Читать книгу Rescuing Rose - Isabel Wolff - Страница 6

Fear and bewilderment mingled in Ed’s soft brown eyes as we faced each other in the garden. I stared at him, vibrant with indignation, then slowly drew back my right arm.

‘Take that!’ I shouted as a Wedgwood Kutani Crane seven-inch tea plate went whizzing past his left ear and smashed into the garden wall. ‘And that!’ I yelled as he raised his hands to fend off first the matching saucer, then the cup. ‘You can have these too!’ I spat as I frisbeed three dinner plates in his direction. ‘And this!’ I bawled as the accompanying soup tureen flew through the air.

‘Rose!’ Ed shouted, dodging bits of projectile china. ‘Rose, stop this nonsense!’

‘No!’

‘What on earth do you hope to achieve?’

‘Emotional satisfaction,’ I spat. Ed successfully deflected the gravy boat and a couple of pudding bowls. I lobbed the milk jug at him and it shattered into shrapnel as it hit the path.

‘For God’s sake Rose – this stuff’s bloody expensive!’

‘Yes!’ I said gaily. ‘I know!’ I picked up our wedding photo in its silver frame and flung that at him, hard. He ducked, and it hit the tree behind him, the glass splintering into shining shards. I stood there, breathless with exertion and raised adrenaline as he picked up the dented frame. In that picture we looked radiantly happy. It had been taken just seven months before.

‘It’s no-one’s fault,’ he said. ‘These things happen.’

‘Don’t give me that crap!’ I yelled.

‘But I was so unhappy Rose. I was miserable. I couldn’t cope with coming second to your career.’

‘But my career matters to me,’ I said as I slashed the matrimonial duvet with my biggest Sabatier. ‘Anyway it’s not just a career, it’s a vocation. They need me, those people out there.’

‘But I needed you too,’ he whined as a cloud of goose-down swirled through the air. ‘I didn’t see why I had to compete with all those losers!’

‘Ed!’ I said, ‘that’s low!’

‘Desperate of Dagenham!’

‘Stop it!’

‘Betrayed of Barnsley.’

‘Don’t be mean!’

‘Agoraphobic of Aberystwyth.’

‘That’s so nasty.’

‘There was never any room for me!’

As I gazed at Ed, the knife dropped to my side and I caught my breath, once again, at his looks. He was so utterly, ridiculously good-looking. The handsomest man I’d ever met. Sometimes he looked a little like Gregory Peck. Who was it he reminded me of now? Of course. Jimmy Stewart in It’s a Wonderful Life, all happy and covered in snow. Except it wasn’t snow on Ed’s shoulders but white feathers, and life wasn’t wonderful at all.

‘I’m sorry, Rose,’ he whispered as he spat out two tiny plumes. ‘It’s over. We’ve got to move on.’

‘Don’t you love me then?’ I asked, tentatively, my heart banging like a Kodo drum.

‘I did love you Rose,’ he said regretfully. ‘I really did. But…no, I don’t think I love you any more.’

‘You don’t love me?’ I echoed dismally. ‘Oh. Oh, I see. Well you have now hurt my feelings Ed. You have really got to me. I am now very angry.’ I rummaged in my arsenal and found a Le Creuset frying pan. ‘And suppressed anger is bad for one’s health, so you’ll just have to take your punishment like a man.’

As I picked up the pan with both hands, horror registered on Ed’s handsome face.

‘Please Rose. Don’t be silly.’

‘I’m perfectly serious,’ I said.

‘You’ve had your little game.’

‘It isn’t over. At least not yet.’

‘You’re not really going to hit me with that, are you?’ he pleaded as I advanced across the feather-strewn lawn. ‘Please Rose,’ he wheezed. ‘Don’t.’ And now, as I moved towards him, smashed china crunching underfoot, his voice began to rise from its normal light tenor, to contralto, until it was a kind of odd, soprano whine. ‘Please Rose,’ he whimpered. ‘Not with that. You could really hurt me, you know.’

‘Good!’

‘Rose, don’t. Stop it!’ he wailed, as he tried to protect himself with his hands. ‘Rose. ROSE!’ he screamed, as I lifted the pan aloft and prepared to bring it down, hard, on his head. ‘Rose!’ And now, from somewhere, I could hear banging, and shouting. ‘ROSE!’ Ed shrieked. ‘ROSE! ROSE!’

Suddenly I was sitting bolt upright in bed, heart pounding, eyes staring, my mouth as dry as dust. I was no longer in Ed’s garden in Putney, but in my new house in Camberwell.

‘ROSE!!’ I heard. ‘OPEN UP!!’

I staggered down the unfamiliar stairs, still shocked by the dream which churned in my brain like a thunder cloud.

‘Rose!’ exclaimed Bella as I opened the front door. ‘Rose, thank…’

‘…God!’ sighed Bea.

‘We’ve been banging for hours,’ Bella breathed looking stricken. ‘We thought you might have done something…’

‘…silly,’ concluded Bea. ‘You wouldn’t, would you?’ she went on anxiously. I looked at them. Would I? No.

‘I’d fallen asleep,’ I croaked. ‘Didn’t hear you. It’s knackering moving house.’

‘We know,’ they said, ‘so we’ve come to help you.’ They came in, then gave me a hug.

‘Are you okay, Rose?’ they enquired solicitously.

‘I’m fine,’ I said, wanting to cry.

‘Wow!’ gasped Bella as she surveyed the sitting room.

‘Blimey!’ said Bea. ‘What a mess.’

The room was crammed with cardboard packing cases, bisected by shiny black masking tape. They were stacked up like miniature skyscrapers, almost totally obscuring the floor. I’d paid good money for Shift It Kwik but now I regretted my choice, for far from putting the boxes in their designated rooms, they’d just dumped them then buggered off. ‘KITCH,’ said a box by the window. ‘BATH’ announced the one by the stairs. ‘BED 1,’ said the two by the fireplace. ‘STUDY,’ declared the one by the door.

