The Desperate Wife’s Survival Plan (7 page)

Peggy’s friend Patricia, the head of the cleaning business, had sounded terribly posh when Charley called her. She wasn’t sure how Aunty Peggy had come to mix in those kind of circles.

Patricia lived in a detached cottage on the outskirts of Little Grove, with
a beautiful country garden at the front. The cleaning business was obviously flourishing.

‘Do come in,’ she said, in a cut-glass accent.

Patricia Chalcot was a stout woman in her early fifties. She was wearing a blue silk blouse, matching pencil skirt and court shoes. She led Charley into the lounge, which was all floral fabrics and sparkling white net curtains.

‘So, my dear.’ Patricia gestured
for her to sit down. ‘You want to join my team of happy cleaners?’

Charley managed a fake smile. ‘Yes, I do.’

No, I don’t, she wanted to shout. I want to run away from here as fast as I possibly can.

‘Well, you look smart enough. All my girls must be trustworthy, reliable and neat. I won’t have untidy cleaners. A messy cleaner is a reflection on Grove Cleaners, which is a reflection on me.’

‘I understand.’

‘My customers want to come home at the end of their working day to a spotless home. My girls see to it that their dream comes true.’

Charley had thought that the job only required her to dust and clean.

‘As a rule, my customers require a weekly service. Normally either a whole morning or afternoon. It can take up to four hours to achieve the dream look.’

The telephone rang.

‘Grove Cleaners. Patricia Chalcot speaking. Yes, Mrs Palmer. I saw your application. How are you? Wonderful. Well, you’re in luck, my dear. I have a lovely girl called Charlotte who will be available to start attending to your home next week.’

Charley’s eyebrows shot up. This was all going a bit too fast. She hadn’t even agreed to take the job yet.

‘Nine o’clock sharp on Thursday,’ carried on
Patricia. ‘Super. So nice to talk to you again. Goodbye.’ She put down the phone and turned back to Charley. ‘Your first customer.’

‘Really?’

The phone rang again.

‘Gosh, it’s busy today.’ Patricia picked up the phone. ‘Grove Cleaners, how may I help you? . . . I beg your pardon? . . . Fanny, is that you? Calm down, dear.’

She rolled her eyes and sighed in an exaggerated manner.

‘I can’t
understand you. Stop shouting. Fanny . . . can you hear me?’

Then Patricia lost her temper.

‘Fanny! What the bleeding ’ell is going on there?’ All traces of the cut-glass accent had gone. In its place was pure cockney. ‘Well, what do you want
me
to do about it? Empty the bloody Hoover bag, you silly mare! If the blasted guinea pig’s not in there, then you’re in the clear. If it is, nip down
the pet shop and get another. What? I dunno. A tenner? No, of course I’m not going to pay for it. You Hoover up the family pet,
you
bloody pay for it!’

Patricia slammed down the phone and turned back to face Charley.

‘These bloody girls! Some of them are so thick . . .’ She caught Charley’s wide-eyed stare. ‘The customers like the posh accent, sweetheart. Makes them think they’re not going to
get some deadbeat like Fanny cleaning their homes. So, whaddya think? You game for this cleaning lark or what?’

That was it. Interview over. Charley had a job.

‘
NO WIFE OF
mine is going to be a bloody cleaner!’ shouted Steve.

‘For God’s sake!’ screamed Charley. ‘I will not have this row over and over with you. It’s a job!’ She put her hands on her hips and scowled at her husband. ‘Which is more than you’ve got at the minute.’

He stomped out of the lounge, leaving Charley to finish packing the box in front of her. She had stuck a few
photographs on the walls to keep up the impression of normality but with the house now almost devoid of furniture, they looked ridiculous. She plucked the last of the photographs down from the wall and stared at the picture of a happy couple getting married. Steve was looking uncomfortable in his suit; Charley was swamped by a meringue of cheap ivory silk. But they were grinning like idiots, young
and in love.

It had been a happy day, if perhaps a little soon after the beginning of their relationship. If you could call six months of sex in the back of his Fiat a relationship.

