by Joan Ellis
I see his salacious expression, realise what I’ve said and want to fall on the nib of my Mont Blanc. But that would be a pointless waste of a very good pen.
We head for Kettner’s Champagne Bar on the corner of Romilly Street. The cafes and bars on Old Compton Street are filling up with suits flexing the company plastic. Peter pauses to look in the window of one of the many sex shops. There’s not much on display, just a few risqué videos. The hard-core stuff is inside, under-the-counter.
When we arrive at the bar, it’s standing room only. I order a Kir Royale as compensation for having to spend a minute more than I am contractually obliged to with Peter Richards. The heady mix of champagne and Cassis, French blackcurrant liqueur, slips down easily and my glass soon empties. I watch Peter’s reflection in the enormous gilt-framed mirror as he nods at the barman to pour me another. To my horror, he leans his head on my shoulder and whispers something urgently in my ear. Luckily, it’s too noisy to hear what he’s saying but the gist seems to be ‘never go out to work while your wife works-out with a personal trainer, half her age.’
His hand rides up my thigh, slipping underneath my skirt.
‘I’ve never had you, have I?’ he asks with an unflattering level of uncertainty.
‘No and you never will,’ I say, draining my glass and leaving.
If my Mum knew what went on, she would be horrified. But Peter’s pawing is a small price to pay to keep her in the house she loves.
I run back along Old Compton Street where I am shocked to spot a well- respected TV presenter exiting a sex shop, clutching a brown paper bag. I’m guessing it’s filled with furtively selected guilty-pleasures. He voiced a television commercial for me last week. Had I known his penchant for porn, I’d have paid him in luncheon vouchers.
The Fox, where I’ve arranged to meet Alan, is Adland’s most popular watering-hole, always packed with media types peering earnestly at each other through expensive designer glasses. Even people with twenty- twenty vision buy frames with clear lenses just so they can be seen sporting the latest, must-have accessories. Alan is already at the bar. I climb up onto the vertiginous stool next to him. This man is so laid-back he doesn’t even speak; he just brushes my lips with his. Alan’s mouth on mine, I shudder with pleasure. Can life get any better? Apparently, it can, as I now seem to be clutching a huge glass of oaked-Chardonnay. He whispers something in my ear. I don’t catch it but that doesn’t stop me laughing, in what I contrive to be an alluring manner, and falling off the stool. Alan pretends not to notice as I try and fail to clamber back on. I lean on the bar as casually as l can with what feels like a broken arm. We spend the next two hours drinking, staring into the middle distance and saying very little. This is as deep and meaningful as I’ve ever got.
I weave my way back to the agency. Having spent lunchtime in the company of a man I adore, I am confronted by a man I loathe, Josh Jenkins. Standing beside my desk, he is every inch the Senior Board Account Director in his pink and white candy-striped shirt and hand-made suit. His unenviable job is to liaise between the agency and the client. His enviable salary reflects the amount of flack he gets from both sides. He is the man for the job, his honeyed drawl exuding the brand of effortless charm only years at a fee-paying school can instil. Charming but unlikeable, I don’t understand how that works.
‘Ella, there you are. Sorry to hassle you, but I can’t find Peter and we need to fax the copy over to Kitty Rescue before close of play. The client’s chasing us - been on the phone all afternoon.’
All afternoon? Just how long have I been out to lunch? Judging from my response, I still am.
‘Okelly-dokelly, Joshie.’
No, please tell me I didn’t just say, ‘Okelly-dokelly, Joshie’ out loud to Josh Jenkins. I can hear Peter’s secretary sniggering so obviously I did. Fortunately, Josh is far too well-mannered to react.
With 70% proof fuelling my cavalier attitude, I insert a fresh piece of paper into my typewriter and hit the keys. If Peter wants me to be more
‘honest’ about Marmalade’s feelings, I will be. I lay bare his thoughts on the snip and include a few choice words regarding his feelings towards the vet who wielded the knife. When I’ve finished, I read it through. It has a rare integrity not often found in advertising copy. I glance at my watch. I must crack on with the real version for the client. The booze has gone straight through me. I run to the loo. When I get back Marmalade’s letter has disappeared.
‘Who’s been in my office?’ I ask Peter’s secretary, desperately trying to sound sober.
‘Josh took the Kitty Rescue copy and asked me to fax it to the client,’ she replies in her bird-like voice.
‘Can I have it back, please?’ I say slowly as if trying to persuade a small child to part with a sweet.
‘Sure, all done,’ she says, picking up the paper as it snakes out of the fax machine and handing it to me.
Why did she have to choose today to be efficient? Usually, she’s happy to be an air-head. I throw the copy, along with what’s left of my career, into the bin.
I run back to the toilet. Very appropriate, given I’m in deep shit. I head for my cubicle – second from the end. It’s the one no-one else seems to use so it’s always well-stocked with paper to mop up my useless tears. I feel safe here, just like I did in the loos at infant school. I hated that place because it meant I couldn’t be with Mum, eating currant buns and ‘Listen With Mother’ on the radio. Such safe, joy-filled days. All I had to worry about back then was how my two dolls, Susie and Carol, would cope without me to take them for walks and brush their hair? Every weekday morning, I would get into a state, sobbing and begging Mum to let me stay with her and not leave me at such a terrible place. A place where they ignored me as I sat with my hand up, begging for permission to go to the loo only to be told I should’ve gone at play-time. No five-year-old can plan that far ahead. A place where the nuns delighted in making me wear knickers from Lost Property after I had wet my own.
