by Rachel Dove
He picked up the phone from his desk, viewing all the missed calls from the village women. None from Amanda, he noticed. He opened the text screen, scrolling the names, and stared at the blank screen. What would he write? Hello? Are you OK? Come back? He remembered what she had said when she was on drugs in the hospital. About her dreams, about him. Was it Marcus she was talking about? She had never really told him why she came here; maybe it was something bad. Maybe she was afraid of him. He shook his head. What an idiot. He had just driven off and left her with that man. Maybe he should have punched him after all. Steeling his resolve, he typed out a message and hit the ‘send’ button before he could second-guess his decision. It was time to do something, and Ben had just decided that today would be the day to do it.
Amanda walked into the foyer of Stokes Partners at Law and marvelled at how little had changed. Smiling at the receptionist, she headed to the elevator, Marcus in tow.
They hadn’t spoken in the taxi, and that suited her just fine. She was still feeling groggy, weak, and the travelling and lack of sleep had definitely taken its toll. She was relieved when Marcus took her straight to one of the large meeting rooms, which was empty, and shuffled off to get the Kamimura files. The contract was on deadline, and whatever work needed to be done, it was obviously important if they had called her in to sort out her failures, although she still didn’t get why. Marcus had been in charge of the contract from day one. Her error had been helping him in the first place, and she had more than paid for that. What could she do now that Marcus couldn’t?
She walked over to the window, taking in the London skyline. She remembered how much she used to love the views from these windows, watching the heart of England live and breathe below her as she worked away, day after day. Now she found herself feeling lost, longing for the view she had from her little flat on Baker Street, that looked down on the street below, and the fields, hills and meadows beyond. Marcus broke the silence as he bounded through the double doors, files and pens bundled in his arms. He dumped the lot on the table and headed over to the phone, ordering coffee and sandwiches from reception. Amanda said nothing, turning away from the window to look at him questioningly.
‘No one else coming?’ she said, as she registered that he had asked not to be disturbed for the day.
Marcus replaced the receiver and avoided her gaze. ‘Er, no, we can do this together.’
‘Marcus,’ she said sternly. ‘If you think that spending the day with you like old times is going to change my mind about you being a colossal sleazebag, you are in for a big disappointment.’
Marcus nodded, taking a seat in front of the files. Pulling out a chair for her, he looked at her earnestly.
‘Mandy,’ he started.
‘My name is A-M-A-N-D-A,’ she said, cringing at the name he used for addressing her. She flashed to a memory of Ben calling her Manda, and ignored the way her heart squeezed with pain. That nickname she didn’t mind, and she didn’t think that she would hear it again. ‘I hate Mandy. Especially when you say it.’
Marcus sighed, pushing his hair back from his face with a tight fist. ‘Sorry, sorry,’ he said. ‘I am trying, Amanda. Once this contract is done, I really think I can have a word with Stokes, get you back in. I hated the way you left, and I want to help.’ He looked sincere for once. ‘It’s the least I can do.’
Amanda nodded then, walking over to take the seat next to him, pulling it away slightly before she sat down. ‘Fair enough. I suppose we can call a truce, till this is done at least.’ Marcus smiled pitifully at her, and she gave him a sly look. ‘Just try not to sleep with anyone in the meantime, OK?’
Several hours and a few curled tuna sandwiches later, Amanda was exhausted. She couldn’t believe the mess that the files were in. Marcus had not done a thing since she had left, as far as she could see, and if the transfer and completion were going to take place on time, it would take a hell of a lot of work and a whole lot of faith too.
‘Marcus, how can you have left it like this, to get this bad?’
Marcus reached for the coffee pot, pulling a face when he saw that it was long cold. ‘I just got overwhelmed, my caseload as new partner is massive, and I was just blind to how bad things were, I suppose.’
‘I feel sorry for you, really,’ she said sarcastically. ‘People would kill to be partner, and you are moaning. I don’t even know how you got it anyway! You work part-time, if that!’
