10. Chloe
Chloe
Chloe is going to be eighteen and has asked if she can have a party in Lavander Cottage instead of in the house. She has officially booked the cottage through the apps, so at least all being well, that will be the first positive review post Lauragate.
Laura’s terrible review after everything we had done for her, rescuing her home and build with Carl’s help and putting her and Oliver up for three whole weeks, has felt like a gut punch that has gradually spread into a slow sadness. All my dreams and plans have been thrown to the horizon. It’s almost impossible to imagine getting Superhost this year after that blow. I’d need so many Five Stars to compensate. The bookings have disappeared too, and that can’t be a coincidence. Who wouldn’t read that review and conclude, I don’t think so. And the Watsons still haven’t settled their bill.
I have been a bit depressed after that, and after the Miles situation. These last few weeks, I’ve gone around in slow motion. Not much energy to do anything. It’s fair to say I have had an official case of The Doldrums. Hey ho. Spring’s coming, the bluebells are out, it’s time to get myself going again. Make a plan and get a job, Janet!
Chloe, the darling, has started giving me fifteen pounds a week toward her board. I didn’t ask for anything, she just gave me it one day. I was head deep in spreadsheets and receipts at the kitchen table, trying to work out who else I could call to try to bring down monthly payments. I’d managed to persuade pretty much every credit card and utility to accept lower monthly amounts. They all sounded very used to the requests and the call centre staff were very sympathetic– once you’d got through to them. I got on so well with Sue from Water that I told her what had happened– that I’d had a fling with the boss in a weak moment and now I was out of a job trying to decide what to do next. She was very nice and told me how she’d once slept with the boss’s son as a young woman at a Christmas party, and how she’d been given her notice on Christmas Eve and never saw him again.
‘Are you on benefits?’ she asks kindly.
‘I can’t face it,’ I tell her. ‘I’ve never claimed anything in my life, Sue, except child benefit. And now my daughter’s coming up to eighteen, so that will stop too.’
She is so kind and sympathetic. ‘My advice is, get yourself something bearable part-time and take tax credit top-up. It’s the only way to do it these days. Most people are struggling, love. They might put on a good show, but we talk to everyone and they’re all just keeping afloat.’
Sue managed to negotiate my monthly payment down by twenty quid a month, citing difficult circumstances and single-parent status.
‘You’re a diamond among utility call agents, Sue.’
‘I know, Janet.’
*
I’ll have to get a job soon, but what? It’s scary really, when you have to think about jobs and careers in mid-life. It’s not something I’ve had to do for nearly a decade. I had my run of really grim jobs as a teen and a young woman and then I gravitated towards admin in some type or another, bank, post office, dentist. Clean jobs behind a desk, set hours and not too taxing, not something I’d ever have to take home with me. Boring but reliable, a job that would allow me to get home and sort out Chloe. The difference now is I don’t really need to do that any more. She’s a grown-up, earning, giving me money! I’m the one who’s drifting and unemployed.
I’m paralysed about what to do. Scared to commit to something and watch another decade slip by. Do I retrain? As what? Do I try and do something I might actually enjoy, such as part-time home help, cook, gardener? Right, yeah. I’m already doing that here. Chins up, Janet, I tell myself. Something will come up. Chloe, bless her, giving me some cash. Her positivity is what’s keeping me going at the moment.
‘Mum, I’m earning OK at the moment, so this is toward bills and everything. If you could get in a few more snacks, decent crisps, more chocolate, smoothies– y’know, the sort of stuff I like.’
I do, and they cost at least fifteen pounds a week on their own. I can’t begrudge her though, she’s trying to be supportive, and I appreciate the effort, so the party is definitely on and it’s the least I can do. It’s not as if I can take her on the long-promised holiday, not this year anyway. What’s great is that one mention of the party idea and everyone, including her dad Franklin, wants to help Chloe have a fantastic time.
