The Other Woman's Shoes (30 page)

It
was
possible that his role in life was as a Sex God destined to service the women of west London. But why put such a small geographical limit on it? He’d service women north, south, east and west of London, and all over Europe, and also the States. He’d give pleasure where he could. He had no concept that each time he gave pleasure he gave pain too. Because, from what Martha said, after they’d done Hope, they did hope he’d be around for longer than the time it took to have breakfast. It was human nature that hope slipped into expectation, and where was Martha in all this? Heading for meltdown, that’s where. Eliza just thought it would be a good idea to have a back-up plan. Maybe if Martha made a list of the criteria for her perfect man she would have to notice and concede how far away from that ideal Jack was.

‘You said that you might take other naked friends when all this started,’ Eliza insisted.

True, Martha had said that, but she’d never believed it. She wasn’t the type. She was a serial monogamist, as unfashionable as it clearly was. She’d said she might take up the naked-friend option just as a way to excuse Jack for doing the same.

Martha felt distinctly uncomfortable; she hated
unpleasant silences. Eliza knew this. Eliza hated not getting her own way. Martha knew this. It was just a matter of who broke first.

‘OK, then. Have you got a pen?’ asked Martha.

‘Here,’ beamed Eliza, waving a pen and a notebook in the air, her mood instantly brightening, reminding Martha of Mathew when he’d won some hard-fought victory such as not having to eat up his peas.

‘Right. Well, I want a man who will de-scale the kettle and change the water filter.’

‘That’s your top priority?’ asked Eliza in dismay.

‘Well, it’s symbolic. If he’ll do those ho-hum household jobs, he’ll definitely be the type to stick a pile of whites into the washing machine.’

‘So you’re looking for someone particularly effeminate?’

‘Ha ha. No. Actually, I want him to be hung like a donkey and to know how to use his equipment with indecent frequency,’ said Martha.

Eliza laughed. She liked this new funny, funky sister. She was so much more entertaining than the sister whose biggest concern had been that Flora had changed their packaging. ‘OK, what else?’

‘Well, obviously, he’d love me. All of me.’ Martha smiled at the thought. ‘You know when you’re really upset about something and you’re asked, “What’s wrong?” and you stubbornly reply “Nothing”?’

‘Yeah.’

‘And you wait to be asked, “No, really, what is wrong?” because you want to be pushed. More, you want
him
to want to discover you.’

‘Yeah. But no man ever does that,’ sighed Eliza.

‘Well, my perfect man would push me. He’d peel me like, like…’ Martha hesitated, as she searched for the correct words. ‘Like an onion.’

‘Nice analogy.’

‘You know what I mean.’

Martha was ready for the striptease. She wanted to be known. Recently she’d started to believe that she was worth knowing and her ideal man would think so too.

‘Right,’ said Eliza, sighing. She thought it was a pity that Martha was such a romantic. Such a typical Virgo.

Martha was also thinking that her ideal man would love it when she took hold of him and wanked him so expertly that he came quickly, spilling over her body. She didn’t think this was the kind of thing she could share with Eliza or indeed anyone.

Other than Jack.

Martha was holding this conversation as she stood in the doorway between the kitchen and the back garden. Mathew and Maisie were feeding the sparrows; there was rarely anything more exotic in London gardens; occasionally a pigeon was spotted, but only if the tourists in Trafalgar Square were being particularly mean. A weak winter sun bounced on their smiling faces. January was normally such a bleak and grey month, full of tatty merchandise on sale racks, and offering nothing more exciting than a free membership to Weight Watchers, but this year January had seemed unseasonably illustrious.

‘Come on in and wash your hands, you two,’ called Martha. She didn’t really hold much hope of Mathew listening to her or Maisie understanding her. Without skipping a beat she turned back to Eliza and continued,
‘But besides that, he would really be worth knowing. He’d be strong. Physically, emotionally and morally.’

‘Phew, you’re not asking for much, are you?’

‘Yes, I am. I know that I am. But I give, too.’

Eliza thought how good it was to hear Martha value herself, really refreshing, it gave her a buzz just listening.

Of course she was utterly doomed.

This search for the perfect man was a non-starter.

