by Sue Watson
10 - Cake Volcanoes and Marital Eruptions
Tom’s reaction to my departure from Media World was not the one I’d hoped for.
“That was a bit hasty, Stella,” he said when he got in late, hanging his coat up and pouring a beer, “are you sure it was the right thing to do?”
I was surprised and hurt. He’d banged on at me so much about giving up work and being the perfect wife and mother, I had expected him to be as pleased as me.
“But Tom, now I can be at home with Grace every day.” I said, incredulous.
“That’s all very well, but what about your salary? I didn’t mean you to quit your job without something else to go to,” he muttered.
Surprise descended quickly into anger. “Tom, you were the one who went on about me not fulfilling my duties as wife and mother and anyway, that suspension was just a smokescreen whilst MJ worked out how to get rid of me for good. My career was over from the moment she was promoted. I’m now just trying to do the right thing, for me and for us!” I yelled.
“You don’t know that your career is over, you’ve just had enough. All you ever think about Stella, is yourself.”
“What? But I thought we’d talked about this?”
“No Stella, YOU talked about it. How can you just throw in your job like that? In this climate?” he ranted.
“How can you say I just threw it in? You aren’t listening Tom – MJ suspended me, pending investigation. Even if I was reinstated, I would have had her on my case 24/7 and that would have been unbearable.” I said, amazed.
“Stella, ‘unbearable’ is working down a mine eight hours a day.”
“Oh that’s right, belittle everything…”
“I just don’t want to hear any more of this. I have to sort out my camera batteries for the morning as I’m the only breadwinner now – or had you forgotten?”
With that, he stormed out of the kitchen and I heard slamming upstairs. I sat down in the sudden quiet and laid my head on my arms at the table. What had just happened? I thought he’d be pleased. I thought he’d agree that I could now be a proper mum – and a proper wife. I thought this would be good for our marriage, but right now it felt like another nail in the coffin.
Tom and I didn’t really speak over the weekend. I was still annoyed and I think he was sulking, but we had a good time with Grace.
On Monday morning the phone rang as I made breakfast.
“Oh Stella, it’s all over Media World!” yelled Lizzie, the second I answered. “I got in early and people are already talking about it. The cleaners are still trying to get peach out of the carpet. And MJ – well, let’s just say she hasn’t appeared yet. I am so proud of you!”
“Thanks Lizzie!” I beamed. “I’ll call you later. Got to go – I’m taking Grace to school.”
I took Princess Grace to the school gate and chatted to the other mums. So immersed was I in this new role that before I knew it I was asking if a few of her little friends would like to come to tea that evening and to my delight, three of the mums seemed very eager to have an evening off. I walked home, contemplating my new goal, which was to reach new heights in mummy-ness. I would achieve this by attending school assemblies, peeling two kinds of organic veg and baking a Victoria sponge all in the same day – every day! On a slightly selfish note, I could see that my emotional and celebrity well-being would also be taken care of because, as I discovered to my deep joy when I got back to the house, I now had precious time to analyse Heat and Hello! from cover to cover each week without merely flicking and rushing through the juicy bits.
Once I had devoured the magazines and come to the conclusion that celebrities didn’t have cellulite, ‘Demi’s Ageing-Knee Nightmare’ required a double above-knee amputation and that ‘Posh’s Bony Body Hell’ would be cured by the regular consumption of cake, I thought I would have a little experiment in the kitchen. I was in need of something sweet so I pulled out all my ingredients and created a fabulous, honey-scented chocolate cake with a gooey, frosted topping worthy of Delia. I even had the time and patience to make tiny striped sugar bees to decorate it. The sponge was dense and moist, yet – though I say it myself – had a delicious lightness.
Chocolate cake and soap stars aside, money was clearly going to be another matter. My husband seemed to be under the impression that I wasn’t taking our financial position seriously enough. I decided to extend the olive branch but when I called his mobile at lunchtime to let him know how well I was doing in my new career as a Yummy Mummy, I didn’t get the reaction I hoped for.
