She didn’t expect to see many jobs (wrong season for job hunting) but she had to start somewhere. At least she’d be able to finish the search she had started on her last day at Caring Cards.
There were plenty of jobs for carers (no thanks, she’d been grossed out enough this Christmas already, what with scrabbling about in her own poo, and wiping her great-gran’s bottom), lots of bar work (she’d do it at a push, but it meant standing on your feet for hours on end and dealing with drunks, and she wasn’t sure if she was cut out for that).
One by one she scrolled down the list: waiting staff (ditto the on your feet for hours on end bit, but with rude customers instead of drunken ones), taxi driver (she could get lost going from her house into the city if she wasn’t careful), receptionist (she could do that, maybe), nurse (no qualifications), social worker (she had enough problems of her own without trying to solve other people’s), forklift truck driver… and so on.
Out of the two hundred or so jobs on the website, there was absolutely nothing she thought she could do, or stood a chance of even being considered for.
The whole experience was a sobering one. She was officially unemployed and seemingly unemployable. She might have to wait on tables, or serve behind a bar after all, and whilst there was nothing wrong with any of these jobs, she really didn’t think she had the temperament for them. For one, she wasn’t at all gregarious, and she didn’t particularly like meeting with, and talking to people, and for another, she worked better when she was left to her own devices, with the minimum amount of supervision. She hated having anyone breathing over her shoulder, and at least Simon used to let her get on with it, as long as she churned out the verses. On a good day (and she was proud to say, she had more good ones than bad) she could produce upwards of twenty verses. Not all were chosen and many required redrafting after Simon had scrutinised them, but Daisy was still prolific and she was good at it. He was stupid to let her go in favour of Melissa. Then, Daisy hadn’t been screwing the MD, had she?
She made a face at the thought. Aaron Dearborn, from what she’d seen of him, had struck her as a bit of a wise guy, a shark, a would-you-buy-a-used-car-from-this-man type of bloke. He was too smarmy, and too sure of himself, for Daisy’s liking, but he must have something about him to have gotten so far up the corporate totem pole. For the life of her, she couldn’t think what. Neither could she see what Melissa saw in him, apart from the high-paying job, the company car (a Jag), the handmade suits, and the suave arrogance.
There was also the issue of his wife.
Was Melissa aware he had one, and if so, did she care? Daisy suspected not, though she did know that her former colleague would need to tread carefully; he’d already gotten rid of one employee by nefarious means (Daisy) so what was to keep him from getting rid of Melissa when he tired of her, or the risk became too great? Oh yeah, a little fact that Melissa was bonking him and could tell his wife. That might stop him, alright.
Concentrate Daisy, you’ve got a CV to write.
Having no inkling where to start, she downloaded a typical template, and stared at it. She could do the name, address, and phone number bit, and even her current (past) employer. She could fill in her school details and qualifications, but it was the rest of it which had her stumped. Significant achievements? What significant achievements? Hobbies? Okay, she could fill that bit in too, but she didn’t think watching TV and going out for meals was particularly riveting to a prospective employer.
Daisy Jones, on paper, sounded as boring as Daisy Jones in the flesh.
What if she put “studying for…”? But for what? A degree? A BTEC in administration? That sounded good, but they would most certainly want proof, and even if they didn’t, they’d probably ask her about it, and bluffing wouldn’t be an option.
She typed “enjoys fine dining” instead, then added, “training for a marathon”, before having second thoughts and deleting it. Training to win a gold in couch potato would be more accurate. “Carer to my brother and his wife”? Er, no. It made her sound as though she had ongoing responsibilities which might affect her commitment to a job.
“Volunteering at an old people’s home”? That might work. She often called in to see the other residents, to have a quick chat when she visited Gee-Gee. Unfortunately, she rarely visited her great-grandmother, relying on old lady being at Sandra’s every Sunday, though over the past year or so Daisy had usually only managed to pop in for the occasional lunch.
