Playing James

by Sarah Mason

  “You and Lizzie were always so popular at school, so sure of yourselves. I really hated you both for it. You had boyfriends, could do what you wanted, it was all so effortless for you.”

  “Teresa, that was twelve years ago,” I say impatiently. “There’s not much we did at school that counts for anything now.”

  “I know, but I just wanted to prove I was attractive to men too. That I could have your man. So I gave Ben my number that night in the Square Bar. It was just a stupid test to see if he would call and he did. But then your diary seemed to be going so well. I didn’t see why you should have it all, so I decided to sleep with him to show you, you couldn’t.”

  I sigh deeply. “Believe me, Teresa, I don’t have it all.” We walk in silence for a few seconds.

  “Was that the first time you’d slept with anyone?”

  “No.”

  Blimey. “Why all the pretense, Teresa? Why all the ‘Jesus wants me for a sunbeam’ stuff? Why not invest in some Maybelline eyeliner and join the party with the rest of us?”

  “With my parents?” She gives a bitter small laugh.

  “Yes. Well.” I think of my carefree, unconventional parents and suddenly I can’t really be bothered to feel angry with Teresa. I don’t even think I can be bothered to hate her any more.

  “You’re welcome to him. I was going to finish with him tonight anyway,” I say staunchly. I might not be bothered with her any more, but I still have some pride.

  “Yeah, I heard. From upstairs. Well, I’ll be going. See you around.” She crosses the road and walks off. I shake my head after her in wonderment. It just goes to show you never actually truly know anybody. Even yourself.

  I come home to find Lizzie and my mother still up. I know they have been waiting for me to see what has happened—a small clue to this great deduction would be my mother’s first question as I walk through the door.

  “What happened?”

  I wearily tell her and Lizzie all about it, but I am so washed out with emotion that I can’t drum up anything but the barest facts. Lizzie is suitably shocked. In fact, she is more like shell-shocked. Actually my mother isn’t reacting as I thought she would. She doesn’t seem surprised at all. Lizzie just sits there with her mouth wide open, saying, “Teresa? Teresa?”

  “Yes. Teresa.”

  “Teresa the Holy Cow, Teresa?”

  “Yes.”

  “Bloody hell.” And then, “Bloody hell.” And then, “Bloody buggery hell.”

  My mother sits silently throughout. “Aren’t you shocked? Aren’t you surprised?” I ask her.

  She calmly studies her fingernails and then smooths down her dress. She is carefully avoiding eye contact. “Why aren’t you surprised?” I demand.

  She hesitantly looks up at me. “Darling, now promise me you won’t get upset. This was a long time ago.” Too late, I am upset.

  “What was?”

  “It wasn’t much, but do you remember Matt?”

  “Yes, of course I remember Matt.” He was one of my first boyfriends.

  “Well, I saw them once in town. Teresa and Matt. Kissing.”

  “So?”

  “You were seeing him at the time. I’ve always hated the little tart ever since. I didn’t say anything and luckily you stopped seeing Matt a while later. I never knew if you found out or not.”

  “So that was her little game, was it?” I almost breathe fire out of my nostrils.

  “I take it you didn’t know then?” my mother asks weakly.

  “Try and steal all Holly’s boyfriends. Oh yes! What fun sport! Well, I would like to see her try with James Sabine,” I say heatedly.

  “Er . . . James Sabine isn’t your boyfriend,” Lizzie points out unhelpfully.

  “Thank you.”

  “Right. Yes. Sorry.”

  “You’re not devastated though are you, darling?” my mother asks with an air of concern.

  My shoulders sag suddenly. I’m too tired to go through the pretense of being upset about something that happened more than ten years ago and I was going to finish with Ben tonight anyway. I shake my head wearily. “It’s been quite a day. I’m going to bed.” I kiss them both and trail my careworn body into the bedroom.

  I must have been really tired, or maybe the concussion was still wearing off, because despite my tumultuous emotions I sleep straight through to daybreak and then wake up with a start, wondering where I am. I have a heavy feeling of foreboding hanging over me and I realize something bad must have happened to me yesterday. Slowly the events come flooding back. I groan slightly. I’m in love with James. He’s getting married to Fleur. Ben’s sleeping with Teresa. Right. Terrific. Things couldn’t be better.

