The Desperate Diary of a Country Housewife Page 13

  Between 7.30 and 9.00 on May 9th 2006 Oakland!’s Traffic Sub-Committee counted 48 cars passing along our road (as opposed to 44, when they counted fifteen months ago).

  Not only that.

  ‘Despite clearly displayed Access Only signs, 14 of those 48 vehicles, 54% of which were single-occupant drivers, then crossed into Archway Lane.’

  The Oakland! mob wants £15,000 from the local council to conduct a further survey, so they can prove conclusively that the entire area should be closed off to everyone but them. Problem is, I rather like the sound of traffic. Reminds me of the good old days.

  So—I am reduced to surfing the net, then, like all the other lonely nutters out there…Anyone else fed up with all the ruddy decency around here? Anyone? I typed in ‘Bossy Britain’ at some point. And then ‘Bossy Britain: South West’.

  And, astonishingly, I hit a seam. I have a meeting! It’s an anti-ID card rally, with fellow humans, nothing less, and so far not one of them—over e-mail at least—has mentioned kids or healthy snacks, or even suggested they bring along their anoraks. There is hope in the damp air at last. Little England is almost beautiful again.

  June 17th

  Just finished a ten-minute conversation with Fin without having a single argument. Amazing. Never worked so hard at anything in my life, and to be fair I don’t think he has either. Anyway, he says he’s coming home at the end of the week. It will be his first time seeing the cottage. He’s arriving early evening on Saturday and leaving after lunch on Sunday. I’m going to put in a call to the babysitter, so we can go out on the tiles together once the children are in bed.

  Also—decided to stop being a martyr and start putting a bit of pressure on my useless, fair-weather friends. I’m going to swallow my pride and call them up and bloody well guilt them into coming down to see me. I’m fed up with spending so much time on my own.

  June 21st

  Big bad night, last night. Fin and I had no idea where to go for our night on the tiles. We finally wound up, with only an hour before closing time (partly because we got lost; partly because of the argument; partly because it took ages to get our over-excited children into bed), in a skanky-looking pub on the edge of Paradise, in the middle of what I think is the only housing estate in the town.

  Interestingly—intriguingly—we almost bumped bonnets with Mr Mega-Bux as we were parking up. His car was stopped directly in front of ours. Fin was staring at him like he’d seen a ghost. He must have spotted the girl before I did—a truly rancid-looking little scrubber, poor thing, climbing out of the Mega-Bux passenger seat. It was pretty obvious what was going on. At least I thought it was. Of course it’s possible he was simply dropping the babysitter back, or something similarly dull. But at the time I was convinced he was up to something scandalous. Either way, Fin and I both studiously pretended not to have seen him and he didn’t appear to see us either.

  Couldn’t help feeling for Clare, with her wrinkle-lifting nightcap and her peachy négligé. Also couldn’t help being reminded of the slanderous story currently being put around by the Fruit’n’Veg brigade; that she had first met her husband while she was on the game. I told Fin.

  But he didn’t laugh. At all. Looked quite angry about it, actually. Maybe he wasn’t listening. His mobile had just pinged through a text message, I think, and he was scowling over that. In any case his non-response offended me disproportionately, I see in retrospect. So we entered the pub with him distracted and me already on the point of tears. Within half an hour, what fragile peace there had been between us was in ruins.

  Two things came out, amid all the rage and drivel.

  Firstly, and for the first time, we gave voice to the possibility that our move to Paradise had been a mistake. Well, I gave the voice. I said it. And Fin…didn’t disagree. He said we shouldn’t give up on it yet; we should ‘give the place a chance’; and the five words together, though clearly sensible, sounded to me like nothing but the CLANG of a jail door. How long is A Chance, after all?

  Nevertheless. We did agree. To give the place A Chance. Another five years, he suggested…I don’t want to think about it too much.

