Georgia was pleased. Pleased and surprised.
“You remembered the name,” she said approvingly. “I think there’s hope for this place yet.”
CHRISTMAS TIMING
This would be their fifth Christmas together, or not together. But the principle was the same. Chris hated the smugness of married people who went on and on about anniversaries, as if a thing could only be celebrated when it was legit. She couldn’t believe that her friends didn’t know that she and Noel had got together in the winter of 1984. A magical winter when they kept finding out how much they had in common; they were both Christmas babies, one called Chris, one called Noel in deference to the season. They had both been bored rigid by the Olympic Games and never wanted to hear of a decathlon, a javelin, or a discus ever again. They had loved the film Amadeus and felt that at just touching thirty they were a little too old for Michael Jackson.
It had been the Christmas of Stevie Wonder and “I just called to say I love you.” Chris would never forget that as long as she lived. And the way Noel did call to say he loved her, from every phone box, hotel foyer, railway station. And from the family home whenever his wife was out of earshot.
The children were so young in 1984. Noel’s children. And of course, to be fair, his wife’s children. They were very young, they were seven and eight. That was young. And oddly, as the years went by, they still seemed to be young. Chris couldn’t understand it, everything else changed. But those children of Noel’s were still clinging toddlers expecting him home, needing to be telephoned, wanting presents, demanding postcards daily on the few occasions when Noel and Chris did manage to get away together. They seemed to be getting younger in their photographs too. Or else dressing younger and assuming babyish positions. They were twelve and thirteen now. Why did they still get photographed cuddled up to Daddy, leaning on him, needing protection? Did a devilishly cunning wife always manage to snap them this way, knowing that these would be the pictures that got shown rather than complete family scenes?
They were very sensitive with each other, Chris and Noel. He never mentioned aspects of the family Christmas that might upset her, the parties for relatives and neighbors. She was the same with him, she never talked about how her parents always invited her father’s junior partner, a man who had the huge advantage of being single. She never told him how her sisters talked to her darkly about the biological clock ticking away and how liberation was all very well but did one want to put off babies forever?
In fact Chris thought that they were much more courteous to each other and anxious not to offend than were most married couples she knew. She often did those quiz-type articles in magazines. “Are you compatible?” In all of them, answering honestly, she thought they came out with top marks. They always listened, fascinated, to stories of the working day. They never slouched around the house in slovenly and unattractive gear. Neither of them would dream of turning on a television rather than having a conversation. They were tender and giving in their love-making rather than selfish. They didn’t need to cheat. They were compatible.
Sometimes she did an “Are you romantic?” test. And they were, they were!
He brought her a single flower; he remembered what she wore and praised it. She always served dinner on a table, no trays on the lap in Chris’s flat.
And it was the same in the “Is he a chauvinist pig?” tests. He wasn’t, he wasn’t. With her hand on her heart she could say that he admired her mind, thought her job was worthwhile, asked her advice about his own, treated her equally in all things. There was no way she could be considered his little bit of fluff.
There were no tests she shied away from. Not even the “Will your love survive?” She went through it remorselessly and decided that it would. Triumphantly, when all others had fallen or cooled down. They had all the right ingredients for survival. They were clear-sighted, they knew the limitations and yet could travel to the furthermost boundaries. Even the regular Christmas promise that next year they would be together. Properly. That wasn’t a weak link in their love. It was a necessary pronouncing of commitment.
Noel loved doing these little psychological tests too. Sometimes he found more that Chris hadn’t seen in management magazines. “Is your love life suffering because of stress?” They would laugh confidently and agree that Noel’s love life with Chris was doing nothing of the sort. He found a serious one called “Are you a cheat?” They went through it very carefully and decided that he wasn’t, because nobody was being let down. And that when the time was right everything would be out in the open.
