Drip Dry (5 page)

‘How're the wedding plans?'

‘Are you going?'

‘Wouldn't miss it for the world.'

‘Well, as far as I know everything is organised faultlessly. And I don't think she'd allow any less. I must admit that I've tried to stay out of it as much as I can. Which is just as well because she doesn't have any faith in my organisational abilities.'

‘Elizabeth still the only bridesmaid?'

‘I'm not sure how it works. All I know is she, Sam and CJ have the same dress, much to Sam's disgust. I believe it's sort of a light salmon pink, fleshy colour.'

‘Hmm.'

‘Yes, precisely. Like cheap tuna. They have the final fitting on Saturday.'

‘And what about your birthday?'

Yes, what
about
my birthday? Of all the days in the year, my mother has chosen
my
fortieth birthday on which to get married for the fourth time. Some people never know when to quit. And you'd think that her fiancé would have taken a slight clue as to his likely future from the fact that each of his three predecessors is
dead
. But no, Harold is still wandering around beaming as if he has won first prize in the lottery. Perhaps he thinks he has. Having finished lining everything in sight, Maggie stands back to examine the windows and their coverings.

‘Do these look grubby to you?'

‘Yes, they most definitely do. And it doesn't surprise me either. I mean, smell this place! That Waverley mob must have been pigs.'

‘Suppose if we wash them it might help with the smell.'

‘That's true. I'll get them all down and take them next door. Did you know that I've got a new washing-machine?'

‘Yeah, fine,' replies Maggie, displaying a rather discourteous lack of interest in my pride and joy, ‘and while you're at it, I'll start on the windows.'

It takes an hour to get all the curtains down, and it'll take the rest of the afternoon to get them all through the machine. I know one thing for sure, I am
not
taking them to a dry-cleaner's. If they fall apart in the wash, it's just too bad. I already think that the time and effort I'm putting in here is a bit above
and beyond the call. I escape next door with my armful of curtains and leave Maggie hard at work washing windows. The only minus to this brief respite is that my house doesn't have air-conditioning and it has definitely become a lot warmer. I fish out the finished washing from this morning and dump it in the laundry basket. Then I refill the machine with the first load of curtains, add some detergent, and put it through the cycle while I lean against the machine lost in my latest fantasy involving Alex's return. The wash cycle ends just as he is telling me, in a voice positively throbbing with raw emotion, that the real reason he has been unable to form a meaningful relationship since our split is that nothing has ever quite measured up to what we had. I nod sympathetically in reply and then head outside with the wet washing. As I am hanging up the first load, and affording Murphy a great deal of pleasure in the process, Maggie sticks her head out of one of the sparkling windows next door and calls out to me.

‘What about some lunch?'

‘Sounds great. What did you have in mind?'

‘Chinese? I'll get it, there's one up the road.'

‘Delicious! I'll have satay chicken, thanks.'

Maggie heads off to fetch the lunch and I go back inside to sit down unobserved while I have the chance. I'll finish the hanging up and put on another load in a minute. This is really a rather ludicrous situation. My
own
house is desperately screaming out for me to spend a day lining drawers, scrubbing carpets and washing curtains, but instead I am performing these services for my
ex
-husband. Would he
do the same for me? I don't think so. In fact, I doubt it would even
occur
to him and I also doubt that we'll get much thanks – he probably won't even notice the difference.

It's going to be a long, long day.

4.30 pm

Maggie has not stopped working all afternoon. Even when she came back with lunch, she worked while she ate, and my repeated efforts to persuade her to
sit down
for a cup of tea or something have been to no avail. And, of course,
I
couldn't very well sit down while she was working so hard. The only break I had was when I collected CJ from school at two-thirty (as a new prep she hasn't graduated to a full day yet, more's the pity). I am hot, sticky and absolutely
exhausted
.

