Mutton, page 5
In fact, none of us are remotely Herculean, except in Kate’s head. Her own extreme weakness (perceived) stands her in excellent stead when she tires of babies, whom she likes but not for too long. ‘Darling, arms,’ she’ll say, handing back the infant after a pleasant two minutes or so. ‘Agony.’ Of course, when I was a child, which is to say before she married my stepfather, Max, she lugged a dozen bags of supermarket shopping without a blink and carried all her own cases. Juggled anvils in her youth, probably. Plus she’s been doing Pilates for thirty years, and I suspect that if any one of us is inhumanly strong, it’s Kate.
Anyway, I schlep up the stairs as requested and into Kate’s bedroom in search of the wretched hand mirror. It’s on her dressing table, nestled among Chanel lipsticks and discarded jewellery. I pause to admire the dressing table. Everything is gorgeous, lacquered, shiny. Except for that ugly tube at the back. What’s that doing there? Very unlike Kate to have ugly stuff out: ugly stuff goes in the bathroom cupboard, hidden from view as though it were shaming. I pick up the tube – an anodyne, atypically functional white plastic number, with writing in German. I don’t speak German, but I want to know what’s inside, so I untwist the cap and squeeze out a dollop of cream. I rub it into the back of my hand. Impossible to tell what it’s for: it’s just a cream. White, thickish and now a bit stingy. Smells of nothing. Hm. I go back downstairs.
‘Now,’ Kate says, taking the hand mirror off me. ‘My face. Look: no lines. Well, hardly any.’
‘Did you send me running up the stairs so you could tell me a thing that is perfectly obvious to me?’ I ask, annoyed. ‘I know you’ve got no lines. I can see. With my eyes. And anyway, stop preening.’
‘I am not preening, Clara,’ says Kate, beaming at herself delightedly. ‘I am the living proof of the efficacy of almond oil, because that’s what it’s all about. Almond oil.’
‘What’s that tube on your dressing table, with writing in German?’
‘Don’t snoop around,’ Kate snaps. ‘My God. I can’t believe you snoop around my things.’
‘I wasn’t snooping.’ She’s quite put out, I can tell. ‘It was sitting there. What’s it for?’
‘It’s just sunblock, for God’s sake,’ Kate says. Could it be that she’s looking shifty? Yes, it could.
‘From equatorial Germany?’
‘I didn’t notice which country it was from,’ Kate says loftily. ‘I don’t scrutinize labels for precise geographical locations. Unlike you,’ she sniffs.
‘Right. Well. What was it you wanted to tell me? To show me?’
‘Ah yes,’ says Kate, perking up. ‘I wanted to share a secret. My facial massage technique. Come and sit over here, so you can really see.’
I roll my eyes. ‘I know about your facial massage technique. It’s nice – I do it sometimes myself. But the point is, you are fantastically genetically fortunate. I too am genetically fortunate, but not as fortunate as you or I wouldn’t have this sodding line. Look.’ I frown exaggeratedly.
‘But you never make that face,’ Kate laughs. ‘When do you ever frown like that? I’ve literally never seen you do it.’
‘It exists, is the point,’ I say. ‘And I don’t like it.’
‘Hm,’ says Kate. ‘No, I don’t suppose one would. It’s probably to do with sunbathing, you know. You’re obsessed with it. Awful business, broiling yourself like that. I’ve never done it, and look at me.’
‘I’m not obsessed with it. I like sitting on the beach for precisely two weeks once a year. With sunblock on. In Devon.’
‘Does terrible damage,’ Kate says. ‘Really dreadful. Do you remember my friend Elsa? Spent her life on beaches. Her cleavage looks like it’s made of cheap leather. Cheap ruched leather, actually. Reminds me of a bag I had in the Eighties. Awful.’ She gives a small shudder. ‘Anyway, shall I show you how to massage your face?’
‘No,’ I say. ‘I already know. And if this confirms anything, this whole conversation, it’s that I’m going to go and have a chat with the Botox doctor. It’s all very well for Flo to be appalled, but she’s younger. And you’re some sort of genetic marvel, and good for you, but really. I still don’t see why I shouldn’t do something about my line.’
Kate sighs deeply. ‘Thin end of the wedge, you know,’ she says.
