Meeting Lydia Read online

  I used to work with someone who Johnny said was the scariest woman he had ever met. She said that the three uses of men were: getting the tops off (jars, etc.); buying the wine and sex, or as she put it, ‘a bit of the other’.

  Presumably if there were no men, then natural selection would eventually favour stronger women, so that would solve the ‘tops off’ problem. But would selection also favour mathematicians and the spatially aware? Who would put the flat packs together if there were no men? And if men weren’t needed for procreation, would the sex-drive eventually be selected out of the population, or would there still be a case for men for purely recreational purposes?

  Best wishes,

  Marianne

  She clicked on Send, then started to panic. Did this count as a taboo topic for discussion?

  No, it’s science. Nothing more than an intellectual debate. A floating of views.

  She needn’t have worried.

  To: Marianne Hayward

  From: Edward Harvey

  Date: 18th March 2002, 18.50

  Subject: Re: The Uses of Men

  Hi Marianne,

  Well thank you for that cheering news!

  Rachel says that if there were no men, the instructions for flat packs would make sense, so there wouldn’t be a problem!

  I think we’re indispensable, but am biased!

  Edward

  To: Edward Harvey

  From: Marianne Hayward

  Date: 18th March 2002, 21.47

  Subject: Survival of the Unfit

  Hi Edward,

  Good for Rachel!

  Continuing this thought … If selection favours stronger women in the future, how will this fit in with the current medical advances allowing people with all kinds of afflictions to survive to breeding age? This cannot be good for the human condition.

  Marianne

  To: Marianne Hayward

  From: Edward Harvey

  Date: 19th March 2002, 22.31

  Subject: Re: Survival of the Unfit

  Hi Marianne,

  Gene therapy will ultimately rectify the faults, so the problems of the future will never arise!

  Edward

  “Men are strange creatures,” said Taryn to Marianne, sitting on a wooden seat in a local park overlooking the ornamental lake. “I have given them up for Lent – but it’s a bit of a cheat ’cos it’s no great loss. I feel positively liberated! Marc ‘with-a-c’ was a bastard, but he played a damned good game of Scrabble. That woman Brenda-what’s-her-face has done me a great favour. If it hadn’t been her, it would’ve been someone else further down the line. Best to find out now before it gets toooo deep. If you ask me, email is the best distance to keep them; meeting is bound to be a disappointment. Ooh look, is that a grebe? I love grebes.”

  Taryn Danielli, quintessentially gamine and with her spiky dark hair and wild brown eyes, had been Marianne’s best friend for all their adult life. They had met first on the teacher training PGCE at the Institute of Education, and been workmates from the very beginning of their respective careers, both teaching in the same school. Taryn had seen Marianne fall in love with Johnny and shared her joys at having Holly and the pain of not being able to have another child. She was always there to lend an extra pair of hands, but had drawn the line at babysitting. “I don’t do babysitting,” she had said firmly. “Course I’d help out in a crisis, but I don’t want any of this ‘let’s ask Taryn, she’s on her own this weekend …’”

  “Johnny didn’t say that!” Marianne had said.

  “Maybe he didn’t, but people do, do they not? They’ve said it to my face! Don’t want to be put upon. Babysitting is a reciprocal activity, or for teenagers who need a bit of extra cash. I probably won’t ever do kids, even if I do husband.”

  That was eighteen years ago and now Holly had flown and Taryn remained resolutely unmarried and childless. How time marches on, stealthily and with ever-quickening pace as the years go by. But Taryn had an ageless quality about her and sometimes Marianne forgot how old she was.

  Taryn knew all there was to know about the foibles of men and took great delight at extolling their weaknesses whenever she met up with her married friends.

  “There’s no sub-text with Edward.” Marianne said this somewhat wistfully, feeling the throb of the season changing as the blossoms appeared and the buds formed on the trees. A second grebe swam from behind one of the small islands and joined the first one.

  “You don’t know that. Much can be hidden in the written word. We self-censor emails to a far greater extent than in real conversation.”

  “I do know … He seems to be a very happy bunny – at least as far as his family life is concerned – and even if he wasn’t, he isn’t that kind of guy. Believe me; I have antennae for anything that smacks of the untoward.”

  “Then he is a rare one indeed,” said Taryn.

  “That’s why I’d hate to lose him. It’s so difficult getting the balance right between mailing too much and not mailing enough. It would be so easy to stop and then never start again. We haven’t yet been through enough history for a significant gap not to matter. I want to tell him things so he knows what I’m like – but I don’t want to overdo it or scare him.”

  “He wouldn’t keep replying if he didn’t want to.”

  “Maybe he’s just being polite. Ex-public school … trained in good manners …”

  “You can be polite without replying as often as he does.”

  “Once we’ve met, I’m sure it will be easier, but for now … oh it’s so difficult to know what to do for the best. In time I think we could be friends. Real friends … And it is useful having a male friend …”

  “Why don’t you stop writing and see if he mails you?”

  “But what if he didn’t?”

  “Well you’d know you weren’t that important.”

  “But would I know that? Men are bad at initiating emails. Most of the ones I know wait for me to mail them first. They’re much swifter than most women when it comes to replying, though! In any case, I’m sure I’m not particularly important to him.”

