You should make the most of being single while it lasts, Bridge, she said. Once youve got kids and youve given up your job youre in an incredibly vulnerable position. I know Jeremy thinks my life is just one big holiday, but basically its extremely hard work looking after a toddler and a baby all day, and it doesnt stop. When Jeremy comes home at the end of the day he wants to put his feet up and be nurtured and, as I imagine all the time now, fantasize about girls in leotards at the Harbour Club.
How come have put on only 8oz after last nights over-consumption orgy?
Wednesday 3 May 9st 2* (Eek. Baby growing at monstrous unnatural rate), alcohol units 0, cigarettes 0, calories 3100 (but mainly potatoes, oh my God).* Must keep eye on weight again, now, for Babys sake.
Youre going to be on television, she gushed as I crashed my head on to the desk.
Silhouette, darling, silhouette. Oh, please, Bridget. Remember, I gave you the gift of life.
2 pieces unbaked lemon cheesecake (very light; also possibly eating for two).
No, no, I wont hear of it. Let me find you a guest towel and some miniature seashell-shaped soaps.’
Friday 5 May 9st (oh sod it, cannot break weighing habit of lifetime, particularly after pregnancy trauma — will get therapy of some kind in future), alcohol units 6 (hurrah!), cigarettes 25, calories 1895, Instants 3.
Had a good week? he said.
Oh, dont be silly, darling, she hissed. I could hear office noises in the background.
Dont you want a child? she said, handing me a tissue.
I grabbed the proffered blue one, handed over the eight pounds sodding ninety-five and scuttled out.
7.45 p.m. Shazzer was annoyed with me for ringing because she had just got in and was about to call 1471 to see if this guy she has been seeing had rung while she was out and now my number will be stored instead.
Jesus. Ill meet you in Café Rouge in fifteen minutes.’
11.59 p.m. Blimey. Hiding in kitchen having a fag. Daniel is asleep. Actually, I think hes pretending to be asleep. Completely weird evening. Realized that our entire relationship so far has been based on the idea that one or other of us is supposed to be resisting having sex. Spending an evening together when the idea was that we were supposed to have sex at the end of it was nothing short of bizarre. We sat watching VE Day on television with Daniels arm uncomfortably round my shoulders as if we were two fourteen-year-olds in the cinema. It was really digging into the back of my neck but I didnt feel I could ask him to move it. Then when it was getting impossible to avoid the subject of bedtime any longer we went all formal and English. Instead of tearing each others clothes off like beasts, we stood there going, Do use the bathroom first.’
He carried eight Cullens carrier bags into the kitchen and started putting everything away.
11 p.m. Hmmm. Thought-provoking supper with Magda, who is v. depressed about Jeremy. The night of the burglar alarm and screaming row in my street was a result of a remark from Sloaney Woney, who claimed she had seen Jeremy with a girl at the Harbour Club who sounded sus-piciously like the witch I saw him with all those weeks ago. After that, Magda asked me at point blank range if Id heard or seen anything so I told her about the witch in the Whistles suit.
It was a disaster of a trip, anyway. The answer to shopping, I know, is simply to buy a few choice items from Nicole Farhi, Whistles and Joseph but the prices so terrify me that I go scuttling back to Warehouse and Miss Selfridge, rejoicing in a host of dresses at ￡34.99, get them stuck on my head, then buy things from Marks & Spencer because I dont have to try them on, and at least Ive bought something.
Jude was depressed because Vile Richard, with whom she is currently split up, keeps ringing her, dropping little verbal baits suggesting he wants to get back together to make sure he keeps her interested, but protecting himself by saying he just wants to be friends (fraudulent, poisoned concept). Then last night he made an incredibly assumptive, patronizing phone call, asking her if she was going to a mutual friends party.
Steamed broccoli (attempt to nourish baby and stop it growing up spoilt). 4 cold Frankfurter sausages, (only available tin in cupboard too exhausted by pregnancy to go out to shop again).
9.30 p.m. Decided to nip round comer for cigarettes. On way up stairs heard phone ringing.
Ah well, in that case I wont come, he said. No. It really wouldnt be fair to you. You see, I was going to bring this, sort of, date with me. I mean, its nothing. Its just some girl whos stupid enough to let me shag her for a couple of weeks.’