Eliza attempted to redirect Martha towards something a little more conventional. ‘What about things like good with children, or earns a decent salary?’

‘That’s so last season,’ commented Martha. She winked and then more seriously added, ‘That’s husband criteria. I’m not looking for a husband. I’ve had one of those. I’m looking for excitement, and that definitely demands an entirely different wish list.’

‘Is that responsible?’

‘I’ve been responsible all my life and look where it got me. I think I’m overdue a bit of irresponsibility. You could lend me yours.’

‘Unfair! I’m trying to be really responsible right now. I have a desk tidy and I back up my PalmPilot every night. I’ve had my hair cut, bought a suit. I’m looking for a husband with a serious income and a serious wardrobe and a serious job.’

‘You honestly believe it was responsible to leave Greg, don’t you?’

‘Yes,’ said Eliza firmly.

‘Amazing.’

Eliza scowled. ‘We’re talking about
you
here, not me.’

‘OK, I’d also want all the usual stuff, you know. Good-looking,
nice smile, good teeth, dark hair, preferably green eyes, no body odour, no dandruff, someone who ferociously loathes football – I simply cannot go through another World Cup and be expected to keep my sanity – wide shoulders, tight butt, single, no baggage, GSOH.’

Eliza reread the list of criteria. ‘Jesus, Martha, I thought you said I was the demanding one. This list is totally unrealistic. This man is beyond fantasy. You’re looking for a single, stunning, sensitive, smiley Sex God who is prepared to don washing-up gloves. This man doesn’t exist.’

‘He does,’ smiled Martha. She leaned back against the kitchen counter, wearing an indecently smug smile and she thought, Jack’s all of these things. He is.

32

They’d decided to manage the divorce without the intervention of solicitors. Martha thought this was the route that was most likely to fall in with her mantra of behaving with elegance, charity and generosity, although Eliza thought Martha was mad.

‘I don’t need a solicitor, I trust Michael. He’d never leave me without money for the children.’

‘Martha, a couple of months ago you thought he’d never leave you, period.’

Period? Oh, another Americanism. God, sometimes Martha despised Eliza’s straight-talking. It was as though she were pulling out toenails.

‘Why are you doing it this way, Martha?’

‘Which way?’

‘This über-sensible, let’s-all-be-friends way. Don’t you ever want to fling crockery about, or cut the crotch out of all his suits?’

Frequently.

Martha, who was, after all, only human, had thought of pouring sugar into the petrol tank of his Boxster. She’d considered emailing embarrassing photos to his work colleagues; she had a selection to choose from. There was the one of him wearing a basque and suspenders. OK, he was going to a
Rocky Horror Show
party, but his colleagues wouldn’t know that. There were the ones of him on his
stag weekend, and not just the ones of him in the commando suit, which were silly in Martha’s opinion (but she knew that other men wouldn’t think so). But there was the one his best man had taken when Michael had passed out after drinking the obligatory twelve pints. They’d shaved his entire body except for his eyebrows. Martha had been furious. The regrowth proved more than uncomfortable for both of them during their honeymoon, but she was grateful they’d left his eyebrows alone – at least the ambush hadn’t ruined the wedding photos.

Not that it mattered now how either of them looked in their wedding photos. Their wedding photos were being slowly removed from a number of sideboards and walls up and down the country.

Such petty acts of revenge were inane, insane. Small gestures that wouldn’t, couldn’t, counter the hurt Martha felt; therefore they seemed pointless.

‘What would be the sense in my going out of my way to be nasty?’ Martha was annoyed at herself for lapsing into fury; she hated the rows with Michael, although sometimes she really couldn’t seem to stop herself. She certainly didn’t need to go and look for aggro. ‘What would it achieve?’

‘Peace of mind.’

‘Sorry?’

‘You’d feel better,’ asserted Eliza.

‘Actually, I’m not sure I would.’

Managing the divorce yourself involved buying petitions for £2.50 from a particular stationer’s on Chancery Lane. Martha knew this because there was an extremely useful
Internet site that guided people like her through the divorce procedure.

Handy, the things you find on the Net.

