I Married a Domestic Goddess

By Simon Brooke

The Domestic Goddess – a story of social media fame, a family in crisis and advice on buying a bike.

Adam and Sarah live in a house that’s too small for them with a mortgage that’s too big for them and, once they’ve wrestled the kids into bed, they watch Netflix series in their pyjamas or have cheap-as-chips, Chardonnay-soaked dinners with their friends.

After Sarah wins a writing competition for a women’s magazine, she’s asked to become a regular columnist. Emma, Adam’s friend, but certainly not Sarah’s, a glamorous celebrity publicity, immediately sees potential in Sarah as a YouTube star.

And so the Domestic Goddess is born.

As the Domestic Goddess attracts followers and cables, lights and free samples for promotion begin to fill the house, Adam and the children find themselves transformed into social media stars. But Adam is uncomfortable with their new found fame.

Luckily, Emma has a suggestion – Adam should follow in his wife’s footsteps and the humble bike shop that he runs with his quirky assistant Fin becomes the home of the Bicycle Boys, the next YouTube sensation. But is more celebrity and more freebies really the answer to Adam and Sarah’s growing estrangement?

Before long, as the couple find themselves competing for subscribers, swamped by fans and struggling to handle their new fame, the fault lines in their relationship force them apart.

Adam has never had to try at anything – other than escaping from the shadow of his celebrated financier father. Sarah, on the other hand, has always had to work like hell – as she does for the Domestic Goddess. “But it’s killing you,” points out Adam. Is it better to die trying? Before long Adam is throwing himself into the Bicycle Boys. But is it to impress Sarah or get revenge on her?

Conflicted, he seeks to rebuild their normal family life but Emma clearly has other plans for the couple. When the Domestic Goddess and the Bicycle Boys come head to head for the glitzy Vlogger of the Year Awards Adam realises that he needs to take drastic action.

• Language: English
• Publisher: AuthorHouse UK
• Release date: Apr 19, 2021
• ISBN: 9781665587211

Simon Brooke

Simon Brooke was born in Yorkshire, England, but now lives in West London. His checkered employment history includes a stint as a male model and work as a political spin-doctor. Eschewing the possibility of getting a proper job, he now writes for The Times, The Sunday Times, and The Telegraph. His first novel, Upgrading, is also available from Downtown Press.

Book preview

PROLOGUE

Extraordinary scenes at the Vlogger of the Year Awards. As hundreds of thousands of fans of the two leading contenders were waiting to see whether their idols had won things didn’t work out as they’d expected. We now go live to our correspondent Jane Taylor who’s on the red carpet for us. Jane, I imagine the organisers must be furious with what’s happened – or do they just see it as extra publicity?

Very possibly, John. But I can tell you, this certainly wasn’t what anyone was expecting. As you know, the rivalry between the Domestic Goddess and her husband, Adam Blackburn, one half of the Bicycle Blokes, has been fierce and very, very public. There’s been extra interest in the awards tonight after social media has been gripped by speculation about the state of their marriage with suggestions that the couple were on the brink of divorce. The Blackburns studiously ignored each other when they arrived and their PR teams have been busy briefing journalists and fans but nothing could have prepared us for what happened this evening…

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1

If you screw this up, I’ll kill you, says Sarah and I know she means it. My wife takes these things seriously and if it did actually come to murdering me, she’d probably do a very good job of it – neat and efficient.

Seems a little excessive, I suggest, still struggling with the vitally important task that she’s given me. I hear her tut.

Look, that thing cost a fortune and it took us about an hour to choose it, remember? So just be careful, OK.

Why don’t you do it then? I ask looking around at her.

Because I’ve got other things to do.

Like?

Carrots.

"Carrots? Can’t believe we’re having carrots. Reminds me of school."

These ones won’t – they’re glazed with honey and cumin, or at least they will be if you ever let me get on with it.

Yum, I say, turning back to the job in hand.

Careful! she says staring at me intently across the kitchen. You haven’t removed that bit of plastic. Look - under there.

Babe, just do the carrots will you? You’re making me nervous.