  The second thing that came out was that I knew he was having an affair with Hatty. He denied it completely, of course. He denied it very calmly. Actually, I’ve never known him so cold. He said I was trying to sabotage ‘a perfectly simple, enjoyable friendship’ out of spite. Because I was jealous and chippy and insecure. I said not. I also said a lot of other things which weren’t especially helpful or friendly either. I’m always horrible—mad and horrible—when I’m pregnant. I have to recognise that. But when did he get to be so vicious in return? What’s his excuse? Anyway, it doesn’t make any difference, really. What does it matter? I’ve asked him to tell Hatt that he’s not going to lodge with her after he returns from the Isle of Man, and he’s refused. Or he thinks he’s refused.

  Obviously, I’ve not given up.

  June 26th

  Spent the whole day trying to think of ideas for newspaper articles, and I’ve come up with nothing. Asked Fin if I could do something on androids, using his film as the peg. He wasn’t that keen. But I’m desperate, and he didn’t exactly refuse, either. There must be something in it…

  Androids: Do They Really Exist?

  Or howzabout:

  Androids: Fact from fiction—What are they, and what do they wear?

  Not funny. No interest in androids anyway. Maybe I should do something on farms instead. Seeing as I’m stuck here in the country. Farms…What goes with farms?

  Farm noises

  Farm fresh

  Farm subsidies

  Farmhouse Cheddar

  Fat farm

  I had a farm in Africa

  Bugger it. The more I think, the more fatuous I become. But none of my usual commissioners call any more. So I’ve got to take the initiative. Got to come up with something. Got to.

  June 28th

  Lovely Alexis. Haven’t spoken to her for months. E-mailed her last week, pretty much begging her to come down here and keep me company for a bit. I know she’s incredibly busy opening a new shop, so I completely didn’t expect her to respond—but she’s coming to lunch tomorrow! Love her. Love her, love her. Also, got an e-mail from Rebecca saying she’d take the day off work and come down. Funny how it’s always the really old friends (apart from Hatty, of course) who come up trumps in the end. Why did I ever imagine I wanted to make any new ones?

  June 30th

  Ha! Hatt e-mailed me a photograph this morning, out of the blue, with subject heading ‘I’m Not Shagging Your Husband’. It was a picture of a new man. Called Angus. He’s a banker, divorced, a bit fat and bald, but not bad looking, I suppose, and apparently he’s asked her to move in with him. So—what could I do? Apart from feel like a prize idiot. In any case I bit the bait and immediately called her up.

  She sounds incredibly happy. She’s apologised for being a stupid cow, though suddenly now I’m not sure if she ever has been, except when she told me to pull myself together—and she already apologised for that. I’ve apologised too. I feel such an idiot. Obviously. On the other hand, if she’d been a bit less wrapped up in her own life and maybe just a little less friendly towards Fin, we might have communicated a little more; I might have known that she’s been having it off with a multi-millionaire banker for the past seven months, and none of this would have got so out of hand. She thinks it’s my fault. She says I’ve been chippy, jealous, pregnant, mad, paranoid and generally impossible to talk to for months. Maybe I have. Maybe I have…I also think it’s her fault. I think she’s been pretentious, egocentric, secretive, insensitive, and an all-round bad and flaky friend. She’s been having an affair with the guy since January—a month before she threw Damian out. Why the hell didn’t she tell me? She ought to have known I was going to be on her side. One hundred per cent. She could have done anything—except steal my husband or torture my children. I would always have supported her. Isn’t that what old friends are for?<
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  But the point is, it doesn’t matter whose fault it is any more. We’ve had it out. We’ve said our stuff, and she’s on the train—right now. For the next two nights she’s sleeping on the fold-out children’s mattress in our tiny cottage, and then at the weekend she’s being joined by the banker Angus, his four children and her three, and all nine of them are checking into a hotel. They’re not moving in together yet. It’s too soon for the seven children. In any case she’s happy, and I am very happy for her. I am happy for me, too. I’ve missed her.

  Called Fin—to apologise. I feel such a bloody idiot. God knows, if I hadn’t got the bee in my bonnet about Hatty and him, how different the last few months might have been. How different everything might have been.

