Coming Clean (12 page)

“But it’s a con.”

“They don’t see it like that.”

When Dad got up to go in search of the men’s room, Gail and I were able to ask Phil how things were going with Mum and Dad.

“They’re a bit of a handful, but we’re coping and Betsy’s amazing with them. Even the boys like having them around. They’re fascinated by Dad’s stories about the Blitz.”

We were interrupted by the kids at the dinner table, who appeared to be in hysterics.

“It’s true,” Spencer was saying. “Honest.”

“Kids, can you be quiet?” Gail said. “I’m trying to speak to my mum and dad and it’s not easy with you lot making a racket.”

A few of the other adults shushed the kids, too.

More shrieks.

Gail glared at Spencer, who seemed to be the cause of all the hilarity. “OK, what’s going on?” she said. It took Spencer a few seconds to compose himself. “I was just saying that male earwigs have a spare penis, that’s all.”

“He’s just trying to draw attention to himself as usual,” Alexa said.

Spencer curled his lip. “Shuddup, Alexa.”

“Spencer,” Gail said. “I will not have you saying ‘penis’ at the Sabbath table.”

“You just said it.”

“It doesn’t matter what I say. I’m an adult.”

“You know what?” a very pixelated Phil was saying. “Maybe this would be a good time to sign off.”

“OK, Phil,” Gail said. “I’m sorry about this, but I need to deal with my son.”

“Sure. Speak soon. I’ll pass on your love to Mum and Dad.”

I said good-bye to Phil and told him to say hi to Betsy and the kids.

Gail closed the laptop.

“But why can’t I talk about the penis thing at the table if it’s true?” Spencer persisted.

“Because we’re eating soup!”

“What’s that got to do with anything?”

At this point Murray stepped in. “Spencer, I’ve had enough of you for one night. Now just do as your mother says.”

“But it’s so cool. If an earwig’s penis snaps off during sex, another one pops out of his abdomen.”

“You know, Murray,” one of the men at the table said, “you have to admit that is pretty clever.”

The other chaps laughed their agreement.

“OK, here’s another fact,” Spencer went on, clearly thinking he had a captive audience now. “A headless cockroach can survive for two weeks.”

“Right,” Sharon said. “I think it’s time we changed the subject.”

“Actually, I’ve got another amazing fact,” somebody said. “Did you know that oysters change sex throughout their lives?”

“That’s, like, so weird,” Alexa said.

“I dunno, sounds like fun,” Murray came back.

Spencer screwed up his face. “Dad, what are you, gay or something?”

Sharon seemed to have decided that it was time for her to take charge of the conversation. “So, Gail, how are the bar mitzvah plans going?”

“Well, Spencer still hasn’t worked out if he wants the iPhone cake or the bass guitar.”

“I’ve told you,” Spencer said with an eye roll. “I don’t care.”

“But it’s your bar mitzvah. You have to care.”

“No, Mum—this is
your
bar mitzvah. You’re the one who can’t stop going on about it.”

“Fine . . . so I’ll take all your present money, shall I?”

At this point Josh, Sharon’s son, broke in: “So, Gail, after what happened have you managed to find Spencer a new bar mitzvah teacher yet?”

“Why would I want to do that?”

I watched the color draining from Spencer’s face. He was glaring at Josh as if to say, “One more word and you are dead.”

“No. No reason,” Josh said.

“Come on, Josh—you started to tell me something.”

Josh looked at Spencer. “Spence, you tell her. She’s your mother.”

“It was meant to be a secret! I hate you, Josh.”

Sharon took hold of her son’s hand and told him to take no notice.

“Spencer, don’t speak to your friends like that,” Murray said. “Now apologize.”

Spencer mumbled an apology.

“Right,” Murray went on. “If you’ve got something to tell us, just get on with it.”

Silence.

Gail said she was waiting. As was the entire table. “Come on, Spencer, why do you need a new bar mitzvah teacher?”

“OK, if you must know . . . I told Mr. Liebowitz that I was a Satanist.”

Several people, myself included, burst out laughing.

“A Satanist,” Gail repeated, clearly unamused.

“Why on earth would you say something like that?” Murray asked.

“It was a joke.”

“Hilarious. I bet old man Liebowitz split his sides.” Gail looked at Murray. “You see what you’ve done? He gets this joke nonsense from you.” She turned back to her son. “So what happened?”

“Mr. Liebowitz called me an abomination, kicked me out of the class and told me not to come back.”

“Perfect,” Gail said. “So why don’t I know about this? Why hasn’t Mr. Liebowitz phoned me or your father?”