  On the island in the middle of the lake, herons were courting and making a noise like the rattles spun by football fans. The grebes with their Taryn hairdos came a little closer.

  Taryn and Marianne watched with the comfortable silence of friends that have known each other for a very long time.

  It was some minutes before Marianne spoke again. “Taryn,” she said. “As you’ve never been serious about wanting kids, do you think this means you use different criteria for choosing men?”

  “If you mean do I prioritise them on how they rate on the bonk-scale, then probably, yes. Why do you ask?”

  “I was reading that testosterone affects the facial features. Masculine looking men have more testosterone. More testosterone makes men more restless and less likely to stick around to look after the children – ’cos they have more other-women options.”

  “That figures.”

  “When women are looking for a mate to settle with, the theory goes that they are likely to select a man with more feminine features because they have less testosterone and are less likely to stray.”

  The grebes came close to the bank, casting their beady eyes over the two women in the hope that food was forthcoming.

  “Marc-with-a-c is certainly masculine – square jaw … chiseled … and he strayed. Had a big dick too, if that’s relevant!” said Taryn.

  Marianne laughed. “By this reasoning, only Barbie dolls and the super beautiful can risk settling down with Mr Gorgeous … But what happens when she reaches a certain age and starts falling apart like us?” She threw broken crust for the grebes.

  “Trade in time!” said Taryn.

  “God, life’s so unfair.”

  “But now there’s always cosmetic surgery.”

  “Would you ever consider it? Money no object …”

  “Thought about adding to the boob department once. D’you remember me saying?�
� said Taryn. “But then I met Alec – or was it Don? – who said that all most men want is a handful and a little bit more, so I decided it wasn’t worth the effort – or the cost, and the bother of finding a whole load of new bras!”

  “But now everyone seems to be doing it …”

  “Only in the media,” said Taryn.

  “Everything that starts with the media, ends with the woman next door. Where does that leave those who are too scared or who can’t afford it? An under-class in the looks department …”

  “But that’s true already.”

  “Yeah, but at least there was a levelling of the playing field when past a certain age. Some of those sultry maidens from the sixties are looking quite haggard now. Tough, I say.”

  “There’ll be a backlash one of these days,” said Taryn. “Scare stories; long term effects. Look at what tanning does for you eventually? Now it’s okay to be pale. I really can’t understand the lengths some women go to.”

  “It’s biologically driven … Beauty equals reproductive fitness, so evolution says, and men are wired to chase the best they can. No point in wasting sperm on someone who’s past it.”

  “But if Ms Averagely Hideous spends a few grand turning her enormous honk into a veritable button, won’t the guys fear the kids they produce may be like tapirs and keep well clear?” Taryn threw another piece of crust into the water and it was immediately besieged by Canada geese.

  “Assuming they know about the nose-job.”

  “Would they see the woman as sex partner, then, but not marriage material?”

  “Didn’t stop Cilla’s Bobby.”

  “And what if someone of fifty-five has face lift, boobs done and liposuction …” Taryn made a slurping noise. “Imagine that! Ends up looking like a startled thirty-year-old … does Mr Gorgeous’s primitive brain take over and does he want to shag the pants off her, or … does he rationalise that she’s not likely to be capable of bringing forth any sprogs?”

  “But rationally he probably doesn’t want any more kids, so it shouldn’t matter that she’s fifty-five.”

  “So why does it matter that she’s had plastic-fantastic?”

  “Primitive brain responds to beauty.”

  “Primitive brain linked to dick! Ah-ha, I see!”

  “And women, traditionally,” said Marianne, “are much more concerned with bread-on-table matters, so they will settle for an ageing, bloated, lump of a guy provided he’s generous with the cash handouts.”

  “Oh look!” said Taryn. “The grebes are doing their weed dance.”

  Marianne looked, and across the lake the grebes were rising out of the water facing each other with beaks full of weeds, heads shaking this way and that, feet paddling furiously just under the surface.

  “And how’s Johnny?” continued Taryn. “Has he stopped seeing the Cow-Charmaine?”

  “I think so … He says so … But I’m still cross with him …”

  “Of course! It’s important that you are. Be cross until July.”

  “Why July?”

  “Summer holidays! Don’t want to spoil them!”

  “Holly’s bringing Dylan to stay next week …”

  “The wonderful Dylan! If he hasn’t got a sculpted face, you’d better buy a hat!”

  And so the conversation went on, flitting from this subject to that; rarely finishing one line of thought before another one interceded. This is why women needed women friends and no amount of conversations with Edwards or Johnnys, (or Patricks or Richards or Winstons or Kurts), could ever take the place of the convivial girly chat with all its unspoken understanding of the female condition. That was the crux of the matter. Women knew without having to say. At best all most men could do was to try to understand.

  28

  Dylan

  “This is Dylan,” said Holly beaming lovingly at the tall, angular, young man on the front doorstep of the house in Beechview Close.

  Marianne gave Holly a big hug and held out her hand to Dylan, noticing his wild brown hair and bohemian style, not unlike Johnny as a teenager. He had big dark bush-baby eyes. Honest, vulnerable eyes that said: ‘I am an open book waiting to be read.’ He would have turned her head when she was at college.

