsoons, and her carefully tanned legs and sun-bleached strands would give her away instead of protecting her from all those sympathetic glances and murmurs as she walked past.

  ‘From Ava Gardner brunette to Jean Harlow blonde. Very brave. Surprise for her boyfriend.’

  ‘Mmm.’ How dumb to change for a man, thought Maura, and was struck by how dated the thought sounded in her head. It was the kind of thing she used to snap out with at college, when she had feminist principles, and couldn’t actually afford leg-waxing that frequently.

  That seemed like a whole personality away. Have I been changing for Phil, she wondered. Oh my God! Maura’s grip on the magazine tightened. Has he moulded me into a boring-conversation-resistant model woman and then dumped me to fend for myself in a world where men like girls to talk about pop music and not the torque ratio on Lancia Integrate Evolutiones? Surely not. Surely he liked me the way I was?

  Am?

  Was?

  Am?

  Maura pondered her personality frantically while snowflakes of snipped hair fell round her face.

  Accommodating, yes; personality contortionist, no.

  But you’re not as much fun as you used to be, observed one of the unnervingly mahogany models on the ‘Red Alert’ page.

  Maura stared in the mirror. Three years ago I would not have given an electric blanket houseroom. I’d rather have died than admitted to needing one.

  ‘Can’t beat getting away, though,’ observed Carys cheerily to no one in particular.

  Maura felt a strange but exhilarating surge of reason sweep through her. It was so obvious!

  She should go to Cyprus anyway!

  As well as the makeover!

  You only got the benefits from travelling if you actually went somewhere. Not to mention a lasting tan.

  Exhilarating reason shoved reasonable reason out of the way. This was so much quicker than self-help tapes! Last-minute holidays were cheap, she could easily save a hundred quid in a week just by not being at home necking endless vodka cranberries while throwing all his left-behind possessions into dustbin liners, and wasn’t it a long-term investment in her own self-esteem anyway?

  She gleamed at the increasingly punky-looking choir-girl in the mirror, baring her sharp incisors to herself. The big stone that even Debbie’s capable hands hadn’t been able to roll from the pit of her stomach began to shift and gather speed up her spine.

  And as for those made-up ‘holiday romances’ – well, it had worked for Phil …

  Maura shivered pleasurably. She could flog his toolkit, for a start.

  Carys took this as an encouraging sign.

  ‘When do you fly out?’

  ‘This afternoon,’ said Maura, staring drunkenly at the new her. ‘As soon as I pick up my bags from home.’

  ‘That’s gorgeous!’

  Carys swept the gown off Maura’s shoulders and showed her the back of her haircut with a mirror. Tiny sun-streaked curls scattered around her ears, which Debbie had carefully tinted an attractive golden colour.

  ‘You look like a different woman,’ cooed Carys.

  Maura smiled like a cat. ‘Absolutely.’ She dipped her head admiringly and the curls bounced like a shampoo advert. ‘Thank you.’

  ‘No problem,’ beamed Carys, brushing strands off her overall. ‘Will you excuse me? My other lady’s due out from under the rollerball.’

  Maura paid at the desk, leaving a healthy tip for Debbie and Carys, seeing as she was now in a holiday spending mood, and tucked a business card from the extended plastic hand by the nail-varnish display into her purse.

  The receptionist offered her the sweaty parka back. Maura looked at it distractedly, recognized it as her own, and rolled it into a ball, which she squashed into her bag. No need for that, she thought, stretching her bare golden arms in front of her.

  Just as the bell above the door was pinging her exit, Maura remembered her earrings were still in the Coiffure Suite.

  Carys was shiftily combing out the freshly-washed hair of her other lady without meeting her eyes. Even wet, Maura could see it was a vibrant platinum, almost as bright as her own. It didn’t go all that well with the woman’s eyebrows, which were still unarguably brunette.

  Earring half in her ear, Maura stood fascinated by the scale of the transformation – beyond cosmetic – to walk in as one person and out as another, where even your own eyebrows would give you away every two weeks. What was the point? Did you get roots on an eyebrow tint?

  And then the woman spoke, nervously, to the hairdresser’s reflection in the mirror.

  ‘Oh my God,’ she croaked.

  ‘It’s gorgeous,’ said Carys soothingly. ‘He’ll love it. Didn’t you say he’d been dropping hints?’

  ‘But my wedding! My dress is cream!’ she wailed. ‘I’ll look like a white chocolate Magnum! Will it wash out by tomorrow afternoon?’

  ‘Er, no,’ admitted Carys.

  Maura ran a hand through her fresh curls, put on her shades and drove straight to the airport.

  Anna Maxted

  Anna Maxted lives in London with her husband Phil and their three sons. She is a freelance journalist, writing mainly for The Times and The Daily Telegraph. She is also the author of seven novels, including Getting Over It, Being Committed, and A Tale of Two Sisters.

