Page 2 of A Clean Sweep
One of her sister’s more endearing traits, in Emily’s view, was her proneness to malapropisms. Hence the Charlton/Charleston mix up.
'Hello, darling! You look fabulous! Haven’t seen that top before, is it new?' Celeste clamped her sister to her bosom, nearly asphyxiating her in a cloud of La Vie est Belle. Emily smoothed down the simple but fitted teal blue number with its daring – for her – halter neck. At a time in life when women were forming campaigns like twenty-first centurysuffragettes to bring back sleeves she was inordinately pleased that she had succumbed to neither bingo hall nor bingo wings. And, with hopefully a real fire to keep them warm this evening, she felt a little flesh-baring wasn’t too over the top.
Celeste followed her sister into the kitchen, opening the fridge and retrieving a bottle of Pinot Grigio. Pouring herself a generous measure, she sank down on a counter stool and scooped up a handful of Bombay mix. Duly chewed and swallowed, she surveyed Emily with an appraising eye. 'A bit outré for book club, ma petite?' Celeste had briefly taken a French course at night school and liked to toss in a few Gallic phrases in a bid to impress. 'Shame we don’t have any male members, I’m sure dear Arnold Pettifer would be quite smitten with your defoliage.' As Arnold Pettifer was nudging seventy and had a smile reminiscent of yellowing tombstones – with an odd familial gap or two – Emily didn’t feel it too much of a loss.
'Did you enjoy the book? Found it a bit boring myself. All that weeping and wailing and endless doom and death! Give me a good Sheila O’Flanagan any day of the week.' On this, Emily had to reluctantly agree, even though it had been her selection. Over 700 pages of painstakingly researched historical fact/fiction did not make for a light bedtime read. It might have won several major prizes but to her it served only as a more effective sleeping pill than those prescribed by her GP. She’d managed a quarter before giving up and downloading something frivolous but eminently more entertaining.
'Last month was really interesting, shame you couldn't make it,' continued Celeste, as her sister looked at her watch and wondered if anyone else was going to show up. 'Not my usual cup of tea, but I’m now an Ernest Hemingsworth devotee.' Oh help, thought Emily, wondering where this particulartrain of thought would crash spectacularly. 'Alice chose it, she’s always been a bit pretentious, but I found it quite fascinating. All about bullfighting in Spain. You know, the tradition behind it, the way those men saw themselves as warriors fighting a noble cause. You really should read it, Em. Here, I’ve written down the name for you.' Celeste scrabbled in her bag, produced a tiny notepad with a flourish worthy of Paul Daniels at his peak. ‘Murder in the Morning!’she pronounced. Emily simply prayed for the doorbell to ring. Which it did.
Half an hourin and book club was in full flow. Emily’s living room was filled with the thrum of ceaseless chatter. Glasses chinked and plates clattered as oozing wedges of Brie were spread on crackers, spring rolls dipped in sweet chilli sauce, horseback thingys taken apart to cries of ‘Ooh, it’s a date, thought it’d be an oyster! Or is that the angel version?' Michael – damn him – had been proven right as this month’s weighty tome had barely warranted more than five minutes of their time.
'Watching paint dry would have been more fun,' said Esther Thompson, licking a particularly gooey St. Augur from her fingers.
'Too true,' chipped in Susan Wainwright. She had sped her way through the savouries like an Olympic athlete with an eye on the gold, which in her case was Emily’s fabled mini cheesecakes. With a crumbly butter biscuit base and meltingly creamy in the middle, they were topped with a layer of sweet but tangy blackberry compote. Emily felt slightly miffed that her book choice had failed to captivate her fellow members. Still, at least she'd got beyond the first chapter.
'Oh, I really shouldn’t, but …’ Susan bore the expression of a woman who’d just spent the past hour in the throes of ecstasy with George Clooney/Brad Pitt/take your pick of desirable males as she grabbed another cheesecake. Her third, Emily noted, relieved that she'd made a double batch. Susan then launched into a blow by blow account of what some random woman she knew was up to these days. Which involved latex, whips and something about the headmaster of the local secondary, who’d always seemed a perfectly nice man to Emily, if you discounted his fur-lined anorak and encyclopaedic knowledge of feathered creatures.
Nancy Edwards, a mousy little soul who had barely contributed a word to the proceedings, was currently fanning herself with a copy ofGood Housekeepingpurloined from Emily’s magazine rack. Gosh, it was a little hot in here, thought Emily. Even with her wispy Arnold-attracting top. Taking a large gulp of water, she glanced at the fireplace and realised her fire was more than blazing. It was now raging like a mini Hades and belching out eye-watering plumes of smoke. Esther was in the midst of a spectacular coughing fit, Alice’s face was turning a vivid shade of scarlet and Susan had put down her dessert plate and looked vaguely distressed. And not just because the cheesecakes were finished.
'Emily!' squeaked Celeste, having just returned from a nose-powdering session in the cloakroom. 'I think we have a problem!' No kidding Miss Marple, thought Emily, as smoke continued to billow around the room. All the women were now convulsed in a cacophony of honking and spluttering like consumption sufferers in a modern-day sanitarium. What to do? Call the fire brigade? Much as the thought of hunky hose-wielding men storming her semi gave her a little frisson of excitement, it seemed to her that the problem was more to do with a blockage in the chimney than an out-of-control inferno.