  I wonder if I could slope off into the country for a bit. Find myself a nice little remote cottage somewhere and quietly go to pot. But then I remember I will see James today and my heart lightens just a little.

  I get up and make myself a cup of tea. I study my reflection briefly in the mirror before returning to bed to nurse my cup. I’m looking a little bit sorry for myself, but the only lasting marks from the past few days are two faint black eyes. To be honest, I think most people would now be shocked if I turned up without a black eye in some shape or form. They probably wouldn’t recognize me, I think gloomily.

  I have no wish to lie in bed and contemplate my past, present or future, so as soon as I have finished my tea, I quickly shower and slip out of the house before my parents wake. I head down to the police station where I intend to collect my e-mails and catch up on the diary.

  There are a few officers from the night shift still there, yawning wearily, but they pat my arm or my shoulder and tell me they are pleased to have me back. I arrive at my desk and spend the next half an hour or so catching up on what I have missed. I lean back in my chair and look at my watch. It’s half past seven. The day shift will be arriving soon. I go to the Ladies and patch up my makeup, trying to cover the bruises under my eyes. I am feeling inexplicably jumpy at the thought of seeing James. My stomach is churning and I feel quite sick with the tension. “Get a grip,” I tell myself, “it’s just another ordinary day on the job. What are you expecting? For him to run through the door with his arms open wide?” I shakily apply a line of eyeliner. It would be nice if I knew he cared just a little about me. You know, as a friend.

  I walk back to my desk and try to concentrate on the screen of my laptop in front of me. I focus on the words but they don’t register, and instead I look anxiously up at the door every few minutes. A hand suddenly clasps my shoulder.

  “Holly!” I leap about ten feet into the air. “How are you? How are you feeling? I wanted to come down to the hospital but James wouldn’t let me!”

  I look round, clutching my hand to my chest. “Callum! You surprised me! I’m fine. Why wouldn’t James let you come down to the hospital?”

  “Said there were too many people down there. You don’t look too bad, apart from the black eyes of course.”

  “Er, thanks.” He takes up residence on my desk next to the laptop. One by one, the day shift arrive on duty and come over to say hello. I smile and thank them for their flowers. A familiar voice filters through the small crowd.

  “WHO PUT THE PICTURE OF FRED FLINTSTONE INTO MY SECURITY PASS? Dave wouldn’t let me in the building on the grounds that I didn’t look anything like my photo. Which I suppose is something to be thankful for.”

  James grins wryly at them all. Much sniggering and back-slapping from the rest of the department accompanies this statement, another stark reminder his wedding will soon be upon us. James sits down opposite me.

  “Morning Holly! How are you feeling?”

  “Fine, thanks. How are you?”

  “Good. I never thought I’d say this, but it’s nice to have you back.” He grins widely at me and my stomach does a triple somersault. He gets on with emptying his in-tray and I get on with the all-important task of sneaking looks at him over the cover of my laptop. I feel as though I am almost seeing him for
the first time, or at least through new eyes. I watch him opening some post, shouting over to one of his colleagues, talking on the phone. I try to file images of him away in my memory so I can take them out and look at them when all this is over. He jolts me out of my thoughts.

  “Are you coming tomorrow? To the drinks thing? Fleur said she invited you.”

  “Yeah, the parents are too, I’m afraid.”

  “I liked them. Thought they were great.”

  “Oh. Thanks.”

  “What are you doing tonight?”

  “TV interview. Why?”

  “Another one? Thought you might want to come out for a drink with the rest of the department. Some other time perhaps.”

  Damn and blast the BBC.

