Fucsia Cowgirl

"Peter Walker can't take your call at the moment. Because he doesn't
live here any more. The useless bollocks has been chucked out on his
arse after his wife found out that he was having one hell of a clich?
of a midlife crisis - and yes, Peter, if you're listening, you
adulterous bastard, you may only be thirty-two but you've been middle
aged since you were still in nappies. Guess what folks? Yep, you got it
- he's been shagging his secretary. For the past six months. Don't
bother leaving a message, and I won't bother to call you back."

I switched the speakerphone off and turned to Holly. "Code Red?"
"Definitely," she agreed. "Let's get over there. Scramble the
Batmobile".

The Batmobile in our case was a short ride on the District Line and a
number forty-nine bus. We arrived at Meg's Chelsea mews about twenty
minutes later.

"Meg," I banged on the door. "It's Jodi and Holly. Let us in."

After a few minutes the door was flung open and we saw the back of Meg
fly up the stairs. She stopped at the corner landing and turned to us,
a pair of pinking shears in one hand and a bottle of vodka in the
other. Despite the early hour, it was clear that she was at least one
over the eight.

"That TWAT," she spat, "has been rogering an overweight midget with an
abundance of facial hair for the best part of a year. For nearly a
third of our marriage," she added. "That fucking fat furry freak." The
"freak" was a shriek. "And she's French!"

"Fucking furry fat froggy freak?" Holly suggested helpfully. I kicked
her in the ankle.

"And," Meg roared. "She has a face like the missing link." She was
standing at the top of the stairs, arms outspread like an evangelical
preacher, dressed in a fluffy fuchsia dressing gown, her long black
hair sizzling with angry electricity about her face. It was quite a
performance.

"Are you going to cut the arms and legs off all his shirts and pants?"
Holly enquired excitedly, indicating the pinking shears. I kicked her
again.

"No. I'm going to cut his fucking knackers off!" With that she turned
and galloped off up the remaining stairs brandishing her scissors above
her head like a demented pink cowgirl.

At this point, I should probably add that Meg's passport states her
occupation as actress. However, Meg's main occupation is waiting for
her agent to call (which he hasn't done in three years) and spending
Peter's vast salary in Bond Street shops and trendy wine bars on Cheyne
Walk. She did have a brief acting career in her mid-twenties when she
starred in a television advertisement for a herbal laxative, and a
short scene in Grange Hill in the early eighties. The scene was cut
afterwards as the director claimed that Meg was simply too posh to
attend an east London comprehensive school, even though the three of us
had been brought up in one of the least salubrious suburbs of
Wolverhampton.

Holly and I cowered in the front doorway for a few seconds more before,
clutching each other in fear, we made our way tentatively up the stairs
to Meg's bedroom. She was heartily kicking the crap out of the doors of
her built-in wardrobe. It later transpired that she had been slamming
all the doors in the house for the past 24 hours but the neighbours had
complained. They had, however, said that she could slam the doors of
the wardrobe during daylight hours, as the circumstances were
mitigating.

Holly persuaded Meg to lay off the doors and the two of them sat on the
bed. "Come on Meg, let's go downstairs. I'll make you a cup of coffee,"
I suggested nervously.

She gave me a look that could wither the Kray twins and I instinctively
retreated towards the door. "Bloody Mary," she yelled like an obstinate
four year-old and resumed her flight down the stairs. Again we
followed. Meg threw herself backwards onto the sofa and lay with one
arm flung over her forehead and one leg on the floor in the manner of a
nineteen fifties silver screen icon. "I need to be loved. I need a man.
I need a Bloody fucking MARY," she raged. It was a performance Dame
Judy would have been proud of.

Already bored of the histrionics, Holly switched on the TV and
pretended to be engrossed in a daytime chat show about women who found
out about their husbands' affairs by spying on their text messages. If
I'd been the other side of the room I would have kicked her but Meg was
too absorbed in her soliloquy to notice. "Fucking traitorous adulterous
bastard," she screamed over and over again. Or words to that effect. I
decided to hide in the kitchen and try to come up with a plan. This was
a Code Red all right.

Opening the kitchen door I froze in fear. My immediate thought was that
Meg had honoured her pinking shears threat to Peter's wedding tackle.
The entire room was splattered with, what at first glance appeared to
be blood, but which on closer inspection of the work surfaces and the
discovery of a bottle of Worcester sauce and a butchered head of
celery, turned out to be tomato juice. It appeared that Meg had been
attempting to mix up Bloody Marys without putting the lid on the
blender. I toyed with the idea of cleaning up but decided the out of
sight out of mind policy would be kinder to my clothes and my stomach
and closed the door.

