by Tess Stimson
My mother has been throwing her Christmas Day soirées since the days when I still believed that having an old man in red pajamas sneaking into your bedroom at night with presents was a good thing. It combines her two favorite occupations: showing off (to the down-market relatives) and social climbing (with the up-market neighbors). It also gives her a very good excuse to replace the carpet every January because of wine stains.
God knows why my father goes along with it. Poor Dad. He hates parties. He usually slopes off to the greenhouse with Uncle Denny once HRH has addressed the nation, where they while away the afternoon leering over the collection of soft porn Dad thinks no one knows he keeps in a plastic bag under the cucumber cloches. Way to go, Dad; though I’m not sure about the Busty Beauties mags. Some of those girls look positively deformed.
Every Christmas the usual suspects pitch up clutching their homemade trifles and hideous poinsettias (what is it with these loathsome minitriffids?) plus or minus the odd newborn/granny at either end of the mortal coil. Which means that over the years, I’ve played Snakes and Ladders, doctors and nurses, Monopoly, PlayStation, blackjack, and doctors and nurses again, with the same assortment of cousins and neighbors’ sons. In fact, due to extreme amorous laziness on my part, at one point or another I’ve dated most of them, for periods ranging from an hour to a year. These annual festive get-togethers are an excruciating exhumation of my romantic roadkill.
First was Gareth, who, every time he met my parents, hugged my dad and shook hands with my mother. He was a bit odd, to be honest. I told him I loved kittens, and he took me to see a lion cub at the zoo. And he zigzagged when he mowed the lawn.
Mark had even smaller nostrils than me. Our children would have had gills. I dumped him forty minutes after our first snog before one of us suffocated.
Cousin Jonathan was—and still is—the most gorgeous man I’ve ever dated; a less stroppy Jude Law. He came out three weeks after we started seeing each other—Jonathan, that is. I suppose I should have guessed when I signed us up for a dirty dancing course at the Y, and he asked if they offered ballet.
Daryl was sweet. But dim. I told him I needed space and he spring-cleaned my wardrobe.
And then there was Andrew. Women have a dozen mental channels, and manage to keep all their thoughts separate in their heads. Andrew had only two. The first: “Can I get sex out of this?” And the second: “I’m hungry.” Quite often, the two coincided rather nicely.
Andrew and I lasted almost a year purely because of the sex. It was sensational. No problems with that side of our relationship at all. Unfortunately, there weren’t any other sides. Things were very simple with Andrew. When he said: “You have beautiful eyes,” he meant I want sex. When he told me I had a pretty smile, he meant I want sex. It didn’t take a Ph.D. to master the lingo.
Trouble was, he didn’t believe in limiting classroom size. I wanted one man to fulfill my every need. Andrew wanted every woman to fulfill his one.
I’m guessing—from Auntie Pearl’s sotto voce infomercial that having just obtained his second divorce at the age of thirty-one, Andrew is newly eligible, “so it’s not too late, love”—that he hasn’t changed in the six years since I caught him teaching linguistics to Mrs. Newcombe-from-two-doors-down’s seventeen-year-old daughter, Libby, in my parents’ bed.
Looking around, it’s clear I’m the tribal bike. But frankly, I think the number of notches on my bedpost is fairly modest, all things considered. It’s not my fault that three quarters of them are currently in the same room.
Oh, God. And Martin. I’d forgotten about Martin. And let me tell you, that hasn’t been easy.
If English schools did those American yearbook things, Martin would be voted Most Likely to Die Alone. Put it this way: If he were on fire, I’d toast marshmallows.
“Well, hell-ooo,” Martin says to my breasts.
Nice glasses, Martin. I particularly like the Star Wars Band-Aid holding them together. Neat touch.
“Sorry, just leaving—”
“Leaving? I thought you were staying the night?”
I pull the half-chewed piece of coronation chicken that has just fallen out of his wet mouth from my cleavage. Trust me, this time I’m not doing it for erotic effect. “I am, but I—er—just have to check in with the office; no reception on my mobile—have to go outside—”
“It’s Christmas Day. Isn’t the office shut?”
“Yes, it is, but I’m the—ah—duty solicitor. Lot of divorces at Christmas. All that family time. And indigestion, often a trigger.”
