The Baby Trail Read online

Jacinta rushed over. She clearly didn’t like what she saw. ‘I don’t fuckin’ believe it. I’ll kill him.’

  I looked down and saw a Tits ’R’ Us minivan pull up and ten buxom strippers in non-existent mini-dresses climb out. Jacinta picked up the phone and roared into it. ‘I told you, Da, I don’t want those fuckin’ slappers at my weddin’.’

  Even people twenty miles away could have heard him bellowing down the phone: ‘THOSE FUCKIN’ SLAPPERS ARE PAYIN’ FOR YOUR FUCKIN’ WEDDIN’. NOW BELT UP AND GET READY.’

  I buried my face in my makeup bag so they wouldn’t see me laughing. They cursed their father and lamented the fact that he was lowering the tone of the wedding.

  ‘Fuckin’ disgrace is wha’ that is,’ said Jacinta, glaring out the window.

  ‘Here, have a drink, it’ll make you feel better,’ said her ever-helpful, underage, alcohol-swigging sister.

  The girls proceeded to polish off a second bottle of champagne and eventually calmed down about the strippers ruining Jacinta’s wedding, by which stage they were fairly sloshed.

  I was panicking about time: we only had an hour to go and it normally took at least forty-five minutes to make up a bride – and that was a sober, low-maintenance bride. I finally managed to persuade Jacinta to stop drinking and sit down beside the window so I could apply her makeup in natural light.

  Her face was a dark shade of orange with darker patches along her eyebrows and ears. I set to work, toning down the fake tan, trying to blend it and make it look a little more natural, but she was staring into a mirror and freaked. ‘Wha’ are you doin’, Emma? You’re makin’ me look all pasty. I want more bronze, just like we did in the trial run. Get out the bronzer and lash it on.’

  There was no point in fighting it – this bride was never going to be persuaded to tone anything down. I fished around in my makeup bag and found a very strong bronzer –a shade I had only ever used on very dark-skinned clients – and brushed it on.

  Jacinta was delighted. ‘Deadly,’ she said, smiling at herself in the mirror. ‘That’s more like it. Now do me eyes. I have the lashes here.’

  She handed me the false eyelashes. They were two inches long, with little diamanté studs dotted along each individual lash. They would have looked over the top on Liza Minnelli in Cabaret.

  ‘Are you sure about these?’ I asked, in a last-ditch attempt to salvage any credibility I’d have left after this job. ‘I have some plain black ones here that would look more natural.’

  ‘Fuck natural. I want to look like a movie star.’

  Fair enough! I stuck them on, then started working on her lips. I was using a nude colour to try to counter the dramatic eyes.

  ‘Hold on, I’ve changed me mind about me lips. I want them scarlet.’

  ‘What?’ Was she completely insane? She’d look like a hooker! ‘I really think you should keep your lips nude with just some colourless gloss, Jacinta. Your eyes are the dramatic part of your makeup, so you need to keep your lips neutral.’

  ‘No, I don’t want tha’ colourless shite. I want scarlet. Show me what you have in there.’

  I sighed and produced an array of ruby red lipsticks and glosses. She chose the brightest red gloss. When her lips were done she turned to her sister for approval. Anita shook her head. Jesus, what now? I thought.

  ‘You’re still too pale. You need more of tha’ bronzer,’ said Anita. ‘Tha’ pale look is crap. I tink tha’ Nicole Kidman looks a fuckin’ state. She looks like a ghost. Why don’t her mates tell her to slap on some tan? It’s very fuckin’ sad. All tha’ money and she goes out lookin’ snow white.’

  ‘I know, and she’s Australian. Sure it’s fuckin’ roastin’ over there,’ said Jacinta, shaking her head at the thought of poor pale Nicole.

  I added yet another layer of bronzer to her cheeks and finally – although she now looked like a Las Vegas stripper – Jacinta was pleased.

  I had to do Anita’s makeup in a hurry. She demanded the same colour scheme as Jacinta, so I put away the muted beige and brown eye shadows, the powder pinks and creamy peach blushers, the gently tinted lip-glosses and natural-tone foundations.

  When Anita was five shades darker, with equally scarlet lips, I helped them into their dresses. Anita’s bridesmaid dress was a skin-tight, red satin, Chinese-style mini-dress. The bride wore a skin-tight, white, full length, satin halter-neck backless dress encrusted with large crystals. It had a slit up the front that left little to the imagination. The Tits ’R’ Us ladies had some stiff competition here.