Marcus jumped up, coffee pot in hand. ‘I’ll go get some more coffee, shall I?’
Amanda rolled her eyes. ‘Fine, make yourself useful, but we are not done here. Something doesn’t add up, and unless you have been sleeping with Mr Stokes to get to the top, then you are up to something.’
Marcus made a weird squeak deep in his throat, and scuttled through the door. ‘Don’t go anywhere,’ he pleaded with her as he went out. ‘A lot of folk don’t know you are back, and the questions will just waste precious time.’
Amanda sighed heavily. Great, stuck in this room with that weasel till the job was done. She suddenly longed for her chic little boutique and its freedom.
She rummaged in her handbag, reaching for her mobile phone. She had better check in with home, see how the shop and the cats were. She would be worrying everyone by now, and leaving Ben to look after her cats wasn’t her finest hour. She hoped that Dotty would take them in till she could get home. She wondered what Ben was doing, and pictured him sitting at his desk at the practice, working away. She felt a pang as she remembered how she had lain in his embrace only days before, wrapped in his muscular tanned arms, smothered by his sweet, bristly kisses, and felt a tear drip onto her cheek. She missed him so much it hurt. She had never felt so herself as she had with him, and now, sitting here, firmly back in her old life, she felt trapped, and she didn’t like it one bit. She put the phone, still switched off, back into her bag. She would wait till she knew when she would be coming back before speaking to anyone. She was desperate to know whether or not Ben had contacted her too, but she feared that if he hadn’t her concentration would be lost for the day. Hope was a wonderful thing, until it was lost, and she wanted to cling on to it a little longer.
Getting up, she felt the pops and clicks in her back as she stretched, and she yawned loudly. Where was Marcus with that coffee? She decided to venture out of the meeting room, slyly dash to the kitchen to grab a cup. Walking into the corridor, she didn’t see anyone. Glancing at the clock, she saw it was just after eleven—everyone would be firmly attached to their desks till lunch. She was just at the door to the kitchen when a voice halted her.
‘Miss Perry?!’ a surprised voice said. Whirling around, Amanda saw her old secretary Elaine standing there.
‘Elaine! Hi!’ she said, rushing to hug her. Elaine stiffened in her arms, and she realised that Elaine wasn’t accustomed to this new, warmer, huggier version of herself. She giggled. ‘Sorry, I didn’t mean to startle you.’
Elaine shook her head, looking Amanda up and down as she grasped her hands. ‘No, no, it’s fine! You look amazing! Where are you working now? I tried to call, and I went to your flat, but you had left.’
Amanda nodded. ‘I sold up, I needed a change.’
Elaine grinned. ‘Well you look great, and listen, I tried to get in touch, I have something to tell you, something really—’
‘Elaine!’ Marcus said, coming out of the kitchen with a coffee pot in hand. ‘Have you no work to do?’
Elaine scowled at him, and Amanda could have kissed her former secretary for her show of loyalty. ‘It’s OK, Elaine, Marcus is actually helping me sort things out with the firm.’
‘Yes, yes, that’s right,’ Marcus said hurriedly. ‘Hopefully Amanda will be coming back with us very soon,’ he said, gripping Amanda’s elbow and steering her back to the meeting room.
Amanda brushed him away, smiling at Elaine. ‘Well no, we don’t know that. I am not even sure I want to come back, but I want to make things right.’
Elaine opened her m
outh to speak but Marcus grabbed Amanda again and pushed her to the door. ‘Yes, well, we can work out the details later, but right now we have some work to do, and I am sure Elaine does too.’
Amanda glanced apologetically back at Elaine as Marcus practically catapulted her through the double doors. ‘Sorry, Elaine, he is right, more’s the pity, but we can catch up soon, yeah?’
Elaine nodded, looking through Amanda straight to Marcus. ‘Oh you can bet on that, Amanda.’ And with one last glare, she walked off.
