Getting Rid of Matthew (21 page)

At three o'clock precisely, she heard the front doorbell ring and Claudia and Suzanne rush to answer it. She picked up a brush and dabbed away at a corner of her painting, fixing her face into an expression of concentration. Claudia burst through the door first, leading Matthew by the hand.

"Dad's here."

She stopped dead at the sight of the mess and Sophie at the center of it.

"What are you doing?" she demanded.

"Painting," Sophie said, as if that were the most natural thing in the world. "Hello, Matthew."

"Why?" Claudia asked.

"Because I enjoy it." Sophie was coloring up. "I often paint."

"No, you don't. Ow."

Claudia was rubbing her shin where Suzanne had kicked her, she hoped surreptitiously.

"What did you do that for, you stupid bitch?"

"Mum," Suzanne was saying, "she swore at me."

"Well, you kicked me."

"No, I didn't."

Claudia looked outraged.

"You did. When I said 'Mum doesn't usually do painting,' you kicked me. Ow. Mum, she did it again."

Sophie was scarlet. She looked up and saw that Matthew was smiling—no, smirking, it seemed to her—in a way which said he knew that what Claudia was saying was right, that she was just pretending to be immersed in her painting to impress him.

"Well…I've just taken it up again recently," she said unconvincingly, starting to clear up and accidentally wiping a streak of ochre through her freshly blow-dried hair.

"Actually, your mum used to paint all the time," Matthew was saying. "But probably when you were at school, so you just didn't realize."

Sophie smiled at him weakly, grateful that he'd stepped in, but irritated that he clearly felt she needed him to get her off the hook with her own children. She felt ridiculous: what was she doing, sitting there in a summer outfit, painting? She felt like she had when she was fourteen years old and Mark Richardson, the coolest, best-looking boy in the lower sixth, whom she had had a crush on forever, had come over to her parents' house.

He had first noticed her at a party given by his parents which her mum and dad had dragged her along to. It had turned out they were both fans of Patti Smith, and Sophie had mentioned that she had asked for and been given the new album
Horses
for her birthday a few weeks before. He was saving up for the LP himself, Mark said, from his wages as a Saturday boy in WH Smith's. As he left for the Red Lion he asked Sophie where exactly she lived. "I'll pop round tomorrow about seven," he'd said, giving her a smile to die for.

She'd tidied her room and swapped her Snoopy poster for pictures of Deep Purple and Genesis that she'd cut out of magazines. She'd burned joss sticks and hidden the toy rabbit she still always slept with in a drawer. At four o'clock she'd started to get ready, trying on five different outfits, and eventually settled on a faded pair of jeans with triangle inserts of floral material, a scoop neck top, and a pair of blue cork wedges. When he'd finally arrived at ten past seven she'd run down to meet him, faint with excitement at the prospect of her first date.

"Can I just get the LP?" he'd said, smiling. "Only Kev and Julian are waiting for me in the car."

Of course Mark had never returned her record or in fact ever bothered to talk to her again.

After that, she approached anything which sounded like a proposition with extreme cynicism. If a boy asked whether he might see her on the weekend, she'd say "Why?" or "What do you want?" If she managed to establish that they were in fact interested in her, rather than her possessions, she'd still greet them in her oldest jeans and T-shirt, no makeup on, terrified of being accused of having made an effort.

* * *

Now, sitting at the kitchen table formerly known as hers and Matthew's, she knew she looked like she was trying too hard again. She had wanted to make him think she was in control and over him, but she'd ended up looking like she was trying to lure him back. Thankfully, Matthew had taken the girls off to the living room to play the Xbox and she was free to sink back into her chair and fight off the tears of humiliation that were welling up. She picked up the cordless phone and took it outside into the back garden, despite the rain.

Helen was reading a book, lying on the living room couch, when her mobile rang.

"Hi Sophie, what's wrong?"

She knew it must be something to do with Matthew, who, she was hoping, was at that very moment realizing that he never wanted to leave his beautiful house and family again.

"Oh, God, it's a disaster," Sophie was saying. "I think he thinks I'm trying to impress him because I'm all dressed up, and I thought I was acting casual but I went over the top, and now he thinks he's made me all flustered. Which he has, but not for the reasons he thinks."

She was babbling.