‘This is going to take you ages,’ said Bea, wonderingly.

‘Weeks,’ added Bella. I sighed. Bella and Bea’s gift for stating the screamingly obvious can drive me nuts. When I broke my arm ice-skating when I was twelve, all they said was, ‘Rose, you should have taken more care.’ When I failed my ‘A’ Levels they said, ‘Rose you should have done more work.’ And when I got engaged to Ed, they said, ‘Rose, we think it’s too soon.’ That didn’t seem at all apparent to me then, but it sure as hell does now. Oh yes, Bella and Bea always state the obvious, but they have twenty-four carat hearts.

‘Don’t worry,’ said Bella. ‘We’ll…’

‘…help you,’ concluded Bea. They’re like an old married couple in many ways. They finish each other’s sentences, for example, and they bicker a lot of the time. Like many an old married couple, they even look alike; but that’s not surprising – they’re identical twins.

‘Give us the guided tour,’ said Bella. ‘It’s quite big,’ she added. This was true. I’d gone looking for a large garden flat but had ended up with a three bedroomed house. The twins admired the size of the kitchen, but thought the bathroom was a bit small.

‘But for a single person it’s fine,’ said Bea helpfully. I winced. Single. Fuck. That was me. ‘Nice garden though!’ exclaimed Bella, changing the subject.

‘And it’s a sweet little street,’ added Bea. ‘It looks a bit scruffy,’ she remarked as we peered out of the landing window. ‘But friendly.’

‘Hope Street,’ I said with a bitter laugh.

‘Well,’ added Bella brightly, ‘we think it’s just…’

‘…lovely!’

‘It’s fine,’ I shrugged. ‘It’ll do.’ I thought with a pang of Ed’s elegant house in Putney with its walled garden and yellow drawing room. Moving into that had been exhausting too, but in a nice way as we’d got engaged just two weeks before. As I’d unpacked my stuff the future had seemed to stretch before us like a ribbon of clear motorway. But we’d hardly set off before we’d crashed and had to be ignominiously towed away. So now here I was, my marriage a write-off, upping sticks yet again.

Some women in my situation might have been tempted to move a little further afield – to Tasmania, say, or Mars, but though I was keen to put some distance between us I reckoned Camberwell was far enough. Plus it would be convenient for work and the area was still relatively cheap. So, a month ago, I dropped into a local estate agents and before I knew it, One Hope Street was mine.

‘It’s vacant for possession,’ said the negotiator with unctuous enthusiasm, ‘and it’s semi-detached.’ Just like me. ‘It’s been empty for a few months,’ she added, ‘but it’s in pretty good shape – all it really needs is a clean.’

When, ten minutes later, I saw the house, I took to it at once. It had this indignant, slightly abandoned air; it exuded disappointment and regret. It was the first in a short terrace of flat fronted houses, and it had a semi-paved garden at the back.

‘I’ll take it,’ I said casually, as though I were spending twenty quid, not four hundred grand. So I inflated my income to the building society and exchanged in ten days flat. But then I’m the impatient type. I married very quickly, for example. I separated quickly as well. And it took me precisely two and a half weeks to buy and move into this house.

‘Can you afford it?’ asked Bella, tucking her short blonde hair behind one ear.

‘No,’ I said simply. ‘I can’t.’

‘Why did you get it then?’ demanded Bea, who can be overbearing.

‘It was an impulse buy.’

‘We’ll help you decorate,’ said Bella as she scissored open a packing case.

‘You can be our first client,’ said Bea.

‘Have you got a name yet?’ I asked.

‘Design at the Double!’ they chorused.

‘Hmm. That’s catchy,’ I said.

The twins have just given up their respective jobs to start an interior design company. Despite a conspicuous lack of experience they seem confident that it’ll work out.

‘All you need’s a few contacts, then it snowballs,’ Bea had said blithely when they first told me about their plans. ‘A nice mention in one of the glossies and we’ll soon be turning them away.’

‘You make it sound unfeasibly easy,’ I’d said.

‘But the market for it is huge. All those rich people,’ said Bella happily, ‘with big houses and horrible taste.’

‘We’ll get you things at cost,’ Bella offered as she unpacked some dinner plates. ‘I think you should definitely get a new bathroom suite…’

‘With a glass basin,’ said Bea.

‘And a jacuzzi,’ Bella added.

‘And a hand-built kitchen of course.’

‘Yes, Poggenpohl,’ suggested Bella enthusiastically.

‘No, Smallbone of Devizes,’ said Bea.

‘Poggenpohl.’

‘No, Smallbone.’

‘You always contradict me.’

‘No I don’t!’

‘Look, I won’t be getting any of that fancy stuff,’ I interjected wearily. ‘I’m not going to have the cash.’

As the twins argued about the relative merits of expensive kitchens I opened boxes in the sitting room. Heart pounding, I gingerly unpacked the wedding photo I’d flung at Ed in my dream. We were standing on the steps of the Chelsea town hall in a blissful, confettied blur. Don’t think me conceited, but we looked bloody good together. Ed’s six foot three – a bit taller than me – with fine, dark hair which curls at the nape. He’s got these warm, melting brown eyes, while mine are green and my hair’s Titian red.

‘You’re my perfect red Rose,’ Ed had joked at the start – though he was soon moaning about my thorns. But it was so wonderful to begin with I reflected dismally as I put the photo, face down, in a drawer. Ours had been not so much a whirlwind romance as a tornado, but it had already blown itself out. I surveyed the trail of marital debris it had left in its wake. There were dozens of wedding presents, most – unlike our abbreviated marriage – still under guarantee. We’d decided to split them by simply keeping those from our respective friends; which meant that Ed got the Hawaiian barbecue while Rudolf came with me. Ed didn’t mind: he’d never really taken to Rudy who was given to us by the twins. We named him Rudolf Valentino because he’s so silent: he’s never uttered a word. mynah birds are meant to be garrulous but ours has the conversational skills of a corpse.