“Now you’ve left work you need to tighten your belt, Stella,” he said, mouth full of sandwich. “I’ve got to go. We’ll discuss this later.” I hung up, feeling annoyed again.
All afternoon I kept checking the time, leaving home at exactly 3pm so I could be the perfect mummy waiting outside the school gates at 3.15 to pick up Grace and her friends Emma, Lauren and Katie. OK, I was actually there at 3.20, but that was only because some 80-year old man in front of me in his car decided to drive at five miles an hour the whole way down the high street. Grace still seemed happy (and I have to admit a little surprised) to see me arrive only slightly late. She was so used to my life of chaos it would take time for us both to adjust.
I had spent much of the day planning this evening as I wanted everything to be perfect. I planned to make little pink fairy cakes with the girls so had all the ingredients and everything laid out ready to go. When we arrived home, everything was pink and gorgeous and the girls threw themselves into the project with gusto.
“Mmm, your Mummy makes such nice cakes, Grace,” I heard Katie say later as I popped to the kitchen to refill the plates, and my heart swelled with pride. Once they had finished eating (I tried to ignore the food fight that ensued) we started on the ‘craft’ element of the party: I had planned for us all to make lots of pretty things with sequins.
I really should have known I was onto a loser with the pink arts and craft, when at breakfast, Princess Grace announced that she was now a ‘Goth.’ It seemed that whilst I’d been busy working, my little princess had moved on from her baby-pink fixation and turned into a dark, shadowy figure of the night. In denial, I continued to wax lyrical about pink napkins and matching crockery for tea, but my only daughter cruelly rejected my pastel advances.
“Mum, can we have stick-on tattoos instead of those boring old sequins? Pleeeease – they’re so uncool?”
So my dream of a pink and perfect teatime ended with me painstakingly sticking glitter onto polystyrene ‘Fabergé eggs’ while tattooed children rode the neighbour’s cat round the garden and fed the fish ‘magic-sequin’ food.
Whilst Grace and her friends were screaming obscenities at each other outside, I abandoned the eggs and gave Mum a ring.
“Grace has taken to wearing burgundy lipstick and studded wrist-bands at the weekend, which I tell myself is all about healthy self-expression – isn’t it?” I wailed.
“Hmmm. Stella, I think she may be having a ‘mid-childhood crisis’.” Mum replied dramatically. “I read an article about it in this week’s Womans Own.”
Within minutes we were both in a frenzy and at the end of the conversation I was convinced Grace was going through an emotional life-stage trauma. I needed a large slice of my bee-covered sponge after that call.
Al, who I called straight after, my mouth full of gooey chocolate, was more optimistic: “My darling, inside every Emo, there’s a cheerleader just itching to get out. Give it time honey, you’ll see.”
I hoped he was right. Just before the first mother arrived to pick up her sequin-covered child I went onto the Internet and bought a set of pink pompoms which I would stash in the back of my wardrobe to wait in the wings for that glorious day.
Anyway, whatever she currently was, I refused to take on any ex-working-mother guilt about Grace’s ‘individuality.’ Yes, of course I’d rather she was more Hannah Montana than Amy Winehouse but a mother couldn’t have everything. And I was now doing my bit, as fr
om that day I resolved that she’d be delivered to school on time (most days) that we wouldn’t ever forget her games kit again (well, rarely) and I would always be a well-groomed, calm and unruffled Yummy Mummy (sort of).
After Grace’s friends left, the two of us collapsed exhausted on the sofa. Grace cuddled up to me.
“Thanks for today, Mummy, it was great having you pick me up. I like it much more than going to After School Club.”
I smiled at her. “I love being at home with you too, sweetie.” I thought I would burst with pleasure. After Tom’s negative reaction about my departure from work I was beginning to wonder if I’d done the right thing; this confirmed it. “I’m so glad you’re happy. You must tell Daddy,” I said, rather sneakily.
