The Secret Life of a Slummy Mummy (34 page)

‘Will you put on something dark?’ Emma says. ‘I can see that you are still wearing your pyjamas. I’ll explain everything when you come down. I’m so sorry.’

Emma is not prone to apologies. In fact, I think this is the first time that she has ever said sorry to me. It is not that she doesn’t realise when she has messed up. She just never likes to admit she might be wrong about anything. She is a woman of conviction.

I open the front door into the night and, shivering with a mixture of cold and fatigue, climb into the passenger seat of her car, breathing in the warm smell of the old leather seats and admiring the wooden dashboard with its dials and walnut finish. I would really like one of these. For a moment I consider the cheque from Petra that is sitting in my drawer.

‘Are you having a Thelma and Louise moment?’ I ask her, as she starts driving down Fitzjohn’s Avenue and then heads due west towards Maida Vale, following instructions on the portable satellite navigation kit that sits on top of the dashboard.

‘We’re not going south of the river, are we?’ I ask, because I have heard of people being directed into rivers by their sat nav before.

‘No, Notting Hill,’ she says.

Emma always drives faster than me. She keeps her finger on the gear stick at all times and changes up and down to alter her speed rather than braking. In fact, since we met at Manchester in the late 1980s she has always done everything faster than the rest of the world. I can imagine her as a child, sighing with boredom when her four-year-old friends wanted to play with dolls, instead of experimenting with make-up. Then, growing frustrated as a teenager when her friends spent hours applying cheap Avon products, while she had already moved on to a more natural look that didn’t involve foundation in shades of American tan.

I have seen photos of her as a child and even back then she somehow looked more polished than the rest of us. A dedicated Londoner, she started university with all the apparent advantages that big-city life offers. While I bought from charity shops out of necessity, developing a look that could best be described as baggy, with its emphasis on ill-fitting knitted cardigans and oversize coats, she was already combining cheap period pieces with items from Miss Selfridge. She knew how to snort cocaine without sneezing and blowing away the fun for everyone else. She sang in a band. Even her parents’ divorce seemed exciting in all its plate-throwing recrimination. Emma made us all feel as though we had no experience of life. Back then, her wariness and cynicism made her seem cool rather than brittle. Aged nineteen, she was already weary of life. She was also the only person that I knew who was sure about what she wanted to
do when she left university. In our last two years at Manchester she worked every weekend at a local newspaper. She knew where she was going, while the rest of us had barely opened up the map.

In our final year, she came to stay at my parents’ house for the weekend with Cathy. It was this weekend that crystallised my view of her. Mark had come for a couple of days to lick his wounds after finishing a relationship with his latest girlfriend. He wanted to talk it through with me. But when Emma walked into the room, his misery over his inability to be faithful evaporated.

‘How can I settle on one woman, when there are so many wonderful girls out there?’ he said.

‘But isn’t there one that seems more wonderful to you than any of the others?’ I asked, a hint of exasperation in my voice.

‘They are all fantastic at different times,’ he said.

‘You can’t have a girlfriend to suit your mood,’ I insisted.

‘But you can, that’s the problem,’ he said. Even as I was having strict conversations with him about the need for a fallow period before rushing into another relationship, his responses drifted into intense glances at Emma.

By the end of the first evening, Mark and Emma were making feeble excuses to be alone together. It wasn’t the first time that he had fallen for one of my girlfriends and I was almost certain it wouldn’t be the last. But it was the first time that someone failed to call him back. A few months later Mark was facing the bitter sting of rejection. This was never discussed with me, either by him or Emma, but Mark never recovered his lost pride over the affair.

By that time, Cathy and I were used to Emma taking centre stage. I was happy with my observer status. Life didn’t
revolve around me. I revolved around life and that felt comfortable.

Heading towards Notting Hill, I have that same sensation of being a spectator to Emma’s life, but as she switches the engine off in a dark street, just off Colville Terrace, I know that this time she requires more of me.

‘Lucy, you know that I am usually a rational person, who rarely loses control,’ she begins, turning in her seat so that she faces me. I nod. But I no longer believe it.

