Wednesday, 1 February
I always feel I should like February better – after all, it marks the end of January, where the only really good thing is the sales (I might have got a bit carried away under the guise of ‘bargains’ – I’m pretty sure a ‘capsule wardrobe’ shouldn’t spill over into the spare room …), and even better, the start of February means it is only two weeks until Simon’s birthday, which means I only have to endure two more weeks of his Annual Grump, whereby he stomps around being a Miserable Bastard from New Year’s Day until his birthday, which unfortunately falls on Valentine’s Day. He is even grumpier this year, as he is still not entirely feeling the love for me working full-time, but he agreed that the au pair was a good idea. I am hoping that this is because he sees the practical benefits and not because he is hopeful of a nubile young sexpot walking round the house in her scanties. I wonder if, in addition to ‘bossy, craft-obsessed, tidy, good at ironing and not too talkative’, one could also ask the agency to ensure whoever they find is on the plain and slightly chubby side. Almost certainly not.
February should be such a romantic month too, with Valentine’s Day (which Simon refuses to celebrate, since it is his birthday) and leap years and ladies being able to propose, except of course that it is the twenty-first century now, and woman can propose whenever they want – though does that mean they have to buy their own ring? What is the etiquette for that? I should not like to have to put in the effort of proposing AND having to buy my own ring, but then again I am lazy, and had Simon not proposed to me, I definitely would not have done it myself. It wasn’t the most romantic, or earth-shattering of proposals – we had just finished our finals, and it was a swelteringly hot early summer in Edinburgh, which took us somewhat by surprise as we had spent the last four years freezing our tits off in draughty tenement flats and shivering as the Haar blew in and obscured Arthur’s Seat, so the sudden warmth made a blissful change – we could even have sex with our socks off. After a few days, though, the city was stifling and airless, and so Simon drove us to Yellowcraig Beach in East Lothian, a glorious golden sweep of sand, looking across to an old lighthouse on an island that allegedly was the inspiration for Treasure Island. Being mid-week, the beach was deserted, and we had some romantic notion of making love in the sand dunes. It became rapidly apparent that this was a very bad idea, as a) sand gets everywhere and b) the beach was not quite as deserted as we had first thought, and some very disapproving dog walkers got rather more of an eyeful than they had bargained for, so we gave it up as a bad job and just lay and basked in the sunshine instead.
I was just drifting off to sleep and so was slightly disgruntled when Simon woke me up by taking my hand and sitting up to block my sun as he said something.
‘Wha’?’ I mumbled sleepily.
‘I said, I think we should get married. What do you think?’
I sat up so fast that I nearly headbutted Simon in the nose, the romantic moment only being saved by his quick reaction of flinging himself backward onto the sand.
‘Oh my God! Yes! I think that’s a fabulous idea! Yes, let’s get married!’
And so, just like that, we were engaged. We drove back to the city in Simon’s antiquated Fiesta, that he insisted he couldn’t ever wash because the dirt was the only thing keeping it together, holding hands (which made changing gear tricky for him, but nonetheless, he didn’t let go) and beaming with happiness. The next day, he bought me a ring, a small and inexpensive but gorgeous moonstone and silver ring, from one of the crafty hippy shops on the West Bow.
We had planned to get married straight away in some tiny romantic ceremony, possibly just the two of us, and two strangers dragged into the registry office as witnesses, but as soon as my mother and Simon’s mother got wind of the engagement, that was the end of that, and a Proper Wedding was in the works, complete with florists and bridesmaids and canapés and yards and yards of taffeta and quarrels between Mum and Sylvia over who got to wear the biggest hat. So it was two years before we actually managed to get a suitable wedding arranged that the mothers deemed appropriate, and we had very little say in our actual day (apart from my insistence that I MUST have puffed sleeves on my wedding dress, my fashion choices having been influenced from an early age by Anne Shirley – a decision I rather regret now when looking back at the photos).
The tiny moonstone ring was replaced by a ‘real’ ring shortly before Jane was born, after a brief and heady period of financial security and two full-time incomes with no childcare to pay for, and then we were caught up in the whirlwind of babies and property ladders and mortgages and catchment areas and school applications and parents’ nights and homework, and somehow, bit by bit, I feel like we’re becoming strangers and those two besotted kids, lying on that beach, so happy to be spending the rest of their lives with each other, are people from a book or a film.
