“Ser!” Kirsty waves to me from the corner where she’s draped all over Tim, as usual. Five years together and they still can’t keep their hands to themselves. She’s twice his size and I can just make out his eyes peeping from behind her oversized earrings and waterfall of crazy caramel curls.
Heading through the throng – the place is heaving even on a Monday – I squeeze into a chair across from them.
“Where’s the old man?” Kirsty’s necklaces clank together as she leans forward to gulp her drink.
“Kirsty!” I hate when she calls Peter that. Okay, Peter’s in his early thirties, but that doesn’t exactly make him ancient . . . just old-ish. “Peter can’t make it. He’s busy.” Busy with Time Team. I don’t dare tell her that, or I’d never hear the end of it.
“Too bad,” Kirsty says, her tone suggesting anything but. Tim gives her a look, the kind where he draws his eyebrows together and frowns. He’s going to get wrinkles if he keeps doing that.
“So how are things in the wonderful world of finance?” I ask, reaching deep into the confines of my plasticky Primark purse where I’m sure I saw some pound coins lurking last week. A glass of wine is calling, but I need at least one more pound . . . got it. One giant House Red coming up.
Tim and Kirsty nod together.
“Pretty good. Kirsty just closed a major deal with Centralna.” Tim smiles at her proudly. They both work at some investment bank in the City, Grant-Jonas-Blythe Investment, Jonas-Blythe-Grant Investment, some combination or other. The two of them graduated at the top of University of Maine’s Economics class, and were snapped up by headhunters and settled into the bank’s corporate London flat before I’d even collected my diploma. If only everything in my world was so easy.
But I’ll make it soon. I will. If not Leza Larke, then some editor is sure to love my Jeremy pitch. They’ll be so blown away, they’ll offer me a job on the spot, and I’ll get to work in one of those big glass buildings and dress in trendy gear from TopShop, not these nineteen-fifties styles I have to pull off for the clinic.
“Guess what?” I blurt out. “I’ve got a great idea for a tabloid story. I think this might be it.”
“Oh, yeah?” Kirsty takes a sip of her drink and turns toward me, face neutral. I know she’s heard it a million times before, but this really could be it.
I quickly explain about Jeremy and all the operations he wants.
“Why would someone do that to themselves?” Kirsty asks.
I shrug. “Who knows? He just said he wanted women to like him. It’ll make a great feature.” My excitement is building just thinking about it.
“And he’s agreed to be in the article?” Kirsty drains her drink and leans back.
“Well . . .” My voice trails off and nerves shoot through me. “Not quite yet. But I’m sure he will. He wants to meet women, after all, and this will be a good way to get his name out there.” I try to sound confident but small doubts gnaw my insides. What if Jeremy says no?
“And Peter’s okay with this? I thought he was, like, Captain Privacy or something.” She raises her eyebrows at me, and I flush. I know she’s recalling the time Peter reamed me out after I regaled her with clinic tales one night over dinner.
“Not exactly,” I mumble, tracing a watermark on the table. I glance up, meeting her hazel eyes. “But I’m sure he will be.” I hope. “Anyway, I’ll wait until I hear back from the editor and cross those bridges when I come to them.”
Kirsty nods, but I can see by her expression she doesn’t believe those bridges will ever need crossing. I know she thinks my tabloid dream is just a fantasy – along with Peter and half the western world. But I’ll show her. I’ll show everyone.
“I’d better make a move,” I say, after chatting (and drinking) for another couple hours. I stand up just as Tim returns to the table with more martinis. The room swings around me and I grip onto the table for support. That wine has gone straight to my head. “I’ve got to be at work early in the morning.”
“Aw, come on.” Kirsty waves her martini in the air, sloshing it all over the table. “What do you care? It’s just standing behind a desk, right? You could show up tomorrow with half a brain and the Botox Bitches wouldn’t even notice.”
A jolt of annoyance flashes through me. Yes, it’s true I could rock up with minimal brainpower, and those women would tell me how clever I am when I correctly spell their surnames (because W-H-I-T-E is really challenging, don’t you know). But I hate that my friends think I’m doing a job a monkey could. I’ve got to make this tabloid thing happen – soon.
