As Good As It Gets? Read online

  Sabrina greets us at the door in a leopard print dress which clings to her taut, skinny body, her auburn hair blow-dried big and bouncy, like Cindy Crawford’s in her 90s heyday. ‘I’m so glad you’ve come,’ she gushes, beckoning us into the cluttered kitchen.

  ‘Hope it’s okay that Ollie’s brought a friend,’ I say.

  ‘’Course it is! The more the merrier.’ A jumble of fairy lights is strewn over shelves and packing cases, and an oak dining table is cluttered with wine and beer bottles, vases of flowers and Welcome to Your New Home cards. ‘Excuse the state of the place,’ Sabrina adds with a husky laugh. ‘I know it seems mad, having a party so soon after moving in but I couldn’t wait. Tommy’s always saying how impatient I am, like a little kid.’

  ‘Well, I’m glad you did,’ I say truthfully. ‘There aren’t enough parties around here.’

  ‘Yeah, it was all her idea, the raving loony,’ Tommy remarks fondly, greeting me with a kiss on the cheek and hastily introducing us to the guests in the kitchen: a cluster of middle-aged men in regulation T-shirts (mostly black) and jeans (faded and a little tight). There’s the odd greying man-ponytail and a smattering of studded leather belts. While I’m not usually one to check out men’s footwear, there’s something about an embellished cowboy boot that draws the eye down.

  The women are all lightly tanned, like Sabrina, with bare legs, polished cleavages and big, brightened smiles. Feeling somewhat lacking in high-octane glamour, I give small thanks that I chose to wear a dress tonight. ‘Here you go, guys,’ Tommy says, handing the kids a Coke each. ‘Come out into the garden and meet Zach and his merry band of men. They might look a bit scary but don’t worry – they don’t bite.’ Obediently, they follow him through to the back of the house, which I can see leads onto a long, narrow, unloved garden filled with billowing smoke from a barbecue.

  ‘So what d’you do, Charlotte?’ Sabrina asks, handing me a glass of wine.

  ‘I work in marketing for a crisp company – Archie’s …’

  ‘Ooh, the posh crisps?’

  ‘They are pretty posh,’ I agree with a smile.

  ‘I love them,’ she enthuses, ‘especially the new kind with sage. My God, they’re so good! I always buy those ’cause I know Tommy won’t touch them.’ She rolls her eyes affectionately. ‘He’s more your Chilli Heatwave Doritos kind of man. Common as muck.’

  We both laugh, and my stomach rumbles, activated by the barbecue smells wafting in through the open back door. ‘So how about you, Sabrina?’ I ask, noticing with relief that Will has fallen into conversation with a jovial-looking bald man who’s swigging a beer by the fridge. At least Will is unlikely to be grilled about his job prospects here.

  ‘I run my own company,’ she explains. ‘Wedding dresses – Crystal Brides, it’s called. I specialise in sparkle.’ She chuckles and waves a tanned hand, which is heavily bedecked with ornate silver rings. ‘I love a bit of glitz.’

  ‘D’you make the dresses yourself?’ I ask.

  ‘No, no, I have girls who do that. I just design them …’ She breaks off as one of the ponytailed men hands us each a glass of champagne, despite the fact that we have wine too. I glance at Will again, conscious that I’m checking on him to make sure he’s okay. Of course he is. We might not socialise much these days, and I know he felt dragged along tonight – but he’s a grown man who can handle himself at parties. I don’t need to worry about him being ‘left out’.

  Sabrina and I drift out to the back garden. ‘Don’t look at it too closely,’ she says. ‘Place is a bloody state.’

  ‘Well,’ I remark, ‘you’ve only been here a week.’

  ‘Oh, we’ll never get around to doing anything with it. We don’t even have a watering can.’ She grins and indicates the pale green shed at the bottom of the garden. ‘See that, though? It’s already been christened.’ She laughs loudly as I try to figure out whether she means what I think she means.

  ‘Really?’ I ask. ‘You mean you’ve …’ – I drop my voice – ‘done it in there?’

  ‘Yeah! What a laugh that was.’ I smile, conscious of a hollow feeling in my gut. ‘You know what it’s like with teenagers in the house,’ she goes on. ‘Impossible to get any privacy …’ Although I want to know more, I’m also a little startled by her honesty. She’s right, though: on the rare occasions that Will and I manage to get it together, we proceed with extreme caution, as if overhearing the merest creak of a bed would traumatise the kids. And when I say rare, I mean precisely that. The reason I remember the precise date of our last ‘session’ (which implies enthusiastic, thrashing-around sort of sex; in fact mice do it more noisily than we do) is because it occurred at precisely 7.15 a.m. on Mother’s Day. Afterwards, Will jokingly said it was my present. The time before that was Christmas Eve; in the periphery of my vision was a heap of wrapped presents, plus the holly garland we’d never got around to nailing on the door. It’s not that I keep a detailed account of our activities. Just that we only seem to get around to doing it on significant dates.

