Chocolate Shoes and Wedding Blues

Justin disclaimed any knowledge of this. ‘I realise she tidies the place up, and she knows I don’t like clutter, but I’d no idea she’d actually thrown anything out.’

‘Well, she has, and this time she’s gone way too far. You’ll have to tell her so.’

‘Look, it’s my shot so I’ll have to go. We’ll talk about this later,’ he said soothingly.

‘And the rest,’ I snapped. ‘We need to talk about much more than your mother, Justin!’

‘Later,’ he assured me, though I’m sure he hadn’t taken in what I’d said. ‘Bye, darling!’

I’d simmered down slightly by the time he’d got home, and he’d stopped on the way to buy flowers, wine and chocolates, so clearly it had finally penetrated his thick skull that I was just a trifle upset about Mummy.

As always, I’d forgotten just how stunningly attractive he was, with his tawny hair and bright blue eyes, and my resolve wavered slightly for a moment when he kissed me …

Then he apologised for his mother and I pulled myself together and said resolutely, ‘It’s not just your mother that’s the problem, Justin. I’ve been doing a lot of thinking while I’ve been away and we have several issues we need to resolve.’

‘Issues?’ he echoed, blue eyes wary.

‘Yes. We seem to be drifting along, never discussing anything important, and I’m not prepared to carry on the way we are now.’

I ran my fingers through my hair, which I’d piled up loosely secured with two pink chopsticks, and it promptly came undone and fell in long, ravelled dark curls down my back. ‘I popped down to the shops after I rang you, and I ran into Rae with Charlie – it was the nanny’s day off – and we had coffee together,’ I added, which might have seemed irrelevant, except that seeing little Charlie had really brought it home to me that I should have had a family by now, just like we’d planned when we fell in love.

The fact that he didn’t like Rae or Marcia had always been one of the best things about Justin and now a cloud seemed to pass across his sunny, good-humoured face at the mention of my younger stepsister’s name.

‘I’d have thought you’d have run a mile at the sight of either of your stepsisters. You’re always telling me how mean they were to you after your mother married Lars and you came to London to stay with them.’

‘Yes, they were, but I was probably too sensitive and should have stuck up for myself more.’

I’d always lived up in Lancashire with Aunt Nan. I don’t even remember my grandmother, Nan’s sister, Violet, because she’d died when I was only two, but she didn’t sound any more maternal than my mother and, goodness knows, I’d seen little enough of Imogen over the years! But Immy’s second husband, Lars, was such a sweet, kind man that he wanted me to be part of the family unit and insisted I stayed in his London house (he has a home in New York too) while I studied graphic design. But his two daughters, both older than me, were tall, slim and blondly attractive, just like Lars and my mother, so I felt like an ugly little dark goblin child foisted into the family. They made my life absolute hell too, from criticising my clothes (quirky, black and a bit Goth) to stealing my boyfriends. Lars didn’t know the half of it and he was quite hurt when I quickly moved out into a rented flat with Timmy.

‘Rae hasn’t been so bad since she got divorced and had Charlie – and at least you don’t find her irresistible, like every other man!’

He looked uncomfortable. ‘I think you know the sort of woman who appeals to me by now, Tansy!’

‘Charlie’s lovely,’ I said wistfully. ‘He’s started school full time and he’s very chatty. He looks just like Rae, too. No clues to who the father is there!’

Rae got pregnant about a year after her divorce, simply because all her friends were, I felt sure. She wouldn’t say who the father was, though she hinted he was a wealthy married man. Someone must have been subsiding her lavish lifestyle, because I knew for a fact that Lars gave both his daughters moderate allowances and expected them to earn the rest themselves. He was easy-going to a point, but totally inflexible in other ways, as my mother found when she decided to move on to husband number three.

Marcia, the older sister, earned her living as an actress of course, but apart from a little modelling when she was younger (like Imogen) Rae had lived an expensive life of leisure. Someone must have been paying for it.

I sighed. ‘Justin, time’s passing and I never thought I’d get past thirty-five and still not be a mother! When we got engaged, we were going to get married and have a family within a few months. What’s happened to us?’

‘Children are expensive,’ he said defensively.

‘But you’re earning loads and I’m doing really well with my books. Other people raise families on much less,’ I pointed out. ‘You seem to have turned into a total skinflint over the last few years.’

‘I’ve had other commitments – in fact, I’ve been helping Mummy out with a bit of a loan from time to time,’ he admitted.

I stared at him. ‘What? But your father left her loaded!’