“Naw, I should go.” I lean over to kiss her and Tim, say goodbye, then head for the street. The air is fresh, bordering on cold, the way only an early October night can be. I turn right and walk by Paddington Gardens, breathing in the smell of crisp leaves to clear my head.
Autumn always reminds me of the beginning of school – new books, new teachers . . . potential. I couldn’t wait to be done with university; to leave Maine behind and to experience the real world. I smile up into the light-polluted London sky. So far, I love it. And even though I’m not exactly fulfilling my potential, I’ll get there. All it takes is just one yes.
I turn onto our street and fit my key into the door of the red-bricked mansion block. It’s taken me a while to absorb the fact that I, Serenity Holland, live here. The foyer is all chandeliers and mirrors gilded in gold, and although the lift’s a rather rickety contraption, it’s carpeted in deep-red fabric with little gold paisleys swimming through it. I blink, and the paisleys stop moving then start up again like sperm. God, I’m drunker than I thought.
Turning my key in the lock, I nudge open the door as quietly as I can. The voice of the BBC announcer – the one whose name I can never remember but always looks like she’s got haemorrhoids – floats through the darkened lounge, and I can just make out Peter’s silhouette on the sofa. Flickering light from the television reflects on the shiny parquet floor and glints off the polished antique furniture. I catch a glimpse of myself in the glass of an oil painting above the sideboard and grimace, pushing my hair behind my ears to try to look more presentable. Peter isn’t a fan of my ‘bed head’ look.
“Hi!” I say, a bit louder than intended. I throw my keys toward the little dish on the sideboard. They miss and fall onto the floor with a sharp clang. Smitty looks up, annoyed, from his prime position in Peter’s lap. I swear that animal gets more quality time with my boyfriend than I do.
“Hey, you’re home.” Peter’s tone is slightly sharp. “Bit late, isn’t it? Remember, there’s work tomorrow.”
I kick off my high heels, trying not to let the flicker of irritation show on my face. These days more than ever, Peter’s quiet and tense after work. I don’t blame him; I’m stressed too after dealing with the Botox Bitches, and I don’t get anywhere as close to them as he does. Thank God.
Easing Smitty away, I lower myself into the crook of Peter’s arm. The heat from his body seeps through my thin coat, warming me up from the autumn chill.
Peter pulls me even closer. I flip on my side and we watch as the BBC woman talks her discomfited way through the war in Afghanistan, onto the Middle East and then through to some disturbed weather patterns in the North. As if that’s news.
Ah . . . it’s so nice lying here. I snuggle even closer, thinking we should move this on to the bedroom. It’s been ages.
Peter grunts. A grunt that sounds suspiciously like a snore.
“Peter!” I turn, scanning his face. Yup, he’s snoozing. Guess I should have come home earlier; I know what he’s like after ten o’clock. Still, I’m not going to let a little sleepiness stop me. I move my hand down to the inside of his thigh, smiling when I feel his body respond. Oh yes, the doctor is definitely in.
Peter lowers his lips to mine and presses against me, and I let out a contented sigh. I’ve got a successful man who cares about me, and a great new life in London. Now all I need is the job of my dreams, and everything will be perfect.
Tomorrow, I
tell myself as Peter scoops me up and carries me into the bedroom. Just wait until tomorrow.
CHAPTER THREE
“Have you seen my blue tie?” Peter yells from the bedroom the next morning as I jam myself full of Jaffa Cakes in the kitchen. I don’t care how early it is, there’s no way I’m facing the Botox Bitches on an empty stomach. My tummy is rumbly enough just thinking about whether there’s a response from Leza Larke.
“No,” I grunt through a mouthful of crumbs, noting with fascination how several float out of my mouth and onto the black marble counter. I grab some kitchen roll and carefully wipe them up. Brits don’t like crumbs. Or maybe that’s just Peter.
“Serenity. Serenity!”
I sigh and stride into the bedroom. “I don’t know where your tie is,” I say, lodging the Jaffa Cake in the side of my cheek to avoid spewing more bits.
Peter stops rifling through his closet and turns to face me. “Didn’t you take a load of shirts to the dry cleaner’s last week? Wasn’t my tie in with that?”