  ‘Got to grab your chance when you can,’ Sabrina adds with a wink.

  ‘Wasn’t it a bit splintery though?’ I ask, picturing our own, equally unlovely shed.

  ‘Yeah,’ she laughs, lighting a cigarette, ‘but we like that. A bit of danger, you know. An element of risk.’

  I turn this over in my mind. Whenever people talk about risky sex, I imagine they mean doing it where there’s the possibility of being discovered – in the car, for instance, or up an alley or something. I’ve never considered it might involve a Black and Decker workbench. I have a fortifying gulp of champagne.

  ‘It was his idea,’ she adds, indicating Tommy, who’s grappling at something charred and black with enormous barbecue tongs. ‘You know what men are like. Insatiable …’

  ‘Oh yes,’ I say, wondering whether Will and I could possibly cram ourselves into our much smaller shed, alongside the mower, the strimmer and God knows what else is in there. A load of spiders, probably. I never go in. Perhaps I should, to assess its potential as a love den …

  We install ourselves with a group of women who are all chatting on embroidered cushions on the overgrown lawn. There are quick introductions, and a woman called Abs – fittingly, she has the sinewy body of a fitness instructor – says, ‘D’you like live music, Charlotte?’

  ‘I do,’ I say truthfully, ‘but I haven’t seen any for ages.’

  ‘You should come and see Zach’s band,’ Sabrina adds, ‘next time they have a gig.’

  ‘That’d be great,’ trying to sound enthusiastic. ‘What kind of stuff do they play?’

  ‘Indie rock, I suppose you’d call it.’ She beams proudly at her son, who’s now deep in conversation with Rosie, while the other teenage boys are kindly letting Ollie and Saul hang out with them. My glass is topped up by a passing bearded man in a leather jacket who joins us on the cushions.

  At the risk of sounding like a Miss World contestant, I realise I’m enjoying meeting new people. Will and I don’t do this enough, I reflect. We don’t do anything enough: have sex, go to gigs or parties … and we’re going to start doing all of those things loads more, I decide, realising the wine and champagne have whooshed to my head as I haven’t eaten anything yet. I can’t grumble that we’re in some kind of marital rut when I’m hardly making an effort to haul us out of it. Everyone I meet seems to have full, exciting lives: Abs, it turns out, isn’t a fitness instructor but Sabrina’s business partner in Crystal Brides. I meet a hat designer, a gallery owner and someone who caters for band tours. The atmosphere is lively and fun, and the music becomes gradually louder as the evening wears on.

  ‘Me and Tommy run a management company,’ explains Brian-with-the-beard. ‘We used to work for one of the majors but decided to go it alone.’ I’m ridiculously pleased that I’ve managed to deduce that he means band management, and major record label. He indicates the teenagers who have now gathered on a stripy rug on the lawn, where Zach is inexpertly strumming an ac
oustic guitar. ‘See that crew over there? Lots of potential … Christ, what is Tommy doing with that food?’

  We all turn to watch as he squirts lighter fuel over blackening sausages on the barbecue. ‘What are you doing that for?’ Sabrina shouts, leaping up and rounding on her husband like a ferocious bird.

  Tommy frowns. ‘They weren’t cooking fast enough. They’re burning outside but the middles are raw …’

  ‘That’s because it’s not hot enough yet, idiot! You say I’m impatient?’ She snatches a cooked sausage with her bare hands, stuffs it into a roll and bites into it. ‘Tastes like petrol, you bloody nutter. God, Tommy, we’ve got forty-odd people here and they’re all pissed and need something to eat. What’re you gonna do now?’

  He shrugs and sips from a can of lager. ‘We’ll have to get them something else.’

  ‘Like what?’ Sabrina snorts. ‘There’s nothing in the house. Just some dried spaghetti and a packet of Club biscuits. What d’you plan to do with that, Barbecue Man?’

  She strides back to rejoin us on the cushions. ‘Damn fool. He can’t cook, he’s never done a barbie before, but of course Mr-bloody-Masterchef had to buy a top-of-the-range barbecue and then fuck it up.’ Brian and I try, unsuccessfully, not to laugh.

