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Listeners' Fantasies |
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Dolores, Part 2
by Boudicca (Queen)
 Visitors to the Fantasy Archers topic of The Archers message board regularly enjoy seamy slices of Ambridge life, dredged from the foetid imaginings of Boudicca (Queen). You can, of course, catch up with .
Alan Franks knew he was no expert on women's fashion, but he couldn't help wondering what had possessed Shula to wear that dress. It was floaty and frilly and abundantly floral and it made poor Shula look like a carthorse in a tutu. In crisp cotton or starched linen she would have looked attractive, maybe even sexy (in a scary, governess sort of way), but she really couldn't carry off "girlish". And why was she simpering at it him like that? She kept fidgeting and squirming too; fiddling with her hair and giving him coy looks from underneath her eyelashes. Why did women do that?
Women had always been a bit of a closed book to Alan; he'd never had trouble attracting them, but he didn't quite seem to know what to do with them once he'd got them. His wife had overcome this problem by sheer force of personality; she told him that they were getting married and they did, she told him they were having a child and they did, she told him she was dying and she did. Alan had always known where he stood with his wife and he fervently wished that other women could be as easy to understand. Alan sighed, if only all these women would just go away and leave him in peace to talk to God.
It was funny, Alistair thought, how the most trivial decisions could alter your life completely. If he hadn't decided to miss breakfast because Shula and Daniel were being even more irritating than usual, he would never have stopped for lunch at "The Farmer's Boy" in Waterley Cross that day and things would have been very different.
Susan still smarted when she thought of her family's reaction to her "Autumn Harvest" hair. Christopher had laughed so much that the caravan had started to shake, Emma had stared open mouthed and speechless with horror and Neil had said (in that nervous voice he used when he thought she was about to throw a wobbly), "it looks very nice, love."
When Emma finally regained the power of speech her first action was to pick up her phone and call Giovanni's to make an appointment for her mother.
"Oh no, Emma love! We can't afford that."
"I'll pay Mum, I don't care what it costs, you're not coming to the wedding looking like that!"
Waterley Cross was one of those villages that had been taken over completely by incomers; pokey, tumbledown hovels had been modernised, extended and made over to satisfy the bucolic fantasies of dentists and management consultants and anything that spoilt the image of a rural idyll had been ruthlessly expunged.
In the middle of this earthly paradise of pristine cottages and rustic water features sat the pub, "The Farmer's Boy" with its sign showing a simpering Narcissus, preening in a smock and gaiters. For more than 200 years it had been "The Marquis of Granby", but the current owners had felt this to be insufficiently quaint and had changed the name along with pretty well everything else; the bare boards and rickety tables that had been perfectly adequate for a village of farm workers were deemed unsuitable for their middle-class successors and the interior of the pub now resembled an urban set designer's idea of an old fashioned country pub. Sepia prints of picturesque peasants ploughing, harvesting and engaging in any country pursuits that were unlikely to upset the squeamish lined the walls, old pieces of farm equipment had been cleaned, festooned with dried flowers and ribbons and suspended from the ceiling and everywhere you looked there seemed to be a shelf of unused pewter tankards or a display of horse brasses.
Alistair had spent the morning explaining (as tactfully as he could) to the trophy wife of a Birmingham rag trade millionaire that there was absolutely nothing wrong with her horse that wouldn't be cured by ceasing to feed it sugar lumps by the bucket load and learning to ride the poor creature properly and, if it hadn't been for the stress of this combined with ravening hunger, he would never have gone into "The Farmer's Boy" that day.
This single, apparently inconsequential, action had changed Alistair's life forever because, if he hadn't gone in there to eat greasy "Thai" fishcakes and drink sour, badly kept beer, he would never have found out what Jonathan did for a living. And if he hadn't found out what Jonathan did, he would never have become Dolores…
Mercedes Goodman couldn't honestly remember the last time she'd washed her own hair; for years now she'd been going to Giovanni's twice a week to take advantage of her friend's incomparable blow-drying skills and hear the latest gossip. She was always shown to the same seat in the most private part of the salon, well away from prying eyes and flapping ears and, of course, since they were such old friends, Giovanni didn't bother putting on his bogus Italian accent, but reverted to his native South London with Mercedes.
"How's it goin’ then darlin’? Your old man still givin’ you grief about the credit card bills?"
"Oh no, I reminded him how much I know about his business dealings. One teeny phone call to the Inland Revenue and the Goodman business empire would be history, my husband may be an old fool, but he's not completely stupid."
"Hang on a minute Mercy, if he goes bust won't you be up the swannee too?"
"Don't be silly darling, I didn't claw my way up from the Buenos Aires gutter to end up dependent on my stupid husband! I've been putting money away in a little account in Switzerland for years. You know those emeralds Sidney gave me for our 25th anniversary? Within a month I'd had them copied, sold the originals and added a nice little bonus to my retirement fund."
"You cheeky mare!"
"I'll take that as a compliment darling. Anyway that's enough about my boring husband, what's the latest news? Who's been playing away and who's been lead up the garden path?"
"Hmm, let's see ... Lillian Bellamy still thinks that Matt will leave Yvette ..."