‘Speak to us, Rudy,’ I heard Bella say.

‘Yes, say something,’ added Bea. I heard them trying to tempt him into speech with whistles and clicks but he remained defiantly purse-beaked.

‘Look, Rudy, we paid good money for you,’ said Bella. ‘Two hundred smackers to be precise.’

‘It was three hundred,’ Bea corrected her.

‘No it wasn’t. It was two.’

‘It was three, Bella: I remember distinctly.’

‘Well you’ve remembered it wrong – it was two!’

I wearily opened the box labelled ‘STUDY’ because I’d soon have to get back to work. Lying on top was a copy of my new book – this is embarrassing – Secrets of Marriage Success. As I say, I do things very fast, and I wrote it in less than three months. By unfortunate coincidence it was published on the day that Ed and I broke up. Given the distressingly public nature of our split the reviews were less than kind. ‘Reading Rose Costelloe’s book is like going to a bankrupt for financial advice,’ was just one of the many sniggery remarks. ‘Whatever next?’ sneered another, ‘Ann Widdecombe on Secrets of Fashion Success?’

I’d wanted my publishers to pull it, but by then it had gone too far. Now I put it in the drawer with my wedding photo, then took my computer and some files upstairs. In the study next to my bedroom I opened a large box marked ‘Letters/Answered’, and took out the one on top.

Dear Rose, I read. I wonder if you can help me – my marriage has gone terribly wrong. But it all started well and I was bowled over by my wife who’s beautiful, vivacious, and fun. She was a successful freelance journalist when we met; but, out of the blue, she got a job as an agony aunt and suddenly my life became hell. The fact is I hardly see her – answering the letters takes up all of her time; and when I do see her all she talks about is her readers’ problems and, frankly, it gets me down. I’ve asked her to give it up – or at least tone it down – but she won’t. Should I file for divorce?

Clipped to the back was my reply.

Dear Pissed-Off of Putney, Thank you for writing to me. I’d like to help you if I possibly can. Firstly, although I feel certain that your wife loves you, it’s obvious that she adores her career as well. And speaking from experience I know that writing an agony column is a hugely fulfilling thing to do. It’s hard to describe the thrill you get from knowing that you’ve given someone in need great advice. So my suggestion, P-O – if I may call you that – is not to do anything rash. You haven’t been married long, so just keep talking and I’m sure that, in time, things will improve. Then, on an impulse, which I would later greatly regret, I added: Maybe marriage guidance might help…

It didn’t. Far from it – I should have known. Ed suggested we went to Resolve – commonly known as ‘Dissolve’ – but I couldn’t stand our counsellor, Mary-Claire Grey. From the second I laid eyes on her she irritated the hell out of me, with her babyish face, and dodgy highlights and ski-jump nose and tiny feet. I have been hoist with my own petard, I thought dismally, as we sat awkwardly in her consulting room. But by that stage Ed and I were arguing a lot so I believed that counselling might help. It wouldn’t have been so bad if Miss Grey inspired any confidence, but the idiotic little woman simply did not. She was thirty-five(ish), divorced, and a former social worker she told us in this fey, squeaky voice.

‘What I shall do,’ she began, smiling winsomely, ‘is simply to listen to you both. I shall then reinterpret – or, to give it its technical name, reframe – what you both say. Got that?’ Catatonic with embarrassment, and already hating her, I nodded, like an obedient kid. ‘Okay, Ed,’ she said. ‘You first,’ and she actually clapped her podgy little hands as though this were nursery school.

‘Rose,’ Ed began quietly, as he looked at me. ‘I feel that you don’t care about me any more.’

‘What Ed is saying there,’ interrupted Mary-Claire, ‘is that he feels you don’t care about him any more.’

‘I feel,’ he went on painfully, ‘that you’re more concerned about the losers who write to you, than you are about me.’

‘Ed feels you’re more concerned about the losers who write to you Rose, than you are about him.’

‘I feel neglected and frustrated,’ Ed went on sadly.

‘Ed feels neglected and –’

‘Frustrated?’ I snapped. ‘Look, my marriage may be a bit rocky at the moment, but my hearing’s perfectly fine!’

And then, I don’t know, after that, things went from bad to worse. Because when it came to my turn, Mary-Claire seemed not to hear what I’d said.

‘Ed, I’m really sorry we’ve got these problems,’ I began, swallowing hard.

‘Rose admits that there are huge problems,’ Mary-Claire announced, with an expression of exaggerated concern.

‘But I love my new career,’ I went on. ‘I just…love it, and I can’t simply give it up to please you.’

‘What Rose means by that, Ed,’ said Mary-Claire sweetly, ‘is that she doesn’t really want to please you.’ Eh?

‘You see, until I became an agony aunt, I’d never really felt professionally fulfilled.’

‘What Rose is saying there,’ interjected Mary-Claire, ‘is that it’s only her job that makes her feel fulfilled.’ Huh?

‘And I guess I am a bit over-zealous on the domestic front,’ I went on uncertainly, ‘and I know that’s been an issue too.’

‘Ed,’ said Mary-Claire soothingly, ‘Rose is acknowledging that at home she’s been a’ – theatrical pause here to signify sadness and regret – ‘control freak,’ she whispered. What?

‘But I do love you Ed,’ I went on, heroically ignoring her, ‘and I think we can work this through.’

‘What Rose is saying, there, Ed,’ ‘explained’ Mary-Claire benignly, ‘is that, basically, you’re through.’

