The Trouble with Single Women Read online

Fee thought the nails were out of synch with the rest of Imogen Banks’s low-profile image. But then again the woman was in television.

  ‘Shall I share the experience of sterilization with you?’ Imogen asked, pitching her voice to a more confidential tone. Fee rather hoped she wouldn’t.

  Sharing an intimate experience was the way in which Imogen had persuaded the most reluctant candidates to reveal their intimate secrets to audiences of millions.

  In the cause of work, Imogen Banks had allegedly been frigid, adopted, abandoned, battered by a former husband, a recovering alcoholic and infertile. Only the presence of a 38B chest had prevented her once from claiming to have had a double mastectomy in order to become a member of the third sex.

  She had no moral qualms about such activities. These weren’t lies, they were the tools of her trade. Fiona Travers needed someone to push her just a little bit further than she might initially be prepared to go. If successful, Imogen could see not just a television documentary, but a heated studio discussion as well. And oceans of media coverage.

  She could visualize the clamour, she could hear the soundbites. She could see the following day’s newspapers.

  NEW SPINSTERS MAKE MEN REDUNDANT! NEW SPINSTERS DEVALUE MOTHERHOOD! WHO WILL TAME THE TESTOSTERONE OF OUR YOUNG MEN, IF YOUNG WOMEN GO ON STRIKE! And even: AS THE MILLENNIUM APPROACHES THE FAMILY WRECKERS ARE ASKING – WHAT ARE MEN FOR?

  She smiled at Fee across the desk. She might not know it, she thought to herself, but Fiona Travers was about to become the leader of a new movement. A very small movement, naturally, but one that could easily be exaggerated beyond all proportion.

  Imogen didn’t even begin to take Fee’s refusal to appear seriously. Everybody wants to be on the box at least once but some people take longer than others to realize it.

  Imogen weighed up her reluctant protégée. Reasonably attractive, but too subdued for the screen. What was required was someone who was stylishly pristine on the surface but who gave out the message that she was unmistakably wicked within.

  A Wanted Woman, an outlaw from society’s conventions. But, above all, an outlaw whom men might fancy, and about whom women would have to concede, ‘Well, she could take her pick if she wanted to—’

  ‘This woman – given a little bit of extra polish – could say that there’s more to life than finding a man – and stand a good chance of being believed,’ Imogen thought.

  It was then that she took the decision. She would do whatever it took to make Fiona Travers the star of The Perfumed Pound. Even, God forbid, perform that most distasteful of acts: become her bosom friend.

  The ringing of Fee Travers’s phone temporarily halted Imogen Banks She attempted to eavesdrop on what sounded like a highly vocal parrot being put through a shredder. Fee looked at her watch several times, made pacifying noises and eventually replaced the receiver.

  ‘I’m awfully sorry,’ she told Imogen. ‘I’ve got to go. A bit of an emergency.’

  ‘Can I help?’ Imogen offered instantly. An emergency was a gift from above, ‘My car’s here . . .’ she added swiftly.

  ‘No, really, I’ll get a taxi. Look, I’m sorry I haven’t been able to help you more but as I explained to your director, it’s not really—’

  Imogen reached for her coat, and waved her arms in the air, fending off the apology. ‘Don’t worry about that now . . . You’ll never get a taxi at this time of night. You give me instructions and I’ll drive. Let’s go.’

  Ten minutes later, just as Imogen had hoped, the car came to rest in a traffic jam in the Marylebone Road.

  ‘Use this,’ Imogen said and offered Fee her mobile phone.

  More squawking, more platitudes and a second promise of a speedy arrival.

  ‘It’s an old friend,’ Fee explained. ‘Her husband is late home – and he’s never usually late. In fact, he’s an unnerving a creature of habit. Anyway, Percy . . . Persephone . . . their daughter – she’s just seven – she says she’s swallowed an open safety pin, the next-door neighbour is away and Gill needs someone to mind the twins while she takes Percy to casualty.

  ‘Gill doesn’t often call on me like this . . . actually, she sounded a bit surprised to find me at the office. Can’t think where else she thought I’d be. Anyway, the twins are no problem. In fact, they are absolutely delightful. Almost make me wish I’d had children—’ Fee added with a smile.

  Imogen Banks gave her passenger a sharp look – was that a hint of ambivalence that she’d just heard? If so, some serious work was about to begin.