‘So I gather. But there’s nothing else actually wrong with me. Just the line. So I get rid of the line and that’s the end of that.’
‘I’ve seen it go wrong so many times,’ Kate says. ‘I mean, half my friends look like this.’ She stretches her whole face back brutally, holding it with both hands, which makes me laugh. ‘Wind-tunnel sort of effect. One hates to be disloyal, but really.’
‘I’m not planning on becoming a monster,’ I say. ‘But having inherited this, er, fine genetic material’ – I gesture in her direction and Kate smiles approvingly – ‘it seems a shame to let it go to seed.’
‘I suppose,’ says Kate thoughtfully. ‘Perhaps. As long as you swear that’ll be the end of it.’
‘It will,’ I say.
‘You know, with my technique and the almond oil – you only need the merest drop –’
‘No,’ I say, cutting her off. ‘The situation is beyond almond oil. It’s a great big crevasse, not a patch of dry skin. And now I have to go and collect Maisy from school, but I’ll keep you posted.’
‘Chemicals!’ Kate mutters as I kiss her goodbye. ‘In the face! It doesn’t bear thinking about.’
6
‘Anything I should know?’ I ask Gaby. ‘I feel weirdly nervous. And you still haven’t told me exactly what work you’ve had done. You’re a mistress of evasiveness.’
‘I wish I was someone’s mistress,’ Gaby sighs.
It’s been three weeks since she moved in and I have so far resisted her pleas for a ‘fun’ night out, but I’m not going to be able to put it off much longer. These days my idea of a fun night generally involves a box set, a glass of wine and my sofa, and if it has to be a fun night out, it’s dinner with a friend. But she pooh-poohed all of that when I told her.
Maybe I’m just prematurely aged. I don’t think so, though: I suspect that I could still drink Gaby under the table and smoke her off the face of the planet, and I don’t have difficulty with the idea of talking to strange men. It’s more that I can’t entirely be bothered: I did that for years, and I was glad when it was over – and it was over twenty years ago, when Robert and I first got together. Obviously you sometimes meet people and occasionally go to bed with them, but I haven’t met anyone in a club since before I had children. Friends’ houses, dinners, parties, yes. The Connaught hotel, once, very memorably. Standing at some noisy, slightly naff bar looking hopeful, though – urgh. I really don’t fancy it.
But Gaby is a mind-reader, because she says, ‘Let’s fix a date and put it in our diaries. High time. How’s Friday?’
‘What, this Friday? I can’t. There’s a car boot sale at school on Saturday morning and I need to get our stuff together.’
‘A car boot sale?’ Gaby’s facial expression is somewhere between ‘amused’ and ‘quite cross’. ‘What are you doing going to car boot sales, Granny?’
‘I like them,’ I say, trying not to sound defensive. ‘They’re fun. In the same way that I like junk shops and flea markets. Plus it’s school – it’s raising funds. Much-needed. Plus I get to get rid of our junk.’
‘Whatever,’ says Gaby. ‘Saturday night? In town?’
I’m trying to remember when I last went out on a Saturday night in the West End. ‘Things have changed since you’ve been away, Gaby. It’s not nice. It’s people from out of town and puddles of sick, plus everybody will be twenty-five years younger than us.’
‘Well, let’s not go to central London, then,’ says Gaby. ‘Let’s go … hey, kids, where shall we go?’
Jack and Sky are, as ever, hovering in the vicinity of the fridge.
‘What for?’ asks Jack.
‘Gaby!’ I say. ‘He’s seventeen. I don’t want to go to a place full of seventeen-year-olds. I can do that at home.’
‘I’m nineteen, actually,’ says Jack, referring to his fake ID.
‘Yeah, well, I’m forty-six.’
‘No, but where do you go?’ Gaby persists. ‘Where’s fun? Where has cool people?’
‘Cool people?’ I say. ‘Cool people? Are you in the Upper Fifth?’
‘Ignore your mother,’ says Gaby.
‘Gabs,’ I say, ‘I’m not completely past it. We can do the members’ club thing if you like. Or a bit of east London. Or both. Find some cool people.’ I start sniggering. ‘Find some HOT GUYS.’
‘Mum, do you mind?’ says Jack, looking repulsed. ‘I’m here.’