'What the hell’s going on in here?' Through the pall ofsmoke emerged the robust figure of Celeste’s husband, Michael. Often on taxi duty – Celeste never knowingly under drank – he forged a path towards the fireplace, pausing only to grab a vase of fast-wilting tulips. Tossing aside the blooms, he chucked the water on to the smouldering embers. Which hissed, spat and emanated an astonishing amount of steam.From hellfire to hammam, thought Emily. All we need now are fluffy white bathrobes and a reflexology session.
A short time later, the book club ladies said their goodbyes.
'Most excitement I’ve had in a long time!' Nancy gave Emily an uncharacteristic hug, her usual lavender and old lace fragrance tinged with a hint of charcoal.
'Wait until I tell the women at yoga about tonight!' chirped Susan, although Emily suspected they already knew, had seen the high definition footage and were on to the next domestic drama-to-be.
Michael, a pink-faced and slightly droopy Celeste clinging to his arm, paused at the front door. 'Have you ever had your chimney swept, Emily?' For some reason – maybe one too many glasses of Pinot consumed or just the sheer exhaustion of it all – Emily couldn’t help but giggle. Not recently, she wanted to retort, but thought better of it. Michael was solid, reliable and adored her older sister but he was not over-endowed in the sense of humour department. Particularly the section marked ‘slightly smutty’. 'Well, I think you should call someone in. Have a look on Google. Could well be something dead up there. Goodnight then.’
Emily, having cleaned up the kitchen, sprayed liberal doses of air freshener around the living room and taken a shower to wash away the stench of smoke, sank down on her bed. A chimney sweep. Did they even exist anymore? Suddenly her head was filled with pictures of Dick Van Dykedancing with penguins, alongside Julia Andrews being practically perfect in every way. ‘A spoonful of sugar makes the medicine go down …’ She shook her head forcefully. The last thing she needed right now was a night’s sleep plagued by Mary flipping Poppins. She’d investigate the existence of men with long brushes and soot-smeared faces tomorrow.
Chapter 2
Back home after several cups of coffee with her mum, Tabitha sank down on the loo seat. What a relief! It was all very well drinking the recommended eight glasses of water a day (plus tea, coffee, wine etc) but not if your bladder was the size of a peanut. OK, it was probably perfectly normal sized for a twenty-something female but it always seemed to scream ‘time for a pee!’ at the most inopportune moments. Like ten minutes into a movie when she was squashed into the middle row of the cinema between a man the size of Magic Johnson and a woman the width of a small bungalow. Both nursing buckets of popcorn that could have fed a small African nation for a week. And as reluctant to budge as a soon-to-be neutered spaniel on its way to the vet. Or – even worse – on a rickety old bus in the middle of nowhere in Indonesia where the choices were behind a bush where goodness knows what creatures lay in wait or a delightful hole in the ground with strategically placed foot markings on either side. That was a memorable trip, thought Tabitha. She’d been proud of her pelvic floor, lasting two excruciatinghours until the relative luxury of the backpackers hostel.
She’d read somewhere, theNational Geographicperhaps, that an elephant could urinate around 160 litres in one go. Or was it David Attenborough? Not who could pee so copiously, of course, just where that little gem of knowledge had come from. Apparently the average human managed a mere 600 to 1000 ml. Which was only a bottle of Sauvignon Blanc, give or take. What wasreallyfascinating, however, was that both elephant and human took about the same time to empty their bladders. She found that hard to believe. Ah well, the miracles of nature. A quick dry off, up with the pants and jeans, hands washed, time to make something to eat. Quinoa with feta and lentils, part of her new health kick. Although egg, chips and beans might be quicker. And tastier. She grabbed the door handle, turned it and … shit, no. Oh, damn and bugger! Tabitha gazed in horror at the handle, now detached and in her squirty soap-scented hand. She rammed it back on the sticky-out spindle thing and tried again. Nothing. It wouldn't budge. Not an inch. She was locked in the lavatory, just like the old ladies in the song.
Right. Tabitha took a long, deep breath. Don’t panic. Stay calm. She checked her watch. 5.30pm. Barring hold ups, Tom should be home in half an hour. She can’t call him as her mobile is in the kitchen on charge. I mean, who takes their phone to the loo? She remembered giggling when her former boss Denis related the tale of his tumbling into the bowl mid-stream. No amount of drenching it in rice grains saved that poor Nokia. An ignominious end.