  ‘Is everything ruined?’ Will asks, appearing at Tommy’s side.

  ‘Er, yeah, mate. It just squirted out of the can really fast.’ Now the teenagers have gathered round, clearly enjoying the spectacle as Sabrina delivers another barrage of abuse.

  ‘Could Dad help?’ Rosie murmurs.

  I turn to Will with a hopeful smile. ‘Do we have anything we could bring over?’

  ‘Um … maybe. I could see what we could do …’

  Sabrina smiles squiffily. ‘No, it’d be far too much trouble.’

  ‘It’s no trouble at all,’ he says. ‘But, um, I don’t want to get in the way of your plans …’

  ‘What plans?’ Sabrina cackles. ‘We don’t have any, apart from Tommy planning to poison us all.’

  Will’s face breaks into a grin – a proper, relieved-to-be-useful grin – as he turns towards the house, summoning Ollie and Saul to join him. ‘C’mon, boys, give me a hand and we’ll see what we can rustle up.’

  Sabrina and Abs watch them leave. ‘What a man,’ Abs breathes. ‘So he’s your new neighbour, Sabs?’

  Just as I’m just processing this – that the friends are called Sabs and Abs – Sabrina tosses her flame-coloured hair and giggles, ‘Mmm, and isn’t he hot? Wonder if Charlotte loans him out?’

  Chapter Ten

  Will, Ollie and Saul return laden with enough delicious offerings for everyone. There are lamb and chicken kebabs with a minty marinade, a huge bowl of spicy slaw and an impressive array of salads. Guests gather around the barbecue, entranced by the mouth-watering aromas (or perhaps my hot husband). ‘Christ,’ Tommy marvels, slapping Will on the back, ‘this is a bit better than a jumbo packet of Iceland sausages.’

  It’s truly impressive, and I watch from the sidelines as everyone fusses around Will and hands him drinks. I know I’ve tended to focus on his rather prickly, defensive side these past few months. In contrast, everyone here seems to appreciate what a brilliant all-round human being he is. Of course, they’re not hovering around him, tentatively asking how the job search is going. They haven’t over-ridden his decision that Rosie shouldn’t have gone to the model agency. Without intending to, I seem to have been stressing him out lately – cranking up his grumpiness – whereas everyone here is just raving about his spectacular cooking. I feel proud, actually. Proud that my husband has saved the day and appears to be mingling happily.

  Music pounds from the kitchen, guests start dancing on the lawn and I find myself installed, a little fuzzy myself, next to Sabrina on a rickety wrought iron bench. ‘So how long have you two been together?’ she asks.

  ‘Fifteen years,’ I reply, to which she darts a quick glance at Rosie, who’s laughing at something Zach has said. ‘Will isn’t Rosie’s real dad,’ I add.

  ‘Oh, right! I just assumed—’

  ‘I mean, I hate that term. Of course he is. But she was a toddler when I met him.’

  Sabrina smiles. ‘She looks like Will, though …’

  ‘Yes, I know. Everyone says that.’

  She pauses. ‘So, er … d’you have any contact with—’

  ‘Her real father?’ I shake my head. ‘No, not since before she was born.’

  ‘Really? God!’

  We break off to thank Will for platefuls of barbecued deliciousness, and wait until he’s resumed his position as head chef before continuing. ‘I met him when we were Inter-railing,’ I add, ‘and he’s never even seen her.’

  ‘Bastard,’ Sabrina splutters.

  I shrug. ‘You know, I don’t really feel like that. Not anymore. He obviously couldn’t cope with the idea of being a dad. At least, he put on a great show pretending he could, but then …’ I nibble a chicken skewer before adding, in a brisker tone, ‘He just disappeared when I was pregnant. There was a terse letter from his mother, warning me off, then nothing.’ And of course, I haven’t thought about him at all …

  Sabrina frowns, processing this. ‘But that’s outrageous, Charlotte. What an absolute dick …’

  ‘I know, and of course, I did try to get in touch. I tried calling his parents’ place, where he lived, but they’d changed the number and any letters were sent back to me. Anyway, my parents stepped in, and were fantastic – and then I met Will and it’s all worked out.’ I beam brightly to show how precisely fantastic everything is.