Well you see darling, Mavis is Winter. And Im Winter, but you might be Summer like Una and then youll get your pastels. You cant tell till they get the towel on your head.’
I think Ive made my bed, Ill just have to lie in it now.’
And me retorting, Daniel. I am avin ay fag.
Burr. All right, then, I muttered grumpily, pressed the buzzer and lurched back to the table.
8st 12 1/2(have lost 3lb 8oz literally overnight — must have eaten food which uses up more calories to eat it than it gives off e.g. v. chewy Lettuce), alcohol units 4 (modest), cigarettes 21 (bad), Instants 4 (not v.g.).
Now come along, Bridget. I dont want any silliness, she said in her Genghis-Khan-at-height-of-evil voice. Mavis Enderby used to be all miserable in buffs and mosses, now shes had hers done she c
99lｉｂ•ｎetomes out in all these wonderful shocking pinks and bottle greens and looks twenty years younger.
Im coming round with the crew at ten oclock tomorrow. Oh, darling, arent you thrilled?’
Oh, hello, darling, said Daniel in his gentlest, politest voice. Im really sorry to bother you. I did ring earlier and leave a message on your answerphone. Its just Ive been stuck in the most tedious board meeting you can imagine for the entire evening and I so much wanted to see you. Ill just give you a little kiss and then go, if you like. Can I come up?’
Oh God. As Tom never tires of telling me, in a sepulchral voice, laying his hand on my arm and staring into my eyes with an alarming look, Only Women Bleed.’
7.05 p.m. No reply. Hmmmmph. Anyway, down to work.
No.’
Apparently in America the 1471 equivalent tells you all the numbers that have rung you since last time you checked and how many times. Shudder with horror at the thought of own obsessive calling of Daniels number in early days being exposed in this way. The good thing over here is that if you dial 141 before you ring, it stops your number being stored on the other persons phone.
My nerves are shot to ribbons.’
When Sharon arrived I sulkily thrust the pregnancy test with its tell-tale blue line, at her under the table.
I hate this idea and toy with calling Mum to see if she had started her periods when the war ended. Do eggs get produced one at a time, I wonder, or are they stored from birth in micro-form until they are activated? Could I have somehow sensed the end of the war as a stored egg? If only I had a grandpa I could have got in on the whole thing under the guise of being nice to him. Oh, sod it, I am going to go shopping.
Oh, hello, darling, guess what? Mum.
Im taking you to have your colours done And dont keep saying, "what", please, darling. Color Me Beautiful. Im sick to death of you wandering round in all these dingy slurries and fogs. You look like. something out of Chairman Mao.’
1 raspberry pavlova.
Oh, but you must, she said icily.
(Thank God she didnt run off with a German.)
I hate communal changing rooms. Everyone stares sneakily at each others bodies, but no one ever meets anyones eye. There are always girls who know that they look fantastic in everything and dance around beaming, swinging their hair and doing model poses in the mirror saying, Does it make me look fat? to their obligatory obese friend, who looks like a water buffalo in everything.
Jude says you have to be careful, though, because if you have an obsessive crush on someone and ring accidentally when they are in, then ring off and no number is stored they might guess it was you. Must make sure Daniel does not find out about any of this.
Monday 1 May Alcohol units 0, cigarettes 0, calories 4200 (eating for two).
I bought you all one of these, he said, one eyebrow raised sexily, to eat with your coffee. Dont let me interrupt. Ive done the shopping for the weekend.’
Bridget, Im not listening to any more of this. Auntie Una was just saying the other day: if youd had something a bit more bright and cheerful on at the turkey curry buffet Mark Darcy might have shown a bit more interest. Nobody wants a girlfriend who wanders round looking like someone from Auschwitz, darling. Thought better of boasting to her about having a boyfriend despite being dressed from head to toe in slurry but prospect of Daniel and self becoming hot topic for discussion precipitating relentless stream of feedback folk-wisdom from Mum dissuaded me.
No, I snuffled. "Me blue line in the pregnancy test.’
11.45 p.m. Daniel just called from Manchester.
Im not pre-menopausal, Mother! I exploded. And Im not Suddenly Single either. Im suddenly part of a couple.’
