The Perfect 10 (22 page)

‘You want it all,’ Cagney says simultaneously. I stop speaking, but he carries on. ‘You want to earn the cash, and have the babies, and spend five hundred pounds on a pair of shoes and not get stressed and have three holidays a year and have the sex life of honeymooners. And when that doesn’t happen you get pissed off and you take it out on the nearest loser you can find.’

I stare at him confused. Where is the bit about food? Did he say something about shoes? And honeymooners?

‘Petrol is my favourite smell,’ says Peter.

‘Hmmm, yes, I love the smell of petrol in the morning,’ Christine volunteers with a smile.

‘Does it smell like victory?’ asks Christian.

I break the staring contest I am having with the vase just over Cagney’s left shoulder to glance quickly at Christine, to make sure that she is OK, and not high.

‘No … it means I’ve dropped the girls at school already. I never fill up the Land Rover on the way to school, we never have time.’ Christine looks from me to Christian, to Peter and back again, confused … she really is very short.

‘Hmmm,’ Christian says.

Somebody sighs, and something falls on the floor. I really want to go home now. I glance around to find Adrian, but he is still in the other room.

‘Do you know what I think, Mr James?’ I sound reasonably sober; I impress myself. ‘I think that the only thing you really understand about women is that they scare the shit out of you, and the only thing you are more scared of is admitting it.’

‘Maybe you are right.’ Cagney nods his head, and looks up. ‘But it’s not all women I am scared of … just the ones that are bigger than me.’

Christian drops the spoon he was playing with and looks up sharply at Cagney. My shoulders sag.

‘Remember 1976?’ asks Terence.

‘Why?’ asks Deidre.

Terence doesn’t answer. Christian and Cagney and I look from one to another of us, never quite meeting either of the other’s stare.

‘Cagney …’ Christian reproaches gently, but it’s like a starter pistol.

‘Women today want the world!’ he shouts, banging his fist on the table.

‘And why shouldn’t I want the world?’ I demand, just as angrily. ‘Why is it for you and not for me?’ I stab my finger in a point towards him.

‘What do you want it for? What could you possibly do with it? Paint it pink? Cover it in chocolate sauce?’ Cagney’s cheeks are flushed red, but his voice is lower, controlled, but angry.

‘What if I want it just to have it? Is that so bad? Or so different, for that matter? Isn’t that what history is all about – men who wanted the world just to have it?’

‘It’s utterly different. The men of history wanted to create better places, greater civilisations. You! You wouldn’t know what to do with it if you had it! You’d have to ask your councillor, or your yoga instructor!’ Cagney laughs a short sharp laugh of derision, and then throws down his napkin for good.

‘What does your agency do?’ I demand, suddenly urgently needing to know.

‘I catch out cheats,’ Cagney says.

Adrian is still in the other room.

‘What do you mean, “cheats”? What do they cheat at? Poker? Monopoly?’

‘Marriage. Sex,’ Cagney replies flatly.

‘You catch men or women who are having affairs? You mean, you take photos? How awful!’

‘It is awful, yes. That’s the first sensible thing you’ve said all night, Sundry. The propensity for women to cheat on men is so great it keeps me and all my staff in hot champagne and penthouses.’

‘You might want to up your clothes allowance if that’s the case,’ I snigger, but to nobody, to myself. And then, ‘Hold on, you mean men and women, right? You just said women.’

‘I was right the first time.’

‘Are you saying men aren’t unfaithful?’ I laugh, wide-eyed, amazed. This guy is from another century!

‘No.’

‘Then why no wives?’ I ask, confused.

‘Because I don’t work for women.’

I cough once, violently and uncontrollably, and Christian looks at me with concern, and mouths, ‘Darling’, before putting two thumbs up and mouthing, ‘You OK?’

‘You mean you
won’t
work for women?’ I say squarely.

‘Won’t … don’t … tomato … tom—ato.’

‘Let’s call the whole thing off!’ Christian sings loudly, and we all turn to face him as he throws his hands in the air.

