Growing Pains of a Hapless Househusband (29 page)

Wednesday 17 September

Woken up at 2 in the morning by a silent caller. It had
to be Emily, although the number was withheld, so I
couldn't be sure. Then I couldn't get back to sleep, not
until five o'clock, by which time it was broad daylight. I
slept badly for about half an hour and finally gave in
and got up to go for a walk. It was a beautiful morning,
but I was too tired to enjoy it properly.

'Who was that last night?' asked Sally.

'Must have been a wrong number.'

'Bloody odd time for a wrong number.'

Thursday 18 September

This time the call came at 3.

'Look,' I said, 'who the hell is this?'

I clamped my ear to the phone, trying to pick up any
sort of clue. I thought I could make out a slight sobbing
noise, like a small child in pain. In the middle of the
night, it sounded positively creepy.

'Whoever you are, please stop it.'

I didn't want to say the word 'Emily', because as far as
Sally is concerned, there is no Emily situation. I listened
hard, but still that faint sobbing sound.

'Can I listen?' asked Sally.

I passed her the phone. I could just about discern her
troubled expression as she held it to her ear.

'The person's hung up,' she said.

It had to be Emily, I thought.

'I'm going to call the phone company first thing,'
said Sally.

'Don't worry,' I said. 'I'll do it.'

This was a little pork pie. The last thing I wanted Sally
to discover was the identity of our midnight telephonic
stalker.

'They should be able to tell us who it is,' she said.

'It's probably some nut who's seen me on TV. I bet
this happens a lot.'

'It could be,' she said. 'But we're ex-directory, so how
would they have got the number?'

'Maybe it's Nick,' I said.

'Stop that! It's not funny.'

'Sorry.'

'If the phone company don't tell us,' said Sally, 'then
I'll just have to do it the naughty way.'

'Via work?'

'Yup. One of the intercept guys owes me a favour.'

'Sometimes your job has its advantages,' I said.

'I know,' said Sally. 'You see, I would be mad to chuck
it in.'

We both lay awake for a few minutes, and then
thought that if we were awake, we might as well be
frisky. We started off well, but my equipment was not
interested. I was too preoccupied by that strange
sobbing noise, and it had a remarkably detumescent
effect, although I hadn't really tumesced in the first
place.

I didn't call the phone company, because I knew
there was no point. Instead, after the school/playgroup
drop-off, I went straight round to Emily's. When she
answered the door, she looked startled.

'Hi!' she said. 'What a surprise!'

She looked wraithlike, a shadow of her former self. In
fact she looked as though she had been up all night
crying, and making crank calls. Very Princess Diana.

'Do you mind if I come in?' I asked.

'Not at all.'

The house was a mess. It was never clean, but it was
now sluttishly dirty, too dirty even for a bachelor Sam
Holden.

'Jesus,' I said. 'Have you given up tidying?'

She tried to laugh.

'Sorry, it's a bit of a tip. I was about to give it a good
going-over.'

She lit a cigarette and then stood there, picking the
scab on her arm as she had done when she made her
'declaration'. The scab looked kind of bad, the type of
scab that your mum tells you to stop picking.

'Would you like one?' she asked.

'No thanks.'

We stood in silence. I decided I would get straight to
the point.

'Listen, Emily, I know it's you.'

She made a great play of furrowing her brow.

'What are you talking about?'

'You know full well.'

She shook her head. So far, so theatrical.

'What?' she asked. 'What?'

'Emily! Please don't do this!'

'Do what for fuck's sake?'

It was rare for Emily to swear, and the word jolted me
a little.

'The phone calls, Emily.'

'What phone calls?'

'The ones in the middle of the night.'

She took a drag of her cigarette.

'Hang on,' she said. 'Sorry if I'm being a bit slow
here, but what exactly are you accusing me of?'

'Calling me up in the middle of the night two nights
in a row.'

'Er . . . no.'

She seemed convincing. In fact, she was such a good
actress, I began to feel small shards of doubt lancing
me. I had to take a punt and call her bluff.

'Emily, please don't deny it. The phone company
have told me it was your number.'

'But they wouldn't have done that.'

'That sounds like an admission,' I said.