Spent the morning mooning abut in mourning for lost baby but cheered up a bit when Tom called to suggest a lunchtime Bloody Mary to get the weekend off to a healthy start. Got home to find a petulant message from Mother saying shes gone to a health farm and will call me later. I wonder whats the matter. Probably overwhelmed by too many Tiffanys boxes from love-sick suitors and TV presenter job offers from rival production companies.
Culture of Entitlement, growled Sharon. Cooking, succor, beautiful young girls bodies when theyre old and fat. Think women are there to give them what theyre bloody entitled . . . Here, have we run out of wine?’
The crew had trodden a couple of wine glasses into the carpet before theyd been in the house thirty seconds, but Im not too fussed about that sort of thing. It was when one of them staggered in shouting, Mind your backs, carrying an enormous light with flaps on it, then bellowed, Trevor, where do you want this brute? overbalanced, crashed the light through the glass door of the kitchen cupboard and knocked an open bottle of extra virgin olive oil over on to my River Café cookbook that I realized what Id done.
I thought about my Mum. You could seize power, I said, in a bloodless coup. Go back to work. Take a lover. Bring Jeremy up short.’
Awake on VE Day in unseasonable heatwave trying to whip up frenzy of emotion in self about end of war, freedom of Europe, marvellous, marvellous, etc. etc. Feel extremely miserable about whole business, to tell truth. In fact, left out might be the expression I am groping towards. I do not have any grandpas. Dad has got all worked up about a party being hosted in the Alconburys’
Mother. If youre comi九-九-藏-书-网 ng round to my flat with a television crew, I wont be in it.’
How lates your period? he bellowed. Youd be better with the blue one. It tells you if youre pregnant on the first day after your period is due.’
If Bridget had a child shed lose it, he guffawed. Pleased to meet you, Mrs Jones. Bridget, why cant you get all done up on Saturdays like your mum?’
How far are you going? said Daniel. Ill drive you home. You cant hang around the streets looking for cabs at this time of night.’
Bastards, I yelled through a mouthful of raspberry pavlova mixed with tiramisu.
Although it was only 12.45 1 thought a vodka and orange wouldnt do any harm since it was a genuine emergency, but then I remembered that baby wasnt supposed to have vodka. I waited, feeling like a weird sort of hermaphrodite or Push-me-pull-you experiencing the most violently opposed baby sentiments of a man and a woman both at the same time. On the one hand I was all nesty and gooey about Daniel, smug about being a real woman — so irrepressiblv fecund! — and imagining fluffy pink baby skin, a tiny creature to love, and darling little Ralph Lauren baby outfits. On the other I was thinking, oh my God, life is over, Daniel is a mad alcoholic and will kin me then chuck me when he finds out. No more nights out with the girls, shopping, flirting, sex, bottles of wine and fags. Instead I am going to turn into a hideous grow-bag-cum-milk-dispensing-machine which no one will fancy and which will not fit into any of my trousers, particularly my brand new acid-green Agnés B jeans. This confusion, I guess, is the price I must pay for becoming a modern woman instead of following the course nature intended by marrying Abnor Rimmington off the Northampton bus when I was eighteen.
offspring in manner of Calvin Klein advert, being trendy Smug Married instead of sheepish Sin-gleton. Just off to meet Magda.
I was too livid to speak. What husband?
Saturday 20 May 9st 3 (why? Why? from where?), alcohol units 7 (Saturday), cigarettes 17 (positively restrained, considering), number of correct lottery numbers 0 (but v. distracted by filming).
I seriously think I am pregnant. How could we have been so stupid? Daniel and I were so carried away with euphoria at being back together again that reality seemed to go out of the window — and once youve . . . oh look, I dont want to talk about it. This morning I definitely felt the beginnings of morning sickness, but that could be because I was so hungover after Daniel finally left yesterday that I ate the following things to try to make myself feel better: 2 packets Emmenthal cheese slices.
Ooh, by the way, she said, brightening, talking of Harvey Nicks, I got the most wonderful Joseph shift dress in there today — red, two buttons at one side at the neck, very nicely cut, ￡280.
I bet thats Daniel, the bloody bastard, I said. What is it? I yelled into the intercom.
