Crappily Ever After (18 page)

‘Who
is
that child with? He is being just beastly
to Florence and Gertrude.’ I shrug and shake my head in understanding, pointing to the nearest cute little toddler – today’s choice, a sweet little girl with bunches, sucking her thumb and clutching a teddy.

‘No idea, that’s mine there,’ I smile sympathetically.

Backfired on me once though. Turned out ‘chosen child to be mine’ on that day actually belonged to the complaining mother. She clutched her to her bosom and gave me a look as if to accuse me of child snatching.

‘Don’t worry, believe me the last thing I want is my own kid, let alone yours,’ I informed her with a reassuring smile.              

‘Time up for George Wilkington-Jones,’ says the bored, pimply youth in charge of soft play. I pretend not to hear.

‘Scuse me, Missus, your kid’s had his forty-five minutes,’ he says, louder this time. I take £5 out of the kitty purse.

‘Forty-five more and this is yours,’ I wave it towards him.

‘I don’t accept bribes!’ he splutters, looking around nervously. Sure you don’t. A pustule on his neck throbs ominously. Maybe it’s a self-defence thing, like those lizards that can drop off their tails. Get too close and splat!

 ‘Fine,’ I say. ‘I’ll just head down to reception and pay my fiver to them, then we’ll stay here
all
day.’ I smile sweetly.

‘You wouldn’t!’ he stares.

‘Wanna watch me?’ I raise my eyebrows defiantly.

‘OK, fine.’ He snatches the fiver with bad grace. I go back to my letter of resignation. I have done two. One horrible and truthful, just to entertain myself; the other – the one I’ll give them – is a polite version, and without a hint of truth.

I read through the joke one.

Dear Sylvia and Simon,

It is with pant-pissing pleasure (Get me! Alliteration! Unlike you thought, I’m not on an intellectual level with a badly trained chimp after all. Woohoo!) that I give you my one-month notice to quit. I have decided that I have had enough of being treated like a hired help and have decided to bugger off with my current shag and two best mates to run a bar in Tenerife. Where I intend to get completely legless every night and flirt with horny Spanish waiters. Safe in the knowledge that I will never see you or your brats again since Spain is beneath you – and just isn’t Barbados, Jamaica or Antigua, dahhhling. Lucky for me, a wonderful friend from a Care Home, (real people – they do exist!) has left me a hefty sum in her will. It would almost be on a par with what you paid for your garden shed. Yes! That much.

I am now in the most fortunate position of being able to tell you to stick your job up your arse and to let you what I really think of you. Simon (crashing bore), Sylvia (so far up your own backside that you’d need to open your mouth to wipe it), Henry (perv, needs restraining order and shares in Kleenex), Katie (see Sylvia), Georgie (an ASBO waiting to happen).

So, from one month and ooh, let’s see, seven and a half hours, you can find some other skivvy to run about after you all like a blue-arsed fly.

Yours (no more),

Lucy Ramsey

PS: It is not acceptable for a nanny to have to unload your clean weekend crockery from the dishwasher, before refilling it with your dirty breakfast ones, take out the overflowing bin bag – again, from the weekend – and spend six hours a week doing you and your husband’s laundry and ironing. Note: nanny, not maid!

PPS: With knickers like Simon’s, I am quite frankly amazed you would want me to handle them. He can make it to position of Managing Director, but he sure as shit (pun intended) has never learnt to wipe his own arse.

I cackle like an old witch as I read it back. Pustule-boy gives me a wary look. I stare him down and begin the real letter.

Dear Sylvia and Simon,

It is with great reluctance that I am giving you my one-month notice to terminate my employment. I have, thanks to a very kind elderly friend, received an inheritance and have decided to pursue my dream of being a chef. I will from next month be moving to Spain with my partner and friends to run our own restaurant business. I have thoroughly enjoyed my time spent with your family and feel blessed that you have allowed me to help in the raising of your children. I will genuinely miss them all. I would love to see you all should you ever consider a trip to Spain and, of course, I hope the children will keep in touch.

Many thanks again. The next nanny is a very fortunate girl. I hope she has as many happy hours as an employee of yourselves as I have.

Kindest regards,

Lucy Ramsey.
           

I find Georgie lying in the bottom of the ball pit and put on his coat and shoes.

 ‘Me troll,’ he says, menacingly.

‘You sure are,’ I say. ‘Was that why the little girl was crying?’

‘Yes, me bad monster,’ he laughs.

‘Come on, Chucky, let’s go.’

We walk back towards their house, stopping off to collect some brochures from the travel agent. I need to see blue skies and sea. Not slate grey, with a
soupcon
of drizzle, and the filthy canal, with attractively placed shopping trolley, that I see now. I put Georgie in the cot for his nap and start unloading the washing machine. Nooo! Red sock, new white Dior top. Sylvia’s. Shit! Bleach. One hour. Now yellow Dior top. Not nice yellow, patchy, piss-stained and still streaked with bits of red from sock. Bin. Sock and top.

Imagining how much top cost. Probably equivalent to a fortnight’s Caribbean holiday for a family of four. Feel sick. Fuck it! Leaving. Never saw it anyway.

I take the bin bag out and place it in next door’s bin. Hiding the evidence. They really aren’t smart enough to think of that. Actually, that’s not quite true, but they wouldn’t think that I was smart enough to think of it.

