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‘I’ve got a new bag. It’s Hermès,’ she said, holding up the handbag. Then her shoulders started to shake.
‘SkinnyVentiDecafCappkeepthechange,’ I rattled off, shoving a fiver at the barista and thinking, ‘If Nicolette’s having a breakdown now, then that’s it. It’s a cut-and-dried case. Everybody, left, right and centre, is a mess of cracked shells.’
‘Come downstairs,’ I said to Nicolette, patting her shoulder awkwardly. Fortunately there was no one else in the basement.
‘I’ve got a new bag,’ she said. ‘And this is the receipt.’
I stared blankly at the receipt. ‘My husband bought it for me, from Frankfurt airport.’
‘Well, that’s nice. It’s beautiful,’ I lied. The handbag was mad. It had no rhyme or reason, buckles and straps and loops bursting out everywhere like lunatics.
‘Look at the receipt,’ she said, pointing at it. ‘It’s for two handbags.’
I blinked at the receipt. It did seem to be for two handbags. But so?
‘It’s just a mistake,’ I said. ‘Ring them and get the money back.’
She shook her head. ‘I know who she is. I called her. It’s been going on for eight months. He bought her the identical bag.’ Her face crumpled. ‘It was a present. And he bought the same one for her.’
Got home and checked my emails:
Sender:
Nicolette Martinez
Subject:
The school fucking concert
Just to let you know I don’t give a flying fuck who brings the mince pies or mulled wine this year and you can all turn up whenever the FUCK you like because I don’t FUCKING WELL GIVE A FUCK.
Nicorette
I need it.
Think will give Nicolette a ring.
11 p.m. Just had brilliant night at our place with Nicolette, with the three boys running riot on Roblox and Mabel watching SpongeBob SquarePants while we had some wine, pizza, cheese, Diet Coke, Red Bull, Cadbury’s chocolate buttons, Rolos and Häagen-Dazs, and Nicolette looked at OkCupid, shouting, ‘Bastards! Fuckwittage!’
In the middle Tom turned up, slightly plastered, going on about a new survey: ‘It proves that the quality of someone’s relationships is the biggest indicator of their long-term emotional health – not so much the “significant other” relationship, as the measure of happiness is not your husband or boyfriend but the quality of the other relationships you have around you. Anyway, just thought I’d tell you. I’ve got to go and meet Arkis now.’
Nicolette is now asleep in my bed and four kids are all squeezed in the bunk beds.
You see? Don’t need men anyway.
A HERO WILL RISE
Friday 29 November 2013
This is what happened. Billy had a football match at another school, East Finchley, a few miles away. We’d been told to park in the street to pick them up, as cars weren’t allowed in the grounds. The school was a tall, red-brick building, with a small concrete yard in front of the gates, and to the left, a sunken sports court, four feet down, surrounded by a heavy chain-link fence.
The boys were running round the sports court kicking balls, the mothers chatting round the East Finchley steps. Suddenly, a black BMW roared right up to the school, the driver, an idiotically flashy-looking father, talking on his mobile.
Mr Wallaker strode to the car. ‘Excuse me.’
The father ignored him, continuing to talk on his phone, engine still running. Mr Wallaker rapped on the window. ‘Cars are not allowed in the school grounds. Park in the street, please.’
The window slid open. ‘Time is money for some of us, my friend.’
