Читать книгу I Heart Hawaii - Lindsey Kelk - Страница 11

Light was already beginning to seep in around the curtains when someone decided to lean on their car horn right outside my bedroom window at six a.m. on Thursday morning. I hated to start my days feeling homicidal but this was the price I paid to live in New York; occasionally, people were thoughtless dicks. Presumably there were thoughtless dicks everywhere but the horn honking really seemed much more prevalent here than anywhere else I’d ever been. Whether I liked it or not, I was awake and I knew the intelligent thing to do would be to stay awake. Either Alice or my alarm would go off by seven anyway and the extra hour would be meaningless, I’d feel worse than if I got up now. But I wasn’t intelligent, I was exhausted. As I rolled over onto my side, pulling the duvet up under my chin, Alex curled around me, pressing himself into my back and giving me another bone to deal with.

‘Alex,’ I breathed into my pillow as he ran his hand under the covers, down my arm, my waist, my hip, tiptoeing his calloused fingertips across my leg and tracing circles on my thigh. ‘I’m tired.’

He didn’t say anything. Instead I felt his warm body moving against the curves of my back, his fingers sliding upwards under the edge of my shorts.

‘It’s so early,’ I mumbled, smiling into my pillow.

‘You don’t have to do anything but lie there,’ Alex replied, lifting my hair up at the nape of my neck and pressing his lips against my skin. ‘Unless that sounds really creepy and you would like to be more actively involved.’

‘That sounds like a very workable plan,’ I replied, giving in as his hand slipped between my legs.

It had been a while since this had happened. And by ‘a while’ I meant more than month. I thought I knew what tired was before I had a baby – living with Jenny was hardly a relaxing experience, after all – but this was something else entirely. Motherhood utterly consumed me, mind, body and spirit. For the first six months, every ounce of my existence had gone into Alice and now, as I tried to pull back pieces of my life, I was even more exhausted than before. No matter what the baby books said, it was almost impossible to get yourself in the mood when you were so exhausted you felt like you were in a medically induced coma every time your head hit the pillow. No matter how hot your husband might be.

‘Alex, wait,’ I whispered, my voice catching in my throat as he pulled my T-shirt up over my head and the world turned pink for a moment as I untangled myself from the fabric.

‘What’s wrong?’ he asked, stopping immediately.

Wrangling my T-shirt back down, I offered him my best apologetic grimace.

‘I need a wee.’

Really I had to start working on my Kegel exercises.

‘Give me two seconds,’ I said, all arms and legs as I scrambled out the bed, running to the bathroom on tiptoes. A quick wee, a rinse around with mouthwash and, bloody hell, I thought as I caught sight of myself in the mirror, maybe we’ll go for a once-over with the micellar water, given that I got approximately none of my mascara off before I went to bed. Motherhood meant multitasking and I was well into my second cleanse, sitting on the loo, when I heard Alice start.

‘No, no, no,’ I chanted, dropping pads of used cotton wool in the bin. ‘Please go back to sleep. Mummy needs to get some.’

Looking down at my shorts and knickers, a pool of pale pink fabric on the bathroom floor, I sighed. My sleeping clothes were a sad state of affairs. I picked up the greying granny pants with my toe and tossed them in the trash, right on top of the cotton wool. So brazen for six o’clock in the morning.

As I washed my hands and combed my fingers through my bedhead, I realized Alice had stopped screaming.

‘Thank you,’ I said as I slicked on some lip balm. ‘Mummy appreciates it more than you’d know.’

Except what Mummy didn’t know was that Alice had only stopped crying because Daddy had brought her into bed.

‘Alex,’ I said from the bedroom doorway.

‘She was crying. I couldn’t leave her,’ he said, bouncing her up and down on his knee. ‘I’ll make it up to you later.’

With a frustrated sigh, I padded back to bed, sliding under the covers. It was true, Alex Reid was the greatest dad of all time. He had taken to fatherhood like a waitress to water, throwing himself head first into all things Alice from the very first day we’d brought her home. He was the one who said we didn’t need a full-time nanny when I went back to work, he was the one who cleared out Barnes & Noble’s parenting section, and I would be lying if I said he hadn’t done more than his fair share of dirty nappies and three a.m. feeds. He’d even built a chute that ran out of her bedroom window and down into the bin so I could chuck her dirty nappies away without having to go outside in the winter. But the fact of the matter was, for one person to be the best at something, someone else had to be the worst.