Why am I even thinking about those kids and that beach on a pissing-wet Wednesday morning in February, when I am supposed to be paying attention in a Very Important Meeting? Oh, yes. February and leap years and proposals. Anyway, I should like February, but I don’t because it is just such a MEH month. It should be spring, the daffodils should be flowering, there should be hope and joy in our hearts, but instead February just squats there like a big miserable grey bastard, cockblocking the spring and the sun. Fucking February.
Friday, 10 February
Heigh-Ho, Heigh-Ho, it’s off to the in-laws we go! In a fit of extraordinary organisation, I managed to remember the approach of half-term, and even more extraordinary, Simon had even announced he would be taking the week off as he wanted to go and see his parents.
Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to take all of next week off, as Lydia has booked it off too, as she also appears to have a Busy and Important husband who believes childcare is a woman’s issue. Simon is not entirely thrilled that I will therefore only be able to take Monday and Tuesday off next week, and will have to get an early flight back on Wednesday morning and go straight to the office (though there is something about going straight into the office from the airport that makes me feel really quite jet-setty and go-gettery – I will have to shoehorn it into conversation several times on Wednesday morning ‘On my way here from the airport …’), leaving him to travel back alone with the children.
I felt quite bad, though, when poor Lydia remarked that she was surprised I wanted to be off the same week as the school holidays, because it’s so much more expensive to go away then, but, she added wistfully, she supposed that was the thing about having no children, your life isn’t ruled by term dates and I probably hadn’t even realised it was half-term, had I? I felt even worse when Alan, who had been muttering darkly about Lydia’s time off and how she always gets first dibs on booking holidays just because she has kids and it wasn’t fair, wished me a lovely break as I tripped out of the office for our long-overdue visit to Simon’s mental parentals at their ‘bijou chateau’ (as his mother likes to call it) in France. In truth, the aged in-laws themselves are not so bad. Michael and Sylvia can be a little wearing, but ultimately mean well, and although Sylvia used to be a bit of a nightmare, she has thawed of recent years, due to a combination of her being forced to realise that her precious daughter is a clusterfuck of epic proportions, said daughter only being bailed out from her shitty life decisions with the profits from my own cleverness in designing that very lucrative app, and me teaching Sylvia of the joys of internet shopping, all of which caused her to decide that my horrid and uncreative computing job wasn’t quite so bad, even though deep down I suspect she would still rather that I was an interior designer like Sukey Poste’s daughter. I don’t actually know who Sukey Poste is, but I have been treated to every detail of her daughter’s brilliant career in wallpaper and soft furnishings. I suspect my own mother would also rather I was more like Sukey Poste’s daughter, if only so I could get her a trade discount at Laura Ashley.
My main reservation about visiting Michael and Sylvia is, of course, that we will also have to endure my fragrant and delightful sister-in-law Louisa – and I use the term ‘fragrant’ very loosely, since she has shown no signs of becoming any cleaner since abandoning her New Age Wanker husband Bardo, and the ‘holistic retreat’ they had run together that she sank every penny she had into along with a large chunk of her parents’ savings. Post-Bardo and retreat, Louisa found herself somewhat high and dry with six children and no income, until I was persuaded to step in and use the remaining proceeds from my Why Mummy Drinks app to buy her a house next door to Michael and Sylvia, so she and her offspring were not rendered homeless, and her parents could attempt to keep her on the straight and narrow (and also French property prices were, thankfully, much more reasonable than prices round us).
Despite all this, Louisa has not become any less irritating, any less sanctimonious or any less of a massive fucking tit. Every time I see her, I am suffused with fury and outrage at all the other things I could have done with my lovely windfall app money instead of propping her up in her deadbeat life. Simon usually has to remove me from the room and encourage me to take deep breaths, while reminding me that we didn’t do this for Louisa, but for her children. All six of them.
Anyway, we managed to journey to France with relatively little drama, apart from Simon swearing profusely while loading the car with the eleventy billion bags required for us to go away for a week, and demanding why we needed so much stuff, and also questioning the need for Peter and Jane to be quite so well furnished with so many snacks for travelling, while I pointed out that if they were eating and glued to their iPads, then there was at least a chance they would ignore each other instead of twatting the everlasting fuck out of each other for the next eight hours. We obviously arrived at the ferry port ridiculously early due to Simon’s worries about Delays on the Road and his conviction that if he is not early, then somehow the ferry people will trick him and send the boat out early for no reason other than to spite him, and we had to stop several times as Jane thought she might be sick while Simon muttered that the only reason she felt sick was three packets of Pom-Bears and a vat of Percy Pigs.
