‘Aren’t you going to eat that sandwich?’
Sasha shook her head and glared at her mother. Before she’d even had her first casting, the agency had baldly told her that she needed to lose at least a stone, so she had spent the last six months of her life hungry.
‘Fair enough. We don’t want you putting on too much weight over Christmas, do we?’
Christmas, thought Sasha. Perhaps now would be a good time to bring up the loan. She’d tried asking her father, but every time she mentioned it, he politely changed the conversation. Well, if you can’t ask during the season of giving... she thought.
‘Did you and Dad think any more about lending me the deposit for a flat?’
Carole put down her Earl Grey tea. ‘I fail to see why you need to move to town when you have a perfectly good bedroom in Esher.’
‘Come on, Mum. What about when I go out? It’s thirty pounds in a taxi from the King’s Road.’
‘Why do you need to be going to nightclubs all the time?’
‘You know I need to go out,’ said Sasha, exasperated. ‘I need to meet people, make contacts. It was the same in your day.’
Carole shrugged and looked away.‘What about Caroline’s house?’ she asked.
Sasha cast her eyes to the ceiling. Caroline was a friend from Danehurst who was now working at Pickton House publishers. For the last four months Sasha had had a tacit agreement with her: in return for Sasha getting Caroline and her two housemates into the many clubs and parties which routinely invited models from the agency, Caroline would let Sasha crash in their draughty end-of-terrace in Chelsea’s Flood Street. Not that she got a real bed; she was relegated to a camp bed in a corridor where they kept their bikes and coats. She would wake up with a crick in her neck and Caroline banging on about the fabulous night they’d had. She was beginning to think she had got the rough end of the bargain.
‘How can I look pretty for castings after sleeping on someone’s ratty couch?’
‘Is this about bringing men home?’ said Carole.
Sasha didn’t blush. She and her mother had always had a very open relationship when it came to sex; indeed, Carole had instilled in her daughter the importance of using her looks and body to snare a rich man. ‘Keep him happy in bed,’ she had said, ‘and he’ll keep your bank account full.’
‘No,’ she sighed. ‘But say I do meet a Hollywood film director in Raffles, I can hardly bring him back to my mum and dad’s house, can I?’
Carole sighed. ‘Look, we can probably give you the deposit, but how are you going to pay rent every month? You’re hardly snowed under with work.’
‘I’ll sort something out.’
Her mother looked sceptical. ‘Sorry, sweetie, I have to fly,’ she said, gathering her things. ‘I fancy quail tonight and if I don’t pop downstairs and buy it now, I’ll never make the five fifty train.’
Sasha felt anger rise up in her stomach. It didn’t seem so long ago that her mother would have done anything to improve the social lot of her only daughter. Why couldn’t she understand? Did she want Sasha to end up stranded in suburbia like her?
‘I see,’ said Sasha bitterly. ‘You can do your weekly shop at Harrods food hall and fill your wardrobe with clothes you hardly wear, but you can’t give your daughter a home.’
Carole glared at her. ‘Don’t speak to me like that.’
‘Well, I thought you wanted the best for me.’
‘Of course I do, but your father . . .’
Sasha frowned. ‘What about Dad? Doesn’t he want me to have a nice flat?’
With evident reluctance, Carole sat down again, then glanced around to make sure they weren’t being overheard.
‘If you must know, there’s been a change of management at your father’s company. They’ve been talking about redundancies.’
Sasha panicked. ‘Daddy’s going to lose his job?’
‘No, nothing like that. But he might have to go down to three or four days a week. It’s this bloody recession.’
Sasha put her hand over her mouth. ‘Oh God,’ she said. It had been bad enough lying about her background for so long, she couldn’t stand to actually be poor.
Carole put her hand on Sasha’s. ‘Don’t worry, your dad and I will be fine.’
It’s not you I’m worried about, thought Sasha, glancing at her mother’s carrier bags with irritation.
‘Can I give you some advice, mother to daughter?’ added Carole. ‘Why don’t you give Miles a ring?’
Sasha couldn’t believe her ears. Her mother had seen how upset she had been after she had flown back from Angel Cay. And anyway, she had tried to ring him – he didn’t seem too keen to pick up the phone.
‘What do you suggest, Mother?’ she said sarcastically. ‘That I should ask him to pay my rent?’
Carole waved the jibe away. ‘But darling, he’ll be back from Oxford for the holidays. He’ll have spent a whole term surrounded by all those plain, swotty bluestockings. Now’s the time to strike.’
Sasha stood up and pushed her chair in. ‘I can’t believe you’d suggest such a thing,’ she said, picking up her portfolio. ‘You may be happy to whore yourself to a man, but that is something I will never do.’
Registering with satisfaction the look of shock and outrage on her mother’s face, she turned on her heel and walked out. Well, if she won’t give me what I want, she thought, I’ll just have to get it myself.