Alex was a natural parent, I was not.

And it didn’t feel good.

‘Here she is,’ he said, waving a sulky bundle of baby in my face. Softly shaking my head, I forgot my frustrations and snuggled into the family hug. Even though she was sleeping in the nursery, I loved how she almost always found her way into our bed in the mornings, all grumpy and fidgety and half-asleep.

‘She always reminds me of you when she first wakes up,’ Alex said, pulling the covers up over his long legs.

‘Thanks,’ I replied, running my fingertip along her tiny ear as her big green eyes watched me, cheeks flushed with crying. ‘She always reminds me of you when she cries, it sounds like you singing.’

‘Thank you for that vote of confidence two weeks out from my first show in forever. My baby’s gonna be a rockstar.’

Stretching until my back cracked, I smiled and shook my head. ‘Auntie Jenny says she’s going to be a YouTube sensation.’

‘Over my dead body,’ he said instantly. ‘She’s going to be a rockstar. Or an astronaut. Only choices on the table.’

‘What if she wants to do something really important with her life?’ I countered. ‘Like write amazing novels that are never appreciated in her lifetime? Or start an underground feminist magazine? Or open a cat café?’

‘Also acceptable options,’ Alex replied as Alice poked the blanket with great concentration and babbled to herself. We were so close to her first words I could feel it and every single atom of my body wanted that word to be ‘Mummy’. I knew it wasn’t a competition as to who she loved the most, but I also knew it totally was.

‘Jenny wants to take me to Hawaii,’ I said, resting my head against his chest with my eyes closed, synching my breathing with the reassuring thud of his heartbeat.

‘And I was going to offer to take you to breakfast. Why does she always have to one-up me?’

‘Because she’s Jenny?’ I suggested.

He nodded sleepily. ‘When does she wanna go?’

‘Next week,’ I replied. ‘For five nights.’

Alex and Alice both looked at me with their matching big green eyes and laughed.

‘Sure. Classic Lopez.’

‘It’s a work thing, all expenses paid, fancy private resort on one of the little islands,’ I said, rolling onto my back and catching Alice’s tiny toes in my hand. Alex closed his eyes and smiled. ‘I told her I couldn’t go.’

I looked over to check for a reaction but in the pale dawn light of our bedroom his face was perfectly still and his eyes were shut. He wove his fingers into my hair, running them from root to tip and then back again, sending happy shivers down my spine.

‘You don’t want to?’

‘I would love to but I have work,’ I reasoned. ‘And Louisa is coming to stay and, you know, I have to keep a human being alive.’

‘I don’t know, Angela.’ The corners of Alex’s mouth turned upwards in a smile even though his eyes stayed closed. ‘I think I can survive without you for five nights.’

‘Ha ha, I meant Alice,’ I said, propping my head up in my hand. Alex stayed exactly as he was, his chest rising and falling evenly with every breath. ‘Although you would also be a concern.’

‘I’m not the one who leaves their hair straightener on three times a week,’ he reminded me. It was a harsh but fair point. ‘If I had the opportunity to go to Hawaii on Lopez’s dime, I would go. You’ll be gone what, five days? Me and Al can cope on our own. You managed when I was gone for the weekend.’

‘Yes but that was different,’ I argued, reaching for a hair band from my nightstand and automatically pulling my hair up in a ponytail. Once the hair was up, that was it. I was officially awake.

Alex opened one eye and raised an eyebrow. ‘How exactly?’

Don’t say because I’m her mother, the voice whispered in my head, do not say because you’re her mother.

‘Because I’m her mother.’

Alex closed his eye and grinned. Alice said nothing.

‘If you wanna to go, you should go,’ he said through a yawn. ‘When this record is finally finished, we’ll definitely have to tour, and I’m not a parenting expert but I hear babies are a lot less trouble than toddlers, so consider this my pre-emptive apology for all the times she throws a tantrum when I’m off playing some rando festival in Germany two years from now. You were fine on your own, I’ll be fine on my own.’

I rubbed my thumb against the band of my engagement ring and scooped Alice out of his arms, resting her against my chest.

‘When you went away, I spent the entire weekend in my pyjamas,’ I muttered, gazing down at my baby. ‘I didn’t shower, I only slept for six hours the whole three days and I took her to the emergency room when her spit-up was blue.’