Once in France, Simon went into his strange Racist British Driver Abroad incarnation, swearing and shouting at the innocent French people for driving on their side of the road (sometimes I wonder if Simon was some Important Official of the Raj in a former life, such is his conviction that Foreigners Do Things Wrong), but as I said, everything is relative, and for us that was a fairly uneventful journey.
The fun really started when we got to Michael and Sylvia’s bijou chateau. Firstly, Sylvia had neglected to inform us that she had got herself a replacement for the late, lamented Napoleon Bonapug – a little pug bitch, called, unsurprisingly, Josephine. Apparently Sylvia had thought it would be a nice surprise for us and my beloved Judgy Dog, who had accompanied us, farting rancidly all the way due to Jane sharing her crisps with him. This would have been a nicer surprise had the unfortunate Josephine not been in the midst of her first season.
Despite my warnings of potential molestation, Sylvia insisted that the dogs would get on fine, just fine (having seemingly forgotten the bitter blood feud that had raged between my poor boy and Napoleon Bonapug), and so she popped Josephine down to ‘say hello’.
Judgy is a Proud and Noble Terrier, and disinclined to let a little thing like having no balls get in the way if there is a bitch in season around. And, I have to say, Josephine lived up to her name and was an absolute trollop, waggling her little puggy bum in his face, as he tried nobly to resist, but eventually he succumbed and leapt aboard, to Sylvia’s horror. Fortunately, Josephine (who perhaps should be renamed Lolita) had her virtue left intact (if not her dignity), due to Sylvia’s having clad her in a dreadful device called a ‘doggy diaper’, which is basically a canine sanitary pad. Thus it was that we were at least able to separate them easily enough, while Sylvia screamed ‘NOT TONIGHT, JOSEPHINE!,’ though I sighed as I looked forward to a long week of trying to keep them apart, as family relations may get strained if Sylvia accuses my dog of rapey tendencies and I respond that clearly Josephine was asking for it.
On the plus side, there is always lots of wine at Michael and Sylvia’s, and one needn’t even feel greedy for quaffing it in gargantuan quantities as one is en Français and so it is only about €0.50 a litre. On the downside, one bloody well needs it to cope with Louisa.
Talking of the unwashed one, Michael and Sylvia grimly updated us on her latest antics over dinner – Louisa herself had not deigned to appear and say hello, despite living at the end of the driveway. Apparently, for reasons known only to herself, Louisa has decided to turn her home into a ‘Woman’s Co-operative’. When I asked Michael what exactly that was, he replied that as far as he could tell she had filled the place with a load of females who didn’t seem to own a single hairbrush between the lot of them.
‘But where does she put them all?’ I said in confusion. ‘I mean, between her and the children, there’s not exactly space for anyone else in the house.’
‘No,’ said Sylvia gloomily, ‘I know. Some of them have brought camper vans, and the rest have put up yurts in the garden.’
‘Place looks like a bloody gypsy encampment!’ said Michael crossly. ‘But apparently men are now barred from the premises, so we don’t have to worry about the stupid girl sprogging again, like we did a few months ago when she was teaching “Life Drawing” and modelling for the classes at the same time, flashing her bits at every Tom, Dick and Harry who signed up. Not until she gets bored and finds her next hare-brained scheme to pursue, anyway!’
Saturday, 11 February
Louisa finally wafted in to say hello today, accompanied by her full complement of vagabond children, whom she announced she would be leaving at Michael and Sylvia’s for the day as she had so much to do, and it would be nice for them to spend some time with their cousins. Michael and Sylvia paled at this prospect, and Louisa’s poppets and Peter and Jane shot murderous looks at each other. The battle lines between them had been firmly drawn a few years ago, when the eldest, Cedric, had attempted to steal Jane’s iPod and she had responded by trying to stab him in the eye, and relations were further soured when Oillell, the youngest girl, then a toddler, now five(ish), had done a shit in Peter’s bed, which Louisa had brushed off as being a ‘perfectly natural part of practising her elimination communication’!
