Killing It

by Asia Mackay

A baby’s natural instinct on seeing a tower is to smash it down. When seeing a box of toys to empty it. Destroy. Bash, smash, crash. Revel in the chaos. The mess. And every noise, every bit of destruction makes them squeal with happiness. This is what comes naturally to them. Then they grow, and they learn and they find fun in building up the blocks. The satisfaction in creating. They see the praise they get for tidying toys away. Nurtured, loved and taught. They take slow, faltering steps into a more grown-up world, but always knowing, always relying on there being someone there to catch them when they fall.

  Before Will, before Gigi, I was just a Rat. Running around in my underground world, causing chaos and destruction without retribution. Because it was expected. That was what Rats do.

  But I grew up. My eyes were opened to what life could be like if I didn’t just break, bash, smash and run away. If I stopped to see the joy in making something. And I did. I made a life with another person, and I made a baby. And now we’re a family.

  I had at first struggled to understand why I was finding the juggling of the two worlds so much harder than my male counterparts. Everyone seemed to openly discuss how mothers were more bonded to their children. I had been outraged when Anne had first accused me of such but I had to confess to myself she was right. I looked at the other Rats and somehow knew they were not lying in bed at night worrying if their child was eating enough vegetables, if they should switch to cow’s milk or the next stage up of formula, or even notice that it had been eleven days since they were the one who’d tucked them in at night. It had fallen to Frankie to explain it all to me.

  ‘Mother’s guilt,’ she announced after I’d ranted about why it was so unfair that I seemed unable to be as relaxed as the men I knew. ‘It’s different for them. For men. They don’t have the inbuilt natural guilt we do. We care more, mostly about stupid shit that makes no real difference, but it’s just part of being a mother.’

  ‘Here you go, ma chérie.’ Will handed me a piece of cake. ‘Cheers to us.’ I gave him a kiss and then took a big bite of the rainbow sponge with buttercream filling. It really was spectacular.

  It may have taken me some time but I finally worked out what ‘having it all’ really was. It was simply being happy. And ignoring what everyone else thought.

  I had to stop comparing myself to my colleagues. I wasn’t a man. And I didn’t need to be a man. My whole career at Eight had been a success not in spite of being a woman, but because I was a woman. I used what I had to be the best I could be. And now I just needed to keep doing that as a mother. I would find my own way. My own path. Work out what made me happy and find a balance. I needed to feel I was doing enough as a mother and enough to feel more than a mother. Gigi was important but I was important too. And I was a role model now. With a bit of editing I could be an inspiration; I had triumphed in a field no one thought I could, I had seen down colleagues out to get me. I had proven a woman could do anything she put her mind to. And that a mother should never be written off. But put on a fucking pedestal.

  I thought about Jake’s question. Was I going to go back? I didn’t like the message I would be sending if I didn’t. Now more than ever I was fighting for equality. It wasn’t just for me, but also for my daughter. And I could do that by continuing to fly the flag for women at the Platform.

  Yet I couldn’t ignore the fact that a fear of dying was a major obstacle in my line of work. If my objective started being how best to keep me alive rather than how best to make someone else dead my success rate was going to dramatically drop. Before Gigi the idea of not being a Rat would have horrified me. But now she was my priority. Was a job that could increase my chances of being permanently separated from her really worth it?

  Perhaps the answer was somewhere in the middle. Give up on the dream job and move to one that fitted in more with my familial responsibilities. I could go into the private sector and as a gun for hire pick and choose jobs that were low risk. More flexible hours. Much better pay.

  I could always switch to Five or Six. Try being one of the Pigeons we so looked down on.

  Maybe I could even have another baby.

  This was me, back to where I should be, back to believing the world was mine for the bloody taking. I watched Gigi cruising around the sitting room, cake in hand, smug smile in place as she wobbled between conveniently placed furniture. Here we were together, learning how to walk in our strange new worlds, and both doing it with our heads held high.

  My mobile rang. I looked down at the 0845 number and stepped into the hallway to answer it.

  ‘Have you ever been mis-sold PPI insurance?’ was the automated message that greeted me.

  I waited for the beep and spoke. ‘Alexis Tyler.’ There was a pause as the voice-recognition software listened.

  Another message played.

  ‘You are needed on an urgent operation. Please confirm attendance.’

  From the doorway I watched Gigi giggling as she took another faltering step forward.

  The beep sounded and I took a deep breath.

  Acknowledgements

  A very big thank you to Katherine Armstrong and Eleanor Dryden and everyone at Bonnier Zaffre for believing in this book and being so passionate about it. You have been a joy to work with and made this whole experience all the more special.