So they had no fear of any Christmas Quiz dreamed up in a family newspaper to keep the readers happy and partially alert over Christmas. And though they were separated by many miles, they wouldn’t be unhappy on Christmas Day. Noel had a picture of Chris sitting down in her family home surrounded by sisters and brothers-in-law, nephews and nieces, and good old family friends. He could imagine her sitting by the fire and picking up this marvelous questionnaire and filling it in quietly, smiling to herself in the knowledge that he, too, would be doing it by his fireside and that everything they answered to the questions would be almost word for word the same. Chris thought of Noel, after all the family fun with those two children who seemed to have reversed the aging process, possibly getting rattles and soft toys in their stockings this year. He would ask for a little peace for Daddy to read the papers and it would be given to him. She could see him nodding and smiling over the kind of thing that might have other couples riddled with anxiety. Compatible, romantic, clear-sighted, nonchauvinist, noncheating? They would win in every category. At around the same time on a crisp, cold afternoon on the day that was both Christmas and the day they had reached half of three score and ten, they sat down to do the Christmas Quiz.
This year it was in a different format. Not the usual boxes to tick for Yes and No and Possibly. Not the usual scoring scheme at the end: “If you scored over 75 you are ridiculously happy” or “If you scored under 20, are you sure this relationship is for you?”
This year it was a completely new departure. You had to write in words, sentences, not ticks and crosses. There was no scoring at the end, only the suggestion that you leave the newspaper around the house so that the loved one could read it. That’s if you wanted the loved one to change. Deep in their armchairs miles from each other, Chris and Noel, the thirty-five-year-old Christmas babies, nestled in to do the questionnaire. It was called “Those little irritations,” and under a whole lot of different headings you had to fill in the things about the loved one that caused you to wince. BE HONEST the headline screamed at you, and said there was no point in doing it unless you did it honestly.
In the house where Chris sat, children played with their new games by the tree, her sisters talked of new arrivals in the new decade, her parents slept contentedly in their chairs. Her father’s junior partner, who had the merit of being single, mended the Christmas lights and put batteries into all the gadgets that had been gift-wrapped without them. He saw Chris take up the questionnaire.
“Only a couple who were seriously mad would attempt that,” he said genially.
Chris looked at him pityingly. He must not know about her happy love life in case he ever let it slip to her parents.
“Oh that’s right, only us singles would dare to do it. Fantasy life and all that.”
He smiled at her; he looked kind of different this year, perhaps he, too, had a secret life. She drew the paper up to her closer so that she could begin without his seeing the pure contentment on her face.
In Noel’s house the children had gone out with their friends; they said there was nothing to do at home and now that they had opened their presents, couldn’t they please go up the hill and fly kites like everyone else. Noel’s wife talked excitedly with her father and mother about the business she was going to start. Yes, of course it would mean a bit of travel, but the children were well grown up now and nothing made youngsters as independent as having to look after themselves a
little in these formative years.
Noel opened the paper and smiled at “Those little irritations.” He knew before he started that there would be no irritations, little or large, about his life with Chris.
Now, if it had been a questionnaire about him and his wife. Aha, that would be a different matter altogether! Look at the very first question.
“Does the loved one have any one phrase said over and over that drives you mad?” Chris hadn’t. She was forever fresh and new in everything she said. But his wife, if she said “Let’s face it” once a day she must say it four hundred times. And her other phrase was “To be strictly honest.” God, how he could scream when she said that. She always felt the need to say that she was being strictly honest when she told him the most trivial detail, like how long she had waited for a bus or what time somebody had telephoned. “No, to be strictly honest it was at three o’clock she phoned not half-past two, but let’s face it, she does phone every day.” No, there was nothing at all in that category that he could hang on Chris. His wife, however, had another phrase that he hated. It was “Right?” Said as a question after the most banal statement. “I saw the new next-door neighbors today. Right?” Why did she say “Right?” With an effort Noel dragged himself away from this bubbling rage. The quiz was meant to be about him and Chris, for heaven’s sake, and so far she had passed with flying colors. Now on to question two. “Is there any item of clothing that the loved one wears which you would like to consign to the dustbin?” Well, yes of course, that hideous mink cravat, and the line of chat that went with it. “I don’t approve of killing animals for their fur, but mink are different, they’re vermin, and they’ve never known freedom.” But wait, that wasn’t Chris, that was his wife. Chris wouldn’t wear any kind of fur, nor would she have a list of excuses ready if she did. She wore lovely soft colors, gray-blue like her eyes and lilac sometimes, then when he would least expect it she might appear in a scarlet dress, or a yellow sweater. No, nothing for the dustbin there. He sighed with pleasure as he thought of his luck in love. A girl who never said a word astray or wore a garment that he didn’t love.
