The Wish List

by Jane Costello

  I am consumed with unhappiness throughout Monday, unable to think of anything except a future without Matt. That and dreaming up imaginary scenarios that could keep him here: everything from Allison developing an allergy to baguettes to her being denied entry to France for a hitherto clandestine drugs trafficking conviction.

  Even the fact that Lulu has finally given me something remotely interior designy to look at does nothing to cheer me up.

  She’s asked me to source fabric for the curtains in a posh gastro pub in the Lake District, the sort of thing I’d once thought would be interesting. But, as I’ve quickly come to discover, once you’ve seen one champagne-silk dupion you’ve seen them all.

  ‘Emma! We’re out of Duchy Originals,’ Lulu cries, popping her head round her office door.

  I muster a smile. ‘I’ll get right on it.’

  ‘And I’d like you to pop back to the Quay today.’

  ‘Oh.’ My spirits lift. ‘Which part of the project will I be working on?’

  She turns up her nose, momentarily bemused. ‘I left my umbrella there.’

  When I arrive at the site, it’s quieter than last time; half the workers are on lunch. I tentatively open the door, like one of those teenagers in a dodgy eighties horror film, and wonder where I’m going to start looking for Lulu’s sodding Marc Jacobs umbrella.

  ‘Hello!’ I call out, as footsteps approach.

  Suddenly there he is, in front of me. Pete Hammond. Zachary’s father.

  The resemblance isn’t overwhelming – not to the same extent as Zachary looks like Cally. But the more I look at him, the more I can see it. The blue eyes, the blond hair, the slightly turned-up nose.

  ‘Hi, again. Can I help?’ he asks.

  ‘My boss left her umbrella here the other day.’

  ‘Oh. Any idea where?’

  ‘Upstairs, she thinks.’

  ‘I’ll have to come with you – it’s still a state up there.’

  I follow Pete up the stairs with an acute sense that, just by uttering one sentence, I could change his life for ever. When we reach the top, his phone rings and he stops to answer it.

  ‘I’m with someone, sweetheart. Yep, I’ll get some on my way home. It’s the SMA White, isn’t it? Okay – got to go. Bye. Love you too.’

  ‘Sorry,’ he grins, ending the call. ‘That was my wife. I’m on the baby-milk run tonight.’

  ‘Oh,’ I smile.

  ‘There it is.’ He points to the umbrella on the other side of the room and marches towards it.

  ‘Thanks,’ I reply, and as he hands it to me I’m unable to take my eyes off his face.

  ‘Anything else I can help with?’

  I hesitate, as he tucks his phone into his inside pocket again.

  ‘No.’ I shake my head. ‘That was all. Thanks.’

  It’s a ten-minute walk to catch a tram back to the office and I reach a shelter just before the heavens open. I sit, as damp and cold as a used tea bag, watching the rain fall in sheets, feeling empty inside.

  The tram arrives and I’m about to step onto it when I realise I’ve forgotten to buy a ticket. ‘Shit,’ I mutter, scratching around in my purse and realising I’ve got seventy-three pence to my name.

  ‘Oh God . . .’

  I step back from the tram and watch as the doors close and it disappears. I gaze at my suede shoes. This morning they were a shade called Oyster. Now, they are more Regurgitated Kipper.

  With my hair sodden, I put up the umbrella and begin traipsing in the direction of the office, a forty-minute walk away. It is the most miserable journey of my life, one that involves relentless battles with traffic and slimy splashes from the gutter, and leaves my toes feeling as if they’ve been through a mincing machine.

  When I arrive at the door of Loop and stand in the lift, a grey pool of water gathers under my shoes. I enter the office squelching like a toilet plunger. For the first time since I started work here, every person in the office turns to look at me.

  Lulu marches over furiously and snatches her umbrella. ‘Where have you been? I’ve got a meeting at three and have been standing here waiting.’

  She strides off, shaking the umbrella and grabbing her coat. I trudge to my seat, wondering how I’m going to dry out without an industrial dehumidifier, and drop my bag on the desk.

  ‘Do you mind?’