  They looked at each other and beamed.

  ‘You’re a ride. All the fellas will be chasin’ you,’ said Jacinta.

  ‘Thanks. You’re a fuckin’ ride yourself. You look better than Posh on her wedding day.’

  ‘Ah, stop.’

  ‘No, I mean it. Better.’

  Jacinta looked thrilled. For her, there was no better compliment.

  As they were leaving I wished them good luck and they assured me that they would tell all their friends to book me for their weddings. I was ‘fuckin’ brilliant’.

  As I watched Mr Foley, proudly helping Jacinta into the car, fixing her veil for her and kissing her forehead as she beamed up at him, I felt a lump in my throat. I hoped we’d have a daughter so that James could walk her up the aisle. I imagined him all grey-haired and debonair escorting our beautiful girl up the centre of the church as I smiled from the top – looking stunning myself, of course – dabbing tears of pride from the corners of my eyes, while my tall, dark, handsome son squeezed my arm …

  4

  Shit. Shit. Shit. Not pregnant again. Damn. I was sure I would be. We had sex on days twelve, thirteen, fourteen and fifteen to be on the safe side. What the hell was wrong with me? I rang James to tell him but Donal answered his phone.

  ‘Hello.’

  ‘James?’

  ‘No, Donal here, is that Olga?’

  ‘No, it’s Emma, who the hell is Olga?’

  ‘I know it’s you, Olga Korbut, Olympic gold medallist. Come on, now, don’t be shy.’

  ‘Donal, put me on to James.’

  ‘Lookit, Olga, I’m a huge fan. I used to love the way you somersaulted around on that beam and don’t even get me started on the parallel bars. I believe you’ve come out of retirement recently. I’m delighted to hear it.’

  ‘Hilarious, Donal. You’re a real comedian, now put James on to me.’

  I willed myself to sound calm. I was furious. How dare James tell Donal about my handstands? How dare he? That was private information. I’d kill him. I could hear Donal shouting to James that Olga Korbut was on the phone.

  ‘Hi, what’s up?’ said James, trying to sound nonchalant as Donal roared laughing in the background. He knew he was in trouble.

  ‘Judas!’

  ‘Pardon?’

  ‘Judas, your thirty pieces of silver will be waiting for you when you get home. I suppose you think it’s funny telling the lads about my handstands.’

  ‘Hold on, Emma –’

  ‘Oh, yeah, I’m sure you all just sat around the locker room and had a good old laugh at my expense. Well, that is just charming. Thanks a lot, James. Some husband you are.’

  ‘Emma, relax, it’s not that big a deal. I didn’t tell them all about it. Donal was asking me if we were going to have kids and I said we hoped to and then he said that his sister had gone a bit mad when she was trying to get pregnant and had ended up going to India to see some healer and then I may have mentioned the handstands but only in passing.’

  ‘Oh, well, if it was only in passing sure that’s fine. I feel so much better now. Don’t give it another thought. Any other private information you’d like to divulge in passing is fine by me. Well, I won’t keep you because I’m sure you have a few more gems to mention, in passing, to Donal. ’Bye for now.’

  I slammed down the phone. I was seething. How could he be so insensitive and disloyal? I pictured them all having a right old laugh at my expense. The mad wife. I hate all that
macho bullshit. Each guy trying to outdo the other guy with his my-bird’s-madder-than-yours stories.

  You hear them going on – ‘My bird went to the supermarket in her pyjamas last week …’, ‘My bird’s making me do tango lessons …’, and on and on they go in some weird competitive ritual.

  But my pet hate is the ‘I have to go home or my bird will kill me’ routine. The guy is out with his friends, he looks at his watch, it’s ten o’clock, he’s tired, has had enough and wants to go home. So you’d think he’d say, ‘See you, guys, I’m off. I fancy an early night.’ Don’t be ridiculous: he can’t do that, it wouldn’t look good, so he says, ‘I’d better phone the missus to tell her I’ll be late.’

