Pedigree Mum

Even when the bucket’s contents have been bagged up and deposited in the outside bin, the crabby odour still seems to permeate the house. Sloshing in extra orange-scented oil as she steps into her bath, Kerry decides that the smell’s probably just in her head now – like her fears that things aren’t quite the way they should be between her and Rob. She’s probably imagining that too.

She’ll get those name tapes sewn on tomorrow, and her plans will all come together beautifully. Yes, Kerry tries to convince herself – Rob’s fortieth will turn out to be the best birthday he’s ever had.

Chapter Three

‘Planning to stay here all night?’ Eddy calls good-naturedly across the editorial office of Mr Jones magazine. Rob looks up from his screen to where his new boss is pulling on his jacket.

‘Just got a few things to tidy up,’ he replies.

‘Oh, c’mon, Rob. It’s Friday night and it’s gone seven o’clock. Come out for a quick drink. Nearly everyone else has been down there since six …’

Rob shakes his head. ‘Thanks, but I’ll just head off home. Got people to show round the house tomorrow, better make sure it’s ship-shape …’

Eddy makes a bemused snort. ‘Just a quick one. It’ll do you good. What’re you working on anyway?’

‘Well, you said you wanted some alternatives to the magazine’s strapline …’ Secretly, Rob strongly believes that ‘The Thinking Man’s Monthly’ does the job perfectly well, conveying the message: Listen, mate, we run features on politicians and serious-looking leather briefcases. If you’re looking for topless women you’ve come to the wrong place because we’re Too Posh For Boobs. However, Eddy thinks it’s not ‘dynamic’ enough. Mr Jones isn’t supposed to be bloody dynamic, Rob mouths silently as his editor banters with Frank, the art director. That’s the whole point. We once ran a four page feature on the history of Gentleman’s Relish and that’s what our readers expect. Sensing tension radiating upwards from his back to his neck, Rob glares at the straplines he’s managed to dredge up so far:

• For men who mean business

• The discerning man’s glossy

• The glossy man’s best friend

Jesus, what the hell is a ‘glossy man’? And ‘best friend’? That sounds like a dog. He ponders some more:

• The magazine that was once respected and is now a bit shit

• No naked girls here – we’re too refined for that …

Then he adds, smiling to himself:

… Although we do feature the odd, deeply patronising sex tip which suggests that our ‘thinking’ readers aren’t that hot in the sack.

He sits back, about to add to his personal rant when he realises with alarm that Eddy is lurking behind him, pink-cheeked like a baby and flaring his nostrils at the screen.

‘Actually,’ he says, ‘I’m thinking of upping the sex content, Rob. We should run a few more features, practical advice, A–Z of foreplay …’

‘Sorry?’

‘You know – the usual get-her-into-bed stuff but delivered with a punchy edge …’

Rob blinks at Eddy. Try as he might, he cannot get his head around what an ‘A–Z of foreplay delivered with a punchy edge’ actually means.

‘Well,’ he says, frowning, ‘if you really think our readers—’

‘What, have sex?’ Eddy guffaws. ‘No, you’re right, Rob. The uptight little farts probably aren’t getting that much. All the more reason to give ’em a helping hand, eh?’ He guffaws at his own joke.

‘Er, I suppose so, yes.’

Eddy slaps a hand on Rob’s shoulder. ‘I don’t mean we’d do it tackily. It’d be tastefully done …’

Nodding sagely as if taking all of this on board, Rob toys with the fantasy of opening a new document and typing out his resignation letter. How can he possibly do his job properly with a twenty-six-year-old idiot at the helm? The last magazine Eddy worked on was full of drinking games and Britain’s Best Bum competitions. It’s rumoured that the winner’s ‘prize’ was to sleep with Eddy.

‘You could write it,’ Eddy adds, giving Rob’s swivel chair an irritating jiggle.

‘Oh, I don’t think so. I’ve got a lot on and I’m sure we could find a freelancer, an expert. I could start putting out some feelers …’

Eddy shakes his head. ‘You’re the best writer here. On all the magazines I’ve worked on, I’ve never come across anyone as versatile …’

‘Really?’ Rob asks, flushing a little.

‘God, yeah. You can turn your hand to anything, can’t you? Interviews, travel, food, politics … You come across as this serious, keeps-things-ticking-along-nicely type, but actually you’re a pretty intelligent guy!’

