by Simon Brooke
“So where were you when I rang?” I ask. “Why were you ‘sort of’ out?”
She grimaces. “I was keeping a low profile.”
“From me?”
“Oh, no, like I said, I tried to ring you but 2cool isn’t in the phone book yet and I only had Piers’s mobile. He said he’d get you to call me but obviously he didn’t pass on the message.”
“Obviously not.” Thanks, Piers. I make a mental note to ask him about that when I see him. “So you were just avoiding someone else you’d libelled?”
“No, no,” she says, holding her glass in both hands and looking away while she begins her story. “It’s really embarrassing, actually. I’d just done something really stupid.”
“Something else?”
“Something else?”
“I mean in addition to that article.”
“Oh, not that again.”
“So what was it you did that was really stupid?”
“I was sending this email to my friend Gemma saying, ‘I’m going to the Ladies, meet you there.’ You know, it was for a girlie chat. Thing is we both quite fancy this guy in the office. I’m sure he’s gay but never mind. Anyway, unfortunately, her last name is Allworthy. That’s not the unfortunate bit, after all it’s quite a nice name, isn’t it? Don’t you think? Allworthy.”
“Lovely,” I say, wondering where the hell this story is going.
“No, the unfortunate bit is that instead of clicking on ‘Allworthy, Gemma’ in the ‘Send To’ box, I clicked on ‘All Staff.’”
She pauses.
“So all the staff at the newspaper got an email from you inviting them to meet you in the loo?”
“Basically, yes.”
I consider it for a moment. Then I realise that actually it’s probably the funniest thing I’ve heard all night, all week, and I find myself almost crying with laughter. When I look back at her, wiping my eyes, she has a “What can you do?” expression on her face.
“So did anyone turn up?” I ask her, not too seriously.
“Well, I’m told that quite a few people did. Even the boys from the mail room were sticking their noses round the door out of interest. I think they thought drugs were involved. Apparently the fashion editor went, but she doesn’t have a lot to do at the moment because there aren’t any shows on, as you know. Who else? A couple of people from the newsdesk popped in. Actually it was quite sweet—the editor’s secretary emailed me back to say that he couldn’t come because he had a lunch booked with the foreign secretary.”
“Has he no sense of priorities?” I demand.
“He’ll never get anywhere in journalism with that attitude,” says Nora.
Just then the music pauses and there is a kind of fanfare from the rather spookily placed minispeakers around us. “Ladies and gentlemen,” says a voice. “This is 2cool2btrue dot com.”
Suddenly the video wall is alive. To the sound of some chilled-out instrumental beat which rises and turns into a dance anthem, we see some of the images I saw in the office but which are now enhanced. They seem to appear out of nowhere and disappear by blending into each other, drawing us in and spinning us round. I almost feel like I’m losing my balance at one point.
You can tell how impressed people are with the graphics and the breathtaking special effects by the fact that after the show there is a stunned silence before the applause begins.
Guy then appears and says, as if he means it, “Wow.”
There is a ripple of laughter from the audience and then he begins to speak without notes about the importance of labels and branding in the third millennium, singling out, sometimes admiringly and sometimes teasingly but always charmingly, representatives amongst the audience from Vogue, Dunhill, Tanner Krolle, Rolls-Royce, Salvatore Ferragamo and Cartier amongst others. Then he moves on to his theory that what they have done for clothes, accessories, cars, electronics, and watches, 2cool will now do for the Internet. He is self-deprecating about his knowledge of Internet technology, and even more so when he talks about dotcom startups—and closedowns—to the further amusement of the audience, but then he talks about why 2cool will be different.
I look around me as he speaks. There are certainly some very clever people here and many of them look intrigued, heads to one side, brows furrowed, eyes narrowed, shrewdly. Not necessarily wowed—they’re obviously too cool, too blasé for that—but they certainly seem interested by this rather serious, intense young man with pale skin and piercing eyes, his dark hair receding into a widow’s peak, and his slight stoop. He looks more like a political speechwriter or a City economist than an entrepreneur, let alone a style guru. Perhaps that is why his audience is so gripped—he is not one of them, but he certainly has a certain nervy, edgy charisma.
