Rescuing Rose

‘But for a single person it’s fine,’ said Bea helpfully. I winced. Single. Fuck. That was me. ‘Nice garden though!’ exclaimed Bella, changing the subject.

‘And it’s a sweet little street,’ added Bea. ‘It looks a bit scruffy,’ she remarked as we peered out of the landing window. ‘But friendly.’

‘Hope Street,’ I said with a bitter laugh.

‘Well,’ added Bella brightly, ‘we think it’s just…’

‘…lovely!’

‘It’s fine,’ I shrugged. ‘It’ll do.’ I thought with a pang of Ed’s elegant house in Putney with its walled garden and yellow drawing room. Moving into that had been exhausting too, but in a nice way as we’d got engaged just two weeks before. As I’d unpacked my stuff the future had seemed to stretch before us like a ribbon of clear motorway. But we’d hardly set off before we’d crashed and had to be ignominiously towed away. So now here I was, my marriage a write-off, upping sticks yet again.

Some women in my situation might have been tempted to move a little further afield – to Tasmania, say, or Mars, but though I was keen to put some distance between us I reckoned Camberwell was far enough. Plus it would be convenient for work and the area was still relatively cheap. So, a month ago, I dropped into a local estate agents and before I knew it, One Hope Street was mine.

‘It’s vacant for possession,’ said the negotiator with unctuous enthusiasm, ‘and it’s semi-detached.’ Just like me. ‘It’s been empty for a few months,’ she added, ‘but it’s in pretty good shape – all it really needs is a clean.’

When, ten minutes later, I saw the house, I took to it at once. It had this indignant, slightly abandoned air; it exuded disappointment and regret. It was the first in a short terrace of flat fronted houses, and it had a semi-paved garden at the back.

‘I’ll take it,’ I said casually, as though I were spending twenty quid, not four hundred grand. So I inflated my income to the building society and exchanged in ten days flat. But then I’m the impatient type. I married very quickly, for example. I separated quickly as well. And it took me precisely two and a half weeks to buy and move into this house.

‘Can you afford it?’ asked Bella, tucking her short blonde hair behind one ear.

‘No,’ I said simply. ‘I can’t.’

‘Why did you get it then?’ demanded Bea, who can be overbearing.

‘It was an impulse buy.’

‘We’ll help you decorate,’ said Bella as she scissored open a packing case.

‘You can be our first client,’ said Bea.

‘Have you got a name yet?’ I asked.

‘Design at the Double!’ they chorused.

‘Hmm. That’s catchy,’ I said.

The twins have just given up their respective jobs to start an interior design company. Despite a conspicuous lack of experience they seem confident that it’ll work out.

‘All you need’s a few contacts, then it snowballs,’ Bea had said blithely when they first told me about their plans. ‘A nice mention in one of the glossies and we’ll soon be turning them away.’

‘You make it sound unfeasibly easy,’ I’d said.

‘But the market for it is huge. All those rich people,’ said Bella happily, ‘with big houses and horrible taste.’

‘We’ll get you things at cost,’ Bella offered as she unpacked some dinner plates. ‘I think you should definitely get a new bathroom suite…’

‘With a glass basin,’ said Bea.

‘And a jacuzzi,’ Bella added.

‘And a hand-built kitchen of course.’

‘Yes, Poggenpohl,’ suggested Bella enthusiastically.

‘No, Smallbone of Devizes,’ said Bea.

‘Poggenpohl.’

‘No, Smallbone.’

‘You always contradict me.’

‘No I don’t!’

‘Look, I won’t be getting any of that fancy stuff,’ I interjected wearily. ‘I’m not going to have the cash.’

As the twins argued about the relative merits of expensive kitchens I opened boxes in the sitting room. Heart pounding, I gingerly unpacked the wedding photo I’d flung at Ed in my dream. We were standing on the steps of the Chelsea town hall in a blissful, confettied blur. Don’t think me conceited, but we looked bloody good together. Ed’s six foot three – a bit taller than me – with fine, dark hair which curls at the nape. He’s got these warm, melting brown eyes, while mine are green and my hair’s Titian red.