‘Um, thanks, Eddy …’ Why don’t you patronise me a bit more, you arsehole in your pale pink shirt and Dolce & Gabbana suit …

‘So don’t tell me you can’t knock out a monthly sex column. Under a pseudonym of course – we’d have to make out it was by a woman, a sort of “what’s going on in her mind” type of thing.’

Rob jams his back teeth together, wishing Kerry were here to witness this. He’s not sure he’s managed to convey to her how awful things have been here lately.

‘We could call you Miss Jones!’ Eddy announces, triggering a bark of laughter from Frank on the other side of the office.

Rob squints at his boss. ‘Or we could just commission an actual woman.’

‘Yeah. Well, let’s think about it. Anyway, that’s enough about work – can I drag you out for that drink?’

‘Yeah, come on, Miss Jones,’ Frank sniggers, swaggering across the office from the art department.

Rob takes a moment to consider what to do next. He knows he should make an effort to socialise, as he did with the old team – the ones Eddy shunted off to the publishing group’s less prestigious magazines like Tram Enthusiast and Carp Angler. He is also aware that he doesn’t fit in with the new dynamic attitude which Eddy announced will replace the ‘stuffy, gentlemanly tone’, and that he’s lucky to still have a job. In truth, though, the thought of going out drinking with these reptiles makes him want to gouge his eyeballs out.

‘So? Can we drag you away from the coalface?’ A smirking Eddy is beckoning him now, his loyal servant Frank looking bemused at his side.

‘Well …’ Rob hesitates before shutting down his computer. ‘I don’t see why not. Where are we going then?’

‘Jack’s.’

Rob nods approvingly, wondering how to negotiate this. He’s not a member of Jack’s, and is tempted to point out that he belongs to another private members’ club – the one he, Simon and the rest of the cosy old team used to frequent. But now he’s worried that even a casual mention of The Lounge will remind Eddy of his vintage, and he’ll make a mental note to bung Rob over to Horticultural Digest first thing on Monday morning. When did life become so worrying?

The move to Shorling – that’s started to concern him too. He knows it makes sense, and he was all for it that lovely day on the beach with the kite. Yet he can’t help feeling a little anxious about the enormity of leaving the city in which he’s spent his entire adult life. Even Kerry seems slightly less enamoured with Shorling since she and the children moved down there, and he can’t quite imagine how she’ll fit in with those posh women with their haughty voices and BMWs.

‘Er, I’m not actually a member of Jack’s,’ Rob admits as the three men head for the third floor lift.

‘That’s fine, you’ll be my guest.’ Eddy sweeps back his mop of fair hair and jabs the lift button.

‘Great. Thanks.’ Rob’s mouth forms a tight line. The lift doors open, and they ride down in slightly awkward silence (despite the invitation, Rob suspects Eddy has only asked him out of politeness). It’s a relief when they step out into the early evening bustle of Shaftesbury Avenue. The warm September evening, and the good-natured hubbub around him, raises Rob’s spirits a little. He experiences a pang of missing Kerry and the children, and decides his one drink policy should mean he’ll catch Mia and Freddie for a phone call before they go to bed. This time tomorrow, he reminds himself, they’ll all be together. Maybe he’ll treat his family to a special Sunday lunch at that seafood restaurant in the big glass cube, see what the kids make of the crustacean-crushing implements. That would be fun. Despite his anxiety about the move, he is heartily sick of being alone in London from Monday to Friday.

At Jack’s, Eddy and Frank make a big show of being on first name terms with Theresa on the door.

‘Has anyone ever told you you have beautiful eyes?’ Eddy drawls, at which she chuckles indulgently and tosses back her glossy raven hair.

‘Yes, darling. You, last week.’

‘Oh, you play so hard to get. Isn’t she a terrible tease, Rob?’ Eddy emits a spluttery laugh, and Rob senses the tips of his ears turning a violent shade of puce. God, imagine having to be pleasant to wankers like this, every night of the week. Rob almost wants to apologise on behalf of all mankind. Just a quick one, he reminds himself as the three men descend the narrow stairs to the basement, so I don’t seem like a stand-offish old bugger …

His thoughts are cut short as he follows Eddy and Frank into the bar and realises that all of the Mr Jones editorial team are here – the clueless designers, the bewildering fashion team who describe clothes as ‘pieces’, and the writers who look like they’ve barely acquainted themselves with razors yet. Even Nadine, the young editorial assistant who doesn’t seem to like him much, is smiling over the rim of her glass. And they’re not only here, having a casual drink after work, but assembled before him in a rabbly semi-circle, all grinning and staring as they burst into song:

Happy birthday to you, happy birthday to you, happy birthday dear Robbeeeee …

Robbie? It sounds as if he’s in a boy band. Rob’s not a Robbie, but never mind that because here comes a cake, ablaze with candles and dusted with sugar (clearly, Jack’s is too cool for the kind of garish iced creations Kerry creates), carried on a big silver board by a beautiful girl with red hair cascading down her back. Shock has morphed into pleasure as someone hands Rob a drink (how did they know he likes vodka and tonic?), and his colleagues cluster around him as the cake is cut.