Beside me is Nora. Eyes fixed in an intense, shrewd gaze that I have not seen before. She seems to be weighing up every word and analysing it, somehow thinking beyond it. I ought to ask her if she’s going to write this up as an article. Is that what she’s thinking? She looks away from Guy for a moment and sees me watching her. We smile at each other uncertainly.
Embarrassing. Never mind, I could just be checking her reaction along with everyone else’s like any good marketing man.
But I’m wondering why she is called Nora. Funny name, Nora. Kind of name your great aunt is called. She sure is a strange girl. Inviting the entire office to meet her in the loo! Is she really that daft? I can’t tell. Anyway, why should I care that she fancies some bloke in the office?
Apparently slightly taken aback and overwhelmed by the enthusiastic reception he generates, Guy mutters some thanks and hands over to Piers before walking off the stage. He’s the least smart, cool thing about the whole evening and yet somehow by far the most intriguing. Piers, by contrast, is confident and relaxed. He introduces himself, makes a few obvious but funny jokes about dotcoms and designer labels and then explains that food is about to be served, but first he would like to express the company’s gratitude to a few people for making tonight such a success.
“I’d especially like to thank Simon and Charlotte from The Communications Game, who have put in so much hard work this evening,” says Piers. “Simon, take a bow, matey, well done.” There is a round of polite applause as people begin to look over to where the food is coming from.
“Fuckin’ ass wipe,” hisses a voice next to me. It’s Heaven.
“And also to Charlotte. Charlotte…where is she?” A spotlight swivels round and falls on a small, timid-looking girl wearing a pink ball dress obviously designed for someone bigger and more outgoing. “Here she is. Well done, Charlotte. You’ve done a splendid job here tonight.” Charlotte beams, some people begin to applaud. “And I know you haven’t been well the last couple of days.” Her smile weakens. “Poor Charlotte.” The smile evaporates altogether. “Chronic diarrhoea,” booms Piers sympathetically. “Sounds like it must have been awful.” Charlotte’s face is frozen in a mixture of horror and a desperate supplication to Piers to just fucking shut up. “Can’t have been much fun but glad you’ve made it tonight.” A couple of people move discreetly but noticeably away from her. “And…er…let’s just hope there’s plenty of Imodium or something in that beautiful handbag she’s carrying,” adds Piers for good measure.
I can’t bring myself to look back at Charlotte but I am sure she is now on her way to the Ladies either to cry her eyes out or to…well, I find myself hoping, like Piers, that the Imodium is working.
I turn to ask Nora what she thinks, as much as anything to explain my staring at her in that very obvious way during the presentation, but she has turned to talk to someone else.
“Hey, you look great this evening,” she says to someone just out of view behind a pillar. I look round to see who it is and recognise her instantly. Instead of appearing flattered, the weather woman looks alarmed by Nora’s compliment and moves away quickly.
After the speeches, I congratulate Zac, who has made no effort in his dress at all tonight—baggy combats and tie-dy
ed, sleeveless green T-shirt with the words “Eat the Poor” on it. He mutters something and crams some food into his mouth as if he hasn’t eaten for a week. Then I try and find Lauren. She and Peter are also getting some food so I grab a plate and join them.
“What do you think?” I ask casually.
“Pretty bloody amazing,” says Lauren. “That film is incredible—I didn’t know it was possible to do that.”
I smile modestly. I wait for her to kiss me but she just shakes her head in wonderment.
“Very impressive,” says Peter. “Is that PictureMark they’re using?”
“Is it what?”
“For those dissolves in between the stills and the principal sequences—is it PictureMark they’ve used there? I’d heard it can do things like that, even in an off-line edit.”