Despite my warm mother-daughter glow it wasn’t long before Tom’s financial paranoia crept to the forefront of my mind. This made me worry about Grace’s forthcoming birthday so, as we picked sequins up off the kitchen floor, I broached the matter with her.
“Sweetie, now I’m not working, I don’t think we’re going to be able to buy everything on your pressie list,” I said, waiting for the bomb to go off. Grace looked at me thoughtfully.
“I’m ok with not having EVERYTHING on my list,” she conceded, to my huge relief. “As long as I can still have my big, birthday disco-party.”
She fluttered a handful of sequins into the air and they landed on the floor at about the same time as my heart, which landed with a bump.
“But sweetie,” I started, “I think we might need to have a smaller party now, at home.”
“Mummy, you promised we could have a big room. Don’t you remember? It was last year when you couldn’t do a party ’cos you were at work. You said, you did,” and her bottom lip began to tremble.
“But Grace, now I’m not working we won’t be able to afford…” I started.
“You said, you said we could wear grass skirts and flowers round our necks and…and that I could have a reeeeally big cake…like a volcano. Don’t you remember? I’ve told all my friends now, Mummy!”
I did recall invites and something vaguely Hawaiian being discussed when Tom and Grace visited Rochdale a few weeks before and Grace clearly remembered it all in detail. I felt so bad.
“I know we talked about it but we don’t have enough money now. I’m so sorry sweetie.” But I could see she had started crying and I wasn’t far from tears either, plus I couldn’t bear to have my ‘Best Mummy’ badge ripped from me so soon. “I’ll talk to Daddy when he gets home and I’m sure he’ll say it’s OK.” This seemed to stem the tears – temporarily at least – and Grace wiped her eyes and stomped upstairs to get ready for bed.
As I carried on picking up sequins one by one, my mind was now filled with strategies and schemes. How could I not grant my daughter her only wish? But this was going to be a tough one; since Monday’s big departure, Tom’s financial sanctions were now in full throttle and there was no way I could get a full-blown ‘big birthday disco’ under his all-seeing radar. Perhaps the only way to approach this was with complete honesty. I knew room hire, a cake and buffet would set us back £400 minimum.
Aware I needed to start this ball rolling immediately, I waited until Tom was home and Grace was safely in bed. I decided to bring up the ‘big birthday disco with price tag’ as Tom wrestled with the remote control and gasped with something akin to sexual excitement at a ball and twenty-two men on the screen.
“Tom, we need to talk,” I said, sounding like some psycho-babbling glamourpuss from an American mini-series. He didn’t look up; apparently they were doing something with penalties and he lunged forward to save one and at the same time blocked me out, waving his hand at me like he was swatting a fly.
“Tom,” I said, louder and more angry now. “It’s Grace’s birthday next weekend and she wants a party.”
He glanced vaguely in my direction and muttered the two words that it would appear were closest to his heart: “How much?”
“About two hundred-ish,” I answered, knowing that the real price would cause heart failure, extreme distress and quite possibly an emergency call to the Air Ambulance to have him choppered out.
“Two hundred pounds? You are kidding?” he said without taking his eyes off the ball.
“No. I’m not kidding. This is important. I promised her she could have one and…”
“Aaagh,” he shouted, bouncing off the sofa and thumping the floor with his open hand. Apparently the other team had scored.
“She wants a Hawaiian theme and cake volcano and we owe it to her,” I said, through gritted teeth. “And Tom, we need to hire a venue, I mean, it just wouldn’t be possible to create a Hawaiian haven in the back garden.”
“Stella, we are not hiring a room. For God’s sake, it’s only a ninth birthday party! We can’t afford it and that’s final!” he yelled between goals. Then he must have felt bad shouting at me because he looked over and said, more calmly, “Why can’t she have her party in the garden like other kids?”
“Tom, you can’t hold a disco in a garden. What about all the lights and things? And besides, it would probably rain!”
“I’d love Grace to have a big birthday party, but I think it’s more important that we keep the house,” he said sarcastically.
