Foursome (26 page)

A little later Lorna phones through to me and asks me to go into her office. Although this is the second time this has happened in the past two days it is not a normal occurrence. Lorna knows that as far as I’m concerned I don’t work for her and she’s hardly going to want to see me for a girly chat. I mutter about being in the middle of something and tell her I’ll come through in a minute. I take my time, making myself a tea, and then I say to Kay, ‘If I’m not out in ten minutes, send help.’ She laughs and wishes me luck.

Lorna’s office is now looking as scrubbed up as she is. She sits behind her desk and motions for me to sit on the other side.

‘Rebecca,’ she says. ‘I think I should say thank you for the way you’ve been covering for me.’

I sit there open-mouthed. Did she just thank me?

‘That’s OK,’ I manage to say.

‘You did a good job,’ she says.

I make as if to get up. ‘Well, you’re back now…’

She’s not finished. ‘And for yesterday. If you hadn’t been there, that lunch would have been a disaster. I just want you to know that I appreciate it.’

‘Right… thanks.’

‘Anyway,’ she says, ‘like you said, I’m back now and I’m feeling much better.’

‘Good,’ I say. ‘I’m glad to hear it.’ She does actually look much better although, of course, we both know that this time yesterday she was a basket case, but it seems neither of us is going to mention that. I try to make a move again. Lorna coughs, which makes me jump. This whole conversation is making me feel very uneasy.

‘I spoke to Alex last night,’ she says, and this time I don’t mind sitting down again because I want to hear what she has to say.

‘And…?’

‘I went round to his flat and waited outside till he got home so he had to talk to me. And you were right. He wasn’t ever in love with me. He was in love with you, just like you said.’

‘I’m sorry, Lorna.’ I mean it, I do feel bad for her.

‘Actually, you know, now he’s finally admitted it, it’s OK. I can move on. I just have to get over feeling stupid…’ Her voice cracks. I seem to be destined to be surrounded by disappointed crying women at the moment. I don’t know what to do. Comforting her would feel like an intrusion so I just sit there.

‘I’m going to concentrate on work,’ she says, once she’s composed herself. ‘And I’m very grateful that I still have that work to concentrate on. So that’s why I asked you to come in really. To tell you that.’

‘Well, if it makes you feel any better, I enjoyed doing it. I really did.’

‘It seems you’re good at it,’ she says, and smiles. At least, I think it’s a smile. It’s hard to tell with Lorna, she does it so rarely. She could just have wind.

29

I’ve had an epiphany.

I couldn’t sleep in the night, thinking about Isabel and Luke and Lorna and Alex and the big old mess that is our lives. Then I started feeling sorry for myself. I’m finding work mind-numbingly boring now I’m back to my old routine. Don’t get me wrong, I still love Mortimer and Sheedy, but I feel like I’ve lost something. Like I’m capable of so much more. I was thinking over the buzz I got while Lorna was away, trying not to feel resentful about the fact that I am not going to be given any credit for anything I achieved – my own decision, I know, but it still bothers me, nonetheless – when I suddenly realized that I don’t have to answer phones and type letters for the rest of my life.

The thing that was always holding me back was my own perception of myself. I never believed I was confident enough or capable enough to do more. I hid behind protestations of wanting an easy life and no responsibility when really, underneath all my front, it was fear that held me back. But it’s different now. Now I know I can do it. I just have to figure out who’s going to give me the chance. On paper I have no experience, just six years of admin.

I can’t help myself – I have to talk it over with Dan. I shake him awake and he groans and tries to roll over away from me.

‘Dan,’ I hiss. ‘Are you awake?’ I know that’s the one thing I can say that will guarantee he’ll wake up enough to talk to me.

He rolls back. ‘Well, I am now,’ he says testily.

‘I think I want to have a career. Not just a job. Not just filing and typing and calling people to tell them other people want to speak to them.’

‘Good for you,’ he says. ‘Night.’

‘What do I do? If I apply to other agencies, they’ll just see me as someone who’s been an assistant forever. Why on earth would they trust me with any of their clients?’

‘Sweetheart,’ he says. ‘I have no idea. Talk to Melanie about it. I’m sure she’ll be able to give you some advice.’

‘Am I being stupid?’ I say. ‘Should I just shut up and get on with what I’m doing?’

‘Definitely not,’ Dan says, suddenly wide awake. ‘You’d be brilliant and, if it’s what you want, then you have to go for it. We just have to figure out the practicalities. Maybe there’s an agents’ training school you could go to.’

I laugh. ‘With modules in inflating CVs and schmoozing.’

‘I think you’re a natural,’ he says. ‘You’re bossy and you like telling people what to do. I’d give you a chance.’

We talk about it for a little while more before I realize that I really should let him get back to sleep. There’s no way I’m dropping off any time soon. I feel elated. Nervous and excited at the same time. I have no idea if I’m going to be doing the right thing, putting myself out there, leaving my cosy work set-up, but at least I’m doing something.