Carl digs out some old party lights, climbs on his stepladder and wraps them around the inside of the beamed entrance to Lavander Cottage, which looks great. I bake her a two-tier chocolate and lemon cake with lemon butter-cream icing. I make some white chocolate shards and stick them onto the cake, which is tricky, then add on different-coloured hundreds and thousands, with chocolate ones on the lemon cake and multicoloured ones on the chocolate. I’m well chuffed with it. Chloe loves it and takes a load of photos for her social media.
Mitzi writes her a poem that she reads out to her as Chloe listens, hair in a turban, one false eyelash on, waiting for her fake tan to dry, as she munches on a pot noodle. It’s called ‘Listen Up’.
*
‘Tell me, what does eighteen feel like from there, sweet niece?
At eighteen, I hitchhiked to London, set my sights on the universe.
My heart hungry for heartbreak, my back broken from the baggage of a wicked home.
*
‘Tell me, what does eighteen feel like from there?
*
‘At eighteen, I danced my way around the world, set my sights on the stars.
Your beauty, sweet niece, will carry you to a million places,
your clever brain will get you in and out of them all.
*
‘Tell me, what does eighteen feel like from there?
*
‘Let me tell you what to do:
Eat the peach, drown in love, dive into the sea of possibility.
Grab your year, Sweet Eighteen. Grab your year. Grab your year.’
*
‘Ah, that’s good, that is, Auntie Mitz,’ Chloe says. ‘Love it. Thank you. I don’t know how much drowning in love I’ll be doing whilst I’m working forty hours at Moloko’s in Halifax, but I promise I’ll try to grab what rears I can.’
She’s so funny, my daughter. No wonder she’s so popular. She has a huge social media following, apparently. The photos of the cake she shows me get over two hundred likes. I’m a bit surprised– two hundred people? I don’t know two hundred people. I don’t want to know two hundred people. Keeping up with Mitzi and Chloe keeps me busy enough. They share a hug, it’s so sweet. Mitzi is definitely warming up as she gets older and Chloe is such an open-minded girl it’s lovely.
Mitzi gets a bit giddy after we have an early glass of celebratory fizz. She demos sixteen possible outfits in order to choose what to wear to the party. Mitzi’s wardrobe is a kaleidoscope of wonder. Thanks to years spent trawling charity shops and car boot sales, markets and jumble sales, she has accumulated the most spectacular collection of weird and wonderful clothes. How can I describe the look? If Sarah Jessica Parker time-travelled via Glastonbury festival and morphed into a member of Bananarama sort of sums it up. Mitzi settles on a butterfly costume: a dip-dye sequin tube dress with these huge sheer rainbow voile panels that hang off both arms and a headpiece with two black glittery antennae, like pimped-up deely boppers. She looks amazing.
Chloe wants her to stand at the door and welcome every guest with a glass of prosecco.
‘I’ll do it with pleasure, Chloe, but I won’t be able to accept anyone who looks as if they haven’t made an effort. It’s about standards.’
I disagree. ‘For some people, a clean pair of trainers is a major effort. Or if they bring a bottle, that’s a five gold stars effort. In fact, how many people are we expecting, Chloe?’ A little flush of fear rattles through me, contemplating boys with bottles rampaging around the cottage.
‘Oh, it’s dead exclusive, Mum. Twenty max. Close friends only.’
‘Girls and boys?’
‘Of course.’
‘Right, right. Do their mums and dads know? I mean, you’re eighteen. No one can object if you drink alcohol. And I’m not objecting, I’m just sort of saying. Is it a good idea?’
Both Mitzi and Chloe pile in at this stage to object to my not objecting. I’ve clearly crossed a line. I leave them to their arrangements and get on with some more cooking. Chloe has asked for cupcakes, all different colours, which will then be put into the shape of a giant C. I absolutely love making them. I’ve got to be a pretty dab hand at icing over the years and I’ve gone for a pastel-pink themed rainbow effect, adding extra food colouring over time so it goes from a really creamy pastel pink through to a deep lilac. I’m arranging them in the cottage on a table we’ve set up for food, and they look pretty blooming good. So I take photos that I pass on to Chloe for her socials. Get me, I’m really with it!