‘What was it?’

‘I was so tired, I forgot I’d given her blueberries,’ I said, stroking her delicate head. ‘She was fine.’

‘If she spits up blue, I’ll shoot you a text,’ Alex promised. Cradling Alice carefully, I reached for the edge of the curtain, pulling it back on what looked to be another extremely sticky day. Did Hawaii get as humid as New York? I imagined it was less of a concern if you were sitting on a beach in a bikini.

‘I don’t know,’ I said, letting the curtain fall back into place, a shaft of daylight fading in and out across Alex’s face. ‘I can always go when she’s older. Hawaii isn’t going anywhere, is it?’

‘Can’t promise that,’ he said with an uncertain shrug. ‘Climate change is a real thing. Which reminds me, you have to start separating the recycling, babe.’

‘I’m going to tell Jenny I can’t go,’ I said, thinking out loud and mentally listing all the reasons not to jump on a private jet to a five-star resort with my very best friends for five nights in paradise. ‘I can’t leave you two on your own. It’s not fair.’

‘Obviously, I would miss you, it’s like we never have any time together, but that shouldn’t stop you from going.’ He turned over and covered his eyes with his forearm.

Well, that was considerably less encouraging.

‘And, if I have to, I can always get my mom to come and help out.’

He could do what? I sat bolt upright, suddenly wide awake.

His mother? Just when I was starting to think about going …

‘It’s not that I don’t like his mum,’ I ranted into my phone the second I left the house. ‘It’s more that my entire body rejects the very concept of her existence.’

Louisa growled in agreement. ‘So what you’re saying is, you’re not that close?’

‘At our wedding, she asked me if I was marrying Alex for a green card. When I said I wasn’t, she asked if I was pregnant. And then, when I was pregnant, she bought Alex a home paternity test, “just to make sure”,’ I replied, peeling off my denim jacket as I walked. It was only the end of May and summer was coming on strong. It seemed as though we were skipping spring and going straight into a three-month-long heat wave again this year. ‘Every time they come over, she spends the entire visit telling me everything I’m doing wrong then goes, “I suppose that’s the British way”, before walking off in a huff.’

‘If she’s not careful, the British way will be me giving her a kick up the arse,’ Lou said. ‘And I thought Tim’s mum was bad.’

‘I don’t know, what’s the worst present you’ve ever had from Tim’s mum?’ I asked.

‘Oh, I don’t know.’ She clucked her tongue as she considered. ‘Probably the time she accidentally bought me a vibrator. The man in the shop convinced her it was a back massager. That was a bit awkward.’

‘Alex’s mum bought me a lifetime subscription to Weight Watchers for Christmas. While I was pregnant.’

Louisa gasped.

‘And his dad’s no better. They never gave a shit about Alex until we had Al and now they can’t keep away, even though all they do is go on about how amazing his brother is and he’s not, he’s the worst human alive.’

‘I already believe they’re awful,’ she laughed. ‘No need for hyperbole.’

‘He’s an estate agent,’ I said, pausing to check traffic before running across 8th Avenue. ‘And an amateur magician.’

‘He must be kept away from Alice at all costs,’ Louisa replied gravely. ‘Have you considered a moonlight flit? Change your names and move back to England?’

‘Yes,’ I admitted ruefully. ‘I actually have.’

‘Well, far be it from me to tell you what to do but I do have to say, the idea of a weekend in Hawaii isn’t the worst thing I’ve ever heard,’ she said carefully. ‘Not that I wouldn’t be extremely happy to spend the weekend in New York with you and Alex but this trip does sound like a bit of a dream come true, doesn’t it?’

I knew I shouldn’t have told her.

‘I’ve got to go,’ I said, checking the address in the mysterious email I’d received a week ago. ‘I’ve got a meeting before work and I’m already late. They bloody love a breakfast meeting around here.’

‘It’s hard to stay on schedule when you’ve got a baby,’ she said. ‘I’m sure they’ll understand.’

‘Keep your fingers crossed,’ I said as I climbed the steps of 585 11th Street. ‘It’s some super exclusive mummy and baby club. They emailed me and Alex said I should meet them. He seems to think I need more mummy friends.’

