Venus Envy (37 page)

‘Oh,’ I said, disappointed, ‘has he got something else on?’

‘Not as such,’ said Mrs Wapter, ‘since he died six months ago.’

She hung up on me.

But on the whole, I got a fairly enthusiastic

, response. And Bronwen and Keisha were dOing their bit, so we could pretty much say the shop would be full. Easyopeasy, I thought, trying not to think about Tom, you can do it.

The next step was to have something to sell. Of course there would be a market for our scruffy eighteenth century filing cabinets and gloomy oil paintings of boys in knickerbockers, but I hankered for just a couple of decent things to display.

‘How about the de Kooning?’ I asked Gordon. ‘And the Jackson Pollock?’

‘The de Kooning?’ he asked in an artificially strangled voice. ‘The Pollock? Have you gone mad?’

It was the pride of Gordon’s life that he owned two pieces by these modern masters. He’d paid vast sums for them, ‘In the high six figures, darling,’ and he liked to keep them in the basement, in shrink wrap, where no one could see them. This was because he was afraid that someone might buy them. Whenever I suggested a client might be shown our jewels in the crown, Gordon shuddered with exaggerated horror.

‘Oh, not Mrs Ricbards,” he would demur.. ‘She’s

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only into the classics … no, not Dame Agnes, good God, that woman has no sense of colour.’ Or ‘Richard Tyrant? He has about as much aesthetic sense as Dale Winton.’

‘But he’s got pots of money, Gordon.’

‘Alexandra, no means no,’ Gordon would say firmly, and then stride across the room with his cheeks clenched very tight, as though carrying a leek using only his bottom.

He looked at me balefully right now. I hardened my heart. It was the immovable object and the unstoppable force.

However, Gordon didn’t have my secret weapon: fear of looking stupid in front of Tom.

‘You’ve got to, Gordon, if you want to be a serious dealer, just think of all the press there, and anyway, none of the old dears will want to buy it, but you’ll look like a player and it will seem awfully strange if you don’t have your best stuff on show…’

‘They’re such Philistines,’ Gordon wailed, ‘you’re such a bully, Alexandra, and we don’t have any other moderns to go with them.’

‘We’ll look marvellously iconoclastic,’ I wheedled. ‘Think what all your friends will say when it passes off so wonderfully.’

‘As long as they’re out of harm’s way,’ Gordon moaned reluctantly, ‘and. I’m holding you responsible, Alex.’

He went downstairs to dig them out and I went home, flushed with triumph.

It didn’t last long: I had a wonderful call from Mummy on the answer machine when I got in.

‘This is Mrs Wilde calling for her daughter Alexandra,’ Mummy said, in a fake posh accent she uses purposely to embarrass me (on answerphones, when buying school uniform, when potential boyfriends

rang to ask me out). ‘Alexandra, will you please call home at once, there is something very important I must discuss with you.’

This vcould have been even worse than it sounded, but Keisha and Bronwen were both out with their nice, available boyfriends. It’s hard not to resent people in couples when you’re on your own. After Mummy’s message I had to listen to some puke-makingly sweet talk from Clan the Man and Jeremy the record executive. Bleuurgh! ‘So looking forward to tonight, darling. Wear that red dress - or don’t bother with any dress.’ ‘Can’t wait to see you, Keish, been thinking about you all day. Did you know you were this distracting?’ I went straight to the cupboard and ate Keisha’s Sweet ‘n’ Spicy Pot Noodle, just to be mean. Also Bronwen’s M&S Lite Toffee-Apple Layered Dessert (only x5 calories, no artificial sweetener), so that showed them.

What right did my flatmates have to a life when all I cDuld do was organise a stupid party?

To reassure myself I went to the fridge and checked the fruit, salmon, Scotch eggs
etc.
were still there. They were. Well, it was going to be a top bloody party. For a second I thought of ringing up Crispin and my old mates in the squat but rejected it as a bit too bohemian. Stimpy ‘two bellies’ Jackson would stand in front of the de Kooning all night belching and asking who’d spilt the paint.

And yes, they had a phone in the squat - some anarchist hackers had rigged it so all their calls got charged to Hello! magazine.

Finally I knew I couldn’t put it off any longer, so I opened the bottle of peach brandy I was going to use for the fruit salad to let it breathe - I read that somewhere once. Alcohol needs the fresh air for flavour. I thought maybe I’d better help ventilate the

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bottle by having just a small glass before I called my mother back.

Anyway, it was medicinal. For courage.