Mitzi and Chloe disappear to get ready, so I use the opportunity to remove anything particularly precious from the cottage. I’m on my way out with a favourite vase and pretty sofa throw when Carl arrives, lugging a giant speaker.
‘Where we putting the sound system?’ he wants to know.
‘Sound system?’ I’m trying to compute what’s happening when in comes another giant speaker, carried by a sweaty Franklin.
‘Hiya, Janet, where’s this going?’ he puffs.
‘I’m not sure. I didn’t know we were doing this.’
‘Chloe, she asked me to sort a sound system. It’s my old mate Jacko’s, you remember Jacko?’ My ex-husband stares at me, as if of course I know Jacko. Trying to remember the name is like batting cobwebs away down an old corridor in a house I long since left and can barely remember living in. He’s there somewhere, but right now I can’t place him.
‘Er . . . not really.’
‘He sends his best. We’re gonna have to make some more room. Can we put this pool table down?’
Before I’ve opened my mouth to reply, Carl and Franklin have dismantled the pool table then put it back up outside on the drive. I hope it’s not going to rain. I’ve removed the last of my ornaments and am tweaking the icing on the final cupcake when the speaker blasts out. The icing shoots across the worktop as I leap out of my wits. It’s one of Franklin’s old Trojan Records classics and boy, does it have a bass. I can remember us bumping and swaying to that tune so much as a young mum and dad, not having a clue about what we were doing or how we were going to manage. ‘Never mind, don’t worry, the baby is fine, let’s put on another tune.’
I can’t help myself and go into the cottage where Chloe, Mitzi, Carl and Franklin are dancing away. I join them and it’s such a good laugh. Franklin wanders over and takes my hands one at a time and we do a little bit of swaying, I can see Chloe watching us from the corner of my eye. When Franklin twirls me round under his arm it’s such a blast of the past, like slipping into a warm bath. I’m grateful when the song comes to an end and I can make my excuses and leave, quickly.
Upstairs in my bedroom, I dig out my electric-blue jumpsuit. Chloe made me buy it last year. It’s bold for me, but Mitzi’s butterfly gives me courage, since literally no one is going to be looking in my direction whilst she’s in vision. Chloe is going bodycon, fake tan, contouring, eyelashes that could literally sweep up the yard, lips that seem as if they’ve had multiple bee stings. It’s quite the look. Not as Chloe, you understand, but an attractive someone else. I barely recognise her when she totters downstairs. She looks amazing.
A van arrives at five to six with a balloon arch she has ordered. It has a light-up sign that says Birthday, so people can do their social media photos against it. Apparently everyone has them now. It takes up half the reception room, so Carl, Franklin and I hump even more furniture out of there into the main house to give her some more space.
Franklin approaches me as we drop the console table into the kitchen.
‘You want me stick around, sort of thing? Make sure everything goes OK?’
Parties were always his thing, and I can’t deny him his daughter’s eighteenth. Plus, if there is trouble, I decide, he will know what to do.
‘Yes, please, if you don’t mind. Want a cuppa?’
‘I’ve brought some beers and even a little rum.’
I smile. Franklin makes a mean Mojito. We’re an hour in, and I’ve already had two. The music is loud but not too loud. There’s quite a few of Chloe’s old school friends in the cottage, and it’s all feeling very civilised and fun when the question comes: have we any more ice? Now everyone looks in my direction, but I’ve had a drink and can’t drive. Of course she’ll need ice, why didn’t I think of it? Plus I want to keep everyone’s drinks watered down, so I volunteer to get some.
‘I’ll walk down to the Co-op.’
