by Shari Low
I wouldn’t change a thing and I’ve never doubted for one moment that we were meant to be together. Mark is my penguin. Or my swan. Or whatever bloody bird it is that only has one love and mates for life. And the thing that I love most about him? It could be that he accepts me for what I am–warts, cellulite, irrational obsession with reality TV and all. It could be that he’s a genuinely decent bloke who couldn’t shaft someone if his life depended on it. It could be that he has the best buttocks I’ve ever seen. God bless all those teenage games of footie down the park. It could be that there’s no one on earth whom I’d rather was the father of my children.
But honestly? I love him because it just feels right. Oh, okay, the buttocks help.
And luckily he’s the most non-jealous easy-going man in the universe, because some of my exes have become really good friends. Nick, obviously, on the grounds that he’s married to one of my best pals. Joe and his partner Claus now own nightclubs all over the world, including one in London, so they pop in regularly for dinner. Phil and Lily still live in New York and we do the whole ‘Christmas card, drunken phone call every three months’ thing.
And Sam…Bugger, my mobile phone was ringing. ‘Don’t move,’ I screamed at Kate, still conscious of the fact that if she pulled a muscle while in that position she was going to have to have a very open-minded physiotherapist.
I snatched it from beside the coffee machine, burning my hand in the process.
‘Hello,’ I wailed.
‘Is that Carly Cooper, literary genius and all-round sex-goddess?’ drawled those familiar transatlantic vowels.
‘Nope, it’s Carly Cooper, crap columnist, bored off her tits and wouldn’t know a good shag if I won it in a tombola.’ I was trying to be casual, but I have to admit, I was more than a bit freaked out. It was the second time that some kind of weird psychic synergy had cropped up that morning. And I MUST remember to stop divulging intimate details about my sex life to my pals.
‘Ah, well, that may be about to change, my darling.’
‘Which bit?’ I asked, puzzled.
‘All of it, my love.’ His English accent was back. The one that teenage girls lusted over, middle-aged women fantasised about, and men (except those in Joe and Claus’s very-camp camp) despised. You see, on the other end of the line was Sam Morton, male hooker turned international A-list movie star, by way of a screenplay he wrote about his life that went on to become a movie with him in the leading role. Obviously the world was ready for a male take on Pretty Woman (with the most amazing abs on God’s earth thrown in for good measure) because it grossed over $100 million. Sam had made the Big Time.
‘Oh yeah, and how’s that, Mr Big Shot Movie Star?’
Kate and Carol realised who I was talking to and shouted a simultaneous ‘Hi Sam!’ in the background.
He laughed. ‘Tell the girls I said hi. Oh, I suddenly got a twinge of homesickness then.’
‘Yeah, cos it’s really tough spending all day shopping on Rodeo Drive and having your ego stroked by young, pneumatic starlets,’ I retorted. ‘Anyway, enough about you, tell me why my life’s about to change?’
‘That’s what I’ve always loved about you–your depth, humility and your interest in the lives of your friends,’ he said.
‘Sam, I’m sitting in a semi in London on a cold, rainy day having a mid-life crisis about the pitiful state of my existence. You, on the other hand, have probably just disembarked from your chauffeur-driven limo after spending the night in the VIP lounge of an exclusive club, having free Cristal champagne chugged down your neck while your adoring masses worship at your Pradaclad tootsies. Forgive me if I don’t feel your pain. Now, I have to go and collect Benny from nursery, so much as I love you madly and would adore to extend this cosy chat I must leave. Go call up Julia Roberts for a blether.’
‘Nah, I’d hate to wake her–her twins have been giving her sleepless nights over the last couple of weeks so she’s exhausted. Anyway, I haven’t told you how your life’s about to change yet.’
‘Oh, I thought you were just being your usual optimistic, dramatic self.’
‘No, it was a statement of fact. Remember I told you that I gave a copy of Nipple Alert to my agent? Well, he loves it, he thinks he can sell it and he reckons it’ll be huge. He wants you in Hollywood, Carly Cooper.’
I was stunned. My chin was down somewhere around my knees.
‘Wha—Whe—’
He was still laughing on the other end of the line.