Back in the living room Meg had tuned in to the chat show and was
raging at the TV. "Cut his fucking bollocks off and put them through a
garlic press I would, love. The bloody lot of them. Bastards to a
fellow." A pink slipper flew past the screen and crashed in to Peter's
cut glass port decanter. A half eaten smoked salmon blini hit its
target and stuck to the chat show host's cheek. An empty champagne
glass hit the off switch and the programme was no more.

"Perhaps we should go all go out for a wander," Holly suggested. No,
no, no. I will kick you, I was thinking. Too late, Meg was whirling
round the room again.

"Yes, yes, yes. Let's go and get pissed." Against my better judgment, I
suggested that she go and get dressed, all the while hoping that she
didn't have a black Chanel suit in her wardrobe, or a little pill box
hat with a veil, but I wouldn't put it past her. I glared at
Holly.

"What?' She glared back. "If we stay in the house she will destroy the
place and everything in it and then start on us. If we're out in public
at least we can summon help if she starts being violent." I grudgingly
admitted that Holly might have a point. Perhaps the fresh air would do
her good.

When Meg returned a few minutes later she was not, thankfully, sporting
a widow's cap at a jaunty angle, but was dressed in jeans and a black
jumper. She was also, however, wearing a large pair of Jackie Onassis
sunglasses and scarlet lipstick, mostly on her teeth but some on her
chin. The fuchsia dressing gown had been substituted with a fuchsia
overcoat. She had procured a cigarette from somewhere.

"Meg," I admonished, "you gave up over three years ago."
"Only because that boring old bugger forbade me to smoke in here," she
waved the cigarette in my face. With that she proceeded to take short
sharp puffs and blow the smoke in to all four corners of the house,
including the downstairs bathroom and the under stairs cupboard. When
she had smoked it all the way down to the filter, she wobbled briefly
and sat down heavily at the bottom of the stairs. I looked at Holly in
despair.

"Come on," she said pulling Meg to her feet. "Fresh air, that's what
you need."
"A Bloody Mary is what I need", the four year-old replied.

Halfway down the King's Road I realised that this was not at all a good
idea. Holly and I took one of Meg's arms each, in an attempt to keep
her upright and in a straight line. "Look Meg, all the lovely Christmas
lights," Holly naively indulged the child within.

"Fucking hate Christmas," she snarled back, targeting a passing elderly
gent sporting a tweed cap and matching wheelie basket with her venom.
He took a discernable step to the left and put on a spurt. "Men! Bloody
waste of oxygen, the lot of them." This was aimed at a group of boys in
blazers and short trousers. We were no longer holding Meg in order to
keep her upright; we had become a human straight jacket.

"This is a Code Purple," I hissed at Holly as Meg busied herself trying
to kick the balls of a billboard Beckham at the bus stop.

"I think the best thing we can do is find a dark corner in a dark bar
and pour Pinot Grigio down her neck until she loses the power of
speech," Holly replied. Spotting just the place, we dragged Meg across
the road where to our utmost misfortune, and that of all those
involved, we found ourselves outside Chelsea Registry Office. A bridal
party was getting out of a limousine. I could almost smell the carnage
about to be witnessed by the great and the good of the Kings
Road.

"YOU'LL BE SORRY," Meg had broken free of our shackles and had grabbed
the bride-to-be by the headdress. "You'll be sorry," she cackled again,
causing a tailback on the pavement as people turned to watch the Wicked
Witch of West London (and Wolverhampton) in action. "Don't do it," she
pleaded with the poor nylon-clad creature. "He may be wonderful today,
he may be wonderful tonight, but you mark my words, in eighteen months
time he'll be off flicking someone else's garter. Don't say I didn't
warn you!"

The mother of the bride was ushering her bemused daughter towards the
entrance to the civic suit with a pleading look at the registrar who
stood open-mouthed but intrigued at the top of the steps. The groom's
party had also gathered by the time Meg decided to play tug of war with
his wife and mother-in-law to be and was pulling back on the girl's
train as hard as her mother was pulling her hand in the opposite
direction. For a second Holly and I pulled Meg backwards but we only
succeeded in increasing the odds against the wedding going ahead with
anyone's dignity intact and let go again. Meg tumbled forwards onto the
train and gazed at us for a second before picking herself up, smoothing
her coat and striding away with a, "need a Blurry Mary," thrown back to
Holly and I over her shoulder. We all gaped at one another. I
considered apologizing to the party, then thought better of it and
followed Meg meekly in to the wine bar.