Louisa’s oldest daughter, Coventina, at least seemed to be continuing on her life mission to thwart Louisa’s determination to make her poor children be as feckless and irresponsible as she is, by washing, brushing her hair and being normal. On closer inspection, she also seems to have turned the second girl, Idelisa, onto her path of rebellion, as they were both clean, had their hair in ponytails and were sporting Gap T-shirts, I assume provided as part of Sylvia’s eBay bounty. The others (I think the order is Cedric, Coventina, Nissien, Idelisa, Oillell and Boreas, and they range now from around eleven to three) looked like they had been raised by wolves. Coventina and Idelisa confirmed their revolution by asking Sylvia if they could go and do their piano practice, while Louisa looked disapproving and sighed that she didn’t know what was wrong with those two. The others, meanwhile, continued their wolf-children impressions.
Louisa then turned to me. ‘I am sorry to be so busy when you’ve just arrived, Ellen, but I have rather an important evening planned. We’re having a poetry reading to celebrate the publication of my book, and I’d like to invite you to come along tonight. You too, Mother!’ she barked at Sylvia. ‘But not you, Si. I’m sure Mum and Dad have explained that no men are allowed in the Commune. We are an all-female group, dedicating ourselves to overthrowing the patriarchy and freeing ourselves from the chains of male oppression, and so having men present is counter-intuitive to all our work.’
‘I didn’t know you’d had a book published, Louisa,’ I said, partly in astonishment that someone would publish Louisa’s ramblings, and partly in the hope that she might actually start earning some money instead of living rent-free in my (I mean our) house and leeching off her parents each month when she’s frittered away the child support from her ex-husband.
‘Yes!’ said Louisa smugly. ‘I mean, obviously I’ve had to self-publish, because the patriarchy has such a stranglehold on the media that there was no way that they were ready for the raw truths contained in my poetry, but that’s fine, because I was not going to submit to their censorship anyway. My work is too important to let The Man butcher it to satisfy the maw of commerce. But once my words are out there, in their full and uncompromised state, well, this book is going to really change things.’
‘That’s nice,’ I said weakly.
‘So, 7 p.m. Don’t be late, the readings will be starting promptly. And Mother, can you bring some wine and snacks for everyone?’
‘What?’ said Sylvia, who had drifted off into a reverie, probably having heard Louisa’s speeches on censorship and the patriarchy eleventy billion times now. ‘Oh no, darling, no. I can’t come tonight, sorry! Josephine is in season. I can’t possibly leave her at such a delicate time.’
‘What?’ said Louisa in outrage. ‘It’s my special night and my own mother will not come and support me because her dog needs her more?’
‘Well,’ said Sylvia, ‘I’d have thought you’d be more understanding, Louisa. This being an important feminine time for Josephine.’
‘Oh, fine!’ huffed Louisa.
‘Um, maybe I should stay here with Sylvia, you know,’ I suggested. ‘Just in case my poor dog tries to do anything nasty to Josephine. Defend her honour!’
‘Ellen! Someone from my family has to be there to represent me on my special night,’ shrieked Louisa. ‘And also someone needs to bring the food and drink that Mum promised me.’
‘I did not!’ said Sylvia.
‘Well, it’s the least you can do,’ snapped Louisa. ‘Since it seems you prefer that dog to me!’
‘I wonder why …’ murmured Simon.
‘And also, if you’re not bothering to come, you can keep the kids overnight, so I can concentrate on my readings.’
With that, Louisa stalked off, leaving Sylvia and Michael mouthing helpless objections to having six feral monsters dumped on them (well, four, and Coventina and Idelisa, who were playing ‘Für Elise’ rather nicely in the drawing room), as well as the four of us.
It is quite remarkable how often Louisa gets her own way, simply by refusing to listen to anyone’s arguments against what she has announced will be happening. In some ways (though not in any that relate to hygiene issues), she is very like my sister. But given the option of spending the evening jammed in a corner while the children fought or going to Louisa’s and possibly getting a chance to have a good judge, curiosity at seeing the Commune and hearing Louisa’s poetry won out.