I dialled Mum’s number and got only my father, who is super-bad on the phone, going for the world monosyllable record (sample conversation: ‘How are you, Dad?’ ‘Fine.’ ‘How’s work?’ ‘Fine.’ ‘How’s the tennis elbow?’ ‘OK, thanks, love.’ You get the drift. Sometimes I would attempt to break the pattern by telling Dad all my news - dumped by latest boyfriend, promoted, starting work on new sculpture, cut hair,
etc.
- and Dad would listen in pained silence, concluding with either ‘Hmm, oh dear,’ or ‘That’s good,’ depending on tragic/ecstatic nature of news. He would then get off the phone as quickly as possible. Not slow to take a hint, after only fifteen or so years we started asking Dad, to pass the phone to Mum, only to be told by a family friend that Dad got upset at this, and puttered round with a long face asking why his daughters never wanted to chat to him).

Of course this is a blessing sometimes, like now. ‘Is Mum there? She rang earlier,’ I said brightly.

‘Oh no. What time is it?’ he asked, a bit eccentrically I thought.

‘About half seven,’ I said.

‘Right. Well, she should be there any minute.’ ‘Where?’ I asked, myst.ified.

‘There, in the flat, silly,’ Daddy said patiently. ‘She caught the five forty-three, so I’m surprised she’s not there already.’

‘Mum’s coming here?’ I gasped.

‘That’s it,’ he agreed. ‘Said she wants a word with

you, darling, and she feels like staying the night.’ ‘But how did she get the keys?’

‘Oh, Gail gave them to her,’ said Dad blithely, presumably unaware how his words were stabbing daggers of fear into my shrivelling, alcohol-induced

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bravery. ‘She stayed here last night. With her nice boyfriend.’

Despite the surging panic, my curiosity got the better of me. Tom must have made quite an impression for Dad to be so chatty.

‘Did you like him?’ I asked.

‘I thought he was terrific, darling,’ Dad said warmly, ‘and they seemed very keen on each other, hope I shan’t have to fork out for too big a wedding, ha, ha.’

‘Ha ha,’ I said. ‘Anyway, gotta go, Dad love, got to tidy the place up for Mum.’

‘Now Alex, I hope you and your friends have been keeping the flat in good condition,’ said Dad severely.

I gave a strangled laugh. “Course! Just going to, uh, , freshen the pot pourri.’

Oh God! Oh God! It wasn’t fair, of course we have our tidy sessions once a week - OK, once every fortnight but who’s counting - but the difference is, the others are here to help. My mother, aka the Wrath of God, was descending on me like a wolf on the fold, and me running around like a blue-arsed fly trying to figure out where to start. Obviously the kinky Nancy Friday/Joy of Sex pop-up editions had to be removed from various tables and cunningly hidden under the bed. Then there was the filthy crockery to be shoved in the sink, with me hastily turning on the taps and squirting with the Pine Fresh Concentrated, because bubbles are better to look at than dried-on kebab. Having done that I made our dirty knickers top of the priority list but only got as far as scooping them off the bathroom floor (pausing to throw three empty loo rolls with bits of pink Andrex stuck on them in the bin) when the doorbell went like the Crack of Doom at the Day of Judgment.

I wailed and flung everything in the washer-dryer. I could run away, but there were no back exits.

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The Hour was upon me.

‘Darlingt’ said my mother, as she swept through the

dool’.

I’ve heard people say ‘Bastardt’ in a friendlier tone of voice.

‘What do you call this?’ she asked majestically.-‘Is it a science project? Are you trying to grow a mushroom crop in the filth?’

‘Ha, ha,’ I said weakly.

Mum picked up a Walnut Whip wrapper from last night’s chocolate run and dropped it in the bin. ‘It’s totally disgusting, completely repulsive. I certainly didn’t raise you to live like this …’

She went on like that for several minutes until I was forced to blame everything on Keisha.

‘Well!’ Sniff. ‘I bet when Gail was here it wasn’t like that. You’d better show me her room. Yes, I see it’s tidy in here, and it smells of lavender.’

Gail had blitzed it with Laura Ashley Asphyxiating Pong whenever Tom was due round.

‘Alexandra,’ Mum rolled my name, ‘we are going to have to talk about your fixation with Tom Drummond.’

‘Tom is a friend of mine.’

‘You’ve got plenty of friends, and Tom is your sister’s boyfriend. You had a chance with him, you know.’

She bustled into the kitchen, putting everything in the wrong place and starting to cook with Bronwen’s groceries. ‘He was a wonderful visitor.’