“I told him you’d gone away indefinitely and that Alexa and me were living here alone.”

Gail sat shaking her head. “This gets better and better. Is there anything else you want to tell me?”

Spencer shook his head.

“Yes, there is,” Josh piped up. “You’ve missed a bit. What about when you told Mr. Liebowitz that you’d started worshipping owls?”

“Josh, you are such a bastard. I am so paying you back for this.”

Sharon turned on Spencer. “How dare you start calling Josh names!”

“Spencer,” Gail snapped, “take that back. Right now.”

“What? Why?”

“Now! Do it.”

“Sorree.”

“It’ll be all right,” I said to Gail. “You’ll find another teacher.”

“What, when it gets around that Spencer Green’s parents left him home alone and as a result he turned into an owl-worshipping Satanist? I think not.”

She stood up and said she was going to get the chicken out of the oven.

“Well, you have to admit,” Murray said, “so far the evening has been quite a hoot.”

“S
o,” I said, “how was your weekend with Dad and Roz?”

“’K,” Amy replied, without taking her eyes off the TV screen.

Ben was even more engrossed and didn’t say anything. Greg had dropped the kids off a couple of hours ago and now they were watching
Scooby-Doo
in their pj’s and drinking bedtime cocoa.

Amy was sitting cross-legged on the floor, about two feet from the TV. “Hon, please move back from the screen. You’ll ruin your eyes.” Ever since the kids were old enough to watch TV, those words had been my mantra. I often wondered whether there was any scientific evidence that sitting too close to the TV affected one’s eyesight. When I was little, my mother would utter similarly dire warnings: “Sophie, darling, please don’t pick your nose. Your nostrils will stretch.” I took no notice, but in my teenage years her words came back to haunt me and I started examining my nose in the mirror to check if my childhood booger excavations had caused my nostrils to spread. They hadn’t.

Without saying anything, Amy shuffled back a couple of inches.

I sat down on the sofa next to Ben. “So, what did you guys get up to?”

Still nothing from my youngest.

“Dunno. Stuff,” Amy said. “Sshh, I love this bit.” She and her brother burst out laughing.

“Didn’t Dad and Roz take you anywhere?”

“Uh-uh. We just hung out.”

“Roz let me take Dworkin for a walk,” Ben piped up, deigning to look in my direction. “All on my own.”

“She did? I hope you didn’t go far.”

“No, just around the block.” He went back to the TV.

It was clear I wasn’t going to get much more out of the kids, so I decided to leave them to
Scooby-Doo
and check my e-mail. I picked up my laptop, which was lying on the coffee table. My in-box contained one new e-mail.
It was from Frizzy-Haired Feminist. The subject line was a noncommittal
Hello
, so there was no clue as to what she might want. Then it occurred to me that maybe she’d been feeling bad about the “porn” conversation she’d had with Amy and was writing to apologize and offer me a seasonal olive branch. I clicked on the e-mail and began reading:

Dear Sophie,

First, I’d like to say what great children Amy and Ben are and how much I’m enjoying getting to know them.

I could definitely feel an olive branch coming on. Maybe I’d misjudged Roz.

In fact, we’re already starting to feel like family.

Oh-kay . . . that didn’t feel quite so olive branch–y.

“Yeah, I saw the Christmas card,” I muttered.

“What?” Ben said, turning to look at me.

“Nothing, darling. You just carry on watching TV.”

Amy and I are developing a really special relationship and becoming particularly close. She’s such an intelligent, thoughtful child and the two of us have wonderful talks.

Like Amy and I didn’t? “You arrogant, smug, self-righteous—”

“What do those words mean?” Ben piped up again.

“Oh, I don’t know . . . you use them to describe somebody with a big head.”

“Mr. Peabody, who teaches year five, has got a big head. It’s enormous. And he’s really skinny. He looks like this pole with a beach ball on top.”

“No, you’ve got the wrong end of the stick. I mean bigheaded as in boastful.”

“Oh. OK. But suppose somebody had a big head and they were also bigheaded? That would get quite confusing, wouldn’t it?”

“I suppose it would.”

“So what’s the difference between the wrong end of the stick and the right end?”

“I really don’t know.”

“Maybe the right end has fruit and delicious, scrummy berries on it and the wrong end is covered in pythons, poisonous spiders and scorpions.”

“If it had berries,” I said, “wouldn’t that make it more of a branch than a stick?”

“A branch can be a stick. I mean, you can use a branch as a stick.”

“OK, if you say so . . . Ben, can we discuss this later? I’m actually trying to read something.”

“’K.”