‘Well, the past month I have been in turmoil,’ she says. ‘About four weeks ago, Guy told me that he had decided to leave his wife and move in with me.’ She pauses for dramatic effect and I willingly comply with a few suitable adjectives. It suddenly feels very late and my body wants to go to sleep.

‘That’s amazing,’ I say sleepily, wondering why she had to drive all the way to Notting Hill to tell me this.

‘It would be, except that he hasn’t done it. At the beginning of this week I looked at his BlackBerry and discovered that they have booked a two-week holiday in Sicily in August. When I challenged him he said that he thought he might have one last family holiday and then tell her everything. Then, this weekend, we were meant to go to Paris together and at the last minute he blew me out because he wanted to go skiing in France with them. It suddenly dawned on me that he would always have a ready excuse to avoid telling her and that I could spend years growing old and bitter, waiting for him to do this and that he might simply never do it. So I decided to take the situation into my own hands.’

I sit up and stretch, too tired to anticipate what might be coming next.

‘So, earlier this evening, I did something radical. I knew that they were away, so I phoned his home and left a message that must have filled the entire machine, giving a detailed account of our affair and everything that has gone on.’

I look at her in disbelief.

‘But he’ll never stay with you after doing something like that,’ I say. ‘His wife will be devastated.’

‘Precisely,’ she says, her head resting on the steering wheel. ‘And that is why we are here. We have to get into their house and delete that message.’ She sits up resolutely, opens the door of the car and gets out, pulling on a pair of yellow kitchen gloves and handing me a similar pair.

‘We mustn’t leave fingerprints. Pass me that handbag, please, Lucy,’ she says, coming to open the passenger door and pointing at my feet. It is her favourite black Chloe Paddington. It is so heavy that I have to use both hands to pick it up.

‘With or without you, I am going to do this,’ she says with steely determination. I open the bag and look inside. It is full of tools. There are a couple of screwdrivers, a drill and a sturdy-looking hammer. I shut it immediately and cling on to it. Emma tries to pull it out of my hands.

‘You’re insane,’ I tell her. ‘I’m going to phone Tom immediately.’

‘I have no choice,’ she says. ‘I made a bad decision, and if I do this I can change the course of history. I promise you, Lucy, that if you help me I will end it with Guy. Eventually.’

‘But you said that you are doing this to prevent him leaving you,’ I say.

‘Lucy, it’s not as bad as it looks,’ she says, ignoring my comment. ‘I got the keys to his house from his secretary and I know how to disable the alarm. I’m just covering my back in case
the answer machine is in a room that is locked. There is a plan. Forget the tools. There will be some in the house anyway.’

She has started walking away from the car down the road. I get out to follow her, struggling with the Chloe handbag. It is a dangerous time of night to be walking around alone, although in our dark clothes and yellow rubber gloves we are probably the ones to avoid. She starts to run at a slow jog, pulling a hat over her face.

‘In case there’s CCTV,’ she says, as though this is a familiar situation.

I struggle to keep up and eventually manage to maintain a slow trot beside her as we go through Powis Square, my tummies bouncing up and down uncomfortably. I am so breathless that I can’t speak. We settle into a kind of rhythm and turn into a small cobbled mews, my chest aching with the effort of keeping up.

Suddenly I have an epiphany. I know with absolute conviction that at the end of this street, Emma will turn first left and we will stand in front of a large, early Victorian house in St Luke’s Road. I have never been to this house before but I know who lives there.

Because in one of those strange coincidences that make up life, I realise with absolute certainty that Emma is having an affair with Yummy Mummy No. 1’s husband. There have been many clues, but I have been so wrapped up with my own dilemmas that I have ignored the obvious.

‘I know the people who live here,’ I say to Emma as we go up the steps at the front of the house. I am leaning over, panting, holding my legs.

‘Of course, it’s Guy’s house,’ she says, looking at me from underneath the brim of her hat. ‘Are you all right, Lucy?’

‘What I mean is that I know his wife. And his children,’ I say. ‘We’re at the same school. She’s somewhere between an acquaintance and a friend. Actually, we’re coming to a school party here next week.’

‘God, that’s no good,’ she says, but she doesn’t stop trying keys in the front door locks. Every few seconds she looks nervously up and down the road to check that no one is watching. This is Emma’s drama and she doesn’t really want me claiming a part of it.