But wait a minute. Didn’t Tom mumble something this morning over his Shreddies that he might go for a pint – or two – with Clive and Keith from work? Maybe even a curry if they hadn’t put the Premier League to rights in the pub? Tabitha, sitting at the kitchen counter with her tonguesticking out as she applied her mascara, had barely been listening. She’d had a long day ahead – sorting out new stock, packing up internet orders, listening to the latest tales of dating disasters from her boss – so Tom’s after-work movements hardly warranted more than a cursory ‘whatever’. He could be at least an hour, probably more like two – or three – or …
Feeling her heart racing faster than Usain Bolt, Tabitha attempted to clear her mind, particularly of the image of two lightly fried eggs, crispy golden chips and a side of Heinz’s finest. She could survive without food for a few hours. Might even help lose some of that excess flab she packed on over the Christmas holidays. But water? Wasn’t the maximum survival time something like a week, less if you were in the baking heat of the Australian outback? Which, of course, she wasn’t but the bathroom was pretty warm. What if Tom, strolling back from a tasty chicken tikka Balti and garlic naan, got hit by a bus? Or an asteroid? Or collapsed with an undiagnosed brain haemorrhage? And, having left his wallet in the Delhi Delight, was now lying in intensive care while staff desperately tried to trace his next of kin.
Tears began to well in Tabitha’s eyes, then spill down her cheeks. Which made this morning’s mascara – a departure from her usual brand – join the cascade. Blinking hard, for there was now a nasty stinging sensation, she squinted painfully at the mirror. Great, just great. Now she resembled a blinking giant panda. As she turned on the tap and grabbed a wodge of toilet paper to wipe away the smudges she ever so slowly registered the trickle of water that gradually became a steady flow. OK, so she might not die a horrible death by dehydration just yet. Or be accepted as a member of Mensa anytime soon.
The morningafter the night before and Tabitha unlocked the door of The Little Shop of Treasures, plonked her handbag on the counter and wandered through the back, the beaded curtain jangling behind her. Her boss was already there, opening boxes of greeting cards and sorting them into neat piles. ABBA’s ‘Take A Chance on Me’ played in the background and the air positively reeked of a consignment of scented candles meant to enhance a romantic evening but more likely to bring on a migraine.
'Darling, you’re late!' Meryl tapped her watch pointedly but with a smile. Clearly last night’s blind date had gone well. A blow by blow account would follow, but for now it was time to get the shop ready to open in thirty minutes.
Tabitha had worked there for almost eighteen months now. It wasn’t quite what she’d had in mind when she’d graduated with a degree in events management. She’d stood there proudly on the stage, clutching her empty cardboard tube (for photo purposes only), and beamed at her mum. And begged her silently not to leap to her feet and scream ‘Love you!’ hysterically like a pubescent One Direction fan. Sadly, her fantasies of micro-managing high-end parties, teetering around in Jimmy Choos and barking orders at minions laden with hideously pretentious canapés – sautéed snails a la croûte, anyone? – and balancing trays of Pol Roger had not been realised. She’d managed a couple of corporate events, but these were more vol au vents, paint-stripping wine and a couple of unfortunateincidents involving ageing executives with bad breath and wandering hands. The closest she’d got to celebrities was assisting at the end-of-season wrap party for reality TV show,Scots Wa Hae.This featured a delightfully colourful cast of Glaswegians being filmed going about their day to day lives. There was Wee Jock, a six foot three bundle of tattooed joy, who claimed to be in theGuinness Book of Recordsfor most pints of Tennents Lager consumed in oneminute; Senga, boasting of bedding half a Scottish third division football team (presumably not all on the same night), and Big Tam, her personal favourite. A die-hardBraveheartfan, he had watched the film a mind-boggling 250 times and still blubbed like a baby whenever Mel made his ‘freedom’ speech. A surprise nationwide hit – with subtitles, of course – the show was scheduled for a second series. So a rather inebriated Tam informed her, his blue-striped face coming perilously close to her crisp white blouse. 'Aye, hen, we’ve had better ratings thanEmmerdaleandCorrieput together.' Swaying slightly, he proffered a congealing plate of deep-fried Mars bars. Tabitha politely declined.
So here she was, hardly in the job of her dreams but it paid the rent and she was very fond of Meryl. Somewhere in her mid to late forties, she’d never been married but still believed the perfect man was out there somewhere. Her real name was Beryl but she’d changed it in homage to her favourite actress who also happened to star in her number one movie,Mamma Mia. Such was her devotion she frequently sported dungarees and would burst into ABBA songs at the drop of a hat. Unfortunately, Beryl/Meryl made Pierce Brosnan sound like Alfie Boe.
'If you change your mind, I’m the first in line,' warbled Meryl. Tabitha looked at a display of hand-painted wine glasses and wondered why they didn’t shatter as her boss did a passable impression of a cat being administered an enema. Grabbing a Stanley knife, she began attacking a box of cutesy fridge magnets bearing such slogans as "Cleaning the house while the kids are still growing is like shovelling snow while it’s still snowing". As she began to arrange them on their special board, Meryl – thank you, God – switched off the CD player.
'Time for a brew, methinks, before the hordes descend.' Tabitha nodded in agreement. She’d overslept this morning,still traumatised by her near-death experience in the loo. Luckily, Tom was home sharpish as Clive had been off sick and Keith under threat of castration from his missus if he wasn’t back in time for the kids’ bath and bedtime story. Once he’d released her from captivity – and stopped laughing long enough to put the oven on – she’d felt vaguely sick and more than a little miffed at his lack of sympathy. Then her sleep had been peppered with vivid nightmares involving killer toilet brushes and lakes of elephant wee.