Michael gave me a lift down, as they had caved in and were providing four litres of red wine and some bags of crisps, which were about the only ‘snacks’ available in rural France that could fulfil Louisa’s vegan and gluten-free requirements. Louisa came flapping out when we arrived, shouting that Michael should not even be on the property and forbidding him to get out of the car, and complaining about driving such a short distance while he remonstrated that I couldn’t very well have carried everything down myself. Louisa swept back into the house dramatically, leaving me to lug in all the wine and crisps.
Inside was pretty much as I had expected – all was dim and dark, with fairy lights and candles burning in dangerous places and a strong smell of cheap incense (in truth I am not sure what expensive incense would smell like). I made a mental note to check with Simon about insurance for Louisa’s house, as I’m pretty sure she would not have troubled herself with anything so patriarchally tedious.
A stern woman came through from the back of the house and looked me up and down disapprovingly. I felt I had cobbled together a remarkably effective outfit for a poetry reading, giving I had had no warning it was happening, and was rather pleased with my black polo neck, denim mini-skirt (I don’t CARE if I’m forty-two and all the articles say you shouldn’t wear a mini-skirt over the age of thirty-five, and anyway, it’s not like it’s a mini like I wore when I was fifteen. It comes to just above my knees instead of barely skimming my groin) and black boots. I thought I looked artistic and poetical, though Simon had made me remove my fetching black beret on the basis that a) it was ‘ridiculous’ and b) the locals might think I was just taking the piss. I had, however, compensated for that by simply applying extra eyeliner.
‘Can I help you?’ she sniffed.
‘Hello!’ I said brightly. ‘I’m Ellen, Louisa’s sister-in-law. I’ve brought some wine!’
‘Oh,’ said the stern woman unenthusiastically. ‘Yes. Louisa has told us about you, I should have guessed. I suppose you’d better come through.’
In the sitting room the furniture ran mainly to beanbags and floor cushions. Until recently, I would have cheerfully judged Louisa for her stereotypical hippy décor, but it was disturbingly reminiscent of the Thinking Space at work, and therefore suggested that perhaps Louisa was in fact annoyingly cutting-edge. The stern woman (who had grudgingly introduced herself as Stella) attempted to relieve me of the wine, but a sixth sense made me suggest that, actually, I would just get a glass and help myself. Stella looked unimpressed by this, but there was no bastarding way I was going to make it through the night without a drink. Another, cleaner-looking woman came in as I was pouring myself some wine, and Stella muttered to her urgently, the only words I could catch being ‘sister-in-law’ and ‘inappropriate’.
Fortunately, Louisa chose this moment to make her entrance, clad (for Louisa is nothing if not predictable in her hippyshit bollocks) in a swirly kaftan, with what appeared to be some antiquated tea towels wrapped around her head. Three other women followed her.
‘Welcome!’ gushed Louisa. ‘Welcome, friends! Ask the others to come through, please, Stella. I’m ready to begin.’
‘Err, that’s everyone that’s here,’ said Stella.
‘Oh,’ said Louisa, looking momentarily deflated. ‘You did put the flyers out around the village, Gypsy, letting all the women know about tonight and that they were all welcome?’
The cleaner woman turned out to be Gypsy, who insisted she had indeed done just that.
‘Well,’ said Louisa, ‘I think perhaps it’s better like this, actually. More intimate, because after all, these poems are very personal. I’d like first of all to read my particular favourite, “My Yoni” …’
Louisa stood in the centre of the room, arms raised, and stared round at us all. I think she was trying to look at us intently, but she looked like Peter trying (and failing) to hold in a fart. Suddenly she dropped her arms and bellowed:
MY YONI!
GAPING!
BLEEDING!
BEAUTIFUL!
MY YONI!
LIFE!
BLOOD!
DEATH!
MY YONI!
PLEASURE!
PAIN!
A BABY’S HEAD!
IT BLEEDS,
IT PULSES,
STRETCHES.
OPENS.
IT GIVES.
MY YONI.
The other women applauded rapturously.
‘That was so powerful, Louisa!’ called Stella. ‘It spoke to me! It spoke to me here!’ She pounded her heart. ‘And here!’ She smacked her hand off her temple. ‘And HERE!’ and to my alarm she grabbed her crotch. ‘I think all our yonis felt the power of Louisa’s words, didn’t they?’
Everyone nodded assent. I didn’t really know what to say, so I murmured something non-committal, which is every proper British person’s default setting in an awkward social situation. Apparently that wasn’t enough for Louisa, though, as she demanded, ‘Come on, then, Ellen. What did you think?’