Amanda frowned, reaching for the coffee pot that Marcus seemed to be trying to absorb through his skin with his tight grip. ‘Marcus, let go!’
He released his grip, and looked at her as though he was about to say something, but then thought better of it. He sat at the desk, and buried his head in a file. Amanda took a grateful glug, eyeing him over her coffee cup. Men, she thought to herself, she would never understand them or their mood swings. As the caffeine started to buzz through her system, she picked up a file. The sooner she closed this deal and finalised the contract, the sooner she could get out of here.
Dotty was just making coffee for a customer at the practice, something she often did when anxious owners were sat waiting for news, when her phone buzzed in the pocket of her trousers. Serving the customers, she waited till they were seated till she sat back at her desk and opened the message. It was from Agatha, with details of their train times listed. At their meeting, they had gone back and forth with suggestions and ideas, Grace’s idea of a shotgun wedding complete with real shotgun being the worst, until they decided that if Mohammed wouldn’t come to the mountain, then the mountain would saddle up and get on a train to London. Hetty had tracked Amanda’s old firm down after scouring the internet, and had been put through to a woman called Elaine, who confirmed that Amanda was working there for the next few days. Everything was in place, they would be back within the day, and New Lease, being worked on by the builders, could stand without them for a while. Hetty suspected that the builders would actually be glad to be shot of them for a little bit.
The only thing that they needed to work on now was Ben, but Dotty hadn’t been able to speak two words to him on anything apart from work, and he had planned his clinics so tight that he was working before she arrived and long after she left. She had tried to get his attention, but Ben had rebutted her at every turn, and time was running out. She was off for the day tomorrow, the day of the London plan, and she needed to make him see sense. She was still staring at the text, contemplating her next attempt, when Ben appeared next to her. ‘Dotty, can you do me a favour tomorrow? I am going to London overnight, and I need someone to take the cats while I am gone.’
Dotty looked at him open-mouthed. ‘You? You’re going to London? Tomorrow?’
Ben raised a brow, frowning. ‘Yes. Me. I am going to London for the night, and I need someone to look after the kittens.’
Dotty wanted to jump up and down on the spot with glee. He must be going to get Amanda! Composing herself mentally, she shook her head, trying not to grin. ‘Sorry, Ben, but I can’t, the girls and I have something planned. Going anywhere special?’ she enquired as innocently as she could.
Ben wasn’t listening though, he was dialling a number on his mobile phone. ‘Mr Jenkins?’ he said into the handset. ‘I need a favour, if you could, please. I need someone to watch the kittens, as I am going away for a couple of days.’ He nodded as Alf replied to him, and a flash of pain struck his face like a lightning bolt. ‘Er yes, Mr Jenkins, Amanda will be away too.’
Dotty tried to concentrate on the computer screen in front of her as she heard the booming voice of Alf Jenkins through the phone, congratulating him on ‘getting it together’ with Amanda. Ben stood silent, and eventually thanked Alf and ended the call.
‘Ben?’ Dotty said lightly. He turned to her and Dotty could have broken her own heart for him. He looked devastated, and she knew it must have been hard to hear, when the truth was so much more uncertain. ‘You OK, duck?’
Ben nodded slowly. ‘I’m fine, Dotty. He is going to look after the cats. I better get back to work.’
He went back to his examination room before she could formulate a reply. Whatever Ben’s plan was, she hoped it would work. She picked up her phone and fired off a group text, telling the others that Ben would be going there under his own steam. The ladies’ excited replies all came back thick and fast, with a shotgun emoji from Grace, and she smiled at their enthusiasm. They decided that they would go to London all the same. They wanted to see Amanda too, and they had to be sure that she would come home. After all, leaving things to a man was never a sure thing.
