Sex and Other Changes by David Nobbs

longing to go home, and before she knew it she had done an enjoyably illegal U-turn and was being hooted at by a white van so filthy she could barely read the words ‘The Throdnall Aquarium – Leaders in Garden Ponds’.
    The driver of the van speeded up and came alongside her little Peugeot – Sir Nigel Gresley Boulevard was dual carriageway in both directions. His eyes were blazing.
    â€˜You aren’t fit to be on the road, little lady,’ he said.
    Wrong! she thought. I am no little lady. I am a man trappedin a woman’s body. You’ve picked on the wrong one here, little yobbo.
    â€˜How suitable that the driver should himself be an example of pond life,’ she said.
    His eyes glittered with aggression. Why were the English so aggressive?
    â€˜I’ve a good mind to report you,’ he shouted.
    â€˜I doubt that,’ she said. ‘You don’t seem to me to have a good mind for anything.’
    â€˜Oh fuck off,’ he shouted.
    â€˜Case proven,’ she shrieked triumphantly.
    He flashed two nicotine-stained fingers at her and sped off. She saw that at the back of his van someone had written in the thick grime, ‘I bet you wish your wife was as dirty as this van’ and suddenly all her anger left her and she laughed inwardly at the thought of the little runt driving around all day, oblivious.
    She pulled in to the side. She was breathing very hard. She had been so angry that she might have had a stroke. When she’d calmed down she drove carefully home, parked the precious Peugeot and phoned Mr Beresford to say she had a migraine, that she’d tried to get to work, got as far as the Boulevard (in case someone had seen her) and had suddenly felt that she couldn’t make it. He was sympathetic. After all, she hardly ever took days off, and, besides, she knew that he rather fancied her, even though he was too much of a gentleman to show it.
    The moment she’d made her phone call she knew that she’d made a big mistake. The house was so silent. Gray was at school, Em was at work, Marge was sleeping and Bernie was watching her sleeping. She had never known number thirty-three so silent. It clanged with silence.
    She was trapped. She couldn’t turn up at work and say, ‘False alarm. I find I haven’t got a migraine after all.’
    She was alone with her emotions. She went to the front door and fetched the mail. Yet another offer of reduced car insurance.Yet another letter from Tom Champagne of the
Reader’s Digest
. And a questionnaire from the Royal Mail. Would you describe your postman as ‘neatly dressed’, ‘reasonably dressed’, ‘averagely dressed’, ‘untidily dressed’ or ‘badly dressed’? Is he ‘very friendly’, ‘fairly friendly’, ‘averagely friendly’, ‘rather unfriendly’ or ‘very unfriendly’? Is he ‘very polite’, ‘fairly polite’ … well, you get the style.
    She filled in that he was untidily dressed, very friendly, extremely impolite, any other comments? ‘Yes, he has twice exposed himself to me in the front garden, in a very friendly, very impolite manner. He has also kicked the cat and broken three elves and a heron.’
    She left the completed questionnaire on the kitchen table, in the hope that Nick would read it that evening and deduce how desperate she was.
    There was nothing for it after that but to clean the house from top to bottom, except for the granny flat. Mrs Pritchard did that once a week, and that was disruption enough for Marge.
    Alison was feeling an emotion that was strange to her and repugnant. She was feeling self-pity. She told herself not to be so ridiculous, but she couldn’t help it. It should have been her. She hoovered with savage feminist resentment, forcing the horrid little machine across the hateful carpets. She really did hate carpets sometimes. God, how she longed to have