How to Kill Your Husband (and other handy household hints) by Kathy Lette (top 10 novels to read TXT) 📗

going to need it,’ I bluffed, tucking my skirt into my knicker-leg elastic, a look I felt was probably not going to catch on at the next Olympics. ‘With any luck your eyelashes will break your fall.’

I was tortured by thoughts of what the other mothers knew. Was I imagining the furtive glances behind my back? These perfect, cake-baking domestic goddesses, the type who make you want to stick your head in your food processor, aren’t competing for the attention of men, but to outperform each other. ‘Did you see she’s getting cellulite?’ ‘Her children are feral. Why doesn’t she discipline them?’ ‘I’m sure she got a boob job for Christmas.’ They were more judgemental than the High Court.

‘On your marks . . .’ We all leaned forward into our starting positions. The white finishing-line tape looked nauseatingly far away. I glanced down the row of runners. Normally mild-mannered mothers had acquired a look reminiscent of hunters about to bludgeon baby seals at the North Pole. Nails outstretched, elbows jutting, they pawed at the starting line like bulls who’ve seen their matador.

‘Get set . . .’

‘Jenny and I got on wonderfully, by the way,’ Bianca imparted. ‘She has such . . . potential. It’s a shame you haven’t maximized it. But there’s still time and a girl her age is so malleable.’

‘Go!’

If Bianca’s comment had intended to unsettle me, it actually had the opposite effect. Fuelled by hatred, I ran as though I were on crystal meths. I ran as though there were free Jimmy Choo shoes at the finishing line, being given out by Brad Pitt, naked.

The woman on my left moved forward like an ostrich, head and neck outstretched, her upper body apparently having nothing to do with her legs. Others ran with bent, averted heads, like small harvest animals. But I felt myself passing them all. Waves of wind spanked my face as I ploughed ahead, pinballing off other runners. As the crowd thinned, I glanced over my shoulder. And there was Bianca. She was flinging other women out of her way, hurling them into bushes. That glance cost me a few seconds and I turned to focus on the white tape, held by the school secretary and the music teacher. I could feel Bianca running up behind me, close as a whisper. The finish line came closer, closer. I was panting, panting, legs like pistons, when I felt the push. I executed a dervish thrashing of arms, but could feel myself falling. I caromed sideways, missing giving the Headmistress a full frontal lobotomy by half a millimetre. Other runners tripped over my falling body, until we lay on the lawn, our tangle of black leggings and brightly coloured tops giving us the look of a large liquorice allsort having an epileptic fit.

‘You fucking idiot,’ spat one earth mother. ‘What the fuck did you do that for!’

‘I . . . I . . . was p . . . pushed.’ My lungs scrambled for fresh air.

‘You should be banned, you stupid bitch!’

‘But . . . but . . .’ My justifications were lost in a general hubbub of disgruntled fury. Talk about a fall from grace. The light under the trees thickened, turning malevolent. Ill-will surrounded me. I was finding it hard to breathe.

‘Mum, are you all right?’

‘Sure. I always bleed from the ears like this,’ I wheezed. ‘And my ankle often flaps off the end of my leg in this rather curious manner.’

I found Jenny’s calf and groped for purchase, pulling myself up. ‘She pushed me, did you see that?’ I gasped. ‘I was winning and Bianca pushed me.’

‘Oh Mum, don’t be a bad loser.’

Rory was moving reluctantly in my direction, with Bianca not far behind, clutching her winning bottle of champagne.

‘You should be awarded something for competing without a bra. A bravery medal perhaps. Are you okay?’ he asked begrudgingly.

‘She pushed me! That cow pushed me. Doesn’t anyone believe me?’ I inwardly cursed my name, Cassandra – one whose warnings go unheeded. No one had believed her about the Trojan Horse either.

‘Bubbles!’ Bianca’s eyes were aglow with a chilling triumphalism. ‘I just love bubbles.’

‘Yeah? Well, why don’t you just go fart in the bath.’

‘Mum,’ Jenny shushed me. ‘Stop it. Haven’t you been embarrassing enough for one day?’

‘Do you want to, um, you know, join us? Bianca brought a picnic lunch,’ Rory asked, half-heartedly.

Of course she had. ‘No. I’ve, I’ve got to get back to work.’

In the midday sun, the wedge of shade from the amenities block had retreated to a thin line. I limped there to lick my wounds before making the crazed dash back to my science excursion. Desolate and ruined, I thought I might start crying, but then rallied. I hadn’t wet my pants, so all in all, it was a success of a kind.

As I said, planning is a vital part of any trip. I had timed things so that I had an hour to get back to my class. But what I hadn’t planned on was firstly, a sprained ankle and secondly, a ‘person on the line’, which is a London Transport euphemism for suicide on the track. And finally, an uncharged mobile.

After hobbling to the tube, there was a delay which meant when the train finally came, I had to work my elbows like oars to fight my way into a carriage, where we sat motionless for the next ten minutes. There is no air conditioning on London’s underground. My T-shirt, already wet with sweat from the run, stuck to me like a cotton skin. When the announcement of the line closure came, I staggered above ground to find a taxi. When no taxi appeared, I lurched onto a bus.

The roads were blocked with North London standard parental-issue behemoths. The bus trundled along at a geriatric pace. I reached for my mobile to call my fellow teacher, Lucy, but the phone was as flat as I felt. I had slept in the surgery the night before so hadn’t had the chance to charge it. I tried telling myself it was all part of the great adventure