I take my time trying to get up the courage to talk to Melanie in the morning. I’m worried it will sound like I’m resigning, which I am in a way although not quite yet. I want to test the water first, see what might be out there. I don’t want to try to run before I can walk. I might have dredged up some courage from somewhere, but I’m still not
that
brave. I confide in Kay and she hugs me and says it’s a brilliant idea and, even though no one else knows it, she knows that I’ll make a great agent because she’s seen me in action.

‘Most of Lorna’s clients would probably leave and go with you if they knew the truth,’ she says.

‘That’s not how I want to do it, though,’ I say.

Lorna is beavering away in her office, back to her old efficient self. She phones through to Kay every few minutes with another piece of business and, from what Kay divulges to me, it seems like she’s gone into overdrive to prove she’s back on track. I’m glad for her. Although a big part of me thinks that my life would be much simpler if she could just get back with Alex and keep him away from Isabel. I shouldn’t wish him on her, though. Slightly alarmingly she seems to be checking up on the work I did while she was away, having Kay set up calls with first Phil Masterson then Marilyn Carson and then Jasmine, Mary, Samuel, Craig, Joy and Kathryn in quick succession. Could she still be plotting my downfall even as she seems to be trying to be a bit more gracious? I wouldn’t put it past her. I’m tempted to listen in on her calls, but I decide my new professional self wouldn’t stoop that low. Oh well, let her try. I’m out of here anyway. Fretting about what Lorna is up to focuses my thoughts and I finally get up the courage to go and knock on Melanie’s door

‘Have you got a minute?’ I say, when she looks up. I know she’ll say yes, she always does, even when she’s snowed under.

‘Sure. Come in.’

I go in and shut the door behind me, which at Mortimer and Sheedy always signifies that something serious is going on.

‘What’s up?’

I sit down. ‘I… you know I love working here…’

‘That doesn’t sound good,’ Melanie says. She puts her pen down as if to prove to me that she’s concentrating on me and nothing else.

‘I’ve never wanted to work anywhere else. You and Joshua are like family to me.’

‘Are you telling me you want to leave now?’ She looks worried.

‘No… Well, I don’t know. Eventually, yes.’ Come on, Rebecca. Spit it out. ‘The thing is that I think I want to be an agent myself. With my own clients and stuff.’ I look up at her to see if she laughs at the ridiculousness of what I’ve just said, but she doesn’t. ‘Only, obviously, I have no real experience and I was hoping you could give me some advice, you know, on what I should do next.’ This suddenly doesn’t seem like a good idea, asking my current employer how I can get a better job probably isn’t the cleverest thing I can do.

‘I thought you didn’t want any responsibility. You always said so…’

‘I know. But now I do. Or maybe I always did, I just didn’t want to admit it to myself.’

‘Well, you know it can’t happen here?’ she says. ‘We’ve just promoted Lorna and we’re only a small company.’

‘Of course.’ The minute she says that there’s no chance of my being promoted at Mortimer and Sheedy I realize that I have been secretly hoping that that was exactly what would happen. The idea of having to go somewhere else, to start again, scares the shit out of me. I feel absolutely deflated suddenly and she must be able to read it on my face.

‘I wish we’d known you had these ambitions before…’

‘I didn’t even know it myself. Sorry…’

‘You know we’ll hate to see you go, but I’ll do whatever I can to help you. I’ve always thought you were capable of so much more.’

She tells me she’ll have a think about where might be good for me to apply. She knows a few people who she can talk to, she says. She and Joshua will give me a fantastic reference, it goes without saying. I thank her and I tell her again that it’s not that I want to leave Mortimer and Sheedy, it’s not like I’m unhappy, I just need to do this for myself. In fact, if nothing comes up then I’ll happily stay here, doing what I’m doing, for the rest of my days. Melanie laughs and tells me she understands completely.

‘I’ll mention it to Joshua,’ she says, ‘prepare him for the worst,’ and I feel sick, like I’ve set something in motion and now I’m not going to be able to stop it even if I wanted to.

It’s only a few days till we shut down for the Christmas break. Two whole weeks of no work and overindulgence. Traditionally Dan and I always have Alex and Isabel and the girls over for a big celebratory dinner on the twenty-first with a few random other friends, whoever we are feeling well disposed to at the time, and then the four of us plus kids all get together again on Christmas Eve.

This year we haven’t organized anything, but as the day draws nearer William starts asking who’s coming and when are we going to start decorating the house, and it makes me realize that more than anything the kids need a bit of stability. I mention it to Dan and he says of course we should go ahead and we shouldn’t let Alex’s bad behaviour get in the way of us all having fun. He doesn’t quite sound like he’s convinced by his own words, but I figure it’ll do us all good so I tell Isabel it’s on, as usual.

We decide to invite Rose and Simon and I tell Dan I’d like to ask Kay along too. I get the impression she’s dreading Christmas, although she’d never admit as much. Her eldest has decided to spend the holidays with his new girlfriend’s parents and her youngest isn’t coming home till Christmas Day when it’ll just be the two of them. In keeping with our own little established traditions, we will be serving sausages and mash with trifle for dessert – I can’t remember when or why this became the official twenty-first of December menu but now it would seem wrong to change it – and pulling homemade crackers, which with everything that’s been going on I haven’t even given a thought to this year.