‘No rush, honey. Any time later this week would be just fine.’
Oh. My. God. I was going. To Hollywood. To fame. To stardom. To success. To Jackie and Sidney, my biological parents.
After all these years, the mother-ship was finally calling me home.
Step Two
There are two things in life that I know inside out: one is the local kiddies’ indoor play area and the other is my husband. He doesn’t like change. He doesn’t do spontaneity. He definitely doesn’t do plain fecking crazy. So I did have the wherewithal to recognise that if I ambushed him with the grand announcement that we were all off to Hollywood the very minute he walked in the door he’d be about as thrilled as J.Lo in anything polyester.
So I waited until he’d dumped his briefcase at the door, hung up his jacket and kicked off his shoes before me and the kids did a conga past him singing, ‘We’re all off to LA, we’re all off to LA, da da da da da, HO, da da, da, da, da.’
He laughed, that gorgeous face crinkling up into a grin that gave me goose bumps. Mac threw himself into his daddy’s arms. ‘Daddy, daddy, we’re going to Hollywood and, and…’ he was in a frenzy by this time, ‘Mickey Mouse is there, and, and Pluto and, and Spiderman and, and, and…’ He didn’t get a chance to finish. Wisely, Mark recognised that such an extreme level of excitement could mean only one thing: incontinence. He whisked Mac into the downstairs loo before he peed his pants.
‘Spiderman, Spiderman, does whatever a spider can…’ sang wee Benny in something approaching the cartoon’s theme tune. What did that say about me as a mother? Could they rhyme off the birds in the skies? No. Could they spot a petunia at a hundred paces? No. Could they tell you the name of the Prime Minister? No. But they could win Junior Pop Idol by chanting the theme tunes to every cartoon that was ever made.
We definitely had to get out more. Oh well, in LA we’d be far too busy surfing and going to Tom Hanks’s house for tea to spend any time in front of the box.
‘So, do you want to tell me what’s going on?’ said Mark when he emerged from the downstairs loo. He didn’t look too pleased and I guessed that it probably had something to do with the damp patch on the front of his Hugo Boss suit. Damn.
‘Sam called today–his agent has read Nipple Alert and feels sufficiently excited by it to request that I come over to LA while he promotes it to the world’s biggest movie studios. I’ve done a cost-versus-risk analysis and while it is, of course, a speculative journey, I feel that it has sufficient merit to warrant extracting funds from our account and making the trip. I’ve cleared it with our accountant who has confirmed that a large portion of the outlay will indeed be tax deductible. I recommend that we start scouring the internet immediately in order to minimise our outlay by booking the most economical flights available and use the air miles that we’ve accumulated over the years to further reduce costs. I would anticipate leaving in approximately three weeks, giving you plenty of time to clear your current caseload.’
You just know I’m lying, don’t you? Was it the ‘cost-versus-risk analysis’ bit that gave it away?
What I actually said, in a babbling rushed voice that was donated especially for the occasion by the Gods of Helium, was, ‘Sam called, we’re going to LA, they want my book, Mark, they want my book! Oh my God, I can’t breathe! Anyway, so we have to go to LA and we have to go this week, so I looked on the internet and all the flights are fully booked, so fuck it, I used my credit card and got us all on a flight on Friday, business class, British Air
ways. You get those lie-down seats and free pyjamas. And your own telly screen. And, oh my God, Mark, I’m so excited. I haven’t found us anywhere to live yet, but Sam says we can stay with him till we find somewhere. Can you believe it, Mark, can you believe it?’ At which point I spun round, reached behind me for his hands, slapped them on my arse, grabbed wee Benny and started another conga, singing, ‘We’re all going to LA, we’re all going to LA, da da da da da, HO, da da da da da…’
I was halfway into the kitchen before I realised that Mark wasn’t behind me.
I stopped, turned around and saw that he was still standing at the end of the hall, and the whole ‘crinkled-up cute grin’ thing he had going was definitely gone.
‘Pardon?’ he said.
I knew I was clutching at straws, but for a few seconds I hoped that it wasn’t a pardon in the ‘for fuck’s sake, have you lost your mind’ sense and more one in the ‘sorry darling, in all the excitement I missed some of that last statement–free pyjamas, did you say?’.