“Really? I never realized. Well, we must catch up some time,” he calls after me as I leg it toward the back door. “Pick up where we left off, hmm, hmm?”
Where exactly did we leave off? For the life of me, I can’t remember. Little shit probably used a roofie.
I’m halfway up the back garden before it clicks that it’s four o’clock on a December afternoon and I’m wearing thin silk jersey and a fixed smile.
Shivering, I plonk myself down on the stone bench beside my mother’s new “water feature,” a hideous stone abortion that would be spouting fluid from every orifice if it wasn’t frozen solid.
I stamp my feet to get the blood flowing and blow on my hands just as it starts to drizzle. Oh, God, what am I doing here? My life sucks. I’m twenty-six years old, with my own job, flat, friends and glow-in-the-dark vibrator, and here I am spending Christmas Day shivering in my parents’ back garden with assorted pieces of faux classic statuary.
There was a glorious window somewhere between sweet sixteen and a year or two ago, when all my friends were single too and we’d spend Christmas skiing in France, surfing in Oz, getting fucked in Phuket. It never occurred to me that it’d ever end. Suddenly they’ve all paired off, some of them even have kids, and most of the time I so couldn’t care less; but at Christmas, how can you help but notice you’re still on your own? So it’s either a turkey Ready Meal for one in front of the Only Fools and Horses Christmas Special or a trip back to the suburban shag-pile-and-pelmeted mock-Tudor nest, where I fit as seamlessly back into my childhood landscape as a Shiite in a synagogue.
Oh, why the fuck does Nick have to be married? And why did I have to let him get to me like this? And why, in the name of Manolo, does he have to be the one married man on the planet apart from my dad who’s faithful to his wife?
I don’t even try to kid myself we can pick up where we (almost) left off, once the country reopens for business after Christmas. You can’t reheat a soufflé.
Nick called my room the next morning to say that the other side had abruptly caved—“Never mind, Sara, the work wasn’t wasted. Si vis pacem, para bellum: If you seek peace, prepare for war”—and he’d be on the next train home as soon as he’d completed the relevant paperwork. Back to his dippy wife with a heartfelt sigh of relief at his lucky escape from the office Jezebel, no doubt. I didn’t even see him check out.
Even now he’s probably carving a perfectly cooked, moist turkey at the head of a groaning table as his three pretty little girls excitedly pull Christmas crackers in their clean new party dresses. Beneath the exquisitely decorated tree (real, natch) in the corner is a heap of still-unopened presents, carefully rationed to prevent overexcitement. “Hark the Herald Angels” is playing quietly on the sound system. On the sideboard, a bottle of Chateau Latour ’85 is breathing. And upstairs, on her pillow, ready for when the children have gone to bed, is the tiny velvet box containing—oh, God. Enough, already.
The drizzle suddenly turns into a downpour. Martin is still lurking in the rockery near the kitchen waiting for me, so I make a run for the greenhouse. It’s in total darkness as I burst in; it takes a moment for my eyes to adjust to the gloom. It smells of damp earth and compost and dead spiders. Dad is at the far end near the potting shelves, and with an inward smile I make a big show of flapping out my rainsoaked skirt to give him and Uncle Denny time to hide the porn magazines.
But it isn’t Uncle Denny who shuffles past me
with an embarrassed murmur a few moments later.
It’s Libby, Mrs. Newcombe-from-two-doors-down’s daughter.
“She sneaked me out a piece of chocolate cake,” Dad says, handing me the crumb-strewn plate. “You know your mother’s got me on another of her bloody diets—” He breaks off as he catches sight of my expression. “Why, what did you think she was doing in here? Slipping out for a quick bit of nookie with your old man?”
Of course I bloody did; she’s got form.
“Of course not,” I snap.
Dad snorts with laughter. “You did, didn’t you? You bloody did! I can’t wait to tell the lads down the King’s Arms. Good Lord, I should be so lucky! The girl’s young enough to be my daughter!”
“Younger,” I mutter crossly.
I’m obviously losing it, of course. It’s this thing with Nick that’s done it: I’ve got affairs on the brain. As if my dad would ever mess about. He and Mum have been together so long they’re starting to look like each other. She so drives me up the wall, but she obviously floats his boat. So, whatever.
He gives my shoulders a warm squeeze. “There you are, then, love. A girl like that wouldn’t look twice at an old man like me.”
