The Tea House on Mulberry Street (28 page)

Sadie was neglecting the housework. That was another thing that worried Arnold. The grass was not cut, weeds grew over the garden paths and the shrubs were untidy. There was dust on the bathroom windowsill and on his after-shave collection. She was always forgetting to post his mail and collect his dry-cleaning. The ironing lay undone on the sofa, in a huge tumbling pile. More often than not, he had to iron his own shirt in the morning, because Sadie was getting ready for the gym. He was no good at ironing, and Patricia often said he looked like he had slept in his clothes. His socks were not rolled into neat balls in his sock drawer and his shoes were not polished. Arnold began to appreciate all the little things Sadie had done for him over the years. Especially the sock balls. It was such a nuisance to have to look for two matching socks in the morning. But no matter how much he nagged her, she was not prepared to organise his socks any more. He began to look quite untidy.

“In fact,” said Patricia, one evening, as they were having dinner in a pub near Saint Anne’s Cathedral, “you’re starting to look positively dishevelled.”

Arnold thought he caught her smiling at another man when he came back from the Gents.

When December arrived, the Christmas decorations had already been up for weeks. Shop windows all over the city were filled with gifts and goodies and little Santas with long white beards and round wire spectacles. The supermarkets played compilations of carols and classical music. A huge Christmas tree was erected in front of the City Hall, and decked out with red and yellow lights and tinsel. The members of the city council managed to put their various squabbles behind them for long enough to organise a lavish Christmas banquet. And the divided communities of the city were finally united in their begrudgery of it all. Millennium or not, those boys were getting away with far too much.

Arnold had a deluge of phone calls from housewives who wanted a new conservatory, after they saw Aurora Blackstaff’s on the front cover of
Ireland’s Homes and Interiors
, with a gorgeous ten-foot spruce tree inside it, absolutely dripping with barley sugar canes and strings of fresh cranberries. That was the way things were going in suburbia, Arnold noted. The women wanted a traditionally decorated tree in the sitting-room for the family to enjoy and another whimsical, one in the conservatory. Just for themselves.

They should feature a Christmas tree in the next Walley brochure, he decided. He faxed the idea to Head Office and they were delighted with him. They sent him a crate of champagne by return of post, and got to work on a new brochure straightaway. The flood of new orders cheered Arnold up and gave him the motivation to sort out his personal life.

He wanted Sadie to revert to the superb housewife she used to be and Patricia to return to her role as his willing sex-slave, on permanent standby to attend to his manly needs. It was frustrating for Arnold when the two women in his life were not behaving properly. He went shopping for lavish gifts for the two of them, to sweeten them up. He bought Sadie a bread-maker, a fancy see-through vacuum-cleaner, an electric hedge-trimmer and some electronic scales for the bathroom. He bought Patricia a bottle of expensive perfume, the naughtiest black bra and suspenders he could find, a set of massage oils and a black, leather dress. He wrapped the gifts in his office and stashed them neatly beside the door, ready for Christmas Eve.

He arranged to spend Christmas Eve with Patricia and he booked a romantic meal for two in a little restaurant on Botanic Avenue, for four o’clock in the afternoon. If things went well, he would be home with Sadie by seven-thirty, ready for a big family get-together on Christmas Day itself.

He thought Christmas would be a good opportunity to get Sadie back to work around the house. Arnold’s relations were always invited for Christmas day and Sadie usually spent weeks polishing the house from top to bottom, and baking cakes, pies and pastries for the freezer. She always filled the house with fresh greenery from the garden, and home-made salt-dough angels and stars. He would speak to her that evening, he decided, as he stuck a big pink bow on the bread-maker. Pink was Sadie’s colour, he thought. Pink, like a cartoon elephant. Like marshmallows and candy floss. Patricia’s colour was black, like the black of a wicked witch’s cloak.

Sadie was watching a drama on television when Arnold came home, and did not even look at him when he asked how the Christmas preparations were coming along.

“I can’t be bothered with all that stuff any. more,” said Sadie. She was sitting on the sofa, with her feet up on a cushion.

“You what?” he said. “The turkey, the goose, the fruit cake –”

“Well, nobody really appreciates it, do they? It takes a whole day to bake a cake, and another day to decorate the damn thing. No. I’ll get some sausage rolls and party nibbles from the supermarket and heat it all up in the oven. Ready-made pasta salads. Potato croquettes from the freezer.”

“Tell me you’re jesting!”

“A buffet. That’ll do. As long as there’s plenty of booze, they’ll be happy. You know your relations are a bunch of old soaks. Now, hush, I’m watching
Midsomer Murders
. You know it’s my favourite.”

“Sadie, I must insist –”

“Oh, here comes the murderer now, and she doesn’t know it’s him. Oh, you stupid girl, he’s got the knife in his pocket! Look out!”

“Sadie. Switch that rubbish off. You can’t mean you’re not doing the traditional turkey lunch? Have you gone insane?”

“Oh, Arnold. You
are
old-fashioned. Nobody in the street is cooking a turkey any more. Mrs Kelly next door is having a dressed salmon delivered from the deli. And her friend, Jessica, has booked the entire family into the golf club for lunch.”

“I don’t care. I
want
a turkey.”

“Honestly, you should loosen up a bit. You’re turning into an old man before your time. You know your trouble? You’ve no imagination.”

“I
want
a turkey dinner.”

“I want to be a size ten, Arnold. But it’s not gonna happen.”

“This is outrageous –”

“Now,
shush
, I want to hear this. Isn’t John Nettles just divine? Oh, I wouldn’t mind finding him under the tree on Christmas morning. I’d soon get the wrapping paper off him!”

“Don’t be smutty, Sadie. You wouldn’t know what to do with him.”