‘And so do I,’ Lou replied. ‘You can’t keep refusing to socialize with other mums just because they sing different words to the “Wheels on the Bus”. It’s not good for Alice.’

‘I’m not refusing to, it’s just weird.’ I shuddered at the memory of my one morning with the Park Slope New Parents group. Dairy-free, gluten-free, caffeine-free and fun-free. ‘The groups here aren’t like they are at home. I feel like I’m about to join a cult.’

‘Then don’t drink the Kool-Aid,’ she instructed. ‘And if you see any pictures of Tom Cruise on the walls, run for the hills.’

‘Noted,’ I said, pressing the doorbell and hearing a gentle chime echo on the other side of the door. ‘Speak to you later.’

I slipped my phone into my satchel, gave my underarms a surreptitious sniff and straightened my shoulders. Even though I was a grown woman with her own child and a husband and a job and a mortgage, whenever I was confronted with a group of women, especially mothers, I always felt like I was back in Year Seven, delivering a message to the sixth-form common room.

According to their website, The Mothers of Brooklyn, or M.O.B., was a non-profit parenting group, ‘dedicated to supporting mothers and children through emotional support and growth’, and according to their Twitter feed, they would be doing this by getting half-priced manicures at Gloss nail salon every Thursday morning from ten until two. The manicures I could definitely get behind, but the rest of it sounded a bit much.

After what felt like forever, a tall slim brunette opened the front door. She was impeccably dressed for eight thirty in the morning, wearing sky-blue Jesse Kamm sailor pants, a white silk T-shirt and a colourful statement necklace made of oversized crystals that Alice would have destroyed in seconds.

‘Yes?’ she said, giving me the same look I gave to the people who knocked at my door with a clipboard in their hand.

‘Oh, hello,’ I said, overcome with the utter certainty that I’d knocked on the wrong door. ‘I’m supposed to be meeting Perry Dickson, I’m Angela. Angela Clark?’

The woman forced a smile onto her face and opened up the door fully, a cool blast of air conditioning making a break for the sweaty street.

‘You’re Angela Clark.’ It sounded more like a threat than a question or a statement. ‘I’m Perry. Please do come in. We’ve been expecting you.’

We? Gulp.

I followed her through the foyer into a huge, airy living room, full of tasteful, elegant furniture that was perfectly lit by crystal-clear floor-to-ceiling windows that let in the blinding sunshine. It looked just like my apartment. If you knocked out every wall of every single room, painted the entire thing a bright, clean white and never allowed a human being to touch a single thing.

‘This place is gorgeous,’ I said, head on a swivel as we carried on walking, striding across the stripped wooden floors and through a doorway at the end of the room. ‘You have a beautiful home.’

‘This isn’t my home,’ Perry replied with a solid bark of a laugh. ‘This is our office, our clubhouse, shall we say.’

The only club I’d ever been a member of was the Take That fan club and I had a sneaking suspicion Perry was neither a Mark nor a Robbie girl. I squeezed my denim jacket, wishing I’d worn something more formal. I loved my little leather flip-flops and pink cotton Zara sundress but, compared to Perry’s sophisticated ensemble, I felt as though I’d just trotted in from the morning milking. Which, I thought, absently squeezing my deflated boobs with my forearms, I sort of had.

‘Here we are.’

I walked through to another high-ceilinged room, this one opening out into a stunning conservatory, full of lush green plants I hardly dared look at. I could kill a cactus by simply looking at it and I counted at least three orchids in Perry’s collection. Best to keep my distance.

‘Morning, everyone,’ I said, raising a hand in a hello. Four other women dotted around the room smiled and nodded in response. Each and every one of them was just as perfectly put together as Perry. These were not women who were worried about sweat stains or subway mess or baby puke. If the townhouse hadn’t been enough of a giveaway, their immaculate presentation did it. I was out of my depth and trapped in a room full of Cicis that had spawned and I couldn’t work out for the life of me why on earth I was there.

‘This is Nia, Danielle, Avery and Joan,’ Perry said, each woman raising a diamond-bedecked hand as her name was called. ‘We’re so happy you could join us.’

‘That’s always nice to hear,’ I replied as I sat down, keeping one eye on the other women. They hovered at the edges of the room, poised and graceful, as though posing for an unseen photographer. It was all very unsettling, not least because there was literally no sign of a single baby in this supposed mother and baby group. I couldn’t see one piece of plastic or wipe-down surface anywhere. I no longer owned anything that couldn’t be cleaned with a baby wipe. ‘I’m sure it’s my baby brain acting up but I can’t remember how you said you got my details originally.’

