(Loosely based on Andersen’s The Princess & The Pea, and The Talisman)
You might remember a feature or two appearing in some of our glossier magazines recently about an eligible young man who wanted to get married. While this is not an uncommon thing and usually not worth too many column inches, the young man in question was no run of the mill Joe. The young man in question had, in fact, once sung a song so popular that he never found a need, financially or artistically, to bother recording any other songs. Wives, mothers and daughters throughout Britain’s suburban radioland knew all of the words to the young man’s song and delighted in humming along to its very catchy tune whenever it was played, all of which helped to maintain its popularity long after the song’s novelty had worn off and also helped to keep the young man’s income at a healthy and quietly spectacular level.
Basking in the glow cast by his brief but perfect musical accomplishments the young man grew older living a quiet life in the countryside with his darling mother. He often thought about singing another song and had, as a result, kept himself in tip top condition, but as the years passed he found himself thinking more and more about settling down, and so it was that he decided to marry. Of course, he didn’t want to marry just anybody. Whoever she might be, the young man’s new bride would have to be what he called: “My Princess”.
And that is why the article about the young man appeared in some of the country’s glossier magazines. He was convinced that the simplest and best way to find his perfect partner in life would be to announce his desire to marry to the world by way of a celebrity photo-shoot. In fact, the article generated so much publicity that the young man found himself appearing on television and on radio shows throughout the country and his old but much cherished song was dusted off and given another airing by disk jockeys on every radio station that played popular music. For nearly a whole month the young man was the talk of the town. He was the brightest star shining above the airwaves. Once again, although in a far more mature sense, he was the dreamboat that drifted languidly through young girls’ daydreams, which, given the fickle nature of the public’s imagination, was a very considerable achievement.
Lured by the prospect of marriage to such a fine young man there were plenty of young ladies who made a beeline for his letter box and his lunch box. The only problem was that the young man simply couldn’t tell if any of these young ladies might really be his darling princess or not. Undeterred, however, the young man travelled the length and breadth of the country, escorting each and every one these beautiful and hopeful creatures to nightclubs, to restaurants and to his hotel bedrooms. He even managed a couple of quiet evenings in with some of the not so beautiful ones. But even after all of this most diligent research the young man still couldn’t find what he was looking for. No matter how hard he tried to see these young ladies in their best light, there always appeared to be something wrong with them. Eventually he returned home, being both very tired and very sad, for he did want to find his princess so very much, and it was then that the young man’s dear old mother came up with a very cunning plan.
“Invite all the most famous young ladies in the land to come and stay with us”, she said.” Not on the same night, of course”, she added just to be sure that she could manage the linen.
Accompanied by paparazzi flashbulbs and reality television cameramen, one by one the young man invited each and every one of the most beautiful and celebrated young ladies in the land to come and stay at his country pile. No matter what the weather, the season or the time of day, the house rang with the laughter of happy young people enjoying each other’s company. Every morning the young man’s mother delivered a lovely tray of tea and toast to his bedroom and as the exhausted but glowing couple lay in the king size love nest that had been especially arranged for them, the young man’s dear old mother asked each young lady in turn if she would give her a hand with the laundry. In particular she asked each fair maid if she would wash her son’s crinkly boxer shorts and diamond pattern ankle socks.
To the grave and desperate disappointment of both the young man and his mother, the young ladies behaved perfectly because they had all been brought up properly by respectably stage struck parents, each of them agreeing immediately to the request for a bit of a scrub at the washtub. As soon as she heard the word “Yes” leave the lips of these kind and considerate young things, the young man’s mother bundled the girls out of the house without a “by your leave” or any further kindness being offered.
“No, she’s no good”, cawed the old crow to her son as she slammed the door on yet another haplessly romantic soul. “No real princess would ever wash your smalls, boy. Ruin her nails, it would!”
This went on for weeks and weeks until, with the young man complaining about the effects of sleep deprivation, there was only one famous young lady left in the whole of Great Britain. The young man was, by now, emotionally drained, having lost count of the number of dates and encounters that he’d endured in his desperate quest to find marital happiness. The posts on the headboard in his bedroom were becoming dangerously weak as he whittled them away to nearly nothing with his little morning notches and aide memoirs. But, with time and the pool of potential brides quickly evaporating, the day came when the last of the country’s suitable young women was due to arrive on his doorstep.