‘I’m not saying that!’ I shouted, getting to my feet. ‘I’m saying we should try again!’ Mary-Claire gave me a look which combined slyness with pity, and Ed and I split up within three weeks.

Looking back, I think I’d been semi-hypnotised by Mary-Claire’s squeaky, sing-songy voice – like Melanie Griffiths on helium – otherwise I’d have been tempted to give her a slap. But for some reason I found it impossible to challenge her bizarre interventions. It was only later on, that I twigged…

Now, as I came downstairs again, I could hear Bella and Bea in the kitchen, arguing about flooring.

‘– hardwood would look good.’

‘– no, natural stone would be better.’

‘– but a maple veneer would look fantastic!’

‘– rubbish! She should go for slate!’

They should call their business ‘2 Much’ I decided as I went into the sitting room. I unpacked a pair of crystal candlesticks which had been a wedding present from my aunt. Shift It Kwik had wrapped them in some pages from the Daily News, and as I unfurled the yellowing paper I was gripped by a sense of déjà vu. ‘AGONY AUNT IN SPLIT’ announced the page 5 headline in my hand. Rose Costelloe, the Daily Post’s agony aunt, is to divorce, it explained gleefully beneath. Her husband, Human Resources Director, Ed Wright, has cited ‘irreconcilable differences’ as the cause of the split. However, sources close to Miss Costelloe claim that the real reason is Wright’s close friendship with Resolve counsellor, Mary-Claire Grey (pictured left).

‘The bitch!’ I shouted as I stared at my rival.

‘She certainly is!’ yelled the twins.

‘Oh dear,’ said Bella, as she came in and saw me clutching the article. ‘Want a tissue?’ I nodded. ‘Here.’

I pressed the paper hanky to my eyes. ‘She was supposed to be neutral,’ I wailed.

‘You should have had her struck off,’ said Bella.

‘I should have had her bumped off you mean.’

‘But why the hell did you suggest marriage guidance in the first place?’ asked Bea.

‘Because I genuinely thought it might help! Ed had been going on and on about my job, and about how much he hated what I did, and about how he hadn’t married an agony aunt, and how he was finding it all “very hard.” And I’d been sent a book on marriage guidance that day so the subject was in my mind. So, in a spirit of compromise I said, “Let’s get some counselling.” So we did – and that was that.’

As the twins disposed of the offending newspaper article, I agitatedly pinched a stray sheet of bubble wrap.

‘Miss Grey,’ I spat as the plastic bubbles burst with a crack like machine-gun fire.

‘Miss Conduct,’ suggested Bea.

‘Miss Demeanour,’ said Bella.

‘Miss Take,’ I corrected them. ‘I mean there she was,’ I ranted. ‘Smiling at Ed. Looking winsome. Batting her eyelids like a Furby. Sympathising with him at every turn, and twisting everything I said. By the time she’d finished you could have used my statements to take the corks out of pinotage. She knew exactly what she wanted and she went for it, and now thanks to her I’m getting divorced!’

I thought of those embarrassingly abbreviated marriages you read about sometimes in Hello! Kate Winslet and Jim Threapleton three years; Marco-Pierre White and Lisa Butcher – ten weeks. And Drew Barrymore split up with her first husband so fast they didn’t even have time for a honeymoon.

‘You got married too…’

‘Young?’ I interjected sardonically.

‘Er no. Soon, actually,’ said Bea. ‘But we warned you…’ she added shaking her head like a nodding dachshund.

‘Yes,’ I said bitterly, ‘you did.’

‘Marry in haste,’ Bea went on, ‘repent at…’

‘…haste. I’ll be divorced in just over six months!’

But the twins are right. It had happened too fast. But then when you’re older, you just know. I mean I’m thirty-six…ish. Well, thirty-eight actually. Oh all right, all right – thirty-nine: and I’d never believed in instant attraction, but Ed had proved me wrong. We met at a Christmas drinks party given by my next door neighbours in Meteor Street. I was making tiny talk by the Twiglets with this pleasant tree surgeon when I suddenly spotted Ed. He shone out of the crowd like a beacon, and he had clearly noticed me; because he came strolling over, introduced himself, and that was that. I was concussed with passion. I was bowled over. I was gob-smacked, bouleversée. I felt my jaw go slack with desire, and I probably drooled. Ed’s incredibly distinguished-looking; elegant, a young forty-one, with strong cheekbones and an aquiline nose. You can fall in love with a profile, I realised then, and I fell in love with his. As for the chemistry – there was enough erotic static crackling between us to blow the lights on the Blackpool tower. He told me he was Head of Human Resources at Paramutual Insurance and that he’d just bought a house near Putney Bridge. And I was waiting for some gimlet-eyed glamour puss to zoom up and lay a ferociously proprietorial hand on his arm, when he added casually, ‘I live there alone.’

If I believed in God – which, by the way, I don’t – I would have got down on my knees there and then and thanked Him, but instead said a silent Hurrah! Ed and I talked and flirted for another hour or so, then he offered to take me home.

‘But I only live next door,’ I protested with a laugh.

‘You told me that,’ he smiled. ‘But I’m not having a gorgeous woman like you wandering the streets of Clapham – I shall see you safely back.’

When you’re almost six foot one, as I am, you don’t get many offers like that. Men tend to assume you can take care of yourself – and of course I can. But at the same time I’ve always envied those dinky little girls who can always get some man to take them home. So when Ed gallantly offered to escort me to my door, I just knew that he was The One. After years of false sightings he’d arrived. Sometimes, in my single days, I’d been tempted to have him paged. Would Mr Right kindly make his way to Reception where Miss Costelloe has been waiting for him for the past fifteen years. Now, suddenly, there he was – phew! We spent Christmas in bed, he proposed on New Year’s Eve, and we were married on Valentine’s Day…

‘I had reservations,’ said Bella judiciously. ‘But I didn’t want to spoil it for you. Ed’s charming, yes,’ she went on. ‘Handsome, yes, intelligent yes…’ I felt sick. ‘He’s successful –’

‘And local,’ added Bea meaningfully.