We have vacuumed and deodorised the carpets, cleaned the curtains and the windows, washed the walls and the floors, cleaned the bath and the showers, scrubbed the kitchen spotless, and even polished the light fittings. As soon as she arrived home from school, Samantha examined the house, chose a bedroom, and then dragged out our lawnmower and proceeded to mow the front lawn (which now makes our grass look
very
long by comparison). Benjamin is
doing a bit of random weeding around the front verandah and CJ is counting out the wire coathangers that Maggie brought, so that every wardrobe gets exactly the same number (well, it keeps her busy anyway).

‘Okay, I've had enough. I'm going next door to put the kettle on. Anyone who wants coffee or tea can come over. Or a cold drink.' I dump the cleaning equipment back into the box in the kitchen and leave Maggie musing over the best position for each of the assorted pot plants that she has brought over. I repeat myself to Ben and then Sam as I cross the front lawn and clamber over the side fence again.

The telephone starts ringing as I close the front door behind me and I glance at it, sitting squatly on the hall table, before deciding to let the answering machine pick it up on the grounds that I just can't be bothered. So, ignoring its shrill insistence, I limp slowly down the passage towards the kitchen, and the kettle, and the rejuvenating properties of a really strong cup of coffee.

I turn on the tap to start filling the kettle as the answering machine kicks in and my two daughters warble their way through our welcoming message. Then, turning the tap off, I pause to listen to who is on the other end.

‘Are you there? It's David! Come on, you must be there!'

With the kettle held in front of me, I stare open-mouthed at the kitchen wall-phone. The excitement in his voice can only mean one thing or, in the case of my sister, two things – both small, and pink, and
female. And, judging from the enthusiastic tone of his voice, both healthy.

‘Come on! Last chance! If you're there, pick the hell up!'

Obediently I clutch the kettle damply to my chest with one hand and grab the receiver off the wall with the other.

‘It's me! What's happening?'

‘She's had them! This afternoon!'

‘David! Congratulations!' I hug myself gleefully, if a trifle awkwardly. ‘That's fantastic!'

‘Yep, and they are absolutely bloody gorgeous.'

‘So, no problems? I mean, everyone's okay?'

‘No problems at all. They're both fine.'

‘How much do they weigh?'

‘Weigh?
I
don't know. But they look biggish.'

‘David! You're a twit. How's Diane – how long was the labour?'

‘Oh, not that long at all and she's fine, fighting fit,' he replies with all the airiness of someone who has not just pushed
two
‘biggish' humans through an extremely narrow orifice, and one who is never likely to be called upon to do so either.

‘Names? Have you thought of any names?'

‘No . . . well, we
have
, but we can't agree yet.'

‘Well, you'll have to get your act together now that they're born. What about visitors?'

‘Not tonight, she's probably knackered. But tomorrow'd be good.'

‘Well, congratulations again. Give her my love and tell her I'll be in tomorrow.'

As I hang up I can actually
feel
a sense of relief
surge through me. As Diane's pregnancy had progressed so satisfactorily, my sense of foreboding had lessened somewhat, but it is still great to know that it's all gone smoothly, and she's fine, and they're fine.

This definitely calls for more than coffee – it calls for champagne. Accordingly I put the kettle down and mop at my chest with the tea-towel before fishing a bottle of bubbly out of the fridge (it pays to be prepared). Then I grab five champagne flutes, arrange them on a tray with a bag of nuts and, balancing the tray carefully, head slowly back next door.

‘Sam! Turn it off and come inside!' I yell as I pass my daughter, who is doing a surprisingly meticulous job on her father's front lawn, something I must file away for future reference. Benjamin looks up from his weeding and catches one of the flutes deftly as it topples off the tray. I raise my eyebrows in surprise because Ben is usually so incredibly clumsy that he is a positive menace to have around anything even remotely breakable. I have no idea where he gets it from.

‘Thanks. Bring it in with you, please.'

Ben moves past me onto the verandah and opens the door for me as the mower shudders to a halt behind us. The cool air inside the house is positively orgasmic. I carry my tray through the house to the kitchen where Maggie and CJ are putting tins neatly into one of the freshly lined cupboards.

‘We've got something to celebrate! Come on, Sam, hurry up, you can get back to the mowing in a minute.'

‘Hmm, what's going on?' Maggie looks questioningly at the tray and then at me.