‘Yes, it was very nice,’ I muttered.
‘Oh, come on, Ellen. You can do better than that,’ laughed Louisa. ‘Didn’t your teachers tell you not to say “nice”? Tell me what you really thought, how it really made you feel. Tell me where you felt the power of it moving in you.’
I wasn’t convinced that ‘Well, Louisa, it made me feel mortified and also a bit sick, to be honest’ was necessarily the most tactful answer, though, so I settled for, ‘Mmmm, it was certainly different!’ which seemed to satisfy her.
Her next poem, Louisa announced, was called ‘Blood’.
As Louisa ranted, ‘Blood, blood, blood, a flood, a flood, a flood’, I sidled out of the room in search of more wine, as Stella had managed to wrest the bottle off me while I was knocking back my first glass.
The woman called Gypsy followed me through.
‘Is this the first time you’ve heard Louisa’s poems?’ she asked sympathetically.
I said it was.
‘I thought so,’ said Gypsy. ‘They take some getting used to, I’m afraid. She’s been practising all week.’
‘Oh God!’ I said. ‘You poor thing!’
Gypsy laughed. ‘Oh, I don’t live here. I think Stella is the only one living here at the moment. Between you and me, I’m slightly scared of Stella. There were about six other women living here when Louisa first came up with the idea, but I think people thought it was going to be more of an artists’ co-operative type thing, and they moved on when it turned out to be mainly Louisa and Stella ranting about the patriarchy.’
‘Which in Louisa’s case is ironic, as she lives off her father and her ex-husband!’ I said. ‘So where do you live, then?’
‘Just outside the village. I teach art, and I have a smallholding, so I try to grow or make as much of what I need as I can. Running art classes doesn’t pay awfully well. I sometimes think that I should try to expand on the art business, start running residential courses or something, but the whole reason for moving here, trying to find a simpler life, was because I had a breakdown after being too obsessed with making as much money as possible in as short a time as possible and spending it all on consumerist crap that I didn’t need.’
‘I quite like consumerist crap,’ I admitted.
‘Oh, me too. I would be lying if I said I didn’t covet your boots, but I’m trying to remember what’s important, that it’s not all about stuff. That taking the time to drink my coffee in the morning sitting on my veranda is actually worth far more than anything I could buy with the money I’d earn gulping a takeaway coffee on the tube on the way to work. Though your boots might almost be worth it!’
‘You must think I’m an awful person, then, pursuing the capitalist dream,’ I said.
‘Not at all!’ said Gypsy in surprise. ‘Everyone just has to do what’s right for them. If you’re happy, and your life is working for you, then that’s all that matters, not what I think or anyone else.’
There was a screech from the sitting room.
‘ELLEN! GYPSY! WHERE ARE YOU? YOU ARE MISSING THE POETRY AND I AM ABOUT TO DO “MAMMARIES ARE NOT FOR MEN”!’
Somewhat reluctantly, Gypsy and I shuffled back through to hear Louisa’s poem about her tits. I don’t know what she had to say on the subject of her bosoms, as I was too busy cringing in the corner because she flung off her kaftan and recited her poem while prancing round the room naked and jiggling her boobs. I firmly believe that one’s personal grooming is one’s personal choice, and it is no business of society’s whether a woman chooses to shave her legs or wax down there or not – however, I have to say that when one’s lady garden has reached the verdant state of Louisa’s, then leaping about nude in a room filled with candles is not advisable, not from a grooming point of view, but simply due to the fire hazards involved. Midway through the recitation, Louisa paused and throatily intoned, ‘Join me, sisters,’ and Stella jumped up and got her kit off too. Oh dear God, it was worse than the time I went to a German sauna and discovered I was expected to go in naked. Neither of them seemed to believe in underwear, which was doubly worrying given the dubious stains on all the beanbags, and I was now seriously concerned about the fire risks to be had with so much pubic hair around the naked flames. I wondered if I was unselfish enough to use my wine to douse a burning bush – probably not, I decided.
‘Come on, Ellen. Join us in our liberation!’ cried Louisa.
