Something Old, Something New. Darcie Boleyn
more details nearer the time, then read it through to check the tone.
I switch on the kettle and lean against the kitchen unit. The high squeaky voices of cartoon characters drift from the living room followed by chuckles from Henry and Anabelle. I don’t like to leave them in front of the TV but now and then I guess it’s okay. I mean, parents can’t just constantly interact with their kids and entertain them all the time, can they?
Janis is still sleeping. It’s only ten and she deserves her rest. She had a friend over last night to study – on a Friday – so I can hardly blame her for needing to catch up on some sleep. I hope she’s not working too hard.
There’s a gentle knock at the back door and it swings open. It’s my neighbour Cassie. There’s a low wall between our back gardens and she often hops over it to come in for a gossip. She’s dressed like she’s just starred in a fitness video from the eighties and I have to swallow the sarcastic comment about starring in an eighties aerobics movie that springs to my lips.
‘Morning Annie,’ she says as she approaches me and helps herself to an instant coffee. She treats my home like it’s her own. I don’t mind. In fact, it helps to have someone else around when I need an emergency babysitter or someone to let the dogs out during the day. She takes a gulp of coffee then grimaces. ‘Did I not buy you some of the good stuff?’
I frown then realise that she’s on about the ground coffee for the cafetiere. ‘Yes, of course. I think it’s in the fridge.’ I gesture at the silver doors of the fridge-freezer but hope that she doesn’t look inside. I’m actually not sure if it’s in there or if Henry used it to age his homework scroll for his Viking project. Luckily, Cassie doesn’t look for it. She’s got that pained expression that she wears when she wants me to ask her what’s wrong.
I oblige. ‘You okay, Cass? You look kind of worried about something.’ I take a sip of coffee to hide my quivering lips. I love this woman, I really do, but she does enjoy her moments of melodrama.
She pats her platinum blonde curls and lets out a huge sigh. ‘I am, darling, I am. It’s just that I have a training session today with Vlad and…’
‘Vlad?’ I frown at her. ‘I thought your personal trainer was called Barry?’
She waves her hand. ‘That was my old trainer. I had to give him the push, Annie, because he had the most awful back hair. Don’t you listen?’
I’m torn between replying to her comment regarding my listening skills and asking why back hair matters in a personal trainer, when I realise that she probably did tell me. I often carry on with chores as Cassie talks and I may well have tuned out during that particular conversation. ‘Oh, yeah. I remember,’ I say. Better to just agree and keep the peace as she clearly needs to vent.
‘So, as I was saying, I have my first session with Vlad but I look such a mess.’
‘Who is this Vlad?’
‘My new trainer, Annie, I told you this too. He’s a six-foot-four wall of Russian beefcake. He spent some time on the bodybuilding circuit but although he still works out, he now focuses his own fitness business.’ She winks at this and I bite my lip.
‘Well I think you look great, Cass. Your hair is beautiful as always, your tan is well topped up and you’re in… what… size six workout gear?’
She giggles. ‘Size eight, darling. A six would be too scrawny.’ She runs a hand self-consciously over her taut neck.
I nod in agreement, absently tugging my baggy grey t-shirt over my threadbare black jogging bottoms. I have a feeling they’re actually an old pair of Dex’s, which would make them a men’s thirty-two or even a thirty-four. Something like that, I guess. I doubt I’d even squeeze one of my arms into Cassie’s fitted three-quarter length running pants, let alone a leg.
‘So you honestly think I look all right?’ She pouts her perfectly made-up lips at me and I nod.
‘Beautiful.’
‘My lips aren’t getting too thin?’
‘No, of course not.’ I shake my head. Unfortunately, Cassie has a penchant for cosmetic surgery. So far, she’s had two breast enhancements, some lipo and tried Botox – although she didn’t like the frozen forehead look so gave that up after the third appointment – and I’m worried that she’ll get addicted and become like the bride of Frankenstein or one of those celebs from the seventies who just refuse to age. I mean, do they really think it’s better to turn into something that resembles a plastic doll than to get a few wrinkles and red veins here and there? Or am I just making excuses for what’s happening to my own almost forty-year-old body? ‘You do not need to have anything done to your lips.’
‘Okay.’ She grins. She has lipstick on her front teeth but I decide not to tell her. She might already have been out this morning and she’ll go mad if she thinks she’s been seen like that.
‘So tell me more about Vlad.’ The name conjures images of vampires and Gothic castles where wolves howl beneath a full moon. I refrain from asking if he’s dark and swarthy with long, sharp incisors and jagged black fingernails that can tear flesh apart like paper.
‘Oh he’s a blond god, Annie. Built like a wall of rock yet sweet and polite, and he has the bluest eyes…’ Cassie places a hand over her heart and stares into the distance.
‘But you haven’t trained with him yet?’
‘No, I met him for a consultation and he’s put together a plan for me, so today he’ll take me through the first stages then up my routine over the next few weeks.’
Sounds like my idea of hell.
‘You should consider joining us, you know, Annie.’ She gives me the once-over and I squirm even though I know she’s not being mean. Cassie is always kind about my mum bod and she helps me to pick out flattering clothes when we go shopping together – which isn’t often as I don’t particularly enjoy clothes shopping for myself. I’d much rather purchase clothes for the children – but I know that she’s right. I have been thinking about it recently, about finding some time for me and improving myself. Exercise could be the place to start and it might re-energise me.
‘I couldn’t possibly spend money on a personal trainer, Cassie. It would be wrong when the children…’ I am about to use the kids as an excuse. The old financial excuse where I can’t spend money on me when my children need so much, but Cassie is holding out a hand and shaking her head so I stop talking. One thing I’ve certainly learnt about Cassie is that she’s stubborn, and where money is concerned she is extremely generous, so I rarely speak about money in front of her because I don’t want her to think I’m after a handout. Cassie was always comfortably off but following the sudden death of her merchant banker husband eight years ago, she became a very wealthy widow. Her husband absolutely adored her and he’d insured himself up to the eyeballs just in case anything ever happened to him. He provided so well for her that she’ll never have to worry about the bills. But money isn’t everything and I know how lonely she gets at times; just like me, although she’s reluctant to commit to anyone else because she fears being hurt all over again. She told me she couldn’t bear to lose another husband, and worries that no man will ever live up to her first love.
‘Vlad has a special offer on at the moment; two for one for the first two months. So no excuses, Annie! You’re coming with me.’
I search her face, suddenly terrified. I cannot go and work out with a huge Russian right now. I’m tired from a busy term, I’m too flabby to run around a park, I don’t have the right clothes and I have no babysitter.
Yes! That’s it! I have no childcare.
‘I can’t.’ I shrug and finish my coffee. ‘Much as I’d like to, Cass. The children…’
At that moment, as if woken from her slumber by the wicked fairy, Janis appears in the kitchen. She’s wearing her purple fluffy dressing gown and white rabbit slippers. Her hair is pulled