  ‘I thought you said you liked tomatoes?’ Fee glared at the twins.

  Ivo and Euan sat in their pyjamas and dressing-gowns at the kitchen table, chocolate moustaches indicating that the first bribe of the evening had gone down well.

  It was an hour later. Imogen had been able to ingratiate herself even further when Gill’s car had refused to start. She had driven Gill and Persephone to hospital, leaving Fee in charge of cooking supper for the boys. And at nearly eight o’clock, there was still no sign of Simon.

  ‘I thought you said you liked tomatoes?’ Fee repeated, glaring at the two untouched plates of food in front of them.

  ‘We do,’ the twins chorused.

  ‘I thought you said you liked fish fingers?’

  ‘We do,’ the boys chorused again, enjoying the game.

  ‘I thought you said you liked baked beans?’ Fee asked.

  ‘We do,’ the boys answered, chuckling with delight.

  ‘So why aren’t you eating the tomatoes and fish fingers and baked beans?’ she asked as patiently as she could.

  ‘Because we don’t like them together!’ the three-year-olds shouted, clapping their hands involuntarily with pleasure.

  Ninety minutes later, when the boys were finally asleep, exhausted, and Fee was making herself tea, the front door crashed open.

  ‘Ah ha!’ said Simon, swaying at the kitchen door.

  He grabbed the tin lid of the bread bin, held it like a shield and advanced, pretending to lunge with the rolled-up newspaper clutched in his other hand.

  ‘Attack! Attack!’ he bellowed. ‘Where are you? I’ll show you . . . What am I, man or minnow? Advance, you whore . . . Come out, come out wherever you are—’

  Fee watched, embarrassed. Had she accidentally stepped into one of Gill’s and Simon’s fantasy games? Was meek and mild and, above all, silent Simon the raging bull of Endlesham Avenue?

  Simon spun round as if on guard and suddenly spotted Fee, standing by the sink. He dropped the bread-bin lid on the table where it clanged. Then his whole body sagged, as if his vertebrae had collapsed en masse.

  ‘Oh, Fee, Christ, how embarrassing . . . I thought Gill was going to be here—’

  ‘No, it’s me,’ Fee replied, shrugging. ‘Would you like some tea?’

  Simon sat down at the table, one elbow in a portion of baked beans, and put his head in his hands. He rubbed his hair and looked up.

  ‘Daft, aren’t I?’ he asked rhetorically, sounding deeply weary. ‘I was banking on Gill being here, doing her Flaming Furies bit—’

  He attempted a poor imitation of Gill’s voice in a rage, ‘What time do you call this? How dare you have a bit of fun . . . What woman would be mad enough to fancy you . . . You are seeing another woman, aren’t you . . . Don’t think I don’t know . . . Well, two can play that game—’

  Simon looked at Fee. ‘You know the sort of stuff, I’m sure . . . No?’ he added, because Fee was shaking her head. ‘No, well, perhaps not. Perhaps it’s a long-term-married-too-many-kids-no-room-to-breathe-is-this-all-there-is-to-life sort of thing.’

  ‘Tea?’ Fee asked again.

  She poured two cups and sat opposite Simon. He was staring at her intently, his bloodshot eyes narrowed. Fee affected not to notice his interest.

  ‘Percy’s swallowed a pin. She seems fine but Gill’s taken her to hospital to check,’ Fee offered on the assumption that Simon might be interested in why the nest was empty.

&nbs
p; ‘Pity.’ Simon ran his fingers through his hair.

  ‘Pity Percy’s all right?’ Fee asked, startled.

  ‘No, pity Gill’s not here. I wanted to make the grand entrance, then refuse to tell her where I’d been. Do you know, that woman’s a bloody mystery to me?

  ‘At times, I think all I remind her of is failure. Then she behaves as if I’m the most desirable man in town – at least to others – and she insists I’m having a passionate affair. With you, as a matter of fact. I don’t think it’s the affair she’s bothered about. I think it’s the idea that I might be having a good time when she’s not—

  ‘It’s not a bad idea, though, is it?’ he added, his eyes narrowing again.

  ‘What, having a good time?’ Fee asked.

  ‘No,’ Simon interrupted. ‘Us. Having an affair. Going for it. Just a bit of a lark.’

  Suddenly, he threw himself across the table, fish fingers and plates spilling to the floor.

