Mad Cows by Kathy Lette

disproportionately, slapping his massive thighs. Undeterred, he covered Maddy’s hand with his own. ‘Now,’ – his Adam’s apple yo-yo-ed up and down with excitement – ‘I’ve always found cunnilingus to be a good opening courting gambit.’
    Maddy snatched back her hand. ‘Why are you like this?’ But she knew why. For all his declarations of love, Alex was little more than the same – a heat-seeking penis which did not report to Mission Control. ‘Wouldn’t you occasionally like to have sex with someone who didn’t press charges later?’
    â€˜Sexually exploiting my clients has the advantage of requiring no more than fifteen minutes of my day, leaving me more time to lavish on the love of my life – a Burmese kitten called Butter Truffles.’
    â€˜In case you’ve forgotten, I’ve just had a baby. There’s an out of order sign on my underpants, okay?’
    He rolled down his sleeves and snapped shut the gaping black jaws of his cavernous briefcase. There was a terrifying finality about it which gave Maddy a panicky feeling in her belly.
    â€˜Anyway, I’ll be out in a week.’
    Peregrine stood up abruptly. ‘Don’t make any plans.’
    â€˜A week I can handle,’ she stated, bravely. ‘I mean, there’s a library, a gym, educational facilities.’
    â€˜With Advanced Rug Munching on the curriculum.’ Peregrine wrestled his way back into his jacket. ‘When I say don’t make any plans, Ms Wolfe, I do
not
mean putting your Women’s Reading Group on hold. I mean write your will and kiss your loved ones goodbye .’ Peregrine galumphed to the door. ‘Rug munching . . . a rather resonant euphemism, don’t you think?’
    Maddy read the graffiti carved into the back of the door which her solicitor had just slammed – ‘Kill All Bitches’. Madeline Wolfe had a terrible feeling that the writing on the wall was about to include her name.

6
    There’s A Baby In My Bath Water!
    â€˜LET’S GET ONE thing straight.
I don’t like babies
.’ Gillian’s gigantic face swelled into Jack’s myopic vision. ‘I’d rather have a pedigree Weimaraner. At least you can sell them. You wouldn’t even
be
here if it weren’t for those five years at Our Lady of Maximum Humiliation and Hypocrisy Convent. A Catholic upbringing, my dear, is a life’s excursion on a guilt trip. Comprehendé?’
    The baby’s hands jerked past his face. He didn’t seem to realize that they were attached to his body. Alternatively amused and intrigued, he watched his own fingers fly by as though they were performers at the Moscow State Circus . . . Oh well, Gillian reflected, he wasn’t the first male she’d met who could be entertained by bits of his own anatomy.
    * * *
    â€˜I’d like some baby clothes,’ said Gillian, gruffly, to the Mothercare assistant.
    â€˜Yes, madam. What sort?’ The shop girl was so enthusiastic Gillian thought her face might fall off.
    â€˜
I
don’t know,’ she snapped. ‘
Clothes
for a
baby
. Oh, and nappies.’
    â€˜What size?’
    â€˜How the hell do
I
know?’ She wrenched open the handles of her handbag and pointed contemptuously at Jack ensconced within. ‘
This size
.’
    Gillian was too irritated to appreciate the incongruity of the situation; she, in her false eyelashes which looked, when she blinked, like terantulas mating, and a four-and-a-half-week old baby, held at arm’s length like a contaminated package. Watching the startled sales assistant assembling the basic-maintenance kit, Gillian idly pondered that she actually knew more about babies than she’d realized. Essentially they were just like designer cars; the fuel tank needed constant topping up and it was impossible to get any replacement parts.
    â€˜Well, rug-rat,’ she said, going through her