Three bottles of bollocks and shits and adulterous bastards later and
we were sashaying back down the Kings Road towards Meg' house. Again
she was flanked by the two of us, but this time it was for mutual
support. The adulterous bastard rant now had a new focus and Meg was
naming and shaming any male in the public eye who had dared to stray
from the marital bed - at foghorn volume.

"Arthur Fowler, Sven Goran Erickson, Henry VIII, philandering plonkers"
she yelled. Now that was not a combination of names I ever expected to
hear anyone say in one breath. "Bill Clinton, Tom Cruise, Cliff
Richard."

"Cliff Richard? Are you sure?" Holly and I looked at each other
doubtfully.
"'Course, 's a bloke isn't he?"

As we rounded the corner to Cabot Mews, I was the only one to notice
Peter's BMW parked outside the house. He was loading a suitcase in to
the boot. The Freaky Frog was in the passenger seat. "Code Red flashing
Blue with bells on," I murmured to Holly. Meg didn't notice. She was
too busy bellowing "John Major, treacherous bollock of a pig."

Holly and I both did an about turn, spinning Meg between us. She was so
drunk she didn't notice and continued her rant. "Prince Charles, JR
Ewing, Robin Cook, lousy lousing louses - in fact any male soap star,
royal or politician including," she wagged a finger knowingly in front
of us, "Peter Mandleson and Tony Blair. One's gay, one's a Catholic.
They're probably adultering together." Having run out of obvious
victims, she slowed down. "Where we going?"

Think, think, think. "Shop. Need cigarettes."
"Yes, and coffee" added Holly.
"And Vodka."
"No Meg, no more Vodka"
"Not going anywhere unless smore Vod - hic-ka." The petulant four
year-old was back.
"OK, Vodka it is then." Anything to get her moving away from the threat
of Peter and his peccadillo driving past us in this state.

Leaving Holly on Meg duty outside Cullens, I went in and did the
shopping, picking up a large box of aspirin as well as cigarettes and
vodka. While waiting in the queue I could hear shouts of "David Mellor,
revolting little toad. With that tennis player too," coming from
outside. A matronly Chelsea lady tutted to herself and I caught her
glance and rolled my eyes to demonstrate that I had nothing to do with
this. "She's right though, he is an ugly bugger, but I think she's
confusing Aranxta Sanchez the Wimbledon winner with Antonia de Sanchez,
the one-legged prostitute," she said. "Adulterous bastards one and
all." The urge to lie down on the shop floor and block out this madness
was overwhelming.

I felt fairly sure that Peter would have scarpered by now and we made
our way back to Meg's, Holly shouting "Dirty Den Watts, the original
dastardly dickhead" as we turned the corner to Cabot Mews incase we
needed to distract Meg from the presence of her wayward husband. Coast
clear, we went inside and I went in search of tea, coffee and unspilled
tomato juice.

A trail of sinister red footprints led through the kitchen, big Hush
Puppy ones that must have been Peter's and small spiky ones evidently
belonging to the French tart. I'd have to get this cleared up before
Meg put two and two together and made a lot of noise. Forgetting about
tea and coffee and returning to the living room with a tray of ice
cubes and three glasses, I noticed an unusual silence. Holly was spark
out on the sofa and Meg was nowhere to be seen.

I ventured upstairs to Meg's bedroom and found her passed out cold,
flat on her face on the bed, still wearing the pink cashmere and her
killer boots. I rolled her in to the recovery position, noticing as I
did so that she'd made a Barbara Cartland version of the Turin Shroud
on her pillow, and covered her with the duvet. This was going to hurt
in the morning.

Covering Holly with blanket from the spare room, I wondered once again
in to the great kitchen massacre and poured a large vodka before
heading off to bed myself. I glanced at the clock in the kitchen before
I went. Twenty to eight. Pm.

When I woke the following morning and ambled downstairs I found a
rather green and shaky-looking Holly wiping the last drops of tomato
juice from the overhead light fitting. "Is she up yet?" I
enquired.