However, it looked good on paper, or at least, better than “can list all the plot lines in A Game of Thrones”. The main reason for her watching the series was because she had a bit of a fan crush on Jon Snow – but then, who didn’t? Freddie had often said how good-looking the character was, in a moody kind of way. Freddie’s interest made more sense now.
She fudged her way through the rest of the document, though by the time she’d finished it the CV looked more like a work of fiction than a factual document. She’d amended her role at Caring Cards slightly to incorporate more administration and secretarial duties, confident she could wing it if she had to. After all, how hard could it be to type up a letter, or organise a meeting?
She returned to her job hunt feeling a teensy bit more confident.
Ah, here was one.
“Office Junior sought for builders’ merchants. Duties include filing, answering customer queries, sending out invoices”, blah blah blah. The “make the tea” part was hidden three paragraphs down, and that was the one thing she was certain she could do well. She’d even provide cakes if it meant she got the job. But the golden words were, “no experience necessary”. The salary wasn’t fantastic, a measly one pound over the minimum wage, but it would serve to give her the experience she so desperately needed.
She drafted a quick covering letter to her email, attached her CV and pressed “send”, and wondered how many more jobs she would have to apply for before she finally landed one – she suspected it might be a few.
By the end of the session, Daisy had applied for a PA to the managing director (not a hope in hell), librarian (she still wasn’t sure what a CILIP qualification was, or whether a GCSE in English literature was a reasonable substitute – anyway, how complicated could putting books on shelves be?) plus loads more.
The reasoning behind Daisy’s throw-a-CV-at-it-and-hope-it-sticks, scatter-gun approach, was that someone, somewhere, would spot her potential.
Sighing in exasperation, she closed the computer down, and went to check on the chicken. Even if she did say so herself, it looked and smelled delicious. Maybe she could be a chef?
She was in the middle of steaming some fresh vegetables (Zoe had things in her salad drawer that Daisy wouldn’t recognise even if they introduced themselves), when Zoe made an appearance.
‘I’ve been thinking,’ her sister-in-law said.
‘While you were asleep? Good trick,’ Daisy said.
Zoe had the grace to look sheepish. ‘I haven’t been sleeping, but I have been resting on the bed,’ she added, before Daisy could tell her off.
‘Thinking?’ Daisy asked. ‘Do I want to know what about? Is it about my being sacked, because you’re not supposed to be doing any kind of work, and you said you wanted to wait until you’d read my contract.’
‘No, not that. I’ve been thinking about what you can do.’
‘About what?’
‘A job, silly.’
‘Go on then, what can I do, because I’ve been on the internet and every job out there either asks for some kind of qualification no one’s ever heard of, or experience which I haven’t got.’
‘Then work for yourself,’ Zoe said, calmly.
‘Doing what?’
‘What are you good at?’
‘Nothing.’
‘Yes, you are. Think about it.’
Daisy thought. She still came up with nothing, so she shrugged.
‘Verses, cards,’ Zoe prompted.
‘Been there, done that, designed the bloody tee shirt.’
‘But that was working for someone else,’ Zoe pointed out.
‘You mean, freelance?’
‘That’s exactly what I mean.’
‘There isn’t the market for it,’ Daisy replied, without hesitation. ‘The big boys have got it all wrapped up.’
‘They haven’t though, have they? I’m thinking about personalised verses, where your customer gives you snippets of information about who they want the card for, and you write a verse suitable for them.’
Daisy pondered the idea. ‘It could work,’ she admitted, ‘but I can’t simply send a verse without a card.’
‘You can if it’s done online,’ Zoe countered. Her sister-in-law had clearly been giving this a lot of thought, and Daisy was grateful to her for taking the time, but Daisy simply didn’t see how it would work.
However, Zoe did. ‘If it’s images you’re worried about, there are loads of companies on the net which provide royalty-free images for subscription, companies like Dreamstime, Shutterstock, and Getty. You can pick a suitable image to reflect the occasion and the person who is receiving the card.’