  Or maybe not. Maybe I would have decided he was copping off with somebody else instead. Maybe the thing with Darrell was going to happen anyway. Maybe I’ve just been using him and Hatty as an excuse. I don’t know. Don’t know. Don’t know. I feel awful. On the other hand he’s away so much, and I may well be chippy, jealous, paranoid, etc., but I’m not completely stupid, and I know he doesn’t have to be away quite as much as much as he pretends.

  Done nothing much these last few weeks beyond child care and marital squabbling, so God knows what I’m going to write about. Pinning all my hopes on the big ID rally tomorrow. Looking forward to it, actually. Expecting to meet a few engaged people at long last. Maybe—crikey—even make a friend. Hatt says she’ll come with me, and she absolutely promises not to giggle.

  COUNTRY MOLE

  Sunday Times

  The husband, sensing domestic meltdown, tore himself away from his film set for a 14-hour whistle stop with his family in Paradise. Our children greeted him like a returning God, and I definitely managed not to look too sour about that. At least, I did look sour, obviously, but I kept my sour face well out of the way. Stayed in the bathroom until the first tidal wave of hero worship had faded and then emerged with a grin any Stepford Wife would have been proud of.

  Didn’t last. The children went to bed and within seconds he and I were yelling at each other, initially about the exact gestation period of a cow, though actually that was only the trigger: his ignorance of—and lack of interest in—cow gestation periods being indicative, I felt, of how little he knew or cared about our new lives, spent sharing a wall with a cowshed.

  Anyway he’s gone now. Whizzed off back to his adorable androids (gestation period: over in minutes apparently, and no associated mood swings). What with one thing and another I don’t suppose he’ll be back in a hurry.

  Marital crisis aside, I can’t seem to find anything much to complain about. The sun is beaming down, and my weird, pregnancy-induced, werewolf-like smelling senses—the same that have driven us from our dream house into a cripplingly expensive studio-cottage-cum-cowshed—have me reeling with delight at the sweet June air. I can smell honeysuckle and jasmine from three fields away. And I do. Stand and smell the flowers for hours on end. In fact I do very little else.

  Also I’ve got a bit more forthright with friends. Stopped pretending this life of sickly, rural isolation is hilarious, and made it clear that, well, I may possibly be going insane. The good ones have all come through; taken detours out of their disconcertingly busy lives to smell the cows and the flowers with me. All’s well that smells well, I say to them sagely. Once I’ve got them here. They tell me I should buck up and organise another book deal. And so I will, as soon as the jasmine season’s over.

  In the meantime there was the Bossy Britain shindy, arranged in cyberspace several weeks ago, during one of my more desperate attempts to integrate with the locals. We met in a pub, six of us (including one who came with me, doing a good-friend detour). We had joined together, or so we proclaimed, to organise local protests against compulsory ID cards.

  The other four were men, of course. And there’s something about men with very strong political opinions which makes me worry when they last bothered to change their underpants. This dozy, dirty bunch were angry about ID, as lots of us are. But the point is they were all angry for very slightly different reasons. So while I worried, perhaps excessively, about the onslaught their filthy underpants might potentially have on my sensitive nasal passages, they simply sat there and shouted at each other.

  ‘I think we’re all agreed that ID cards are a bad thing,’ my friend, usually so effective, occasionally interrupted. ‘The question is, what should we do about it?’

  Finally, Patchy Red Beard (name forgotten) thumped our little pub table so hard it wobbled, and declared we must immediately sign a pledge forswearing ID cards, regardless of consequences. I asked if there might be other, less personally inconvenient tactics we could try first.

  ‘You!’ he shouted. (I could smell sweat.) ‘You’ve obviously only come here for the drink!’

  It was a little awkward. But I think, with the exception of my effective friend, the same could have been said for all us. In any case the Meeting of the Lonely Hearts broke up soon afterwards, with exactly nothing achieved. I said, ‘I imagine we’ll meet again shortly,’ and they all looked astonished.

  So much for local protest. Dr Reid and his evil colleagues clearly have nothing to fear from this corner of Paradise. Except for the dirty underwear, of course, and I suppose he’s used to that.