  ‘Simon.’ Gill’s voice rang out from the kitchen door in a tone that any two-year-old would recognize as bad news. ‘For God’s sake, act your age!’

  Imogen was standing directly behind Gill. She saw a large ramshackle man with gingery-blond hair and freckles on the back of his hands, sprawled across the kitchen table. Instantly she knew. In spite of the haze of Worthington E, the sweat and the whiff of congealed fish, to Imogen Banks, this poor, crumpled, downtrodden man smelt as good as the gods.

  Here was The One for her

  ‘Guess how many single women there are in Britain? Ten million . . . half a million are forty-plus and never married . . . a figure that’s doubled in the last decade. You are not alone, Fee . . . You are part of a growing trend . . . You are ahead of the trend! You are a pioneer!’

  Imogen, on the journey home, poured out statistics on the state of the British femme seule as she preferred to phrase it, for three miles. At a set of traffic lights, she turned to Fee to assess the impact.

  ‘I’m not interested in pioneers; I’m only interested in cowboys,’ Fee answered, smiling.

  ‘Having one?’ Imogen asked crudely, forgetting herself momentarily.

  ‘No, of course not,’ Fee replied. ‘Being one. But that’s a different story—’

  Imogen decided to change tack. For the remainder of the journey, she affected no interest in whether Fee chose to appear in her documentary. Instead, she concentrated on disclosing more and more about herself. She chatted about her disastrous love life; her pledge to celibacy; her interest in the Third World and charities. (She wasn’t entirely sure that Fee had a heart of gold, but she threw in a touch of philanthropy just in case.)

  ‘My goodness,’ she remarked as they drove into Fee’s road, ‘you must have a gift. I can’t remember the last time I was so open with someone—’

  Fee, flattered, was surprised to hear herself suggest that they have a drink some time.

  Imogen gritted her teeth. ‘Why not?’ she smiled.

  Chapter Eight

  ‘IT’S SMOKED goose plus rocket with herb butter and Saxmundham mango chutney on rye,’ Les said, examining the unlabelled contents through the Cellophane. ‘It’s all we’ve got, I’m afraid. Veronica took a turn for the worse on Wednesday. And that’s the day she usually goes to M&S.’

  ‘A cup of tea will be fine,’ Fee answered. ‘My kettle’s bust and it takes hours to heat up water in a saucepan. I keep meaning to buy a new one, but you know how it is—’

  Les sat down opposite her at the breakfast bar in his wife’s kitchen and nodded glumly. He always thought of it as Veronica’s kitchen, in the same way as the double garage was his garage, not theirs. It was Saturday morning and normally he’d be at work, touring his brasseries. It was his favourite day, watching the gannets. Instead, here he was, fifty-six and wife-sitting. And worried, dead worried.

  Perhaps the shrink had been right? Perhaps it was all his fault? Perhaps he had been too over-protective? Les shrugged, as if to cast off blame. Don’t be daft, man, he told himself sternly. He’d never denied his Veronica anything. All she had to do was ask.

  ‘You want a kettle? Take ours,’ he suddenly offered, as if to confirm to himself the extent of his generosity. Fee shook her head.

  Les coaxed her. It suddenly mattered to him very much that she accepted this gift.

  ‘Go on, take it. We’ve already got two. Veronica has one in her room. Had it there for a couple of days. She’s not come out for over forty-eight hours now. She’s got milk and tea but no sugar. And she loves a spoonful in her tea. Don’t know how she’s coping. Without sugar, I mean. She won’t open the door to anyone.’

  ‘Do you mind if I go up?’ Fee asked.

  ‘It won’t do any good,’ Les said, but he nodded his head, giving permission.

  Veronica opened the door instantly. ‘It’s not locked,’ Fee said in surprise.

  ‘No, Les just expects it to be,’ Veronica answered wearily.

  The room still had the curtains drawn, but Fee could see that Veronica was dressed in a white frothy nightgown and an equally frilly dressing-gown. Her toenails were painted shell pink. Her face was bluey-white, as if despair had drawn every ounce of blood.

  ‘They’ll put me away if this goes on, won’t they?’ Veronica addressed the curtains.

  Fee gave her a hug. Then she sat on the bed, at a loss as to what to say. At the christening, she had briefly believed that a couple of pep talks was all Veronica required to put her right; Now Fee knew, if her sister was to improve, it was going to take a great deal more than words.