In another house Chris was Being Honest, as the headline had urged her to be. Any phrase, over and over? Well, only the way he always said “I must go to the little boys’ room” when they went out to dinner, or even when they had dinner in her flat. But that wasn’t something you hated. Just a bit predictable. Oh, and of course he always said “Ice and slice?” when he got her a gin and tonic, as if it were mint new. But that was sort of a joke, he had imaginary quotation marks around it. No, she wouldn’t write it down, that would be nit-picking. Across from the fire she saw her father’s partner. She thought he had been looking at her, but she must have imagined it, he was very busy installing new batteries. He had brought a seemingly endless supply of them, which was good thinking on the part of someone who didn’t have any children of his own. Chris read on. Was there an item of clothing belonging to Noel that she would throw out, apart from the underpants with the words “Hot Stuff” on them? Well, there was the red-and-white-striped nightcap that had been funny once, and the fur hat after the Gorbachev cult, and the socks with sandals in the summer, and the driving gloves that were perfectly reasonable gloves in themselves but looked self-important on a driving wheel somehow. But these weren’t real irritations. Not in the sense of being able to find a list of them.
There were twenty questions in the list. Twenty times Noel found at least five flaws in his wife and not one in his girlfriend. When Chris answered the twenty questions, however, she found twenty flaws in Noel. Twenty times, with tears beginning to start at the back of her eyes. Yes, she had found three unpleasant eating habits, and yes, she had observed two signs of corporate dishonesty, as well as an alarming six signs of petty personal meanness. She wrote none of them down. She didn’t need to. It wasn’t a paper to be left around to improve his habits. It was an eye-opener. As the scales fell from her eyes so did the glory seem to fall from Noel. She knew he would call soon and sing the Stevie Wonder lines down the phone. She knew she wouldn’t tell him now that she knew he would never leave his home for her and furthermore she didn’t want him to. It would be an ease to him too. He wasn’t a basically bad man, just a basically irritating one.
In another house, Noel had counted seven unpleasant eating habits in his wife, and such high levels of corporate dishonesty that he feared she would be in a major criminal league when she got her business going. Noel knew that this was the time he would tell his wife that he wanted to leave. He would tell her today, this very day. It would be fairer and she could go ahead with her plans without taking him into consideration. He hadn’t realized just how far they had grown apart. Just how little his children needed him. What a revelation it had been.
He would tell her straight out and then phone Chris. And this time no need to go up to the bedroom saying he needed to go to the little boys’ room to make the call. No need to go down the road to the phone box on the corner. He would be honest.
Noel could hardly wait to know what Chris would say. Perhaps she would leave home immediately and drive back to her flat in the city. What would there be for her to stay at home for? He would drive around to see her, take a bottle of tonic, possibly, and a lemon, she’d have gin, it would be silly to duplicate but he did know how she loved a gin and tonic with its ice and slice.
He wished he could see her now. But later, afterward, he would ask her what it had been like in the hours before he had rung to tell her that he was free.
Chris sat and played a game of electronic ice hockey with the friend of the family, her father’s partner, who happened to be single and who also happened to be very nice.