She is, as well. I take a deep breath and consider using a spatula. Or a scalpel. Where can you buy a scalpel at 7pm on a Friday evening? I can’t believe that so much time, energy and emotion can be invested in extracting a bit of pastry, some fruit and a splurge or two of cream from some packaging. I suppose the fact that it cost almost as much as the rest of the whole dinner party ingredients put together and is more delicate than a butterfly with a broken wing might have something to do with it. It would have been quicker and easier to make the tart ourselves but Sarah just lurrves this elegant French patisserie that recently opened around the corner. Its stuff is better than we could ever make and it does have the wow factor – as well as meeting Sarah’s stratospheric dinner party standards. As I turn round to see if I can find a spatula to ease the tart out of its chi-chi pink and gold cardboard box I catch Sarah looking at me anxiously, saucepan in hand.

Er, carrots, I tell her again.

What are you looking for? she asks. Why don’t you just, you know, sort of…slide it. She mimes vaguely at me with her free hand.

Why don’t you, just, you know - shove it, I reply. Doesn’t she realise that being a man I need tools - preferably a whole array of them - to do a job? Where did I leave that monkey wrench?

What are you looking for now?

I’m not looking for advice, thanks anyway.

I can’t believe you’re making such a meal of it.

Ha, ha.

Oh, you know what I mean, she mumbles, chopping disconsolately.

I open the drawer and rattle some kitchen implements around looking for inspiration. Then I turn round to view my opponent again - the tart, that is, not Sarah. Somehow, they’ve managed to wrap it up in bits of paper and put it on a disc of cardboard and then drop it very snugly into a surprisingly sturdy plastic container. Actually, a spatula won’t be much help. What I need is a crane or a drone. Yeah, that’s it - a drone operated by a brain surgeon.

Now what? asks Sarah, carrot in hand.

Where did I leave those pliers? I ask, rattling around in the drawer again.

Oh, for God’s sake! She slams down the knife and marches towards tonight’s desert with a determined look in her eye. But I catch her and hold her back. Her hair smells of cooking and her cheeks are slightly flushed from the heat of the hob.

Aderrrm! I can always tell when Sarah’s annoyed because she adds an extra syllable to my name. Aderrrrm is Adam’s evil twin, you see. Get on with it. She’s frowning and obviously trying to stay cross with me, trying not to smile. I kiss her and run my hands through her hair and immediately I feel her body begin to relax slightly. We kiss again, more slowly, more intensely this time, lost in the moment.

Do you think we’ve got time to…?

No, we haven’t, she says, her disapproval mixed with regret. They’ll be here in half an hour and I haven’t even had a shower yet.

That’s plenty of time -

No, she says. She pulls herself free and begins to chop more rapidly. I turn back to my sugary, creamy, calorie laden nemesis. I have to say, if we ever actually manage to eat it, it’ll be delicious.

Right, you smug French bastard, I hiss at it. I prize away the plastic and dig my fingers in. Some of the pastry breaks slightly but what the hell? If I’d had my way we’d just put the tart, packaging and all, on the table, give everyone spoons and tell them to dig in.

So what about leaving a bit of cardboard and plastic on it? I ask, finally lifting the tart to the waiting plate. No one’s going to believe you made this anyway. I mean, after all - oh, oh, fuck! The activity at the other end of the kitchen stops abruptly. Oops!

Oh, no, Aderrrm, she wails, looking round. What have you done?

I’ve put it on the plate, I say coolly, showing it to her.

It takes her a moment to realise that I really have. Mission accomplished. Shock melts away and is replaced by a mixture of relief - and annoyance.

Oh, very funny! She begins to inspect the tart closely as if hardly able to believe that it really is in one piece. She finds a tiny bit of damage. What’s that?

Oh, the pastry got a bit broken, look I can -

Don’t touch it, for God’s sake! Put it down carefully over there and then back away with your hands above your head. Go and have a shower and leave me to finish here. Quickly. I try and kiss her again but she pushes me away. Aderrrm! Oh, and have a shave too, you’ll all scratchy. Go on! Oh, and check on the children too, it’s unnervingly quiet up there.

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I’m actually very glad to get out of the kitchen. Even though we seem to have people over for supper quite a bit Sarah still gets very stressed every time. It’s all got to be perfect you see. I’d just shove some pasta and salad on the table, tell everyone Chow down, and open more wine. But Sarah is all about detail and perfect execution. That’s one of the reasons why I married her.