At the age of eighteen, Steve still lived with his tyrant of a mother. She was a scary religious nut who went even nuttier when he’d told her that Charley had accidentally become pregnant. One row followed another.
By the time she miscarried at eleven weeks, the church had been booked and there was no going back. So they said their vows and got married.

Steve’s meteoric rise in the local fashion trade took them both by surprise. On the advice of a mate, he had borrowed some money from the bank and set up a small shop selling knock-off clothing. By some kind of miracle, the clothes were popular and people
started to come into the shop in droves. The bottom had begun to drop out of the housing market and customers were looking for cheap ways of staying fashionable.

In those days Charley helped out in the shop at the weekends and it had been fun . . . certainly different from the boring office work she was used to. Steve made all the business deals and she worked the till. Then they had become ambitious
and decided to open a second shop. She gratefully gave up her office job as the money began to roll in. Two more shops were added to their empire in as many years.

But when had their ambition turned to greed? Was that when it had all begun to slip away from them? Now they had nothing, she thought as she dropped the last photograph into the box. Nothing but each other. They were back to where
they had started.

She carried the box into the kitchen and set it on the floor, next to the counter top. Glancing at the clock on the oven, she realised it was time to leave for her first cleaning job. Patricia had told her that it would take a week or so to build up to a full complement of customers but had already arranged a three-hour clean for that Monday morning.

Charley found herself unexpectedly
grateful. The money would give her a chance to top the car up with petrol, and the work would get her out of the house, away from Steve and the risk of yet another row.

The customer lived down a country lane beyond the green in Little Grove. It was a small farmhouse with a stable block tagged on to one side. A large pond curved around the front and one side of the house. It was a beautiful setting
with rabbits on the grass, ducks by the pond and birdsong filling the air.

Walking up to the front door, Charley was suddenly wracked with nerves. She had no idea why. It wasn’t going to be rocket science. She had cleaned her own home, hadn’t she? She took a deep breath. She would just get on with the job, take the money and get the hell out of there. How difficult could it be?

Brushing off
her anxiety, she rapped firmly on the front door knocker. A cacophony of barking exploded from inside the house and Charley took a step backwards. She heard the sound of a woman shouting amongst all the woofing and yapping. Gradually, the noise became muted before the front door was opened.

‘Are you the cleaner?’ boomed the middle-aged woman standing in the doorway.

‘Yes. Hello, I’m Charlotte.’

The customer introduced herself as Miss Fuller and went back into the dark hallway.

‘Dogs are going mad for their walk,’ she said over her shoulder. ‘Never had a cleaner before.’

Despite the idyllic setting, the house was a mess of paperwork, boxes, dog baskets and general untidiness. It wasn’t filthy but it wasn’t pristine either. And the smell of dog was definitely in the air.

‘Blasted landlord
has told me that I’ve got to keep the place tip-top. Can’t possibly move away at the minute. I’ve only just planted a new lot of potatoes.’

Charley glanced out of the window and spotted four dogs tearing around the garden.

Miss Fuller threw open the back door. ‘Leave those cabbages alone!’ she roared.

She slammed the back door shut and led Charley on a tour. Front room, dining room, utility
room, a couple of bedrooms which were mostly used for storage. And a grim bathroom which hadn’t seen a drop of bleach for decades.

By now, Charley was seriously worried. She had only been allocated three hours. This house looked as if it needed three years spent on it.

Back in the kitchen, Miss Fuller told her all the cleaning materials were under the sink. ‘Hoover’s in the hall cupboard. We’re
off for our walk. Should be back in an hour. Just start wherever you like.’

She left through the back door, calling the dogs as she went. ‘Herbert! Mozart! Come on, you lot! Desmond, I told you to get away from my cabbages!’

Charley watched them recede out of sight and then turned to face the inside of the house. It was weird being alone in a stranger’s home. She felt unnerved, as if she were
an intruder.

With a sigh, she opened up the sink cupboard, grabbed a duster and some furniture polish and made her way to the front room. An hour later, she had dusted, scrubbed and cleaned as much as she could downstairs and was already exhausted.

