How to Kill Your Husband (and other handy household hints), Kathy Lette [books to read to increase intelligence .txt] 📗

check homework, get the kids to bed, pay bills, do various household DIY and – oh God! Try to find a plumber. It would be easier to find my orgasm again than to find a plumber on a freezing January evening. My central heating is one of those models that has been pre-programmed by the factory to break down the minute the temperature reaches winter levels. And apparently, the repairman I booked couldn’t find my house – even though he must have scoured the street for literally a nanosecond before zooming off home in his heated white van to his roaring fire after leaving me a note that he could make it back to me by, oh, say January next year.

Rory has always taken care of the plumbing before. Oh well, at least in the last year he’s brought religion into my life. I now really do know what it’s like to be in hell.

26. The Househusband

Apart from the discovery of a Condoleezza Rice/George Bush sex video, and for it to be authenticated, the most cheering thing that could happen to an exhausted single mother is coming home to find her house miraculously painted and the garden weeded. At first, I allow the taxi to drive right past my house. It’s so neat I don’t recognize it. The lawn is shorn, the hedges trimmed, the bins out of sight, the flaky front door painted pretty pink. Hell, the ficus tree’s even been re-potted. When I dazedly let myself inside, the warmth of the hall embraces me – as do the aromas emanating from the kitchen. God! Is that roast chicken and apple pie I detect?

‘Darling.’ And there’s Rory, in an apron.

‘Are you actually baking?’ My pulse quickens.

‘The homework’s done and I’ve put out their school uniforms. I’ve rotated your tyres, read, then filed all the warranties, bled the radiators, fixed the central heating, de-leafed the gutters, assembled the Ikea flatpack furniture, replaced the dud light bulbs and closed down the surgery. I’ve also rented some rooms on Kilburn High Street for the practice so you no longer have to put up with all my smelly animals. I thought we could use the extra space for the family – knock the walls through and give the kids a den and you a study. I mean, now that you’re an Acting Head Teacher. I’m so proud of you.’ And he grins, his eyes crinkling with kindness. ‘Your first job as Head is to make me write out one hundred lines I must worship my wife and wash up occasionally.’

I stare at my husband in astonishment. What on earth was I going to do with my lips now that I couldn’t thin them whenever I looked in his direction?

‘You see?’ he went on. ‘Men can change.’

‘Ohmygod. What’s that noise?’ I reply. ‘Oh, I know. It’s the sound of millions of women laughing themselves to death.’ I narrow my eyes. ‘How long do you think this phenomenal change will last, Rore? Don’t you think I’ve figured you out by now?’

‘Well, there’s only one way to handle a woman, although nobody has bloody well worked out what that is yet! But I will clean up more and listen more, and I have now got directions to the G spot, and a lovely little spot it is too! So lovely that I actually intend to spend a lot more time there. And I love you loads. So it’s a start, right?’

Words burble out of him as though he’s an auctioneer. And what he’s selling is himself.

‘Rory, the thing is, I’m over you.’

‘Over me? Christ, what am I? The flu?’

I shrug off my coat and amazingly he takes it from me and hangs it up. He then steers me gently into the kitchen, which is, by the way, spotless, and sits me down at a table, prettily laid with polished silverware on a spotless cloth. Where have we moved to? Stepford? ‘Did you really go round and terrorize the prison playwright into withdrawing his statement?’ I ask.

‘Yeah. It’s amazing what people will do when they have a loaded Doberman pointed at them. I didn’t do it for Jasmine, though. I did it to prove how much I love you. Please,’ he begs remorsefully. ‘Please take me back.’ If his voice had legs it would be on its knees. ‘Forgive me, Cass.’

I shake my head in tight, quick, determined little movements.

‘Is it because of my air guitar? Or is there some other little thing?’ he asks nervously, serving up my dinner.

‘Oh no, not much – just that when the babies were born, okay I stayed home, but then when I went back to work fulltime, you just expected me to continue doing all the washing, cleaning, cooking. You left it to me to organize the kids and get up with them at night. And I started to resent it. My personality changed. I felt I couldn’t be myself. I lost interest in sex – Jesus, my pussy’s been drier than Gandhi’s left flip-flop. But did you notice? No. Which is why I suggested therapy. And we both know how that bloody well worked out . . . But apart from those little, teeny, tiny things, I’m fine. I really, really fucking am!’ I shovel a forkful of food into my twitching mouth – food which is tonsil-ticklingly good, I note.

Rory winces. ‘Listen, what I’ve learned is that the only rule for achieving a good marriage is to talk through any problems with sufficient honesty to be able to agree that I’m always wrong,’ he adds playfully.

Is this my husband talking? He must have taken a course at Say The Right Thing School. I stare at him suspiciously.

‘Cassie.’ He sits down opposite me. ‘I know you want me to express my deep innermost emotions and share my feelings. And I would, believe me, only I’m a guy. I don’t think I have any deep innermost feelings . . . Except for you, Cass.’

I look at him the