Woman of a Certain Rage

by Georgie Hall

  I make it to a field fence and throw it over first, then climb after it and sprint in the direction of the lock.

  Which is demonstrably mad and quite bitchy, but also positively childish, I’d say. In fact, I’m not feeling old at all.

  *

  I’m three fields further along with a bad stitch before I relax enough to slow up, confident the kayaker isn’t chasing me on foot.

  Creeping closer to the water’s edge, I can’t see Sexist Kayaker on the river either.

  Up ahead a tributary stream feeds into the river and I’m trapped at the point of a triangle. I’ll have to find a way across the stream, but the far bank is an impenetrable-looking six feet wall of bramble and nettles that I don’t think I can hack through with a kayak oar. It’s that or crossing the river again.

  The whine of an outboard motor makes me turn and look upstream. A flash of orange draws closer. A little inflatable launch is buzzing along the river at speed. I know it straight away, having edged my way past it on numerous occasions to get across the garage, cursed it, hauled it on and off its trailer and once famously overturned it on a Cornish creek losing a picnic for five.

  Standing up, tiller in hand, is the unmistakeable shape of my husband.

  He is wearing his suit.

  *

  Paddy never made any secret of the fact he’s old-fashioned enough to want to pull out chairs, foot restaurant bills, open doors and mend things. We wrangled a lot about it in our early days together as chairs were scraped back and forth between us, bills split, doors slammed and I hid the things I clumsily broke.

  Over time, as I hid the broken bits of myself from him too, and lay awake anxiously wishing he footed more of the big bills and opened more of the metaphorical doors in life for our children, I realised Paddy had stopped holding out chairs for me. And I experienced that contrary pinch of sadness women do for the dying art of chivalry.

  *

  ‘Need a lift?’ He says it with such cool, I feel like I’ve stumbled back into an Avengers episode, which was where today’s mission started, but this time it’s the New ones, with Gambit helping Purdey into a speedboat, my boiler suit and pearls look and his suit bang on vintage. Less convincing is the way I clamber aboard and almost fall straight out, inflatable wobbling madly, or Paddy trying to get me to wear a child-size life jacket.

  ‘The Tempest’s up ahead at the lock,’ I tell him, hoping she’s still safely stranded where Kayaking Sexist saw her.

  We buzz on towards the weir, Paddy in surprisingly good spirits, joking, ‘Brought your own paddle, I see?’

  ‘I’m oar-struck,’ I joke. ‘How did you find me?’

  ‘You shared your location.’

  ‘But my phone got drowned.’ I take it out of my pocket and realise that thanks to the wonders of modern wizardry, its waterproof boast has held true and it’s back in business, a screen message telling me that dampness has been detected in the charging port.

  There’s dampness in my charging port too at the sight of Paddy, chin high and heroic. And the little tingles and shivers going on down there are something I’ve not felt in a very long time.

  ‘This is quite some anniversary surprise.’ He doesn’t look at me.

  I open my mouth to tell all, but I don’t genuinely know where to start or how I’ll talk around the grateful lump in my throat, so I adopt a Purdey-ish enigmatic pose and say, ‘That was the idea.’

  ‘You’re beautiful, you know that?’ He smiles down at me.

  Whilst clearly not true at this present moment in time, I’m owning that compliment. Perhaps unadvisedly I tell him, ‘I’m wearing the crotchless knickers.’

  He almost ploughs the inflatable into the riverbank.

  *

  The gregarious hosts of the fortieth birthday party we went to all those years ago in their riverside garden are great characters. A quantity surveyor and his private caterer wife, they are can-do people, absolutely the sorts you’d want on your side in a crisis. Which makes it handy they live opposite a river lock where so many day trippers in hire boats get their propellers snagged on the weeds by the weir.

  These intrepid sorts think nothing of rowing across to help and it gives them something to dine out on that month. Like the day they saw a marvellous old barge rammed against the weir walkway. ‘Turns out to be the Marie Celeste of narrowboats. Not a crew member in sight! Inside, there’s the most darling puppies imaginable and a terribly sweet poodle Nigel befriended with a Werther’s Original.’

  ‘Only one thing for it, wasn’t there, Sooz darling? We whisked them all back across the river for a bowl of Chum.’