‘What’s that got to do with anything, Mum?’ I asked crossly.

My mother ceased crumbling the Oxo cube into the water and fixed me with a deathly stare.

‘The way you talk, anyone would think you were after him,’ she said. ‘I hope you’re not going to embarrass Gall at your do this weekend. I can tell you, “

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my girl, your father and I have been very patient, but if you hurt her chances, you’ll just have to find somewhere else to live. Fiona Kane hasn’t forgiven me, you know.’

At that moment the door burst open and Bronwen stumbled in, drunk as a skunk.

‘Hey Alexsh - gesh what, caught him wif anuvver woman, motherfuggin bastard, complete blurry cunt-oh, hello, Mis’ Wilde, nish to shee you …’

Gail played hardball. Mum stayed for two nights and made my life a living hell. The word ‘shame’ is not in her dictionary.

‘Now come along, Keisha, you can’t go out looking , like that. No, Alex, be quiet, Keisha’s wearing so much

make-up she looks like a clown.’

‘Where’s my collection of NMEs?’ Bronwen asked after one nightmare day.

‘Oh, those scatty old papers?’ Mum said brightly. Our drawing room was now so sterile you could operate in it. ‘I threw them out.’

‘You did what?’ asked Bronwen silkily.

Mum was unfazed. ‘I threw them out, dear. They were a fire hazard.’

‘I’ve been collecting them since I was twelve,’ Bronwen gasped.

‘Then it’s high time you grew out of them. No wonder your young gentleman preferred another girl.

Nobody likes a tomboy,’ said Mum, ‘look at Alex.’ ‘What about me?’

‘Well, you are on the shelf, dear, aren’t you? You can’t deny that.’

I begged and pleaded with Mum to go away, which she agreed to do only after she had confiscated my Joseph pant suit - ‘Feminine women let the boys wear the trousers, darling.’

She paused to tell Keisha that men liked long hair

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and to warn me again: if I screwed up Gail’s patch, I was out.

I would have loved to tell her to jump in a lake, but she was my mother. And at twenty-seven, I was still dependent on my parents. Without Mum, it was hello Crispin, hello squat.

Isn’t it amazing? Just when you think things can’t get any worse, life takes a major bloody dive.

‘You needn’t think we’re going to help you prepare,’

Bronwen said darkly, ‘daughter of the psycho mother.’ ‘Yeah, you brought her here,’ Keisha added.

The two of them were primping and spritzing and selecting darling little dresses, Keisha going it with her Mac nearly nudes and Bronwen ladling on the Shu Umera. I was trying not to be frazzled, I had two hours to get the. food ready and drive it there. Gordon had already called in a panic so many times I had to take the phone off the hook.

‘Oh please, pleeese, I’ve got to do my hair,’ I wailed. T minus fifty and my face was pale and stressed, my eyes were red and my tights were ripped.

‘Oh well, I guess I can do the fruit salad,’ Keisha grumbled.

I tapped it dubiously. ‘It seems a bit hard.’

‘It’ll thaw out,’ Keisha promised, ‘you just get ready.’

I dived into the bathroom and started wrestling with my appearhnce. I had a stress-related zit right in the middle of my chin. Hastily I covered it in eight layers of Rimmel but.it still showed through. Never mind.

‘Do what you can with what you have,’ I breathed, trying to be Zen. My crappy No. 7s repaired some of the damage, but my eye pencil went a bit wonky, and it was the Stay-on For Ever indelible kind. Shit. Visions of Gail, radiant in her fresh-faced beauty, danced before me.

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‘The cheese is a bit hard,’ Bronwen yelled.

‘Well, put it in the microwave.’ I grabbed my dress, the long, white Emporio Armani number, forgiving in the bum area and you can’t really ask for more. It swept all the way down to my ankles, so I decided to go pantyless. VPL would be a total nightmare. I wanted this to be the smoothest, coolest night ever.

My reputation was riding on it.

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I recklessly jumped in a cab and went round to the gallery. Only a minicab, and it did smell of spilt beer and old fags, but what the hell, it seemed like the height of luxury.

Bronwen and Keisha were bringing the food later. Fortunately I was not going to have to wait for Keisha to be ready before I got out of the door. Apart from wanting my chocolate on the chocolate run, her most annoying.habit is her lateness. Her make-up and dress have to be changed fifty times. Her jacket at least three times. In fact if Keisha says, ‘OK, AI, let’s go,’ you can say it’ll be at least another half-hour before she gets from the mirror to the door.