I set off before anyone notices or can get involved. I’m strolling down the road with a couple of jute bags as a couple of cars go past me up towards the house. I know they’re party friends as I can hear Chloe shrieking when they pull up. As I pass Laura’s I notice she is out on the porch with a glass in her hand, but I don’t let on. I haven’t forgiven her for the review and they still owe me ￡1200– twenty nights at ￡30 per person per night. I’m going to get heavy with them on Monday about the money, I’ve decided. I’m going to ask Carl to come down with me as I know Oliver goes to jelly around Carl. I’ve politely asked the Watsons three times now to settle their bill. I started off with an email that was ignored, then I texted, was ignored, then I saw Oliver in the street and mentioned it and he apologised and said things had been chaotic since they’d moved back in and he promised me he would get to it this week.
That was two weeks ago. Why do they need to make it so difficult? Pay your bills, you swine! If I wanted to make the mortgage this month, they were going to have to pay it. I’m sweating by the time I get back to our street, lugging eight bags of ice, having cleared the Co-op of their entire stock. I can’t help but get slightly nervous due to the amount of traffic now clogging up our street. Every inch of the road is parked up and there are what look like streams of people heading toward Lavander Cottage. The noise of music, party chatter and laughter is hitting the high-decibel range.
As I hurry past Laura’s I hear a door slam– I’m not sure how to interpret that. I get back to the party and it’s crazier than I’d imagined. Mitzi is DJ-ing at a phenomenal pace to a cottage that is rammed full of teenagers bouncing up and down to 90s’ club anthems. I get told by a random girl I have never met before in my life that a friend of a friend of the birthday girl, called ‘Amelia’, is apparently upstairs sound asleep in Chloe’s bed having ‘had enough’. I go to the bathroom to see what mess is in there, to find two girls are holding each other’s hair back as they take turns to throw up in the loo. I run back downstairs where the party has now spilled into the garden, with teenagers raving on the lawn and on the drive. I can see a heavy-petting young couple splayed against my verbena, and completely oblivious to them a pair of lads are having the beginnings of a tussle, all whilst Carl and Frankin calmly continue playing pool.
‘What’s happening?’ I ask them. ‘And where’s Chloe? This party is getting way out of control.’
As if my words are the ignition, the tussle between the two lads grows into full-blown fisticuffs. Streams of kids emerge from the cottage with shouts and screams that are a mixture of encouragement and their attempts to stop the fight escalating. Once punches start being thrown and the chants of ‘Fight, fight, fight,’ get going, Carl and Franklin put down their pool cues and wade into the middle of the crowd to attempt to sort it out.
Carl immediately gets punched in the face by one of the lads. He doesn’t move an inch, which is hugely intimidating for everyone, watching and wondering what he is going to respond with. Whilst we are taking that in, the other lad does some sort of kung fu move and kicks Franklin’s legs out from under him. Tall and lanky as Franklin is, taken completely unawares, he makes a dramatic drop onto the ground. Carl reaches down to help him up, and now like a scene out of a cartoon, someone shouts, ‘Pile on!’ and the kids immediately start to topple and throw themselves onto Franklin, Carl and the other boys, et cetera.
I survey the scrum of bodies for a few seconds when Chloe staggers out of the cottage, takes one look and says to me in a desperate way, ‘Oh God! Sort it out, Mum.’
I take a fast decision. Attaching my hose to the outside tap and using the nozzle, I begin to spray the hill of mangled shouty bodies with cold water. It does the trick. The stack erupts, as people dive and roll to escape the spray. It’s all calming down now, aggression turning to laughter and screams of fun as I make liberal use of the spray on everyone there. It sweetens up the atmosphere, but the tension is immediately ramped up again as we are all deafened and blinded by the sound of loud police sirens and neon-blue flashing lights as not one, but two police cars skid to a halt in front of the house.
I feel as if I have been caught red-handed wielding a weapon and do the only reasonable thing I can think of and start to use the hose now to spray the flower tubs. Of course this is perfectly normal behaviour at ten o’clock at night with a hundred teenagers on my lawn. Two burly coppers and two equally intimidating female officers stride menacingly up the drive.
I feel all shaky and do a nervous, ‘Hello.’ Of course I don’t mean to, but as I swerve to acknowledge them, I take the hose with me and a swirl of cold-water pebbledashes all four of them.
