The Shoe Princess's Guide to the Galaxy (21 page)

       
‘OK. Name three words from my last three sentences.’ This should be good.

       
‘Millie,’ he whips back without a second thought.

       
Mmm, well, that one’s not rocket science.

       
‘Err ... baby. And ... mums,’ he finishes triumphantly.

       
Heck – am I that predictable?

       
‘All right then, but what was I actually talking about?’

       
‘Ah, yes.’ He straightens himself in the car seat and, in a voice that’s clearly supposed to mimic mine (and isn’t particularly complimentary), quotes verbatim my very own (and according to him, dubiously derived) theory: ‘The genetically predisposed inequality of life as a woman and mother in the modern capitalist world. As evidential proof of Darwin’s theory of natural selection, transposed as a model for male power attainment and world domination, and female social exclusion.’

       
Well, it’s a theory. And one admittedly more likely to have been derived by Kate than me. (But I thought it sounded quite good at the time.) I don’t know whether to be offended or flattered, as I never truly think he’s listening when I go off on my hobby horse. (Usually on the phone, towards the end of his third week in Bangalore, when my emotional and physical reserves for solo-parenting of a baby are perilously low.)

       
The speedometer suddenly increases in unison with Tim’s ire and I realise that he’s really worked up.

       
‘Do you think that I’m particularly
excited
about staring down the barrel of sixty-plus-hour working weeks, deep in the bowels of middle management, for the rest of my life? Constantly hassled by the financial stresses of mortgages, school fees and retirement funds. Oh, and with the added bonus, if I’m
really
lucky, of a heart attack, or a stroke, by the age of sixty-five.’

       
A distinct air of bitterness fills the car.

       
‘But surely the best part of my most excellent
male
life’ – blimey, if he spits that out any more spitefully he
will
have a stroke – ‘must be the prospect of never having the time to form a relationship with Millie. Having her see me as a walking, talking wallet that appears sporadically at mealtimes, weekends and school-concert nights. With a wife who resents me because all I do is work and not help enough with the chores.’

       
I’m now completely exasperated (and a little stung) by his outburst.

       
‘Don’t you get it? I’m not the enemy here. As long as most jobs that men perform get paid more than women’s, things will
never
change. If my pay was nearer to yours, for example, and we were both able to work flexitime, we could both split our week between caring for Millie and participating in paid work outside the home – with the same net income.’

       
‘Ah, my lovely wife the closet socialist. Shall we call in the removal men and go and live on a kibbutz, then?’

       
‘Don’t make fun of me, Tim.’ His highbrow tone smacks of patriarchy and is really winding me up. ‘If couples shared the burdens of finance, child-rearing and domestic chores more
equally
, men like you might, God willing, just live a few years longer with the aid of healthier arteries; and not to mention have more nurturing relationships with your kids ... and less bickering from your wife.’

       
‘Let’s play the cards we’ve been dealt, Jane. You’re living in la-la land.’

       
I’m
furious
that he’s so dismissive.

       
‘Oh, I get it. Just because a situation
exists
, that makes it right, does it?’

       
‘Look, you know I don’t think it’s right.’

       
‘No, I don’t, actually. You never acknowledge how hard it is for
me
– being at home with Millie. Especially with you being away so much.’

       
‘Oh, I do – all the time. You just don’t want to hear it.’

       
‘Rubbish! We live in parallel universes, Tim: work and home. Not to mention different bloody
continents
! Apart from now, you haven’t said very much to me about it at all, actually.’ My voice falters a little and I feel quite teary all of a sudden.

       
‘Look,’ he says, clearly trying to make amends, ‘as much as I’d
love
to change the world, I’m just saying that we’re mortgaged up to our eyeballs, we have other bills to pay and I have a job to do to pay them while you’re at home caring for Millie. That’s the choice
we
made – for Millie. And it is hard right now. For
both
of us. But we’ll get through it.’

       
‘
I suppose
...’ I mumble belligerently, and turn and stare out of the car window. Where, incidentally, I don’t see a mass rally of men with placards demanding equal rights for pay, flexitime, housework and home-parenting. Funny that.

       
Following the uneasily brokered truce in our game of my-life-is-harder-than-yours we sit in silence, with seemingly little else of mutual interest to talk about, for the remainder of the drive to my parents’ house.

After a rather awkward lunch and handover of Millie, and the obligatory check of Tim’s phone, we’re back on the road again for the short drive to the manor house – with sadly no time to spare for any stops at quaint antique shops.