‘Darling,’ I say. ‘It was just a joke.’
‘Kind of a joke,’ Gaby says unhelpfully.
‘I can ask my sisters,’ I say. ‘At least they’re in their thirties. And I do have a vague idea myself, Gaby, what with occasionally leaving the house and all. But honestly – wouldn’t you rather go somewhere that had proper cocktails and squashy sofas? Couldn’t we at least start somewhere not-edgy? Plus, you get the West End as well, that way. Not that it’s any great shakes, as you will discover.’
‘Oh, I suppose so,’ says Gaby grudgingly. ‘If we must. Like where?’
‘Like, I don’t know. Like … Like the Connaught. Claridge’s. That sort of thing. A smart hotel.’
‘God, how stuffy,’ says Gaby. ‘But,’ she adds, perking up, ‘not at all like LA. Old-school English, which actually might be quite nice. Refreshing. So, yeah. I’m going to break my no-drinking rule for the night. The Connaught it is. For starters.’
‘Actually,’ I say, ‘not the Connaught.’ I feel pierced with sadness just thinking about it: there is actually an ache. Am I going to have to avoid bits of London forever, because they remind me?
‘Oh?’
‘They’re, er, I think they’re having building work. Claridge’s. And then I’ll take you somewhere grimier,’ I say. ‘I promise.’
I don’t know that I particularly want to be somewhere grimy aged forty-six and with a girlfriend, I think, and then I immediately think that I am displeased by my own thought. I like hanging out in louche bars well enough, provided it’s with a man. What is this? It’s crap. I spent my whole teens and early twenties hanging out in louche bars with women, and that was the way I liked it. Hanging out with women is my raison d’être, practically. I hang out with women all the time. But not to pull, and those sorts of places are very pully. I realize that I only like going to pully places if I’ve pulled already. When did that happen? Do men have this? Why have I apparently become the kind of woman who’ll only go to a particular sort of place with a man on her arm? The answer comes quickly: because then I feel safe. This is yet another function of age: the idea of ‘feeling safe’ with a man has crept up while I wasn’t looking. They’re coming thick and fast, the functions of age, and I don’t think much of any of them.
I’m having a very odd three weeks. I am filled with weird thoughts. I wonder if there’s actually a moment when you first feel OLD. If there is, I think I’m having it. I’m in it.
‘Anyway,’ I say to Gaby. ‘Anything I should know before my appointment? Any top tips? You’ve got five minutes to finally spill the beans.’
‘You’re only going for a consultation,’ says Gaby. ‘Calm down.’
‘But why are you being so evasive? It’s not like I want to copy your face, Gaby. I just want to know what to expect. And anyway, I don’t think it’s just a friendly chat. I mean, I think there’s time built in for Dr Halliday to do stuff; it’s an hour-long appointment, after all. I’d quite like to know what the stuff feels like, that’s all. What I should ask for. I mean, you’d know.’
‘You’ll be fine,’ says Gaby. ‘He’s very good. He’ll explain everything.’
‘I don’t think you should have stuff put in your face, Clara,’ says Sky.
‘Come back to me when you’re in your mid-forties,’ I snap. ‘I’m fed up with people telling me what I should and shouldn’t do to my own face.
Sky looks at me sadly and I feel a bit mean. ‘Sorry, Sky. I didn’t mean it. I’m just nervous,’ I say. ‘Right – well, since no one’s going to enlighten me, I’m off. Wish me luck.’
‘It’s not luck,’ says Gaby. ‘It’s expertise and skill. You’ll love it.’
The first surprise is that Dr Halliday’s waiting room contains a well-known actress. This in itself isn’t surprising as such, but what is is that said actress is famous – feted, even – for her absolute repudiation of any kind of cosmetic work. She has chosen to age gracefully, and the British public love her for it. She’s the pin-up for the ‘no to Botox’ brigade, the living, breathing proof that women can be in their sixties, as she must be, and look amazing naturally. I should know – I’ve interviewed her. I remember the quotes, or some of them: ‘What people do with their face is up to them, but I’d never do anything to mine. I think happiness comes from within, and if you’re happy it shows in your face. It’s the best medicine! Other than that, it’s down to Pond’s Cold Cream, a good night’s sleep and plenty of water.’ There was a run on cold cream once the interview appeared.
