Hens Dancing

by Raffaella Barker

  ‘What are you doing?’

  Tears spring to my eyes and trickle down face. Am not sure why, but cannot stop crying. David leads me into the kitchen, guides me to a chair and sits holding my uninjured hand.

  ‘What’s happened, Venetia? Are you all right?’

  Weeping now unbridled, and nose begins to drip as well. Have to get a hanky, and find that standing up improves the situation enough for a tragic utterance.

  ‘The mouse bit me.’

  ‘What mouse?’

  I point quavering finger towards the corner of the room most likely to be a rodent hideout: ‘That one.’

  On cue, mini-mouse totters out from under the sink and pauses by a chair to take stock. It is roughly the size of a sugar lump. David calmly places a jam jar over it and a postcard beneath it and removes my arch-enemy without fuss or violence. Having found a bottle of rescue remedy in the cupboard, I am using the drop dispenser as a kind of straw, and am swallowing every last hint of delicious brandy-flavoured flower juice when he comes back in.

  ‘How about a proper drink?’ he says, surveying my red nose and wobbling lip. A splendid idea. I nod eagerly and am poised for a marathon drinking session to start when I suddenly notice the clock.

  ‘Oh, bugger, I can’t. It’s time to go and collect the boys. Some other time, David, thanks.’

  Must still be suffering from slight mouse shock, as when he says, ‘Are you all right to drive, or would you like me to take you?’ I jump at the chance of being a passenger for once.

  Felix is waiting by the gate, socks collapsing around his ankles, knees grass-stained and decorated with several plasters. He waves and jumps about when David’s clattering old Land Rover ambulance grunts into the school car park, and races to greet us.

  ‘Hi, Mum, why did David come? Can I sit in the front?’

  There is in fact nowhere but the front to sit, as the back half of the ambulance does not even have its canvas hood on today, but is heaped with wooden planks and evil-looking saws. Giles is less pleased when we roar through the gates to his part of the school. Hands in pockets, face expressionless, he slowly extracts himself from a group of boys kicking a mini rugby ball and lunges over to us.

  ‘Where’s our car, Mum?’ He ignores David’s cheerful greeting, and Felix’s, and slumps back next to me, closing his eyes and muttering, ‘And I bet you haven’t brought anything for us to eat, have you?’

  Am mortified by his behaviour, and furious.

  ‘Giles, how can you be so graceless? You’re jolly lucky to be collected from school at all. Maybe we’ll just leave you there tomorrow—’

  Pulled up short by glancing down at him to find that he is rubbing his knuckles in his eyes and holding back tears. Am transported to the agonies of my own schooldays, the wrongness of my parents’ car, the wrongness of the parents themselves, and the knockout hunger and exhaustion experienced at the end of a long day. Hand him a packet of biscuits Providence has placed on the dashboard, and put my arm around him.

  September 11th

  I have a vile cold, and it is spoiling what should be a carefree day with The Beauty now that the corporate brochure is safely faxed to the publisher. Throat red and prickly, eyes ditto and am experiencing non-specific pain, gloom and self-pity. Hope it is not delayed Weil’s disease. Have consumed three Lemsips, two hot toddies, each with at least two inches of whisky, and six spoonfuls of cough mixture and it is still not lunchtime. The Beauty rises from her morning sleep much refreshed, and I follow her around the house for a while, blowing my nose every thirty seconds and putting on another jersey each time we pass one of the piles of clothing which are dotted about the hall and landing.

  ‘Bouffe,’ squeals The Beauty, body-surfing through a heap of vests and socks at the top of the stairs. Felix was her dresser this morning, and his choice of flouncy skirt, hairgrip and his own old Aertex shirt give her a very adorable St Trinian’s look. The Beauty is on riotous form, and pays scant heed to me, coughing and sneezing on the top stair. She has engineered that her pram shall be upstairs, and is a tank commander, driving it through every obstacle, crashing against walls and door frames as she pursues her aim of world domination, starting with my bedroom. I lie on my bed groaning and overflowing with self-pity until a slender-heeled and mud-caked shoe hits me in the midriff.