Wouldn’t she? I look at my dad, look at him properly, in his creaseless khakis and the light-blue sweater Mum gave him this morning “because it matches your eyes”—as if—and try hard to be objective. He’s not as slim as he was in their wedding photos; but, on the plus side, not as spotty either. All right to look at, I suppose; quite nice, actually, if he wasn’t my dad, despite that crappy geek haircut—that’s one thing that hasn’t changed since he was seventeen. At least he hasn’t got Uncle Denny’s beergut like the rest of his brothers-in-King’s Arms. But he’s past it, surely? I know he and Mum must occasionally—well, let’s not go there. Not a pretty thought. But otherwise. Twenty-six years in, settled, sorted, well and truly married; past all the flirting and butterflies and assignations in potting sheds.
And then I realize with a shock that he’s only forty-three years old: exactly the same age as Nick. Who is most definitely not past it at all.
New Year’s Eve is worse.
I had planned to escape to London and shake down some of my friends to find a cool party to go to. Failing that, I was even considering throwing one (inevitably somewhat less cool) if I could round up enough takers; or, as a last resort, staying up till five A.M. with Amy—like all mistresses, forced to fly solo at holidays and weekends—to watch the ball drop in Times Square on CNN, since Improved New Labour has successfully fucked up the fun in Trafalgar. One thing I was most definitely not doing: attending the St. Edward’s cheese-and-wine New Year’s Eve parish supper with my parents.
I’ve got to hand it to my mother. First came the Christmas presents: the latest BlackBerry, a Bose docking system for my iPod, half the Chanel makeup counter (actually, I prefer MAC; the colors are funkier, but my mother insists Chanel is classier), and a gorgeous Hermès scarf, (though I can’t imagine what I’ll wear it with; I’m not really a scarf sort of person, they make me look like a land girl). And then the coup de grâce: a Christmas card containing my latest statements from Visa, Amex, River Island, Gap—all of them paid off. Fuck, that must be several thousand pounds right there. More, probably. Agnès b. was having a sale last month. Mum must have gone through my In tray—a.k.a. my knicker drawer—to find them last time she came to my flat; but I am too busy reveling in the novel sensation of being solvent to object to the invasion. Too much.
Gratitude secure, she moves on to Guilt.
A whispered conversation about Dad in the kitchen: “Do you think he’s lost weight, darling? It’s all the stress at work. Hot water first, dear. Warms the pot. Of course he misses you dreadfully; it’s always lovely for him when you come home to visit. He really perks up. I know you’re terribly busy with your ‘career’ ”—damn her, I can hear the quotation marks—“I don’t blame you for not coming back home very often. No, skimmed milk, darling. Such a pity you can’t stay longer.”
And, “Mrs. Newcombe’s daughter won first prize for her sponge last month at the WI Harvest Festival Fair, did I tell you? Joan was so proud. Libby makes the most delicious chocolate cake, simply melts in your mouth—”
“Would you mind just getting the tea cozy down from that shelf for me, dear? My sciatica has been acting up dreadfully, I’ve never been right since I had you, of course. What a nightmare that was. Did I mention, Muriel’s daughter had twins? That’s four grandchildren she’s got now …”
So when she asked me if I’d like to come to the bloody cheese-and-wine supper with them—it would be such a treat for Dad, we’d love to show our clever girl off, we hardly get to see you these days, darling!—I knew I was screwed.
Now I get it. I am so never going to live this down.
“I don’t need you fixing me up with anyone, Mum!” I hiss furiously as Martin pumps my father’s hand enthusiastically and shoots me a triumphant leer. “And for God’s sake, why him?”
“Don’t blaspheme, dear, there’s a church on the other side of that wall,” my mother says calmly. “And I always thought you rather liked Martin.”
“What on earth gave you that impression?”
“You did, dear. The night your father caught the two of you in the greenhouse and had to have words with young Martin.”
I swear, I don’t remember any of this. It’s either early onset Alzheimer’s or the little twat did slip me a roofie. Although—now I think about it—there was the night I experimented with those little blotting paper tablets; he might have been there.
“Be nice to him,” my mother says firmly. “He only agreed to come at the last minute as a favor.”
