Original Cyn (8 page)

“Come on, you have to eat. I promise there’ll be no strings. No pressure.” She racked her brain, desperately trying to invent an excuse. “Actually, I’m off to the Brazilian rain forest the day after tomorrow to film a . . . a muesli commercial.” Bugger, bugger, bugger. What on earth had possessed her to say muesli? “Won’t be back for a week,” she added.

“A commercial for muesli? In the Brazilian rain forest? Funny, I’d associate muesli with a more alpine setting.”

“Yes, most people do, but I see this commercial as a deconstruction of neo-Bergmanesque, postexistential ennui.” She hadn’t the foggiest what that all meant—if anything—but it was the kind of intellectually impenetrable guff she’d heard Hugh spout when he was banging on about art-house films.

“Wow! I’m impressed. I just know we’re not going to regret hiring you, Chel. OK, let’s put our date on hold until you get back.”

“Great,” she said, massively relieved that she had been able to negotiate some breathing space.

“In the meantime, I’ll e-mail you.”

What? No. On no account could he be allowed to e-mail Chelsea. Posh private hospitals like the one Chelsea was in were bound to have Internet access. She could be checking her e-mail within hours. “Er, getting e-mails in the middle of the rain forest might be a problem. It’ll be easier if you e-mail my assistant. Her name’s Cyn. She’s a lovely girl. She’ll phone our hotel and pass on any messages.” She gave him her e-mail address, which he wrote down on an immaculately folded Kleenex Man Size tissue. “Wicked. I’ll be in touch.”

“I’ll look forward to that,” she said.

As she headed out toward the M4, Cyn felt positively euphoric. It was partly the adrenaline still pumping through her, but it was primarily the realization that she was fulfilling her desire to do something bad and brave for the most honorable and noble of reasons. She pulled up at traffic lights, opened the window and started singing at the top of her lungs: “You know I’m Bad, I’m Bad, I’m Really, Really Bad . . .” A prim-looking woman in a red Metro alongside her gave a disgusted look. Whether this was in response to what Cyn was singing, the Anusol ad on the side of the car or both, Cyn had no idea. What was more, she didn’t remotely care.

As she as she came onto the M4 slip road, she put her foot down and forced the Smart Car up to 70. Since the vehicle was so tiny, this felt more like 170. For a few minutes she flew along, the icy wind gusting through her hair, feeling as if she could take on the world.

She was still singing when her phone, which was lying on the passenger seat, started ringing. She wound up the window and picked up.

“Hey, Cyn, it’s me, Chelsea.” The shock of hearing Chelsea’s voice instantly segued into fury. Bad back or no bad back, her instinct was to blast Chelsea with a character reading that would have her cowering under her hospital bed, begging for police protection. Almost at once her rage turned to panic. For some stupid reason, it hadn’t occurred to her that Chelsea would phone to check up on the situation at Droolin’ Dream. She wasn’t even remotely prepared. Did she have the wit and the nerve to fool Chelsea like she’d managed to fool Gazza? Heart thumping, she fought through her emotions, desperate to keep cool head.

“Chelsea, how
are
you?” She prayed she didn’t sound suspiciously caring and upbeat.

“Pretty spacey from all the medication, but at least the pain’s gone. The doctors say I’ll be in the hospital for a few weeks. Apparently I’ve slipped three discs. Pretty major. Listen, Brian Lockwood told me you were off for the rest of the day. I just wanted to check that everything’s OK with the guys at Droolin’ Dream.”

“Everything’s fine,” Cyn soothed, wondering how she was managing to sound so calm. “I’ve had a conversation with Gary Rossiter and he said he’s happy to put everything on hold until you’re back on your feet. He told me to tell you’re not to worry about a thing and just concentrate on getting better.”

“That is so darling, but I’ll give him a call, just to reassure him.”

What? No. She couldn’t do that. It would blow the whole thing. Think, Cyn, think. “You can try calling him, but I don’t think there’s much point. He’s on holiday for the next few weeks. I spoke to him a couple of hours ago. Your meeting was going to be his last appointment. Since you couldn’t make it, he said it gave him the chance to leave early.”

“That’s strange. He never mentioned a vacation.”

“Um. Hill walking in the Himalayas, apparently. Can’t be reached.”

“Funny, he didn’t strike me as the hill-walking type. But you’ve definitely sorted everything out with him?”

“Definitely. It’s all under control. You just take it easy.”

“OK, I will. And thanks for calling him. It’s really put my mind at ease.”