Martha had limited experience of Chancery Lane, even though she’d lived in London all her adult life. There were no shops, no supermarkets, few restaurants – in short, nothing to induce her to visit there at all. She did know that Chancery Lane was near the Strand, where she would find the Royal Courts of Justice; she knew that because she watched the six o’clock news and there were often TV cameras gathered outside trying to capture the comments of the latest acquitted defendant, or at least of their lawyers.

Martha pushed open the door to the stationer’s and a loud bell chimed, announcing her presence. This was completely cringe-making; she’d rather hoped to creep in to buy the petition and then creep out again, without attracting anyone’s attention. She milled around the shelves, looking at the selection of hole punches and various-size packets of Blu-Tack. Martha was astounded to note that you couldn’t even purchase a lever-arch file for the price of a divorce petition. A lever-arch file cost £2.75, unless you bought them in bulk. The whole process was cheap and sickeningly undignified. After moseying around the shop for what seemed like a month, Martha realized she was unlikely to find the documentation she required without asking for assistance.

As coincidence would have it, the shop assistants came to exactly the same conclusion at exactly the same time. ‘Can I help you?’ asked the younger of the two available (male) assistants.

And it shouldn’t have mattered that he was a man, but it did. In Martha’s bleaker moments, she found herself believing (illogically) that they were ‘all in cahoots’. They were all deserters and philanderers and they all had an inability to keep promises, especially promises they made in church whilst wearing a suit hired from Moss Bros. It hurt her to think this, but not as much as it hurt to admit that actually she’d simply made a duff choice.

The assistant was plump and scruffy, and he looked vaguely dusty like an elderly academic, but Martha guessed that he was only in his late twenties. His stomach folded over his trousers, completely hiding his belt. Martha wouldn’t normally notice this kind of thing, but she was having difficulty dragging her eyes up from waist level – she didn’t really want to meet his stare. When she finally managed to do so, she didn’t like what she saw. Somehow this man had guessed what she needed and he was enjoying it, she was sure. He was actively taking pleasure from her obvious pain and embarrassment.

‘I’d like a copy of a divorce petition, please,’ said Martha. She pronounced every word carefully, as though elocution could protect her.

‘Is either of the parties an adulterer?’ asked the chubby shop assistant.

Martha noticed that he bit his nails and his fingers looked like sausages. She bet he wore nylon trousers, although she couldn’t quite see because his legs were behind the counter. She didn’t like him at all. ‘No,’ she said, trying her best to sound like the queen. She’d like to have replied, ‘Yes, my husband is sleeping with your wife – how do you feel about that?’ But perhaps she was getting
things a little out of proportion. Martha was divorcing Michael on the grounds of unreasonable behaviour, and she had to cite three examples. Just three.

‘Silly me, it doesn’t matter now, it’s the same form anyway,’ smirked the assistant.

Martha would have liked to say he smiled but it was definitely a smirk. She suspected that he got off on asking women like her if she, or her husband, was having it away with a cute third party, but she had no proof. All she could do was hand over her £2.50, and try and ignore his damp, sweaty paw.

Martha was about to leave the shop when she thought again. ‘I’d better take two,’ she said. She was notoriously bad at filling out forms, she was bound to make a mistake.

‘Bigamy is a crime, you know,’ laughed the assistant. He had no idea how criminal it was that four lives that had been inextricably woven together had been hacked apart. Martha treated him to a steely glare and left the shop.

The next stage was filling out the blasted form. She was required to give examples of Michael’s unreasonable behaviour. Apparently ‘He doesn’t love me’ didn’t count. They quietly agreed the words between them, settling on inoffensive, bloodless reasons for a divorce. Martha found that insulting too. Surely the reasons for a divorce ought to be great and dramatic.

Next, she went to the post office and made lots of photocopies of the petition and of their wedding certificate. Then she sent the package to the austere Courts of Justice, remembering to use registered post. She understood that the whole process could take as little as twelve
weeks. It had taken her longer to choose the table decorations for her wedding reception.

It ought to have been grander, more serious, thought Martha as she negotiated Maisie’s stroller through the narrow post-office doorway and out on to the street. She looked around. There wasn’t a hat in sight, nor even the smallest handful of confetti.