What’s she doing here? Dr Halliday is of course also a dermatologist: perhaps she has terrible rosacea or adult acne or something. I peer at her face as I head to the coffee machine. It’s the face everyone knows and loves: no spots or red bits. The actress is wearing enormous sunglasses and a wrap that hides her neck, and is reading what looks like a script. She doesn’t look up or make eye contact with anyone – well, with me: there’s no one else in the room. I wonder if I should say hello, but she’d probably have no recollection of our having met – and anyway, bit awkward, in the circs.
I’m such a ninny, I think to myself. I absolutely believed her about the water and the sleep and the cold cream, on the basis that she looks her age, but a fantastic version of her age. A probable version. She has lines round her eyes, and lines when she smiles. In my idiocy, it never occurred to me that this could be the result of cosmetic surgery. Until a couple of months ago, I thought cosmetic surgery meant a tight face, unblinking eyes and a rigid forehead.
I really feel like saying something. I mean, I feel personally slighted. Affronted. That’s quite some lie she’s got going there. Because why not say? Why not come clean? Why not give an interview and, when asked about your remarkable state of preservation, say, ‘Well, I have a little help,’ instead of sending millions of poor sods running to Boots to buy products that have absolutely nothing to do with it?
I’m ruminating on all this when a nurse shows another woman back into the waiting room. With the inevitability of Greek tragedy, this woman is a television personality of roughly my age. Exactly the same vibe going as with the actress: lines around the eyes, mobile forehead, nothing untoward-seeming at all – and many, many public pronouncements about how she in fact likes to eat like a horse but not a pound goes on, because of ‘running after the children’. Nobody questions the fact that ‘the children’ that she makes sound like hyperactive toddlers are in fact by now slothful teenagers.
It slowly dawns on me that maybe everyone’s at it. Well, everyone who can afford it and whose face is public property. Maybe there’s a vast conspiracy and nobody’s telling anyone anything. Not that you’d have an obligation to fess up, I don’t suppose: people’s faces are their own business.
I’m still standing by the coffee machine, staring absent-mindedly at my plastic cup. ‘Ms Hutt?’ the nurse says, with a beaming smile that shows perfect, quasi-fluorescent teeth. God, people’s teeth. I am surrounded by teeth. ‘We’re ready for you.’
‘Fantastic teeth,’ I say by way of small talk as we head down a brightly lit corridor. If it weren’t brightly lit, her teeth would make a passable torch.
‘Veneers,’ she says. ‘My own teeth were awful. Although,’ she adds with a tiny frown, ‘I’m thinking of having them redone. It’s all about the London Smile these days.’
‘How do you mean?’
‘More natural. A bit crooked. These veneers are very 2005,’ she says. ‘You know – that whole Big White American Teeth thing. My friend works at a cosmetic dentist’s and now everyone’s coming in wanting the London Smile. I blame Kate Moss,’ she says. ‘Still.’ She rolls her eyes. ‘The stupid thing is, my teeth were kind of like that in the first place. They had that gap at the front – that’s very big at the moment. And not this white. You know, more natural-looking. Couple of shades darker.’
‘Well,’ I say. ‘That’s OK, then. You can just have the veneers removed.’
The nurse gives me a look. ‘Do you know anything about veneers?’
‘Not a sausage,’ I say cheerfully. ‘I don’t give my teeth that much thought, to be honest. I mean, I’ve only got one filling and I brush and floss, obviously. But otherwise …’
‘Well, it’s really not that simple,’ she says. ‘But here we are. Dr Halliday, this is Ms Hutt.’
‘Clara,’ I say, shaking his hand.
Dr Halliday is about six foot tall, and handsome in a disconcerting way. He has dark hair that falls forward on to his face, and Clark Kent glasses with a jawline to match. Behind the glasses are sparkling blue eyes. But as I look closer, I realize that he has a baby’s skin – fresh-looking, brand spanking new, as though he’d stolen a newborn and nicked its casing.
‘What can I help you with?’ he asks, staring quite hard at my face, just as I am staring quite hard at his. We are having a face stare-off.
‘Ah yes. This,’ I say, frowning as hard as I can. ‘You see that vertical line there? I’d like it to be gone, please.’