  ‘Yes, barely sat back down with a fresh round of Pimm’s when a couple appeared in an orange dinghy and boarded the old barge. Quelle surprise if it wasn’t the actress I knew yonks ago and her husband. They came to a party here once; he hardly said a thing and she didn’t stop talking, danced a lot, drank like a fish and even went over to the old mill with Nigel and his ghost hunters.’

  ‘I was all for rowing straight across to help them out, but sometimes a little voice tells you it’s best to wait, doesn’t it, Sooz?’

  ‘Too right it does! What I actually said was: “Don’t even go there, Nige darling. Can’t you see Eliza Finch is perfectly capable of handling this situation herself? This is her moment: she’s a true English rose like Rose from African Queen and now that she’s in full bloom, she’s unashamed to be middle class and middle-aged and menopausal because she’s living life as a great mother and a good wife and loving daughter and sister and fantastic friend and a proud feminist! What’s more, she risked everything to save the boat her husband loves, and she did it all in pearls!”’

  (OK, I’m imagining all this because I can’t hear a thing over the roar of the weir, but I do spot them waving and pointing at Lady and her puppies stretched out in the sun looking blissed out, and I wave back with a thumbs up and nod and smile at their ‘drink?’ gestures, and thumbs up again, grateful that they haven’t changed a bit, and looking forward to laughing it all off later.)

  *

  The first thing I must honourably do is confess to Paddy about the bet with my brother.

  But when I do, he just nods and says, ‘Yeah, he told me.’

  ‘You knew?’

  He pulls open the trapdoor on the stern deck and jumps into the bay to open the weed tank.

  ‘I phoned him as soon as I’d dropped Ed off this morning. I wanted to try to talk him out of selling her.’ Taking off his suit jacket, he hangs it on the tiller and rolls up his shirt sleeves. ‘Miles told me about the bet. He never thought you’d do it, but I did. That’s when I discovered the Navigation Guide was missing from the bathroom and the spare boat keys had gone.’

  ‘And you didn’t try and stop me, follow me, take over?’

  Great handfuls of twisted brown rush leaves are coming out. ‘I didn’t think you’d want me to. I wanted you to have a chance to do it for yourself, to feel a bit better about yourself.’

  ‘I did.’

  ‘Besides, Tesco.com were due and the neighbour wanted a quote for a kitchen,’ he smiles up at me, shaking the water off his arms and straightening up to close the prop hatch. ‘That should do it. I’ll use the bargepole to hold her away from the walkway and you can get the engine started. You’re still skipper.’

  I don’t move, hanging onto my paddle. ‘I loved taking her downriver, even the bastard bridges. I was going to hide her here, near the old mill’s dry dock.’

  ‘Good plan. Let’s do that.’

  ‘There’s no need now I’ve won the bet is there?’

  ‘Well, you’ve come all this way,’ he steps closer, ‘and we have champagne.’ That slow smile emerges. Is he thinking about the crotchless panties, I wonder? I don’t mind if he is; I’m thinking about them too.

  ‘Still awestruck?’ He nods at the paddle which I’m holding like a Masai warrior’s spear.

  I am a bit, but I put it down. What I long for him to say is that he’s
proud of me and that he thinks I was brave and brilliant and that I’m forgiven for being grumpy and sweaty and not wanting sex much, and that while today’s adventure might just be a few hours’ cruising downriver for him, he appreciates that for me it was a life-affirming challenge, life-changing even. Because he knows that I did it for him. For us. For love. And, Eliza my darling, my beautiful girl, Bellissima, that’s amore.

  But he doesn’t do that. And that’s OK because we’ve been married for twenty-two years and I know Paddy doesn’t say stuff like that.

  What he does do is kiss me. And it’s that kiss. That kiss which flips something upside down inside. That.

  *

  By the time we’ve manoeuvred The Tempest into the old mill dock, a secret passageway overhung with willows, we are gripped with unspoken lust.

  Only for a moment do I hesitate before we hurry below deck. Given that having sex is an ambitious undertaking for us nowadays – and we’ve only managed it twice in the past year, both times with the lights out after I’d consumed a bottle of wine to get in the mood (and still wasn’t in the mood) – on a boat in daylight, stony sober, it’s high risk. Surely we have more debriefing to do before these crotchless enticers come off?