  I look up and Dee is pulling one of her septic faces. It appears that the strap from my bag has encroached on her desk – by an inch. I calmly remove it and smile sweetly, to conceal the fact that I’d like to stab her with a sharp pencil until she screeches like a mutilated pterodactyl.

  I glance at the clock. I have two hours and sixteen minutes of this working day left and the thought makes me want to cry. In fact, I think I’m going to. In fact . . .

  It is as I sit with tears teetering on the rims of my eyes, that I hear my phone ringing. I hastily compose myself, sniffing back tears, rain and snot, before answering.

  ‘Hello?’

  ‘Emma, it’s Perry. Got time for a chat?’

  Chapter 77

  When Matt and I make love that night it’s as if we’re in a bubble, one in which nobody can ruin things, where everything is so right that it’s impossible to imagine anything else.

  I am on top, our faces inches apart as my thighs squeeze his hips and I gaze into his eyes. He is beautiful to me, there’s no other way of saying it.

  I sink my lips into his, tasting him, drinking him in. I kiss the sweet skin on his neck and I inch my hips upwards until I’m poised in that heavenly and unbearable position where he’s almost, but not quite, inside me. His hands slide up my body as we become one and I groan with pleasure as his fingers run through my hair.

  We make love into the night and it isn’t only lust that makes me want him so badly. I need to be with him, as close as it’s humanly possible to be. Because otherwise I’m overcome with one terrible fact about Matt and me.

  That this great thing we’ve got has suddenly become horribly finite.

  It is three a.m. and even though I have to be at my desk in Manchester in six hours, I can’t bring myself to turn off the light.

  ‘You’re going to be exhausted at work,’ Matt tells me, brushing hair away from my face.

  ‘I’m beyond caring.’

  He tuts. ‘I really feel for you having to work for people like that. If you’d gone to another interior-design company it could’ve been completely different.’

  ‘Maybe. The company certainly hasn’t helped. But, if I’m honest, it’s more straightforward than that. Interior design isn’t for me – not as a career. I love making my home look lovely, but doing it as work – when I get to do it – removes all the fun. I took my old job for granted.’

  ‘We’ve all been guilty of that. It’s easy to get so used to something being there that it’s only when it’s gone you realise how much you wanted it.’

  I swallow, momentarily silenced. ‘Has Allison set a date for when they’re leaving yet?’ I ask, leaning up on my elbow.

  He hesitates before answering. ‘Yes, actually. She told me today. It’s the twenty-second of December.’

  The contentment I’ve been experiencing all night disintegrates. I nod and clench my jaw. ‘My birthday.’

  He lowers his eyes. Neither of us can bring ourselves to comment on that little gem. ‘I guess you’ll have to look for work out there soon?’

  ‘I started this afternoon. One of my old friends, Patrick, has contacts over there. He put me in touch with a magazine and they commissioned something for an edition in a few months. I’ve started to do some social media work in French and sent my portfolio out.’

  ‘Good,’ I force myself to say, though it sounds as though someone’s stretched an elastic band round my tonsils. ‘What are you going to do about your flat?’

  ‘I’ll try renting it out first, though it’s inevitable that I’ll have to sell it. It pains me to think about putting it on the market when I haven’t owned it for even six mo
nths yet.’

  He kisses me softly on the lips. ‘Emma, I’m going to be here for your birthday. I was intending to go on the same day as Allison but, in the light of the date, I’ll postpone it until the next morning. I’d stay even later but I can’t miss doing something with the kids over Christmas . . . even if it’s going to be very different from last year. The point is, I’ll be there for your party. I wouldn’t miss it for the world.’

  I close my eyes tightly, trying to force back the tears, before opening them again and realising I can’t.

  ‘Matt.’ I squeeze his hand, unable to look at him. ‘I hope you understand why I’m saying this but I think it’d be better if you just went when you were intending to.’

  Saying goodbye to my twenties on the evening of 22 December is one thing; saying goodbye to the love of my life as well would be unbearable.

  ‘Is that how you’d prefer it?’

  I nod. ‘It is.’

