Why Not? - Softcover

Low, Shari

Softcover

ISBN 10: 074348312X ISBN 13: 9780743483124

Verlag: Gallery Books, 2004

Inhaltsangabe

SHE SHOULD HAVE LOOKED BEFORE SHE LEAPT.
The man Jess has fallen in lust with is not only married, he's her boss. He's also famous -- a high-ranking government official who is all business by day, and all-out kinky by night. And when his photo -- his naked photo -- is splashed on the front page of the supermarket tabloids, Jess has Rude Awakening #1: home-wrecking leads to nothing but heartache. How could it all have backfired so? Are her instincts in this Crazy Thing called Love really that deplorable?

SHE'LL LAND ON HER FEET.
Maybe her instincts aren't the problem. Relying on her colorful circle of girlfriends for unconditional love and break-up recovery via margarita infusion, Jess makes another play for domestic bliss -- only to experience Rude Awakening #2: some men are wired to behave badly. But rather than settle, Jess is finally ready to put her happiness first. And happiness, for the time being, means calling on her friends to concoct a marvelous plan to get payback from her exes that's daring, hilarious, and certain to hit the jerks where they live....

Über diesen Titel

Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

After a varied career in leisure management and sales in the UK, Holland, China, and Hong Kong, Shari Low returned to her native Scotland. She lives in her home city of Glasgow with her husband, John, an ever-increasing brood, and writes full time.

Auszug. © Genehmigter Nachdruck. Alle Rechte vorbehalten.

Why Not

Serve My Kidneys With

a Good Lambrusco?

June 2001

I can't decide what to wear. Should I go for fat, black, baggy jumper or fat, blue, baggy jumper? At least the bottom half is easy: a pair of jeans that look like two tents sewn together and topped with more elastic than a support bandage.

I used to be attractive. Not Jennifer Aniston -- drop down on my knees and thank God for my genes -- gorgeous, but pleasant, passable and after a good scrub up, attractive. I guess I still am -- if you're one of those guys with a fat fetish.

So I've decided that God is definitely a man. If She were a woman this whole pregnancy thing would be far more efficient. We'd be able to unzip our bump and put it in the oven while we were washing windows or doing a trolley dash round Sainsbury's.

I've just realised that I sound more domesticated than Nigella Lawson on cleaning day. I think I need a long lie-down in a dark room. My tenth one of the day. That's the other thing. Whoever says pregnancy makes you glow is lying. Or mistaking the shine of perspiration, as you try to manoeuvre more flesh than a fully grown seal from place to place. And don't even start me on piles. Whose idea of a sick joke is that? I know, I'm ranting. I'm allowed. I'm nine months and three days pregnant. I therefore qualify for emotional extremes, including self-pity.

I weigh up the options: get dressed and go meet the girls, or close the blinds and get horizontal. It's an easy choice really, because if I'm so much as five minutes late there will be a stampede of high heels rushing to my door with hot towels, a kettle and bicycle pump to blow up the birthing pool.

Black baggy jumper wins and in ten minutes I'm out of the door and safely ensconced in a cab. It's the one highspot of being pregnant -- the panic-stricken look on every cab driver's face as you use a crane and Vaseline to prise yourself into their back seat. That's followed by a fierce look of concentration as they speed to your destination quicker than a space shuttle, meticulously avoiding speed bumps and cobbled streets. Don't they realise that careering round London streets at ninety miles an hour causes enough terror to induce labour?

On second thoughts, driver, put your foot down -- let's get this bump on its way into the big, bad world. Poor bugger. It doesn't know what it's coming into. Or maybe it does and that's why it's refusing to come out. I've got a mental picture of it with one foot on either side of my cervix, suction pads in its hands, shouting, "Don't make me jump."

As I enter Paco's I spot the girls at our usual corner table. It's the worst one in the restaurant -- right outside the kitchen doors and camouflaged by several plastic pot plants. Paco has made us sit here ever since we had a party for fifty which two hundred turned up at and caused so much accidental destruction that he was forced to refurbish. We still come every week figuring that our contribution to his turnover will go a little way to paying off his decorating bills. I'm sure they do illegal things to our food before they serve it to us.

The girls see me coming and start singing the Jaws theme in their Scottish accents. It's amazing that we've all lived in London for years, yet we still sound like Lulu. Except when we sing, unfortunately.