  It seems not. Because Eliza Finch is in the mood for sex today, and Paddy Hollander is taking full advantage, flagpole already aloft and no need for blue pills.

  I usually hate myself naked, and haven’t really looked closely at Paddy unclothed for a while, but today I find us beautiful, the shared intimacy of ageing that has taken us from such careless young perfection together to this, familiar bodies whose combined age is over a hundred, our mutual attraction springing from a far deeper well.

  I should go to the bathroom to clean up a bit. But Paddy is looking at me so lovingly, as though I’m Venus de Milo (only with arms, a pulse and insect bites) that I can’t bear to lose his gaze.

  ‘I couldn’t love you more,’ he says, which for Paddy is absolute poetry and I’m frightened I might cry and ruin it. But as we look at each other, we start to laugh instead.

  Because it is ludicrous, us two naked in a canal barge on a weekday. It’s not even our anniversary. Yet we are so hopelessly, hugely turned on. There’s no overthinking, over-drinking, performance nerves or deadly silence. The fluffy cuffs stay firmly in the drawer and there’s just lots of laughter and a bit of gasping and grunting, and compliments and endearments, and all-important shuddery joy as we remember we used to be really quite good at all this once.

  Then we open a bottle of champagne and talk about Miles’s business idea and Summer’s complicated romance (me championing both) and all the places we can take The Tempest together when we’re old empty nesters (Paddy championing Shropshire). We’re so engrossed, it’s only when we hear barking and music from the garden across the river that we remember we’ve been invited for a drink and that Paddy hasn’t yet met Lady and her little family.

  So we grab a second bottle of champagne and jump in the orange dinghy to row across the river and toast enduring friendship and puppy love.

  Above all, we toast the fact there’s life in these old dogs yet.

  25

  Celebration Time

  ‘To Argy Bargy!’

  ‘It’s now called Dream Boats, Dad.’

  ‘To Dream Boats!’ everyone choruses, glasses clinking. I touch rims with my sister beside me, can tell from her fixed smile that she hates this new name too. It sounds like a male stripper troupe.

  We are in Russo’s, where my parents are treating the extended family to lunch to toast Miles and Paddy’s new enterprise, which is already on its fourth name change – I’ve a fiver says it will end up as Hollander and Finch. Name aside, Miles has certainly done his groundwork: market research is in, business model posing prettily, projections good enough to float investors’ boats.

  Miles has already signed up an old venture capitalist friend for the lion’s share and, somewhat alarmingly, our host and genial restaurateur Matteo Mele is also coming on board. Nothing awkward in that. I will look him in the eye when I am good and ready. Possibly next year.

  We’re in the restaurant’s wine cellar, a part of which is a new private dining suite, working our way through a taster menu that showcases the all-new, authentically Puglian dishes. Convivial as ever, Matteo is alternately sitting with us, fetching food and wine or checking on the kitchens as lunch service carries on in the main restaurant above us. This is the first time I’ve seen him since he and Kwasi were separated like rutting deer as we glided past aboard The Tempest.

  Summer originally wanted to invite Kwasi here too, but until ‘Mr Owusu’ officially leaves the school’s payroll at the end of term there’s no way Paddy’s endorsing the relationship; Kwasi is of the same opinion. I’m quietly hopeful.

  It’s a gourmet tour de force, or giro de forza, with tongue-tinglingly sweet mussels, aged ricotta, softest slow-cooked lamb and nothing is overcooked or too hot. Antonio never cooked like this.

  The cousins, all gaggled together at one end of the table, are stuffing themselves with high-class pizza and playing a boxed trivia quiz that Jules brought from London because she’s a proper grown-up parent.

  Here at the adults-only end, Miles is holding court sporting a big sling (it turns out he suffered hairline cracks in both his collarbone and humerus in the microlight crash). Right now, he’s talking up his plans for the business. ‘Slow is a disrupter buzzword on the horizon. Narrowboats deliver a perfect capsule of authentic, personalised slow.’

  He’s a man transformed, restored to making-things-happen glory, the foppish sarcasm nowhere to be seen, his enthusiasm infectious. I don’t think any of us realised how unhappy he was until he had something to focus on. His mood lifted overnight.