I set aside tomorrow lunchtime to go to Fortnum & Mason to buy the little gifts to go inside, and I break the news to Zoe and William that they will have to spend Tuesday and Wednesday evenings on the production line. Dan and I will make two in secret for them after they have gone to bed. I write a list of ingredients for Dan to buy at Waitrose after work tomorrow and then William and I climb into the tiny storage space we call the loft, even though we are on the third floor of a six-storey block and it’s really just a cubby hole built into the suspended ceiling in the hall, and dig out the decorations. We spend a happy hour or so putting up the tree while William tries to convince me that buying him a chemistry set for Christmas would be a real investment for his future as a mad scientist as opposed to an irresponsible and potentially lethal thing to do.

Rose sounds delighted when I call her. I think she has been a little nervous around us since she told me what she knew about Luke, that she might have put her foot in it. Isabel says that, of course, she just assumed that it would be on. It’s the twenty-first of December, it’s tradition, what else would be happening?

‘Have you decided what to do about Christmas yet?’ I ask, not for the first time. If I’m being honest, I’m worried that Alex is going to use the holidays to try to crowbar his way back into her life. On the other hand the girls will want to see him, of course they will; he’s still their father. I’ve thought about suggesting to Isabel that she tell him he can come over either before or after lunch, but not for the actual meal itself. Preferably before when he is less likely to have had a few glasses of wine too many, although that way there is always the danger that he will get there and then refuse to leave and Isabel won’t want to cause a scene in front of the twins. Anyway, I haven’t offered up my suggestion because I am trying to live by my new rule of keeping out of things that really don’t concern me.

‘No. It’s hard to have a rational conversation with Alex at the moment,’ she says. ‘I’m just playing it by ear.’

That’s a recipe for disaster in my book, but I don’t say so. Instead I say, ‘You know you and the girls would be really welcome to spend the day with us?’

‘Thanks. We might take you up on that. I just don’t know…’

‘It’s OK,’ I say, thinking of the turkey I’ve ordered that will never feed seven of us, ‘you don’t have to give us any notice.’ I add ‘frozen free-range turkey crown’ to Dan’s shopping list although I have little hope they’ll have any left.

I can hardly breathe. Joshua has me in a bear hug. To say I’m in shock would be an understatement. Kay is laughing while Lorna, who is looking for something in the script pile, just looks horrified.

‘I can’t believe you’re leaving us,’ he cries, mock distraught. ‘What are we going to do without you?’

‘You’re leaving?’ Lorna says, sounding genuinely surprised.

‘Maybe,’ I manage to say from the depths of Joshua’s armpit somewhere. He lets me go just before I pass out from lack of breath.

‘Rebecca has discovered her inner ambition,’ he says to Lorna. ‘She’s got fed up with typing up my letters and making me coffee.’

‘No,’ I say. ‘It’s not like that…’

‘About bloody time too,’ Joshua goes on, laughing loudly to make it clear he’s joking.

‘You should have seen her face,’ Kay says once they’ve both gone back to their rooms. ‘It was priceless.’

Now I have made my announcement I feel like I should be seen to be doing something about it. I start making a list of the other agencies. I can’t imagine going to work for one of the big successful companies. They’re too corporate, too showy. And God knows why they would even think about employing me either when they have their own thrusting young assistants champing at the bit to be promoted. So that leaves the smaller – for that read less successful – outfits. The Mortimer and Sheedys.

I don’t know where to start there are so many of them. And what are the chances I’ll approach one just as they’re thinking of expanding? Let alone how would I then convince them to hire me? I’m starting to despair a little. Why didn’t I just keep my mouth shut, keep my stupid ambitions to myself? Now I’m going to have to deal with the embarrassment of failure – or at least of never really having had the guts to try – on top of everything else.

Having made the list I decide that at least I’ve done something, so I try to think about what I might put in the crackers instead. The gifts are always small but personal, and I usually think about them well in advance. Kay is easy. She’s always losing her keys around the office because every time she gets them out of her pocket her keyring falls apart. I write down ‘Kay: key ring’, and then sit staring at the piece of paper for a couple of minutes. Kay is beyond thrilled, by the way, to have been invited to our little Christmas do. She’s heard so much about Dan and Isabel that she can’t wait to put faces to the names and I think, to be honest, she’s just glad to be getting out of the house for the evening. I indulge her in five minutes of chat about her boys. The ways she has of justifying the fact that she’s hardly going to see them over the holidays breaks my heart, actually.

I tell her I’d like to take the early lunch and I’m just putting my coat on, ready to go off to potter around Fortnum & Mason, looking for cracker gifts, when Melanie pops her head round the door and says, ‘Rebecca, I’ve spoken to a few people. Carolyn Edwards at Marchmont, Edwards and Wright said they’re thinking about expanding in a year or so’s time, maybe. They’re looking for a new assistant, so she said you could go in and meet if you were interested. You’d be well placed when they did want to expand… It’s difficult, you know, because we know you’re brilliant, but for other people, if they don’t know you at all…’