‘He’s amusing…’

‘Okay,’ I said.

‘He has, moreover, a magnetic personality,’ Bella continued, ‘and sex appeal in spades. But, at the same time there was something I didn’t quite…like. Something…I can’t quite put my finger on,’ she added thoughtfully.

‘I thought he was all right,’ ventured Bea. ‘And you can sometimes be a bit abrasive Rose.’

‘That is hypocritical bollocks!’ I snapped.

‘But you didn’t seem to have much in common with him,’ Bea went on calmly. ‘I mean what did you do together?’

‘Well there wasn’t a lot of free time because we were so busy…’ I racked my brain. ‘We went swimming,’ I remembered, ‘and we played Scrabble. We did the crossword too. He was useless at anagrams,’ I added with a twist of spite, ‘so I’d do those. But soon all we were having were cross words.’

The problems had started almost immediately – within a month of our honeymoon. Ed and I had gone to Menorca – not my first choice admittedly, but on the other hand it seemed perfect in some ways as the anagram of Menorca is ‘Romance’. Between you and me, though, I’d thought he might whisk me off to Venice, say, or Sandy Lane. But his mum has a little flat on Menorca and so we went there. We had a lovely week – it was too cold to swim, but we walked and played tennis and read.

Then we went back to work – I was doing a stint at the Post – when this amazing thing happened to me. I was sitting at my desk one lunchtime, putting the finishing touches to a rather vicious profile of the P.R. king, Rex Delafoy, when suddenly there was this commotion. Doors were banging, people were running, and an air of tension and panic prevailed. It turned out that Edith Smugg, the Post’s ancient agony aunt, had gone face down in the soup at lunch. No-one knew quite how old she was because of all the face-lifts, but it turned out that she was eighty-three! Anyway, before Edith’s stiffening body had even been stretchered out of the building, I’d been deputed to complete her page. And I remember standing, shocked, by her paper-strewn desk and wondering what the hell to do. So I stuck my hand in the postbag and pulled out three letters as if drawing the raffle at some village fete.

To my astonishment I found the contents riveting. The first was from a chap with premature ejaculation, the second was from a woman who’d sadly murdered her boyfriend five years before, and the third was from a seventy-three-year-old virgin who thought he might be gay. So I answered them as best I could and the next day I was asked to carry on. I didn’t mind at all, because I’d enjoyed it; in fact by then I was hooked. I didn’t care how many letters there were – I’d have done it for free if they’d asked. The feeling it gave me – I can’t quite describe it – this delicious, warm glow inside. The knowledge that I might be able to help all these total strangers filled me with something like joy. I suddenly felt that I’d been born to be an agony aunt: at last I’d found my true niche. It was like a revelation to me – a Damascene flash – as though I’d heard a voice. ‘Rose! Rose!’ it boomed. ‘This is Thy God. Thou Shalt Dispense ADVICE!’

I kept expecting to hear that they’d hired some B-List celeb to take over, or some publicly humiliated political wife. I thought they’d be handing me my cards and saying, ‘Thanks for helping out, Rose – you’re a brick.’ And indeed there was talk of Trisha from daytime telly and even Carol Vordeman. But a month went by, and then another, and still no change was announced, and by now they were putting Ask Rose at the top of the page, and my photo byline too. The next thing I knew, I’d got a year’s contract; so there I was – an agony aunt.

I’d always read the problem page; it’s like the horoscope, I can never resist. But now, to my amazement, I was writing the replies myself. It’s a role I adore, and the sight of my bulging postbag just makes my heart sing. All those people to be helped. All those dilemmas to be resolved. All that human muddle and…mess. There are lots of perks as well. The money’s not bad and I get to broadcast and I’m asked to give seminars and talks. I also do a late-night phone-in, Sound Advice, at London FM twice a week. And all this simply because I happened to be in the office on the day that Edith Smugg dropped dead! I thought Ed would be pleased for me, but he wasn’t – far from it. That’s when things began to go wrong.

‘Ed – what’s the problem?’ I asked, one Sunday in late June. He’d been in a funny sort of mood all day.

‘The problem Rose,’ he said slowly, ‘or at least the main problem – because there are several problems – is other people’s problems. That’s the problem.’

‘Oh,’ I said uncertainly. ‘I see.’

‘I wish you’d never become an agony aunt,’ he went on wearily.

‘Well I’m sorry, Ed, but I did.’

‘And I don’t like you bringing your work home.’

‘I have no option, it’s a huge job. In any case I’d have thought you’d be understanding given that you work in Personnel.’

‘It’s called Human Resources these days,’ he corrected me stiffly.

‘So it is. But you sort out people’s problems too.’

‘I sort out “issues” actually,’ he said. Not “problems”. And it’s precisely because I have to listen to people whining to me about their maternity leave or the size of their parking space, that I don’t want more whingeing when I get home. In any case I thought agony aunts made it all up.’

‘A common misconception,’ I said.

‘Well how many letters do you actually print?’

‘I answer eight on the page, twice a week.’

‘And how many do you get?’

‘About a hundred and fifty.’

‘So why bother with all the rest? I mean, why don’t you just put a line at the bottom saying, “Rose regrets that letters cannot be answered personally”.’

‘Because, Ed,’ I said, irritated by now, ‘those people are depending on me. They’ve confided in me. They’ve put their faith in me. I have a sacred duty to write back. I mean, take this woman for example.’ I waved a piece of Basildon Bond at him. ‘Her husband has just run off with a dental hygienist thirty years his junior – don’t you think she deserves a reply?’