  To my brilliant agent, Alice Lutyens at Curtis Brown, I am thrilled and so lucky to have you in my corner.

  I am forever grateful to the Faber Academy for helping me transform my late-night ramblings into a workable first draft. A massive thank you to my tutor, Tom Bromley, whose teaching and mentoring were invaluable.

  To the very talented author Rebecca Thornton. When I told you I had an idea for a book you could’ve laughed, gently pointed out I hadn’t written more than a shopping list since school and I would’ve forgotten about it. But you told me you loved the premise, hassled me to pursue it and cackled your head off when I finally had the courage to show you my first few pages. So for all that and for being my best friend for as many years as we’ve been alive, thank you.

  There are many other amazing women in my life but I owe particular thanks to Caroline Barrow, Lara Smith-Bosanquet and Georgia Tennant. This book has been in your lives as long as it has been in mine and your constant reading and re-reading, encouragement and support has meant the world to me.

  Tavie, Arlo, Gus and Silva – my totally wonderful, utterly perfect and completely exhausting children. It turns out boredom at soft play can make for excellent inspiration – so when I say without you this book would never have happened, I truly mean it.

  To Andrew Trotter. I don’t know where to begin or where to end. Thank you for it all. Nothing in my life would be as much fun without you.

  Finally, to my dear Dad – as a man in his eighties you were hardly my target audience but as the very first person to read my very first draft it meant everything when you said you loved it (even if you were a little biased). Thank you to you and Mum for always being there and always telling me I could do anything I put my mind to. Pep talks work – look I wrote a book!

  About the Author

  Asia lives in London with her husband, four children and two dogs. She can’t remember the last time she had a full night’s sleep.

  In Conversation with Asia Mackay

  Killing It is your debut novel, how did you come to write it?

  One night I was crawling across my kids’ bedroom floor trying not to wake the baby and I thought; if only I had some kind of special ops training, maybe I’d manage to get out of here without him waking. It sparked the idea of a hard-core secret agent busy on important missions for the good of the country, but still having to rush home for bath time. I found myself jotting down notes on my phone when feeding – ‘Gun in nappy bag, pretend formula is cocaine, does breast milk have DNA in it?’ – the mad ramblings of a sleep-deprived mother. After a few months of this I realised I needed to either make a go of it or just forget about it. I sat down one evening and started writing. The very fir
st paragraph I ever wrote is still the opening to Killing It.

  As this is your first book, how did it feel when people first read it?

  Exciting. And terrifying. I would alternate between wanting to sit next to them as they read it (what do you think about that bit? Is that funny? Why aren’t you laughing? Do you think that’s clever? Do you get it? I don’t think you get it. Are you enjoying it? ARE YOU?) to hiding under a duvet cringing at the thought they were all hating it.

  Having never written before how did you approach the writing process?

  Although I’d loved writing at school I had never tried to pursue it. Even when I came up with the idea of a secret agent Mum, the thought of actually sitting down and writing a book seemed too intimidating to even try. Then I read an article about National Novel Writing Month – the idea quite simply is to write a whole novel in a month. Although it was something I knew I wouldn’t be able to do amid work and the kids I really took their philosophies of ‘no plot, no problem’ and ‘just write’ to heart. I started writing as Lex and just went from there. The more I wrote the more I realised how much I wanted it to be a book. I did a seven month online Writing a Novel course at the amazing Faber Academy and by the end of it I had a very rough first draft. My writing process throughout has been write first, structure later. I jot down ideas for potentially amusing spy/mum crossovers before having a go at writing them into a scene. If the scene works I then fit it into the plot.

  You have four children and a busy life, how do you juggle this with writing?

  Support. No mother is an island. If she was it’d be more like a sinking ship.

  Our children are aged one, three, five and six. To make writing deadlines, fulfil my other work responsibilities and still feel present in my children’s lives is something I couldn’t do without my husband and our nanny. It’s chaos. Even before you add two leg-humping, yapping dogs to the mix. What helps me manage is starting the day early (a choice the kids make for me, really) and forgoing the post-children-in-bed celebratory Netflix sofa slump for writing on my laptop at the kitchen table. Every now and then I might sit back and smugly toast myself with a green juice for my awesomeness at fitting it all in, and that’s normally when it all falls apart. I forget to pick up one of the kids from somewhere. A dog vomits on our bedroom floor. Microsoft Word crashes losing the edits that were finally perfect. A daughter says ‘b . . . b . . but Mama I’ve hardly seen you’. And all that can be done is bed with a box of Maltesers and a hope tomorrow will be better.