Oh, good, thought Helen.

"Oh, shit," said Eleanor. "I'm sure he doesn't. I'll bet you anything he's nervous, as well. He's probably just relieved you're not throwing stuff at him. Anyway, how about him, I bet he's made an effort," she added, knowing full well that she had forced him to.

"Actually, he does look pretty smart. Not in the casual stuff he usually slobs around in at the weekends."

"See," said Helen/Eleanor. "Imagine if you'd looked like shit and he was all dressed up, he'd be at a real psychological advantage. You've done the right thing, you just have to keep it up. Don't let him see he's rattled you, go back in and show him how calm and in control you are. You can do it."

"OK." Sophie sounded more confident. Just then, Norman pushed his face up against Helen's arm and meowed impatiently.

"I didn't know you had a cat." Sophie had heard him.

"Oh, yes, have I never mentioned him?"

Oh, for fuck's sake, she thought, now I have to remember that Eleanor has a cat.

"What's his name?"

"Erm…" Helen looked around her flat for inspiration. "…Cushion."

"Cushion?"

"Yes, he's fat, he looks like a big, furry cushion. Sophie, why are we talking about my cat when you've got an ex-husband to go and show off to?"

* * *

Sophie checked herself in the hall mirror, practiced a confident smile, then burst faux-confidently into the living room.

"Anybody want a drink?" She smiled, looking a bit deranged.

"Shh," said Suzanne, who seemed to be in the middle of a drug deal.

"Kill that hooker," Claudia shouted, trying to take the handset off her. "She's trying to get away with your crack. Shoot her, for fuck's sake. Quick." Sophie thought that if she'd been asked, this probably would have been at the top of the list of the sentences she never thought a ten-year-old daughter of hers would say. Matthew rolled his eyes at Sophie, inclusively. Her smile softened into something more natural. He stood up.

"I'll have a cup of tea," he said, stretching, "if that's OK."

Matthew followed Sophie out to the kitchen, getting out the tea bags while she filled the kettle, like two people who had shared a kitchen for fifteen years, which of course they had.

"Do you think they should be playing that?" Sophie asked him, as he rooted around in the cupboard over the sink for mugs.

"They're from a broken home, they're destined to be drug-addicted criminals anyway, so they might as well learn how to do it properly. You never know when a prostitute might run off with your stash and you need to be equipped to deal with it."

Sophie laughed. "I was going to teach them all that myself. Just not for a couple of years."

"I'll take it off them, if you want," he said. "It's just, they've been on at me for years to let them play, and as a part-time dad, aren't I now meant to indulge them with things you wouldn't approve of, thereby rendering your authority useless and ensuring my place as the favorite parent?"

"Just maybe not every week, eh? I don't want social services coming round."

There was a bit of an awkward silence while they waited for the kettle to boil, but Matthew didn't seem in any hurry to go back into the other room. In fact, he sat down at the kitchen table, seemingly completely at home. Seeing him there made Sophie's stomach turn over. It could be a snapshot from a couple of months ago, an ordinary couple sitting around and chatting while their children played in the next room. For a moment, she felt like she wanted to throw herself at him and beg him to come back; she could learn to pretend it had never happened. Then, as quickly as that thought had come, it was replaced by the memory of what he had done to her and the girls, and she felt sick with the realization that in a couple of hours he would go home to Helen and the new life he had chosen again. She took a deep breath. Eleanor was right, she had to show him that he hadn't destroyed her. The only real revenge she could take was to make him regret what he had left behind. Maybe it was petty, but it was only human nature, and there was some satisfaction to be had in that.

By the time she sat down with him, she had recovered her composure enough to tell him about the post–parents' evening fallout with Suzanne who, having been told that no one expected her to come top of the class anymore, seemed to have abandoned schoolwork altogether and was now talking of becoming a beautician.

"She already told me," Matthew said. "God, I hope she grows out of it."

"She will. I give it a couple of weeks and then she'll settle back down. She's just pushing us to see if we really mean it."

"I knew we should have called her Shirley. Or Kylie."

"Don't go on at her about it, Matthew. If you do, it'll make her want it even more."

Sophie heard Claudia shouting from the other room for Matthew to go and play Scrabble.

"Want to play?" he said. "The girls would love it."