‘Well do other agony aunts write back to everyone?’

‘Some do,’ I said, ‘and some don’t. But if I didn’t then it would make me feel…mean. I couldn’t live with myself.’

Gradually it became apparent that Ed couldn’t live with me either.

‘Will you be coming to bed tonight?’ he’d ask me sardonically, ‘and if so, how will I recognise you?

‘I shall cite the letters as correspondence in our divorce,’ he’d quip with a bitter laugh.

Then he began getting on at me about all my other alleged shortcomings as well: my ‘total inability’ to cook for example – well I’ve never learnt – and my alleged ‘bossiness’. He also objected to what he impertinently called my ‘obsessive’ tidiness – ‘It’s like living in an operating theatre!’ he’d snap.

By July conflict had long since replaced kisses and we were sleeping in separate beds. That’s when, in a spirit of compromise, I suggested marriage guidance – and that was that…

‘Ed was supposed to get the seven year itch, not the seven month itch,’ I said to the twins as I fumbled for a tissue again. ‘I don’t know what I’m going to do. It’s so humiliating.’

‘Well what would you advise a reader in this situation to do?’ asked Bella.

‘I’d advise them to try and get over it – fast.’

‘Then you must do that too. There’s an equation for post relationship breakdown recovery,’ she added knowledgeably. ‘It’s supposed to take you half the time you were actually in a relationship to get over it. So in your case that would be five months.’

‘No,’ Bea corrected her, ‘it takes twice as long, not half – so it’s going to take her a year and a half.’

‘I’m sure it’s half the time,’ said Bella.

‘No, it’s double,’ insisted Bea. ‘Look, I’ll show you on a piece of paper if you like. Right, where x = the time it took him to ask you out and y = the number of times he told you he loved you and z = his income multiplied by the number of lovers you’d both had before then –’

‘Oh stop arguing you two,’ I said. ‘Because you’re both wrong – it’s not going to take me five months or eighteen months – it’s going to take me the rest of my life! Ed and I had our problems but I loved him,’ I wept. ‘I made this public commitment to him. He was The One.’

‘No, he wasn’t,’ Bella said gently. ‘If he really was The One, he would not have a) objected to your new career – especially as he knew it made you happy – and b) carried on with Mary-Claire Grey.’ At the sound of her name my tears slammed on the brakes and did a rapid U-turn up my cheeks. ‘May I inject a little reality here?’ Bella added gently as I felt a slick of snot slither down my top lip. ‘You’ve been let down; your marriage has prematurely failed; you’re nearly forty…’ – OH SHIT!!!!!!! – ‘…so you’ve got to move on. And I think you’ll only be able to do that successfully if you expunge Ed from your life.’

‘You’ve got to expel him,’ said Bea forcefully.

‘You’ve got to eject him,’ agreed her twin.

‘You’ve got to exile him,’ said Bea.

‘Erase him,’ Bella went on.

‘Evict him.’

‘Excommunicate him.’

‘You’ve got to exorcise him,’ they both said.

‘Exorcise him?’ I whispered. ‘Yes. That’s it. I shall simply Ed-it Ed out of my life.’

I felt better once I’d resolved to do that. Ed and I live eight miles apart, we have no mutual friends, my mail’s redirected, and we don’t have kids. We don’t even have to communicate through lawyers as we can’t start proceedings until we’ve been married a year. So it can all be nice and neat. Which is how I like things. Tidy. Sorted out. Nor do we have any joint financial commitments as the house belongs solely to Ed. I sold my flat when we got engaged and moved in with him. Ed wanted me to put in my equity to pool resources but Bella advised me to wait.

‘Rose,’ she said, ‘you haven’t known Ed long. Please, don’t tie up your cash with his until you feel certain it’s going to work out.’

Ed seemed disappointed that I wouldn’t do it, but as things turned out, Bella was right. As for letting all our friends know about the split – that had been taken care of by the popular press.

I shall simply carry on as though I’d never met him I decided as I opened more packing cases the next day. I shall be very civilised about it. I shall not get hysterical; I’ll be as cool as vichyssoise. In any case the unpalatable image of him canoodling with our marriage guidance counsellor would keep sentiment firmly at bay.

And now I masochistically replayed the scene where I’d found them together that day. I’d been invited to speak at a seminar on Relationship Enrichment and told Ed I’d be coming home late. I hadn’t thought it relevant to mention that it was being held in a conference room at the Savoy. But when I left at nine I had to walk through the bar and, to my astonishment, I spotted Ed. He was sitting at a corner table – behind a large parlour palm – holding hands with Mary-Claire Grey.

My unfailing advice to readers in such disagreeable situations is, Just Pretend You Haven’t Seen Them And Leave! But in the nanosecond it took my brain to clock their combined presence I had walked right up to them. Mary-Claire saw me first and the look of horror on her snouty little face is something I’ll never forget. She dropped Ed’s hand as though it were radioactive, and emitted a high-pitched little cough. Ed swivelled in his seat, saw me, blinked twice, blushed deeply and simply said, ‘Oh!’

I was relieved that he didn’t try and cover it up by saying, for example, ‘Gosh, Rose, fancy seeing you here!’ or ‘Darling, do you remember our marriage guidance counsellor, Mary-Claire Grey?’ or even ‘Can I get you a drink?’

‘Oh…Rose,’ Ed stuttered, getting to his feet. ‘Well, what a surprise! I, er expect you’re wondering what we’re…’

‘Yes,’ I interjected. ‘I am.’ I was so frosty I gave myself goose bumps, but inside I was as hot as a flame.

‘Well, I…we…we were just having a chat, actually.’

‘A chat?’ I echoed. ‘How nice. Well, don’t let me interrupt,’ I added with a chilly little smile. Then I turned on my heel, and left.