  Then he calls you and before you’ve even had the chance to say hello, he starts this strange monologue with himself. ‘I’m staying out with the lads. What’s that? Ah, I know I said I’d be back early but we’re having a laugh here. What? Oh, you’ve cooked dinner already. Oh, right, well, then, I suppose. Yeah. OK. Well, I’ll just finish this one and come home, then. Relax, don’t get your knickers in a twist, I won’t be long, I’m on my way.’ Before you can tell him that you’re going out to the cinema with a friend, there’s no dinner of any description in any oven and he can stay out as long as he wants, you couldn’t care less what time he comes home – he hangs up.

  As I was standing in the kitchen thinking how annoying the phrase ‘don’t get your knickers in a twist’ is, and still fuming at James, the phone rang.

  ‘What?’ I shouted, expecting it to be James grovelling.

  ‘Emma?’

  Oh, great. Fanfuckingtastic. It was Imogen. I was going to pretend I was a Russian housekeeper with no English, but while I was trying to get the accent right in my head, she said, ‘Emma, hello, are you there? It’s Imogen.’

  Damn, too late now.

  ‘Oh, hello, Imogen, sorry about that, I was just in the middle of something. How are you?’

  ‘Very well, actually. Bit of news to tell you. I’m preggers again. Yep, Henry and I are expecting. And it’s twins this time. Fancy that, and we weren’t even trying, it just happened. Bit sorry that I won’t be able to ride for a few months but there you go. Still it’ll be maaahvellous to have some company for Thomas.’

  I felt physically sick. Lucky cow. Twins. That would be so perfect. What was wrong with me? I must have no eggs, or only little shrivelled city ones. Bloody Imogen and her big, horsy, fertile, country eggs.

  ‘Congratulations, that’s amazing news,’ I said, trying to muster some enthusiasm and failing miserably.

  Elephant-skinned Imogen, however, was oblivious to this. ‘Yes, it is, rather. Thanks. So, how about you? Any sign of a cousin for Thomas?’

  Sod Thomas, snotty little shit. I didn’t want any child of mine hanging out with him. ‘No.’

  ‘Well, chop-chop, Emma. You need to set to. James would be a maaahvellous father.’

  Oh, yeah, and what did she mean by that? What about me being a maaahvellous mother? God, she got up my nose.

  ‘I’m sure we’ll get around to it in our own good time,’ I said, trying desperately not to lose my temper.

  ‘Well, you don’t want to leave it much longer, Emma – you’re not getting any younger. You may not feel maternal now, but once you have a baby you will. Everyone does, even the least likely people. Motherhood is such a wonderful thing. The love between a mother and her child is like no other love.’

  Unbelievable. Now she was implying that I had no maternal instinct.

  ‘Yeah, so I’ve heard.’

  ‘You really should try it, Emma, I’m sure even you would take to it. Going to fancy parties and restaurants is all very well, but it becomes a bit hollow after a while, don’t you think?’

  I had to do something drastic. I had to get her off the phone before I lost my temper and told her exactly what I thought of her. I yanked the phone from the kitchen to the front door. The cord was stretched so far that I thought it would pop out of the socket, but I didn’t care. I opened the front door as quietly as I could and rang the bell loudly. ‘Oh, sorry, Imogen, have to dash – it’s my mother. ‘Bye now.’

  I was so angry that I didn’t know what to do with myself, so I jumped up and down shouting, ‘Patronizing bitch,’ for five minutes until I was out of breath and my feet hurt. Some women swear by slapping on the Marigolds and giving the kitchen floor a good scrub in times of anger, but I think they’re all depraved. Cleaning the kitchen floor definitely would not do it for me.

  After jumping up and down I took out a tub of Häagen Dazs vanilla chocolate fudge and ate my way through my anger. But then I felt guilty about the eight thousand calories I’d just consumed so I dragged myself to the gym.

  I hated the gym. There was something so unnatural about a group of women in Spandex thongs jumping around like monkeys to cheesy seventies disco music. So I never went to classes, I just went down and watched EastEnders while ‘power walking’ on the treadmill, or read Hello! on the Stairmaster.

  The Hello! was gone when I got there but there was an old Cosmopolitan left in the stack so I took that. It had an article about masturbation and how men masturbated all the time and the effect this could have on fertility. If men were ‘slapping the salami’ every day – Cosmo’s words, not mine – they might not have much sperm left for reproductive purposes.