Zoe looked so hopeful that Daisy didn’t have the heart to disillusion her. ‘It’ll take a lot of organising,’ she said instead, hoping the answer sounded keen enough, but not too keen. It was a lovely idea, but it simply wasn’t possible. She wouldn’t have the faintest clue where to start.
Zoe had that covered too. ‘My nephew is great at website design. He could set you up, and I could help you with the logistics until the business was up and running,’ she said. ‘Research and organisation are my thing.’
Daisy didn’t doubt it for one second, but she did doubt everything else, including her own ability to make it happen. She wasn’t a businesswoman, she was a worker bee, and she liked the security of a job with a wage at the end of every month.
‘What have you got to lose?’ Zoe persisted.
‘My savings, my sanity?’ She was sure she could find many more objections if she put her mind to it.
‘Look, I’m not saying you should give up a well-paid job to do this, but you’ve not got a job to give up at the moment, have you?’
Thanks for reminding me, Zoe, she thought.
‘You could try it until you found something else, give it a go,’ Zoe persisted. ‘And you won’t lose your savings because the costs would be minimal to start off with.’
What did Zoe consider minimal, because Daisy was pretty sure Zoe’s minimal and Daisy’s wouldn’t be the same thing at all.
‘Website hosting is, I don’t know, maybe ten pounds a month, plus a bit more for a subscription to one of the image sites,’ Zoe said.
Her sister-in-law was stubborn, wasn’t she? But those costs sounded good. Hmm.
‘Have a look tomorrow,’ Zoe said. ‘I’ve written the web addresses down for you. You can always work on verses until your own site is up and running, and even if it went nowhere, the worst you’d be doing is keeping your hand in.’
Daisy still wasn’t convinced. She’d be better off spending her time job hunting. Then there was looking after David and Zoe – that wasn’t going to happen by magic. David would be semi-mobile at best. The worst-case scenario could involve someone having to bath him, and she was damn sure it wasn’t going to be her. Zoe had to take it easy, so that particular job was going to fall to their mother, by default. Sandra had seen his bits and pieces enough times, so a couple more wouldn’t matter. But there was still the task of helping him move around the house, and someone had to do the cooking, the laundry, the cleaning, and the other hundreds of domestic household chores, and that was without taking him to his physio appointments. Daisy anticipated being very busy indeed.
What she hadn’t had anticipated was her sister-in-law’s dogged determination, and a refusal to take no for an answer.
Chapter 20
Outrageous plans or not, everything went on the back burner the following day (New Year’s Eve) because David was finally discharged. The hospital had lent him, in no particular order, a wheelchair, a Zimmer frame, a pair of crutches, and had also arranged to have one of the beds from upstairs moved into the dining room, and the table relegated to the garage by two burly men, because David wasn’t yet able to negotiate the stairs.
And if that wasn’t enough, Daisy was expected to share the spare bed with her mother tonight because Daisy had arranged to go to a party with Sara, which she had forgotten about in all the excitement over the past few days. Sandra had insisted on staying over for the night to babysit David, who, she maintained, needed a good wash. David, in pain and very irritable, wasn’t best pleased to be called a baby, or to be told he could do with a bath.
‘You’re being a baby now,’ Sandra insisted. ‘I’ve seen it all before, you know.’
‘I don’t want a bath.’ David glared at his mother.
‘That’s just as well, because you can’t climb the stairs. What you need is a proper bed wash. I bet those nurses didn’t give you one.’
‘I’ll give you one in a minute,’ David muttered under his breath.
Daisy, sitting beside him on the sofa, giggled. Her brother bared his perfect teeth at her.
‘I’ve borrowed one of Mrs Danson’s chairs as well,’ Sandra said.
‘Mum,’ David sighed. ‘We’ve got plenty of chairs, four in the kitchen, six in the dining room, two in here and a three-bloody-seater sofa. Will you just stop fussing!’
‘But this one is electric. You sit in it and press a button and it lifts you back out. You can’t expect our Daisy to manage you. She’s got fewer muscles than a slug, and Zoe isn’t allowed to lift anything.’