“It’s PictureMark Super,” I lie blithely, chasing a giant shrimp around my plate and catching it elegantly before I stab it, feeling the fork push its way in and the flesh satisfyingly giving way to the sharp metal. “Do you want to dance, babe?” I suggest. “They’ve imported this guy specially from New York. He’s only here for a few hours, then he’s off to Ibiza. We’re paying him fifty grand for it. Can you believe it?”
“Not yet,” she says. “Peter wants me to meet this woman from…where is she from?”
“Channel Five. They’re looking for new programme talent.”
“I’ll introduce you if you want,” I say. “I’ve just been talking to her. She wants to do a promotion with us.”
“Don’t worry,” says Peter. “We were at Cambridge together. She’s an old, old mate.”
“Sure,” I say and walk off. There must be a way to separate Lauren from him, perhaps with a crow bar, I think as I wander around the room. I suddenly realise that the girls on the soundtrack arranged by the ultracool DJ are groaning:
Hey, babe.
Do you wanna ride me?
Do you wanna come inside me?
Perhaps I’m just getting old, but that is bloody rude isn’t it? Suddenly someone slaps me on the back.
“How’s it going?”
It’s Piers.
“Great,” I say miserably.
“Splendid,” he bawls.
I find myself talking to a woman from an expensive shoe company.
“Think Jimmy Choo on acid,” she says.
“Okay.” I don’t think I could imagine that even if I was on acid.
“Think classic with a surrealist twist.”
“Right.”
“We’re talking deconstructionism taken to its logical, terrifying conclusion—in terms of slingbacks, anyway.”
“I see.” I wish I did have some acid now.
Suddenly she takes a step further towards me and says, “After all, you know what they say: ‘Shoes are the windows of the soul.’”
“It is all pretty impressive isn’t it?” I say to Lauren as she nestles under my shoulder in the car on our way home. It’s gone four and we were almost the last to leave. Guy and Piers are still chatting up the remaining potential investors and partners. Peter is talking to some “old mates” from the Beeb and Nora must have gone without saying good-bye to me.
“Oh, yes, it’s amazing. Your friend Guy certainly knows his stuff.”
“He’s brilliant. So…what’s the word? Cerebral. I think that’s why they like him. They sense that here is someone with something new, something different to offer. Did you have a good time?”
“We did, yeah.”
We? What’s with this we?
“Peter enjoyed himself too, did he?”
“Yes, it turned out he knew quite a few people there. Mind you he knows so many people.” Now that his name has been introduced again it feels as if he is in the car with us, crammed on the back seat. The atmosphere is suddenly soured. My arm’s going to sleep a bit anyway so I pull it out from under Lauren’s head, perhaps a bit more roughly than I had intended. We sit in silence as the car speeds along Knightsbridge.
Finally Lauren says, “Who was that strange-looking girl you were talking to?”
“Which strange-looking girl?” I ask unnecessarily.
“The one in the maroon dress. You seemed to be having a great laugh at one point.”
“Oh, her. That’s that journalist who wrote the piece in the Post.”
“Oh.” There is a pause as store windows fly past, their reflections dancing over us. A few late-night stragglers walk backwards looking for cabs and night buses or joke with their mates, while others stagger around drunk. “Well, you seemed to be giving her a good talking-to like you said you would.”
Lauren’s sarcasm hangs in the air like a challenge. I try to neutralise it.
“We discussed the piece and she explained why she’d written it.”
Silence.
“And that’s that?”
Silence.
“What do you want me to say? We discussed it. I told her what I thought of it, she told me why she’d written it the way she had and that was that. Piers asked her to do it like that apparently.”
Silence. With Peter and Nora in the car with us now, things are getting very cramped and uncomfortable.
“I see.”
Silence.
“Look, I’ve got to keep her onside. She’ll be very useful.”
“Huh. What for?”