  ‘You mean he’s never even contributed?’ Sabrina checks herself. ‘Sorry, Charlotte, that’s so nosy of me. Tell me to shut the hell up …’

  I smile, enjoying her lack of restraint. She is fun and refreshingly honest, and I think – I hope – we’ll be friends. ‘It’s fine, honestly. There was a cheque from his mum, but …’ I tail off as a bunch of men burst out through the back door, hooting with laughter and carrying a life-sized blow-up doll. She is a vision in marshmallow-pink plastic with a mass of bouncy red hair, rather lethal-looking pointy breasts and a circular, red-lipped mouth. ‘Who invited her?’ I exclaim, laughing.

  Sabrina cackles. ‘Oh, that’s Chloe. Friend of Tommy’s gave her to him for Christmas.’ I catch Will’s startled expression and laugh even harder. ‘Classy, huh?’ she adds. ‘She always makes an appearance at parties.’

  Ollie and Saul appear at my side. ‘What’s that?’ Saul asks, eyes agog.

  ‘It’s, er, a sort of doll.’

  ‘A doll?’ He guffaws and nudges Ollie.

  I glance at Sabrina, who’s in hysterics now, with her blow-dry mussed up and her lipstick worn off, bar the pencilled outline. ‘It’s Tommy’s,’ I explain as Chloe is paraded past us, as if about to be given her birthday bumps. Even Will is creasing up with laughter now.

  ‘But what’s it for?’ Ollie wants to know.

  ‘It’s, er, a sort of pretend girlfriend,’ Sabrina replies, trying to keep a straight face.

  Saul looks incredulous. ‘What does he do with her?’

  She smirks and takes a big swig of wine.

  ‘What’s she for, Mum?’ Ollie demands.

  ‘Er, they probably sit and watch TV together,’ I explain, noticing Saul nudging Ollie, then the two of them dissolving in laughter – my cue, I think, to whisk the kids off home. It’s gone eleven; amazingly, none of the neighbours have complained about the thumping music.

  ‘We’re heading back,’ I tell Will, finding him chatting away to Tommy, ‘but you stay as long as you like.’

  ‘Hey,’ Tommy chuckles, ‘you’ve got a late pass, mate,’ which isn’t what I meant at all, but never mind. At least he’s enjoying himself, which sparks a tiny flicker of optimism that he’ll soon put his special foraging gloves into retirement and rejoin the human race. A job, and colleagues, and the odd rowdy night out – that’s what he needs, urgently. Then we’ll start to have fun again, like in the old days. Thi
s party has proved that Will can shake off his grumpiness and be charming and lovely, like he used to be.

  Wrapping a matey arm around Will’s shoulders, Tommy hands him a beer. Will grins, clearly enjoying being made so welcome and having his barbecuing skills praised to the hilt. And my heart does a little skip, forcing the trials of late into the background: my lovely, hot Will, whom women joke about ‘borrowing’. Does it matter that we haven’t done it since Mother’s Day? It’s normal, I think. All couples’ sex lives fall into a pattern eventually, and ours now seems to happen quarterly, like a VAT return.

  Even so, as I hug Sabrina goodbye I make a supreme effort not to even glance at her shed.

  *

  Tired and yawning, the boys shuffle straight off to Ollie’s room, leaving Rosie and me in the kitchen. How lovely, I think: some mum – daughter time. Who cares that it’s almost midnight? No school or work tomorrow. ‘You seemed to be getting on well with Zach,’ I say lightly, clicking on the kettle for tea.

  ‘Yeah, he’s all right.’ She perches on the edge of the worktop, swinging her almost endless, denim-clad legs. Her feet are bare and pretty, her nails painted duck-egg blue. ‘We were just talking,’ she adds.

  ‘I wasn’t suggesting anything else, love.’

  Her face softens. ‘He’s nice. Interesting. We had a laugh.’

  I try to arrange my features into a casual expression. What I’d love to do now is ask her about boys, and if there’s anyone around whom she likes at the moment. But it doesn’t feel right to quiz her. I’d always imagined we’d have one of those lovely, discuss-anything mother/daughter relationships – boys, sex, the whole caboodle – but it hasn’t quite happened that way. Whenever I’ve tried, tentatively, to touch upon sensitive matters, she’s shuffled uncomfortably as if I’m a PSE teacher about to thrust a wad of embarrassing leaflets at her. It’s so hard to know how to be with her these days. I know she doesn’t want me checking her homework, or running her a bath, or doing any of those motherly things I used to do for her – yet she’s not quite grown-up either. She seems incapable of fixing herself breakfast without leaving a scattering of Frosties in her wake, and I’ve found her prodding nervously at the washing machine buttons as if the appliance might blow up in her face.