The rest of the day passes remarkably quickly. Henry has football practice and Katie disappears to her room to play Cyber Pets with the girl from next door. Thirteen and a bit old if you ask me. But, apparently, she’s a good influence on Katie, according to Sylvia. I think she is actually ‘grooming’ her to be a future babysitter. Free child labour and definitely wouldn‘t let the little ones eat five Easter Eggs, like Henry did when Sylvia popped out for the weekly shop.

Before I know it, I hear a key in the lock and Sylvia walks smiling down the hallway. Katie takes the wine out of the fridge and Georgie opens the cupboard to fetch a glass.

‘Oh, my babies,’ she smiles, ‘so good of you to look after Mummy. Not the crystal though Georgiepops.’

‘Lucy, you pop off home early. The traffic is terrible out there.’

‘Oh, thanks,’ I say, surprised. This is how brainwashing affects nannies. Like a kicked dog, they immediately forgive one hundred acts of bitchiness for one act of kindness. I have a momentary pang of guilt thinking of the letter in my bag. I hover in the vestibule while I place the letter in the envelope.

‘Georgie! Psssht. Over here, honey,’ I whisper.

He continues to wheel his truck along the bottom stair and blatantly ignores me.

‘Georgie,’ I cajole. ‘Want a sweetie? Don’t tell Katie.’

Immediately he lumbers towards me on chunky legs. I hold out a chocolate orange square, complementary from our Indian restaurant and definitely less than a week old, though it’s hard to tell with my handbag. I’m sure there are lost ancient tribes lurking in the bottom there.

He goes to grab the sweetie.

‘Ah, ah, ahhh,’ I say. ‘Take this to Mummy and come back for the sweetie.’ He practically takes my hand off for the letter and runs in the direction of the kitchen.

‘Mummy letter,’ I hear his muffled babble.

‘Thank you, Georgie.’

She has it. I hand him the sweet, say thank you, and slip out into the Baltic chill of the evening.
                           

                                   
            
Chapter Fourteen

I arrive home to find Nick and Mike smiling like Cheshire Cats. They’ve only gone and booked us flights to Tenerife for this weekend. This weekend! Mike pops a bottle of champagne and a beaming Becky walks into the living room with four glasses.

‘Here’s to the business buddies,’ announces Mike.

‘Cheers!’ we chorus, clinking glasses together.

We sit around the table and call out for a Chinese. No time to cook, too much to discuss. We look at my brochures and argue good humouredly about how we need to be in a commercial-ish area, but not one full of spewing Club 18-30-types. I don’t know anyone aged thirty who goes on these holidays. It should be call Club Eighteen to Twenty-two and a Half. By then you are fed up of being urinated on in the pool and treading through rivers of vomit to get to your room. Or at least, I was. We finally decide to travel around the island at the weekend, looking for possible sites and take it from there.

‘Oh, Lucy, so how did the resignation go?’ asks Becky.

‘Well, I kind of gave it to Georgie to give to his mum on the way out the door,’ I say with a grimace, feeling slightly ashamed.

‘So, you got a two and a half-year-old to hand in your notice for you,’ laughs Nick.

Well, of course it sounds really bad when you put it like that.

‘Oh, wait till you see what I was going to write,’ I giggle, trying to change the subject from my spinelessness. I delve into my bag and – with a flourish – hand over my hilarious resignation.

All three huddle around and read. Becky smiles as she mouths the words. Well, it is pretty funny. The boys focus hard, faces serious. Becky finishes first,

‘Very nice,’ she smiles.

‘Not funny, though,’ frowns Nick.

‘What? Have you all had a sense of humour bypass? Simon’s shitty pants? Sylvia’s head up her arse? Henry’s shares in Kleenex?’ I finish lamely. Well, I thought it was funny. They all look at me confused.

‘Look,’ I say, snatching back the letter. ‘Maybe it’s funnier read aloud.’ I skim through.

Dear Sylvia and Simon,

It is with great reluctance that I am giving you my one-month’s notice...
NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

I stare at their three worried faces in horror. Becky bites her bottom lip and stares back at me. Mike’s eyes are wide and shining. Nick shakes his head and gives me a lopsided smile.

‘You gave them the wrong letter. Didn’t you?’         

I pace the room anxiously as the other three practically wet themselves laughing and demand to know what was in the other letter. I can’t even bring myself to remember, I am so mortified.

‘Oh, come
on,
Lucy!’ Nick holds his stomach. ‘You are so fired anyway. Embrace the moment.’

I tentatively think back, cringing, and sink my Champagne quickly. I recite as much as I can remember. Pretty much all of it word for word, unfortunately. I have never seen anyone laugh as much as those three that moment. My mobile rings.

Oh fuck fuck fuck!

Becky snatches it up.

‘Sylvia, home,’ she exhales.

‘Put it down,’ I order. ‘
Put it down
!’ Silence. We all wait, shoulders hunched and grimacing, for the voicemail beep.

Beep-Beeeeep. It sounds pissed off.

I snatch it up and put it on speaker phone.

‘You have One. New. Message. Message. One.’

‘Lucy? Sylvia. Well what can I say? I received your resignation and this is just to let you know we will not be requiring you to work your notice. Oh, and since you owe me for a Dior top, which I found in next door’s bin, I will be keeping your holiday pay. Goodbye.’ Click.

We look around each other. Purple-faced. Nick is the first to laugh. My sides ache. Guess I should have listened to my mouth after all, and just told her to get lost. Kind of did, I guess.