  ‘Oooh,’ The Beauty cries, poised with its pair for another grenade attack.

  ‘Ow, you little monster.’ Rage hardens me against her instant sobs and I march out of the room with her under my arm, determined at last to put the washing away. Trap her in the empty bath, where she immediately cheers up and starts pretending to wash her hair.

  I trudge about, becoming increasingly bowed beneath vast piles of clean laundry, and wishing my life was less pedestrian and more like Rose’s, when inspiration suddenly strikes. What I need is a laundry room, of the sort generally found in the nether regions of stately homes. Start hurling washing onto the spare-room bed and quickly use up my piles. Make a dash through all the upstairs rooms looking for more clothes to add. The spare-room bed will act as a giant clothes holding station for all of us. No more boring folding and putting away of garments; I shall simply chuck them onto the heap and send Felix, Giles and The Beauty in to select their outfits when necessary. We will all dress and undress in the holding station, and dirty laundry will vanish into the bedroom’s en suite loo until I can be bothered to take it down to the washing machine.

  September 14th

  Spend the morning harvesting lavender with The Beauty hovering at a distance with her wheelbarrow and some sand. She has found a pair of gardening gloves, and has huge fun dipping them in a puddle and then cuddling them. God knows what she thinks they are, amphibious dolls, perhaps? Bees drone about nearby, the sun shines and the heady, feel-good scent of lavender fills the air and I am sure begins to work its magic on my cold. Leave lavender in a heap in the hall until can think of something to do with it. Lavender bread, perhaps? Or lavender bags. Could become upstanding member of the WI with schemes such as these. Linger outside, admiring nature. Someone has lit a bonfire nearby, and gusts of smoke scent puff across the garden and through the lavender, until even the lawn and the trees are grey and softened.

  September 17th

  Am proud of our pig husbandry. We have had the piglets almost a month now, and they are a credit to us. They simply get on with life, rootling and grunting, scratching or snoozing under their garage-door roof. One of the fruitcakes has made a good wallow next to the water trough and is lying in it, a neat tidemark making him look as if he has been dipped in dirty cream.

  Leave them and saunter up to the orchard with The Beauty to pick some windfalls. We count the apples into the bucket and The Beauty throws them out again, guffawing and seeking applause. The garden is suffused with a rich, damp earth smell, and the golden afternoon light sparkles through wet leaves and petals until the borders are wreathed in precious jewels. One or two horse mushrooms gleam in the grass, and squatting over them in admiration The Beauty is a Teletubby lookalike in her purple dungarees with her paintbrush topknot. All is blissful.

  I take a deep breath and begin to panic. Am suddenly assailed by dreadful cabin fever. I have not spoken to a human being over five feet tall and ten years old for four days. My cultural references are down to one toddler’s TV programme, I haven’t read a book or seen a film for months. I can only cook fish fingers and macaroni cheese and have forgotten what grown-ups eat, let alone how you cook it. All my clothes have holes in them, all my shoes are covered in mud and many are no longer pairs, having been requisitioned by The Beauty for dressing up in. A glance at the mirror in the downstairs loo reveals terrible wire-wool hair in need of much expensive attention. Remember that I have not dared open the sunroof in the car for weeks now in case I accidentally catch sight of my grizzled locks. I must go to London and improve myself. Immediately.

  Fate has placed a glossy magazine next to the telephone. I open it at the beauty pages, among which I rem
ember seeing an article about a new hairdresser in a very expensive shopping street. Moments later I have booked myself into the Concept Salon, where my hair will be serviced and I will also be massaged and generally mollycoddled. What heaven. I ring Rose to share the great news and she is delighted.

  ‘I’ve been longing to go there. You are clever to have organised it. I’ll come and meet you afterwards, then we can go and buy things.’

  Can’t wait for this day of girlie hedonism.