‘Well, thanks,’ he blusters. ‘I didn’t think, I mean I didn’t realise …’

‘Hope you don’t mind us hatching this little surprise,’ says ‘Stewie’, the new features editor whose pallid complexion suggests he spends most of his free time huddled over a games console.

‘No, of course not. Not at all.’ Rob grins in disbelief. ‘I’ve never had a surprise party before. I’m really touched …’

‘Feel okay about the big four-o?’

‘Oh yeah, it’s fine …’

‘And I hear you’re going to be our new sex columnist!’ exclaims fashion editor Ava, her severe black bob swinging excitedly.

‘Er, it hasn’t exactly been decided yet,’ he says, a little less freaked out by the prospect now he’s quickly downed most of his drink. How did she know, anyway?

‘Eddy seems to think it has,’ Ava says, raising an eyebrow. ‘Once he gets an idea in his head there’s no shifting it.’

‘Well, I suppose I’ll manage to, er …’

‘You’ll do a brilliant job,’ declares Nadine, startling Rob with her friendliness. Usually, she regards him with cool indifference as if he’s the maintenance guy.

‘Er, thanks, Nadine. I’ll give it my best shot, I suppose …’

She giggles, sweeping a hand over her cute gamine crop, and he feels himself blushing. Rob wonders briefly if she’s teasing him. Perhaps she finds it hugely amusing that the oldest man in the office – the Granddaddy of Mr Jones – has been chosen to write a sex column. He’s faintly relieved when Frank beckons him over to the bar to share a filthy joke.

No, he’s just being paranoid, Rob decides, which is understandable, considering the sweeping changes Eddy’s been making. Anyway, he feels better tonight, now buoyed up by his second vodka and tonic. Nadine has reappeared at his side, and is telling him about working with Eddy – ‘I follow him around like a little limpet,’ she explains with a grin – and Ava is complimenting his jacket. As the evening continues with much banter and laughter, Rob decides to socialise more often, and to try to remodel his work persona, which he suspects comes across as too earnest for Eddy’s ‘dynamic’ regime.

Rob might not be a member here at Jack’s, and he might be hanging onto his job by the tips of his neatly-filed fingernails, but right now, turning forty doesn’t seem so bad. And hours later – even though Rob rarely stays out late on a school night – he doesn’t see why he shouldn’t go along when someone suggests continuing the party at Nadine’s Baker Street flat.

Chapter Four

‘Mum. Mum! MUUUUM!’

Kerry snaps awake and peers at the alarm clock on her bedside table: 1.37 a.m. ‘What is it, Freddie?’ she croaks.

‘Mum! C’mere!’

With a groan, Kerry hauls herself out of bed and blunders barefoot in a rumpled T-shirt and knickers across the landing. By the time she’s in his room – which still retains its crabby whiff – she has already decided he sounds too perky to be ill or traumatised by a nightmare.

‘It’s the middle of the night, Freddie. What’s wrong?’

‘Can’t sleep.’ His brown eyes gleam in the dark.

‘Why not? Did something wake you up?’

‘Yeah.’

‘What was it?’

‘The sea.’

‘The sea?’ she repeats.

‘Yeah.’ He nods. ‘It’s noisy.’

Kerry kneels at his bedside and rubs her eyes. ‘There’s not an awful lot I can do about that, sweetheart. I mean, I can’t turn it off.’

He scowls, radiating disappointment in her mothering abilities. ‘Well, I can’t sleep with it on,’ he growls.

‘You’ll get used to it, love.’

‘How long have we lived here?’

‘Three weeks.’

‘When will I be used to it?’

How is she supposed to answer that? On September twenty-fifth at eight p.m. you will stop noticing those infuriating swishing waves …

‘Listen,’ she says, mustering up a hidden reserve of patience, ‘just close your eyes and think of happy things, okay? That’s what I do and it really works. You’ll soon be asleep.’

He’s quiet for a moment. ‘I’m thinking about a happy thing, Mummy.’