Looking back, the only thing that gives me any solace is the knowledge that I retained my dignity. It’s only in my dreams that I throw things at him, and swear, and rage and hit. In real life I was as cool as a frozen penguin, which might surprise people who know me well. I’m supposed to be ‘difficult’ you see – a bit ‘complicated’. A rather ‘thorny’ Rose – ho ho ho! And of course my red hair is a guaranteed sign of a crazy streak and a wicked tongue. So the fact that I didn’t erupt like Mount Etna in this moment of crisis would almost certainly confound my friends. But I felt oddly detached from what was going on. I was numb. I guess it was shock. I mean, there was my handsome husband, of barely six months, holding hands with a troll! This realisation astounded me so much that I was able to retain my sang-froid.

‘Rose…’ he ventured an hour and a half later in the kitchen where I was tidying out a drawer. ‘Rose…’ he repeated, but I was having difficulty hearing him over the deafening thump, thump of my heart. ‘Rose…’ he reiterated, ‘you must think badly of me.’

‘Yes,’ I said quietly. ‘I do.’

‘I just want to say that I’m truly sorry. I know it doesn’t look good.’ Now that elegant little apology really annoyed me, because I was enjoying being on the moral high ground. The air’s very bracing at ten thousand feet, and of course there’s a wonderful view. ‘But I’d like to…explain,’ he suggested impotently.

‘No. Spare me, Ed. Please don’t.’

‘I want to,’ he insisted. ‘There are things I’d like to say.’

Suddenly I noticed that one of the cupboards was grubby and began wiping it with a damp cloth.

‘I’m not remotely interested in why you were holding hands with that pigmy,’ I said stiffly as I swabbed away.

‘Look, Rose. We’ve got to talk.’

‘You sound like the B.T. ad.’

‘Mary-Claire and I were just…chatting,’ he added lamely.

‘Ed,’ I said serenely, ‘that’s a lie: a) you were not just “chatting”, you were holding hands; and b) there was a pool of drool under your table big enough to support aquatic life. What’s the attraction?’ I added breezily as I reached for the Ajax. ‘She looks like a pig in a tutu to me.’

‘Well…she…she…Mary-Claire listens to me Rose,’ he said with sudden emphasis. ‘She hears what I say. You don’t. You take everyone else’s problems seriously, don’t you – but not mine, and would you please put that cloth down?’

‘There’s a nasty mark here,’ I said. ‘It’s very stubborn. I’ll have to try Astonish if this doesn’t work.’

‘Will you stop cleaning, Rose, for Chrissake!’ He snatched the cloth out of my hand and hurled it into the sink with a flaccid slap. ‘You’re always cleaning things,’ he said. ‘That’s part of the problem – I can never relax.’

‘I just like things to be shipshape,’ I protested pleasantly. ‘No need to snap.’

‘But you’re always at it. It’s bizarre! If you’re not at work or the radio station you’re cleaning or tidying, or polishing the furniture, or you’re sorting drawers. Or you’re colour spectrumming my shirts: or filing stuff away, or you’re hoovering the floor, or telling me to hoover.’

‘But it’s a very big house.’

Ed shook his head. ‘You can never relax, Rose, can you? You can never just sit and be. Look,’ he added with a painful sigh, ‘you and I have got problems. What shall we do?’

At this my ears pricked up like a husky. Ed was talking my lingo now. This was just like one of my monthly ‘Dilemmas’ when the readers, rather than me, give advice. Rose (name changed to protect her identity), has just found her husband Ed (ditto), canoodling with their vertically-challenged marriage guidance counsellor, Mary-Claire Grey. Rose, understandably, feels shocked and betrayed. But, despite this, she still finds her husband desperately, knee-tremblingly, heart-breakingly attractive, so is wondering what to do. And I was just about to open my mouth when I heard Ed say, ‘Maybe we should have a trial separation.’ Separation. Oh. S, e, p, a, r…I reflected as I pulled the knife out of my heart.

‘One is apart,’ I said quietly.

‘What?’

‘One is apart.’

‘Well, yes – we will be. Just for a while.’

‘No, it’s the anagram of separation,’ I explained.

‘Oh,’ he sighed. ‘I see. But I think we should just have a breather…take a month off.’

‘So that you can shag that midget again?’

‘I haven’t shagged her – and she is a not a midget!’

‘Yes you have – and she is!’

‘I have…not…slept with Mary-Claire,’ he insisted.

‘I have a diploma in Advanced Body Language! I know.’

‘Well, I…’

‘Don’t bother to deny it, Ed.’

He clenched his jaw, as he does when he’s cornered, and a small blue vein jumped by his left eye. ‘It’s just…’ he sighed, ‘that I was feeling neglected and she –’

‘Paid you attention I suppose?’

‘Yes!’ he said defiantly. ‘She did. She talked to me, Rose. She communicated with me. Whereas you only communicate with strangers. That’s why I wrote you that letter,’ he added. ‘It’s the only way I could get a response! You’re…neurotic, Rose,’ he snapped, no longer contrite now, but angry. ‘Sometimes I think you need help.’

At that I put my J Cloth down and gave him a contemptuous stare. ‘That is ridiculous,’ I said quietly. ‘Help is what I provide.’

‘Look Rose,’ he said exasperatedly, running his left hand through his hair, ‘our marriage is not going well. We rushed into it because, being older, we thought we knew what we were doing – but we were wrong. And I found you so vibrant and so attractive, Rose – I still do. But I’m finding it hard to live with you, so for the time being let’s give each other some space.’

‘You want more space?’

‘Yes,’ he said. ‘Space.’

‘Well you can have all the space in the universe,’ I said calmly, ‘because I’m going to file for divorce.’

‘Oh,’ he said. I’d shocked him. I think I’d shocked myself. But I knew exactly what ‘let’s give each other space’ really meant, and I was going to be the one to quit first.

