Fifty Is Not a Four-Letter Word (26 page)

Over coffee on the grounds of Kenwood House, I try to work out what to do about Dan. It seems to me I have three options.
I can lie and say I’m busy or out of town; I can meet him for the show and dinner afterward, then go straight home—alone;
or I can go back to his hotel for another night of the kind of fabulous sex I’d forgotten still existed. The kind of sex I
only have to think about for a spontaneous pelvic contraction to occur. My gynecologist would see this as very healthy—he
recommends that all his patients practice their Kegel exercises at the bus stop to prevent the possibility of prolapse in
later life.

I get the feeling Dan doesn’t have to wrestle his conscience over this, unlike me. I wonder if he even has a conscience. My
guess is that he’s a pretty casual kind of philanderer. Which, leaving aside his wife, who’s not really my business, is probably
a good thing as far as I’m concerned. I know from the word go that this is strictly casual, something that has absolutely
no possibility of a future, and is therefore a lot less complicated than a full-on affair.

Maddy and Mozart are coming for supper tonight. Fortunately, Mozart and Susanna are made for each other. He hasn’t attacked
her once. And like most new lovers, they spend their time either kissing or sulking and deliberately ignoring each other.
I’m going to have to confess Paris to Maddy. I’ll go crazy if I don’t talk to someone about it. I’d talk to Vanessa, but involving
my son’s mistress in my extramarital affairs is beginning to sound too Jerry Springer for my taste.

• • •

I’ve cooked a half leg of lamb with a mustard and honey glaze, alongside roasted red peppers dressed with garlic, olive oil,
and balsamic vinegar, potatoes sizzled to golden crispness in the oven with goose fat, and broccoli al dente spritzed with
lemon juice. Then a chocolate and almond cake for dessert. I think Maddy was expecting spaghetti Bolognese, but she has still
to absorb the fact of my new obsession with chopping, paring, slicing, grating, kneading, baking, reducing, and every other
culinary-ing.

“Mmm,” says Maddy, patting her tummy after two portions of each course as I feed Susanna and Mozart the scraps from our plates.
“She/he liked that. And so did I. Not sure I could ever walk out on someone who cooks as well as you.”

“Cooking’s another of those avoidance activities, like the dog, that I’ve taken up since I got booted off
Jasmine
. In a funny way, I think all this manic cooking was one more thing that made Jack uneasy.”

“How do you mean?”

“He liked me best when I was a working woman, independent. He’s never wanted a hausfrau for a wife, and if I fuss over him
in any way, he feels all hemmed in and claustrophobic. He told me as much. He was once going off to a conference in Nottingham,
and I offered to make him a sandwich for the train journey. It was as though I’d mortally offended him. Instead of saying
something like ‘Oh, that’s really thoughtful of you,’ he said, ‘I don’t want a sandwich, and if I did want one, I’d be perfectly
capable of making it myself.’ He hates to be fussed over.”

“Men are so weird.”

“I need your advice, Maddy.”

“Shoot.”

“You know my trip to Paris . . . ”

“You mean the lingerie, the Picasso Museum, the fantastic restaurant in Saint-Germain. You were very perky about it all.”

“More perky than you know.”

“Meaning?”

“Meaning I slept with someone.”

“You slept with someone! But you were only there for three days. Who? How? Where?”

“The restaurant. I met him in the restaurant.”

“And you had sex with him?”

“Well, not there and then. After dinner. After walking for two hours along the Seine. After a couple of brandies.”

“You old slag! How was it?”

“Incredible. Mind-blowing. Earth-shattering. Stupendous.”

“Lucky old you. Was he a sexy frog?”

“An American. A professor. He teaches musical theater. He loves old musicals.”

“Handsome?”

“Very.”

“Married?”

“Very.”

“Kids?”

“Two.”

“If you’re going to tell me you’ve fallen in love, I might have to throw up. And after four months of throwing up every day,
I’d really rather you didn’t get me going again.”

“Honestly, Maddy, I thought we’d never meet again. But I gave him my e-mail address, and he got in touch, and he’s coming
over.
En famille
. Something to do with a house swap in Dorset. But he’s coming to London on his own for a few days, and he wants to see a
show and have dinner.”

“So what are you going to do?”

“Exactly.”

“Exactly what?”