‘No, that’s because we didn’t say,’ she replied as one of the other women presented us with glasses of sparkling water before resuming her original position.

Gulp.

‘You didn’t?’

‘We didn’t,’ Perry confirmed. ‘We’re very discreet. And as the head of the membership committee, I personally select women for the group who are a good fit for our community.’

And I had been selected? Me? Teenage Angela who never got picked for dodgeball was very excited but adult Angela was more than a little wary.

‘Let’s get to know each other a little better,’ she suggested. ‘You work at Besson Media?’

‘I do,’ I confirmed, sitting on my shaking hands. ‘Well, I just started but I was at Spencer Media before that.’

‘And you’re a writer.’

Perry’s smooth face barely moved as she spoke.

I nodded, crossing my legs at the ankles to hide the chipped nail polish on my big toe. This was not a chipped pedicure kind of a gang, I could tell.

‘We have a lot of contacts in the media,’ she said. ‘And a few of our members are in publishing.’

‘Oh, I’d love to write a book one day, it’s always been my dream,’ I told her, a happy smile on my face as I rambled on. ‘I used to write children’s books, ghost-write actually. I would write the books that went with kids’ films and TV shows. You might have read some of them actually, they were dreadful obviously, but don’t hold that against me.’

This is not the time for verbal diarrhoea, I whispered to myself. Cut it out, Angela.

‘What is it you do?’ I asked, very aware of the sweat patches under my arms.

‘Hedge fund manager at YellowCrest,’ Perry said as though telling me she ran the corner shop. No wonder The M.O.B. had a five-million-dollar brownstone as their clubhouse. Erin’s husband worked at YellowCrest and Erin’s husband made literally millions of dollars a year.

‘Or at least, I used to. I gave it up after Mortimer came along.’

‘Mortimer?’ I squeaked. Please let it be the name of her dog, please let it be the name of her dog, please let it be the name of her dog.

‘My son,’ she replied with a smooth smile. ‘He’s my second, he’s almost eighteen months now, and Titus, his big brother, will be three next month. Two sons under three, oof, what a challenge. There’s simply no way to manage a full-time job and two children, although I was heartbroken to leave.’

‘Right, must be tough,’ I said, trying to work out just what exactly Perry had done to her face. Her forehead was perfectly smooth, her cheeks very slightly overinflated and there wasn’t a single visible pore on her skin. While I very much supported people doing whatever the hell they wanted to their own faces, something about Perry’s work just looked off. She looked ageless and not in a good way. I’d have placed her anywhere between thirty-five and fifty, there was just no way to tell.

‘We’re so excited you’re interested in joining us,’ Perry said, glancing over at the other women who promptly left their positions and came to join us on the sofas, her smooth face void of any visible signs of said excitement. ‘We do some magnificent work here and we’re always on the lookout for quality members. Between the support we give each other and community outreach, if you’re accepted into The M.O.B., I think you’ll find being part of our group quite rewarding. Although I should mention membership is select – not everyone who is invited to meet with us ends up making the cut.’

‘And I’m always excited to make new friends,’ I lied, so pleased to know they might still reject me even though I hadn’t asked to join in the first place. ‘So what’s the deal? Coffee mornings, jumble sales, playdates, that kind of thing?’

‘I don’t know what a jumble sale is but I am quite sure the answer is no,’ she replied, brushing her silky brown hair over her shoulder. ‘We’re an exclusive network of elite women, come together to lift each other higher. I will admit we are somewhat selective about the women who join our collective but that’s to preserve the quality of our experience. We strive to stimulate our intellect and grow our spirit in all that we do.’

Oh god, it was a cult.

‘Right, one question,’ I said, slapping my thighs and making everyone jump. ‘Where do the kids come in?’

‘Kids?’ Perry looked confused.

‘Yes, your kids,’ I said. ‘Where are they while you’re, you know, stimulating your intellect?’

‘This isn’t a mommy and me class,’ she replied as the other four women laughed. ‘The B.O.B.s aren’t always here.’

‘B.O.B.s,’ I repeated slowly.

‘Babies of Brooklyn,’ Perry clarified.