I turn back to Cagney. ‘I am sorry, Mr James, but that is just hateful! What you do is just … it’s just evil! You are just evil!’ I consider standing up for emphasis, but realise that I have lost one shoe whilst dangling it off an aching foot beneath the table, and if I did stand up quickly, even now feeling almost entirely sober, I would be lopsided. And then I would fall down.

‘It is in no way worse than what you do!’ Cagney fumes, his cheeks turning pink, and puffing out. He resembles a spoilt child throwing a temper tantrum.

‘I sell underwear, for Christ’s sake!’ I shout. Christine winces as I swear. I don’t see it, I just sense it.

‘And great big bloody dildos!’ Cagney shouts back, and I feel Christine almost pass out.

‘What is so wrong with a vibrator?’ I shout, reclaiming my shoe and pushing myself to my feet, as my chair scrapes back across a cold slate-tiled floor.

‘You are replacing men!’ Cagney shouts back, and visibly thinks about standing up himself.

‘Oh my God, Mr James, men aren’t just there for sex! What is wrong with you? A man is not just the sum of his reproductive parts. Some men can actually have a conversation with a woman! Can you believe that?’

‘What do you call what we’re having?’ Cagney jumps to his feet and places his palms face down on the table, leaning forwards in my direction.

I take one step forward, place both of my palms flat on the table as well, and say in the lowest most controlled voice I can muster, ‘A living bloody nightmare.’

‘Why? Because dessert hasn’t arrived yet?’ Cagney stares at me. And the tears rush to my eyes again.

‘Sorry?’ I ask softly.

‘Need that chocolate, do we?’ Cagney asks flatly.

I feel my lip quiver, and I gulp loudly. Cagney’s eyes flicker, and he glances quickly at the table, and then back at me.

‘What are you saying to me?’ I ask quietly, my lip trembling, my hands shaking, my eyes watering.

Cagney stares at me for a second, and I see something sweep across his face as a tear swells out of my right eye and lands heavily on my cheek. I see his hands, clenched in fists of the tablecloth, loosen. But then Peter Gloaming coughs a drunken cough, and it catapults Cagney out of the trance that had taken us both just then, feeling the pain together. He remembers his audience, and plays the role that he started to the end.

‘Calm down, Sunny – lose your sense of humour as well as your love handles, did you?’

My hand moves up to wipe my eye quickly, and I move
out from in front of my chair. ‘I’m leaving,’ I say flatly, waiting for the tears to subside.

‘Don’t bother, I will.’ Cagney moves out from behind the table with a ferocious speed.

‘No! I said it first!’ I shout at him, and he stands still. I turn to Deidre and Terence. ‘I’m really sorry but I have to go now. Thank you for this evening, and …’ I am already moving towards the door, before I stop suddenly, and turn to address them seriously, as I should.

‘Words cannot express how glad I am that Dougal is OK, as OK as he can be. I am truly thankful that I could help, and the fact that he is still safe with you is all I need to know. I don’t think it would do him any good to see me again, in case it does make him remember something he might otherwise have blacked out for life. So anyway … I’m just saying thank you, for tonight. But now I have to go.’ I stare at them for a second, and then dart around the table and kiss them both on the cheek. I look up to see Christine and Peter sitting opposite each other, hammered, trying to focus on my leaving.

‘Christine, and Peter, it was lovely to meet you both.’

Peter is drunk and gets up to kiss me goodbye.

I kiss him, or rather the air around him, lightly and quickly, and then click quickly around the table to Christine and kiss her as well, so she doesn’t think I am hitting on her husband.

‘And, Christian! I’ll see you again soon, I’m sure.’ I reach across a hand to hold his, but he pushes his chair back and leans forward, so I can peck him a quick goodbye. I stand up straight and survey the only adult left standing that I haven’t kissed goodbye.

Cagney, who is standing on the other side of the table, glares at me.

‘Now I have to go,’ I say, and walk out.

I grab my bag from the table in the hallway and stop by the door to the sitting room. Adrian is still on the phone. He looks up at me apologetically after a few moments, and mouths the word ‘sorry’. Then puts his finger to his lips and mouths ‘shhh’.

