Wendy Perriam (9 page)

*

She was woken by a familiar rustle. Alexandra? Zeena? Opening her eyes, she was surprised to see a slightly larger mouse than hers, with bigger ears, bulbous eyes, and different coloured fur. It was sitting on its haunches, watching her with both fear and curiosity, its long tail twitching, its small pink nose aquiver.

“It’s all right,” she whispered gently. “There’s room for both of us.”

She shut her eyes again, pretending to go back to sleep, so that her nervous shed-mate wouldn’t be disturbed. However, after half an hour of lying almost motionless, she was forced to get up for the sake of her complaining skin.

Looking round for the mouse, she eventually traced it to an old Wellington boot lying on its side in one corner of the shed. Inside the boot was a nest, and inside the nest was a brood of eight - only a few days old, she guessed, judging by their hairless coats. She gazed at them, enchanted. How remarkable, extraordinary, that once again she was sharing a home with mice, when her own had been so recently exterminated. These were field mice, not house mice, but in essence the two species were the same. Surely it must be
meant
; arranged by some benevolent Fate to appease her for her loss. Already she had nine companions and, if she fed and tended them, the nine would reproduce in their turn, until she had a shedful. She must go out now, catch the shops before they shut, lay in stocks of nuts and seeds, fresh vegetables, fresh fruit. She wasn’t sure if field mice had a sweet tooth, but she’d find out soon enough.

She tiptoed to the door, shivering in the evening air. Twilight was just falling, the sky barred with grey and gold. As she crept along the narrow path that skirted the rubbish dump, she stopped to stare, in surprised delight, at the contents of the pile. When she’d arrived this morning, there’d been nothing that she hadn’t seen before, but now, discarded on the top, lay a tall, impressive Christmas tree, still planted in its sturdy red tub. Its branches were browning a little, and one or two had snapped off, but it was in good shape overall. And, strewn across it, was a tangled heap of decorations - tinsel, paper streamers, golden baubles, silver stars. Excitedly, she climbed the slope to the dump, crouching on her hands and knees to explore its treasures further. A half-eaten Christmas pudding had been casually tossed away, along with the remnants of a Christmas cake, stuffed into a plastic bag. And next to that, a carton of mince pies, with at least a couple left in it, and a red string bag of tangerines, not all of which were mouldy. Some wealthy family had obviously dumped their leftovers, though that again was strange. Wouldn’t she have heard them during the day - the noise of a car engine, raised voices, tramping feet? And why had they brought their rubbish to this derelict place instead of to the official dump? Hardly anyone ventured down this uneven rutted track, yet here were all the ingredients for a full-scale family Christmas - and hers for the taking, at no expense, no cost. Yes, it was obvious now, some Force must be concerned for her, working for her benefit and that of her new friends. She would decorate the tree for them, share the Christmas food with them, restore a sense of harmony.

Piling her arms with provisions - cake, pudding, mince pies, tangerines - she carried them in to the shed, putting them down as gently as she could, so as not to alarm the mice. Then she went back for the Christmas tree, first disentangling the pile of decorations. As she tugged at yards of tinsel, the sky dramatically lightened, and a three-quarters moon bellied out from behind the clump of trees. She stood gazing at it, humbled. Now she had the gift of light, along with all the rest.

As she craned her neck to keep the orb in view, she was aware of scaly patches on its surface, dark encrusted areas, discoloration, lesions. How familiar they looked, like the lesions on her back, the blood-encrusted sore place just below her coccyx, the abrasion on her arm, where the skin was still discoloured. Could the
moon
be thin-skinned, too - that pale ship on the dark sea of the night foundering as it sailed the broken world?

The thought was oddly comforting, and, watched by its unblinking eye, she slipped back into the shed, to celebrate the, perhaps, first happy Christmas of her life.

Like the plots of her novels, Wendy Perriam’s life has taken a few unexpected turns, including expulsion from her convent school for heresy, being told by doctors at the age of 21 that she wouldn’t live beyond 30, and a variety of offbeat jobs, from artist’s model to carnation-disbudder to starring role in a blue movie.

After graduating from Oxford, where she read History and also trod the boards, she ran away to America and worked as a cocktail-waitress, rustling up Harvey Wallbangers and sorting out the drunks. She now divides her time between teaching and writing, regarding both as a life-raft.

Wendy started writing at the age of 5, completing her first ‘novel’,
A Pony At Last
, on her 12th birthday. However, after the loss of her Catholic faith and serious illness in her twenties, she went through a period of silence and depression, only rallying a decade later.

Since then, she has written 18 novels and 7 short-story collections, which boldly mix sex, religion and humour, and have been acclaimed for their psychological insight and their power to disturb, divert and shock. She has also written extensively for newspapers and magazines
and has contributed to anthologies of poetry. Her television appearances include Catholics and Sex
,
The Truth About Women
,
The Pat Kenny Show
,
London Tonight
,
Business Breakfast
and
Writing About Sex
, and she was a frequent contributor to the radio series
Stop The Week
and
Fourth Column
.

In 2013, she was awarded an Honorary Doctorate by Kingston University for her “services to literature and her contribution to reading pleasure”.

Wendy feels that her many conflicting life experiences - strict convent-school discipline and swinging-sixties wildness, marriage and divorce, infertility and motherhood, 9-to-5 conformity and periodic Bedlam - have helped shape her as a writer. ‘Writing allows for shadow-selves. I’m both the staid conformist matron and the slag; the well-organised author toiling at her desk and the madwoman shrieking in a straitjacket.’

Novels:

1.
Absinthe for Elevenses

2.
Cuckoo

3.
After Purple

4.
Born of Woman

5.
The Stillness the Dancing

6.
Sin City

7.
Devils, for a Change

8.
Fifty-Minute Hour

9.
Bird Inside

10.
Michael, Michael

11.
Breaking and Entering

12.
Coupling

13.
Second Skin

14.
Lying

15.
Tread Softly

16.
Broken Places

17.
An Enormous Yes!

Short Story Collections:

1.
Dreams, Demons and Desire

2.
Virgin in the Gym

3.
Laughter Class

4.
The Biggest Female in the World

5.
Little Marvel

6.
The Queen’s Margarine

7.
“I’m on the Train!”