An unbelievable amount of food and wine was consumed since the generous girls, as well as bringing a bottle of wine each, had all brought a little extra something from M&S. Therefore, in addition to the three-course meal and two bottles of wine (1 fizzy, 1 white) I had already bought from M&S (I mean prepared by entire days slaving over hot stove) we had:
Eventually got her to shut up about Color Me Beautiful by telling her I would think about it.
Bastards! yelled Jude, slurping her Pinot Grigio.
You get an extra chocolate for being lovely even when youre squiffy. he said, taking a foil-wrapped chocolate heart out of his pocket. And then . . . Mmmmmm.
Where would you be without me? Nowhere. Nothing. A dead egg. A piece of space, darling. The thing is Ive always, secretly, rather fancied being on television.
By 11:30 Sharon was in full and splendid auto-rant.
Friends? Pah! The Enemy more like! I shouted happily, tucking into another Silk Cut and a couple of salmon pinwheels. Bastard!’
I have come home with four things, all them unsuitable and unflattering. One will be left behind the bedroom chair in an M&S bag for two years. The other three will be exchanged for credit notes from Boules, Warehouse, etc., which I will then lose. I have thus wasted ￡119, which would have been enough to buy something really nice from Nicole Farhi, like a very small T-shirt.
Super, thanks, I said brightly. Super, thanks. Huh! I read somewhere that the best gift a woman can bring to a main is tranquillity, so I could hardly, as soon as weve started properly going out, admit that the minute his back was turned I started having neurotic hysterics over a phantom pregnancy. Oh well. Who cares. Were seeing each other tomorrow night. Hurray! Laialala.
When he came back he ran up the stairs, swept me up into his arms and carried me into the bedroom.
12 smoked salmon and cream cheese pinwheels.
12 mini-pizzas.
There was a pause. I could hear her talking to someone in the background. Then she came back and said, We could blot out your face. What? Put a bag over it? Thanks a lot.
Thursday 4 May 9st alcohol units 0, cigarettes 0, potatoes 12.
Saturday 13 May 9st 1lb 8oz, cigarettes 7, calories 1145, Instants 5 (won ￡2 therefore total Instants expenditure only ￡3 v.g.), Lottery proper ￡2, number of correct numbers I (better).
Sharon was on top form. Bastards! she was already yelling by 8.35, pouring three-quarters of a glass of Kir Royale straight down her throat. Stupid, smug, arrogant, manipulative, self-indulgen九九藏书网t bastards. They exist in a total Culture of Entitlement. Pass me one of those mini-pizzas, will you?’
Is this it? she said.
I stared at her incredulously.
Hello, darling! My mother. Guess what? Ive got the most marvellous opportunity for you.’
At this point there was a loud snort of laughter from the back of the room. I had thought it would be fine to leave Daniel asleep in the bedroom because he never wakes up tiff after lunch on Saturdays and Id put his cigarettes on the pillow next to him.
1 litre freshly squeezed orange juice.
Maybe food and weight are the same as garlic and stenchful breath: if you eat several entire bulbs your breath doesnt smell at all, similarly if eat huge amount does not cause weight gain: strangely cheering theory but creates V. bad situation in head. Would welcome removal for thorough valeting. Still, was worth it for delicious night of drunken feminist ranting with Sharon and Jude.
Friday 19 May
Shh, I hissed, looking over my shoulder.
Tuesday 17 May9st 2 (hooray!), cigarettes 7 (v.g.), alcohol units 6 (so v.g — v. pure).
Er. Well, Ive got to go to work, I said.
Her nerves are shot to ribbons!
Turned out Jeremy admitted thered been a flirtation and hed been very attracted to this girl.
I mean, it must be a terrible time, with no partner on the horizon and that biological clock ticking away, she said, kicking me under the table. I kicked her back and she jumped and let out a little noise.
You, she said, are a ridiculous human being. Didnt you read the instructions? There are supposed to be two lines. This line is just to show the test is working. One line means youre not pregnant — you ninny.’
2 Swiss Mountain Bars.
Just then the doorbell rang.