  2018 is The Year of the Woman, was creating a feminist hero part of your inspiration?

  I wrote the only book I knew how to – one with a woman at the centre of it. I was influenced by my own experiences as a first-time mother and a belief women deserved their own secret agent heroine. Lex is just as well-trained and ruthless as James Bond but while his private life is merely about juggling romantic liaisons, Lex is trying to persuade her daughter to eat her vegetables and wondering if she’ll ever get a full night’s sleep again. Whereas Bond might need the flashy car with the machine gun headlights, Lex can get the job done just as well in a Volvo with a rear-facing car seat. She’s a capable, relatable hero who has to battle sexism at work and Mum guilt in among life or death operations. In my opinion that makes her more hard-core than Bond!

  I can’t wait until the time comes when we don’t have to identify as feminist but that those who really do believe women shouldn’t have equal rights to men are simply written off as sexist. ‘Feminist’ can still bring up negative connotations of angry women who want to burn their bras, which is ridiculous – I’ve had four kids – my bra belongs on a pedestal. Back in Neanderthal times men may have been considered superior because their height and strength made them better hunters. With food came power. Nowadays women can Ocado just as well as men. It’s about time the world shook off prehistoric notions that women are in any way inferior – we need to be regarded as equals – whether that be at parenting, working or fighting bad guys.

  Can you give us any hints about what to expect next for Lex?

  Lex’s story is far from over. As Gigi gets older she will have new parenting problems to battle and new enemies to takedown. Coping with the terrible twos when facing her latest mission of global significance might be more than even she can handle . . .

  Who are your five favourite female fictional characters, and why?

  Scarlett O’Hara (Gone With The Wind) – a calculating bitch who messed up numerous times but would pick herself back up again and come up with a new plan. She was as determined as hell and I couldn’t wait to read on to see what she’d do next.

  Buffy Summers (Buffy the Vampire Slayer) and Sydney Bristow (Alias) – these were my favourite TV shows when I was at school. They were bright, fearless and in charge – everything awkward, teenage me wanted to be.

  Elizabeth Bennett (Pride and Prejudice) – a woman with principles. I loved her slow-burn relationship with Mr Darcy and her refusal to accept him (and his vast wealth and palatial mansion) until he had proved himself and his good character.

  Bridget Jones (Bridget Jones’ Diary) – one of the most relatable and funny characters I’ve ever read. In a world that too often only celebrates the perfect and aspirational it’s good to remember Bridget who smoked too much, drank too much, wore big pants and made us all laugh.

  Who are the women that have inspired you the most?

  I have to say my mother or she’d kill me. You don’t upset a Chinese matriarch. The women I find inspiring are the ones in my life I see going through utter hell and somehow come out the other side. They’re people you know everything about and seeing how they cope with their traumas makes me realise there’s strength in all of us. They inspire me to think I too might just be able to cope with anything life throws at me. So yes, all the amazing women in my life. And Beyoncé.

  What are you currently reading?

  I just finished The Power by Naomi Alderman which I loved as much as everyone said I would. Next is Little Fires Everywhere by Celeste Ng.

  If you were stuck on a desert island, which three books would you take with you and why?

  War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy – a book I know I should read yet haven’t managed to so far.

  Rivals by Jilly Cooper – when I need some relief from War and Peace I can revisit my old friends Rupert and Taggie Campbell-Black.

  Teach Yourself Mandarin – with all that peaceful, kid-free time I might finally succeed in a life-time goal to be fluent in Mandarin.

  All the best intentions but I have a feeling I’d just work on my tan and read Rivals every day.

  First published in Great Britain in 2018 by Zaffre Publishing

  This ebook edition published in 2018 by

  Zaffre Publishing

  80-81 Wimpole St, London, W1G 9RE

  www.zaffrebooks.co.uk

  Copyright © Asia Mackay, 2018

  Cover design by Alexandra Allden

  Cover illustration by Gary Newman

  The moral right of Asia Mackay to be identified as Author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988.

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, organisations, places and events are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or locales is entirely coincidental.

  A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

  ISBN: 978-1-78576-447-9

  Paperback ISBN: 978–1–78576–453–0

  This ebook was produced by IDSUK (Data Connection) Ltd

  Zaffre Publishing is an imprint of Bonnier Zaffre, a Bonnier Publishing compan
y

  www.bonnierzaffre.co.uk

  www.bonnierpublishing.co.uk