  Man with a Tan

  Anna Maxted

  When you meet the man you’re going to marry,
you just know. Apparently. I suppose it’s like walking into Whistles and just knowing you want the pink spangly halterneck top. You slink it on in the matchbox changing room and are instantly transformed into a sparkly, if curiously undernourished, sex goddess. It’s only later in the cold light of your bedroom that you realize you look like a camp frankfurter brought to life in a mad experiment. Marriage can have a similar effect – though in this case your husband turns out to be the sausage.

  Pardon me if that sounds harsh. I have nothing against buying spangly tops or tying the knot – either one ensures you oodles of attention and fuss, and if you look like a pig in a poke no one is going to mention it. Very nice. The reason I’m sceptical about the cupid’s arrow theory is because, in my experience, love isn’t as instant as a cup of Nescafé. It’s a screamingly slow, foot-dragging process. I can only compare it to glaciers which move about one millimetre every thousand years.

  When I met the man of my dreams I didn’t notice him. I was too busy posing in a deadly new pair of needle sharp stilettos. And when he brought himself to my attention – ‘Ah, excuse me, but you’re treading on my toe’ – I certainly didn’t think in terms of marriage. It would have been such a killjoy thought! Like binning the candyfloss and eating the stick. When the man of my dreams announced himself, my first thought was, ‘So that’s why the carpet feels lumpy.’

  Maybe I’m cynical about happy ever after because I hail from a family as dysfunctional as The Simpsons without the exonerating factor of charm. (My partner, whose middle name is charm, can’t quite get over it and avoids his in-laws like other people avoid ink clouds in swimming pools.) Ah yes. My partner. Wasn’t that who you were waiting for? I have my eldest sister Gloria to credit for bringing us together. Thanks to her I live in a big sunny house where I don’t have to lift a finger. And I can buy as many pink spangly tops as Whistles will sell me.

  It all began on the second day of summer, the sky a weak lazy blue for the occasion.

  ‘You know,’ Gloria remarks to our dappy sister Denise while ogling a celebrity’s over-pined home in Hello! magazine, ‘I used to think that money didn’t matter. But I want my three holidays a year!’ I suggest she could earn it herself, but she blanks me. ‘MC Magimix has his three holidays all right,’ she drools. ‘Oooh he’s practically mahogany.’

  I make a face at Robert, and say, ‘What a shame, he’ll clash with his pine. I’ll be making my own millions, won’t you?’

  Robert says, ‘I’d rather be kept by a rich D J personality, thanks,’ and then Gloria tells us to shut it and get on with our work.

  Robert and I giggle because Gloria – who doesn’t know the meaning of the word ‘tacky’ – fancies her chances with Magimix. Gloria, who has a high squeaky voice and a bony nose, is the worst aspect of being employed by our family business which, I’ll tell you now so you’re not disillusioned later, is a contract cleaning firm. Dirty work and filthy pay. The one advantage is that I get to spend time with Robert – an old friend of mine employed by my mother and paid a pittance after he was sacked by Tesco. (He didn’t change the doughnut oil in their bakery for a month and it went green.)

  Gloria drops Hello! on the table, declares, ‘I’m off to Prada, I need a new business suit. Page if you need me,’ and sweeps from the room.

  Denise snatches up the magazine, flicks to a page, and stares at it. She has yolk on her Laura Ashley cardigan from breakfast, but hasn’t noticed. She squints, and her face wrinkles up like an old peach.

  ‘What are you doing?’ I say, trying to keep the irritation out of my voice. At least pretend to be working!

  ‘Checking for dust,’ she replies.

  This bizarre response doesn’t surprise me as Denise is away with the fairies and rarely makes sense. I glance at the clock. Twelve thousand miserable pounds per annum divided by 48 x 5 = fifty quid a week. I’m paid a tenner a day.

  It’s 3 p.m., so I say loudly, ‘Denise, I’ve got a meeting with our accountant, it’ll probably take hours, so I’ll go straight home. And Robert is accompanying me to take the minutes.’ I nod at Robert who smiles winningly and brandishes his notebook.

  ‘Have a nice time,’ says Denise absently.

  We take advantage of her mental blip (so far it’s lasted thirty-one years) and head straight for the pub where we spend today’s tenners.

  Robert shows me a fancy way of lighting a match that really impresses girls. I can’t do it but he twirls a curl of my hair around his finger and says, ‘You have other talents. You’re a sensational liar.’

  Sadly, when I stagger into work the next day in the grip of a vicious hangover, my stepmother proves him wrong. I know the game’s up when I see her pacing the purple carpet in Christian Lacroix.

  ‘Where’ve you bin!’ she shrieks.

  ‘Sorry, Edith,’ I whisper, ‘the car wouldn’t start.’

  She purses her mouth, and her bright red lipstick bleeds into her violent tan. She snaps, ‘Don’t lie, you’ve bin drinkin’, I can smell it!’ I stand still to avoid being sick. Her voice is so shrill my brain might shatter.

  ‘Where is everyone?’ I whisper.

