The Darker Side of Mummy Misfit #2 (16 page)

Where we once would have laughed at this, Ned looked put-out.  “Well if you didn’t have bloody bum-boys as friends, we wouldn’t have this problem, would we Lib?”

And he left the room.

Monday 15
^th
December

Fenella offered to have Max and the dogs today so that I could get on with some decorating.  Probably not my wisest decision when I’ve got the drinks party to organise for Ned’s birthday on Friday, but at least it’s given me something to focus on.

Mrs S rang at about eleven to say that she was “very much looking forward to” the party on Friday and that she would be bringing Pritesh now that he was single again.

“My poor lonely boy, Libbybeta.  Will you never come to your senses and leave that Neddy-Man to make my son happy?”

Oh great, here we go again.  Come back Gestapo - all is forgiven.

Made an extra strong coffee and retrieved a Silk Cut from the drawer - desperate times called for desperate measures.

Settled at the breakfast bar with my notepad and pen.

TO DO

Complete paint job on sitting room - hang pics etc.

Not so easy, as I’m useless at knocking nails in walls, but Ned’s never around to help these days.  Refuse to pay someone to do it - that’s just daft.

Finish cooking and freezing nibbles.

Also check what Fenella’s prepared.  She’s offered to help but I think that’s just so that she knows there’ll be enough food to keep her going through the night.

Stock up on Irn Bru.

Think a dozen cans should do her for the night.  Must remember to buy some new champagne glasses - never owned a complete set before but see no reason why we shouldn’t now we are a ‘family of means’.  Also Fenella is quite fussy about her choice of Irn Bru glass and she’s passed the habit on to Mrs S who will now only drink ‘accessorised’ Babycham.

Finish wrapping Christmas presents and rack brain for birthday present idea for Ned.

Sex? With a bow?

Stop kicking myself for not inviting Dan to the drinks party.

Would have been a daft idea - he’s a teacher, not a friend.  
Daft!

Double check that Olga is OK for the night.

I offered to pay her if she came to look after the kids.  Felt like a bit of a Meemie because I would normally have asked her as a guest, but I was worried that Nic and Rick wouldn’t be able to enjoy their evening if Mikhail was playing up.  I know Olga needs the money to send back home to her family and she was thrilled to be asked - so I didn’t feel so bad.  Nic and Rick are staying the night with us so I pray Mikhail lets us all get some sleep.

Finalise numbers.

Me, Ned, Mrs S, Pritesh
,
Fenella, Josh, Jenny, Colin, Patience, Skunk, Silver, Nic Rick - all OK.  Elle has a Christmas bash with Rob, and Harriet has far too many balls in the air (and to break) but may “pop in”.  I’ve not bothered to ask Mum and Bert - she’d be bound to upset someone and I can’t be on edge all night waiting for her to drop another verbal bombshell.

Kids - Max, Todd, Charlotte, Solomon and Wonder Lungs

Dogs - Dog, Dot, Stripe, Splodge, Brown.

Phew, it’s going to be quite a houseful and at the moment it’s covered in dust sheets and half-painted walls.

Better get on.

PM

Thank the Lord for green-haired, pierced punks!

Skunk turned up at about midday with some new pickles he’s thinking of introducing to the ‘Ba’s Kitchen’range.  He thought it might be a good idea to ‘test drive’ them on people at the party.

Anyway, he was at a bit of a loose end so he offered to stay and help me with the painting and any odd jobs I couldn’t manage.

We had a great afternoon, singing along to ‘Heart’ radio.  Must have made quite an incongruous sight - middle aged mum and punk working side by side and singing to the likes of Take That and Bonny Tyler.

Skunk told me that things were going really well with Silver and that they were intending to move in together in the New Year.

“She’s great, Lib.  You know, she’s put together an ace stocking for Mrs S for Christmas - it’s got some of those wicked trackies she loves wiv ‘Chili Hot’ on the butt cheeks, a rare Bazza CD, some o’ those ‘saddo-loved-up’ books she reads and some weird dangly bits to put on her Babycham glass.”

Told him that sounded fab and that Mrs S would be over the moon - they really are so good to her and I know she appreciates what they do for her.

“Anyway, ‘ow you been keeping then, Lib?  You know, after the baby and all that?  Must be tough.”

Realised that Skunk was the first person, for the longest time, to acknowledge my loss - it had become a bit like the elephant in the room, with everyone else side-stepping it and I appreciated his directness.

Told him I was OK but no, it hadn’t been easy.

“Must fuck up your marriage for a while, eh?  S’pose it kinda changes everyfink.”

I nodded silently at Skunk.  So much said in so few words.

Tuesday 16
^th
December

Ned was amazed at the transformation of our house when he
finally
got home last night.

Felt a bit miffed with him for being late (again) so didn’t bother telling him what I had planned for today.

Skunk had said that he had a totally free day and, if I wanted to make myself scarce, he’d come in and give the kitchen a lick of paint.

Practically bit his hand off at the offer - it would mean I’d have the whole of the downstairs completed before Christmas.

So today Patience is having Max, Todd and Charlotte while Fenella and I take Mrs S out for a spin in her wheelchair around the shops.  Since her fall she doesn’t get out and about that much, as she’s still a bit dodgy on her pins, and I thought it would make a pleasant change for her.

Fenella ‘rolled’ round here just after eleven and we set off with Mrs S bundled in her coat and scarf telling us that her bootie was “lovely warm” because she had a hot water bottle down her ‘Blingtastic’ trackies under her billowing blood-red sari.