‘No thank you very much, I am fine,’ I muttered. I do not do nudity. I am not one of those merry souls who can prance around the house letting everything blow in the breeze. I am British and I am repressed and I am quite happy with that, if it’s all the same to you. Also, I was afraid that if I did take my kit off, someone might nick my (almost matching – it was all black anyway, which counts) underwear.
When the horror show was finally over, and the last wobbling tit was tucked away out of sight, Louisa came over and enfolded me in a rather sweaty embrace.
‘Thank you for coming, Ellen,’ she said soulfully. ‘I have a gift for you.’
I stiffened. Louisa’s gifts are always a double-edged sword, and I braced myself for whatever her offering was. She handed me a slim booklet and beamed at me in delight.
‘It’s a copy of my book. All the poems I read tonight are in there, and some more. And I’ve personally inscribed it to you, and signed it. And dated it.’
‘Oh, thank you, Louisa!’ Actually, as gifts from Louisa go, it wasn’t as bad as it could have been – for my birthday last year she had given me a list of all the ways she thought I should ‘detox technology’ from my life and make it more like hers. ‘That’s very thoughtful of you!’
Louisa looked at me expectantly. Obviously, my thanks had not been effusive enough. I tried again. ‘I’ll … err … I’ll treasure it. Pride of place on the bookshelf!’
Louisa cleared her throat and continued to stare at me. ‘I mean, I don’t think I’ve ever had a book signed by the author AND personalised. I’ll … err … I’ll really look forward to reading it!’
‘That’s €20, Ellen,’ she said.
‘Sorry?’
‘The book. It’s €20, please.’
‘But you said it was a gift.’
Louisa sighed and smiled at me pityingly. ‘It is a gift, Ellen. My words are a gift to all women. The gift is the words, but the book costs €20. You can’t expect me to just give you it for free? I have to live, Ellen. And I have to cover my costs so that I can continue to spread my message to the world. Artists can’t just give their work away, or that cheapens its meaning.’
Many, many thoughts sprang to my mind. Not least, that being asked to pay €20 for a book that appeared to be about fifteen pages long and printed and bound at home was a fucking iniquity, followed by indignation that Louisa seriously expected me to pay her for a book of shitty poems that I didn’t even want while she was living rent-free in a house that I had paid for. But the other women were circling balefully and I was terrified that if I refused to cough up, they might make me sit in a circle with them and talk about my feelings and ask me where I thought the source of my rage came from (Louisa. The source of my rage was definitely Louisa), and frankly, given the option of forking out €20 or having to endure another second with Louisa and her acolytes, the €20 suddenly seemed cheap at the price, just to be able to escape.
Back at the bijou chateau, Simon looked at my face and handed me a brimming glass of wine. ‘That bad?’ he said anxiously.
I nodded. ‘Do you have any fags?’ I whispered feebly. Simon looked shifty – we are both supposed to have given up smoking but have a tendency to relapse in times of extremis. It is extraordinary how often these relapses coincide with spending time with his sister.
‘I might have bought a packet of Gauloises when I popped down to the village this afternoon,’ he admitted. ‘But you left me alone with all those children all night, AND I have deal with the kids on my own for the rest of the week while you swan off back to work. It’s no wonder I’m stressed enough to start smoking again!’
‘I’m not judging you for it. Gimme one! I need to cleanse my soul with more than just booze. And I’d rather reek of Gauloises than –’ I sniffed at my jumper – ‘patchouli oil or whatever it is I’ve come home smelling of. And “all those children” are your nieces and nephews, and I’m sure you’ll not be overwhelmed looking after your own children once I’ve gone. Your mother will step in, I’m sure. She has told me at least six times since we arrived how “tired” you are looking and how worried she is that me working full-time to is “too much” for you.’
Simon made a non-committal noise about this, but he dutifully handed over the cigarettes and we went onto the terrace, where I filled him in on the night’s events, as he turned paler and paler.
‘Oh, fuck my life!’ he said. ‘Can she get any worse?’
I assured him that Louisa most certainly could get worse, because as I’d fled out the door she had shouted after me that she would be holding a masturbation workshop the next afternoon that she thought might be beneficial for me, as she could tell that my yoni’s chakras were very blocked. I had, of course, declined, and Gypsy and the other women also murmured that they thought they had something on.
‘Thank fuck!’ said Simon. ‘I seriously can’t think of anything more disturbing than my wife and my sister sitting in a circle and wanking.’