  July 12th

  I’ve e-mailed every friendly commissioning editor at every newspaper and magazine I’ve ever had any dealings with, letting them know that I’m bubbling over with ideas for them, and suggesting that I come up to London and meet them for lunch. Three of the e-mails bounced back, but beyond that no comeback yet. Lucky really, since I’d have nothing to say to any of them if we did actually meet. I’ve got one idea so far, and it’s so lame I’m not sure I’ll ever be able to pitch it with a straight face…But it occurs to me that a lot of people don’t like Christmas pudding. Which begs the question, Why do we keep on eating it?

  Christmas Pudding, yes or no?

  If only it was December. If only someone would e-mail me back. In the meantime I’m reading a good book about Stalin. Wonder if I could do something about—er. Also, farming. There must be something in farming. Tractors. Tractor factor. Ukrainian tractors. I’ve got a brand new combine harvester and I’ll give you the key.

  Bollocks.

  Hatty and I were coming away from the mad ID meeting, snorting and giggling over general uselessness of said event, and suddenly—there was Darrell. It was another beautiful, warm evening, and he was sitting on his own at one of the wooden tables outside the Red Lion. He was looking at us, smiling slightly, I think. He had a pint of beer in front of him, and opposite, in the empty space, a glass of white wine. So. The laughter died. Or mine did, anyway. I think Hatt’s may have continued a little longer. But I froze right there in my tracks. I could feel my face, my chest—my entire big, fat, pregnant body—glowing in awkwardness, shyness and general, horrible confusion.

  ‘Hello my dear,’ he said, with that lovely deep West Country burr. With the smile. Like he had his own secret joke going. Which he did, perhaps. In a way. I must have surprised him. We hadn’t seen each other since the evening in the woods, all those months ago. He’d telephoned me a couple of times, and for a while, when I was stuck in that bathroom, I got into texting him quite a bit, and he always texted me back, though not always immediately, but then gradually even that petered out. He moved on. And of course so did I.

  He looked at my bump, which is small but pretty unmistakable. Or at least it was to him. He looked at my bump long and hard. ‘When’s that one due, then?’ he said softly.

  I pretended not to hear. Introduced him to Hatt. Gabbled at her that he was the builder of our beautiful kitchen, and that we’d played tennis a couple of times. I gabbled at him that Hatt and I had just come back from a meeting to protest against ID cards, but they were both of them pretty distracted. Darrell said, ‘Aahh. So you’re the one who knows all the Hollywood film stars.’ And laughed—that amazingly sexy, deep laugh
. ‘Heard a lot about you,’ he said.

  Hatt just stared at him. The problem with Hatt is, she’s pretty astute. She just stared at him, and said, ‘Really?’ without any expression.

  There was a girl coming out of the pub and heading towards the table. Pretty. Probably ten years younger than me. It was time to move on.

  ‘Anyway,’ I said.

  ‘Anyway,’ he said. ‘Congratulations.’

  ‘Nice to meet you,’ Hatty said.

  He just nodded. Looked at me. But then the pretty girl was taking her seat, and my view of him was obscured. So I said goodbye to the back of the girl’s head and Hatt and I went on our way.

  Hatt didn’t say anything for a while, and I couldn’t think of anything to break the silence either. Eventually, she said, ‘He’s very attractive.’

  I said, ‘Isn’t he!’ And we laughed, very briefly, eyes firmly on the pavement. And after that, thank God, we didn’t mention him again.

  Hatty woke me up in the middle of the night, unable to sleep on our fold-out children’s mattress and convinced that she’d solved the mystery of our strangely familiar-looking babysitter. Hatty reckons she was featured on that TV programme Wife Swap a few years ago, and funnily enough I remember exactly the episode Hatt was talking about. The wife was cold and strangely unresponsive, just like the babysitter; and she used to put on suspenders and a geisha kit to welcome her husband home from work every day.

  So exciting. Almost better than Johnny Depp.

  Makes you wonder, though, what happens to the other reality stars, after they’ve stopped making prats of themselves on national television. There ought to be a support group for them. Perhaps there already is. Or perhaps I should found one. Call it After Reality, Reality—like After dark, Tia Maria. Or maybe just Reality after Reality…Good God, I feel an article coming on!