  “We’ve put you in Holly’s room,” she said, adding hastily, “but Holly won’t be there.”

  Dylan’s flicker of surprised joy quickly vanished and he looked embarrassed. “Hi-ya. Good to meet you, Holly has told me lots about home.”

  “Where will I be?” asked Holly as they stepped into the hall. They had already had the conversation about the appropriateness of separate rooms, Marianne saying that it would be best not to upset Johnny.

  “In the spare room with the computer and the junk,” said Marianne.

  “I wouldn’t’ve minded,” said Dylan. “I’ll sleep anywhere. You should see my room at home.”

  There was a touch of the public school about his accent and Marianne was cross with herself for being pleasantly surprised. There she was being judgmental again when she swore she wouldn’t be. She ushered them into the living room where Johnny was standing waiting to greet his precious daughter and give this ‘friend of hers’ as he kept saying, with emphasis on the friend, the once over. He was ready to be critical, but so far as first impressions went, Dylan had done nothing wrong and seemed to have impeccable manners.

  Just the kind of young man my parents wanted me to bring home, thought Marianne, once they got past the hair and the clothes, that is. She remembered that apart from Nick, they were always hypercritical and always disappointed. Worst was the time when she was dating a meteorologist called Max who was ten years her senior and so worldly-wise by comparison that he would never pass the test. They grilled him for a good two hours after their first supper, assessing his intentions and deducing that he was bound to be a bad influence. After he had gone, they pulled him apart piece by piece, calling him too full of himself and even criticizing the way he was dressed. After Max she gave up bringing boyfriends home until she and Johnny got together.

  Marianne had been determined not to be negative, no matter what Dylan was like, but she need not have worried because almost immediately they were at ease and she began counting chickens and grandchildren. Soon Johnny and Dylan were drinking beer and talking about the merits of real ale. Seeing Holly glowing beside him and noting his attentiveness towards her gave her a warm feeling that she hadn’t experienced with any of the previous boyfriends that had crossed the threshold of Beechview Close.

  The ‘what are you going to do with your life?’ question hovered on her lips, but she kept biting it back and eventually Dylan offered the information that he was hoping to do a PhD and then eventually become a barrister.

  “Either that, or go round the world doing a bit of this and a bit of that,” he added with a chuckle and a disarming smile. “Quite like the idea of keeping the student-thing going for as long as poss. Thought about taking a gap year after school – but worried that getting back into study after might be tricky … And the parents weren’t too keen on some of my suggestions… South America … Said they’d worry … A friend of theirs, who was kipping out in the rain forest, had his arm eaten by a snake … Slipped out from under the mosquito net while he was asleep, and when he woke up, there was this snake looking right into his eyes with its jaws around his arm and up to his shoulder.”

  “No way,” said Holly.

  “God’s honest truth,” said Dylan. “Course they couldn’t pull it off like a sleeve because the teeth are angled backwards …”

  “Gross!” said Holly.

  Johnny and Marianne were listening with rapt attention.

  “And it had begun to digest the arm by the time—”

  “Too much information,” interrupted Holly.

  “And how did they get it off?” asked Johnny.

  “I wouldn’t like to speculate,” said Dylan, grinning. “But the guy was okay in the end.”

  Marianne wanted to ask what his parents did, but she
knew that this was yet another question that smacked of assessment and judgement. She had hated it when her parents asked. It shouldn’t matter these days.

  “You could forget South America but still do the gap thing with me, after we’ve graduated,” said Holly, adding swiftly, “if we just happen still to be together after all that time.”

  Dylan smiled at her and squeezed her hand reassuringly.

  “Young love,” said Johnny later, when they were getting ready for bed. “Do you remember feeling like that? All fresh and new and hopeful?”

  “Oh yes.”

  “It seems a long time ago – suddenly.”

  “Does it?” Marianne was acutely aware that this was one of those critical points in a conversation where a misplaced word could have major consequences.

  “I still feel like that about you Mari. We are okay, aren’t we?”

  “What’s brought this on?”

  “Seeing them setting out at the beginning of it all. I felt old.”

  “You are Peter Pan. No need to feel old.”

  Johnny climbed under the duvet, watching Marianne undressing. “I’ve stopped seeing Charmaine outside of work. Keeping things more businesslike … You were right … She was getting too involved.”

  Marianne held her breath, wondering if this was going to be the apology she had long been waiting.

  “I know I’ve said things I shouldn’t … I know I’ve upset you sometimes these past few months … but I’ve always told you I loved you. Never stopped.”

  Here she could have made peace and said she loved him back, but the hormonal undulations dimmed her rationality and made her provocative. She could feel her heart beating.

  “If you really loved me, you wouldn’t have said such hurtful things. Wouldn’t have made such a fuss of Charmaine and made me feel I was getting past it.”

  “You know I didn’t mean it. It was just once or twice … I’d been drinking …”

  “It only takes one bad comment … You only remember the bad things.” She turned her back on him and combed her hair slowly, pausing over a tangle, feeling the silky strands run through her fingers.