  ‘I’ve thought about what you said about change the other day,’ Veronica suddenly said. ‘But change is a terrible thing to do to the people you love, you know that, don’t you, Fee? I mean, if they’re not ready for it—’

  She paced up and down, picking up speed as she became more agitated.

  ‘Everyone liked me the way I was – Jason, Samantha, Les, Mum, you—’

  ‘Me?’ Fee replied, startled.

  ‘Yes, you. I wasn’t a bother then. I was just someone to chat to, someone who didn’t get in the way. Now, you feel obliged. I’ve become one more thing for you to sort out—’

  ‘Don’t be ridiculous,’ Fee protested feebly. For someone who wasn’t supposed to be fully aware of what was going on, Veronica was proving uncomfortably perceptive.

  Fee picked up the kettle, moved into the bathroom and filled it from the tap. She put teabags into two cups by Veronica’s bedside table and, trying to sound casual, asked, ‘When do you think this . . . um . . . ah . . . killing . . . began?’

  Veronica stopped walking. ‘Five months ago, I suggested to Les that I go back to college. Samantha was already settled, and Les Junior had just left home so I needed something to do. Something real to do.

  ‘I’d decided I wanted to be a speech therapist. Help people find a voice.’ Veronica gave a wry laugh. ‘Help me find a voice . . . I’d applied to do a course and been accepted.

  ‘Les was very nice about it. He said he thought it was a good idea but wouldn’t it intrude on our lives a bit? Just when we’ve got a bit more free time to do things together, now the kids were off our hands.

  ‘He said that if I went to college, he’d be forced to take up golf and then we’d never see one another. Was that what I wanted?

  ‘What he said seemed fair and reasonable to me. He’s worked hard all his life, it was time we had a bit of fun together—’

  She fell silent. Fee, who had been stirring the tea bag in her cup, looked up. A tear was silently sliding down her sister’s face.

  ‘Go on,’ she encouraged.

  ‘I don’t know.’ Veronica shrugged. ‘Perhaps I was more disappointed than I realized. Anyway, that’s when it started—’

  ‘Of course you were disappointed,’ Fee reassured her sister. ‘You’ve done your bit for Les and the kids. Why shouldn’t you do something for yourself now? What’s so wrong about that? All you’re saying is, “It’s my turn.” ’

  ‘It’s selfish,�
�� Veronica replied. ‘It’s all right if you’re single, like you, I suppose. But if you’ve got commitments, you can’t. It’s selfish and it’s—’

  Fee interrupted. ‘Dad used to say, “You don’t have to fight to be a Somebody, just learn to be yourself – that’s the hardest job of all.” Isn’t the idea of you starting a new career part of learning to be yourself?’

  ‘But he wasn’t himself, was he?’ It was Veronica’s turn to interrupt, this time in anger. ‘He wasn’t himself, was he? And sure as hell, he wasn’t a Somebody.

  ‘He wanted to live in Cheyenne, ride the range, be a Wyatt Earp or Hopalong Cassidy . . . be a Somebody with a horse of his own. The truth was that our dad was a welder in East Calderton – and the only nag he knew was our mum.’ She smiled grimly.

  ‘You could never see it, but some people thought he was pathetic. Our dad wanted to live in a place where bad and good and duty and honour and rights and responsibilities are all dead simple. But it isn’t like that in the real world, it’s a whole lot messier.

  ‘Look at me, Fee, I’m fifty-one years of age. I was brought up to be a good wife, a good mother . . . then suddenly, twenty years down the line, everything changes.

  ‘Half of me wants to stick to what I know – the house, the home, making Les happy. I’d never want to be without him, so why risk losing him by expecting more? But the other half of me does want something different – a life of my own as well as what I have with Les. And I just don’t know what to do. I just feel so useless . . . so destructive, always so wrong—’

  Fee put her arms around her sister and held her, stroking her hair, while Veronica buried her face in Fee’s shoulder and sobbed. A framed photograph on Veronica’s bedside table caught Fee’s eye. It showed Fee, Veronica and Helen at a family wedding.

  What do women want? We’re three generations – each with a different answer, she thought.

  Her mother couldn’t even begin to fathom Fee’s decision to stay away from relationships since it was inconceivable to her that a woman could provide her own security. While Veronica’s commitment to putting her husband’s needs first no matter how much she had to forfeit herself seemed to Fee not just misguided but a positive danger to her state of mind. And what of Fee, what did she want?