And she smiled for the first time in days.
Standing in the warmth of Caroline’s bedroom, Sasha pulled the contents of her small overnight bag on to her friend’s bed. It was depressingly slim pickings for a night out. One dress, two tops and a pair of white jeans.
‘So what’s the party tonight?’ asked Caroline as she unselfconsciously stripped off.
‘Oh, just some drinks company. Are Deborah and Jenny coming out?’ Sasha asked. Caroline’s two housemates hadn’t been in when she arrived.
‘No. Deb’s got her office party and Jenny’s got this new boyfriend.’
‘The one she met at Raffles?’
‘The one with the Porsche. Anyway, speaking of those two . . .’ Caroline took a sip of her Lambrusco. ‘Debs was asking when . . . if you’re going to start paying some, er, some rent.’
‘Rent? For the bike shed?’
‘It’s part of the house,’ said Caroline.
Sasha snorted. ‘Barely.’
‘Look. Don’t shoot the messenger. I don’t think they were thinking much. More like a contribution to bills really.’
This was the last thing Sasha needed.
‘Frankly, I’m offended,’ she said. ‘It’s fine for me to bunk down when they want tickets to parties and free drinks and boys on tap, but as soon as Jenny gets a boyfriend I’m in the way.’
Caroline looked awkward. ‘Listen, between you and me, I think Jenny will be moving out soon anyway, so I’ll probably take her room and you could have this one.’
Sasha looked around and sighed. It wasn’t the room; it was a lovely room in a great house on one of Chelsea’s prettiest back streets. In fact, the prospect of landing a room here was the only reason she put up with sleeping with her face pushed up against a muddy tyre. The only reason, if she was honest, she put up with nights out with Caroline and her giggly friends when she could be socialising with the girls from the agency. But her mother was right: how was she going to pay the rent when she wasn’t earning a penny?
‘This house is a bargain for Chelsea,’ said Caroline.
Sasha caught a flicker of something on her friend’s face. Sympathy? God, was it pity? It was fine for Caroline, with her rich parents who had pulled strings to get her a job in publishing. It was a classic holding job for a pretty socialite, something to keep her busy until she inevitably met someone rich enough to marry. That was where she and Caroline differed. Caroline would be happy to settle for a husband called Jonty and the odd long weekend in Klosters. Sasha wanted the world and she wasn’t going to settle for anything less. Su
ddenly she was filled with purpose: she knew what she had to do.
She pulled on a clingy Ozbek tunic that stopped at the top of her thighs. She didn’t bother with a skirt; instead she pulled on silver tights and her black patent heels, adding smoky eyes and pale beige lips. The look was bold and striking, like Daryl Hannah in Bladerunner.
‘Wow! Sexy,’ said Caroline.
‘That’s the idea,’ she said. ‘Come on, I’ve got somewhere to take you.’
They walked on to King’s Road and flagged a taxi. Sasha leant in to the driver and told him the address.
‘I thought the party was in Notting Hill?’ said Caroline.
‘There’s been a change of plan.’
‘Ooh, I like surprises,’ said Caroline. ‘Will there be boys there?’
‘That, also, is the idea.’ Sasha smiled.
They pulled up outside The Embassy Club, the place Sasha had overheard the secretaries at D&D gossiping about. The queue for the agency’s Christmas party was long and boisterous, but Sasha wasn’t fazed, striding up to the doorman and giving him the benefit of her widest smile.
‘He’s got our tickets,’ said Sasha, waving towards the queue vaguely.‘But it’s cold out here.’ She smiled, touching his chest suggestively. He unhooked the velvet rope and waved her through.
‘Have we just gatecrashed someone’s office party?’ whispered Caroline.
‘Oh no,’ smiled Sasha, taking in the leery gazes of half a dozen men in expensive suits. ‘They definitely want us here.’
Sasha had been to dozens of Christmas parties in the past few weeks and had noticed that gatherings in the festive period had a particular energy, almost as if people had been freed from their usual roles and were allowed, for one night at least, to go wild. The D&D party was no different, with dozens of young women in short dresses and too much make-up eyeing up powerful-looking men with slick haircuts. The atmosphere was buoyed by alcohol, drugs and – particularly – the undercurrent of sex.
‘I’ve got a good feeling about tonight,’ said Sasha as Caroline headed off to the bar.
They have to be in here somewhere, she thought, scanning the crowd carefully. She glanced at her watch anxiously; she could imagine that a ball-breaker like the Benson account director would still be in the office, getting ahead of her male counterparts by clocking up overtime.
‘Hey, great dress,’ said a voice behind her.
Sasha turned to see a woman with sleek blond hair smoking a cigarette.
‘Actually it’s a top,’ she said cautiously.
She looked at the blonde more closely. Now she could see that the woman was stylish and actually quite striking, with almond-shaped eyes and high cheekbones. Handsome rather than beautiful, but still, she had the look of an ex-model.