* * *

By the time Matthew left, slightly after his allotted time of six o'clock, Sophie felt as if they had crossed over into a whole other relationship—one where they could be civilized and spend time together with their children. She and Matthew had a history that was undeniable. She could see that a tiny part of him felt reluctant to leave to go back to what Claudia had gleefully told her was a dingy shit hole, and she felt like she'd scored a point against Helen. Just one, but it felt good. Her life might never be able to go back to what it was, but that felt more bearable if she knew that Matthew wasn't living a dream life somewhere else. Immature, maybe, but true nevertheless.

* * *

Helen was pacing by the time Matthew got home. She'd thought about ringing Sophie to see how it had gone, but she couldn't be sure he would have left, and she didn't think she could carry off a performance as Eleanor, knowing that Matthew was hovering in the background somewhere. She was wearing her least-flattering pajama bottoms and a shapeless fleece with a food stain down the front. She'd washed her hair and left it to dry naturally so that it frizzed. She knew that Matthew would still have a picture in his head of Sophie looking her best.

"How did it go?" She pounced on him as soon as she heard the front door open.

"Good," he said enigmatically. "Yes, it went well. Oh," he said over his shoulder as he went through to the bathroom, "Sophie suggested we do the same next week, if that's OK?"

Hallelujah, she thought.

"Fine by me," she said, trying to sound a little put out.

25

T
HE OPENING OF VERANO WAS HAPPENING
on the following Friday night. The invitations were due to come back this morning, Monday, and preliminary yeses had been given over the phone by twelve of the thirty-five D-listers Global had so far invited. That was a respectable enough figure to lure some paparazzi. Shaun Dickinson and his surgically enhanced ex were bringing their new partners (O
UR
B
REAK
-U
P
!, M
Y
T
HREE
IN-A-
B
ED
R
OMP
!, P
OISONED BY
M
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MPLANTS
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M
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NGAGED
A
GAIN!
being some of the headlines that had appeared in the weekly glossies in the last few days), and the press had been promised that it would be ex-girl-band-member Kellie Shearling's first night out since she had left rehab for "depression," apparently brought about by no longer making enough money to fund her rather more secret cocaine and alcohol addiction.

Helen couldn't help thinking that Leo didn't quite know what he was letting himself in for, but it would generate publicity, and that could only be a good thing, even if it wasn't the sort of publicity she thought he would have envisioned for his beautiful, tasteful restaurant. They had so far not managed to place any features, and Helen was resisting the temptation to pick up the phone herself to call Lesley David at the
Mail on Sunday
and cash in her favor. This was nothing to do with her anymore—it was far less complicated if she just kept out of it. Leo was coming in this morning to go over the final details for Friday evening, hence Helen was spending the early part of the day sitting in a café on Old Compton Street, reading the papers.

At eleven fifteen, she called Helen-from-Accounts.

"Helen Sweeney," Helen-from-Accounts answered, in her annoying singsong voice.

"It's Helen. Has Matthew's son left yet?"

"Yes…just."

"Great. Thanks. Bye."

Helen cut off the call before Helen-from-Accounts tried to engage her in conversation. She was in the office by eleven thirty. She called Sandra Hepburn to check that she was ready for her trip the following day.

"I've got a massive spot on my chin," Sandra said. "And carpet burns on my knees."

"It'll be fine," Helen reassured her, thinking she must talk to Ben about airbrushing. She read through the press release she'd drawn up about Sandra's modeling assignment and thought she'd done a good job of implying that it was for
Vogue
without ever actually saying so. She took it through to get Laura's approval before she sent it out, and found Laura looking a little flushed and distracted.

"Helen. Perfect. Sit down, I want to talk to you."

Helen did as she was told. "Are you OK?"

"Fantastic. Listen, I've handed my notice in. I'm leaving Global."

Helen stared at her, unsure of what to say.

"I'm setting up on my own," Laura continued. "I've been planning it for ages, but I couldn't say anything till I'd got my finances in place. I have to give three months' notice but I actually told the other directors a while ago, so I'm starting to sound out clients. Contractually, I'm not allowed to approach anyone on Global's list, but to be honest, I'm not sure I'd want to. I'm done with the D-listers. I'm going upmarket—fielding offers for people instead of trying to create celebrities. Patrick Fletcher and Anna Wyndham have already said yes," she added, naming two of the British film industry's current favorites.