This evening is particularly tense because of one of the guests. I don’t know why I suggested that we invite Emma. Somehow it felt more honest and open to do it rather than sneaking off to see her in one of our old haunts, just the two of us. Of course, I’d always tell Sarah that I was going to see Emma for a drink and she’d be pretty cool with it, usually anyway. Sometimes she’d just roll her eyes and say, Have fun. Other times she’d try and conjure up some enthusiasm with a comment like, Oh, that’s nice. I’m glad that you’re seeing your old friends from uni. But then I’d get the quiet treatment the next day anyway.

She wasn’t usually so happy about the fact that I’d stagger back at 2 or 3am decidedly worse for wear. We’d row, I’d sleep on the sofa and feel like crap for at least the next 48hours impressed by and not a little jealous of the knowledge that Emma would get four hours sleep and be one hundred per cent, well, Emma, the next day.

Once or twice I’ve tried to address the elephant in the room by reminding Sarah that Emma and I have, honestly, I promise, never done it. Sarah, with her usual calm manner, has replied that, yes, she knows that but in a way that makes it sound as if either she didn’t believe me or it wasn’t surprising at all. Then we’d end up having a row in which I’d accuse her of hinting that Emma was way out of my league or that the only reason the supercilious bitch (that phrase came out from Sarah’s gritted teeth after a particularly vicious row over her) and I haven’t done it was because I can’t help her in her career or something. Stupid I know but Sarah did more than once suggest that I was part of an exclusive club – men with their own teeth and no serious mental health problems who hadn’t slept with Emma.

Why do we always end up having a row about that woman? asked Sarah after we’d kissed and made up on one occasion. I still don’t know but Emma does produce this effect on people – they either love her or hate her. And in most cases with couples it’s the men who love her and the women who hate her.

Having replayed this in mind and reminded myself that the reason that I’d invited Emma to dinner was that she is actually very entertaining, a source of appalling anecdotes and celebrity gossip, as well as being something for any male guests to drool over. Do I enjoy watching female partners growing fury at the sexual chemistry? That’s a terrible thing to say – but it’s also very funny to watch.

So that’s probably why I’ve invited Emma to dinner tonight following a lengthy text exchange centred on one of our silly in-jokes. I pick up my phone to check the latest on the footy scores. Liverpool have lost again. 3-2 to Arsenal. I tut and look for something more about the game. Just then Sarah yells from the kitchen, half threatening, half beseeching. I put down my phone and wander into the bathroom, trying to decide who I’d buy if I was Liverpool manager and money were no object.

Ten minutes later I’m shaved, showered, hair washed and dressed in the chinos that I know Sarah likes to see me, in plus a dark blue shirt which her mum bought me for Christmas.

Good, she says, checking me out, picking some fluff off my shirt and taking the casserole out of the oven. Can you put that garlic bread in to bake and open the wine while I go and have a shower.

Sure. Mm, that smells nice. Charm offensive aside, it really does, actually. It’s chicken with tomatoes, mushrooms, pancetta, shallots and various other things. I know because I was dispatched around Sainsbury’s to find these various ingredients while Sarah manoeuvred the wonky-wheeled trolley we’d been forced to use and ticked off the items on her list.

I was then sent out again shortly afterwards to the corner shop with another list of bits and pieces that we’d forgotten. Bloody bay leaves. Like we’d miss them. And who cares that somehow, when we got home, we discovered that we were one tin of chopped tomatoes down? Did it matter that the mushrooms we’d bought (all right, I’d bought) weren’t exactly the ones described in the recipe after all? But Sarah insisted because that’s what it said and, as far as Sarah is concerned, recipes are there to be followed. To the letter.

She opens the lid, irritably dodging the cloud of steam that emerges, but then looks pleasantly surprised by the aromatic, bubbling mass. Taking a wooden spoon, she scoops out some of the sauce and blows on it, checking her watch at the same time. Then she takes a sip and looks thoughtful.

Needs more salt…or something…I don’t know.

I finish off the contents of the spoon.

Tastes good to me.

Does it? OK. That’ll have to do, then. I’ll never be ready otherwise. Quick, put it back for me, can you? And wipe down the hob.

Who the hell is going to see that?

Aderrrrmn, she whines with a pained expression. Just do it.

She carefully puts the spoon into the dishwasher and dashes out. It’s five to eight. Luckily no one is ever on time for these things, though. Now, what was it I was charged with? Oh, yes, garlic bread. My favourite. I know Sarah only buys it for me really. Deeply naff, of course, but it reminds me of being a student, I suppose. I unwrap two anaemic, butter clogged, unbaked French loaves and put them onto a baking try, my mouth watering already at the prospect of my favourite food.