“My pleasure,” Cyn said, with a smile that would have done Snow White’s stepmother proud.

Gradually, the traffic began to slow down. After a few minutes all three eastbound lanes were bumper-to-bumper. At the same time, Cyn’s high gradually morphed into a not quite so high. Not only was she starting to think that impersonating Chelsea was immoral, she was imagining what might happen if she got found out. And she was bound to get found out. Did she really think she was going to pull this thing off? This wasn’t a movie, it was real life. She saw herself in a few weeks having been sacked without a reference and effectively unemployable. Her thoughts were interrupted by her phone ringing again.

“Cyn, it’s me, Harms. ’Ewge just told me what happened.” Harmony was so outraged she was barely pausing for breath. “I-tell-you-if-I-got-hold-of-this-Chelsea-cow-I’d-bloody-swing-for-her.” Cyn said that was a very sweet thought.

“Look,” Harmony said, lowering her voice, “I know this bloke back in Liverpool. Petal, he’s called—only don’t be fooled, he’s built like a brick shithouse. Ex-boxer. He does freelance jobs . . . on a contract basis, if you get my drift.”

“Bloody hell! I’m not going to kill her!”

“No, I wasn’t suggesting killing her. But maybe Petal could put the frighteners on her. You know, gently persuade her that it would be in her best interests to own up.”

“
Put the frighteners on her?
Sorry, have we just stepped into a Philip Marlowe novel?”

“OK, it was just a thought.”

“Look, Harms, I love it that you care, but I’m not sure violent intimidation is quite the way to go. Tell you what, let’s agree to put it on the back burner and look at it again if my plan doesn’t work out.”

“Oh, right. I didn’t know you had a plan.”

Cyn explained.

“Omigod, just like in
Working Girl
. That’s amazing. But do you think you can pull it off?”

“Dunno. That’s the scary bit.”

“You will. You will. I just know it. You just have to keep your nerve, that’s all.”

Harmony’s encouragement boosted Cyn’s mood, but not for long. As she hit the North Circular, she realized it was past six. Buggeration. She was desperate not be late for her therapy session two weeks running. Repeated lateness was something the group always seized on. They would question her commitment to the group, suggest she was late because subconsciously she had issues she didn’t want to confront or that being late made her feel powerful and gave her a hold over the group. It would go on for hours.

In the end the traffic eased up just past Brent Cross and she arrived at Veronica’s a few minutes early. The only person there was Joe, the exceedingly good-looking new chap in front of whom she had humiliated herself so thoroughly the previous week. He was looking slightly nervous and uneasy, she thought, but ever, ever so sexy.

“Bitter night,” she said, taking in the gray V-neck sweater that he was wearing over a white T-shirt. Her eyes moved down. Same battered Levi’s. Ah, but trendy new trainers—the Puma ones—which did up with those wrap-over strips. Umm. She really approved. “Sensible chap taking the seat near the fire.”

The deal was that when the group wasn’t in session, like now, conversation between members should be kept to the superficial and mundane. It tended to feel a bit false and awkward, but it made sense. Everybody agreed that the important stuff should be discussed in front of the whole group, when Veronica was present. On top of this, surnames were not revealed and Veronica asked them not to meet socially outside the group. The theory was that alliances would be formed that “might threaten the therapeutic process,” in Veronica’s words.

“If you’re cold,” Joe said, “please sit here. I’m fine.” She hadn’t noticed last week—probably because she was too taken up with her own embarrassment—but he spoke with a distinct Irish accent. He started to get up.

“Goodness, no, I wouldn’t dream of it.” She took a chair opposite him. OK, why opposite? Why not sit next to him? That would be the friendly, welcoming thing to do. But she knew why. She wouldn’t have felt comfortable sitting next to him because she found him attractive. So, in order not to give him the wrong idea, she was sitting as far away from him as she could.

“So, you’re Irish,” she said, stating the stark staringly obvious.

“Yes. I’m from Dublin, but I’ve lived in London for the last five years.”

“I’ve never been to Dublin. It’s meant to be beautiful.”

“It is,” he said. His voice reminded her of Liam Neeson. He had the same inflection, the same deep but gentle tone. He asked her where she lived.

“Crouch End. Except tonight I drove from Slough. Work thing.” She nodded because she couldn’t think of anything else to say. He nodded, too, and they fell into silence for a few seconds. Then he said, “There’s that famous John Betjeman poem about Slough, isn’t there?”

“That’s right,” she smiled. “ ‘Come friendly bombs and fall on Slough’ . . .”

