by Carmen Reid
The returning officer leaned over the microphone and began to give details of the vote count. He named the candidates from the big parties and their tallies, which seemed high . . . too high. When he came to Savannah’s name he gave a number, which Jo didn’t think was high enough.
‘Has she . . . ?’ she began, heart in her mouth. But then the whooping noises, claps and cheers started up and the camera, after a swoop of the disappointed faces, closed in on Savannah’s huge, relieved smile.
She started to shake the hands of the candidates standing beside her, then she waved out into the crowd and for a moment it looked as if she was moved to the verge of tears. But someone rushed up to hug her and a grin split across her face again. ‘Green Party candidate Savannah Tyler takes the seat for Oxford North,’ the BBC commentator’s voice was cutting across the noise in the hall. ‘This is something of a historic moment for the Green Party. Their first ever Westminster MP. . . ’ then commentator-spiel took over. Some blurb he’d no doubt spent all day rehearsing.
‘Get us an interview then, you dickhead,’ Jo directed at the TV, momentarily forgetting she was still on the phone.
‘Take it that’s not me you’re talking to?’ Jeff said. ‘No. No - ‘ she was taken aback to hear his voice again, realized she was much, much happier about this than she’d even guessed she could be. It felt momentously important.
‘This is amazing,’ she exclaimed. ‘She is amazing.’
‘Really?’ Jeff asked. ‘Sounds to me like you’re undergoing some sort of political conversion. Well, don’t,’ he added. ‘They’re all bastards. A year from now you’ll be looking into Savannah’s murky expenses fiddle for me or uncovering the fact that she’s secretly on the payroll of British Nuclear Fuels.’
‘Stop it!’ she interrupted him. ‘She’s not like that. Nothing like that at all!’
‘Jo Randall! You’ve been spun!’ was Jeff’s response. ‘I’m sorry but all politicians if they don’t start out bastards, end up bastards. I’m much older and much more cynical than you, so I know. But she’s got to you, hasn’t she? I didn’t realize that.’
‘Just to you, Jeff, I am going to admit to something close to a great big crush on Savannah Tyler,’ was how Jo tried to express it. ‘And you know what? She phoned me on Sunday, when the paper came out, and said if she got elected she’d like to offer me a job.’ Now, there she’d gone and said it. Five years of working for Jeff and she’d never once breathed a word about going anywhere else, although there were occasional offers.
‘Obviously, as an MP, I’ll have money for support staff,’ Savannah had told her. ‘I’ll have to employ a really good researcher, an excellent communicator to help spread the message.’
‘Well, your party must be full of those kind of people,’ Jo had said, sure that Savannah couldn’t possibly mean what, for a moment, Jo had thought she meant.
‘Yes. There are lots of good people there,’ Savannah had agreed, ‘but I’ll be a lone Green voice, I’ll need someone really exceptional . . . Jo, I realize this will come as a surprise,’ Savannah had continued, ‘but if I become an MP, I want to ask you to consider coming to work for me.’
‘Me!?’ And into Jo’s mind had jumped all the reasons why she couldn’t possibly . . . wasn’t at all. . . had never even . . .
But Savannah hadn’t wanted to hear, hadn’t even wanted to have a big discussion about it, she’d simply said: ‘Please give it some thought. Sometimes it’s best when an idea grows . . . you know – organically!’
‘And what did you say to that?’ Jeff asked, not missing a beat, not even sounding particularly surprised.
‘I said I’d think about it.’
‘Aha.’ There was a pause before Jeff said: ‘And what about your newly pay-risen SAS team?’
‘I know.’
‘I don’t need to tell you that, as your news editor, I wouldn’t want you to go. Can’t imagine working without you.’
‘No, but it’s nice to hear. Maybe you should tell me anyway – and more often,’ she said, suddenly aware of a squeeze in her throat.
‘As your news editor,’ he repeated, ‘I don’t want you to ever even consider leaving the paper or else I’ll have to send Vince in his bulletproof car to bring you back.’
She gave a little laugh at this.
‘But,’ he went on, ‘not speaking as your news editor, speaking as your . . . umm . . . friend, maybe I should tell you to think about it.’
‘Really? Why?’
‘Because, you know . . . change is . . .’ he considered for a moment and decided on, ‘Interesting.’
‘Yup. It’s also bloody stressful and kind of sad.’
‘Yes, kind of sad,’ he agreed.
‘Yeah,’ was all she could manage, because suddenly the thought in her head was: What’s going on? Is Jeff asking me to leave? Doesn’t he want to work with me any more? And now, she couldn’t imagine being without her job.
‘And maybe . . . if you didn’t work at the paper, other things would be possible. . . ’ and here he stopped to clear his throat in an entirely uncharacteristic way. ‘You know,’ he went on, ‘if you were working somewhere else.’
‘Other things?’ she asked. Now what? She found herself doing the throat-clearing thing. What was going on? What was the matter with them? A Green MP gets elected and they fall to pieces.
‘Yes, other things,’ he repeated and coughed.
If she worked somewhere else, it was occurring to her, like wiping mist off a window, the invisible hurdle, the unspoken boundary that, like their marriages, had stopped them from even thinking about exploring the something which was only just the beginning of a feeling . . . well, it would be gone.