I don’t turn round as I walk out, despite hearing Christine ask, ‘What’s the name of her website? It sounds wonderful!’

I round the corner of their pathway by the gate and walk deliberately into the middle of the quiet road, because it is safer and nobody can grab you from behind a bush or a wall and drag you in. It’s a little tip I picked up from
Crime Watch
, otherwise known as the most terrifying show on television. I have barely taken a few steps when I hear a voice behind me.

‘I’m very sorry.’

I turn round and see Cagney is standing in the middle of the street.

‘Christian told you to apologise that quickly?’ I say quietly.

‘I didn’t mean for you to leave. I’m going now, please go back in.’ Cagney looks at his hands as he wrings them once, and then lets them fall to his side.

‘No,’ I say resolutely, ‘I’m too upset to stay. I’m going home.’ I turn to walk away.

‘Sunny,’ Cagney says clearly, and I stop with my back to him. He doesn’t speak, and so I turn round. ‘You should at least wait for … your friend,’ he says. I smile half a sad smile.

‘I don’t know how long he’ll be, and I can’t ask, in case his girlfriend hears me.’ I laugh at how pathetic I sound.

Cagney doesn’t say anything, but stares at a bush to his right, filled with small blue flowers that I am guessing neither of us could name given fifty guesses.

‘You can’t walk home alone,’ he says to the blue-flowered bush.

‘I’ll be fine,’ I say sadly. It’s not so bad, it’s what I’m used to. Maybe I don’t need protecting.

‘Fine is never fine,’ he says, and I smile because I’ve heard that before.

‘Well, what do you suggest?’ I ask suddenly, surprised at the words as they come out, surprised at what I might suddenly be about to say.

Cagney looks at me, and then at a post box across the road. I look at the post box too, to see what is so interesting.

Cagney coughs slightly, and his eyes flicker towards me. I widen my eyes, waiting for his suggestion. We both hear Christian shout, ‘Bye bye,’ as he heads out of the front door. Cagney’s eyes dart back to the post box.

‘At least let Christian walk you,’ he says quietly.

I open my mouth to speak but nothing comes out.

‘Christian, you’ll walk her home, won’t you.’ It is a statement, not a question.

Christian stops at his side, and glances at Cagney with incredulity. I feel a trickle of disappointment chase down my spine with a bead of sweat, and I don’t understand it at all.

Christian looks up in time to catch the confusion on my face. ‘Of course I’ll walk you home, Sunny. Come on, my lovely.’

As Christian walks towards me I concentrate on his face, although something makes me glance back at Cagney at the last moment. But he simply looks at the ground, as Christian grabs my hand, and pulls me off in the opposite direction. Until this evening I have met him only in the video shop and yet it feels comfortable to walk hand in hand with Christian, arms outstretched, swinging our interlocking palms backwards and forwards, in the middle of the quiet Kew streets, towards home.

‘What a funny man,’ I say eventually.

‘Funny’s not a word that gets used a lot to describe Cagney, to be honest.’ Christian winks at me and smiles.

‘You know I mean funny weird, of course. Not funny ha ha.’

‘Oh, he’s not weird, not really. He’s just been through a lot.’

‘Not that you’d know! I mean, Jesus, Christian, he’s so angry all the time! And I haven’t done anything – why does he hate me so much?’

Christian tugs my hand back so I stop walking and addresses me. ‘It’s not you, lovely girl, it’s more that … he doesn’t really mix … with women … that much anymore.’

‘Has he ever?’ I ask, incredulous.

‘Oh, yes …’ Christian nods his head wisely.

‘So does that mean he is … divorced?’ I ask curiously.

‘Yes.’ Christian nods his head solemnly, and I am sure I am supposed to take something more from it.

‘I see,’ I say, not really seeing at all.

‘Three times,’ Christian says.

I cough loudly, and pull on Christian’s hand, so he stops this time. A big fat Kew cat strolls past, utterly disinterested in the pair of us.