I do, however, have some concerns regarding Amy that I feel compelled to raise with you.

“Concerns? She has concerns? Who is she to have concerns?”

I’m not sure that you have given sufficient thought to the way you allow Amy to dress.

“OK, this time she has gone too far.”

For example: This weekend, I noticed that she was wearing a short denim skirt and a Hello Kitty T-shirt. I find it hard to believe that you consider this to be an appropriate look for a ten-year-old.

“I don’t believe this.”

Who was this woman to tell me what was or wasn’t an appropriate look for my daughter? I thought back to what Amy had had on when she left the house on Friday. She’d been wearing her short denim skirt, but over thick leggings and the Ugg boots Gail had bought her for her birthday. She hadn’t exactly been flaunting herself. And what was supposed to be wrong with the Hello Kitty tee?

As a mother, I’m sure you agree that young girls shouldn’t be allowed to wear clothes that sexualize them, which is what Amy’s miniskirt did. Meanwhile, the pink top with the girlie cat motif portrayed her as delicate, powerless and insubstantial. For years, feminists like myself have fought to empower girls and women. (Do check out
The Female Eunuch
. Women have come a long way since the seventies, but Greer’s work remains hugely relevant.) By allowing Amy to wear this T-shirt, you are undermining the cause and setting it back decades.

What is more, encouraging Amy to follow fashion in such an unthinking, slavish manner is surely the start of the slippery slide. I’m sure you agree that fashion is an active cog in the undeclared war against women. We must encourage our daughters to understand that the buying of clothes is a meaningless, frivolous activity.

On future occasions, I would be grateful if you could ensure that Amy is more suitably dressed when she comes to visit.

Naturally, to protect Amy’s feelings, I haven’t mentioned my disquiet to her.

With best wishes for Christmas and the new year,

Roz

Heart thumping, ears bursting with steam, I changed the subject of the e-mail to
I want to throttle this bloody woman!!!!!!!
and forwarded it to Gail and Annie. I was about to hit the keyboard again and tell Frizzy-Haired Feminist that she could stick her copy of
The Female Eunuch
where the sun don’t shine, when Greg called to say that Ben had left his gloves in the car. I told him not to worry and that he had a spare pair.

“You OK?” Greg said. “You sound a bit stressed.”

“Yeah, you could say that. Look, there’s something I need to discuss with you. Hang on a tick.” I got up, went into the kitchen and closed the door. “OK . . . I just got this really snotty e-mail from Roz about Amy being inappropriately dressed. I’m Amy’s mother. Do you mind telling me where she gets off lecturing me about what my daughter should or should not wear?”

“Soph, calm down—”

“No, I won’t calm down. Why should I?”

“Because I think Roz has got a point.”

Now I wanted to throttle him, too. “What? You’re siding with that woman against your child’s mother?”

“Actually, I’d prefer it if you didn’t refer to Roz as ‘that woman,’ and I’m siding with her because I think she’s talking sense. I’m not sure that Amy should be wearing short skirts at her age. And maybe the Hello Kitty T-shirt is a bit twee.”

“Of course it’s twee. Girls wear twee at ten. Ten is a twee age. What would you put her in—a Chairman Mao suit?”

“Very funny. But you have to admit that these days Amy’s pretty hung up on what she looks like. She paints her nails. She wears eye shadow.”

I was fighting not to lose it. “Yes. In her bedroom. She’s experimenting. We’ve been through this. The child is about to hit puberty. Of course she’s starting to take an interest in her looks. That’s what girls her age do. It’s normal.”

“But it’s so mindless and trivial.”

“Yeah, like keeping the house clean and tidy is mindless and trivial. Greg, our daughter is ten. Isn’t she entitled to a few more years of fun and frivolity before real life kicks in?”

He didn’t say anything.

“Look,” I said, changing down a gear, “you’re Amy’s father and you have a right to object to what she wears—even if I don’t happen to agree with you. Roz, on the other hand, does not have that right. She’s sticking her nose into affairs that don’t concern her, and if you don’t tell her to back off, I will.”

“Soph, please don’t start a fight with Roz. I don’t want us all at war in the run-up to the holidays. I agree she’s been a bit high-handed and, for the record, although we had a conversation about Amy’s clothes, I had no idea she was planning to e-mail you. She shouldn’t have done that. Roz is one of those people who acts on impulse and doesn’t always think before she speaks. I’ll have a word with her. I promise.”

“You said that last time, after her porn discussion with Amy.”

“I did speak to her. And she promised she’d apologize.”

“Well, she hasn’t. And anyway, I don’t care about an apology. I just want her to back off.”