Emily said nothing, but instead walked to the kitchen
and went to the fridge. She scrabbled around inside it,
and then slammed it shut.

'Fuck!' she exclaimed.

'What?'

'I thought I had some wine left.'

'It's a bit early for wine, isn't it?'

'Never too early,' she said, and then she cackled, in a
slightly unhinged way I thought.

'Come on Emily,' I said. 'You've got to stop this. I
know what else you've been doing as well.'

'Go on then, I'm all ears. What else can you accuse
me of this fine morning?'

As she was talking, she was rummaging through the
cupboards, no doubt on the hunt for some booze. She
was in a bad bad way, and I didn't want to break a
butterfly upon a wheel.

'Well, I know that you follow me to the supermarket.'

This was met by an OTT snorting sound.

'Now why, Mr Holden, would I do something like
that?'

I didn't want to respond to that, because we both
knew the answer. There was also something pathetic
about her continued denial, and I didn't want to play
her game.

'I saw you waiting in the car,' I said.

'When?'

'On Monday.'

'I was making a call.'

'No you weren't.'

'How do you know?'

'Because I could see you.'

'I have a hands-free.'

'No you don't.'

'How do you know?'

'Because it's just not something you would have. Shall
I go outside and check?'

Emily slumped down on a kitchen chair. I thought
she was going to collapse, pass out, but instead she just
sat there, looking emptily at the bottom of the fridge,
the fridge that had so cruelly cheated her of alcohol.

'My life is fucked,' she declared.

'No it's not.'

'Yes it is.'

'Why is it fucked? You have three lovely children, you
have a nice house, you look good, I don't see the
problem. All right, I know that you are still upset about
me, but surely not enough to say that your life is
fucked.'

'Externals, Sam. Is that all you're interested in?'

'No, but . . .'

'Because you don't know what happens up here, do
you?'

She tapped the side of her head.

'No, of course not. But I can guess. I can guess that
you're upset because you've got divorced. You're stuck
in the middle of the countryside with three children
and you're on your own. Your last lover was a shit-loving-nappy-wearing
pervert, and the man I think you still
love doesn't love you back, and does in fact live in a
state of marital bliss, which makes your own situation
feel worse. I can guess that you are desperately worried
about the future, about whether you'll ever find
another husband, or at the very least a decent boyfriend
who can be a father to your children, and you're
worried that if you don't, you're going to end up lonely.
And I can guess that the more you think about these
things, the more they eat you up, and you become more
and more preoccupied, until you realise that you are
not doing your job as a mother. And I guess that in turn
eats you up, and from then on it's a vicious circle of self-doubt
and self-loathing. And then, one final guess, the
great healer is of course the bottle. Except it's not
really, is it? When you wake up, you hate yourself for
doing it, and so the loathing gets worse. And so on.'

Emily started clapping, the type of sarcastic clap that
crap playwrights insist on putting in their plays, and the
kind of clap that nobody does in real life.

'Well done, Dr Freud,' she said.

I didn't reply. I slightly regretted putting on such a
long spiel.

'Be as sarcastic as you like Emily, I still think you need
help.'

'No I don't,' she said. 'I'm fine. It'll be fine, you'll
see.'

'How can it be?'

'Because I'll get over you, that's how. It shouldn't
take too long. You're not that special.'

I laughed.

'That's the attitude,' I said.

'But you think you're special, don't you?'

Uh-oh, I thought. Here comes the sourness.

'No,' I lied.

'Yes, you do. Oooh. Did you see me on Friday night?
No? OK then, well you can catch me on
Joseph and Mary
.
Oh yah, the party in London was such fun. So sorry I
couldn't invite you. Numbers, eh? Wretched PR girl,
you know what it's like. By the way, sorry that we had to
sack you from the programme. Wife too jealous. Oooh.
Did I tell you I'm now a columnist for the
Advertiser
?
Make sure you get it! Looks like there'll be a book as
well. Should be fun, don't you think?'

'Come off it,' I said. 'I'm not that much of a show-off.'

'Pah! You've become unbearable.'

'That's not fair!'

Emily lit another cigarette. This time she didn't offer
me one. Her face contorted into a pinched, suddenly
somewhat haggard, expression of pointed malice.

'You just think people like me and other people in
this village are the little people.'