Then I open the wine. Two bottles of Merlot and two of Pinot Grigio. Yeah, it might be just uncorking a couple of a clichés, but what the heck? Everyone likes it, don’t they? I pour myself a glass of the Merlot and take a big gulp.

Mm, I say to no one in particular. I take another mouthful. God, I’ve earned this, I think to myself. It should be quite fun tonight. The smell of the garlic bread is beginning to fill the kitchen. Personally, I always think that as long as the food’s edible, there’s plenty of wine and everyone is relaxed – oh, and I’ve remembered to put my trousers on – you can’t go wrong. Sarah’s the one who worries that the napkins don’t match the curtains or that we haven’t got quite enough desert spoons and someone might notice that she’s using a teaspoon.

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I put some music on and Sarah shouts something from the bathroom.

Sorry, my sweet?

I said, you’ve got shaving cream all over the taps.

That’s good - I was aiming for them.

Don’t shout – you’ll wake the children.

But you shouted to me.

And light the candles will you, her face appears at the doorway, hair in a towel turban. No, not the ones on the table, the tealights. Look, around there. She pauses again. Is that one going to set fire to the curtain.

That would be funny. You remember that time…no, it wouldn’t be funny.

Just move it and then -

OK, just go and finish getting ready, I tell her. She looks like she is about to say something else but then disappears. I light the tealights as instructed, then sit down on the settee. The living room looks neat and tidy in a, bare, bereft kind of way, like when you have a very quick shave and your face is smooth and clean but still raw and smarting from the experience. I think the place would look better with the usual books, magazines and bits and pieces lying around but they’ve all been tidied away.

Exactly where they’ve been tidied to is obvious when I open a cupboard to put the matches away. There’s even a mug and a plate with toast crumbs and a smear of jam on it thrown in next to some magazines and a couple of newspapers from a few weeks ago. If Sarah sees this she’ll have a fit. I manage to force the cupboard door shut as she returns looking gorgeous. A moment later the door buzzer goes. She freezes in panic as always and I have to hold her by the shoulders and say:

It’s fine – you go and let them in while I take the garlic bread out. She looks at me and then nods. I go into the kitchen and look around for a tea towel while Sarah gets the door. It’s James and Becky. I’d half forgotten that they were coming. We call them the Tonics because they’re sort of bland and they mix well with anybody. They’ve both got PhDs in small talk. She’s a teacher so anyone can talk to her about being at school or having kids at school and he’s a solicitor so everyone can ask something like: My neighbour’s got this tree, right, and one of the branches is hanging right over my garden, can I cut it off? I pretended to be a solicitor once at one of Sarah’s fantastically dull work drinks parties and I said yes, and you can throw it back into their garden. I hope that’s right. Anyway, who cares. Mind you, I also told one of Sarah’s colleagues that the law does, in fact, allow you to sue someone for buying the same cushions as you from IKEA if you can prove that they got the idea for them from you in the first place.

Really? she said. I didn’t know that.

Not many people do, I told her, smiling condescendingly. I think I also mentioned that it was now legal to break into the home of any celebrity that you follow on Instagram and help yourself to their cereal packets, according to a little known clause in the Social Media (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act. I think that was when Sarah stopped inviting me to her work dos. (Why do you have to be such a silly smartarse, Ads?) Either it was that occasion or the time when I arrived having eaten nothing since breakfast, downed three glasses of warm Chardonnay from a smeary glass and started doing my Shirley Bassey impression.

It’s actually rather good.

I hate Sarah’s work. I hate the fact that it makes her stressed and miserable and that she has to keep customers happy and, even more so, her arsehole of a boss, Rob. Quite often the two are incompatible – pleasing a customer with an apology or a refund is the opposite of what Rob wants to do. He seems to regard them as opponents rather than customers, collateral damage in his campaign to become regional director of, er, whatever it is. Whenever I see the London & Eastern Building Society logo, I feel angry and slightly sick at the same time.

Once, after I’d heard Rob giving her his usual bollocking-flirty-I’m-your-friend-flirty-but-also-your-boss-bollocking-I’m-your-friend-flirty-but-I’m-doing-your-appraisal-bollocking thing on the phone to her at 8pm, I went out the next day to where L&E has a huge poster and defaced it. Admittedly I couldn’t reach very high and only wrote bollocks at the bottom of it with one of the children’s colouring felt tips that was already running out, but it did make me feel a bit better on behalf of Sarah.