‘Oi!’ Daisy cried. ‘I’m planning on going to the gym, I’ll have you know.’
‘Why bother? You’re allergic to exercise,’ her mother replied. ‘It brings you out in a rash,’ she added, giving Daisy a hard stare. ‘Look what happened the last time you went for a jog; you had a red rash all over your backside.’
‘It was a heat rash.’
‘If you say so,’ Sandra retorted. ‘Now, David, about that wash.’
Daisy fled, but not before she heard David yell, ‘You can stick that flannel where the sun doesn’t shine,’ and their mother’s determined reply of, ‘I intend to, son. It could most likely do with a good scrub.’ Zoe’s soft laughter followed her up the stairs.
Daisy was still chuckling to herself when she did a final check in the mirror: sparkly black dress? Tick. Strappy, impossibly high heels? Tick. Flashy gold necklace and bracelet to match? Yep. Lipstick on, hair done, and false eyelashes in place. All she needed was a quick squirt of her favourite perfume, grab her black, beaded clutch, and she was ready to go.
Her mood had lifted considerably since her useless internet search. She knew it was all down to the prospect of a good night out, a new year ahead (out with the old, and in with the new) and that maybe babysitting her younger brother would be more entertaining than she’d first thought. At least staying at David’s house got her out from under her mother’s nose, except for tonight.
‘I’m not driving at that time of night, and I’m not paying for a taxi either,’ Sandra had stated. ‘Those New Year’s Eve rates are daylight robbery. I’ll get into bed with you, Daisy.’
‘I can drive you back home, I don’t mind,’ Daisy had offered, but her mother was having none of it.
‘You’ll be as pissed as a fart, if I know you, Daisy Jones. You won’t be in any condition to be driving anyone anywhere, except me up the wall.’
Daisy certainly hoped she was drunk, so she could ignore the fact that her mother was going to be sleeping inches away from her, because her mother snored. Daisy could hear it through two walls and across the landing. Goodness knows what it would sound like from less than a foot away.
She’d arranged to meet Sara in a bar in town, and she asked the taxi driver to drop her at the top end of Friar Street, an ancient cobbled street with buildings going back to medieval times, which had a lively atmosphere with many tre
ndy pubs and restaurants. They’d arranged to meet in a pub called The Cardinal’s Hat, and it was packed with revellers dressed in their finery, and already well on their way to being three sheets to the wind, despite it being only eight o’clock. It was going to be a long night indeed, for some people.
She fought her way to the bar and ordered two white wines.
‘Making up for lost time?’ a voice asked in her ear.
‘Pardon?’
The man at her elbow wore a suit, no tie, shirt undone to the second button, and his dark hair was gelled back. Designer stubble coated his cheeks and chin, and his skin looked suspiciously bronze for the time of year.
‘Been anywhere nice?’ she asked.
‘Eh?’
‘The tan.’
‘The new salon up the road. I was going to offer you a drink, but I see you’ve got everything in hand.’
‘They’re not both for me,’ she said, taking a swift swig of hers, and thinking that if Sara didn’t put in an appearance in the next five minutes, they very well might be. After the week she’d had, she needed a couple of stiff ones.
‘Where’s your friend?’
‘Not here yet.’ Daisy checked her phone. No messages. She checked her watch: ten past eight. Plenty of time. Sara was renowned for being fashionably late. Daisy would give her another twenty minutes before sending a “where are you?” distress call to her friend.
‘I’ll keep you company until she arrives, if it is a “she”,’ the stranger offered.
‘It is a she,’ Daisy confirmed, ‘and she’s late.’
‘Typical woman.’
‘I was on time.’
‘You’re obviously not typical. You certainly don’t look typical to me. In fact, you look like a very special lady indeed.’
Smarmy, but she’d take it all the same. It was an awfully long time since anyone had chatted her up, and she was in the mood for some male attention, even though she wasn’t looking to take it any further. After the dent Freddie had put in her confidence, she was happy for this strange man to have a go at bashing it back out.
A Very Lucky Christmas Page 13