“I certainly
would
. I’d have a good go, anyway.”

“Oh, Sadie! What about all the decorations?” he asked feebly. “The little biscuit-angels?”

“I’m having a few scented candles and pine cones in a big glass bowl. Minimal and restrained. That’s the fashion, nowadays. I’m not killing myself any more.”

Arnold went out to the shed and sat on a deckchair, beside the plastic Christmas tree. Sadie had no time for either him or the tree. She had dismissed them both as old-fashioned. She had bought some willow twigs in a big pot, and was planning to hang five stars made of crystal beads on them. That was their Christmas tree now. Some twigs and stars! And a bowl of candles! That was the full extent of the Christmas decorations.

Everything was going wrong. Just that morning, Patricia had told him she thought they should take a break. She wasn’t getting any younger, she said. She was tired of being the mistress. She wanted to be the wife for a change. She wanted a big house to decorate for Christmas, and fill with family and friends. She was tired of living on her own in a bed-sit, waiting for the phone to ring. Her lovely apartment had suddenly become a
bed-sit
.

Maurice and Daisy were staying in Greece for Christmas. Arnold wanted them to come back to Belfast for the holidays but they told him they couldn’t face the crowds in the airport. They were meeting some friends in a local restaurant for lunch, and then hosting a small cocktail party in their apartment. Maurice was going to play a selection of songs from the 1950s. Daisy had bought a new dress for the occasion. She said it would be lovely to spend the day with people their own age; people with the same interests. Arnold was devastated.

His sons sent a big card and said they were staying in Australia, and going to a pool party with their girlfriends. Arnold peered at the enclosed photo of some near-naked girls lying on a sunny beach with his two sons. It would simply be a waste of his dwindling energy, telling them to come home.

Never mind, he consoled himself, there was still the office party to look forward to. And the presentation of his award for Employee Of The Year.

Sadie was delighted that her campaign of subversion was going so well but she wasn’t finished yet. Arnold’s confidence was waning. He was deflating slowly, like an old balloon. The next part of her plan involved the public face of Arnold Smith. The crisp, white invitation to his office party was tucked in a corner of the hall mirror.

WALLEY WINDOWS AND CONSERVATORIES OF DISTINCTION

INVITE Mr Arnold Smith and guest TO THEIR CHRISTMAS PARTY.
TO BE HELD: 21st December 1999
8PM AT THE EUROPA HOTEL
FORMAL DRESS.

Sadie was going to wear a pink trouser suit and a pair of sandals with diamonds on the toe-straps. She was having some red streaks put in her hair, and had bought a new handbag with embroidered roses on it. She was going to wait until Arnold went up to the microphone to accept his prize, and then she was going to make her big announcement.

Chapter 36

M
ERRY
C
HRISTMAS
,
N
ICOLAS
C
AGE

Brenda was enjoying one of Daniel’s Christmas Platters, a blob of cream still on her top lip as she wrote the letter.

14 December, 1999

Dear Nicolas,

How are you? Have you decorated your mansion for Christmas yet? Have you got white fairy-lights strung around your swimming-pool? I bet you have.

My mother bought me a lovely frame for my exhibition. I haven’t decided what to put in it yet
.

I’m feeling really happy today. The gallery in Galway got in touch, first thing this morning. The Blue Donkey Gallery. They said they are all ready to stage my show tomorrow. They have the walls freshly painted, and a stack of promotional postcards printed up. Everyone who was invited has said they will attend.

Maybe Belfast artists are becoming fashionable at last. If you ever received the painting I sent you, hang onto it. It could be worth money some day!

I have sixty-nine canvases ready for the exhibition. I have used canvases with deep sides, and painted the sides as well, so they won’t need to be framed. That’s very contemporary, you know. And cost-effective.

There’ll be local musicians to play soft Irish ballads, and there will be designer nibbles as well. I’ve got a new dress and high-heel shoes for the occasion. All I have to do now is pack the paintings into crates, ready for the journey
.

Wish me luck. Merry Christmas,

Love, Brenda.

PS. Please send me a signed photo.

I am a genuine fan.

Brenda posted the letter right away. She was sure that Nicolas would reply to her soon. Even a movie-star of Nicolas’ magnitude could find the time to send a postcard, surely? Should she have written
Love, Brenda
at the end of the letter? Oh, never mind! It was Christmas! She spent the rest of the morning packing her precious paintings into wooden crates, and filling the spaces between them with polystyrene balls.

Her beautiful dress from Monsoon, with the blue and silver bugle-beads on it, she hung on a padded hanger from the picture rail. A fortune, it had cost her, even though she had found it on the sale-rail. She checked her new shoes for SALE stickers, and set them on the floor, beside the dress. She didn’t want to turn up at the exhibition with a big yellow sticker on each sole, declaring ONLY £4.99; that had happened before. Twice. She dyed her dark hair raven-black, in honour of Nicolas Cage, when he played the part of Sailor Ripley, in
Wild At Heart
. The blue-black sheen of it made her look paler than ever. Pale and interesting, she hoped. Finally, she was ready. She sat down on the tattered sofa, with a celebratory gin and tonic, and wondered how she would spend the afternoon.

She had one large piece of canvas left. She would do another painting, maybe one of Nicolas himself? Strange, but she had never painted him before. That was it! She would stretch a piece of canvas across the back of the golden frame, and staple it in place! She had plenty of staples left, thank God. Why had she not thought of that, the moment her mother pulled her surprise gift out of the carrier-bag? It was the perfect,
perfect
thing to do. She would paint a string of fairy-lights around the edge of the picture and call it,
Merry Christmas, Nicolas Cage
. Sure, she had a really nice tree right here in the flat, this year, for inspiration. (Mrs Brown had supplied the decorations.)