‘Nothing’s worth as much as it used to be, is it? Some of her investments haven’t been doing well and she’s not very good at living within her means.’

‘Can’t you tell her to draw her horns in a bit?’ I asked. Not that I was suggesting she really had a devilish little pair of horns, you understand, though sometimes I’d suspected there might be, under that bouffant beige-blond hair. And maybe there was even a hint of a forked tail under her cocktail frocks. …

‘I’m doing my best,’ he protested.

‘No, you’ve been putting her before me and any chance of a family,’ I pointed out bitterly, a bit stunned by this revelation. ‘Anyway, children aren’t that expensive. They don’t have to go to private nurseries and prep schools, or expensive boarding schools. We could manage. Assuming I can still get pregnant, of course.’

‘Oh, come on, Tansy,’ he said impatiently, ‘of course you can get pregnant!’

‘Justin, I’m serious: I went to a private clinic and had a fertility MOT and it wasn’t the best result possible.’

‘You did that, without telling me?’ he said, looking taken aback.

‘I tried to discuss it, but you kept shying away from the subject. Anyway, I did it, and although it showed I still had some eggs, I’m running out of time.’

He came over and sat next to me on the sofa, putting his arm around me. ‘I’m sure they were just erring on the side of caution, Tansy, and things aren’t that bad,’ he suggested. ‘You’re only thirty-six, after all.’

I turned to him. ‘Justin, what’s happened to us? When we got engaged there wasn’t any talk about waiting for children. We were going to start a family as soon as we got married. Not that we’ve got married, either, have we? I thought you were joking when you said we’d set a date for the wedding as soon I got down to a size eight, but you weren’t!’

‘I just want you to slim down for your health’s sake. You’re carrying a bit too much weight … though sometimes it’s hard to tell under all those weird outfits you wear,’ he added, eyeing today’s bright pink and orange ensemble critically. ‘Isn’t it time to stop dressing like an art student and smarten up a bit? Mother said you would look quite chic with a decent haircut and in the right clothes.’

‘I’m surprised she remembers what I look like at all!’ I said tartly. ‘And she wouldn’t like me even if I’d been gilded by Cartier and dressed by Gucci. But you used to say my clothes were zany and fun, just like me, and you didn’t like skinny women.’

‘There’s something between skinny and overweight, though,’ he said.

‘Well, whatever I am, Aunt Nan says I look fine to her. And goodness knows, dieting never works – it just makes me hungrier, so I go off the rails and eat much more. It’s a vicious circle.’

‘Your aunt Nan doesn’t like me. I think she’s been poisoning your mind about me over Christmas and getting you all upset,’ he said, which was pretty rich when Mummy Dearest must have spent the entire Christmas season pointing out all my shortcomings!

‘Aunt Nan expected us to get married long before this. She doesn’t believe in living together beforehand; it’s not how she was brought up and it upsets her. But at least she wants us to get married – your mother’s desperate to get rid of me.’

‘Of course she isn’t,’ he insisted unconvincingly. ‘You have to admit, though, that we don’t have a lot in common, so naturally she’s worried that things wouldn’t work out. Perhaps you could try to win her round a bit – wear something a little more ordinary when you see her next.’

‘I don’t have anything more “ordinary”, and the way I dress expresses the inner me – so if you don’t like that, or my weight, then maybe you don’t really like me either?’

‘Of course I do – I love you!’ he protested. ‘And if you lost a stone, not only would you be healthier, but it would increase your chances of getting pregnant too – and you wouldn’t want to start a pregnancy overweight, would you? You’d never get the excess off afterwards. Look at Leonie!’

Leonie, one of his friends’ wives, had gone from being a bonily chic woman, all knobbly joints and neck tendons like a chicken, to a plump, dishevelled mother in the space of a year.

‘She looks fine to me, better than she did before the baby,’ I said.

‘Do you think so?’ He smiled at me ruefully with a sort of boyish charm and I remembered Aunt Nan’s Dr Kildare remark. When Justin looked most trustworthy, was he really the opposite?

‘Let’s not argue about it any more now, Tansy. I can see what the clinic said upset you, though I’m sure they were being alarmist. And Mother really has been insensitive about your things, so I promise I’ll speak firmly to her about it. We can sort things out.’

‘Do you still love me, Justin?’ I asked curiously, half-afraid of the answer.

‘Of course I do,’ he assured me, giving me another hug. ‘Look, perhaps we just haven’t spent enough time together lately. I’m working all hours, and what with you off to Lancashire a couple of times a month and Mother wanting to see as much of me as she can, the opportunities have been few and far between.’