A New Gloria Soames
When you least expect or want change to happen ...
Arthur Soames had a wife whose movements he could predict with unnerving accuracy: Monday – vacuum floors, clean toilet and roast pork for dinner. Tuesday – wash towels and sheets, her tapestry group and then steak and chips for dinner. Wednesday – wash clothes, clean kitchen and chicken Kiev for dinner. And so on.
It had never occurred to him, an accountant, to change anything. He was happy with their routine … well, that was until he realised computers were infecting his occupation and could take over his job. He resisted these new-fangled gadgets for years, until he acknowledged his dwindling clientele meant his expenses were more than his income. He felt hot and bothered at that thought but resisted telling Gloria. He knew what she was like when her mother died and his manly pride couldn’t admit his failure as a man and then upset his fragile wife.
But these pesky computers didn’t go away and so he rehearsed a speech at work, many times, fortified himself with a three-sugar cocoa drink and stormed to the front door with all the effrontery of a p defending its nest. However, that effrontery evaporated like a politician’s promise as Gloria met him in the hallway, wearing black heels, black slacks and a white business shirt with a coloured logo on the pocket.
His mouth hung open like a broken purse and she smiled as she’d never done before, like she’d just stolen the last cookie.
“Can we have a chat, Arthur?” she asked, waving towards the table that had been set with teapot, teacups and a platter of several biscuits. Definitely not the Yorkshire pudding he was expecting.
He complied dumbly with a thousand thoughts whirling round on his brain: Is this the I’ve-had-enough divorce talk? The I’ve-found-another-man talk? The I’ve-discovered-I’m-a-lesbian talk? The I’ve-been-diagnosed-with-cancer and have three months to live talk?
“First thing, Arthur,” she said as she sat and poured the tea, “is that this change is all good. For both of us. No bad surprises.”
He nodded dumbly while his brain wondered how any change could be good.
“See, since my mother’s funeral, I have been struggling …”
“You have?”
“Yes, Arthur, and I didn’t know how to tell you how sad I was and how paralysed I felt.”
“I know that …”
“Please, please let me finish.”
“Oh, right.” His brain had shut down, now that it was out of questions.
“Despite the paralysis, there was the urge to go on as it hit me that we only have one life. One chance. We don’t get a rerun.”
“Oh.” Is she considering suicide?
“I also know you’re stuck in a rut with your business and need space to step back and rethink.”
“Oh, gosh.” He didn’t know he needed that.
“So, over the last six months I have been doing a real estate course.”
“You didn’t ask me,” he said, plaintively.
“I knew you wouldn’t agree so I used my meagre savings and, yesterday, qualified and, this evening, I have my first client.”
“You’re a real estate agent?” He tried to squeeze this new occupation into the small box he’d built for her in his mind. It didn’t fit.
“Yes, naturally!” She smiled gloriously and she really did look beautiful.
“Why naturally?”
“What’s my name, Arthur?”
“Uh, Gloria Soames.”
“And that’s what I’ll be selling. Glorious homes.”
They laughed together for the first time since the funeral.