“For promoting the site. Now let’s leave it shall we?”
“What’s her name again?”
“Nora. Nora Benthall.”
“Never heard of her,” says Lauren. “She’s obviously slept her way to the bottom.”
Lauren and I get ready for bed in silence. When I get in she has her back to me. I wriggle over to her and put an arm round her. She mutters something about being tired.
Chapter
10
It takes me ages to get to sleep. My mind is still buzzing from the party. I’ve got lunches arranged from now until the end of my life and there is a stack of business cards on the dressing table. I can still hear the voices: “So exciting,” “Excellent product,” “So looking forward to doing business with you,” “You certainly have a wonderful proposition here,” “Tremendous opportunities for developing synergies.” Or something like that. Smart people, rich people, powerful people, famous people asking for a piece of the action, a piece of me.
The light wakes me up. I reach round instinctively for Lauren, looking for some lazy Saturday morning sex. The kind where you don’t mind if you come or not. But she’s not there. The curtains are open already. I squint my eyes up against the harsh, unforgiving light. I can smell coffee. I fumble for my watch and check the time: just before eleven. I get up and stumble into the kitchen. Lauren is chewing on a piece of toast and flicking through the newspaper. I come up and put my arms round her, nestling into her hair and kissing her neck.
“Morning, hon,” she says quietly, still reading the paper.
“You’re up early,” I say, wandering over to the fridge.
“Mmm? Yeah, I know, we’ve got access to a studio today, so I’m going to do some autocue practise.”
“What? Today? But you were at it last Saturday.”
“Yes. That’s when the studio’s free. Do you know how much these things cost to rent? Thousands. Thank goodness Peter knows someone who said we could borrow it for nothing.”
“So you’re going to a studio this Saturday as well?” A pretty pointless summary of the situation, but I want her to understand how ridiculous it is that she’s working all day, given that we’ve seen so little of each other over the last week or so. Instead she takes the opposite view.
“Yes, like I say, it makes obvious sense.”
“When will you be finished?”
“I don’t know. When I’ve had enough. When Peter thinks I’ve done all I can.”
“Will you be back by five?” I ask, drinking orange juice out of the carton because I know it will annoy her.
“I don’t know, Charlie, please don’t pressurise me.” I turn up the
sulk meter a bit more. She comes over to me and studies me for a moment, then she laughs. “You look like a little boy with your hair all messed up.”
I narrow my eyes at her with mock crossness.
She laughs again, takes the carton out of my hand, puts it back and then says, “What am I going to do with you?”
I look into her eyes, pull her towards me and say, “I can think of one thing.”
She pinches my cheek and giggles. “That’ll have to wait.” She pulls away. “I’m going to be late.”
I catch her arm but, instead of asking her what she wants to do tonight I find myself saying, “Do you love me?”
She pushes my hair out of my eyes.
“’Course I do.”
I pick up the paper after Lauren has gone and begin to flick through it, making my way towards the sport to see whether Chelsea are at home. Halfway through there is an article by Nora along with a picture of her, looking cheekily over her black-framed glasses. It’s called “Why I’ll Never Marry a Man Who Waxes His Behind.” I have to read the title twice to make sure I’ve got it right. The piece is about how women hate male vanity and how she and her friends (who are her friends? Other clever, barmy women with strange names? Or does she just invent them too?) would rather have a man with shaggy nose hair than one who spends hours in the bathroom cutting it with his nail scissors. It seems that her friend Amanda, who works in marketing, once went out with a bloke who waxed his butt—hence the headline. My buttocks clench at the thought of it. They clench even tighter as I read on.
Male models shave their chests. Can you imagine a greater turn off? Most women I know like curling their fingers around a light dusting of chest hair. The idea of a waxed, fake-tanned chest is about as attractive as low-calorie, frozen risotto compared to the real thing, oozing wickedly butter and parmesan and eaten overlooking the Canale Grande.