‘What bit did you miss?’ I asked hopefully.
‘The bit where my wife lost the plot altogether and, if I understand correctly, booked flights we can’t afford, for a trip we can’t take, on the premise that some agent thinks that her book might, perhaps, maybe appeal to someone in the movies.’ Then his tone changed altogether. ‘Incidentally, congratulations on that part, honey, you deserve it.’
‘Thanks,’ I mumbled.
‘Carly, I’m sorry but I can’t take any time off right now. You might not have noticed, since the last time you asked me about my work was about three years ago…’
Ouch. Bulls-eye in the dartboard of brutal honesty for Mr Barwick.
‘…but I actually have a lot on my plate just now and there’s no way that I can…’
‘We’re all going to LA, we’re all going to LA, da da da da da, HO, da da da da da, HO.’
It was Mac, on the way through the hall, having divested himself of his wet undergarments and replaced them with a Batman suit.
Benny spotted him. And, naturally, burst into song.
‘Da na na na Da na na na Da na na na Da na na na BATMAN!’
Woah. My husband and I were in crisis talks, having one of the most important discussions we’d had in years and I couldn’t hear a word he was saying because I was stuck in the family home equivalent of Nickelodeon Channel hell.
And said husband was looking at me like he was trying to decide whether to have me certified or shot.
How to play this? I could shout, I could holler, I could blackmail. I was sure I had some dodgy photos of him somewhere. In the end, I decided to let one of my other personalities take over. If anyone could swing this, it was Saint Carly of the Blessed Martyrdom.
‘But Mark, we have to go. Come on, please. Mark, look at my life. I cook, I clean, I organise your life and I spend most of my day dealing with the aftermath of other people’s body fluids.’
Mac and Benny had the decency to hang their heads at this point.
‘This could be great! This could be our big chance for financial reward, for a life of fame and stardom, for glitz and glamour…’
I could see I wasn’t winning, so I pulled out my trump card.
‘…for a NANNY!’
He still didn’t blink. God, he was good. Saint Carly gave it one last shot.
‘Come on, babe. In five years I’ve never asked you to do anything for me. Do this for me, please.’
His face softened. I could taste victory. We were going! Now where was my passport, my travel adaptor and the list I got off the internet of all the stars’ Hollywood addresses?
Or maybe not.
‘Carly, I’m sorry. I’m really pleased that they’re interested in your book, but we can’t go just now. Mac has school. I have work. I can’t just take time off on a whim. And most of all, we can’t afford it. Can’t you tell them we’ll come over in a few months’ time when we’re a bit more organised and on our feet?’
Over my dead Tinseltown-bound body!
‘But we can’t. Mark, Hollywood doesn’t work that way!’ said I, trying to sound like I knew what I was talking about. I’d seen Fresh Prince of Bel-Air twice, I watched Beverly Hills 90210 for years and I never missed an episode of Baywatch; I was a seasoned LA veteran.
I took a huge breath then went on the offensive.
‘Mark, they’re interested in me this week, but it’ll be someone else next week if I don’t get over there and make the most of it. And Sam says we should plan to stay for a month–four weeks without preschool for Mac is hardly going to scar him for life. He’s four–they’re still painting with their fingers and singing songs about blind mice for God’s sake. As for your work, Mark, you need a holiday. The whole legal backbone of this country is not going to crumble if Mark Barwick takes a month off. And don’t even get me started on money. If lack of money were a barrier to everything I wanted to do in life then I’d have done nothing. To hell with it, that’s what credit cards are for, I say!’ I finished with a dramatic flourish and accompanying triumphant hand gesture.
I peeked at the boys. Mac’s expression showed he was definitely on my side–I think it was the whole school-avoidance thing that swung it. Benny, however, just looked puzzled. Then, a split second later, his face lit up and he blurted out, ‘Three Blind Mice, Three Blind Mice…’
That boy was a walking request show.
Mark didn’t notice–he was far too busy getting pissed off. Or as close to pissed off as Mister S. T. Able ever got.
‘Carly, we know that’s your attitude to money and that’s probably why you had more debt than Peru when we met.’