  Chapter 78

  If I’d hoped, before I met Perry at a restaurant near work, that he’d become any less mad in the month since I saw him, I’d have been disappointed. His outfit looks as though it was raided from the archives of the V&A and he’s gesticulating so wildly our fellow diners would be forgiven for thinking he’s attempting to start an aerobics class.

  ‘The scripts,’ Perry says, wide-eyed, ‘they’re almost there. Almost. But they’re missing a sprinkle of magic. I’ve made a few suggestions but nobody seems overly keen. And—’

  ‘Perry.’

  Perry’s mouth slams shut and he looks at his father.

  Being in the presence of Perry Ryder Snr is like sitting in front of the Godfather – except I suspect the most violent he’s ever got is threatening his son with instant removal of his teddy bear collection.

  He is almost totally bald, but for two or three straggly grey hairs clinging to the top of his head, and despite his age he remains a big, strong-looking man. His milky-blue eyes are compelling, partly because I know that behind them is a mind that has enchanted millions of children with some of the most brilliant and original stories ever written.

  I’m in the presence of a legend. A genius. A man whose work I watched when I was a little girl and who has inspired every single creative thing I have done since (this is in spite of the fact that the last time we both worked for Little Blue Bus – before he retired and in the early years of my career – I was too in awe to ever speak directly to him).

  ‘Emma, I’ll get straight to the point,’ he says, putting down his knife and fork. ‘Bingbah has been incredibly successful but, as you know, every major television channel is constantly reviewing things. And we are up for review. The fact that it’s been successful in the past isn’t enough.’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘That’s particularly the case given the influx of competitors recently. Other production companies, especially overseas ones, can do things more cheaply, often more quickly.’

  ‘But can they do them as well?’

  ‘We can’t afford to be complacent. Ratings are unsteady, Emma – and that makes everyone nervous. Factors have combined against us this year. The loss of Sarah McIntyre and probably – if Perry’s entirely honest – some lack of direction.’

  Perry pulls a face as if he’s been sent to his room without supper. ‘I was only trying to come up with something different . . .’

  ‘You see, Emma,’ Perry Snr says, rescuing Perry from himself, ‘the thing I’ve explained to my son is that when Little Blue Bus was at the height of its success, when we were blazing a trail in the industry . . . it was a team effort. We had the best working for us. And every one of those people had a clear idea of our aims. That’s how we were a success. And that’s how we’ll be a success again.’

  ‘I see.’ I twist my napkin. ‘So . . . what’s your role in all this, if you don’t mind me asking?’

  ‘The presentation to Channel 6 takes place a week today. Which makes this one of the most critical weeks in the history of the company. If we don’t win this, there is no company. I’m the major shareholder in Little Blue Bus Productions, Emma, and although I’ve taken a back seat, there are times when I have to do what I think is best for the company. My intention is to come out of retirement for limited and fixed period of time. To prepare for the presentation and – if it goes the way we want – to get the next series off the ground. At the same time, I intend to launch the process of trying to find our next big hit, something I propose we dedicate a significant amount of time and resources to. All being well, I will step down at that point.’

  ‘I wish you luck. Little Blue Bus is a brilliant company and it deserves to thrive.’

  ‘I’m glad you think so. Because there was a reason we wanted to see you today, and it wasn’t just for a chat. I wanted to ask you what we could do to persuade you to come back.’

  At that moment, I think of the hell I’ve been enduring under Lulu and I want to leap over the table and smother him with kisses. I manage to restrain myself. And instead simply manage: ‘Well, it’s really flattering—’

  ‘Before you refuse,’ he interrupts, ‘I should tell you that it’s not your old job we’re offering you. It’s Creative Director. You’d be in charge, Emma.’

  My jaw drops so rapidly it almost lands in my starter. ‘Me?’

  I look up at Perry Jnr and he throws me a wobbly smile. ‘It’s nothing less than you deserve.’

  ‘Of course, there’s a lot riding on the pitch – I can’t pretend otherwise,’ Perry Snr continues. ‘If we don’t succeed in persuading Channel 6 to take the next series, everything is up in the air. I hope you think it’s a risk worth taking.’