  September, 19th

  Any residual guilt feelings at the amounts of money I hope to spend on my outing with Rose vanish when I receive a telephone call from Mo Loam’s Temple of Beauty, where I have had an appointment for an overhaul since practically the dawn of time. The High Priestess has apparently fallen off her pedestal and broken her collarbone, so no beauty magic will be dispensed until after Christmas.

  ‘Don’t say that horrible word,’ I shriek at the assistant priestess who rings, ‘I can’t think about Christmas now.’

  Although I had utterly forgotten my assignation with La Loam and would have missed the appointment anyway, as I have not written it down anywhere, I am still furious not to have it to look forward to.

  ‘We’ll book you in for February 12th then,’ purrs sub-priestess, ignoring my whingeing with regal serenity. ‘Do please now give me your credit card number so I can take a deposit. It’s thirty-five pounds, and is redeemable against Loam products.’

  Am so gobsmacked that I do exactly as she tells me, and afterwards find a tiny crumb of satisfaction in having accidentally paid for it from Charles’s account in my confusion.

  September 23rd

  Have cleverly timed trip to London to coincide with Gawain’s preview party. Cleverness is accidental, as I had most unfortunately used my invitation to the show to splatter a superwasp on the kitchen window sill and was forced to throw it away weeks ago, but Rose has the date etched on her soul and is determined to take me there in new clothes.

  Read the beginning of Frederica by G. Heyer, and the whole of Hello! on the train, revelling in the atmosphere of serenity in my carriage, where there are only five passengers, all reading, all drinking coffee. Escaping to London during term-time, leaving my mother and Egor holding the fort, is a rest cure in itself, and hysteria ebbs as the train thunders away from home and the school run towards shops, hairdressers and cinemas. Am, of course, very keen to do culture as well as retail therapy, and have even made a plan to meet Lila at the Royal Academy tomorrow. Make a list of everything I want to buy as the train pulls into London and realise that I will have to marry a millionaire or win the lottery in the next twenty minutes if I am to achieve even a fifth of the desired purchases.

  The Concept Salon is terrifying. I enter through a mirrored door, deliberately not looking at myself, and am suddenly in a vast white room like a photographic studio or an operating theatre. Everything is white: the floor, the chairs, the frames round the huge mirrors, even the brooms wielded by the juniors. My dress, forties floral crepe, with a tiny hole under one arm, which looked utterly chic and bohemian when I left home, now feels like an item from a jumble sale. Which, of course, it is. Jude, my hair technician, approaches, as if from the future, his white-blond hair sleeked back to touch the collar of his silver neoprene bodysuit. He is chillingly beautiful. I wish I had worn my wetsuit, and succumb to his ministrations.

  Rose does not recognise me when she enters the café we have arranged to meet in. I watch her scan the room, missing me because I am the eiptome of blissed-out cool after a head massage, a manicure and a complete hair overhaul. Have purchased a red wool jacket to hide my bag-lady dress, and with new highlighted, sleek fair hair I feel as groomed as a Hitchcock blonde. Raise a sultry eyebrow at Rose and she shrieks and rushes over.

  ‘My God, you look amazing. How did they do that? It’s fantastic. I can’t believe it.’

  Am torn between delight at how impressed she is and irritation at how surprised she is.

  ‘I asked him to make me look like him, and he said he couldn’t but he’d do the next best thing. I don’t think he even realised how vain he sounded.’ Rose and I giggle hysterically, and are too overexcited to drink our cinnamon-flavoured coffee. We depart and plunge into a wild afternoon of extravagance. Am astonished at how quickly I adapt from rustic hayseed to town-bronzed sophisti-cat; wielding my credit card like a machete in the urban jungle, I am soon forging ahead in the smart-bag count. The final purchase is the most fraught and the most rewarding, in a shop where the assistant looks at me as if I am Sidney the cat walking in with a decapitated rabbit in my jaws. She stalks up and sticks her nose in my ear as I examine a rail of clothes. ‘Can I help you?’

  Determined not to be intimidated, I turn on my heel and walk across to the changing room, grabbing the nearest garment.