‘I’m really sorry to involve you in this, but I knew that you would have the imagination to help me resolve the situation. You’re so unflappable.’

The front door opens and we find ourselves in the hallway of Yummy Mummy No. 1’s house.

‘Am I?’ I say, a little surprised, shutting the door behind me, forgetting how Emma always uses flattery to get her own way. She pulls out a small piece of paper from her pocket and starts to punch numbers into the alarm.

‘I suppose it’s because you are used to dealing with unpredictable situations in hostile environments,’ she whispers. ‘Mothers are good at that.’

‘You make me sound like a member of the special forces,’ I say, looking around. I don’t know what I was expecting, because I didn’t have the luxury of anticipation. I switch on the light and look up at a beautiful chandelier with multi-coloured crystals that throws different-coloured light against the cream walls. Its brightness makes me blink. There is a table and a bunch of flowers beside a large mirror, and in the reflection I can see a black-and-white family portrait hanging at the bottom of the staircase.

Yummy Mummy No. 1 is lying on an overgrown lawn with
Guy. In the background is a house that I imagine is their Dorset retreat. Her head is thrown back in laughter. Guy looks at her indulgently. They are surrounded by their four children. It must have been taken in the summer because the children are wearing swimsuits and Yummy Mummy No. 1 has a pair of cut-off denim shorts that show off her long legs to perfection. Emma goes over to look at the picture and sighs.

‘How did I get involved in all this?’ she says wearily.

‘Pictures never tell you the whole story,’ I say, trying to be reassuring. ‘They’re a projection of how people want you to see them.’

A big vase of purple alliums, lilacs and green chrysanthemums sits on the table.

‘That’s exactly like the bunch he sent me on my birthday,’ she says bitterly. ‘He must have got a job lot from Paula Pryke. Come on, let’s go and look for this answer machine.’

We creep into a huge double sitting room that leads off the hallway and both take off our shoes. Wooden shutters are closed over floor-to-ceiling windows. I turn on a small lamp on a table at the end of the room facing the road. The answer machine sits there, flashing to indicate that there are new messages.

‘I hope they haven’t picked them up remotely,’ Emma says, looking worried and chewing the sleeves of her black shirt. She looks small and vulnerable. I press the Play button on the answer machine. Emma’s voice fills the void, and in a raspy, slow tone, she gives an account of herself to Guy and his wife. I sit down on a chair in front of the desk, remove my glasses and sleepily rub my eyes.

‘Your husband is living a double life . . .’ the message starts. I want to listen to it all but Emma comes over and presses the Delete button before I have a chance to stop her. I feel slightly
cheated because I think if I could hear the whole message I might access parts of her that are normally unreachable.

‘I don’t want you to hear it,’ she says. ‘I sound so pathetically desperate. The rational part of me knows that I should end it with Guy but I’m too weak to do it. I’ve never felt so close to anyone. I think that he means it when he says that he loves me, but what I now realise is that he is also happy when he’s with his family, while my life is on hold until he comes back. I’ve never felt so fragile. And it was all so obvious that this would happen.’ Then she starts crying. ‘This is what happens if you become dependent on someone. You become impotent. That’s what happened to my mother and now the same thing is going to happen to me.’

‘Falling in love is always a risk,’ I say, slightly shocked to hear Emma’s relationship philosophy expounded so baldly. ‘But it isn’t a sign of weakness. You could argue it is a sign of strength. Because inevitably there will be periods of doubt and incompatibility, but when you get over those they transmute into something even more valuable. Let’s go downstairs and make a cup of tea.’

She laughs weakly.

‘Sometimes I wish I was you, Lucy,’ she says. ‘Everything sorted.’

‘Don’t be ridiculous,’ I say. ‘It’s all a house of cards. Could come tumbling down at any moment.’

We stand at the bottom of the stairs in the basement kitchen. I switch on the light. We are in an enormous space, staring at a kitchen island that is so long it looks like a landing strip. A kettle sits at one end and there is a pile of papers at the other. I take off the rubber gloves and start opening and shutting cupboards searching for tea. Emma is looking at the
pile of papers, immersed in what looks like
Yummy Mummy No. 1’s bank statement.