The Model Wife Read Online Free PDF Page A

generous divorce settlement and ‘allowed’ me to stay in the family home by paying the mortgage. The implication that I should somehow be grateful to stay in the house I have lovingly restored, cared for, brought up our babies in, sends me virtually to boiling point.
    Nonetheless, I keep telling myself, I have no choice but to move on. I must find a way of coming to terms with my new situation. Thousands of families endure this same pain every year and – though I find it near impossible to do – we have to be forgiving. If my children, and I, are to be happy, then we all need to believe in a rosy future, just rather different from the one I dreamt of when I pledged my troth.

3
    The month after Luke arrived on Poppy’s doorstep was a whirl. They spent a week in her flat, before Luke said he couldn’t stand any more of this student lifestyle and not being able to get into the bathroom in the morning when Meena was doing her make-up. He rented a large flat in Maida Vale right next to the canal. It was in a handsome white stucco building, based over two floors. It had two bedrooms, a study for Luke, a high-ceilinged living room and a Poggenpohl kitchen/diner.
    ‘It’s lovely,’ Poppy breathed, unable to believe how quickly she’d moved on from Kilburn. She’d known Luke was rich; he was obviously well paid by the network, plus he’d inherited a lot from his father who had been something in the City. Only now, however, did she begin to realize how rich. ‘Do we need such a big place?’ she added.
    ‘Well, the kids will be coming to stay,’ Luke said.
    ‘Oh,’ Poppy said. ‘Of course. I can’t wait to meet them.’
    In a weird sort of way she was quite looking forward to it – after all Luke’s daughters weren’t that much younger than her. But in the end, they never came. They said they had no desire to meet the woman who had ruined their own and their mother’s lives, so Luke was obliged to spend every other weekend taking them to Pizza Express and – they scornfully dismissed his suggestions of the zoo – on shopping trips, which he complained bankrupted him. Poppy had dreamt of spending weekends strolling hand in hand along the canal, but instead she was left all alone for forty-eight hours with a pile of DVDs and a growing bump.
    Even during the weekends he was with her, he was busy working on his book about the Balkans and spent nearly all the time secluded in his study. Poppy would bring him snacks and offer him head massages, which he gratefully accepted but then he’d wave her out again.
    No one had reacted to her news in the way she’d hoped.
    ‘You’re up the duff!’ Meena had screamed. ‘Poppy, you idiot!’ She paused and then added, ‘I mean, congratulations. I suppose it’s one way to get a ring on your finger. But, Poppy, you don’t want a baby, you’ll get all fat and then you’ll have an agonizing birth; you’ll never sleep again and spend the rest of your life covered in puke and poo.’
    ‘I love babies.’ Actually, Poppy loved the idea of babies, crooning softly to them wrapped in pink fluffy blankets. She’d never spent any time with a real one.
    ‘Then go and be a nanny. Don’t have one of your own. You’re not twenty-two yet. You’ve got the rest of your life for all that. Plus,’ Meena paused for a second, ‘plus I know Luke’s on telly, but it’s boring telly. Couldn’t you hold out for someone from Hollyoaks or something? I mean I’d never heard of him, and you’re so pretty, Poppy, I reckon you could do better for yourself.’
    Poppy decided it was sour grapes. After all, Meena made no secret of the fact that her game plan was to bag a member of the royal family or, failing that, a Bollywood mogul and spend the rest of her life shopping. To help achieve her goal, Meena worked as a receptionist at a ludicrously swanky health club in St John’s Wood where she could get discounted manicures, facials and hair cuts, plus meet plenty of potential husbands.