  I’d have to tackle James on that later. I had him on the back foot for telling Donal about my handstands so he’d have to listen to me whether he liked it or not … and, let’s face it, James was not going to be too thrilled about discussing his masturbation timetable.

  When I got home I noticed that the formerly bouncy, curly telephone cord now hung in a limp, straight line down to the kitchen floor. Great – every time I looked at it, it’d remind me of Imogen.

  Twins. Lucky her. Maybe if I got James to stop masturbating, we’d have triplets and then I’d never have to get pregnant again. Hurrah. If Henry could produce twins, I didn’t see why James couldn’t manage triplets. I could picture it now. Two girls and a boy – Holly, Sophie and Ben. Two pink Babygros and a blue one. All sleeping sweetly in their cots side by side. Everyone would know the Hamilton triplets. They’d bring a smile to people’s faces as they passed by. The girls looked like little Shirley Temples and the boy looked like the cute little kid in Jerry Maguire. Aww, they were gorgeous.

  As I steamed the vegetables for dinner I imagined little Ben playing rugby for Ireland as his father watched proudly from the sidelines, although James would probably want him to play for England. Mmm, hadn’t thought of that. It might be less complicated if he played tennis. Yes, tennis was better. We could go to Wimbledon and sit in the posh box where the families sit and cheer him on as he wins the tournament. Then, in an emotional acceptance speech, he’ll thank his parents, but especially his wonderful mother for her support and encouragement throughout his formative years. I was clapping and wiping away tears when James walked in.

  Obviously feeling bad about the Olga Korbut palaver, he had bought me flowers. He saw me in tears and came over to hug me. ‘I’m sorry, Emma. I didn’t mean to upset you.’

  There was no point in trying to explain that I was crying with pride at our son’s nail-biting Wimbledon-final five-set victory, so I said nothing. He handed me the flowers and I put them in a vase. They were lovely but I was going to make him sweat it out for a bit.

  ‘I really am sorry, darling. I promise, no more indiscretions.’

  ‘Well, there’d better not be, James. That’s private stuff, not for the locker room. I don’t want the whole team laughing at me. You know what Dublin’s like, the whole city will know about it. I’ll be a laughing-stock.’

  ‘You won’t. I only said it to Donal and he swore he hadn’t said it to anyone else.’

  ‘Oh, really, and you believe him, do you? I’d hardly describe Donal as the soul of discretion.’

  ‘He is, actually. He plays up the gruff-rugby-player thing, but he’s a really good guy.’ />
  ‘OK, enough of the eulogy. You’ll be telling me he’s in touch with his feminine side next. Besides, I have something more important to talk to you about.’

  ‘Oh? What’s that?’ James looked at me warily.

  ‘Masturbation.’

  ‘Emma!’

  ‘I need to know how often you masturbate. There’s no point looking appalled: it’s a well-known fact that men masturbate regularly, I just need to know how regularly.’

  ‘Emma, there are some things that a guy needs to keep to himself and that’s one of them.’

  ‘Oh, for goodness’ sake, I don’t want to watch, I just want to know. It’s important.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Because apparently if you’re cleaning your pipe – or whatever the expression is – every day there’ll be none left for when we have sex. We need nice full loads of sperm, not the measly leftovers from your earlier activities. So come on, tell me, how often, James? Every day? Twice a day? Couple of times a week?’

  ‘I don’t know. It depends.’

  ‘On what?’

  ‘On lots of things.’

  ‘Like what?’

  ‘Stuff.’

  ‘Like what?’

  ‘Like how I’m feeling, what I’m thinking about, if I have an urge, stuff like that,’ said James, looking increasingly uncomfortable.

  ‘Really? What kind of urge?’

  ‘Well, if I woke up with an erection or saw a steamy film or something. Look, can we please change the subject? I really don’t want to discuss this with you.’

  ‘OK, but where do you do it? In the shower? Down the loo?’

  ‘Well, I don’t know, I suppose in the shower mostly.’

  ‘Well, at least it gets washed away there. Anyway, the thing is you have to stop it. I need you to save up all the swimmers for me. Keep them all inside so that when they’re finally let loose they’re champing at the bit and raring to go. That way they’ll charge up and hunt down my eggs. It makes sense if you think about it. The less those sperm get out into the fresh air the more eager they’ll be.’

  ‘Fine. Now can we please talk about something else?’