He must have spotted the blaze of anger that went across my eyes because he switched to a more conciliatory tone. ‘Honey, it’s just too tenuous for us to risk blowing a fortune, not to mention my job. If Warner Brothers were on the phone right now with their chequebook at the ready, I’d say go for it. But how many people are in Hollywood right now trying to sell a script? Hell, the whole city is made up of wannabes who are convinced they’re the next big thing. Tell Sam thanks, but we’ll pass. We’ll maybe go over for a fortnight later in the year. The kids can do Disney and you can perhaps set up some meetings then.’
I was furious. What do you call a Taurean with the hump? Raging bull. Or ‘me’. But I was suddenly aware that the kids were watching the whole exchange, their heads swivelling from side to side like something out of The Exorcist.
I morphed into Mary Poppins. ‘Right, guys, come on then, bath time,’ I said in a singsong voice.
‘Don’t want a bath,’ Mac replied petulantly. ‘Want to go to see Spiderman.’
‘ Spiderman, Spiderman…’ Oh, Christ. I scooped Benny up, and invoked Method Number One in the Parental Code of Discipline and Behavioural Adjustment–blatant bribery.
‘Mac, fifty pence for sweets if you’re in that bath in five minutes.’
He shot up the stairs. That boy will do anything for cash to finance his E-number habit.
I crossed the hall to follow him with Benny wrapped around my neck, drooling milk down the back of my shoulder.
Mark was standing at the bottom of the stairs. ‘I’m going,’ I said deadpan, when we were face to face. ‘This means a lot to me, Mark, and I’m going.’
I carried on up the stairs, furious that he’d so ruthlessly burst my little happy bubble of optimism and excitement. How often is the repetitiveness of everyday life interrupted with such an exciting prospect? One of my biggest ambitions in life had always been to sell one of my books to someone in the movie industry. Anyone. I didn’t care if it was the bloke who drove the tour bus in Universal Studios and he bought it for a tenner. But all my beloved husband could think about was the cost, and the fact that it wouldn’t allow him the statutory two-week lead time to fill out his company’s administration form, number 2334: Holiday Request Form for the Anal Retentive.
In fact, Sam wasn’t the only major A-list movie star who knew how serious I was about my drea
m. Kate Winslet knew too. Oh yes, we were close personal friends once. For about five minutes.
A few months before, the boys and I had been having a picnic in Richmond Park. It all sounds very Enid Blyton, but in truth it involved two Happy Meals from the nearest McDonald’s and a rug I got free with an order from a catalogue. We were lounging in the sun, when another family plonked down not far from us. I nodded a friendly hello, a gesture that was reciprocated by the blonde woman who was unpacking a picnic from a real hamper. Flash cow. I was furtively shoving my Happy Meal boxes under the rug, when I realised that I’d seen her before somewhere. It came to me in a flash. Checkout number six at Waitrose. She was the girl from Newcastle who was trying to break into glamour modelling. Suddenly the blonde with the picnic shouted to a little girl who was with her. Nope, no Geordie accent. But…oh, good grief, Kate Winslet! I was sure of it. I considered bursting into the theme tune from Titanic just to check.
‘Mac,’ I hissed, ‘go and play with that little girl.’
‘Can’t,’ he replied, completely matter-of-fact.
‘Why not?’
‘She’s a girl. Don’t play with girls.’
‘Mac, please. Just this once.’
‘Nope.’
I was getting desperate. I needed an ‘in’ and I wasn’t above resorting to desperate tactics to get it. Ever since Nipple Alert had been published I’d carried a copy around in my bag, just waiting for the day that I would bump into Steven Spielberg in Woolworths and present him with the material for his new blockbuster.
Time to call out the big guns.
‘Mac, a Spiderman magazine, a pound for sweets and you can watch The Simpsons every night this week if you go and play with her.’
He knew when he was beaten. But five Curly Wurlies would cushion the blow. Off he wandered with his football, and soon he had a game going with the little girl–two-touch soccer with Benny as a goalpost.
I wandered over as casually as I could. ‘Ah, kids–they just make friends so quickly, don’t they?’