It's getting louder as I get to the table. The other diners are wide-mouthed and there's a stampede of waiters to the kitchen to request the night off. I sit in the chair with reinforced steel legs.

Kate, Carol and Sarah eye me anxiously. I can tell they're trying to deduce my emotional state. Is it tears and tantrums, or earth mother karma calm?

"Hi, sweetie, how're you doing?" Kate asks with obvious trepidation. That's usually my cue to break down into uncontrollable sobs, or rub my belly gently and smile serenely. I shrug my shoulders, point at my ever-expanding mass and reach for a garlic breadstick. "Not a contraction, not a drop of broken waters and it's still doing the salsa."

They groan. So do I. Why didn't they warn me about pregnancy? This lot have seven children between them. Seven! And Carol has twins, for God's sake. It's bad enough carrying one, but two would definitely tip me over the edge -- I'd have been giving myself an internal with a sink plunger to get them out long ago.

"Any word from him yet?" Sarah ventures. Now "him" is not a reference to my gynaecologist. Nor does it refer to God, my boss or Butch, my long-lost poodle. "Him" is Mike Chapman, father of bump and the man I joined in matrimonial bliss barely a year ago. Don't ask: do you want to see me cry?

I shake my head. To be honest, it's probably a good thing. If he walked in here right now I'd end up in jail for assault with a deadly ciabatta. I can feel the tears welling up. Don't cry. Don't cry. I try to replace sorrow with anger. Bastard, bastard, bastard. It's working. I take a deep breath and I'm back in control.

The girls look relieved. I've put them through so much stress in the last few months that it's a miracle they haven't developed stutters and nervous tics.

Kate rubs my hands, concern oozing from every pore. She was born maternal and spends her whole life worrying about our welfare. Although lately she's had enough dramas of her own to keep her occupied. You see we all have very defined roles in this little group. Kate: soft, motherly. Sarah: sensible, reasoned. Carol: tactless, glib. Carly: hopeless, hilarious. We've been friends since primary school, since the biggest decision in our day was what to spend our dinner money on. Even then, Kate would fuss and make sure we ate a balanced lunch.

Kate was a hairdresser until she married Bruce Smith, a highly successful architect, and had three children, Zoë, Cameron and Tallulah (we're sure that the after-effects of an over-enthusiastic epidural were responsible for the name of her last born). Thereafter, she decided to devote her life to creating a haven of family bliss in her Richmond semi. Fortunately, we girls constitute family members too, so she does everything from serial nagging (in a nice way) about our cholesterol levels, to buying our condoms. She must have been on holiday nine months and three days ago.

Lately, though, Kate's been a bit distracted. In fact, the onset of the distraction can be traced back to when Keith Miller (alias Builder Bob), construction entrepreneur, bought the other half of her semi. She's been weirder than Tantric sex ever since.

Carol, on the other hand, is our in-house beauty consultant and provider of salacious gossip. She's a "just a wee bit too old to still be called super" model: auburn tendrils that hang to her twenty-four-inch waist, eyes like chestnuts and a figure that mannequins would kill for. She's in more demand than ever as she now comes complete with the most beautiful twins that were ever put on this earth. This is obviously down to hereditary blessings. Her husband Cal also struts the catwalks and he makes Brad Pitt look average. It would be easy to be jealous of her (OK, sometimes in my extreme emotional state I do have the odd encounter with the green-eyed monster). But Carol is so lacking in pretension, has more hang-ups than the fashion floor at Harvey Nicks, and is so hilariously shallow that you can't help but adore her.

Sarah has taken on what was previously my role: sensible, focused and utterly devoid of madness. She teaches primary children and honestly enjoys it. Personally, I'd be threatening the little buggers with violence, but Sarah is more compassionate than Claire Rayner. What's more, since being rescued from a life of impoverished singlehood by her lovely husband Nick, she radiates happiness from every moisturised pore. Now that makes me insanely jealous. I know, I'm a terrible person.

Nick...

Details zur Ausgabe

• Verlag: Gallery Books
• Erscheinungsdatum: 2004
• Sprache: Englisch
• ISBN 10: 074348312X
• ISBN 13: 9780743483124
• Einband: Taschenbuch
• Anzahl der Seiten: 352
• Kontakt zum Hersteller: Nicht verfügbar
• Verantwortliche Person: Simon and Schuster Netherlands BV; info@simonandschuster.nl; ; Herculesplein 96; Utrecht; 3584 AA; Niederlande