Daniel is still being gorgeous. How could everyone have been so wrong about him? Head is full of moony fantasies about living in flats with him and running along beaches together with tiny
Then we ended up lying side by side and not touching, like we were Morecambe and Wise or John Noakes and Valerie Singleton in the Blue Peter House. If there is a God I would like to humbly ask Him — whilst making it clear that I am deeply grateful for His suddenly turning Daniel inexplicably into a regular feature after so much fuckwittage — to stop him getting into bed at night wearing pyjamas and reading glasses, staring at a book for 25 minutes then switching off the light and turning over — and turn him back into the naked lust-crazed sex beast I used to know and love.
Help. Monday and most of Tuesday I sort of thought I was pregnant, but knew I wasnt really — rather like when youre walking home late at night, and think someone is following you, but know theyre not really. But then they suddenly grab you round the neck and now Im two days late.
Thanking you for your kind attention, Lord, regarding this matter.
It is all a punishment, I realize, for being obsessed by shopping in a shallow, materialistic way instead of wearing the same rayon frock all summer and painting a line down the back of my legs; also for failing to join in the VE Day celebrations. Maybe I should ring Tom and get a lovely party
Bloody bastards! shouted Jude, lighting a Silk Cut with the butt end of the last one.
I know this is painful for you. If you feel youre going to break down we can stop for a moment, she said hopefully.
Ten years ago people who cared about the environment were laughed at as sandal-wearing beardy-weirdies and now look at the power of the green consumer, she was shouting, sticking her fingers into the tiramisu and transferring it straight into her mouth. In years ahead the same will come to pass with feminism. There wont be any men leaving their families and postmenopausal wives for young mistresses, or trying to chat women up by showing off in a patronizing way about all the other women throwing themselves at them, or trying to have sex with women without any niceness or commitment, because the young mistresses and women will just turn around and tell them to sod off and men wont get any sex or any women unless they learn how to behave properly instead of cluttering up the sea-bed of women with their SHITTY, SMUG, SELF-INDULGENT, BEHAVIOR!’
Oh, said Magda, looking momentarily surprised. You know, she went on, toying with her champagne, Once you get the feeling that theres a woman your husband prefers to you, it becomes rather miserable being at home, imagining all the versions of that type of woman he might run into out in the world. You do feel rather powerless.’
Oh, please, darling. Ive told them Ive found someone.
4.30 p.m. Just when Perpetua was breathing down my neck so she didnt end up late for her weekend in Gloucestershire at the Trehearnes the phone rang.
Not with two children under three, she said resignedly.
Consider 1471 to be brilliant invention, instantly telling you the number of the last person who called. It was ironic, really, because when the three of us first found out about 1471 Sharon said she was totally against it, considering it exploitation by British Telecom of the addictive personali-ties and relationship-breakdown epidemic among the British populace. Some people are apparently calling it upwards of twenty times a day. Jude, on the other hand, is strongly in favour of 1471, but does concede that if you have just split up with or started sleeping with someone it
Oh dear. Am starting to get carried away with idea of self as Calvin Klein-style mother figure, poss. w九九藏书earing crop-top or throwing baby in the air, laughing fulfilledly in advert for designer gas cooker, feel-good movie or similar.
After 45 minutes of staring blankly at the computer trying to pretend Perpetua was a Mexican cheeseplant whenever she asked me what was the matter, I bolted and went out to a phone booth to ring Sharon. Bloody Perpetua. If Perpetua had a pregnancy scare shes got so much English establishment behind her shed be down the aisle in an Amanda Wakeley wedding dress in ten minutes flat. Outside, there was so much traffic noise I couldnt make Sharon understand. What? Bridget? I cant hear. Are you in trouble with the police?’
Got home to an answerphone message from my mother saying, Darling, call me immediately.
I had a proper job before. I know for a fact its much more fan going out to work, getting all dressed up, flirting in the office and having nice lunches than going to the bloody supermarket and picking Harry up from playgroup. But theres always this aggrieved air that Im some sort of ghastly Harvey Nichols-obsessed lady who lunches while he earns all the money.’
Mum, Im not going to Color Me Beautiful, I hissed, desperately.
Daniel ignored me all day Monday then caught me at 6 p.m. and said, Listen, Im goin to be in Manchester till the end of the week. Ill see you Saturday night, OK? He hasnt called. Am single mother.
What? I muttered sulkily.