They were the only ones who heard the telephone ring, and he agreed with her that there was no point in answering it. Only very irritating people rang on Christmas Day.
THE CIVILIZED
CHRISTMAS
It had been a civilized divorce, people said. What did that mean? It meant that Jen never said a word against Tina, the first wife, the beautiful wife who had run away and run back half a dozen times. It was civilized because Jen wrapped Stevie up in his scarf every Saturday and took him by two buses to Tina’s house without complaining. She smiled an insincere smile as Tina, often in housecoat, always lovely, came to the door. Tina used to ask her in at one time, but Jen had always said no, thank you, she had some shopping to do. Tina would repeat the word “shopping” in wonder, as if it were a very unfamiliar and outlandish thing for someone to do on a Saturday. When Stevie’s visit was over, Tina put him in a taxi and Jen took him out of it and paid the taximan. Tina had a house, a terraced house, she had a three-piece suite with beautiful flowers on it, she had a mirror with a big gilt frame in her hall, but she never had the taxi fare home for her son.
They said it was civilized because Tina hadn’t contested the custody. Her job took her away from time to time—she was a casino croupier and was often called on to go to big functions in the country. Her hours were unsuitable, much better not to try and rear an eight-year-old boy, better for the child. And anyway, the boy’s father wanted the child so much, let’s be civilized about it, Tina had said. Martin was so delighted that there was no battle, he had started to think almost warmly about Tina. Stevie loved going to see his beautiful mother and her bright chatty friends. It was all much better than the days when Mum and Dad had been fighting and crying. They had told him it would be better this way and they were right. Mum had bought him a computer, so usually he spent the time at that when he went to Mum’s house. All the people had wine and sandwiches and they would come in and watch him and say wasn’t he marvelous. Mum had a big bottle of apple juice all for him, as well as the sandwiches, and she used to ruffle his hair and say he was very brilliant as well as handsome, and that he would look after her in her old age when all her looks and her friends had gone.
Mum’s friends would pat him on the back approvingly and it was all very grown up and exciting. Mum even realized that
he was old enough to take a taxi on his own. She would run lightly down the steps and whistle, a real ear-splitting whistle, and passersby would smile as they always did at Mum.
At school people asked Stevie was it awful, his parents being divorced, and he said no, honestly, it was fine. He saw them both, you see, and they didn’t fight, he was welcome in two places. And in the pub where Martin had his half pint on the way home from work, the kind motherly woman who polished glasses and listened to life stories asked him if it was all working out and if the boy was settling down with his new mother. “Uh, Jen isn’t his mother,” Martin would say happily. “Nothing is ever going to replace his real mother, he knows that, we all know that.” The woman smiled as she shone up the gleaming brass on the pumps and said it would be a happy world if everyone was as civilized as Martin and his wife.
This would be their first Christmas together. Jen, Martin, and Stevie. Jen had planned every detail to make it perfect. She worked in a supermarket for five hours every Saturday morning, a tiring job particularly at this time of year. She worked the cash register and sat in a cold, windy part of the shop where the doors were always opening and the December wind came biting around her shoulders. They didn’t like her wearing a jacket, so she wore three vests and a small jumper under her nylon coat. She looked much fatter than she did at school, where she was the secretary in a nice sensible wool dress. The school had central heating and nobody leaving doors open. Jen saved the supermarket money to make it a great Christmas for them all. She bought crackers and table decorations, she bought mincemeat for the pies, she got the kind of tin of biscuits they would never have dreamed of buying normally, she had a tin of chestnut puree and a box of crystallized fruits.
Jen wasn’t a great cook, but she had planned their Christmas lunch so often that she felt she could now do it in her sleep. She even knew what time she should start the bread sauce. It would be the first real Christmas Day for Martin and Stevie, she reminded herself. The lovely Tina had never been very strong on home cooking, and she liked to spend the festive season drinking to people’s health in wine bars or restaurants and clubs.