Love Your Life(6)

“Bloody dog,” says Nell.

“Shouldn’t have left it in my bag,” says Sarika, shaking her head. “Harold, don’t eat the plastic, you total moron.”

“Harold?” A familiar voice comes wafting in from the hall. “Where’s that gorgeous dog?”

A moment later, Maud appears round the door, holding the hands of two of her children, Romy and Arthur. “Sorry I’m late,” she declaims in her theatrical way. “Nightmare at school pickup. I haven’t seen Harold for ages,” she adds, turning to beam at him. “Is he looking forward to his little holiday?”

“He’s not a gorgeous dog,” says Sarika ominously. “He’s a bad, naughty dog.”

“What did he do?” says Arthur, his eyes lighting up in delight.

Harold is a bit of a legend in Arthur’s year-two class. He once starred at show-and-tell, where he swiped the school teddy, escaped into the playground, and had to be rounded up by three teachers.

“He stole my chicken wrap,” says Sarika, and both children roar with laughter.

“Harold steals everything,” proclaims Romy, who is four. “Harold steals all the food. Harold, here!” She holds out her hand encouragingly, and Harold lifts his head as though to say “Later,” then resumes chomping.

    “Wait, where’s Bertie?” says Maud, as though only just noticing. “Arthur, where’s Bertie?”

Arthur looks blank, as though he’d never even realized he had a brother called Bertie, and Maud clicks her tongue. “He’ll be somewhere,” she says vaguely.

Maud’s basic conundrum in life is that she has three children but only two hands. Her ex, Damon, is a barrister. He works insanely hard and is pretty generous on the money front but not on the showing-up front. (She says, on the plus side, at least her kids’ lives won’t be ruined by helicopter parenting.)

“Sarika,” she begins now. “You don’t happen to be driving through Muswell Hill at five o’clock on Thursday, do you? Only I need someone to pick up Arthur from a playdate, and I just wondered…”

She flutters her eyelashes at Sarika, and I grin inwardly. Maud asks favors all the time. Will we mind her children/take in her shopping/research train times/tell her what tire pressure her car should be at? This isn’t since becoming a single parent—this is ever since I’ve known her. I still remember meeting Maud at choir. This amazing-looking girl with tawny, mesmerizing eyes came over, and her very first words to me were, “You couldn’t possibly buy me a pint of milk, could you?”

Of course I said yes. It’s almost impossible to refuse Maud. It’s like her superhero power. But you can resist if you try, and we’ve all learned, the hard way. If any of us said yes to all Maud’s requests, we’d basically become her full-time bondslaves. So we’ve informally agreed on a rough ratio of one to ten.

    “No, Maud,” says Sarika, without missing a beat. “I couldn’t. I work, remember?”

“Of course,” Maud says with no rancor. “I just wondered if perhaps you had the afternoon off. Ava—”

“Italy,” I remind her.

“Of course.” Maud nods fervently. “Impossible. I see that.”

She’s always so charming, you want to say yes. She should basically run the country, because she could persuade anyone to do anything. But instead she runs her children’s ridiculously complicated social lives, plus an online furniture-upcycling business, which she says is going to start making a profit any month now.

“Well, never mind,” she says. “Shall I make some tea?”

“You didn’t ask me,” comes Nell’s voice, upbeat but just a little tense. “Don’t leave me out, Maud!”

As I turn to look at Nell, she’s smiling broadly enough—but in her Nell-ish way. It’s a determined smile, Nell has. A strong smile. It says, “Just for now, I’m not going to punch you, although I can’t speak for the next five minutes.”

“Don’t leave me out,” she repeats. And she’s kind of joking—but she’s not. I force myself not to glance at her cane in the corner, because she’s having a good patch at the moment and we don’t bring up the subject except when she does. We’ve learned that over these last few years.

“Nell!” Maud looks stricken. “I’m so sorry. What an oversight. Will you pick up Arthur for me?”

“No,” shoots back Nell. “Sod off. Do your own chores.”

    Sarika snuffles with laughter, and I can’t help grinning.

“Of course,” replies Maud, in the same earnest way. “I totally understand. By the way, Nell, my sweet, I meant to say, there’s a revolting-looking man standing by your car, writing a note. Shall I have a word?”

At once, Sarika lifts her head and glances at me. Sensing the atmosphere, Harold gives an ominous whine.

Nell frowns. “Does he look like a miserable git?”

“Yes. Gray trousers. Mustache. That kind of thing.”

“It’s that bastard John Sweetman,” says Nell. “Moved in a month ago. He’s always on at me. He wants to have that space for unloading his shopping. He knows I’ve got a blue badge, but…” She shrugs.