The Coming of Age. January Part 4.

26th January. My next door neighbour Fran, on the other side from Tripletmother, was almost normal until she took up Counselling. Now every time I see her, she comes up to me and asks, soulfully gazing into my eyes, ‘Are you all right? Are you really really all right?’ She does this again today.
I resist, without much difficulty, the urge to list all my problems and say brightly ‘I’m fine, absolutely fine’. I know she thinks I am still ‘in denial’ about Martin leaving me and she repeats the question, ‘But are you really all right?’ I repeat my answer and she retreats, hurt. I feel mean, as if I had refused to buy a copy of The Big Issue from the man with the thin dog who sits on the bridge. The dog has similar soulful eyes. I could have told her about my affirmations, that would have given her something to gnaw on, but I am too mean.

28th January. Spend day looking after grandchildren, Alice, three and Letitia, one and a half, as Nanny has to go to a funeral and Sarah and Roland both have essential meetings. I ring the doorbell and wait for thirty seconds. Then there are the sounds of running feet. Nanny opens the door and Alice and Letitia are both jumping about with excitement.
‘It’s Ganny, it’s ganny’, they shriek joyously. Tears prickle in my nose. Who has ever loved me this much? Even in our courting days Martin never leapt ecstatically when I arrived at his door.
Now their lunch is all ready, says Nanny. There is pasta, broccoli and strawberry yoghurt to follow. For tea there are fish fingers in the freezer and there is plenty of fruit.
It is ten o’clock. I have planned to do jigsaw puzzles in the morning and go to the park after lunch. Nanny leaves, dignified in dark clothes. At 10.15 all the jigsaw puzzles are scattered over the floor. Alice is screaming because Letitia’s idea of doing a jigsaw puzzle is to sweep all the pieces off the table.
Perhaps I say diffidently I could read a book to Letitia while Alice does the puzzle by herself. No, they both want me to read to them, unfortunately from different books. Why don’t I choose a book, I say brightly and discover one about a child who refuses to eat. The child in the book refuses pasta, broccoli, yoghourt, tomatoes and fish fingers. I fail to grasp the significance of this and read the book not once but twice.
It is now 10.45. In three-quarters of an hour, Letitia is to have a rest in her cot. I suggest we play pretend tea parties with favourite teddies and we set off round the house to gather up a sufficient number of stuffed toys. Alice makes her way up stairs at speed while I stoop to pick up Letitia whom I am afraid will fall down stairs if I do not carry her. She does not want to be carried and we make a slow nervous progress up the first flight of stairs. Alice has disappeared and it is very quiet.
Alice, Alice, I call anxiously, as I tote a very wriggly Letitia up two more flights of stairs. We reach the marital bedroom and Alice is sitting in the middle of the large double bed with its squashy white duvet, fiddling with a packet of something.
I put Letitia down and dash across the room and snatch the packet from her. It is Sarah’s contraceptive pills, luckily securely sealed. I sit on the bed and give Alice a little lecture about the sanctity of Mummy’s bedroom and the inadvisability of putting anything in her mouth.
Letitia has disappeared into the en-suite bathroom. There is a crash and the sound of falling objects. I tug a reluctant Alice off the bed and lurch into the bathroom. A stand of expensive toiletries has been pulled over and bottles of bath oil, eau-de toilette, boxes of tissues have tumbled on to the floor. A demonically smiling Letitia starts to hurl these into the bath. Alice thinks this is fun and joins in. All would have been well if Sarah had had the foresight to put all the lids back on her jars and bottles. As it is, Chanel body lotion, Clarins facial toner and Listerine all dribble out at various speeds into the bottom of the bath. What a waste I think, and although the Listerine gives the mixture an odd smell Chanel and Clarins do not often come my way these days. I cannot bear to see these expensive substances disappear down the plughole so greedily scoop up the mixture and start to rub it into my neck and arms. Alice and Letitia stare and then copy me. We make a game of tidying up and return to collecting teddies. Alice is looking a bit shifty but I am eager to get them downstairs and take no notice.
It is almost time to put Leititia in her cot so I leave Alice arranging stuffed toys round the table while I do it. When I get back to the living room, Alice is covered in lipstick as are a fluffy white rabbit with a plastic face and a Baby Chou Chou doll. Alice is hiding a squashed Christian Dior lipstick behind her and looking like Neil Hamilton on the hustings.
I try to remember what I did when Sarah and Harriet were the same age. I think longingly, if guiltily, about play pens and reins and high chairs with harnesses.
At lunchtime Alice recalls the book I read to her and declares that she will never, not ever eat pasta, broccoli or yoghourt. Letitia thinks this is great fun and pushes her food around too, shouting ‘No pasta, no bockly.’ They eat nothing. I was a wartime baby, so I eat everything up, theirs and mine. Tea time is similar. In desperation I feed them bananas and eat a whole packet of fish fingers myself. It’s years since I had a fish finger.
At 6 o’clock Nanny returns, closely followed by Sarah. I say goodbye in a state of extreme exhaustion. I arrive home two hours later thinking I shall enjoy my peaceful house but the emptiness lies in wait and catches me as I enter.

31st January. It is very quiet on a Sunday. I quite miss the sound of Martin’s voice intoning from the top floor, when I am dusting or washing up. Martin used to read aloud from his own works. I don’t think he ever read anything else. I don’t want to see him at all but occasionally I just long to know if he still does this, wears his shirt tucked in his underpants, and has fits of irritability every time he reads a newspaper and realises he has not in it and Tracy Emin is and so is Charles Saatchi. Now he doesn’t have me to blame for the fact that he is not a household name, how does he manage? How does Lolita cope with it all? Every now and then I am consumed by curiosity.
There is a nice Lonely Heart in the paper today. ‘Handsome, intelligent, romantic Italian male of 51.’ I am almost tempted. He sounds like Rossano Brazzi in ‘South Pacific’. There must be something wrong though. If he is so handsome and etc. why is he reduced to advertising for female companionship? If he lived in this town, he would be mobbed by single women.
There is a desperate shortage of men here. Perhaps I should have a sex change. This would remove one lone woman and add an extra man which would be two good things at a blow. I read about one in the local paper though and it does seem to have its problems. Apparently ‘Sex swap’ bank clerk Gordon Parrott lost his job at the bank when he turned up at work after a spell of sick leave, in a tight satin skirt and insisting on being called Trixie. But that was a man becoming a woman, and they never seem to want to wear jeans and be called Pat like an ordinary woman when they make the change over. It would be easier for me. I have got plenty of pairs of jeans already. I am sure I would get invited to more dinner parties.

I remember that my life is about to change anyway. ‘I have an exciting life. I have all the money I want. I am in perfect health,’ I say to myself.