  ‘Brent Cross Shoppin’ Centre,’ she replies in a smug tone.

  ‘Why?’ I say.

  ‘Because!’ bellows Edith. ‘Unlike you, yer sisters ‘ave a brain in their ‘eads!’ That sounds right, one between two. ‘Yesterday, when you was off drinkin’,’ Edith adds, ‘Denise was proposishinin’ clients!’ I find this hard to believe, but suspect linguistic error rather than career change. ‘And MC Magimix’s agent got back to us, and said that Crispian – that’s ‘is real name, Crispian Bartholomew – it jus’ so happens ‘e is lookin’ for a top-flight cleaning service, so we’re goin’ for interview and the girls are off buyin’ new kit. ‘E’s seein’ us at two.’

  The curse of Hello! strikes again.

  Happily, Edith decides I look too much of a state to stand trial and delegates me to another, less crucial client.

  ‘Gloria doesn’t want to be upstaged,’ whispers Robert as I wave them off. How come he looks as fresh as a daisy that drank water and went to bed at 9 p.m.?

  ‘Rob,’ I say, ‘you don’t have to console me. I’m not so sad that I get off on scrubbing the toilets of minor celebrities, especially those with orange skin.’

  Robert jumps into the Range Rover behind Denise. As they roar off, he shouts, ‘Orangist!’

  I smile into the silence that follows their departure. If it weren’t for Robert my life would be pure drudgery. His teasing presence and filthy sense of humour promote it to impure drudgery, and make it just about bearable. An hour until I’m expected at my next job – cleaning the townhouse of Hattie Hayter, barrister. Time enough for a nap under my desk. I tootle back inside. The next thing I know, I am rudely awoken by an ear-piercing blast. I stumble out from under my desk, fumbling for the phone.

  ‘Hello?’

  I am nearly deafened by Edith yelling, ‘Why int you at ‘Attie ‘Ayter’s, you shoulda bin there ages ago!’

  My brain is too fuddled to lie plausibly so I stammer, ‘Oh.’

  Edith growls under her breath then hisses, ‘Git yer arse over ‘ere, ‘e only wants us to clean is ‘ole aas –’

  I interrupt. ‘Pardon?’ I squeak – I expect celebrities to be debauched but MC Magimix sounds disgusting!

  Edith snaps, ‘Just git over ‘ere! Robert’s gardenin’, Gloria’s goin’ over the rates with Crispian an’ chattin’ about ‘is job an all, an Denise is in ‘is bedroom, she’s bin tryin’ to straighten’ out ‘is waterbed for the last ‘arf hour, an I int doin no aaswork, so that leaves you, so ring ‘Attie ‘Ayter’s an tell ‘er you’ll do ‘er later, then git over ‘ere!’

  Never mind that I’m still over the limit, I scrawl down the address, brush my hair, crawl into my green Datsun and trundle off.

  Hattie Hayter is understanding and when I offer to clean at half-rate she says, ‘Don’t be ridiculous.’

  Twenty minutes later, I crunch up t
he tree-lined driveway leading to Crispian’s white house and park the Datsun in a leafy corner. I expect a sign saying Magimix Towers and grey stone lions guarding the porch and for the doorbell to sing the initial notes of ‘Heartbreaker’ when you press it, but there are no signs, lions, or singing. I ring an ordinary buzzer and four seconds later the red door is flung open and I look into the stunning green contact lenses of MC himself.

  ‘Wotcha!’ says Magimix, but before I can reply, Gloria appears and says, ‘There you are, did you remember your apron? Now, Mr Bartholomew – oh! [simper] Crispy, if you insist! how kind! – Crispy has a soiree tonight and he needs the house pristine, and if we do a satisfactory job, the account is ours. Come along now Ella, don’t stand there – make use of those large capable hands. Hurry, time is money!’

  Money and money, it’s all she ever thinks about. I scowl at Gloria and smile at Crispian – ‘Crispy’ indeed – who steps aside to let me into the hallway.

  ‘Ecstatic to meet you,’ he says, and winks.

  Gloria stares after him like a fox after a hen. Then she says, ‘Start from the top of the house and work your way down. You’ve got three hours to do the best frigging job you’ve ever done in your life. I want him to be able to serve his soiree off the toilet seat.’

  I bite back the response, ‘I believe that’s the norm in media circles,’ and plod upstairs. I peer out of a stained-glass window and see Robert pulling up weeds in a flowerbed. I rap-rap and he looks up but can’t see me. I fling open the window and sing, ‘Woo-ooo!’ He grins and blows me a kiss through mud-stained fingers. I shut the window, still smiling, look up and scream.

  ‘Oh, sorry,’ I gasp. ‘I didn’t see you.’

  MC Magimix laughs and says, ‘Am I that terrifying?’ He has an air of cool confidence and a voice as rich and creamy as a glass of Baileys.

  I blush and say, ‘I was just saying hi to my colleague.’

  MC Magimix drawls, ‘Live dangerously, sweetheart.’ He looks close to a smile.