After a week of tears, Mum came up with a plan. If I went to school, she would wait outside all day, no matter what the weather, just below the toilet window. So when the teacher humiliated me for getting my spellings wrong - an every-day occurrence since I was under the mistaken impression I had only to glance at a list of words in order to commit them to memory, I could run to the loo and tell Mum all about it. Luckily, the window above my cubicle was too high for me to see out of so her cover was never blown. Little did I know then, as I was pouring my heart out, she was pouring herself a nice cup of tea, at home.
Now, here, in my addled state, I like to imagine she is outside, all ears, in her silk headscarf, shift dress and stilettos. I let rip.
‘Kitty Rescue will go ballistic when they read Marmalade’s letter. I could blame the cat; after all he wrote it.’
I’m not sensing any reassuring vibes coming my way. Mum’s not there. She never was. I unlock the door and slope back along the corridor. I may as well clear my desk, but decide to clear off before someone spots me. How could I have been so stupid? I need time to decide what to do next. Like sign on the dole. I zip in the lift and push the button for the ground floor. The doors glide open.
‘What’s this, half day?’ Peter slurs as he bowls in, barring my exit with his shoulder pads. ‘You left me alone in the bar; naughty girl.’
He leers before stumbling forward.
‘I’m just popping out, Peter.’
‘So I see,’ he mutters, his eyes level with my cleavage. ‘Oh by the way, I dropped into The Fox and had a chat with Alan Ferguson. Had no idea you were a fully paid-up member of his fan club. I don’t know what you girls see in him. He’s ginger.’
‘His hair is chestnut,’ I correct, regarding Peter with disgust. ‘And he is a very kind person.’
Then I remember some sobering facts, the country is in the grip of recession, unemployment is rife and I have undoubtedly just lost the agency a major client. I adjust my sneer into a smile.
‘Fancy a
ride home in my Porsche, young lady?’ he asks taking a condom out of his pocket and waving it at me.
‘I’m going by tube.’
‘I’m going past your front door.’
Unfortunately, we live just three streets apart in Highgate. I’m in Crouch End. That’s ‘Highgate borders’ in estate agent’s speak. Peter loves the fact that his N6 post-code is worth more than my N8. Thankfully, our paths rarely cross at weekends but since his wife left, I live in fear of bumping into him in the Marks and Spencer Food Hall, cruising the meals-for-one section.
Peter had had enough to drink when I left him in Kettner’s. He’s well over the limit now. ‘Why not stay in the company flat tonight?’
He may be a scumbag but I’ve met worse and he has had a tough ride recently. Besides, I don’t want him ending up looking like one of the crash victims, with scars like tramlines, who stare out from the posters in the government’s anti drink-drive campaign.
‘Stay with me, Ella,’ he whines.
‘See you tomorrow, Peter.’
For once, I really hope I do, for his sake and mine.
When I get home, I am as close to sober as I’m going to get. A mortgage rate of 9% has that effect. I spend the evening alone fretting about the consequences of my stupidity. Kitty Rescue will have read Marmalade’s letter by now. They will fire the agency and Peter will fire me. So not only am I a pain in the arse, I am also a fool. I must add it to my CV. I lurch around the kitchen in an attempt to make myself a drink but am incapable of boiling a kettle let alone opening a packet of tea-bags. I give up and go to bed early. I just want this day to be over. I lie awake, worrying about the consequences. If I lose my job, Mum loses her home. I can’t let that happen. She’s been through enough.
The next morning, I force myself to get up and go to work. As soon as I arrive. I am greeted by Peter’s secretary, looking thinner than ever. It’s a marvel the poor woman’s still alive. She speaks slowly as if trying to conserve the few calories she has permitted to enter her body. Even her voice is weak.
‘Peter wants you in his office.’
‘If he wants me that bad he can pay for a room at The Ritz,’ I retort.
She looks at me and I remind myself not to take my frustration with him out on her.
‘What does he want?’ I ask.
‘Don’t know but I shouldn’t bother taking your coat off,’ she replies before turning away to admire what little there is of her reflection in the mirror behind her desk.
Wally, the night-watchman ambles past and gives me a reassuring wink as he heads home after his shift. He used to work next door. Had his own little business. A café. I used to nip in there most mornings before work and we’d chat as he made my regular order, a lovely ham sandwich, on brown, no butter, salt and pepper. Then, one day, he wouldn’t accept any money, said it was on him, a ‘thank-you’ for all my custom. He was shutting up shop for good. The landlord had increased the rent to an astronomical amount. He was being squeezed out, just like Mum’s landlord had done to her.
‘What will you do, Wal?’ I asked.
As he turned away to clean the knife, I quickly took a twenty pound note from my purse and left it beside the till for him to find later.