“Tom, you’re so bloody practical – and selfish – and boring!” I screamed, storming back into the kitchen to arrange decorative limes on the granite worktop. He couldn’t see that this wasn’t just about Grace’s birthday party; it was about me wanting to do right by her after all the time I’d missed and about us doing something fun as a family. I was still racked by unworthy-mother guilt. I didn’t agree with Tom, Grace did need her Birthday luau, and I was going to make sure she got it – with or without her father’s help.
I woke up the next day and decided to take matters into my own hands.
Grace was going to a friend’s house after school (and would no doubt be painting her lips and nails black whilst planning her first tattoo) so I took the bull by the horns and approached a small local hotel regarding her party. They came up with what I considered to be a very reasonable Mount Etna-style buffet for thirty children in a Honolulu-style setting for £250. I booked the venue there and then but nearly fainted at the price of creating a spectacular volcano cake. They wanted a further £175 so I promised to ‘talk it over with my husband’ and left.
As I arrived home, clutching my receipt for the venue, I felt slightly nauseous. I knew I was still working on the Oprah-esque ‘take charge of your own destiny’ thing but I couldn’t stop myself worrying about what Tom would say and dreading another eruption over grass skirts and cake volcanoes.
Walking into the sitting room, I saw that Tom was home from work and hard at it, about to bat against Pakistan. I watched him twitching in the chair, knowing I needed to get him off the pitch and convince him that Grace’s party was absolutely vital for all our emotional well-being. He also needed to get it into his thick skull that Hawaii was not a theme to be taken lightly; we were talking tropical fruit-filled paradise in the bowels of Bromsgrove, and believe me that didn’t come cheap.
“Hi,” I ventured, sitting on the sofa nearby and trying vainly to attract his attention.
“Christ, they’re giving us a run for their money!” he announced, to no one in particular.
“Talking of money,” I saw the opening and raised my voice, “I’ve just booked a hotel, for Grace’s birthday. It was only £250 which I think was quite reasonable,” I gabbled and biting the bullet added, “plus another £175 for the cake.”
His initial response, in between runs, overs and wickets, was silence.
“I said, I have just paid for…” I started again.
“I heard what you said,” he snapped. “I just don’t believe it, Stella.”
I felt the tremor underfoot – this was going to blow, so I stomped out of the sitting room and into the kitchen. On safer ground, no leather on willow here, I switched on my nice, comforting kettle but to my surpris
e, Tom appeared in the doorway. For him to abandon England to carry on without him during a vital cricket match was unprecedented, and for just a moment – a teeny tiny one – I realised the enormity of what I’d done.
“Have you any idea how much money we have?” he said. Then without waiting for an answer, he continued, “We have almost nothing Stella! We’ve had a couple of expensive years and now, without your salary, there will be nothing left in the bank at the end of the month. Do you understand? NOTHING!”
Even in this awful moment I was amazed at how animated this made him and couldn’t help but think it would be nice to see this kind of passion in other areas of our life.
“You have no income Stella – what if you were on your own?” he continued, more calmly, like he was about to die or something. God, I thought, he’s been coughing a bit recently, I hope he’s OK.
“You and Grace are a huge responsibility and it worries me.”
This was the perfect opening to make him see my point. “Tom, I told you it’s what Grace wants, and I feel…”
He slowly walked towards me, his hands held out in despair.
“You feel? Always about you, isn’t it, Stella? What about how I feel? About how I lie awake at night worrying about the mortgage, bills, car tax, all those boring things that don’t interest you? Go on Stella, tell me, what do we do now? You’re the one who tossed her job down the drain and instead of trying to find something else, you’ve immediately spent several hundred pounds we don’t have.” This was becoming ever so slightly scary because Tom always knew what to do. For him to ask my advice on monthly finance issues was bizarre and unsettling. “You must have a plan,” he continued, “because I sure as hell don’t!”
“If you have a problem with a birthday cake shaped like a volcano and costing £175 then perhaps you shouldn’t have had a child!” I shrieked, slamming plates into the dishwasher like something from a Greek wedding. Tom just stared at me and walked back into the living room.