‘In a minute. Right, is everyone here? Well, we have to have a toast,' I say as I attempt to wrest the top out of the champagne bottle. ‘Diane has had the twins and everyone is fine!'

‘That's
fantastic
!'

‘Oh, Mummy! Do they look like me?'

‘Das ist gut!'

I ignore Sam's foray into German, which I have been finding increasingly irritating over the last six months (however, one of the elective subjects I have chosen is German, so soon I'll know what she's talking about and then she'll be in for a surprise), and concentrate on unscrewing the wire from the champagne cork. That done, I start to carefully lever out the cork.

‘Oh, can I do that, Mum? I'm really good at it.'

‘So give us all the details – like, how big are they?'

Just as I am about to answer Maggie and inquire of Ben why and how he is really good at removing champagne corks, the cork I'm working on disengages itself with a loud pop and immediately shoots straight through my fingers and upwards into the ceiling. Where it imbeds itself. We all stare in unison at the little bit of cork that is sticking crookedly out of the plaster. It looks a bit like a lunar module after a bad landing.

‘Mummy, look what you did to the roof!'

‘Good one, Mum!'

‘Doesn't matter. Don't worry about it, let's fill the glasses before it froths everywhere.' Maggie grabs
the bottle from me while I am still staring in disbelief at the corked ceiling, and proceeds to pour foaming champagne into the five flutes.

‘Here, CJ, only a little one for you. Ben, Sam.' She passes them out and then tops up the remaining two to the brim.

‘Cheers!' She passes me my glass and raises her own.

‘Cheers!' I reply, dragging my eyes down from the ceiling and fixing a smile on my face. ‘Here's to Diane, David and the boys . . . and the girls too, I suppose!'

‘Cheers!'

‘Cheers!'

‘Prost!'

‘I'm
really
sorry about the ceiling, Maggie,' I say with feeling as Sam grabs a stool and climbs up to have a closer look at the cork appendage. ‘It just shot straight out!'

‘It's okay,' Maggie replies heartily as she watches Sam lever the cork out with her finger. Ben catches it as it falls and we all look at the neat, deep, circular indentation it has left.

‘It really just
flew
out,' I continue, feeling pretty rotten about the dent, ‘but I've never seen one actually stick
in
the ceiling!'

‘Neither have I but, look, don't worry about it.' Maggie shakes her head at me. ‘Knowing Alex, it'll be the first of many.'

‘Not like
that
, surely.'

‘Hmm, no, you're probably right.' She looks up at the dent again with a sort of wonder.

‘Don't look at it, you make me feel guilty.' I grab
her glass to top it up and then refill my own. ‘Here, let's nibble some nuts.'

Maggie gives yet another of her guffaws, for what reason I don't want to even think about, and I put my glass down to try and open the shiny foil packet. It is definitely not my day. I think the damn thing has been super-glued together.

‘Here, let me.' Maggie sounds a bit nervous as she watches my attempts to tear open the packet. ‘Give it over.'

‘No, I've
got
it.' A statement which I immediately proceed to demonstrate by tearing through the package and straight on down one whole side. The momentum causes my hand to continue onwards after the foil parts and I send my full glass flying. Nuts cascade everywhere. The flute hits the edge of the counter lengthwise and expels its contents before rolling slowly over the edge to the floor, where it smashes into a million or so little pieces. Champagne pools on the counter and begins to drip steadily over the side. Meanwhile, nuts bounce gaily over the freshly vacuumed carpets in one direction, and scatter wilfully over the kitchen floor in the other. Numbly, I watch a couple roll under the stove.

‘Good one, Mum!'

‘Mummy! I
wanted
some of those!'

‘Hmm,' says Maggie faintly.

‘I am
so
sorry, Maggie!'

‘Look, perhaps you'd better . . . that is, I'm sure you've got heaps to do next door. Why don't the kids and I clean up here?'

‘Oh no! I couldn't leave you with this mess!'

‘Yes! You could! Really, it'll be fine.'

‘Are you sure?'

‘Oh, absolutely,' replies Maggie, a little bit too quickly for my liking.

So – I leave.