‘That’s what I thought,’ I said, leaning back against the sofa. ‘Just wanted to make sure.’

‘The goal is to create an empowering network for our children from an early age,’ she said, flicking an invisible speck of dust from her trouser leg. ‘I’ve worked with a social psychologist and several corporate counselling experts who agree it’s essential for children to begin forging the right kinds of bonds right from birth. They are the next generation of leaders, after all.’

‘Do you not worry that’s a lot of pressure to put on a baby?’ I asked gently, a vision of Alice being sworn into the White House passing through my mind.

Perry stared right back at me.

‘No,’ she said.

I waited for the rest of the sentence for a moment before realizing that was it.

‘Oh, OK.’ I looked down at my flip-flops and wondered how fast I could run in them. This was clearly not the group for me.

‘The networking isn’t just for Alice,’ Perry said, leaning forward and gripping my knee with her coffee-coloured nails. ‘We want to raise these children in an environment of powerful women. A tribe is only as strong as its weakest member.’

‘Christ almighty,’ I whispered.

‘I’m sure we all have a busy day ahead of us so let’s get things moving,’ Perry said, sitting back and clapping her hands. ‘I’m going to ask you a few questions and then we’ll play a little game.’

Please let it be Hungry Hungry Hippos.

‘In how many classes is Alice currently enrolled?’ Danielle, a striking woman with tightly curled black hair, asked from the sofa beside Perry.

‘Classes?’ I stared back blankly.

‘Music class, baby yoga, dance, swim, is she learning any languages?’ Nia replied. Nia was a tall willowy blonde who looked as though she should be playing Reese Witherspoon’s best friend in at least seventeen movies.

‘Maybe art class?’ suggested Joan, the gorgeous black woman sitting on my left with poker-straight hair that fell all the way to her waist. My hair was in a bun, secured by a scrunchie. I was a monster.

‘Or sign language? Or ballet? Mind and body sensory stimulation?’

‘She’s not even one yet,’ I replied, making a mental note to find out what the hell mind and body sensory stimulation was and avoid it at all costs. ‘She isn’t in any classes.’

Joan sucked the air in through her teeth as though about to give me a quote for a new carburettor.

‘What’s her hashtag?’ Perry asked, tapping away on an iPad that had appeared from nowhere.

‘Hashtag?’

‘For social media,’ she clarified. ‘My boys are “hashtag MorTitus”, for example.’

Oh dear god, those poor children. As if their real names weren’t already going to get them beaten up when they got to school.

‘My husband isn’t a massive fan of social media so we don’t really put pictures of Alice online all that much,’ I said slowly.

All the women looked at each other.

‘If that’s the choice you’ve made, that’s the choice you’ve made,’ Perry declared. I had a feeling it wasn’t the only choice that had been made. ‘Perhaps we should skip along to the game and get this over with.’

‘You know, I have to get to work,’ I said, fiddling with the buttons on my denim jacket. A universal ‘I’m going to leave now’ gesture. ‘This has been so lovely but—’

Before I could stop her, Avery, a delicate redhead with reflexes like a cat, had snatched my handbag from the floor and upended it on the coffee table. My phone clattered onto the marble tabletop first before it was buried in piles of my secret shame. A bag of M&Ms, three tampons, one out of its wrapper, a dried-up pen with a missing cap, lip balm, lip gloss, eyeliner, a manky old mascara, two more lip balms, my MetroCard and, even though this wasn’t my baby bag, two open packs of baby wipes.

I opened my mouth to protest as the women began pawing through my belongings but nothing came out. It was worse than the time Karen Woods nicked my diary in Year Nine and read it out loud in registration so the entire year group heard how I was worried about my left boob coming in bigger than my right one. Nia screwed up her delicate face as she held a loose Percy Pig up for inspection.

‘I wasn’t going to eat that,’ I said quickly.

I was absolutely going to eat it.

‘What we carry with us is who we are,’ Perry said sadly as she inspected a half-eaten Special K bar. ‘What do you think the content of your purse says about you, Angela?’

‘I think it says I have a baby and a full-time job and no time to sit cleaning out my handbag,’ I replied. My cheeks burned as the five women picked over my belongings, tutting and sighing and occasionally throwing in an ‘Ew’ for good measure.

‘How cute!’ Avery held up a key ring in the shape of the Empire State Building. ‘You know, I’ve never actually been.’