“What am I going to do?”

“Bloody hell, Hope, I don’t know. But it does sound awfully tempting.”

“The thing is, I can’t separate wanting to get back with Jack from my desire to go to bed with Dan. I’d like to put the two
things in separate compartments, but they keep rubbing up against each other, blurring the boundaries.”

“It doesn’t make you seem very committed to getting back with Jack if you’re off screwing someone else in a swish London hotel.”

“But what does one thing have to do with the other? Jack and I haven’t had sex since last year. Dan made me feel desirable
again. I’ve been wired all day since receiving his e-mail. If he walked through the door right now, I’d have to drag him straight
up to the bedroom, leaving you to do the washing up.”

“It doesn’t sound all that healthy to me.”

“Meaning?”

“Meaning even if we’re talking pure lust, it’s going to muddle your feelings about Jack. On the other hand, there’s always
the chance that when you meet Dan again, he might not appear nearly as attractive as he did the first time around. Sometimes
the one-night stand is best left at that, as I’ve learned from bitter experience.”

“You mean I might not even fancy him? I hadn’t thought of that. And then instead of this great memory, it will be somehow
sullied.”

“But if you do fancy him, which is the more likely scenario, you could be heading for dangerous waters.”

“I’m feeling guilty about so many things at the moment, but oddly, not at all guilty about having slept with Dan. It’s the
possibility of a replay that’s pricking my conscience. I want to be with Jack, and I want to have fun with Dan. I have no
illusions at all about a relationship with Dan. On the other hand, if it were the other way round, and I discovered Jack was
making out with some popsie . . . Actually, I don’t know how I’d feel, maybe I’d think he deserved the break . . . Oh, this
is hopeless.”

“When it comes down to it, you may just be playing one night of pleasure off against a lifetime back with Jack,” says Maddy,
no longer teasing.

“But Jack doesn’t have to know, and so far he hasn’t even mentioned coming back. When I tried to bring up the subject, he
left the room.”

“Oh, Hope, I really don’t know. But my gut says don’t do it—maybe later, if things with Jack don’t work out, but not now.
Not while it’s all still up in the air.”

“There may not be a later, but I’m sorry to say I think you’re right. Look, Maddy, I’ve got an idea. When I was little and
made a promise to someone, I didn’t always keep it. But if I’d also said at the time of that promise, ‘Cross my heart and
hope to die,’ nothing but nothing could have induced me to renege on it. So I’m making a solemn promise to you now. I will
meet Dan for the show and dinner afterward, but I promise I will not have sex with him.”

“Cross your heart and hope to die?”

“Cross my heart and hope to die. There, it’s done.”

“Hope, are you sure that this will do the trick? It seems rather random.”

“Positive. But I have to admit that although I know it’s the right thing, I’m really, truly, deeply disappointed.”

“You do want Jack back, don’t you?”

“Yes, I do. I mean, I’m really unhappy without him around, but I’m still trying to work out exactly what it is about him that
I miss. And I’m beginning to think that I’ve spent the last eighteen years—ever since Olly was born—treating Jack like a vase
or a painting that’s been sitting in the same place all this time. Something you’d spot immediately if someone moved it to
another position or took it away altogether, but on a day-to-day basis, you don’t notice it’s even there. Jack’s always been
so reliable, so accommodating. So involved with Olly and always willing to listen to my problems. I think there must have
come a point when I stopped appreciating him doing things and expected it instead. Maybe I should have taken more notice,
said thank you a little more often. Given back more. Although Jack always seemed so self-contained and cheery and un-needy.”

“I don’t know,” says Maddy, sighing, “maybe this separation is a good thing. It’s painful, I know, but at least it’s forcing
you to examine everything.”

“I think that what’s really felled me is the fact of everything hitting me at once. I can’t focus on any one thing.”

“Keep working on it, Hope.”

“I’ll try.”

“And now there’s something important I want to ask
you
.” Maddy takes my hand and places it on her tummy.

“Go for it.”

“I want you to be he/she’s godmother.”

“Oh, Maddy, I thought you’d never ask. I assumed you thought I wasn’t up to the job. That I might be too old.”

“Will you be godmother to my child, my friend?”

I could win awards for crying, I’ve done so much of it lately. “I am honored, privileged, and over the moon,” I blub. “I can’t
wait to have this baby of ours.”