The young man was not hopeful. “OK”, he said to his dear old mother, “we’ll have some fun, but I think the socks idea stinks. Can’t we just buy new ones every week?”
“You never know. A bird in the bed is worth two in the laundry, as they say”
The young man looked at his mother quizzically and let slip one of those long drawn out sighs that is the trademark of every thirty-something man who still lives at home with his dear old ma.
That evening the heavens opened upon the world and, depressed by the rain and the generally gloomy outlook, the young man all but gave up hope of ever finding true happiness. Nevertheless, and at the expected time, there was a knock on the front door. The young man opened the door with his usual flourish, a showman to the end, and was greeted by a storm of flashing electric light, and once his eyes had adjusted, to a positive vision in pink. The young lady, who was famous, as is every “glamourista”, for the skimpiness of her skirts and the translucency of her pure silk blouses, stood there dripping from head to toe.
The young man smiled his sunniest smile in an attempt to alleviate her damp suffering. The young lady, known as Burberry to the common people, glowered at him for a moment before barging him aside and striding purposefully into the hallway.
“Don’t just stand there”, she screamed at him as the world turned a brilliant shade of gloss white in a storm of paparazzi shouts and exploding flash bulbs. The young man slammed the door shut and wrapped the young woman and her dripping designer clothes in a towelling bathrobe that his mother hurriedly threw at him. As he caught the bathrobe he thought he saw his dear old mother grinning the widest grin this side of Wonderland.
After a long hot shower, a manicure, a pedicure, two hours with her stylist and half as long again on the phone to her agent, the super-model known as Burberry was ready for the fun and games. She glided to the top of the large and ornate staircase in a positively charged shimmer of discotheque fashions and demanded champagne. Then, as she descended the stairs in large, but strangely and compellingly graceful platform boots, she explained to everyone that she had sold the picture rights for the evening to Howdy! - the celebrity lifestyle magazine beloved of the little people.
The young man’s dear old mother was a true brick that night. She soaked the labels off of every bottle of Cava before it was served, and she handled with absolute tact and aplomb every request for pizza, for nail varnish and for some decent bloody music. The young couple got on famously all through the evening, cuddling up on the sofa, talking, eating Marmite on toast in the small wee hours and generally adopting every pose and every smile called for by the photographer. The evening was, despite the early rain affected shenanigans, a resounding success.
Eventually, with the photographers long gone and with the young couple safely tucked up in bed, the young man’s dear old mother sat quietly in the kitchen with her gnarled old hands wrapped tightly around a steaming mug of cocoa. The grin on her face was as wide as the Grand Canyon as she flicked her top dentures forward absentmindedly to relieve the irritation to her palate caused by some very annoying biscuit crumbs. Her body swayed gently in time with the sound of creaking mattress springs coming from her son’s bedroom.
Bright and early the next morning the young man’s mother tapped on her son’s bedroom door and walked into the room carrying the usual tray of tea and biscuits. She threw open the curtains, letting the room flood with glorious summer sunshine, and as she stood there, silhouetted in her curlers and her power-shouldered dressing gown, she started to sing. The old lady’s gravel laden voice was perfectly suited to the tune: “Oh, what a beautiful morning”.
“Aaaarrrggghhh!” screamed Burberry, as the dulcet tones of cock-crow dipped in beneath the duvet cover and dragged her into the world of sunlight. “What the bloody hell is that?”
She yanked the duvet cover back up over head and started to swear loudly. The young man rolled over slowly, opened one bleary eye and made a slow motion lunge for one of the mugs of tea. From under the duvet cover the disembodied stream of oaths and imprecations continued unabated, and as the young man tried to sip from the life giving tannin elixir, his latest paramour started to thrash her legs around wildly.
Finally, and in a real one hundred and ten percent hissy fit, she surfaced from under the duvet and screamed, “Shut the friggin’ curtains. It ain’t nat’ral bein’ awake before bloody lunch time”.