       
Tim suddenly cranes his neck at an obscure angle to gawp at a roadside poster – of The Cat, no less. She’s in a new series of advertisements for Mange Chat. This time in a gold-lamé bikini (that really leaves little to the imagination), strategically covered by a perspex cape with satin leopardprint trim, gold platform wedges and dark, oversized sunglasses.

       
So much for The Fat Cat. She looks jaw-droppingly amazing – I’d say she must have shed about two stone in two weeks. I guess that old Cat-a-Pole has been getting a workout of late.

       
‘You’re ogling, Tim Meadows!’

       
‘I am not,’ he huffs. ‘And since when did you become the fun police, anyway?’

       
Ever since I went up two dress sizes.

       
I try to lighten the mood a little.

       
‘I’m just sick of seeing The Cat this week, that’s all.’ Her PR team obviously want us to know that she’s not The Fat Cat any more. ‘She’s got a huge spread of “exclusive secret photos” in the trash mags.’ I hold up my
Hello!
with the front-page picture of her frolicking on a Sardinian beach with Happy Sunshine, wearing those bloody giant black sunglasses again – which are incidentally bigger than her micro-bikini. ‘It was all completely orchestrated, anyway.’

       
‘How do you know?’

       
‘Trash Queenz – they said that she paid for the flights of the photographer.’

       
‘Hah! And you believe everything you read on a blog.’ He can hardly disguise his contempt. ‘You never used to be this gullible. Or cynical.’

       
‘Well, what about the drunken nightclubbing shots sent in to Trash Queenz from someone’s phone camera the following evening? Are you saying they made them up, too?’ It’s pathetic that she gets paid loads of money for being the so-called model mum, at home knitting mittens and baking cakes.

       
‘Why can’t you just be happy for her? She put on weight, she lost it. So what if she had a big night out. You’ve become obsessed with this whole conspiracy-theory-feminist-band wagon of late.’

       
Have I just.

       
So far, NOT so good.

www.ShoePrincess.com
 
Toe Tips
 
If you’re shorter than 5’5’’ and do not wish to be mistaken for a garden gnome, then it’s strongly advised that you never wear flat shoes with a pointed toe. If you insist on wearing flat shoes, try a square toe – it’s much more becoming.
 
And while we’re covering toes, there are two important rules for round-toed shoes: only ever wear them if they have high heels or if they’re complete flats (e.g., Chanel ballet slipper). Never wear a round-toed shoe with a mid-heel height – think Minnie Mouse!
 
SP Star Summer City
 
It is my great pleasure to announce that the award goes to Copenhagen. Any city where it’s normal practice to ride bicycles in stilettos is a shoe princess’s kind of city!
 
Walk Tall
 
Classic courts with a medium to high heel height elongate the leg and flatter the ankles. Only wear ankle straps and T-bars if you can afford to cut a foot off your height.
 
And in the summertime, wear light-beige (nude) high-heeled courts with sundresses or jeans (A-list actresses and the Scandinavian royals do it all the time) to give height and poise, yet not draw the eye down. You’ll be amazed at how much taller you appear!

19. Stilettos at Dawn

Tim and I quarrel the remainder of the way to the manor house, only to arrive and find that it is no longer a luxury five-star country estate but a clean, green, spartan wellness centre that Kate would most surely approve of: No caffeine. No carbs. No meat. No fat. No smoking. No alcohol. No TV. No shoes. (I’m
deadly
serious – everyone seems to be walking about barefoot.)

       
What have I done to deserve this? My very own living hell!

       
To make matters worse, Tim has just remembered to give me the schedule for the partners’ welcome session: We are to assemble in the main foyer in half an hour, where we will be led by none other than Tim’s illustrious boss Alex in a session called Facing Your Fears – at the indoor three-metre-springboard diving complex.

       
I didn’t pack my swimsuit. What a brilliant stroke of luck – as I’m terrified of heights, not to mention the idea of baring my blubber in public.

       
We run into a familiar face – Hannah, the wife of Tim’s long-time colleague, Charlie. She tells me that if I don’t participate in the diving session it won’t be just Tim who loses points, but the whole team. Apparently, they’re going to spend the week accruing points, as part of a corporate incentive scheme. Whoever wins gets the chance to share the prize of their choice with the team. But only if they beat the scores of the other twelve teams in the company. The sky’s the limit.

       
Charlie’s already put his name down for a heli-ski trip to Colorado. I wistfully think that, if Tim won, I’d convince him to book everyone (including partners) into the Savoy for a fortnight – so I could catch up on a year’s worth of sleep.

       
Hannah also tells me that she’s been in training for the diving for months – ever since Charlie told her about it.