‘Oh my God, I’m so sorry.’ I drop the hose and put my hands in the air as if I’m being arrested in a movie. The nozzle jumps off with the impact of the hose hitting the ground, and the hose, now completely out of control, flails on the lawn, spraying water everywhere, including over me and very annoyingly also over the police people. Thank God Chloe realises what’s going on and the water finally stops.
‘I’ve, like, turned off the tap,’ she says breathlessly.
‘Thank you,’ says one of the officers, who I notice is dripping wet. Through gritted teeth she asks, ‘Whose house is this?’
So, as Lavander Cottage is my home and the party is at my house, and I’m the one spraying four police officers with water, it’s inevitable that I’m the one in trouble. I end up, wet through, steaming and a teeny bit tipsy still, at the police station. Only once everyone has dried off does the tea come out and the atmosphere lighten up a bit. Three hours later, I call a taxi and return home stuck with a caution for noise and disturbance in a residential area and told that any more incidents of this nature and I will be given an Asbo. I assure them that won’t be happening.
Franklin, Carl, Chloe and Mitzi and a random stray teenager are waiting up for me when I get home. Chloe has knocked up a stack of blueberry pancakes with cream, and a giant pot of tea is being refilled as I arrive through the patio door to a cheer.
I explain that the police had been called by a worried neighbour, concerned that there was a party going on that had gotten out of control.
‘Who would call?’ Chloe asks, and I know she is feeling guilty that her party had led to this.
‘I had pre-warned everyone around here that we were having a party and to expect some noise.’ Any normal person would have done so, and I am normal.
Chloe is livid. ‘Bloody Laura bloody Watson, any money.’
Of course it was, I’m sure she’s right.
Quite how I am ever going to get revenge on that woman is beyond me. Mitzi insists on making me a police arrest-type card thing with my name on it and then takes a photo of me holding it. She and Chloe mess about with it on filters and turn it black and white and retro then print it out and stick it on the wall. It’s hilarious. I look like a latter-day Annie Oakley. I can laugh because I’m so exhausted I’m beyond caring. I look around at the piles of rubbish and debris scattered about the garden and could weep. The general upside-downness of the whole night has left me feeling absolutely wasted.
The clean-up can wait until tomorrow. After all, I don’t have a job to go to. Do I?
‘I’m off to bed.’
*
I’m out like a light and wake up early, still tired, but fired up with the sense that there’s a lot to do and there’s no point putting it off. I pull on some scruffs and go downstairs, braced for what I’m to face, only it’s not too bad at all. The dishwasher at home is full of glasses, with another stack ready to go in. I tiptoe into the cottage, where Franklin is asleep on top of the sound system. The balloon arch is down on the floor, with the neon birthday flashing intermittently. I turn it off at the wall and retreat to let my ex get in a few more zeds. I go back outside and find Chloe out there, still in her party dress. She’s got a recycling bag and is collecting up cans and bottles from around the garden.
‘I’ll do that, love,’ I tell her. ‘Have you been to bed yet?’
She twirls around, one eyelash stuck to her cheek, her make-up gone, her hair a tangled clump, some sort of stain on her dress, and she’s barefoot. She also has a huge beaming smile that could light up a dark room.
‘Mum. I love you. Best party ever.’
She drops the bag and runs and throws her arms around me, and whatever I am thinking, feeling or worrying about evaporates with the love coming from this lunatic, wonderful daughter I adore more than life itself.
‘Happy Birthday, love, Happy Birthday.’
***** Five Stars
Wonderful space for a get-together. Best-ever hostess. A huge big thank you. We’lldefinitelycome again.
Yes, you might have a wonderful space that is suitable for parties, but avoid if at all possible. Unless you really want to annoy the neighbours.There’s a thought.
Try to get your paying guests to paybefore they leave. This may be fundamentally obvious, but people are sneaky and unpredictable. The most respectable, they’re the ones who can really take you by surprise. Be better at it than me. Hold someone or something hostage. Get a flaming deposit.
Anyone got any?