  ‘I’ll try this,’ I say languidly, and shut myself in the cubicle.

  I have brought in a fluid, strappy ink-blue dress. Size ten. Completely unsuitable for me, being the wrong size and totally impractical. It also costs more than a washing machine. There is no way I can have it. What the hell, I may as well try it on. It slides onto my body and hangs from my shoulders, a vision of chic slenderness, a caress of wondrous fabric. I love it with all my heart, mostly because it is size ten, but also because it is truly heaven. I must have it. I must. In a fever of adrenalin I dress myself and rush to the cash till brandishing my credit card. The girl slides the card through the machine and stands surveying her perfect nails while the machine grunts and sighs. Affecting disdain, I too survey my nails and try to control my panting breaths. Am sure something will prevent me from having this scrap of pleasure, this tiny size-ten indulgence. Sure enough, Perfect Nails is calling for assistance.

  ‘Your card has been declined. Do you have any other means of paying?’ The paper bag with my dress inside it is on the counter between us. She taps her fingers on it possessively. I try to look nonchalant again.

  ‘Oh dear, what a bore, I can’t think why that’s happened. There’s plenty of money in my account. Masses, in fact,’ I lie, beginning to perspire in my red wool jacket. ‘Can I write a cheque?’

  The girl arches her perfect brows. ‘Not if this is your cheque card,’ she says softly, her tone especially designed to make me feel like a Category A criminal. Am now close to tears and cannot think what to do. Fumble for a tissue as my nose begins to drip. Can’t find one. Use the back of my hand.

  ‘What’s the matter, Venetia? Why are you taking so long?’ Had utterly forgotten Rose’s existence from the moment she popped out to the chemist until now, when she has popped back in looking alarmed. Salvation. Explain my crimes to her and stand at her elbow watching with ill-suppressed delight as she flings her card at the assistant.

  ‘Here, I’ll do it. You can write me a cheque, Venetia.’ Could swear that Perfect Nails is disappointed; she would rather lose her commission than see me walk out with the dress.

  ‘Let’s go and drink cocktails and look at everything,’ says Rose, and I hurry after her through the streets and into a bar, rejoicing that it is six in the evening and I have no childcare ahead of me. No bathtime, no de-nitting, no evening of ironing. I can drink Americanos in smart hotels until dawn if I like. I do like; so does Rose.

  September 24th

  Thumping hangover not improved by the arrival of Theo at my bedside at seven in the morning. He is clutching a book, a pair of red wellingtons and a plastic train.

  ‘Thomas the Tanker. You read it and take me for a walk,’ he urges. ‘Come on. I say you read it.’

  Groan and turn over. ‘Go and find Daddy, Theo, he’ll read it, he didn’t get drunk last night.’

  ‘You’re a silly old lush,’ says the tiny tormentor before departing. Am rather impressed by his vocabulary and repeat his words to Rose when we meet some time later in the kitchen. She rolls her eyes.

  ‘He copies everything. He heard Tristan saying it to me because I couldn’t get up this morning.’

  A
morning at the Royal Academy with Lila prancing about in ballet pumps and a black polo neck as if she is Audrey Hepburn does nothing for the hangover, but an afternoon at Rose’s health club sees it off. Am able to approach Gawain’s party with poise and courage thanks to the hour spent sweating out poisons in a seaweed wrap. New dress and new hair give the final boost, and I arrive at the gallery with Rose and Tristan, my heart thumping in excited anticipation at the thought of the ravishing, prizewinning portrait of me.

  The show is in a room much less intimidating than the Concept hairdressers’, more like a big sitting room and painted the colour of wet sand. I see Gawain at the other side and begin to thread confidently between throngs of guests to greet him. Feel as if I do this all the time, and, more importantly, am sure I look as if I was born to go to cocktail parties. Hooray, am ready for a top-notch evening, and will flirt with everyone. Huge fun. A shadow looms, quite literally, and Charles appears in my path, blocking my view of everything except his ghastly sidekick. Helena bobs and titters like a small tugboat at his elbow.