“ ‘It isn’t fit for humans now.’ ” They laughed softly. Another silence followed. She sat there thinking how sexy she found his Liam Neeson voice and wondering if his sweater was cashmere.

“I love that painting,” he said, nodding toward the abstract print over the fireplace.

“Umm. Cashmere.”

“Actually, I think you’ll find it’s Mondrian.”

“Oh, God, sorry. The print. Of course it’s Mondrian. Sorry, I was just admiring your sweater. Must keep you very warm.”

“Yes, it does.” His rather bemused smile began at his lips and moved to his eyes.

Just then, the rest of the group, including Veronica, began to trickle in. As everybody sat down and got comfortable, Cyn’s mind went back to the Chelsea affair. She was just about to tell her story, when Sandra, the yo-yo dieter, announced: “I called in fat to work today.”

Cyn burst out laughing. “That’s really funny,” she said. It was only when she saw Sandra’s despondent expression that Cyn realized she hadn’t been joking.

“Sorry,” Cyn said, cringing inside.

Ken, the earnest ex-priest with the Amish beard and no mustache, shot Cyn a pitying look, which made her feel worse. Then he suggested to Sandra she must be in great pain and that maybe she would like to share with the group. Sandra shrugged.

“We’re all here for you, Sandra,” whining Jenny with the plait said in that sickly sweet, caring-sharing way of hers.

Clementine gave a loud snort and rolled her eyes. “Jenny, do you have to be so bloody compassionate all the time? It’s so tedious.”

“I’m sorry. It’s a problem I have. I brought up my sister after our mother died. I suppose I’ve always seen myself in a mother role.”

Veronica broke in at this point and, with a good deal of tenderness, asked Jenny why she felt the need to apologize for being herself. Jenny shrugged and said she didn’t know. “I think it’s time,” Veronica went on, “that you found the courage to stand up for yourself, don’t you?”

“I know and I am trying,” Jenny said.

Ken tried to bring the discussion back to Sandra’s weight problem, but she had begun to get tearful and said she would rather not say anything for a bit.

It was Joe who spotted Cyn’s faraway look. “Is there something you want to say?” he asked her. His expression was warm and encouraging. She found herself wishing that everybody else would disappear and that it was just the two of them on her sofa with a bottle of wine.

“I’m not sure,” Cyn said, looking down at her hands and then back up at Joe. She was starting to feel the same emotions she had felt this afternoon when she discovered what Chelsea had done. Therapy was like that. You’d think you had your feelings under control and then bam, they came crashing down like a wrecker’s ball. Her eyes were filling up and she was biting into her bottom lip.

“Come on, Cyn,” Joe urged gently, “what is it?”

She took a deep breath. “OK, something absolutely dreadful happened to me today. I discovered that a woman I work with has been very cruel and deceitful. I don’t think I have ever been so angry. I wanted to stick pins in her eyes.”

It took her nearly ten minutes or so to tell the Chelsea story. She kept getting choked up and having to stop. Joe looked particularly concerned. When he passed her the box of tissues, she looked into his eyes and got goose pimples down her back.

“Anyway,” Cyn went on, “to get even, I did something a bit wicked. Well, really wicked, actually. In fact, I think it’s the first really wicked thing I’ve ever done and it felt great.” She told the group how she had impersonated Chelsea. “It was as if I’d been trapped inside myself all my life—always having to do the right thing and finally I was free. I was actually singing in the car.”

Veronica raised her eyebrows. “Ah-ha, Cyn has sinned at last,” she declared with a glimpse of approving smile. “Finally, you are standing up for yourself and it feels good.” Cyn said it had felt good and it still felt pretty good, but she wasn’t sure about the morals of it all. “I mean, stealing somebody’s identity is a pretty heavy thing to do. It’s almost as bad as what she did to me.”

Clementine said Cyn was just being a drip and that Chelsea was a total bitch who deserved everything she got. Ken, Sandra and Jenny sat shaking their heads, their faces furrowed with concern. Jenny wondered if Cyn had really sat down and considered the possible consequences of what she had done. “I mean, it could all go so terribly wrong. You could lose your job.”

“Yes, of course, I have thought about it,” she said. “But does that mean I shouldn’t have done it?” As an ex-priest, Ken took this as his cue to start spouting religious ethics. He wasn’t at all sure that she had done the right thing. “As Gandhi so rightly said: if we all adopted the ‘eye for an eye’ approach, the whole world would be blind.”