She jabbed her finger into my chest every time she
said 'you'. It actually started to hurt.

'You just can't wait to get out and go and live in your
old rectory or whatever it is. We're just stepping stones
for you, aren't we? And I expect you find it all jolly fun
that the village bicycle has declared her love for you,
and I bet you laugh about me behind my back, and
share jokes about me with all your London friends.'

'Jesus, Emily! Where is all this coming from? I haven't
mentioned a word of what you said the other day. I
haven't even told Sally. And that's the truth! God, this is
eating you up. This isn't good for you, Emily, or your
children. You should see someone professional. A
psychiatrist even. Please.'

'I don't need a fucking shrink!'

'OK, OK. But you need a rest, or at least somebody
neutral you can talk about all this to. That's what
psychiatrists are for . . .'

'I don't need a fucking psychiatrist. Didn't you hear?'

'All right. But isn't there someone you can just talk
to?'

'No. And besides, I don't need someone to talk to.
The person with the problems is you, don't you see
that?'

'Me?'

'Yes, you! You're the one who's losing touch with it
all. You're the one who's lost their balance. You're the
one who should see a fucking shrink!'

'I find that a little hard to take from someone who
looks through their fridge for a bottle of wine at 10 in
the morning.'

'And so fucking pompous as well.'

'Emily, please stop being like this.'

Watching her was soul-destroying. I wished I had told
Sally about Emily now, then at least I could ask for her
help. She'd know exactly what to do in this situation.

'No! It's YOU who needs the help. It's you who needs
to be brought down. All that
WonderHubby
thing is just
shit. It's not you. It's all a pack of lies and crap. You
must give it up Sam. Save yourself!'

This was all sounding far too dramatic.

'Have you been taking something?' I asked.

'Fuck off.'

'Have you?'

'No! Can't you see I'm angry with you? Can't you see
that you're living a lie?'

'No. What's a lie?'

'Everything!' she shouted. 'The TV! The newspapers!
The magazines! I've read all of it, and it's just shit! It's a
load of lies. And your marriage to that woman, that's a
lie as well.'

'Take that back,' I said.

'No. Because it's the truth, Sam. You know that you
want to be with me, and you just won't admit it to
yourself. And you'll never admit it if you stay with her.'

'But Emily, I don't want to be with you! I love Sally,
and that's that.'

'You love me as well, I know it.'

'You're wrong.'

'No I'm not,' she insisted. 'No I'm not. You need to
be brought back down to earth. All this
WonderHubby
shit has got to end, then you'll see who really counts, me
or her! Let's face it, Sam, she's only with you because
you're a success. And when you're no longer a success,
then you'll see.'

Although she had a valid point that
WonderHubby
was
probably the greatest deceit played upon the British
public since the discovery of Piltdown Man, she had
alienated me still further by bringing Sally's feelings
into this. She knew nothing about how wonderful Sally
really is. I felt indignation rise in my gut.

'How dare you speak about her like that? Can't you
see that you're just jealous, Emily? You're jealous
because Sally and I have everything you've ever wanted.
But dragging us down isn't going to make you feel
better. It'll just create more pain and resentment, and
you'll be hurting people who haven't even touched you.
Please Emily, I beg you, just leave it alone. Forget about
me.'

'That's what you'd love, isn't it? For me to forget
about you, and for you to forget about me. Mad old
Emily. Remember her? Well, I'm not mad, and you're
not going to forget about me.'

'There's no chance of that.'

She Dutch-fucked another cigarette.

'OK,' she said, hazily waving the fag in my direction.
'Here's a plan.'

'What?'

I was doing my best not to sound irritated.

'A plan,' she repeated.

'OK.'

'I want you to leave your wife for me.'

'No.'

'Ah! Ah! Patience. I haven't finished.'

I said nothing. Most of my being wanted to stand up,
tell her to eff off, and be done with it. However, some
sense of – what? Cowardice? Decency? Middle-class
politeness? Sympathy? Whatever it was, I heard her out.

'And if you don't leave your wife, then I'll tell the
newspapers that
WonderHubby
and the WHOLE Holden
Childcare Programme is a pack of lies. You have until
Monday. If I don't hear anything by then, I shall go to
the press.'