“I will speak to her, I promise. But she’s got a lot on right now. Her UK book tour starts tomorrow. Plus it’s almost Christmas.”

“Poor thing. Must be hectic,” I said. “I mean, what with all those cards to write.” I’d promised myself that I wouldn’t let Greg and Roz see how much their family Christmas card had hurt me, but it wasn’t easy.

“Oh, come on. Surely the card didn’t upset you. It was just a bit of fun.”

“Of course it didn’t upset me,” I said, aware of how defensive I sounded.

“You know, when couples split up, families morph and change. Ours is no different.”

“Greg, please don’t patronize me. I do get that. Look, can we drop the subject? Just tell Roz to stop poking her nose into matters that don’t concern her and I’ll be happy.”

He said he would.

I went back to the living room to shut down my laptop and found an e-mail from Annie re FHF’s critique of Amy’s clothes.

Whadda bitch!!!!! Assume naked mud wrestling to follow. Please save me front-row seat. Call if you need to vent some more. Annie xxx

I e-mailed back to say that naked mud wrestling might well be in order if the frizzy-haired one didn’t get down off her high horse and behave, but for now Greg had persuaded me to let him handle her. Before hitting “send,” I added a PS:

Let’s get together soon—without kids. What about lunch one Saturday if Rob’s back from his travels and can look after your two?

I was still worried about Annie. I was pretty sure that she wasn’t as happy with her domestic lot as she made out and I wanted a chance to have a gentle probe.

The next morning when I checked my e-mail, there was a message from Gail:

Bloody hell!!!!! Who the hell does she think she is? I’m speechless, which has to be a first. This woman is a monster! Take my advice—this situation can only get worse. If you want her out of your life then keep the kids away from her. Insist that Greg see them on his own.

BTW, I couldn’t believe it when you told me about Mike and the whole MI5, MFI mix-up. Hysterical. Got Murray’s old mum here for a couple of weeks. She’s now wearing incontinence pads and refusing to put her teeth in because the dentures hurt. Told Murray to shoot me if I get like that. Speak soon. G X

I wrote back:

Glad you thought MI5 mix-up was hysterical, ’cos I didn’t. Re FHF . . . has occurred to me to keep the kids away from her, but really don’t want to go to war with Greg. Would mean slugging it out in court. Can’t put kids through that. Good luck with mother-in-law. Trying to picture you toothless! Is that our destiny—ending up on a Zimmer frame with pee trickling down our legs?

•   •   •

O
n Friday, there was a farewell drinks do for Liz at the Hog’s Hind, around the corner from the office. We presented her with a
Best of Coffee Break
CD and a Clarice Cliff coffee set (she collected art deco china). There were tears and hugs and promises to stay in touch.

“So what are your plans?” I asked her.

Liz said that after years in broadcasting, she suddenly found herself craving the simple life. To that end she had bought an allotment, where she was going to grow vegetables. My first thought was that she’d be bored in five minutes, but I didn’t say anything.

Everybody was saying their good-byes when Nancy dragged me to one side. As she usually did at office dos, she’d downed a few too many kir royals. This had resulted in her spending the last hour kissing everybody and telling them how much she loved, valued and appreciated them.

“Sophee,” she gushed, letting go of my arm. Her eyes were wide with excitement. “I have the most amazing news. Brian has finally agreed to go into sex therapy. Isn’t that wonderful? I’ve already phoned Virginia Pruitt thingy and we’ve got our first session this week. I just hope that finally we can make some progress with my vulva. I can’t thank you enough for the recommendation and I promise faithfully to keep you up to speed.”

I was in no doubt that she would.

Then she threw her arms around me. “I love you, Sophee. I really love you. And I value and appreciate you, too. I really should tell you more often.”

•   •   •

O
n Monday, I got to the office two hours late. I knew that the media change consultant (whose identity still hadn’t been revealed by the bosses at GLB) was due to start work that morning and that a meet and greet had been arranged for nine. I left home at my usual time and should have been in by eight.

Putney to Vauxhall went without a hitch. For once I even managed to get a seat. Then, as I was standing on the escalator heading for the Victoria line, the announcement came: owing to “a person on the tracks” at Stockwell, passengers could expect serious delays.

I went up to the street and tried hailing a cab, but by now it was raining and there were none to be had. Eventually I headed back into the tube and along with all the other wet, frustrated commuters waited over an hour for a train. When it finally arrived, the crowd surged on board. The train crawled along, stopping for minutes at a time at each station, I with my rear end pressed firmly against some chap’s groin.