‘We’ll discuss it tomorrow,’ he added wearily.

‘No,’ I said, ‘there’s no need.’ I’d been chewing so hard on my lower lip that I could taste the metallic tang of blood.

‘You want to call it a day already?’ he asked quietly. I nodded. ‘Are you really sure?’ I nodded again. ‘Are you quite, quite sure?’ he persisted. ‘Because there’ll be serious consequences.’

‘Yes,’ I lied. ‘I am.’

‘Right,’ he said faintly. He shrugged. ‘Right. Okay…if that’s what you want. Well then,’ he said bleakly, ‘I guess that’s…it.’ He inhaled through his nose, gave me a grim little smile then walked away. But as he reached for the door handle I said, ‘Can I ask you something Ed?’

‘Of course.’

‘I’d just like to know why you asked me to marry you?’

‘I didn’t, Rose. You asked me.’

Christ – I’d forgotten. How embarrassing! I could have sworn it was the other way round. I certainly don’t have any memories of getting down on bended knee. All I recall is whizzing round the London Eye, drunk as a monkey, and finding myself engaged by the time we got down. But if, as Ed ungallantly claims, I was the one who popped the question, then it’s right that I should also be the one proposing divorce.

I was thinking about all this as I emptied the last few packing cases and cleaned the house after the twins had gone. The interior isn’t bad – just a bit dusty, that’s all. Off-white walls, limed wooden kitchen units, cream silk curtains (included in the price) and a perfectly respectable oatmeal Berber carpet everywhere. The house is the colour of string. It looks etiolated. Drained. Like me. I quite like it, I thought as I scrubbed and swabbed – too much colour would get me down. I decided I’d redecorate it later; I could live with this for a while.

And now, bearing in mind what the twins had said, I prepared to expunge the memories of Ed. I’d given this very careful thought. I went to the Spar round the corner and bought a packet of party balloons. When I got back I laid them out flat, then wrote ‘ED WRIGHT’ in black biro on each one. Then I inflated them, watching his name grow and expand on the rubber skin. Ears aching from the effort I watched the balloons bobbing up and down on the sitting room floor. They looked incongruously, almost insultingly, festive as they bounced against each other in the breeze. Then I found my sewing box, took my largest needle and stabbed them, one by one. BANG! went Ed’s name, as it was reduced to rubbery shreds. CRACK! exploded the next. POP! went the third as I detonated it, feeling the smile spread across my face. I derived enormous and, yes, childish satisfaction from this – it gave me a malicious thrill. Ed was full of hot air – his vows meant nothing – so this was what he deserved. I burst nine – one for each month I knew him, then took the last one, which was yellow, outside. By now the wind had picked up, and I stood in the middle of the lawn for a moment, then let the balloon go. A sudden gust snatched it and lifted it over the garden fence, before it floated up and away. I could still make out Ed’s name as it rose higher and higher, bobbing and jerking in the stiff breeze. By now it was just a yellow blob against the sky, then a smudge, then a speck, and then gone.

I heaved a sigh of relief then went inside for Stage Two of my ritual. I took a piece of string and tied knots in it, one for each happy memory of my time with Ed. The first knot was for when we met, the second was for New Year’s Eve; as I tied the third I thought of our engagement party; I tied the fourth for our wedding day. As I tied the fifth I remembered how happy I had felt when I moved into his house. Then I lit the end of the string and watched a neat yellow flame take hold. It climbed slowly but steadily, leaving a glowing tail of embers and a thin coil of smoke. Thirty seconds later and my memories were just a thread of ash which I washed down the sink. Finally, I riffled through a wallet of snaps and found a photo of Ed. He’s usually extremely photogenic, but in this one he looked like shit. The camera must have gone off by mistake, because it was looking straight up his nose. He was scowling at something, it exaggerated his slight jowl, and his face was unshaven and tired. So I pinned it to the kitchen noticeboard and made a mental note to have it enlarged. Then I went into the bathroom to perform the final part of my cathartic rites. Suddenly my mobile rang.

‘It’s us,’ said the twins, one on each extension. ‘Where are you?’

‘In the bathroom.’

‘You’re not taking an overdose are you?’ they shrieked.

‘Not at the moment. No.’

‘And you’re not slashing your wrists or anything?’

‘Are you crazy – just think of the mess!’

‘Well what are you doing in the bathroom then?’ asked Bea suspiciously.

‘I’m doing my exorcises,’ I said.

I rang off, took my wedding ring out of my pocket, and looked at it one last time. Ed had had it engraved inside with Forever – I emitted a mirthless laugh. Then, holding it between thumb and forefinger, like a dainty titbit, I dropped it into the loo. It lay there, glinting gently in the shadeless overhead light. Now I took our engagement photo, ripped it into six pieces, threw them in, then pulled the flush. I watched the cauldron of water swirl and boil then it cleared with a glug, and refilled. Everything had gone – the ring and the photograph – all except for one piece. To my annoyance it was the bit with most of Ed’s face on and it was resolutely refusing to go down. It was unnerving, having him bobbing about like that, smiling cheerfully up at me as though nothing were amiss. So I flushed it again and watched the fragment spin wildly but, to my intense annoyance, it kept popping back up. After ten tries, defeated, I fished Ed’s still smiling face out with the loo brush, and scraped him into the bin.

‘Now Wash Your Hands,’ I said wearily; then I went downstairs.

I felt a little, well, yes, flushed from my exertions so I made a cup of tea. And the kettle was just boiling when I heard the loud clatter of the letter box. On the mat was a creamcoloured envelope, marked, To Our New Neighbour in a large, round hand. Inside was a floral card, inscribed, Welcome to Hope Street, from…Hey! I’ve got celebrity neighbours!…Beverley and Trevor McDonald.