"Wow," Helen said, trying to disguise her jealousy. She realized that she was genuinely pleased for Laura, but that didn't wipe out the overriding feeling of envy that she was also experiencing. "Congratulations."

"Oh," Laura said, picking up the lack of enthusiasm in Helen's expression. "I forgot the main bit." She paused for dramatic effect. "I want you to come with me."

Helen raised her eyebrows, trying to look interested. There were worse things than continuing to be Laura's secretary. Laura was still talking excitedly.

"Not as my P.A., but as a junior account manager. I know you're up to it."

Helen suddenly felt dizzy.

"Are you serious?"

"Of course." Laura laughed. "It won't be like here, I mean it'll just be me and you, an assistant and an accounts person to start off with, and you won't be on any more money than you are here for a while but, you know, you can have clients of your own…"

"Oh, my God." The truth of what was happening was dawning on Helen. "Is this definite? I mean…oh, my God."

"What do you reckon?" Laura asked her. "Are you interested?"

Helen let out a noise somewhere between a laugh and a squeal. "Of course I'm interested. Thank you. Really, thanks."

"I thought you could start setting up the office as soon as you leave here. Well, after you've had a holiday. And then I'll join you in a month or so."

Helen resisted the temptation to hug her. She couldn't stop smiling.

"Thank you again. Honestly."

* * *

Helen sought out Matthew, something she had rarely done at work since he'd moved in with her.

"Did you know?" she asked.

"I did," he said, "and it's no more than you deserve. You'll be brilliant."

She felt like she ought to be cross with him for keeping secrets from her, but nothing could puncture her good mood and he seemed so genuinely delighted and excited for her that she put her arms around his neck and kissed him, in full view of Jenny, who had come in with a letter for him to sign.

* * *

Back at her desk, her head was buzzing. Laura had asked her to keep it a secret from the other girls for the next few days, which wasn't going to be a problem, given that nobody was really speaking to her, but she found herself smiling at them whenever they came anywhere near her, which unsettled them, so she did it some more.

"What are you looking so happy about?" Annie said eventually.

"Nothing." Helen couldn't help her smile getting even wider.

"Stop smiling like an idiot, then."

"Sorry, can't."

* * *

Helen shut herself in Laura's office when Laura went out for lunch and called Rachel with her news. Rachel, who had been Helen's closest friend and confidante for the past ten years, and who had heard her moan about her thwarted ambitions countless times, was thrilled for all of thirty seconds and then went into a long monologue about place settings and tiaras. Helen feigned interest for as long as she could, but wedding talk bored her to death. On Rachel and Helen's list of "Women We Hate," drawn up on their trip around the world and added to regularly since, there had been not only "Women who steal other women's husbands" and "Posh women" but also "Women who put their boyfriends before their friends" and "Women who bore you to death with stories about their wedding and/or babies." The full list in fact read:

Women who steal other women's husbands

Women who put their boyfriends before their friends

Women who bore you to death with stories about their wedding and/or babies

Posh women

Fat women who go on about how little they eat

Women who have their tits out all the time (with a subsection of women who substitute big tits for personalities)

Tits-on-a-stick (Jealousy alone put that very rare breed of women who were both slim and naturally big-chested beyond the age of twenty-five on the list because, Helen and Rachel were convinced, all well-endowed women had fat in the post which would arrive with their cards on their twenty-sixth birthday.)

Fat women who brag about their large breasts (In fact, breasts in general could have taken up a whole page of the list, as could fat women, but they had decided to draw the line.)

Women who like Dido

Women who like Bridget Jones

Women who are like Bridget Jones

Sophie

Women who go on about how much they love shoes (subsection—women who think
Sex and the City
is real life)

Women who obsess about chocolate

Women who ask you what your sign is

Jennifer (neither of them could remember who Jennifer was, but they had agreed to leave her on because they must've had a good reason for adding her to the list once)

Thin women who make a big fuss because they've fattened up to a size ten

Crybaby women (arguably Helen, these days, but anyway) Women who say "pants" or "wicked" or "chav" (or whatever the catchphrase of the day is)

Women who talk in little-girl voices

Women who tell you they're mad (unless they are actually clinically insane)

Anyone who refers to themselves or anyone else as a "yummy mummy" Girly-girls

Women who refer to their periods as "women's problems"

Women who think you're interested in their IVF treatment

Broody women

Women who've had therapy

Women who fish for compliments ("I look so fat today," pause to give you time to say, "No! You're tiny")

Women who refer to their boyfriends as their "fella"

Laura (recently crossed out by Helen)

Women who wear suspenders. Or corsets. Or anything else they've read in one of their boyfriend's lads' mags is supposed to be sexy.