"Stupid woman! Still, I don't suppose Matt has bothered to tell her that all the money belongs to Yvette and that he's just an employee of Crawford Enterprises."
"That Elizabeth Pargetter is threatening to sue the salon because her laser hair removal treatment didn't make her legs as smooth as a baby's bum. I told her, technology has its limits and at least her husband won't have an excuse to call her his "little chimp" no more. Blimey, you should have heard the language she used! What is it Julia always says about her?"
"You can take the girl out of the farmyard ..."
"Yeah, but you can't take the farmyard out of the girl!"
"Dear Julia, such a snob, but she does make me laugh. And is that all, or are you saving the best till last?"
"Well ... you'll never guess who's working for Abigail and proving very popular with her clients…"
Alan Franks was feeling stressed and bad tempered; Amy had been pestering him for some new outfit that was going to cost an arm and a leg, Susan Carter kept cornering him and wittering on about the arrangements for her daughter's wedding (and what had she done to her hair, she looked like a belisha beacon dipped in gravy) and, thanks to all the home-made cakes and scones that his female parishioners kept trying to force feed him, he'd put on so much weight that he could only just do up his trousers. What he needed was some relaxation, a spot of stress relief to make him forget all about his work for an hour or two. He picked up his mobile and scrolled through the phone book to Abigail's number.
Alistair had first met Jonathan Hendriks at his surgery, it was only a few weeks since he had realised that not only could he not afford to divorce Shula, but that his gambling debts were starting to spiral out of control. It was a struggle to get through each day without yielding to the desire to curl into the foetal position and simply howl. With his inner sense of emptiness and misery clamped down tight beneath a façade of professional bonhomie, Alistair had greeted the elderly and bad tempered spaniel Jonathan had brought in with a hearty, "and who's this old fellow then?"
"Stinky."
"Stinky?"
"Yes, my aunt named him "Binkie" originally, but after a few weeks she decided that "Stinky" was much more appropriate. And you must admit she has a point."
For the first time in months a genuine smile lit Alistair's face.
By the time she walked into the marble and gilt splendour of Giovanni's, Susan felt quite sick with fear. All the way there, Emma had lurched from tight-lipped fury to bitter tears whenever she looked at her mother's hair and, faced with the intimidating grandeur of Felpersham's most expensive hairdresser, Susan felt that life couldn't get much worse.
"Good morning madam, can I help you?"
Susan's mouth was dry with terror and before she could get a syllable out, Emma was answering on her behalf.
"My mother has an appointment with your senior colourist. Susan Carter, 10 o'clock."
"Oh yes, if you'd just like to take a seat Kayleigh will be with you in a moment", the receptionist gestured graciously at a pair of cream suede sofas on either side of a coffee table piled with glossy magazines.
Susan sat awkwardly on the edge of a sofa like a woman waiting to mount the scaffold. Emma sat on the other sofa and glared. Five minutes later a young woman with the most extraordinary hair Susan had ever seen approached them.
"Morning ladies, I'm Kayleigh. I'll get us some coffees and we'll have a chat about what you want me to do for you today."
Her voice had Meadow Rise Estate written through her it like a stick of seaside rock and Susan started to feel little less intimidated, but the girl's own hair did not inspire her with confidence; it was the most unnatural shade of primrose yellow that Susan had ever seen and it was chopped about in a way that reminded her of the day Emma had taken the kitchen scissors to her favourite doll.
When the three of them were settled with cups of cappuccino the size of soup plates Emma did the talking yet again.
"You have to fix her hair. I'm getting married in a few weeks and I can't have her looking like that."
Kayleigh looked straight at Susan.
"You believed what it said on the packet, didn't you love? Don't worry, it happens to all of us - you shouldn't have seen what I did to my mum's hair when I first started in this game! Never mind, I can fix it. What do you fancy? I reckon a nice light chestnut with some warm highlights would suit you, how about it?"
Almost overcome with gratitude, Susan murmured meekly, "yes please."
Alistair was surprised to see Jonathan in The Ploughboy that day and after they had said their hellos, he asked jokingly, "I thought everyone who lived round here had to work 18-hour days to afford the mortgages, are you skiving off or something?"
"No, I work slightly unusual hours. Evenings mostly."
"Really? What do you do?"
It was odd now he came to think about, but Alistair knew very little about Jonathan even though Stinky was a regular visitor to his surgery and Jonathan was always friendly and talkative. Alistair knew all about Stinky's original owner, Jonathan's elderly and much loved Aunt Dol ("The only member of my family who couldn't bore for Britain") who had given Stinky to her nephew when her arthritis had got so bad that she had chosen to move into a very expensive nursing home ("It's got hot and cold running nurses in every room and a decent wine list darling, so I shall be quite comfortable. And you needn't worry about the cost Jonnie, some of my gentleman friends were very generous to me."), but Jonathan had never said much about himself. Jonathan smiled and handed Alistair a business card. It said:
Abigail
TV Massage
And underneath there was a mobile phone number.
Part 1 of this story.
Discover Dolores' real identity in Fantasy Archers.
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