It took all of the young man’s guile and persuasion to coax and persuade his new paramour to keep her head above the duvet cover and to accept that it was, indeed, a very beautiful morning. It was only with the greatest reluctance that Burberry allowed herself to become accustomed to the brightness of this early hour.
Once her eyes started to focus properly, she let out another, huge, lung-bursting scream. Stood there right in front of her was the young man’s wrinkled old mother and in her arms she was holding a plastic laundry basket full of crinkly, used boxer shorts and stiffly soiled socks.
“What the…” stuttered the young lady. “If you think I’m going anywhere near those things then you’re bloody barking. Haven’t you got a maid?”
The young man leaped out of bed and spun his mother round by her waist as they waltzed around the bedroom in a dance of pure joy. Teacups shattered and biscuits crumbled underfoot as they danced and sang. It was all over. At last they had found the perfect match; at last the young man had discovered a real princess. And so, with the pre-nuptials agreed and with the photographic rights sold to the highest bidder, the young man finally got his heart’s desire and married his darling princess.
The young man and his bride jetted off to their honeymoon paradise sponsored by a company that made coconut filled chocolate bars, and in return for a few more photographs, a short video and some encouraging words, they were given a wonderful time on golden beaches lapped by azure seas. Their evenings were a riot of dancing, laughing and the after hours bliss of the marital bed, and after all of this the happy couple even found time to sit quietly as the dawn rose and talk of life, love and their plans for the future. They were so very happy and everything seemed to be working out perfectly for them, but as the honeymoon neared its end, they couldn’t help noticing that all was not well between them. There were no fights, no disagreements, nor was there any petulant posturing, but nonetheless, during their long dawn conversations they became aware of a doubt nagging away at them beneath their true, true love.
The doubt that each of them felt was this: will I always be as happy as I am now?
They checked their legal agreements through, clause by clause and swore to each other in front of various newspaper and television reporters that they would always be true, but no matter how vehemently they protested their love for one another the doubt always remained. Finally, with that hook of uncertainty still snagging and scratching at their hides, they decided to seek out a talisman, a lucky charm that would protect their love for each other forever and ever more.
In their professional capacities they had both heard about a foxy old publicist who spent his summers on this very same Caribbean paradise isle, a wily old dog of a man who was held in the highest esteem by stars and celebrities the world over. He was wise and powerful, and it was said that he always knew how to give the best advice, even in the middle of the greatest of hardships and miseries, and so, over a mint julep or two by the side of the old man’s pool, the young man and his princess told him about their problem.
When the wise old publicist heard their story and thought about everything they had told him, he turned to them both and said, “Journey to the four corners of the world. Ask every famous married couple if they’re truly content. If they really are, then ask them for a couple of signed photographs that each of you can keep with you wherever you go to remind you of your love for each other. That’s the surest remedy for your problem. And if you want, I can arrange for a documentary crew to accompany you every step of the way”.
The documentary idea was tempting, but the young couple resisted the old man’s inducements. They wanted this journey to be a pure expression of their love, unsullied by grubby fingered commercialism.
The very next day Burberry read about a famous film star and his wife in one of her favourite glossy magazines, a couple who had been happily married for over forty years and even had a barbecue sauce named after them. What could be better? The young man and his adoring wife immediately flew to Hollywood and as soon as they arrived they telephoned the film star’s agent, who happily arranged dinner for the four of them at a swanky restaurant on the strip. During dinner the young man asked his guest if his marriage was truly as happy as it was rumoured to be.
“Of course”, was the reply. “Except for one thing. We have no children, unfortunately, at least not from our marriage”.
The talisman was not to be found here then.
On their way back home the young couple stopped off in New York, where a wealthy business tycoon lived, who was rumoured to have found true happiness in a long and successful marriage. The tycoon was only too happy to entertain such well known newly weds and he invited them to a party with all of his friends, acquaintances and prospective business colleagues.
When asked the same question he replied, “Why yes, indeed, we really are very content. My wife and I lead the best of lives. Our only regret is that we have so many children. They cause us so many headaches and heartaches”.