Women who try too hard (see above)

Women who wear flowers in their hair/pashminas/black bras with white tops/court shoes

Mothers who work part-time and expect the whole world to revolve around their commitments ("Oh, I'll have to change my day next week, Sam's nursery's closed for redecoration.")

Women who breast-feed in public

Women who are still breast-feeding when their children are old enough to ask for it

OK, so Helen might be guilty of a major crime on the list, but Rachel was now culpable on two counts and probably would soon be ticking off a few more.

Helen cut the call short, promising to spend some time over the next few weekends visiting potential wedding venues. She thought about asking if Rachel was up for a drink later in the week, but she knew she wouldn't be—or if she was, it would be on the proviso that Neil came, too—not that that was a bad thing in itself, Neil was good company, but it wasn't the same. Helen didn't feel she could talk about the Matthew problem with Neil chipping in every so often that he thought Matthew was a "nice guy" and when were they all going to go out again? She knew that Sophie, under different circumstances, would indulge her, but of course Sophie thought she was a successful publicist already, so she couldn't share her news with her. Still, she wanted to hear the details of yesterday afternoon, so she called her anyway, reminding herself not to let anything slip about her own situation.

"Honestly," Sophie said when Helen pressed her, "it was great. The girls loved it, we got on, no arguments. You were right, you know, I felt in control, well, once I got over the painting thing, anyway, and I think that however happy he thinks he is, he must've gone back thinking he was missing out on his family. I hope so, anyway."

"Well, you have to keep it up," Helen said in reply, trying to ignore the irrational twinge of jealousy that she was feeling. She should be pleased—and she was—but it wasn't the world's greatest ego boost to know that he could slip back into his old life so easily. "Make him suffer."

"I will. Thanks, by the way," Sophie was saying, "for all your advice and stuff. I really appreciate it."

* * *

Helen decided to leave work early, leaving Jamie reading aloud the latest installment from Alan's e-mails—which detailed an evening at a hotel which had taken place recently—to the general office. She headed home to find that Matthew had beaten her to it and was in the middle of dressing the front room so it looked like, Helen thought, a brothel at Christmas: colored scarves draped over the table lamps—she was sure she could smell burning—and candles teetering precariously on the bookshelves. The table was laid for dinner for two and a bottle of champagne sat in an ice bucket in the middle. Helen looked at her watch; it was only half past five. She could hear Matthew humming away to himself in the shower and she knew she'd ruined some kind of big surprise or other. She didn't even take her coat off but, loath as she was to leave the death trap her flat seemed to have become, with the lethal combinations of not only scarves and naked lightbulbs but candles and an inquisitive cat, turned around and walked out the front door. Then she unlocked the door again, went straight back in, picked Norman up and, despite his protests, shut him in the kitchen.

At half past six, she started to trudge back toward the flat, rehearsing her shocked and delighted reaction in her head. Matthew was hovering in the hall when she let herself in, like a nervous party hostess, looking so eager and excited about his big secret that she didn't find it too hard to indulge him a bit.

"What?" she said. "What's going on?"

Matthew indicated the living room with a flamboyant wave of his hand.

"Ta-da!"

Helen went on through. The candles were burned down to stumps and she could see that one of the colored scarves had been discarded and was lying on the chair with a suspicious-looking black ring in the middle. The burning smell, which had gotten worse, had been joined by a delicious curry aroma.

"Wow, Matthew, what is this?"

"Celebration dinner," he said proudly. "In honor of your new job."

"You've cooked?"

"Well, I ordered takeout."

"It looks amazing in here. Thank you so much."

It
was
sweet that he'd gone to all this trouble for her. Three or four months ago, she would have been blown away, would have bored Rachel to death with every detail. Today, she was just about managing to look grateful.