Confessions of a Gym Mistress

“Hello? Hello? Are you still there?” Geoffrey is sounding quite worried. Good!

“Sorry, Geoffrey,” I say, calmly. “That was the telly: ‘Family At War’.” Dad looks as if he is going to say something but settles for slamming the door.

“Please come out with me, Rosie. We could have something to eat, as well.”

“I don’t fancy a Wimpy, tonight,” I say. Talk about last of the big spenders. Geoffrey’s idea of giving a girl a good time is to let her have first nibble at his choc ice—he wipes it on his handkerchief afterwards, can you imagine? I don’t want to sound like a gold digger but Geoffrey is tighter than a new roll-on and after asking for Natalie he deserves to suffer a bit.

“I wasn’t meaning a Wimpy,” he says. “I thought we might have a bite up West.”

“The West End?” I say. You have to be careful with Geoffrey. He could be talking about West Chingford.

“Of course. Oh Rosie. Do say you’ll come. You don’t know how much I’ve missed you.”

“You’re sure you wouldn’t rather take out Natalie—or my mother?” Sometimes I am so nasty I amaze myself.

“Rosie! Don’t be like that. We’ll have a great evening. I know we will.”

I don’t mean to be unkind to poor Geoffrey but he is so easy to push around that I can’t stop myself. I am much better with the mean, moody and magnificent types—at least, I would be if I could ever find one. I have not got any nearer than the mean type, so far, which brings me neatly back to Geoffrey.

“Oh, all right, Geoffrey,” I say graciously. “You’ll be round about seven, will you?”

“If that’s all right. Then I can show you my new car.”

“A new, new car?” I ask.

“Oh yes. It’s one of these new Japanese jobs. Goes like a bomb.”

I can remember the last car of Geoffrey’s that went like a bomb—it disintegrated on impact with the road.

“Sounds great, Geoffrey,” I say. “See you later. ’Bye!” I ring off as Natalie comes out of the front room.

“Who was that?” she says.

“Just Geoffrey,” I say, stifling a yawn. “He wants to take me out to dinner and the Wembley tennis.”

“Should be very nice if you don’t mind eating off your knees,” says my revolting little sister. “I had to pack him in. He’s so mean and he only thinks about one thing.”

I ignore her bitchy remarks but at the same time I can’t help thinking about the sex angle. Natalie has suggested before that Geoffrey is a bit of a handful passion-wise. With me he has always acted as if weaned on Horlicks tablets. Could it be that he finds me less desirable than Natalie? Of course, she does behave like a little trollop and wear the most obvious clothes—I will never understand why Mum lets her get away with it—but I would have expected Geoffrey to see through that. Still, he is a man—I think—and they can be very stupid sometimes.

I stick my head round the front room door. “Sorry, Dad,” I say.

Geoffrey arrives just when I knew he would. At ten to seven while I am still in the bath. This is not a great hardship because he goes into the kitchen and helps Mum with the potatoes—I can tell by the peel down the front of his Eastwood Tennis Club blazer. Mum thinks that Geoffrey is the greatest thing to happen to a girl’s marriage prospects since Artie Shaw. She is always telling me what a gentleman he is and what good prospects he has. I think she fancies him a bit, herself.

“Sorry I was a bit early,” he says when I come down at twenty past seven. “Gosh, you do look nice.”

“She’s not a bad looking girl, is she?” says Mum, almost swinging up and down on the bell rope.

“Mum, please!” I say. “Geoffrey, will you look after these, for me?”

Geoffrey pockets my lipstick and compact and leads me out to the car. I must say, it does look snappy. Pillar box red with white wall tyres.

“I can let the seat back a bit if you find it cramped,” says Geoffrey.

“That’s all right,” I say. “Just give me a shoe horn to get in.”

I am not kidding. With both Geoffrey and me inside we have to open one of the windows before the door will shut properly.

“Precision engineering,” explains Geoffrey. “No draughts.”

“You mean, if we have all the windows closed, we suffocate?”

“Not if you remember to switch on the air conditioning.”

“That’s reassuring,” I say. “This wasn’t made by the same firm as the kamikaze planes, was it?”

“I don’t know,” says Geoffrey seriously. “I’ll have to look at the handbook.” Poor Geoffrey. He doesn’t cause Jimmy Tarbuck any sleepless nights.

“I heard a rumour you were giving up nursing,” he says.

“Natalie told you?”

“Well, she sort of mentioned it.”

Typical, I think to myself. I’ll have to wait until Friday to see if she has put an advertisement in the local paper.

“I decided I couldn’t make it my life work,” I say.

“What are you going to do now?”

“I haven’t really made up my mind. I might go into teaching.”

“I hear there’s a big shortage.” Geoffrey makes it sound as if that is my only hope. I think he said the same thing when I told him I was going to become a nurse.

“I think it could be stimulating,” I say.

“I think you’re stimulating.” Geoffreys hand drops onto my knee like a lead spider.

“Keep your hands on the wheel,” I scold, secretly glad that there is asign of red blood coursing through the Wilkes veins.

“It’s not easy,” pants Geoffrey. “It’s been so long.”

I am not quite certain what he is talking about so I don’t pursue the matter.

“We’re going to the tennis first, are we?” I ask.

“I’ve booked a table for ten.”

“But there’s only two of us.”