"Nope, but I heard a groan a few minutes ago, so I don't think it'll be
long now." I put the kettle on, dug out some coffee and four of the
aspirins I'd bought last night and turned to Holly.

"Action stations." Another groan from above and a shout that sounded
remarkably like "Bloody Mary" but which could just as easily have been
"Bloody Hell." Holly brought the coffee and I brought the aspirin and a
pint of water and we crept up the stairs together. "Meg? Are you awake?
How are you feeling?"

"Grrrrrhhhhmph. Fucking awful. How could you let this happen?" I
grimaced at Holly and resisted the urge to kick Meg. Instead we both
went and sat on the bed and administered our gifts. Meg was still
wearing the boots and the coat under the duvet. "What am I going to do,
girls?"

"What do you want to do? Do you want to win him back?"
"Or do you want to kill him?" Helpful Holly struck again.
"I don't know."
"Do you love him?"
"I don't know."
"Are you still in love with him?"
"Do you know what?" She sat up in bed and looked straight at us. "I
don't think I am. And to be honest, I don't think I ever was."

I thought back on all the times I'd seen Peter and Meg together and
remembered that I'd never been entirely convinced by the union. If we
went to parties, Peter would ring ahead to the hosts and request that
Meg was only given one drink for the evening. He stopped her smoking,
made her eat meat again. Wouldn't let her drive his car but made her
give hers up when they got married. Insisted that she cook meals for
his clients and colleagues and then ran her down while they were
eating. Holly and I always put up with him because we believed that she
loved him.

It was Holly who brought the subject up first. "I always hated his tank
tops. And do you remember once when we went to the beach in Brighton
and he insisted on sitting in his deckchair with his suit trousers
rolled up over his ankles and a white handkerchief on his head? He
didn't even take his jacket and waistcoat off."

"Adulterous bastard," but Meg was laughing.

"And when we went to see Bridget Jones' Diary at the Coronet and he
tutted all the way through." I added.

"And he wouldn't let you have any ice-cream, said you were getting a
bit porky," threw in Holly.

So we started a six hour bitching session about Peter, picking apart
all his faults and his dress sense and his parents and his friends and
his driving interrupted by cries of "adulterous bastard" and cups of
tea. At about three o'clock in the afternoon, Meg finally threw off the
Duvet and coat and jumped up on the bed. Bouncing up and down in her
killer heels she shrieked, "And he was crap in bed. Poor Frumpy Frog!"
and we howled with laughter.

I hated to put a dampner on proceedings, but I asked again, "So what
are you going to do?"
She stopped bouncing for a minute and looked quite serious. Then smiled
her evil smile and yelled, "I'm going to divorce the fucker. Ha!" and
we all bounced together for a while. Then she said, "But first I'm
going to paint the front door Fuchsia Pink. That'll stop him ever
setting foot in this house again!"
So we went out and bought fuchsia pink paint from B&;Q and set about
painting the front door of the tasteful house a shocking shade, much to
the surprise of the neighbours. We celebrated the new door with
pitchers of Bloody Mary and blaring Spice Girls.

We were into the second verse of D-I-V-O-R-C-E at about seven that
evening, when the doorbell rang. Meg went to answer it and we heard
Peter's yell from the pavement. "Megan, what the hell have you done to
the front door?"

"Fuck off Peter." Meg slammed the door. Over the course of the next
hour the three of us sat behind the pink door crying with laughter as
Peter begged Meg to take him back.
"Come on Meggy Weggy, I can forget about the door, and you can drive
the car if you want to. And you've lost a little weight recently so
perhaps we can start introducing some little treats again. You could
even smoke in the garden if you'd like to. And I'm sorry about
Grenouille and all that business, but really if I'm completely honest
some of it was your fault too. I'm not saying you drove me to it
deliberately but.... But it's all over now and don't worry, I forgive
you for the door. Can we try again pumpkin, please?"

Meg stifled a laugh and whispered "after three&;#8230;" holding her
hand up.
In unison we all knelt by the open letter box and shouted, "Fuck off
Peter, you adulterous bastard" and laughed until we were nearly
sick.

EPILOGUE
Just before we left that evening I felt that I had to confess one last
thing to Meg. "You know that er, incident at the registry office
yesterday?" She flushed a shade deeper than the front door and nodded.
"Well, when I got up to get another bottle of wine in, I looked out the
window and I saw that girl you attacked running off down a side street.
I think she took your advice."