Staring up at the ceiling, I strain to remember. Every week seems the same around here, the days seamlessly blending into one giant mushy time sponge. But I sort of remember thinking I’d do something nice and take Peter’s shirts and that tie I spilled wine on (in my defence, it was abnormally splashy wine) to the dry cleaner’s around the corner. The guy had given me the tag and told me to come back . . . Monday.
Shit. Monday last week. Eight days ago.
“Oh, um . . . they needed extra time to get that wine stain out,” I fib. “Sorry I didn’t tell you.”
Peter’s face relaxes. “Oh, okay. I thought you’d forgotten, as usual.”
“Of course not,” I say, coughing as more crumbs make their way down my throat. As usual? When was the last time I forgot to get the dry cleaning? Oh, right. Pretty much always. A geyser of frustration gushes inside me. Why can’t I remember all these pesky domestic details? No matter how hard I try, they always slip my mind.
I make a mental note to pick up the shirts and tie on my way home from work tonight. Peter’s got his monthly dinner with all the other cosmeticians (he gets so annoyed when I call them that, but ‘cosmetic surgeons’ just seems too pompous), so I’ll be on my own. I’m planning an exciting evening of takeaway curry. Then I’ll use lots of dishes and leave them wherever I want. It will be nice to have a breather from Peter’s all-dishes-must-be-washed-as-soon-as-they-touch-the-surface regimen.
I feed Smitty his organic cat food and mushed-up meds, then Peter and I head out the door, into the silent corridor, and down to the street. Just like I do when I leave the clinic, I let the sounds of traffic and the noise of people wash over me, taking in a deep breath of that wonderfully sooty London smell. I love this city. If I breathed in too deeply in Harris, I’d probably get a noseful of eau de manure.
We walk at Peter’s break-neck pace to the clinic. It’s only eight-thirty and we open at nine, but sometimes the women are pacing around out front just waiting for us. They stare daggers at me like it’s my fault we’re late, even though they’re the ones who can’t tell time.
What makes it worse is that Peter actually apologises, then tells me to get them coffee, tea, Ex-Lax, and any other mushy food they consume. When we first opened, we actually had biscuits in the waiting room – until Mrs Rhinod, a recovering gastric-band patient, binged and had to be rushed to hospital. Now we have yoghurt.
For once, though, I don’t mind being rushed – I’m dying to check my inbox. I flick on the computer, nervously tapping my nails on the desk as it boots up. Please please please, I chant, clicking on Outlook and holding my breath. This could be it. The pot of gold at the end of my pitch rainbow.
But . . . I let out my breath. There’s nothing. Nothing. Not even spam. Disappointment floods into me, and I slump onto the stool. I was so sure this was the pitch that would launch me straight to my dream job.
Maybe everyone’s right, I sigh, clicking open the patient schedule. Maybe I should give up, focus on a real career. Join the pasty-faced zombies I see every morning on the street lurching toward the Tube.
I give my head a little shake to clear the depressing thought.
“Dream it, live it,” I whisper, repeating my mother’s favourite mantra. Whenever I was faced with anything I doubted, Mom would smile, throw back her braids, and repeat those words over and over.
Dream it, live it. I’m not going to give up. All I need is just one foot in the door. If Leza doesn’t respond by the end of the day, there’s always Metro. I try to push down the hard knot of disappointment, heart sinking even more as I spot that the first patient today is none other than the hideous Madame Lucien (or Madame Lucifer, as I like to call her). I’m so not in the mood for her antics. If there’s a speck of dust that dares settle on a nearby surface, she sputters like she’s going to throw up a lung, rolling her eyes back into her head in a most unattractive way. Peter had to tell her to stop hacking so much or her recent ear-pinning might come loose.
But the funniest thing is, she refuses to acknowledge my existence – even to pay!
She swans in, gets Botoxed to the eyeballs, then walks out without even looking at me. The first time it happened, I chased her into the street, banging on the dark windows of her car. She rolled down the window and – eyes firmly fixed on a spot over my shoulder – told me to take up ‘the matter’ with her assistant. My jaw nearly hit the ground. Back in Harris, we call that stealing.