We’re still hugging and weeping when Olly appears.

“What’s this? A lesbian-love-in-cum-dog-orgy? Haven’t I had enough shocks lately?”

“Congratulate me, Olly, I’m going to be a godmother.”

“Congratulations, Mum. Maddy, you’re enormous.”

“Love you, too, Olly.”

“Have you eaten?” I ask.

“Yeah, I had pizza. But I’m starving,” Olly says.

“There’s a whole plateful there left over. You can heat it in the microwave or have it cold.” I feel the little stabbing pain
that occurs every time I think about Olly leaving home. Very soon there’ll be no more starving boy in the house.

I turn my attention back to Maddy, and we talk about the baby and when we’re going to go shopping for the pram, the cot, and
all the rest of the paraphernalia. When Maddy leaves, I call Ticketmaster and book seats for
Grand Hotel
. Then I ring the Ivy and book a table for ten-thirty p.m. after the show.

It’s the end of another average day in my weird new world. A world that used to be full of certainty, and now the only certain
thing is that I don’t have a clue what’s going to happen from one moment to the next. I’ve been turned down for a job I didn’t
apply for. I’ve gained a godchild. And I’ve waved goodbye to all possibility of a sex life. When I drift off to sleep, I’m
thinking of that night in Paris. Some people say women don’t have wet dreams, but they’re wrong. I wake up around four a.m.,
having had delicious sex with a stranger. “Jack,” I say sleepily, reaching out for my husband. Only Jack isn’t there.

• • •

I book a manicure, pedicure, leg wax, bikini wax, facial, roots tint, wash, and blow-dry. I am
not
going to have sex with Dan Drake. I go to Diane von Furstenberg in Ledbury Road and try on everything in the shop. I am
not
going to have sex with Dan Drake. I buy a simple sleeveless wrap dress with a hot-pink twiglike motif on a white background.
And because the assistant insists I try it with a pair of dusty-pink suede Prada peep-toe shoes, which she brings in from
Matches next door, and which have heels high enough to elongate and slim my legs but not so high as to make me walk like a
duck, I buy the shoes as well. Cross my heart and hope to die. I am not going to have sex with Dan Drake. But I didn’t say
I wouldn’t do my damnedest to make him want to have sex with me.

• • •

I’ve been buffed and polished like the very best antique silver. I don’t look a day over forty-eight. I shall have to wear
my glasses to the play if I’m going to be able to talk intelligently about it afterward. I do have contact lenses, but I can’t
read the menu with them in, and I find it embarrassing to have to ask diners at the next table to hold up the menu for me
so I can read it long-distance. Why am I fussing so? I’m only going to talk to the man.
Not
sleep with him.

Olly’s working at the bar on West End Lane and should be home by eight. Later, he’s going clubbing, but not until around ten-thirty,
which means he can walk the dog round the block before he goes out and before I get home, after which she won’t need to go
out until the morning.

It’s a gorgeously warm night, I don’t even need a jacket, but I take a cream pashmina to wrap round my shoulders in case it
cools down. I am nervous, excited, and slightly panicky in case I bump into anyone I know. I decide to arrive in style in
a minicab, then regret it. The cab reeks of stale tobacco and grease, and I fear that’s how I’ll end up smelling, too. There
is so little stuffing in the upholstery, I might as well be sitting on steel rods. Great black clouds are trailing from the
exhaust. My cloud has given me the night off. In fact, there have been an increasing number of stalker-free moments since
Susanna came into my life.

I step out onto the pavement outside the Donmar Warehouse.

“Hope, how great to see you. Wow, you look a million dollars. Not working clearly agrees with you.” Of all the people I never
want to bump into, Exquisite Mark has to be right at the top of my list. He’s on a roll. “DvF, of
course
. Once a woman’s hit a certain age, she really shouldn’t wear anything else.
So
flattering to the figure.”

Garrotting would be too kind an ending for Mark.

And then I spot Dan, ambling down the street in beige chinos, a bottle-green polo shirt and a pair of brown brogues, waving
a copy of
Time Out
.

“Wow, Hope, you look great,” he says, stooping to kiss me lightly on the cheek.

“Just what I said,” says Mark, extending a hand toward Dan and fluttering those fabulous eyelashes of his.