This is such a gross misrepresentation of the facts that for a moment I am rendered speechless. And a moment is all it takes for Martin to slide his skanky ass into the plastic chair next to me, trapping me between the wall and a hard place. His hard place, to be precise.
“Well, I’ll leave you two to it,” my mother says brightly, getting up from the table.
“Mum—”
“Come along, Vincent,” she says to my father. “I want to get to the cheese before they run out of all the nice ones. Muriel said there’s a lovely Crottin de Chavignol, very earthy and flinty, our cheese coach says, and there’s the Tomme de Savoie I want to try—”
A cheese coach? Did my mother really just say that, or have I actually fallen down a rabbit hole?
My father throws me an apologetic glance as she drags him away. I want to throttle him. For God’s sake, Dad, could you just stand up to the Gorgon for once?
“Well, isn’t this nice,” Martin says, oozing closer. “All on our own at last.”
“With a roomful of people,” I point out. Witnesses, Martin.
He pushes his glasses back up his nose with his thumb. “You were a bit of a tease the other day. Running off like that. You gave me a chest cold, keeping me out in the rain, you know. Mum was quite cross about it. But I know you girls like to treat a man mean, keep him keen, hmm, hmm?”
Oh, God. He’s Fisher’s secret love child. I grab the bottle of cheap red on the table and fill my water glass with it, then drain it in a single gulp. This could be a very, very long night.
Libby Newcombe sniggers as she dumps a book from the pile in her arms onto the holly-sprigged paper tablecloth. Briefly I lift my head from the table to glower at her retreating back. If you’re so fucking cool, you cow, how come you’re here on New Year’s Eve, too?
“Fancy a quick spin on the floor?” Martin asks hopefully.
“Can’t. Got to read this very interesting book about—er—cheese.”
“I didn’t know you were interested in cheese.”
“Oh, yes, very. My cheese coach is terribly strict, though, won’t let us just dive in half-cocked. Have to read all about, um”—I flick it open—“the blue-veined cheeses first.”
“Wouldn’t mind being a little half-cocked myself,” Martin leers, “if
you get my drift.”
“Sorry. Got to concentrate. Test on Tuesday.”
I suddenly catch sight of the author photograph on the inside jacket flap, and my knickers skip a beat. Shit, but he is hot. Talk about fallen angel. Square-jawed, hot-eyed, just-tumbling-into-bed-with-you-if-you’ll-let-me expression. Who the hell is he?
I flip the book over again. Trace Pitt—oh, of course, I’ve heard of him. Pitt’s Cheese Factory, it’s that famous deluxe cheese shop in—God, where is it? Covent Garden somewhere, I think. It’s the Harvey Nicks of cheese shops. There’s only one other, in New York. Actually, I vaguely remember Mum saying something about the committee getting their cheese from Pitt’s this year after the fiasco with the mouse last Christmas.
That is one hot man. Dumb name, sounds like some comic book private eye—Trace Pitt, Ace Detective, what were his parents thinking?—but with a face like that he could call himself Mother Teresa for all I care—
I yelp in shock as Martin sticks his tongue in my ear.
Right, that’s it. I whack him with The Cheese Lover’s Guide, drop to the floor, slither under the table, and flee to the other side of the room. I am not, repeat not, staying here a moment longer. Even if I have to walk home all the way to London.
Well, maybe not in these stilettos. OK, where are my fucking parents?
Of my mother, there is no sign—probably next door reading from the Sacred Cheese Text with Muriel—but I spot my father straight away.
He’s sitting at the bar, and he’s not alone. I watch Libby Newcombe cross her legs so that her ridiculously short skirt rides up her thighs, giving Dad a bird’s-eye view. Her lips are parted as she hangs on his every word with rapt attention—yeah, right, my dad: specialist subject, Motorway Cones on the M25—flicking her long blond hair all over the place like she’s in a damn shampoo ad. Little tart. Don’t you lick your lips and flaunt your cleavage at my dad. He’s a happily married man. Against all reasonable expectations, admittedly. But still.
I’d like to know what the little ho thinks she’s playing at. Blond hair, legs up to here, no bra: It’s like shooting fish in a barrel. He hasn’t got a chance. Look, you homewrecker, he’s taken. It’s hard enough holding a marriage together without some twenty-something totty putting pressure on its weakest link. Which, let’s face it, we all know men are.