Still, she can provide a bit of entertainment. I try my best sometimes to hunt down a mega dust-bunny, strategically place it just peeping out from under the sofa, then await the explosion. And I always ask her to pay – loudly, exaggerating my accent – even though she totally blanks me each time.
What can I say? It’s the little things that get me through the day.
After Madame Lucien, I’ll have a bit of a breather, perfect for reading my favourite websites: Gawker, Heat, The Daily Planet, and, of course, Metro. If I’m feeling more upmarket I might hit Hello! and maybe click onto the Guardian and The New York Times so I can feel my university degree wasn’t in vain.
The door opens and in sweeps Madame Lucien, wearing her ridiculously large dark glasses. She walks right by me and sinks into a chair at the far end of the waiting room. Of course she can’t breathe the same air as me.
“Hello, Madame Lucien!” I say, smiling like I’ve just devoured a whole packet of Jaffa Cakes. The bigger the Botox Bitch, the sweeter I try to be. It’s my passive-aggressive way of showing they won’t break me.
Madame Lucien lifts her head a fraction of an inch and gives it a little shake, like she’s not quite sure where that strange noise is coming from.
I’M OVER HERE! I want to yell.
“I trust you had a pleasant journey?” I say instead, like she’s come from Siberia not Mayfair.
No response. God, I do wish I’d tracked down that dust bunny.
“Oh, bonjour, Doctor,” Madame Lucien says as Peter comes into the reception area. She raises her sunglasses and stands, kissing Peter on both cheeks.
I shake my head at the transformation in her behaviour. Of course she’s nice to him. Who wouldn’t be? He’s about to inject acids and paralytic bacteria into her face. I’d be nice to Hannibal Lecter if he was going to do that to me.
“Come, Madame Lucien.” Peter takes her arm, escorting her into his room as if she’s the Queen. I snort. The Queen of the Botox Bitches, more like.
As I plonk back down on the stool, my eyes flick to my email and I nearly fall over. There’s a response. From Leza Larke! My heart almost pounds itself right out of my chest, and the Jaffa Cakes I’ve eaten for breakfast shift uncomfortably. Part of me wants to let the email sit there, bolded black, and hang on to the possibility that it could be a yes. The beginning of my tabloid career, right there in my inbox.
When I can bear it no more, I take a breath and double-click the email.
Interesting. Call me.
I stare at the words, grinning lik
e an idiot. Leza Larke thinks my pitch is interesting. Leza Larke wants me to call her!
I breathe in a few more times to steady myself then creep down the corridor. Peter’s door is closed and I can hear him telling Madame Lucien not to worry if she can still move her forehead; the Botox may take a while to set. Based on my experience, it’ll be a good ten minutes or so before she’s convinced, so I’m safe to make my call.
Settling back on the stool, I get out my mobile and punch in the number in Leza’s email signature.
“Leza,” a voice barks after one ring.
“Hi, Leza? It’s Serenity Holland?” God, I sound like I’m ten.
“Who?”
“Um, I just sent you a pitch? About the man and cosmetic surgery . . .” My voice trails off.
“Oh yes. Sounds interesting. Here’s what I’m thinking.”
My heart is beating so fast I can barely take in her bullet-like phrases.
“We’re launching a health and beauty website called Beauty Bits on Friday, and we still need content. I’d like you to write a column on this man; follow his progress. A blow-by-blow account of the whole thing.”
“Okay!” I squeak. Breathe. Breathe.
“I want you to write about more than the surgery stuff. This man will undergo an all-round transformation, courtesy of our readers.”
“Courtesy of our readers?” I echo, wondering what she means.
“Yeah. We’ll use polls to have them choose what this bloke does to himself. Dress him up in a tux, design his stubble, cut his hair, whatever. They’ll select his new body parts, too. We’ll let them think that, anyway – don’t worry too much about what he actually does; that doesn’t matter. It’s all about having the readers feel like they’re in control. We’ll call the column Build a Man.”
“Wow. Great idea.” Now I sound like a bleating goat.
“We don’t have a budget for freelancers. So you won’t be paid. But if your columns get a lot of hits and you can keep up the pace, we may consider you for a junior position on staff.”
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