‘My husband took me when we first started dating,’ I said, compelled to explain in spite of myself. ‘He gave me that before he went away on tour a few years ago.’

‘Tour?’ There was a very definite sneer on Avery’s face as she raked through my makeup, tossing eyeliners and lipsticks all over the coffee table. ‘What is it that your husband does?’

‘He’s in a band,’ I told her, grabbing a precious packet of Sour Patch Kids out of Avery’s hands. ‘I don’t know if you’ve heard of them, they’re called Stills.’

All five women froze.

‘Stills?’ Perry repeated, her grey eyes suddenly open wide. ‘Your husband is in Stills?’

I puffed out my cheeks and nodded slowly.

‘Is it Alex or Craig?’ she demanded before looking at the other women to explain. ‘Graham the bassist is gay.’

Oh god, I thought as the colour drained from my face. She’d shagged one of them, hadn’t she?

‘Alex,’ I replied, my voice barely above a whisper.

As my voice grew quieter, Perry’s elevated to an all-out screech.

‘You’re married to Alex Reid?’ she squealed.

‘Yes?’ I replied.

Perry turned on Nia with savage stare.

‘Why was this not in her background check?’ she hissed. ‘Unacceptable.’

Nia shrank back, visibly quaking in her overpriced boots, and I wondered how many lashes she’d be getting after I left.

‘Do you know Alex?’ I asked, afraid to hear the answer to my question.

‘I don’t know him, know him, but I love him,’ she said so quickly I could barely understand her. ‘That is, I love Stills. They’re my favourite band. I’ve seen them at least ten times. I’ve been to every tour they’ve ever played. I once went to Texas to see them play at South by Southwest. Imagine, me in Texas.’

A quick look around the room confirmed that neither Nia, Danielle, Avery or Joan could even conceive of such a thing.

‘Angela,’ Perry said. ‘I have to meet him.’

And just like that, Perry the investment banker and grown-up Mean Girl turned into a squealing teenybopper who had a crush on my husband. But on the upside, at least she hadn’t shagged him.

‘They’re playing here in a couple of weeks,’ I said as casually as I could manage. ‘Trying out some new material.’

Perry gave a sharp nod and Danielle, Avery and Nia began shovelling my belongings back in my handbag while Joan pulled out a Google Pixel phone and began tapping away at the screen.

‘If you’re looking for tickets, the show sold out as soon as they announced it,’ I said. ‘Sorry.’

‘Angela,’ Perry leaned forward and gripped my knee so tightly my foot sprang out and kicked Avery square in the shin. ‘Can you get us tickets?’

‘I don’t know,’ I gasped, wincing as I pried her fingers off me. ‘I can ask.’

‘I would do anything to go to that show,’ she said, opening her eyes so wide I could see white all the way around her pale grey irises

‘Anything?’ I replied, more frightened than interested.

‘Anything,’ she confirmed. ‘Forget the membership process, you’re officially in The Mothers of Brooklyn.’

‘Which is very nice of you,’ I said as I grabbed my bag back from Nia, immediately reaching in to find my phone, my thumb hovering over the emergency call button. ‘But really not necessary. I really do have to go, as lovely as this has been.’

It hadn’t been lovely, it had been intimidating, humiliating and ultimately terrifying, and for the first time since I’d met Cici Spencer, I couldn’t wait to get to work.

‘We’ll work it out,’ Perry said, following as I stood up out of my seat. ‘There has to be something.’

‘I will ask,’ I promised, not even sure if I meant it. ‘Nice to meet you all.’

The M.O.B. stared after me as I dashed out the room, walking quickly through the big white room and breaking into a run as I hit the steps to the street.

‘You need to socialize with other mothers more, they said,’ I muttered as I turned onto 8th Avenue and flagged down a passing yellow cab. I couldn’t get far enough fast enough on foot. ‘You need more mommy friends, they said.’

Hurling myself into the back seat, I rummaged through my bag to make sure everything was there before tearing into the packet of M&Ms, inhaling them by the wild-eyed handful. There wasn’t a single thing anyone could offer that would make me go through that again. They could send all four of the Chrises to my house, oiled up and shirtless, each bearing a different Chanel handbag, and I still wouldn’t be swayed.

I never wanted to see Perry Dickson again as long as I lived.