‘You’re my perfect red Rose,’ Ed had joked at the start – though he was soon moaning about my thorns. But it was so wonderful to begin with I reflected dismally as I put the photo, face down, in a drawer. Ours had been not so much a whirlwind romance as a tornado, but it had already blown itself out. I surveyed the trail of marital debris it had left in its wake. There were dozens of wedding presents, most – unlike our abbreviated marriage – still under guarantee. We’d decided to split them by simply keeping those from our respective friends; which meant that Ed got the Hawaiian barbecue while Rudolf came with me. Ed didn’t mind: he’d never really taken to Rudy who was given to us by the twins. We named him Rudolf Valentino because he’s so silent: he’s never uttered a word. mynah birds are meant to be garrulous but ours has the conversational skills of a corpse.

‘Speak to us, Rudy,’ I heard Bella say.

‘Yes, say something,’ added Bea. I heard them trying to tempt him into speech with whistles and clicks but he remained defiantly purse-beaked.

‘Look, Rudy, we paid good money for you,’ said Bella. ‘Two hundred smackers to be precise.’

‘It was three hundred,’ Bea corrected her.

‘No it wasn’t. It was two.’

‘It was three, Bella: I remember distinctly.’

‘Well you’ve remembered it wrong – it was two!’

I wearily opened the box labelled ‘STUDY’ because I’d soon have to get back to work. Lying on top was a copy of my new book – this is embarrassing – Secrets of Marriage Success. As I say, I do things very fast, and I wrote it in less than three months. By unfortunate coincidence it was published on the day that Ed and I broke up. Given the distressingly public nature of our split the reviews were less than kind. ‘Reading Rose Costelloe’s book is like going to a bankrupt for financial advice,’ was just one of the many sniggery remarks. ‘Whatever next?’ sneered another, ‘Ann Widdecombe on Secrets of Fashion Success?’

I’d wanted my publishers to pull it, but by then it had gone too far. Now I put it in the drawer with my wedding photo, then took my computer and some files upstairs. In the study next to my bedroom I opened a large box marked ‘Letters/Answered’, and took out the one on top.

Dear Rose, I read. I wonder if you can help me – my marriage has gone terribly wrong. But it all started well and I was bowled over by my wife who’s beautiful, vivacious, and fun. She was a successful freelance journalist when we met; but, out of the blue, she got a job as an agony aunt and suddenly my life became hell. The fact is I hardly see her – answering the letters takes up all of her time; and when I do see her all she talks about is her readers’ problems and, frankly, it gets me down. I’ve asked her to give it up – or at least tone it down – but she won’t. Should I file for divorce?

Clipped to the back was my reply.

Dear Pissed-Off of Putney, Thank you for writing to me. I’d like to help you if I possibly can. Firstly, although I feel certain that your wife loves you, it’s obvious that she adores her career as well. And speaking from experience I know that writing an agony column is a hugely fulfilling thing to do. It’s hard to describe the thrill you get from knowing that you’ve given someone in need great advice. So my suggestion, P-O – if I may call you that – is not to do anything rash. You haven’t been married long, so just keep talking and I’m sure that, in time, things will improve. Then, on an impulse, which I would later greatly regret, I added: Maybe marriage guidance might help…

It didn’t. Far from it – I should have known. Ed suggested we went to Resolve – commonly known as ‘Dissolve’ – but I couldn’t stand our counsellor, Mary-Claire Grey. From the second I laid eyes on her she irritated the hell out of me, with her babyish face, and dodgy highlights and ski-jump nose and tiny feet. I have been hoist with my own petard, I thought dismally, as we sat awkwardly in her consulting room. But by that stage Ed and I were arguing a lot so I believed that counselling might help. It wouldn’t have been so bad if Miss Grey inspired any confidence, but the idiotic little woman simply did not. She was thirty-five(ish), divorced, and a former social worker she told us in this fey, squeaky voice.

‘What I shall do,’ she began, smiling winsomely, ‘is simply to listen to you both. I shall then reinterpret – or, to give it its technical name, reframe – what you both say. Got that?’ Catatonic with embarrassment, and already hating her, I nodded, like an obedient kid. ‘Okay, Ed,’ she said. ‘You first,’ and she actually clapped her podgy little hands as though this were nursery school.