She allowed herself to remember in full Technicolor the very end of the Christmas party two and a half years ago. Two and a half years ago! A long time ago, when she’d made her way through a packed, noisy crowd to seek Jeff out, intent on a mission to say goodnight to him even though they’d see each other again in the office in the morning.
She’d got to him. The crowd had squeezed her in closer to him than she’d meant and he’d turned from the person he was talking to, not anyone she recognized, who’d excused himself.
Then they were there, facing one another, an island of two for a moment in this busy throng.
‘Came to say goodnight,’ she’d said as lightly as she could.
‘Oh,’ he’d given a quizzical little smile. ‘Goodnight then.’
Then the strange thing.
The emboldened by too much champagne, maybe, moment. Their heads had moved towards each other, intending a friendly kiss on the cheek, perhaps. But still something they’d never done before.
She’d got to his cheek but had felt drawn to turn so that her lips were on his. And he’d reacted by pressing his lips against hers, putting his arms tight round her back.
She’d noticed a flurry of things in the momentary swirl: how he’d smelled of aftershave, smoke, the drycleaning fluid on his best suit. The solid bulk of him, the strength in his grip, the want in that kiss.
And then she’d pulled out, met his eye, read there something of the confusion, bearings lost, that she’d felt herself.
‘G’night,’ she’d said and turned. To find her husband. To let Jeff return to his wife. To return to normal.
And that’s how the next day in the office had been. Normal. Absolutely nothing out of the ordinary in the way he spoke to her, related to her. Normal service was resumed.
‘Here she is,’ Jeff interrupted her thoughts. ‘Your leader,’ he teased.
‘Ha, ha,’ was Jo’s response but she leaned forward as if to get a better view as Savannah’s face filled the screen.
Oxford’s newest MP may have looked somewhat shell-shocked and flushed, but she spoke with something approaching collected calm. She had replaced the bright green rosette pinned to her dress earlier in the evening with a large green flower – surprisingly Sex and the City but probably biodegradable.
‘This is a fa
ntastic result for us,’ she was saying into the microphones thrust into her face. ‘This is the start of the Green revolution.’
Then she stumbled up the steps to the stage again, high heels obviously not quite her thing, to make her acceptance speech.
‘I’d like to thank everyone who made this possible. . .’
‘Here we go, the Oscars moment,’ Jeff interrupted.
Jo didn’t reply. Her eye had fallen on her two handbags. They were propped up side by side on the windowsill at the foot of her bed.
One was the heavyweight, expensive label that could accommodate her whole life, everything about her. It was dependable, solid, strong. A lifelong companion . . . a heavy weight round her shoulders . . . It came with history. It came with a wallet from Jeff . . . it was Jeff. A little bit jowly, heavy set, ten years older, gym strong, a man who made writing macho, who came with a lifetime of experiences. Who came post-marriage, with his own children. Who would understand everything about her and her work. Who was married to the paper, married to the job. Who had an older, well worn, somewhat weary world view.
And then there was the Marcus bag. Fun, frivolous, futuristic. Lightweight. Everything was still ahead for him. Everything was new. He wasn’t a long-term commitment.
But neither was she, right now. She was newly freed. She was uncommitted.
The Jeff. The Marcus. Heavyweight Italian leather, master craftsman made. Or appliquéd girlie glamour. A bag for the moment.
Which to choose?
Or bugger the choice.
She watched Savannah on the dais thanking everyone who’d helped her to run her campaign.
‘Why rush the decision?’ was the thought that sprang to mind. Why even make it a decision? She was in-between. And in-between choices was just fine.
There was far too much emphasis on quick decisions, quick gratifications, quick solutions.
Maybe there was no quick remedy here. What about a long, slow, elaborate romance? Slow, slow simmering of years of unconsummated devotion.
The kind of wonderful, complicated mental creation that would have existed in the past. An unspoken romance that lasted and lasted and shaped the course of two lifetimes.
She could wait until she was ready. Until she knew what she was ready for.
There was another more important decision to make first. Would she leave the paper, the pinnacle of her career, and work for Savannah? Again, she didn’t need to decide just yet. The right decision would come.
‘So what might be possible?’ she asked Jeff, clearing her throat, ‘You know – if I were to leave the paper?’
‘I’d probably take you out to dinner,’ was his answer.
‘Is that it? Dinner! Just maybe, I’d say no,’ she replied.
‘I’ll have to take that risk,’ was his calm answer. As if he was prepared to sit it out.
‘I might not need dinner . . . I’m currently seeing a chef.’
‘I know.’ Still the same calm. The steady, steadying voice she knew so well.
No denying the little lurch this provoked in her. But really, she wasn’t sure if she even wanted him to suggest anything like this . . . Not yet. She didn’t know if she had anything to offer him . . . or would ever have.
The delicious smell of Marcus was on her sheets, was on her skin, erasing her past, her mistakes, making her look forward like him. To better things ahead.
‘So, what’s next?’ Jo asked, wondering how Jeff would reply. Wondering if any more of him or his intentions would be revealed.
‘What’s next?’ he repeated. ‘The same as always.’
No more throat-clearing now, just the usual hint of friendly tease evident in all their daily conversations.
‘The Savannah victory interview, obviously,’ he said. ‘I’m expecting you to do that for us. Exclusive. But then what the hell else have you got for this week?’
‘Oh a lot more,’ she answered him. ‘A lot more. I might even surprise you.’
THE END