What? exploded Sharon, beginning to turn pink. Thats the most repulsive thing Ive ever heard anyone say about a woman. Arrogant little prat! How dare he give himself license to treat you any way he likes under the name of friendship, then make himself feel clever by trying to upset you with his stupid new date. If he really minded about not hurting your feelings hed just shut up and come to the party on his own instead of waving his stupid date under your nose.’
Really! I insist.’
What? I said, miserably.
Shes so beautiful, Magda. I watched her toying with her champagne glass despondently and wondered what the answer is for we girls. Talk about grass is always bloody greener. The number of times Ive slumped, depressed, thinking how useless I am and that I spend every Saturday night getting blind drunk and moaning to Jude and Shazzer or Tom about not having a boyfriend; I struggle to make ends meet and am ridiculed as an unmarried freak, whereas Magda lives in a big house with eight different kinds of pasta in jars, and gets to go shopping all day. And yet here she is so beaten, miserable and unconfident and telling me Im lucky . . .
7 p.m. The heat has made my body double -in size, I swear. I am never going in a communal changing room again. I got a dress stuck under my arms in Warehouse while trying to lift it off and ended up lurching around with inside-out fabric instead of a head, tugging at it with my arms in the air, rippling stomach and thighs on full display to the assembled sniggering fifteen-year-olds. When I tried to pull the stupid dress down and get out of it the other way it got stuck on my hips.
1 Milky Way (125 calories only. Bodys enthusiastic response to cheesecake suggested baby needed sugar).
No! After you!’
garden at which, for unexplained reasons, he will be tossing pancakes. Mum is going back to the street she was brought up in in Cheltenham for a whale-meat fritter party, probably with Julio.
Sunday 21 May My mum is not speaking to either of us for humiliating her and exposing her as a fraud in front of her crew. At least she might leave us alone for a bit now. So much looking forward to the summer, anyway. Will be so lovely having a boyfriend when it is warm. We will be able to go on romantic mini-breaks. V. happy.
Went to the chemist to discreetly buy a pregnancy test, I was just shoving the packet at the girl on the till, with my head down, wishing Id thought to put my ring on my wedding finger, when the chemist yelled, You want a pregnancy test?’
Ive got a boyfriend. Never you mind, I said, suddenly glancing over my shoulder at Perpetua, who was smirking.
As the girls fluttered around finding their handbags and grinning stupidly at Daniel, I started eating all the nut, praline, fudge or caramel-based chocolates out of my box of Milk Tray, feeling a bewildering mixture of smugness and pride over my perfect new boyfriend whom the girls clearly wished to have a go at shagging, and furious with the normally disgusting sexist drunk for ruining our feminist ranting by freakishly pretending to be the perfect man. Huh. Well see how long that lasts, wont we? I thought, while I waited for him to come back.
Instead of wanting to staple things to her head, I merely smiled in a beatific sort of way, thinking how soon all these things were to be immaterial to me, alongside caring for another tiny human being. Next I discovered a whole new world of Daniel fantasies: Daniel carrying the baby in a sling, Daniel rushing home from work, thrilled to find the two of us pink and glowing in the bath, and, in years to come, being incredibly impressive at parent/teacher evenings.
No, no no! After you!’
doubles misery potential when you come home: no-number-stored-on-1471-misery, to add to no-message-on-answerphone-misery, or number-stored-turning-out-to-be-Mothers misery.
Oh, darling, she cooed. Theyre wanting someone younger for me to interview on "Suddenly Single": someone pre-menopausal and Suddenly Single who can talk about, well, you know, darling, the pressures of im99lib•net pending childlessness, and so on.’
No, I said. But then vanity began to get the better of me. Why, anyway? What?’
Of course its it, I muttered. What do you think it is? A portable phone?’
Bloody bastard.’
7.10 p.m. Think Will just call Sharon.
Mum. I cant really talk, Im expecting . . . ‘
1 cold jacket potato.
Aargh! Aargh!
Then Daniel appeared up the stairs, smiling lovingly. He looked tired yet fresh-faced, clean-shaven and very neat in his suit. He was holding three boxes of Milk Tray.
1 tiramisu (party size).
Saturday 6 May: VE Day 9st 1, alcohol units 6, cigarettes 25, calories 3800 (but celebrating anniversary of end of rationing), correct lottery numbers 0 (poor).