  Despite, or indeed because of, James Sabine’s presence, it is quite an unpleasant day all in all. I read undue meaning into his every word or expression. It is hard to stop staring at him and whenever Fleur phones up to talk to him it feels like someone has punched me in the stomach. I wonder how anyone has the stamina to keep up this love thing on any sort of permanent basis without a regular subscription to a health spa. I dramatically yo-yo between wanting to drop to my knees, clasp his feet and tell him everything and the more realistic position of saying nothing because he is getting married to a beautiful and kind girl one week from tomorrow, whom he did, freely and without coercion, ask to marry him. The whole thing makes me a little damp under the armpits and determined to invest in a new deodorant. The rest of the afternoon I spend dabbling in bizarre fantasies of what might have happened with my life if I had been assigned to anyone else in the room but James Sabine. Also, a more delicious but macabre fantasy of what might have happened if James’ brother Rob hadn’t died and James hadn’t ever met Fleur, thus leaving the way clear and decidedly uncluttered for yours truly. But that’s the ironic thing, I belatedly realize; the only reason I was assigned to James Sabine was because he was getting married.

  I pop over to the paper to file copy. For some peculiar reason, Joe is absolutely insistent that he come to the BBC with me for the TV interview this evening. I am in the middle of a lovely conversation with Valerie from accounts about how I should look after myself after such a nasty accident, and am just about to suggest that she could take up residence chez moi, take on a mumsy capacity and perhaps see her way to preparing a few scooby snacks, when Joe leaps on me (not literally, figuratively) and insists he will accompany me. I point out I will have to go back home to change first, but he says, “No matter, I will come and pick you up at six.” I shrug to myself because, to be honest, life is just one big surprise to me nowadays, and then I wend my way home to get changed. So here I am at home, drinking the sloe gin that my mother had the foresight to pack, with Lizzie and the aforementioned relative trying frantically to decide what I should wear on Southwest Tonight.

  Lizzie and Mother, bless them, are trying to be terribly cheerful and upbeat for me. But I wish they would stop. It’s quite depressing and it’s having the very opposite effect to the one they intend. Fortunately the sloe gin is hitting the mark quite nicely.

  We finally settle on a beautiful, feminine, pale blue dress which clings in all the right places and is embroidered throughout with little white daisies. I stare unseeingly ahead of me as my mother dresses my hair and wonder if I’ll ever be happy again.

  My parents and Lizzie opt to stay at home to watch the interview from the comfort of the sofa, and as we don’t know how to preset the video someone has to do it manually anyway. Joe and I walk into the reception area of the TV studios just after six P.M. In an exact replica of my last visit, the “Shan’t-keep-you-a-moment” secretary signs us in and then Rosemary, the aspiring punk, collects us and wordlessly deposits us in the hospitality suite. I wearily sit down on a chair against the wall.

  “Do you know what you’re going to say?” asks Joe.

  “I don’t know what I’m going to be asked.”

  “Right. Well, try and plug the fact we’re the leading regional paper and also mention we’re at the cutting edge of journalism.”

  I look at him. Cutting edge? What cutting edge would that be? Joe seems agitated, I suddenly notice. He nervously licks his lips. “Oh, and they might show some photos of that chase; Vince had the other half of the film developed. So be ready to talk about it.”

  I frown at him; what the hell has he got to be worried about? I have no time to prevaricate as Giles, the host of Southwest Tonight, bounds in.

  He enthusiastically shakes our hands. “Holly! Hi!” I introduce Joe to him. “Joe! Nice to put a face to the voice!” I frown to myself—I suppose they must have talked over the phone to arrange this. Although I thought researchers did stuff like that?

  Giles turns back to me. “We’ve removed all glasses of water from the set so we can avoid a repeat incident of last time! Ha, ha!” I smile at the memory. It feels like a lifetime ago. “After you’re miked up, someone will bring you down.” He says goodbye and we wait for the sound man.

  Down on the set, I am deposited once more on the squishy sofa while Giles talks directly to the camera.

  “Our next guest is Holly Colshannon, the journalist who has been writing a hugely popular daily column in our local newspaper, the Bristol Gazette, called ‘The Real Dick Tracy’s Diary.’ ” He turns to me. “Welcome back to the program, Holly.”

  I smile. “Thank you.”

  “I have to say, I’m a big admirer. Just for the benefit of the viewers who haven’t read your diary, could you tell us a bit about it?”