I can hear Becky and James apologising for being late and talking about the problems of getting a reliable babysitter or something as I search for the tea towel. Eventually, as James informs Sarah about the insanity of the one-way system at the top of our road (again) I give up on the tea towel which has obviously done what I’d quite like to do and scarpered off to the pub and I use my hanky to take the garlic bread out of the oven. Unfortunately, just at that moment Sarah appears in the doorway.

"What are you doing?"

I couldn’t find the tea towel - this is just as good, I tell her although the evidence of our eyes suggests otherwise - the butter is soaking into my hankie which, in turn, is now offering no insulation whatsoever. Oh, fuck, I mutter as I drop the whole lot onto the draining board with a resounding clatter.

Aderrrm. Careful, all the butter’s leaking and it’s burnt! How did that happen? Also, the fact is that I want our guest to taste garlic, parsley and butter – not snot and earwax in their garlic bread.

It’s not burnt - it’s just well done, I say. No, burnt is what my fingers are. Look just get the drinks will you.

Shouldn’t you…?

Drinks for James and Becky.

OK…shit, I’ve forgotten what they want now. Erm! I think it was… She slaps her hand on her forehead. Oh, what the hell was it? Look, move the tart will you, it’s going to get garlic butter all over it.

No, it’s not, I say calmly. I’m really wishing she would just get out now so that I can get my throbbing fingers under the tap.

White wine and a Cranberry juice. Look, give me the tart and I’ll put it in the fridge until we need it. I’m finding her presence really annoying now – the garlic bread tray is determined not to cooperate and most of the precious butter has become fused on to it. I reach round for a spatula or something, but my hand hits her arm which seems to have appeared around the side of me from nowhere.

Sarah, just –

Let me get this tart out of the way and then you can –

I’m still looking round into the drawer when it happens and so I don’t see anything, but I hear a splat and the sudden silence from Sarah tells me all I need to know. I freeze for a moment.

Oh, no, don’t tell me… I begin in a small, weak voice. There is part of me that hopes that if I haven’t seen this disaster it won’t have happened. If a tree falls in the wood and no one sees it does it really fall? If a tart falls in a kitchen and no one sees it, does it really spell dinner party disaster? Suddenly the garlic bread seems unimportant. I shove it onto the plate with my hands, drop the baking tray into the sink to soak and turn to survey the carnage properly.

Well, I say. "At least we survived."

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2

Emma is telling us a story about a friend of hers who was in a club when a rock star invited her - completely out of the blue - to come into the gents to do a line with her. Sometimes Sarah’s worked herself into such a tizzy about the arrival of the Emma who she regards as Cruella Deville’s younger, slightly more sinister sister, that I’ve been tempted to text Emma to say Looking forward to seeing you. About 8? Don’t bother to bring a bottle – but a bodyguard might be useful.

Sarah was clearly on best behaviour when Emma arrived, looking, as she always does, slightly sort of distracted and amused – oh, and let’s face it, pretty gorgeous in a sheer black dress. She made some comment about her journey, as she always does, that implied that we live in the Australian outback. I’d watched the two of them double kiss, observing them closely to identify any tension or mutual antagonism, as Emma handed over a bottle of Bollinger and said how lovely something smelled. Was Sarah’s smile a little too fixed? Did Emma withdraw from that delicate embrace too quickly? Was my double kiss with her too lingering? Did her comment about how nice the house was looking sound a little bit two-edged? Why am I playing this over and over again in my mind?

Emma usually makes a thing of stepping over children’s toys and Sarah swears that she once caught her running her finger along a shelf looking for dust.

Spare coke, probably, I suggested helpfully. Sarah rolled her eyes. Oh, don’t worry. Emma …just…likes…you know…running her finger along things, I bleated helplessly. Likes running her finger along things? Why is it that everything about that woman sounds so sexual? I wondered.

Look, Babe, I know you’d rather someone else was coming this evening…

I’d rather the pest control man was coming this evening, she muttered, polishing the table.

Oh, come on she’s nice really, I say unconvincingly above the noise of the vacuum cleaner. Sarah turns and looks at me sceptically. OK, ‘nice’ is probably not the right word