For the first two hours this morning I kept staring at my handbag as if it was an unexploded bomb. At 11.30 I could stand it no longer, grabbed the handbag, got in the lift and went to the loo two floors down to avoid the risk of anyone I knew hearing suspicious rustling. For some reason, the whole business suddenly made me furious with Daniel. It was his responsibility too and he wasnt having to spend ￡8.95 and hide in the toilets trying to wee on a stick. I unwrapped the packet in a fury, shoving the box and everything in the bin and getting on with it, then put the stick upside down on the back of the loo without looking at it. Three minutes, There was no way I was going to watch my fate being sealed by a slowly-forming thin blue line. Somehow I got through those hundred and eighty seconds — my last hundred and eighty seconds of freedom — picked up the stick and nearly screamed. There in the little window was a thin blue line, bold as brass.
They hadnt slept together, he alleged. But Magda was really fed up.
together for Bank Holiday Monday. Is it possible to have kitsch ironic VE day party — like for the Royal Wedding? No, you see, you cant be ironic about dead people. And then theres the problem of flags. Half of Toms friends used to be in the Anti-Nazi league and would think the presence of Union Jacks meant we were expecting skinheads. I wonder what would have happened if our generation had had a war? Ah well, time for a little drinkv. Daniel will be here soon. Best start preparations.
Suddenlv realizing had forgotten to put answerphone back on when Tom rang, tore up stairs, emptied contents of handbag on floor to find key and threw self across from to phone at which point phone stopped. Had just gone into loo when phone rang again. Stopped when got to it. Then started ringing again when went away. Finally got it.
Oh, pleeeeeease. Ive never had a career all my life and now Im in the autumn of my days and I need something for myself, she gabbled, as if reading from a cue card. Someone I know might see. Anyway, wont they notice Im your daughter?’
Sunday 14 May 7 p.m. Hate Sunday night. Feels like homework night. Have got to write catalogue copy for Perpetua before tomorrow. Think I will just ring Jude first.
But then Daniel appeared. I have never seen him look worse, The only possible explanation was that on leaving me yesterday he had carried on drinking. He looked over at me, briefly, with the expression of an axe-murderer. Suddenly the fantasies were replaced by images from the film Barfly, where the couple spent the whole time blind drunk, screaming and throwing bottles at each other, or Harry Enfields The Slobs with Daniel yelling, Bridge. The baby Is bawlin. Its ead off.’
God, I so much wish I was like you, Bridge, and could just have an affair. Or have bubble bath, for two hours on Sunday morning. Or stay out all night with no questions asked. Dont suppose you fancy coming shopping tomorrow morning, do you?’
At that moment the phone rang. It was the mini-cab firm the girls had rung half an hour earlier saying thered been a terrible multiple pile-up in Ladbroke Grove, plus all their cars had unexpectedly exploded and they werent going to be able to come for another three hours.
1 chocolate Viennoise dessert thing with cream on top (greedy baby incredibly demanding)
Three hours after they arrived, filming had still not begun and they were still boshing around saying, Can I just cheat you this way a bit, love? By the time we finally got going, with Mother and I sitting opposite each other in semidarkness, it was nearly half past one. And tell me, she was saying in a caring, understanding voice Id never heard before, when your husband left you, did you have — she was almost whispering now — suicidal thoughts?’
None of my friends are organizing anything. It would seem embarrassingly enthusiastic and all wrong, somehow, suggesting a positive approach to life or that we were trying creepily to annex something that was nothing to do with us. I mean, I probably wasnt even an egg when the war ended. I was just nothing: while they were all fighting and making jam out of carrots or whatever they did.
But I don t want to come out in shocking pinks and bottle greens, I said, through clenched teeth.
1 tub hummus & pkt mini-pittas.
In the office today Perpetua was at her most obnoxious, spending 45 minutes on the phone to Desdemona, discussing whether yellow walls would look nice with pink-and-grey ruched blinds or whether she and Hugo should go for Blood Red with a floral freize. For one 15-minute interlude she said nothing whatsoever except, Absolutely . . . no, absolutely . . . absolutely, then concluded, But of course, in a sense, one could make exactly the same argument for the red.’