‘That’s good.’

Small pause. ‘I’m thinking about when we have a dog.’

Kerry exhales loudly. ‘Don’t start on about dogs now, Freddie.’

‘But you said, you promised—’

‘I’ve never promised …’

‘You did!’ he shrieks.

‘Shhh, you’ll wake Mia—’

‘You said we could have a dog when we’re not in London and we’re not in London now.’

‘I didn’t say definitely. I said maybe when you’re older and can take him for walks by yourself and—’

‘I’m older NOW!’

For God’s sake. What would Rob say now, if he were here? He’d say she should have been one hundred percent firm about the dog thing, instead of her feeble ‘maybe-one-day’ wafflings. Rob is exceptionally good at pointing out what Kerry should have said after the event. It doesn’t seem to occur to him that, as she has only worked part-time since having the children, she has had to make thousands more child-related decisions than he has.

‘I’m going back to bed now,’ she says firmly, tucking Freddie’s duvet, with its prancing Captain Haddocks and Snowies, around him.

‘Mum!’ Freddie cries as she leaves his room.

‘Freddie, you’ll wake your sister …’

‘Can I phone Dad?’

‘No, not in the middle of the night.’

‘I wanna talk to him! I wanna say happy birthday …’

‘It’s not Dad’s birthday yet, not till tomorrow.’ Actually, it is tomorrow, she realises; it’s nearly two a.m. and Rob is officially forty years old. But better not tell Freddie that. ‘Good night, Freddie,’ she says firmly from the landing, realising there’s no point in going back to bed, as she is now shimmeringly awake.

Pulling on Rob’s soft grey cashmere sweater over her T-shirt, Kerry heads downstairs into what used to be Aunt Maisie’s dining room, and is now her designated music room. A music lecturer until cuts swept the university, Kerry is now trying to carve out a living as a freelance songwriter. While this might sound glamorous, her latest commission is for Cuckoo Clock, a long-established TV show for pre-school children (the over-zealous presenters wear bird costumes and sinister-looking rubbery yellow feet). The show is being given a facelift, including a whole stack of new songs, and at least they want her, Kerry thinks defiantly as she sits down at her piano. It might not be quite the illustrious future she’d in mind for herself at music college, but the money’s good, and she also plans to teach piano from home. Isn’t that the modern way of doing things – to have several strings to your bow, so to speak? And surely dozens of parents in a well-heeled town like Shorling are desperate for their little ones to learn the piano. Kerry doesn’t have any pupils yet, but she plans to put ads on all the newsagents’ noticeboards in the next day or two. God, she hasn’t even finished unpacking or organising the house yet. It still amazes her, despite the fact that she should be used to it by now, how little you get done with children around. And the people at Cuckoo Clock’s production company don’t seem to understand that even bouncy little bird songs can’t be hammered out in five minutes.

It’ll be easier when Rob moves down, she tells herself firmly. Then we won’t feel like cuckoos ourselves, stealing someone else’s nest … They’ll also be able to buy Aunt Maisie’s house, which will hopefully make it feel properly theirs. At the moment, thanks to her aunt’s generosity and keenness to move, Kerry and the children are living here rent-free.

After taking a moment to gather her thoughts, she starts to sing and play quietly so as not to disturb the children.

Welcome to the cuckoo clock,

It’s time to say to say hello,

What’s behind the little doors …

‘“What’s behind the lit-tle doors?”’ comes the mocking echo behind her.

She whirls round. ‘Freddie! What are you doing out of bed?’

His lightly freckled face erupts into a wide-awake smile. ‘What are you asking that for?’

‘Because I told you, it’s the middle of the night—’

‘No, about the doors.’ He rakes a hand through his dishevelled brown curls.

‘Oh. Er … to build up tension, I suppose, so it’s a surprise …’

‘But it’s a cuckoo, innit? That’s what’s behind the doors.’

Kerry blinks at her son. She is chilly now, despite the cashmere sweater, and goosebumps have sprung up on her bare legs.

‘You’re right,’ she says flatly. ‘It’s a cuckoo. It really couldn’t be anything else.’

Freddie grins triumphantly and starts swinging on the door. ‘Ha, I knew it was. Now can I phone Dad?’

Chapter Five

Nadine’s flat might only be forty-odd miles from Rob’s new house by the sea, but the way he feels now, he might as well have landed on a different planet. The huge living room is girlie in the extreme, its sofa and chairs strewn with fluffy throws and an abundance of embroidered cushions. There are fairy lights, glowing red lamps and a multi-coloured chandelier. The effect, he muses as Nadine dispenses drinks (aided by a rather worse-for-wear Frank), is a little nauseating.