  In the history of resignations, nobody has ever done it as fast as me. I quit this job faster than a Serengeti wildebeest on the run from a cheetah, faster than Superman pulls on his tights and, if not faster than the speed of light, then certainly fast enough to break some law of physics.

  The only thing faster is the speed with which Lulu accepts it.

  ‘This has been an interesting experiment for both of us,’ she smiles, as we skip to the door after I’ve handed in my notice, precisely twenty minutes after I left the two Perrys.

  ‘Do I need to put this in writing?’

  She races back to her desk, rips off a bit of scrap paper from her desk pad and hands it to me. ‘Scrawl something on that – it’ll do.’

  ‘How would you feel about me leaving early?’ I try.

  She grins. ‘Go for it!’

  I grin. ‘Thanks!’

  And after I’ve scribbled an official cheerio on a piece of paper, told Dee that she can shove her request for a not-too-milky tea up her perfect jacksy (not really, that was in my dreams), I’ve grabbed my coat, my bag, and am striding out of the door of this dystopian hell, ecstatic at the end of a not-so-beautiful relationship.

  Chapter 79

  ‘Well, I’m very glad,’ Dad concludes, duster in hand as he attempts to put such a shine on the mantelpiece that it’d be capable of causing instantaneous optic-nerve damage. ‘You’ve got to feel passionate about what you do. It was obvious that that was the last thing you felt in that place.’

  ‘Do you feel passionate about what you do?’

  He spins round. ‘Of course! Show me another mobility specialist offering seventeen different brands of bath lifts. You don’t achieve that unless you do it with passion. Your mum was the same. She approached everything with one hundred per cent commitment, not least raising you girls.’

  I smile.

  ‘She used to read to you for hours, you know – even when you were tiny,’ he continues. ‘She’d recite The House at Pooh Corner endlessly when you were still ages off being able to speak. You were a bit of a slow starter, admittedly.’

  I pretend I haven’t heard the last bit. ‘I wish I could remember that sort of stuff.’

  ‘You were very small, Emma.’

  ‘I wish I could remember anything,’ I say, sipping tea. ‘I can’t tell you how much it fr
ustrates me that all this information is missing.’

  Dad puts down the duster and looks at me, as if the possibility that I feel like this has never occurred to him. He sits on the armchair opposite mine.

  ‘Do you really feel like that?’

  I nod, suddenly overwhelmed by how much I do.

  ‘You can ask me anything you want about her – at any time.’

  I think for a second, barely knowing where to start. ‘What was she like when she was my age?’

  Dad looks out of the window and smiles. ‘She was beautiful and bold.’ He turns back to me. ‘Just like you. She loved dancing. And Roxy Music. And gingerbread. And bright red lipstick. And she loved being a mum.’

  I smile hesitantly. Because knowing she loved gingerbread and Roxy Music and bright red lipstick still doesn’t feel enough. I want to know what she’d advise me to do about Matt. And Cally. And I wonder if she’d think I’d done the right thing about work. I want to know how she spoke, her way of thinking. Was her personality like mine?

  ‘You know, thinking too much about this can get you into a real spin, Emma,’ Dad says. ‘None of it will bring her back. If thinking about someone could do that, I’d have managed it long ago. You have to get on with life. It’s too upsetting otherwise.’

  ‘But it’s good to think about someone important to you every so often, don’t you think? Even if it is upsetting.’

  Dad looks at his hands and says nothing. Then he looks up again. ‘Not long now until the big day, hey?’

  I frown. ‘What big day?’

  ‘Your birthday! The big three-oh!’

  ‘Oh . . . yes. Two-and-a-half weeks.’

  ‘How many people are coming to your party?’

  ‘About fifty or so.’

  Dad frowns. ‘You don’t look overly excited. When you were seven you didn’t sleep for three nights then almost fell asleep on your own birthday cake. Your hair would’ve been like a fireball if Aunt Sheila hadn’t had reflexes like the Karate Kid.’