The talisman was evidently not to be found here either.
The young couple continued to seek out every happily married celebrity couple in every city and in every country where really famous people lived, but nowhere could they find anyone who could say a “yes” without adding a “but”. Eventually, and with heavy hearts, they gave up their quest and headed for home.
When the happy couple disembarked from their Jumbo Jet and left their first class seats in the usual state of long distance disarray, they found themselves in the middle of another media scrummage. Hundreds of reporters and photographers vied with each other to get the best quotes and the best pictures, and in the middle of this ruck and maul the young prince and his lady wife spotted a tired looking man and woman sitting in the middle of the airport concourse. These two frayed individuals were playing lovingly with their twin sons. They seemed oblivious to anything going on around them. The husband, his smiling wife and his happy sons seemed to exude a sense of calm that was quite unique and perfect in this rushed and bustling world. Breaking free of the media circus, the young man and his new wife rushed over to the happy family group and asked them the same question that they had asked all around the world.
“Yes, we are very happy”, said the man. “With my wife to comfort me and my children to keep me young I’m extremely happy and content”.
The young man grinned at his new bride. Remembering the words of the wily old publicist, the young man said, “If we make you famous, you know, fifteen minutes and all that, could we have a signed photograph of you? You can even kiss Burberry on the cheek if you like”.
The older man looked at his wife in horror and his cheeks burned red with indignation. He managed, however, to summon up his reserves of inner calm before turning towards the young man and and saying, “Bugger off! Don’t you know who we are? Don’t you recognise us? How dare you be so patronising, you little shit, you one hit bloody wonder”.
The young man looked blank. His beautiful new bride looked blank. Around them pandemonium broke out. The gentlemen of the press surrounded the family and completely ignored the young man and his beautiful new wife. As the young starlets started to slink away, confused and not a little annoyed, they heard the familiar shouts and barks of the hounding press pack:
“Over here, Prime Minister…”
“Give us a smile, Brenda, love…”
“Any comment on the single currency, Sir?”
And so the young man and his wife returned to their new home, which they had recently bought in a prime location just to the northeast of London’s orbital motorway. They were tired, disappointed and frustrated. The very next morning they telephoned the wily old publicist and gave him a piece of their combined minds, but having listened to their ranting and raving for nearly a whole minute, the old dog smiled to himself and asked the young couple, “Has your journey really been such a waste of time? Haven’t you learned a great many new and wonderful things?”
The young man thought about this for a few minutes. His new wife also stopped short of her final insult and gave these wise words some serious consideration. The young man took his bride’s hand in his and spoke gently to the old man on the other end of the telephone line.
“Well, I suppose we’ve both learned that to be content you need nothing more than just that - to be content”.
He looked into his wife’s hazel eyes and smiled. She looked back at him for a second, grinned and then taking the handset from him she said, “Or maybe we’ve learned that that there’s more than one way to skin a cat...we’re too young to settle down. I’ve been offered a part in an ‘Adult’ movie by Jean Paul Robespierre, you know, one of them blokes we met in Hollywood and I’ve always wanted to do some serious acting, so thanks for the advice but...”
With their respective lawyers flexing their considerable egos and with the press pack baying like wolves, Burberry hopped onto the next transatlantic red-eye. Despite his grief, and with his deeply tanned six-pack still in fine shape, the young man overcame his tragic flirtation with married life, secured a new recording contract and within a month he released a new disk full of sad little love songs, which sold millions of copies.
Burberry’s film, while not a critical success, was watched by millions the world over and as the young man set off on a world concert tour, Burberry found herself on set playing the lead in a new film, this time with complete sentences for her to speak.
In their respective hotel suites on opposite sides of the world, the young man and his soon to be divorced wife considered the lessons they had learned from married life. True love might be a holy grail worth chasing, but in its absence a good marriage with plenty of publicity did wonders for the old bank balance.
In hotel rooms on opposite sides of the world the young man and the young woman looked at their reflections in the bedroom mirror and smiled to themselves.
“What a perfect marriage…” they both thought and as one being they picked up their bedside telephones and rang down to order more champagne.