‘So d’you like my place?’ Nadine asks, curling up beside him on the vast purple velvet sofa.

‘It’s really, um, stylish,’ he tells her, enunciating carefully in the hope of appearing sober.

‘Thanks.’ She smiles prettily. ‘It’s a bit of a mish-mash but I like it.’

‘Yeah, but it’s not yours, is it?’ Eddy teases from his cross-legged position on the pink shag-pile rug. ‘It’s Daddy’s.’

Nadine rolls her eyes good naturedly. ‘Yep, but I’m here for the time being, darling. You don’t think I could live here on an editorial assistant’s salary, do you?’

‘Thank God for Daddy,’ Eddy guffaws, stretching the joke a little thin in Rob’s opinion. He glances down at the gnarled oak table on which the remains of his birthday cake look a little ravaged on a plain white plate, wondering why he’s suddenly feeling protective of Nadine. Her slight haughtiness in the office is, he suspects now, a desire to seem properly grown-up when she’s barely emerged from her teens.

‘So you’re off to your new place tomorrow?’ Ava asks Rob, rearranging her bony limbs on a giant floor cushion.

‘Yes,’ he says, ‘after I’ve shown a couple of people round the house.’

She smiles, her teeth Tipp-Ex white against the blood red of her lipstick. ‘I don’t know if I could ever do that.’

‘Show people around a flat, you mean?’

‘No, silly! Leave London.’ Ava winces.

‘Well,’ Rob says, ‘it just seemed like the right time.’ He can’t explain about the education issue now, and how several friends have faked addresses and religions in order to get their children into decent schools. Mentioning that in front of all of these young things would make him sound about five hundred years old.

‘What’ll you do with yourself down there, Rob?’ Nadine’s voice cuts into his thoughts.

‘Er, just get on with life, I suppose. Get fit, start running, go for long walks on the beach …’ Agh, why is he saying that? Eddy will have him shovelled off to Rambler’s Monthly.

‘I love the sea,’ Nadine says wistfully, ‘but I can’t imagine living away from all the shops and bars.’

Typical, he thinks without bitterness. Just the kind of thing a privileged girl with nothing to think about but chandeliers and cushions would say. Rob, whose father is Italian and his mother a straight-talking Yorkshire woman, is at least aware that life happens north of Watford – or south of Croydon, come to that.

‘Well, I’ve been here for twenty years,’ he explains patiently. ‘The noise, the traffic – I’ve had my fill, to be honest.’

Now he’s sounding like Granddad again. Nadine nods, and at some point the others seem to drift away to different parts of the room, leaving just the two of them sitting very close on the sofa. She isn’t his type at all – too girlie and far too young with her silver cowrie shell necklace which was probably acquired on some gap year jaunt, or maybe Daddy bought that for her too. In fact the thought of having a ‘type’ hasn’t crossed Rob’s mind since he met Kerry. But now, having drunk more than in recent memory, he can’t help but notice how mesmerising her blue eyes are, framed by a sweep of dark lashes, and how her dainty nose is incredibly cute. For some reason, despite knowing the others for far longer, she has chosen to sit next to him. It no longer seems to matter that, while he was getting to grips with disposable nappies and jars of sludge-coloured baby food, Nadine was still in high school. Exquisite is the word that springs to mind now. This girl is exquisite, like a jewel.

‘I hope you don’t mind me saying,’ she murmurs, shuffling even closer with her feet tucked under her neat little bottom, ‘but you seem like your heart’s not really in this seaside thing, Rob.’

‘Er …’ A wave of dizziness engulfs him as he blows out air. ‘Yeah, it’s freaking me out a bit. The practical side, the train and stuff – that’ll be okay …’ Hell, he is slurring now. Is he even making sense?

‘But …?’ She smiles sympathetically.

Rob blinks at her. ‘God, I don’t know, Nadine. It’s half two in the morning …’ She nods, encouraging him to go on. ‘Am I ready to move? I don’t know. It started off as a vague idea, something we might do when we were properly grown-up’ – he laughs self-consciously, feeling a little sick – ‘then wham, it’s happened, Kerry and the kids are there already and there’s this awful pressure to sell the London house …’ No, stop it, that came out all wrong. What about that lovely day on the beach with the kite? It had felt completely right then …