  “Sure,” I say in a voice that doesn’t quite sound as though it comes from me. “I have been assigned to shadow a detective sergeant at the Bristol Constabulary—”

  “That’s Jack Swithen,” interrupts Giles.

  “That’s right, and every day I shadow Jack on real cases and crimes and then write up my diary.”

  “It’s been fascinating so far—you’ve reported a number of burglaries, thefts and goodness knows what else! But your most recent development has been the case of The Fox, hasn’t it?”

  “Yes. We’ve been investigating a series of burglaries and, after a dramatic dawn raid on a property, the police made an arrest a few days ago.”

  “I understand you ended up in hospital though.”

  “The suspect we apprehended . . .” It is disturbing how easily I can lapse into this police speak so I modify it. “. . . made a bit of a run for it. We all gave chase and unfortunately I was knocked out in the process.”

  “Can you attribute the success of the diary completely to the officer, Jack?”

  I shift in my seat. I’m not quite sure what he’s getting at. “Em, well. Jack Swithen has a great deal to do with it. I mean, people have gradually got to know him over the last few weeks. I think he stands for the values we all would like to see in our police officers. It was difficult, at first, to get any personal details out of him for the diary readers to actually be able to relate to him.”

  “Did your relationship with him at the time have anything to do with that?” I think I’m starting to see where this is heading now.

  “We didn’t perhaps see eye to eye at first . . .”

  “And now?”

  “We are getting on better.”

  “We have a few pictures.” Giles gestures to a monitor to the right of me and up on the screen flashes a photo. A peculiarly intimate photo of me lying on the ground with quite an impressively sized tree next to me (no wonder I had a headache). James is bending over me. I feel a bit funny and try to compose my features. And then another picture appears of James apparently yelling for an ambulance. And yet another with his hands on my head. I’m starting to feel a little hot. I nervously fidget with my necklace.

  “I have to say, Holly, since we’ve been trailing this interview, we have had quite a few faxes and e-mails asking if anything is going on between you and the detective? Would you like to confirm or deny the rumor?”

  My eyes briefly flicker toward Joe. Undoubtedly he se
t this up. I say, in a strange voice, “Ha ha! Of course there’s nothing going on! He’s actually getting married in a week’s time!” Leave it there, leave it there, I try to communicate to Giles.

  Far from leaving it, he says, “IS he, indeed?” Giles’ eyes light up. “That’s not actually mentioned in the diary, is it? Then he’s looking very worried for a man who’s getting married in a week’s time!” This is a bloody hatchet job.

  “He thought he’d killed me! He should look worried, he didn’t want my editor suing him!” Attack suitably deflected. Giles’ eyes flicker briefly toward Joe but he stops it there.

  “Well, thank you, Holly. You’ve certainly given us all some food for thought and I’m sure people will be following developments in ‘The Real Dick Tracy’s Diary’ more avidly than ever!”

  “Did you have to deny it so vehemently?” whispers Joe on the way back through the maze of corridors to the car.

  “You did that, didn’t you? You set me up!” Joe at least has the good grace to look sheepish. “Not content with blood and guts, you had to chuck a bit of sex in there too for good measure, didn’t you? The journalist shagging the detective! Oh yes! That’ll get the circulation up, won’t it? Is that what you were talking to Giles about on the phone? Didn’t bother telling me, oh no!”

  “We needed it to look genuine. I don’t know what you’re getting so upset about, it will help your career too. You’re going to have to learn there’s more to good journalism than just good writing.”

  “Well, if that’s what it involves, I don’t want to know,” I whisper viciously.

  “There was absolutely no need to tell everyone James is getting married next week. You could at least have let them wonder. Besides, people really have been asking so we just thought we would bring it up on air, that’s all.”

  “That would have nothing at all to do with your choice of pictures, would it? It hasn’t escaped my notice you’ve been putting more and more intimate shots in lately.”

  “Maybe there have been more and more to choose from lately. What on earth is your problem? There isn’t actually something going on is there?” he breathes excitedly.