There is an expensive-looking bouquet of flowers losing the will to live in our sun-trap of a front window. I plonked them in a waterless vase after my daughter’s boyfriend presented them to me two days ago and haven’t given them a drink since.
‘I don’t know where Alex gets these flowers he brings you,’ my husband Martin observed. ‘They die so quickly.’
Then he saw my smirk and the penny dropped. ‘Are you deliberately killing them?’ he asked. Yes, I am.
I also know that Alex doesn’t like onions – apparently they give him wind. So when he is here, I quietly sneak them into every dish I can. It surprises even me how much pleasure I take from making sure he gets the smallest portion when I dish up dessert.
Alex is my daughter Nicola’s boyfriend. They are both 30 and she has recently informed me that they plan to start trying for a baby.
Of course, my first reaction to this news was joy at the prospect of being a grandmother for the first time.
But it was mixed with dread at the idea of finally having to accept Alex as a permanent fixture in her life – and therefore mine, too.
Why? Because he gives me ‘the ick’ – that undefinable pang of revulsion that can instantly put you off a person for good. I hate the smell of Alex’s aftershave, while his voice – to my ear an octave too high – irritates the hell out of me. After he has hugged and kissed me, when no one’s looking, I rub his kisses off my face then go and wash my hands.
A man has not triggered this level of feeling in me since I was 16, and the sight of my then-boyfriend letting his dog lick his mouth – the same mouth I’d been enthusiastically kissing five minutes earlier – made me cringe so hard I never spoke to him again.
It baffles me Nicola doesn’t have the same visceral response every time she looks into Alex’s eyes, which, incidentally, are set fractionally too close together. And that she belly-laughs at his jokes, which I don’t find remotely funny.
Nicola and I are very close and have always shared the same dry sense of humour. Alex’s is much more obvious, less sarcastic. In fact, he is infuriatingly upbeat; a glass three-quarters full person.
You can’t enjoy complaining about anything in front of him – the weather, the cost of butter, slugs feasting on your dahlias – without him smiling broadly and reminding you ‘how very lucky we all are’.
Horrifyingly, he calls my daughter ‘pumpkin’ because they met around Halloween. Every time I hear him say it, something inside me dies.
So to make myself feel better, I’ve resorted to mean and sneaky acts of attrition, such as pretending not to see the dog take his left trainer and start chewing the insole. Am I secretly trying to break them up? I’d never do anything deliberately deceitful but I refuse to let the fact they have been living together for two years, and are now talking about starting a family, get in the way of my conviction he won’t last.
I admit I haven’t particularly liked any of her previous boyfriends either, always questioning whether they’re good enough for my little girl. But I’ve warmed to them eventually. I can’t see that happening with Alex.
‘She’ll come to her senses any day now and leave him,’ I tell Martin. But he just says Alex has grown on him and I need to accept our daughter’s in love and it has nothing to do with me.
It would be so much simpler if I had some hard, tangible evidence that proved Alex is no good. But he has a good job, appears to be both solvent and faithful, and there are no obvious signs he is a secret gambler.
He brings me flowers, and usually ones I like. He’s affectionate towards me and shows interest in what I have to say.
I once asked Nicola whether pharmaceuticals play any part in his seemingly boundless energy. She looked annoyed and said: ‘No, he’s just good fun.’
He also clearly dotes on my daughter. I’ve never heard her laugh quite as much as she does when he is around. Yet I still ask myself: ‘What does she see in him?’
I really did want to like him – desperately, in fact.
A year before Nicola and Alex got together, she had been in a relationship with a man who dumped her for her friend. Nicola suffered terribly from that double betrayal. Alex, she told me happily, was ‘the man who would heal her broken heart’. But it all went wrong the first time she brought him home. As he pulled onto the drive, she said: ‘I think I love him, mum. I hope you will, too.’
I told her that if he meant that much to her, I was bound to be bowled over by him, too. What a platitude that turned out to be.
Moments later, Alex – reasonably handsome – walked into the kitchen, shook Martin’s hand, then kissed me warmly on the cheek. So far so good.
But then he spotted lunch – a steaming hot lasagne resting on the kitchen counter – and completely lost his head.
This fully grown, bearded man suddenly started whooping with delight, then danced on the spot doing a happy little jig.
At which point the dog – an elderly labradoodle – sauntered in to see what the fuss was about. Resulting in that whoop of joy turning into a shriek of alarm.
‘Oh, I forgot to say, Alex is terrified of dogs,’ said Nicola as she shooed poor Barney out of the room. If he had just been stared down by a rottweiler, I’d have had some sympathy. But a quick sniff from a freshly shampooed fluffball? Really?
This set off such a strong gut reaction in me that I’ve been airing my disapproval of Alex to my husband, my friends and my dog-groomer ever since.
All while pretending to my daughter – who moved in with him six months later – that I think he is absolutely wonderful because I know how hurt she’d be if I suggested otherwise.
You might find it hard to believe, but Nicola honestly has no idea how I feel. My facade of affection is so convincing, Martin is now questioning whether he will ever be able to trust me again. (And in case you thought it was a one-off, I’ve seen Alex do his ‘happy dance’ countless times since that first meeting. According to Nicola, he wakes up most mornings so happy to be alive, he does that jig all the way to the bathroom.)
Recently I couldn’t help just probing a little more.
‘But what about when the honeymoon period ends and he turns out to be a miserable old so-and-so?’ I asked her.
She pointed out that honeymoons don’t usually go on for two years and I quickly shut up.
I couldn’t bear for my relationship with Nicola to suffer because of how I feel about Alex, and I’m no fool – I know mothers who criticise their daughter’s partners only end up cut off and lonely. Indeed, I hope I genuinely get over my icky feelings towards him so I can stop faking to her that I really do like him.
Meanwhile, my friends think I am being unreasonable and that I need to give Alex a break. In fact, those who have met him think he is good fun and are following him on Instagram.
One also pointed out that his fear of dogs might link back to some childhood trauma – though they did all agree that calling Nicola ‘pumpkin’ is a step too far.
Still, now that he could well become the father of my grandchildren, it’s more important than ever that I keep her in the dark about my true feelings.
I know I must do everything I can to make Alex feel welcome in our family. Deep down, I do know the problem lies with me and not him.
But as anyone who has ever had the ick will know, once it’s taken hold it’s almost impossible to shake off.
So, how do I keep up the pretence without inwardly imploding? Easy. Through discreet acts of revenge, like gushing over the flowers he brings me while knowing I’ll soon be tossing their wilted remains on the compost heap.
At the weekend, Nicola asked whether I’ll be making my famous lasagne any time soon because Alex loved the first one I served him so much.
‘Let me know when you do,’ he chipped in cheerfully. ‘I’ll be round like a shot.’
Note to self: Never, ever make a lasagne again.
- Names have been changed.