PM

My kitchen is gorgeous, which is just as well because I can’t move from the sofa in the corner.  My back’s breaking and I’ve got blisters on my feet and hands.

Never
take a geriatric, arthritic octogenarian shopping in a wheelchair with a heavily pregnant rhino.

All was going swimmingly as we meandered around the shops pondering over our purchases - a mega expensive anti-stretchmark cream for Fenella, some new cushions for my kitchen for me and some thermals for Mrs S.

We then decided to head off for some lunch as Fenella said she was wasting away from lack of food - she’d been nibbling on crisps, nuts and chocolate digestives the whole time we’d been out!

Lunch was great - an ‘all you can eat’ Indian buffet - and we certainly made the most of it.  Mrs S was of course saying it was nothing like proper home-cooked Indian food, but it didn’t stop her tucking in.

Fenella actually made me feel a little unwell with the amount she managed to eat but she said she needed it as fuel to make it through the rest of the afternoon.

If anyone should have had extra fuel to make it through the afternoon, it should have been me.

No sooner had we hit WH Smith (for Mrs S to have a look at the new Mills & Boon titles), Fenella started complaining of a pain in her side.  It got progressively worse as Mrs S debated whether to buy ‘Primal Passion’ or ‘Letter to my Love’.

By the time we were paying, Mrs S was out of her wheelchair and Fenella was in it, groaning and holding her stomach.

“I am very much thinking that we may need to be delivering a baby in the gift wrap section,” Mrs S was twittering as she leant on her walking stick, which thankfully she’d remembered to take with her.

Told her not to be so silly and that all Fenella needed was a bit of fresh air and some Rescue Remedy.

The ‘bit of fresh air’ concept was much harder to put into practice.

I don’t know how much Fenella weighs now but I’d hazard a guess at about four times a Mrs Sengupta because I could hardly get the wheelchair to budge.

It eventually took two security guards to get her out onto the street with Mrs S tottering beside me and hanging on to my arm, talking of hot towels and kettles of water.  Tried to explain to her that it was far too early for the baby to be making an entrance (or exit!) but she was having none of it.

Once outside I had to put all my strength into getting the wheelchair closer to a bench so that Mrs S could have a sit down - the security guards told me it was more than their jobs were worth to push her further than the shop front - something to do with health and safety.

What about
my
health and safety?  I thought I was about to suffer heart failure by the time I fell onto the bench next to Mrs S.

Fenella was beginning to pant by this point and I was panicking that Mrs S might have been right about the imminent birth.  I managed to get my breath and tell Mrs S to sit and chat calmly to Fenella.  I stood shivering in a shop doorway and called for an ambulance after letting Josh know that his wife might be about to give birth prematurely in the middle of town.

By the time the ambulance arrived Mrs S was beside herself with the drama of it all and Fenella was looking a little green around the gills.

“I had very much forgotten how exciting it can be to have a day out and about”, Mrs S was telling the lovely ambulance-man as he took Fenella’s blood pressure.  “It is very much more exciting to be travelling in an ambulance as a passenger and not a patient.”  She just kept going
on and on
and I really wanted to scream at her to shut up but I knew, deep down, it was probably because she was a nervous as I was.

Once we got to A&E we were kept waiting for ages but Fenella seemed to have improved a little.  Mrs S kept herself busy hobbling backwards and forwards to the drinks machine and talking to the other patients - she really did make the most of her big day out.

After we’d been waiting for a couple of hours Fenella decided to hoist herself out of the wheelchair and make her way to the loo.  Mrs S had become restless by this point and was banging on the receptionist’s counter demanding that Fenella be seen by a doctor before she gave birth on the floor.  “I am very much knowing what I am talking about.  I have been with child four times and I know the signs.  You must not be leaving this woman in pain any longer.”

At which point Fenella appeared back from the loo and coyly whispered in my ear that it may have been a bad case of wind and just “the smallest of false alarms”!

We left fairly quickly after that, before Mrs S was barred for life, and she and Fenella took it in turns to be pushed home by Muggins.

Uphill!  With all our shopping hanging on the handles!

Wednesday 17
^th
December

Oh my poor aching bones - felt like a geriatric arthritic myself when I got out of bed this morning.

Fenella called to apologise and said that she’d been burping and farting all night.  “Must have overdone the Indian a bit, Lib!  Soz!”

Told her not to worry about it, it had all worked out in the end - so to speak!

Took Max next door to see if Mrs S had recovered from her busy day out.

Of course she was positively buzzing with the excitement of it all.

“Libbybeta, I have not been enjoying myself so much for years.  I was telling Skunk this morning on the telephone, I felt like one of the Charlie’s Angels on a mission about town.  What an exciting day!”

My aching limbs decided it had all been worth it if I’d managed to cheer Mrs S up
that
much, but I figured there must be easier ways.

PM

Spent the afternoon cooking with Max who’s very excited about the party on Friday because he gets to have his best friends and all the dogs over.

Realised how lucky we are to have a child who’s so easily pleased and happy-go-lucky.  He also has no idea that things aren’t too great in the Marchant household at the moment and that’s exactly the way I want it to remain.

Just as well he didn’t witness Ned and me trying desperately to make conversation over a bottle of wine tonight.

Or the way I snubbed him when he tried to get ‘friendly’.

I guess he’s wondering why he bothered coming home on time.

Thursday 18
^th
December

Realised that I’d not had the call from Jenny with the goss she’d promised, so decided to take the initiative and call her before Max and I set off to do the food shopping for tomorrow.