He looked back at me and shrugged.
‘Something will turn up. Always does. I’ve told the wife not to worry but she do. Born worrier, thinks the bailiffs are goin’ come knockin’. D’you wanna cake with that, young ‘un?’
A wasp flew through the open door and crawled slowly across the row of iced fingers, waving its antenna at me.
‘No, thanks Wal,’ I say. ‘And I’m really sorry. I’m going to miss you.’
The following week, the caretaker at CBA retired. It seemed the obvious solution. I had a word with Wally and then put him forward for the position. Most people at CBA had been in his café at some point so he was well known and liked. He got the job. He even cannily upped his money by offering to double-up as a night watchman. As job descriptions go it was fundamentally floored but Wally could cope with most things. If a gang of thieves ever breaks while he’s in the basement fixing a burst pipe say, he would probably make them all tea before asking to borrow their monkey wrench.
Now, he looks at me, his watery eyes, wrinkled with concern.
‘Chin up, young ‘un, it might never ’appen,’ he whistles tunefully through his dentures.
‘Peter’s going to fire me, Wal.’
‘Give him a smile and you’ll be fine,’ he grins. ‘See you tomorrow, young ‘un.’
He waves as he disappears slowly down the spiral staircase, torch in one hand, today’s newspaper in the other. For someone who has been up all night, he’s surprisingly upbeat. I never thought I’d envy him his late-shift but it must be better than doing battle with the Prince of Darkness in broad daylight. I breathe in and knock sharply on Peter’s door. He is sitting smugly behind his vast desk with Josh at his elbow like an obedient sentinel. A wave of nausea overwhelms me and my stomach flips. Before I can recover Peter throws the opening punch.
‘I suppose you think it’s funny to compromise the agency’s reputation with one of our most valued clients,’ he says sending the Kitty Rescue copy skimming across his smoked glass table-top towards me.
This desk could tell some tales, like the one that ends with Peter naked on top of it. No. Not now. I’m in enough trouble thanks to a speaking cat; I don’t need a talking table too. The offending piece of paper, still on its flight path, narrowly misses his cup of coffee made by his secretary with one brown French sugar cube, just how he likes it.
Josh clears his throat and fixes his owl-like eyes on me. He leans across the desk and I am treated to the full force of his halitosis.
‘I was unaware Peter had not seen the copy. And I certainly had no idea you had made such sweeping changes, Ella,’ he says, neatly side- stepping any share of the blame.
‘But I thought ...’ I falter.
Peter halts my words with a look, making me wait as he drains his cup before unleashing the full force of his fury.
‘I am the Creative Director. You are just my writer. I say what happens here.’
‘Sorry, the client was never meant to see it. I was being honest like you suggested and went a bit over the top.’
‘A bit O.T.T.? Why not just post Marmalade’s gonads to Mrs Miggins and have done with it?’ blasts Peter.
‘Wow! Peter! Great idea! That would certainly make the letter stand out!’ exclaims Josh. The sycophant.
‘Josh took the wrong version,’ I lamely tell Peter.
‘You shouldn’t have written such damaging rubbish. And you know I have to approve everything. Nothing leaves this agency without my signature.’
‘But you weren’t here.’
‘All work must have my ‘P’ on it,’ he snaps.
‘Yes, Peter must do a ‘P’ on everything,’ echoes Josh.
I snigger. Why? It’s not funny. I’m not funny. I am a loser. Add it to the list.
‘You seem to think everything is one big joke,’ says Peter.
He’s right. I make light of things; it’s how I cope. My hand hovers over my mouth but I can’t prevent a huge guffaw from escaping.
‘You’re fired,’ says Peter.
Stop laughing you fool, he means it.
‘No, please,’ I say desperate to keep my job, my morning cappuccino and almond croissant, my champagne cocktails, my gym membership, my flat. Oh no, not my beautiful flat with its stripped pine floors and Victorian star-glass doors. And what about Mum’s rent? I can’t let her lose her home.
It’s no use appealing to Peter’s better nature. He doesn’t have one.
He looks away. I turn to Josh but he’s disappeared. Before I can stop myself, I’m running round the desk, tugging at Peter’s tie. This may be Adland but we’re still in England where unemployment is running at 124%. I visualise a dismal dole queue, snaking into oblivion, like the one depicted by Saatchi and Saatchi in their ‘Labour Isn’t Workin
g’ poster. And Mum, me and Beauty-Column-Sixpence holed up in a bedsit. And every time the landlord turned up to collect the rent, we had to hide the parrot and hold its beak shut so as not to breach the ‘No pets’ clause.
‘I’ll do anything, Peter,’ I tell him.
‘If I’d have known you were this easy, I’d have sacked you months ago,’ he says lasciviously.
I look down. My hand is on his leg. How did it get there?
‘Don’t worry,’ Peter says. ‘I’ll tell Josh to schmooze Kitty Rescue over lunch somewhere ridiculously expensive. We’ve done them a few favours; they owe us one. Now, stop snivelling; snot is not a turn-on.’
He reaches into his breast pocket and hands me his pristine white handkerchief. I blow my nose in it and give it back to him. He drops it in the bin.