And they say romance is dead …
Saturday, 18 February
Hurrah and huzzah, the au pair arrived today! She is French and her name is Juliette, which was slightly disappointing, as I had hoped that her name would be Marie-Claire and she would habite en La Rochelle, like in my French book at school. She does not habite en La Rochelle, she habites en Limoges. I don’t know anything about Limoges, apart from it is famous for china, whereas I knew quite a bit about La Rochelle.
Juliette is very quiet, and has spent most of her time in her room so far, though she has only been here a few hours. I am also starting to panic about what I am supposed to do with an au pair. The agency guidelines said she can do ‘light housework’. What constitutes ‘light’ housework? Dusting? What about hoovering? My hoover is very heavy. Should I buy a new hoover so it counts as ‘light housework’? Also, what about wine? If we’re having a glass of wine, do I offer her one? I mean, she’s French, so she probably pours wine on her cornflakes (not that she probably eats cornflakes, it’ll be croissants or pains au chocolate), but I don’t want to set a bad example. Is one even allowed to drink in front of an au pair? I DON’T KNOW! Also, is it OK to just leave her a list of the ‘light housework’ I want done, or is that rude? Should I simply let her decide what needs to be done?
She is also not being very helpful on the whole helping me to learn French front, because when I very politely asked her if she voudrais allezing à la discotheque, she sort of winced and asked if I wouldn’t mind speaking to her in English, as she was hoping to improve her English while she is here. As her English is pretty perfect already, I suspect it was my diabolique French accent that was the issue. Or maybe she was just worried I might want to allez à la discotheque with her.
We have all been playing super-happy families today, and pretending we are perfectly normal and functional and of course we always spend our Saturday afternoons playing board games and having cheery singsongs (the board games were done grudgingly, but there was mutiny over the singsong). Juliette seemed unconvinced.
I really think this is going to make a massive difference, though. With Juliette able to pick up the kids every day, there will no longer be the fraught tag-teaming between Simon and me as we frantically race to After-School Club and Breakfast Club and snarl that it’s not our turn and argue furiously over whose job is more important and thus who gets to stay late at work. We shall be calm and neither of us will feel that the other’s job takes precedent over their own, and oh my God, Juliette might even babysit so we can go out together as a couple on a regular basis and we will fall in love all over again and it will be very romantic and wonderful!
Simon’s only comment on Juliette so far is that she seems ‘very French’.
Wednesday, 22 February
Juliette is a wonder! I love Juliette! I never want Juliette to leave! She cooks the children strange French food, complete with bits and with vegetables, and they eat it! It turns out Peter is quite capable of using a knife and fork, after a dismissive comment from Juliette about how uncivilised he is and how much she dislikes such nonsense. As Peter is quite hopelessly in love with Juliette, he immediately abandoned eating his potatoes with his fingers and began using cutlery. I have begged Peter for years to have some semblance of table manners, pleading with him that a fork is not to be used simply to scrape food directly off his plate and into his mouth, which he has lowered to plate level. He has even stopped farting and inviting you to guess what he’s been eating.
And Jane! Jane has decided Juliette is the epitome of everything cool, and since Juliette wants to be a lawyer, not an Instagram influencer, Jane has decided to be a lawyer too. Juliette told Jane that Instagram was only fun for looking at photos and wasn’t a viable career option, and Jane, Jane who a few months ago was screaming at me for ruining her life for saying exactly the same thing, nodded sagely and said she quite agreed.
Simon and I have not had a row in the last three days, which is possibly a world record, and actually watched a TV programme together tonight (admittedly with Juliette there too, so there was no romance, etc., but it was still very civilised).
The ‘light housework’ is proving slightly more problematic, as in I’m not actually sure Juliette has done any – even emptying the dishwasher seems beyond her, so I am having to clear up after her when I come in from work – but to be honest, that is a small price to pay for all her many excellent qualities. It’s just a pain in the arse that she had already said before she started that she will be going home for a fortnight over our school holidays, but it’s not an insurmountable problem because long before Juliette came into our lives and started persuading my precious moppets to eat lentils (LENTILS! They ate LENTILS! And said they enjoyed them!), I had already booked myself one of the weeks off work and asked Simon to book the other one off, so we are covered, even if the children may revert to their usual pursuit of scurvy in her absence.