She trudged her way upstairs to the bathroom. Grimacing, she squirted cleaner around the dark rim inside the bath and stood well back to avoid the
toxic aroma of bleach and chemicals. Then she scrubbed at the places where the chemicals had done their job, giving the bath a streaked effect. She was running out of time, with the bedrooms and vacuuming still to do. She would just have to get the bits she’d missed the following week, and hope Miss Fuller wouldn’t notice.

Charley heard the back door slam and some movement in the kitchen.

‘Want
a cup of tea?’ came a holler.

‘Yes, please,’ she shouted back, hoping the offer was for her.

Next she heard the sound of scrabbling paws on the tiles in the hallway, followed by pounding on the carpeted stairs. Something was coming for her and there was nowhere to hide. Charley drew herself up to her full height and braced herself.

A blur of yellow labrador rushed around the corner into the
bathroom and leapt into her arms, knocking her down on to the floor. Pinned to the lino, she had no choice but to endure his rough licks and bad breath.

‘Herbert!’ came a shout from the doorway. ‘Stop that! Leave poor Charlotte alone.’

The dog instantly abandoned Charley, leaving her free to struggle to a sitting position.

‘Sorry about that,’ boomed Miss Fuller. ‘Have your cup of tea.’

‘Thank
you,’ she stammered, checking for broken bones as she stood back up and Miss Fuller strode downstairs again.

Charley brushed herself down before catching her reflection in the mirror above the sink. What a mess! Her t-shirt was damp and appeared to have new white blotches where the bleach had splattered it. Her hair had escaped from its ponytail and was now framing her face in wild black curls.
She peered closer and found one small curl coated with a dew drop of doggy saliva.

She sank on to the side of the bath, staring down at her ragged hands. No longer manicured, no longer pristine. Slave-to-money hands. Cleaner’s hands.

After gulping down her tea, she finished dusting the bedrooms and went downstairs to find the Hoover. She opened the hall cupboard and was greeted by a mess of
coats, brooms and boxes.

Pinning the ironing board back with one elbow, she held a broom high out of the way in order to make way for the Hoover. However, the broom handle dislodged a plastic tub on the top shelf and a large number of shoe-polish tins and brushes tumbled down around her. Charley shouted out in surprise and then pain as the tins bounced off her head. She screamed at the messy
cupboard, screamed at the pain in her scalp and then screamed at her own wretched life.

She sank to the floor. Wracking sobs appeared from nowhere, and once they started Charley found she couldn’t stem the tide. Her tears were dripping on to the lid of an old ice-cream box.

She thought back to her lovely Gaggia Gelatiera ice-cream maker. To when her beautiful home had been filled with expensive
things, as well as laughter and smiles. A time when it had been filled with the love between her and Steve.

That all felt a very long time ago.

THE CLUB HAD
once been a large rundown pub in the High Street, but now it was the only cocktail bar in Grove. After its makeover, it was frequented by Upper Grove clientele who relished the long leather sofas, soft lighting and sophisticated atmosphere.

Not that there was much sophistication amongst her work colleagues, thought Samantha, staring across to the dance floor with
disdain. There was nothing worse than watching middle-aged people trying to be cool. Moves like Jagger? More like David Cameron, she thought.

God, she was bored. All the oldies were bopping on the dance floor. All the youngsters were downing tequila shots at the bar. She had already had to endure a soggy pizza in the Italian restaurant down the road, stuck between snotty Miranda and the head
of Human Resources who kept talking about work. Was this night never going to end?

Or even begin, she wondered, her eyes flicking around the club trying to pick out Richard, the new Sales Director. She noted a few men looking in her direction but avoided making eye contact. She knew she looked fabulous. Her hair had behaved itself; the new blue bodycon dress clung to all the right places. Modesty
was for other people. She was looking good.

But it all felt such a waste. She took a sip of her Cosmopolitan, to relieve the boredom. Not that she ever got drunk. Samantha liked to be in control. She wasn’t going to let go and make a fool of herself like the others.

‘Hello.’

The voice was so close to her ear that when she spun round, she found herself, finally, face to face with Richard.

‘Hi,’ she said, giving him the full benefit of her smile.

He was standing very close to her. ‘Enjoying yourself?’

I am now, thought Samantha. But she wasn’t going to rush this.

‘I was just watching the floor show,’ she said, nodding at their dancing colleagues.