It was Mr Wallaker, positively sneering down at my iPhone. Was just trying to get up, which, because I’d been sitting on my knees for so long, involved crashing onto all fours, when the starter pistol went off for the first race.
In that split second, I saw Mr Wallaker freeze, and his hand whip to his hip as if for a gun. I could see the powerful body tensed beneath his sports shirt, the muscle in his cheek working, eyes casing the playing fields. As the egg-and-spoon racers wobbled off the starting blocks, he blinked, as if remembering himself, then glanced round sheepishly to see if anyone had noticed.
‘Everything all right?’ I said, raising one eyebrow in an attempt to mimic his usual supercilious manner, which may not have been entirely successful, owing to my still being on all fours.
‘Absolutely,’ he said, his cool blue eyes levelly meeting mine. ‘Just a slight issue I have with . . . spoons.’
Then he turned and jogged off towards the egg-and-spoon finishing line. I stared after him. What was that about? Was he delusional, dissatisfied with his mundane life and filled with Bond fantasies? Or was he the sort of person who dresses up as Oliver Cromwell and fights pretend battles at the weekends?
As the sporting events got under way, I put the iPhone away and started to focus. ‘Come on, Mabel,’ I said, ‘it’s Billy’s long jump.’
As they measured Billy’s jump a cheer went up and he leaped into the air.
‘I told you, dammit!’ said Mabel.
‘What?’ I said.
‘Dey do have tape measuring in the Kwintoflon.’
‘Yes, it is an increasingly popular athletic category.’
It was Mr Wallaker and, teetering behind him, a strange, out-of-place woman I hadn’t seen before.
‘Could I possibly have a drop of that Pimm’s?’ She was wearing a white, expensive-looking crocheted dress and high-heeled mules with gold things on. Her face had that slightly peculiar look which people have when they’ve had work done which obviously seems fine when they’re staring at the mirror but looks weird as soon as they move their face.
‘Pimm’s?’ she said to Mr Wallaker. ‘Dear?’
‘DEAR’? Could this possibly be Mr Wallaker’s WIFE? How had that one happened?
Mr Wallaker looked uncharacteristically discombobulated. ‘Bridget, this is . . . this is Sarah. Don’t worry, I’ll do the Pimm’s, you go to Billy,’ he said quietly.
‘Come on, Mabel,’ I said, as Billy galloped over like an exuberant puppy, bits of shirt and sash flying in the wind, and buried his head in my dress.
As we started packing up the things before the prize-giving, the weird, drunk Mr-Wallaker-wife teetered over to us again.
‘Could I have some more Pimm’s?’ she slurred. I began to think I quite liked her really. It’s always so nice to meet someone more badly behaved than oneself.
Then she said, ‘Thanks you,’ peering at me with her surprised eyes. ‘Not often I meet someone your age who’s still got a real face.’
‘Someone who’s still got a real face’? During the prize-giving I couldn’t help regurgitating the phrase. ‘Someone your age with a real face’? What did she mean? That I was daring to go around without having Botox? Oh God, oh God. Maybe Talitha was right. I was going to die of loneliness because I was so wrinkly. No wonder Roxster had dumped me.
As soon as the prize-giving was over and Billy and Mabel absorbed with their friends, I dived into the clubhouse to recover my composure, stopping in appalled dismay at a poster on the noticeboard:
And another:
Furtively typing the Advice and Support number into my iPhone, I stumbled into the Ladies and surveyed myself under the harsh, unforgiving light of an unshaded bulb. Mr Wallaker’s wife was right. The skin around my eyes was becoming, even as I watched, a mass of wrinkles; chin and jowls were sagging, neck like a turkey, marionette lines rushing from my mouth to my chin in manner of Angela Merkel. As I stared I could almost see my hair turning into a tight grey perm. It had finally happened. I was an old lady.
THE DEEP FREEZE
Tuesday 18 June 2013