  The false wall behind him is made of old wooden wine crates installed as part of the Russo’s refit. Multiple rectangles have been cut from it in front of which hang a mosaic of ornately gilt-framed screens like a gallery, digital back projectors creating a clever bit of media trickery. A discreet sign offers diners the chance to curate their own slideshow of images. It’s so new even Miles didn’t know about it. Today we’re being treated to a slideshow of the Cotswolds, the pictures dim against the light spilling from the chandelier over the table. I feel like I’ve seen Bourton-on-the-Water and Blenheim Palace from every angle. Russo’s definitely needs a better image library.

  Reece asks Miles about his plane crash, which he’s happy to describe, now beefed up to include a tailspin, ducking-and-draking along the river, rolling through the crop and a small explosion.

  I catch Paddy’s eye. He isn’t saying much as usual, but he looks happier than I’ve seen him in a long time, the easy smile quicker, the future a place he wants to go to. Our gazes keep tangling all the time, which I love. He’s not wearing his suit today because I ‘forgot’ to pick it up from the cleaners, but thankfully we’re still aglow from having sex twice last week, something I’m hoping will last him a while.

  Talking Paddy round to the idea of giving Miles’s boat-fitting business a go was surprisingly easy – having my blessing was the push he needed to reconsider his decision. Besides which, the prospect of designing New Neighbour a kitchen made him realise his heart is no longer in bespoke butcher’s blocks and larder cupboards. In fact, he was so relieved when she turned down his quote, he opened another bottle of Moet. ‘It’s all about resale at the end of the day, isn’t it?’ she’d explained when she popped round with Death-stare Baby on her hip last weekend to break it to us that she’s decided to go with the big-name designers at twice the price, adding that as a gesture of neighbourly goodwill they’re dropping the solicitors’ action, which she hopes means we’re cool with the trade vans that need to park across both sides of the drive while her new kitchen is being fitted? We said that was fine. I’ve parked wantonly ever since.

  ‘You have adopted a rescue dog, I hear?’ Jules leans across to me. ‘With puppies?’

  ‘Three.’ I can’t help smiling w
idely every time I talk about Lady and her poodly brood. ‘The vet thinks they’re not even six weeks. The mother and her son will stay on with us,’ I glance at Paddy again, the infectious smile shared, Lady’s blue-eyed, black-eared boy his sidekick from the moment they met. ‘Our friends Nigel and Susie are taking one pup when it’s old enough and,’ I miss a beat, ‘Matteo’s having the other.’

  ‘Is not greyhound, but the story break my heart.’ Our host swoops between us with fresh glasses and a new wine to try. ‘This Pinot Grigio is spettacolare. Like a kiss on a mountain top, eh?’ I sense his eyes on me.

  I don’t look at him. I stare at his necklace instead, dangling level with my gaze, the cornicello pendant glinting in the candlelight.

  It was Paddy who offered Matteo one of the puppies. After just one evening in this cellar talking boats, he, Matteo and Miles are already a bro-trio, like the Three Musketeers, Ghostbusters or Kirk, Spock and McCoy. I fear manly misadventures ahead…

  There’s an ‘ooo!’ from my parents as pictures of Stratford Upon Avon are projected on the little picture screens: Shakespeare’s birthplace, the river, lots of swans.

  ‘There’s the Gower Monument!’ Jules points out.

  ‘Ah, this is good!’ Matteo is still crouching between us. ‘This is for you Eliza, yes?’ he tells me before turning to Jules. ‘Your sister tell you about her superfan?’

  ‘Her what?’ Jules looks amused.

  ‘Last week a visitor from Japan came into Russo’s for a coffee before he flew home, leaving a gift for our most famous diner. He was kind enough to copy his camera card files onto a flash drive as a memento of the day he and Dame Emma Thompson posed together by Shakespeare’s statue.’

  I lower my fork. If revenge is a dish best served cold, I am eating it.

  On screen I’m laughing. I look happy. Really happy. Sexy happy. Walking beside me, Matteo’s laughing too, although half his head’s cut off, making him harder to identify, his pendant catching the light with a lens flare.