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

bandages, the room exhaled an antiseptic breath. Jazz took a key from its hiding place inside the hollow leg of a bronze statuette, unlocked a filing cabinet, then threw open the drawer with a flourish. She flung a manila folder onto the desk as though it were contagious.

Hannah moved towards the desk so slowly it was as if she were underwater. She put one foot in front of the other as gingerly as a novice ice-skater. Quailing inwardly, I came to a ragged stop beside her and also began to pore over the contents. The file contained the medical records of Pascal Swan, a twenty-six-year-old woman named Shona Sarpong, and a five-year-old boy – Dylan Swan.

My blood was throbbing like a diesel engine. This could not be happening. Since Rory’s betrayal I hadn’t been able to regain my equilibrium. The floor in front of me seemed to be constantly undulating. Hannah leaned on to the desk for support, equally unbalanced. At first she said nothing. There was just an aching, tourniqueted quiet. Then, when she finished reading, a single tear crawled down one cheek. She closed the file on Shona last. ‘She only has three per cent body fat,’ she said, her voice suddenly thick-throated with sobs.

I didn’t want to believe it, but pieces were suddenly falling into place – Pascal’s holidays with male friends abroad, like the truffle hunting in Italy when he failed to bring back any truffles. The heli-skiing in Russia – when he couldn’t ski. The weekends he went painting in the Cotswolds, returning with a curious lack of canvases. His studio in Shoreditch, the one Hannah was never allowed to visit, even though she’d bought it for him. This, no doubt, was where Dylan and Shona resided.

‘Why would he stay married to me if he has a child with her? Why would he stay if he didn’t love me best?’

‘Um . . . what’s the phrase I’m looking for? Joint bank account? Holiday house in France? First-class air travel?’ Jazz replied bluntly.

‘Jazz, that’s enough,’ I begged.

‘Oh, but does infidelity really matter, when you have so much else?’ Jazz parroted what Hannah had said months before when Studz’s sexual incontinence had been discovered. ‘“It’s only sex” – isn’t that what you said to me? And “Can’t you move on?”’

‘Jazz. Stop it!’ Jazz may be stunningly attractive but if her inner beauty were on the outside right now, she’d be Boris Karloff.

‘Why? Why did you have to tell me?’ asked Hannah numbly.

‘Come on.’ Jazz softened her tone. ‘You must have known something was wrong when you saw stiletto marks on the leather roof lining of that new jeep you bought him.’

‘I didn’t know anything.’ Hannah’s voice sounded creaky and old.

‘I see. So you kept your eyes wide open at work and half-closed at home – is that it? Would you really rather live in ignorance?’

‘Yes,’ Hannah said sadly.

‘If ignorance is bliss, then why aren’t more people happy, huh? Besides, if I hadn’t told you and you’d found out, you’d be screaming “Why the hell didn’t you tell me?” I’ve agonized over this for a week. But how could I know something about your life which is this monumental and not tell you? I wish someone had told me about Studz. Then I wouldn’t have wasted my whole fucking life. Maybe you did know and didn’t tell me, is that it?’ Jazz turned the tables with the expertise of a furniture removalist.

‘You want me to feel sorry for you!’ Hannah exclaimed. ‘But you’re the kind of female creature my husband is with now. You sleep with other women’s men.’ Her lips were drawn tight, as thin as a paper cut. And her words scissored out sharply. ‘You’ve become the female version of Studz. You’ve become the very man you hate.’

Jazz recoiled at the idea. ‘You’re just taking your anger out on me because you can’t believe how stupid you’ve been. Pascal’s wedding vows should have read “Do you take this woman to the cleaners, for fifty per cent of her income, from this day forth, for richer and richer?” You bloody well bet I do!’

‘You’ve ruined my life,’ Hannah moaned. ‘You’ve ruined Cassie’s life too, making her find fault with Rory. You practically pushed her to the abyss she’s in now. You’re evil. You’re Machiavelli in Miu Miu!’

I, too, looked at Jazz astonished. ‘Chaos, heartbreak, despair. I’d say your work here is done, Jasmine.’

Jazz made a placating gesture and began to speak but Hannah silenced her with a traffic cop hand.

‘You’re like some psychological butterfly collector. An emotional lepidopterist. You just pinned us both onto a board, to watch our painful flutterings, for your own sadistic enjoyment. But do you know what I’ve just realized? You’re the poor, pathetic moth, flitting from flame to flame.’

At Hannah’s harsh rebuke, Jazz’s bravado evaporated and sadness flowed down her face.

‘Constantly telling us we’ll be cured by taking toy boys.’ Hannah snorted. ‘It might be okay behaviour for Joan Collins and Cher, but for we mere mortal women, it’s pathetic. Look at you. You’re walking around in orthopaedic nightmares to make your legs look longer. You’re losing circulation because your clothes are so tight. You spend the whole time reversing out of bedrooms so that younger men can’t see the backs of your thighs.’

Jazz looked suddenly pitiable and faintly ridiculous in her ankle chains, henna tattoos and rubber message bracelets.

‘But what you didn’t realize, you silly cow, is that all those toy boys only have sex with you because they’re too lazy to masturbate.’

Jazz rose to criticism like a cobra, striking Hannah’s face. With slapstick timing, Hannah hit Jazz right back. Mimicking premenstrual schoolgirls they started tearing at each other’s hair. Their argument was silenced by the crash of Jazz’s crystal vase. I gasped. It was her most treasured possession, given to her by her mother before she died. Watching the pink flower petals fall to the carpet with gentle implacability, Jazz dissolved into silent tears. Hannah, however, began howling like a wounded creature,