‘Do you work in fashion?’ she asked.
‘Sort of.’ The woman smiled. ‘Do you?’
Sasha shrugged. ‘Yes, I’m with Elan Models.’
‘Well, you really have great personal style. Most people would look like Metal Mickey in that outfit, but you look . . . futuristic. Like a sexy robot.’
Sasha narrowed her eyes. Was this woman hitting on her?
The blonde laughed and stubbed out her cigarette. ‘Sorry,’ she said, holding out a hand. ‘Venetia James. I’m a clothes bore, I’m afraid.’
‘Sasha Sinclair. What do you do at D&D?’
‘I’m freelance. I had a job on one of their commercials yesterday and they invited me to this. I’m a stylist.’
‘A stylist?’ said Sasha, looking at her with more interest. ‘You mean like a fashion editor?’
‘Kind of. Except I don’t work for a magazine. I used to, though, for Vogue.’
‘Wow!’ said Sasha, letting her pose of bored indifference drop. ‘I bet it was amazing!’
Venetia smiled sadly. ‘You’d think so, wouldn’t you? Bloody hard work and I earned a pittance. Didn’t have a trust fund or rich boyfriend like most of them.’
‘So what do you now?’ Sasha asked, intrigued.
‘Catwalk, editorial, record company promos, lots of commercial stuff. Catalogues pay the most, even though I wouldn’t dream of telling anyone I work for them. I’ve got a few personal clients as well. My workload is getting crazy. Actually, you should think about styling, you’ve obviously got a good eye.’
‘Thanks,’ said Sasha, ‘but I do think I am just one break away from a big modelling career.’
Venetia smiled kindly. ‘That’s what I said ten years ago.’ She grinned and reached into her bag. ‘Let me give you my card anyway. You never know when our paths might cross. When I might need an assistant. You really do have a great look.’
Sasha thanked the woman and moved into the crowd. It was always good to make new contacts, but she was still keen to track down the Venus executive. She felt sure she’d screwed up the audition and would do whatever it took to remedy the situation.
‘Well, well, well,’ said an amused man to her left. ‘I didn’t know we’d had D&D staff auditioning to be the ice-cream girl.’
At first Sasha didn’t recognise him – he wasn’t wearing his John Lennon glasses and had swapped the turtleneck for a blue shirt. She breathed a sigh of relief: it was the art director from the casting.
‘You,’ she said.
He grinned. ‘I don’t why you’re so surprised, I work at D&D, remember?’
‘And I’m here with a friend,’ said Sasha vaguely.
‘Remind me of your name . . .’
She felt a pang of disappointment. Surely she must have left some impression?
‘Sasha Sinclair. And you are?’
‘Martin Newsome.’
‘Well, Martin Newsome,’ said Sasha as she shook his hand, ‘I think my agency are expecting to hear from you about my recall.’
‘So you think it went well?’ He grinned.
She smiled coquettishly. ‘You tell me.’
‘Kim and I are talking it over tomorrow. There’ll be a recall on Monday.’
‘And am I going to be hearing from you?’ she pressed. She knew she should be playing it cool, but she couldn’t face another night on Caroline’s camp bed.
‘We’ll see. Shall we go somewhere a bit quieter?’
She nodded, and allowed herself to be led towards the back of the club, where topless men wearing sashes of glasses handed out vodka shots.
Martin summoned a waitress. ‘Champagne,’ he commanded.
Nervously, Sasha threw back her flute in one go.
Laughing, Martin waved the waitress back. ‘Better give her another,’ he said.
Emboldened by the alcohol – she’d had three glasses of wine at Caroline’s and all on a permanently empty stomach – she met his gaze.
‘Well, if you want my opinion, I think your script is a bit stupid.’
‘Really?’ he said with surprise.
‘Well, not stupid. Just wrong. I mean, my agent said it was a premium product, which means Benson are going to be charging a lot for it. You want something sexier.’
‘Sexier?’ said Martin, raising an eyebrow.
‘I just think chocolicious sounds a bit cheesy. You should be saying something like “Venus ice cream. My guilty pleasure.”’
He gave her a wolfish smile. ‘I like the sound of the pleasure part.’
‘Please, just call me back,’ she said. ‘If Kim doesn’t like me, let me meet the Benson marketing director.’
She hated the desperation in her voice. This wasn’t Sasha Sinclair the confident ass-kicking bitch who ruled the roost at Danehurst. But something had changed in her since she’d arrived in London and she felt she was down to her last roll of the dice. She couldn’t go back to that semi in Esher, she just couldn’t.
‘Listen, Sasha, it needs the marketing director’s sign-off, but they are pretty much following our lead.’
‘So what are you going to recommend?’
‘That we steer away from those stick-insect models. I think we need someone a bit sexier.’
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Kiss Heaven Goodbye Page 10