The London sky hung like a drape outside the huge glass windows of the meeting room. Amanda was tucking into some pad thai, feet propped up on the table. Energy drink cans and empty cups of coffee littered the mahogany surface. It was well after 9 p.m., and Amanda was starting to long for her hotel room bed. Marcus was clueless, she knew that now. There was no way he would have been able to pull off this contract, and even though she had messed the paperwork up, filing the wrong forms, she had still done a better job than he had. She had no idea how he had been made partner, but she knew it wouldn’t last long. It couldn’t, the man had less legal knowledge than his ex-secretary, the boobalicious Angela, and that was saying something, given that the average pot plant had a higher IQ than her.
He was sat staring at her over a legal pad, chewing on a hangnail. She eyed him and sighed. ‘I think we are about done. It’s tight but it should be good to go before the board tomorrow for final checking.’ Marcus huffed out a huge puff of air like a deflating balloon. She half expected him to whizz off around the room.
‘That’s great,’ he said, smiling, relief obvious on his features. ‘I can’t thank you enough, I really can’t. I will speak to Mr Stokes tomorrow after the meeting, tell him you helped on this, get him to think about taking you back. It will be great working with you again.’
Amanda flashed to a future with the firm, watching Marcus take all the glory as usual for her work behind the scenes, now as a partner of the firm, whilst she spent long hours working at her desk, making the faceless rich even richer with every transaction, every billable hour another hour lost of her own life.
‘I don’t think I want to come back,’ she said before the thought had even formed fully in her head.
Marcus looked at her in horror. ‘Not come back? But why? You love your job!’
‘Loved,’ Amanda retorted. ‘Loved the job, till I made one mistake, albeit on a big account. I made one mistake after years of hard work, missed birthdays, weekends, holidays, and they bin me off. Just like that. Out the door.’
Marcus hung his head, not saying a word.
‘I just can’t forget that, Marcus. That’s why I came. To put things right. Put this to bed and get my parents off my back. Once the account goes through, I can look Mr Stokes in the face, draw a line under the whole thing and move on.’
Marcus’s jaw dropped. ‘You want to talk to Stokes?’
‘Yes, Marcus, of course I do. I will have to face him sometime, whether they want to take me back or not.’
Marcus paled. ‘Sure, sure,’ he muttered. ‘Never thought of that.’
Amanda nodded. ‘Yes, this needs closure. I can hold my head up high—I came, I fixed, I left.’
Marcus nodded weakly. ‘I suppose. Let’s just talk after the meeting, OK? You might change your mind yet.’
Amanda started to pack the files away, ready for the morning. ‘I doubt it, Marcus, I actually have a life now, and I am not in a hurry to give it back to the rat race.’
The commuters on the Westfield to London King’s Cross train might be forgiven for believing that they had stepped into Narnia the morning they encountered the Knit and Knatters of Westfield group. Taking over a corner of business class, the ladies were dressed in all their finery, ready to do battle in London. Grace, resplendent in cream and rose, was knitting away, the strand of wool coming as if from
nowhere from a large bag at her feet. Hetty and Marlene were both embroidering, and Dotty was on the laptop, using the free Wi-Fi to plan the reopening of the community centre with Agatha. Mrs Mayweather, complete with bluetooth headset and Clarks leather shoes, was patrolling the aisles, talking to the caterers, clipboard in hand. Taylor was sat reading the morning paper, occasionally looking over the pages at Agatha and the girls, chuckling at the bemused looks of the passengers on the morning commute. The announcer signalled their imminent arrival at King’s Cross, and the carriage heaved a mechanical sigh of relief. The girls hurriedly decamped, applied fresh lippie, aside from Taylor, of course, and charged out of the carriage doors, ready to get to Stokes Partners at Law.
Amanda had had no sleep again, once again stuck in the stifling heat of the hotel room, and unable to bear the noise from the window outside. She had dreamed the night before too, but this dream was new. She dreamed that she was under the water again, and Marcus was still chasing her under the waves, but this time he was trying to apologise, begging her to stop and listen. Once again she charged through the blue depths, trying to hit the surface, when she started to see something above the water, hovering over the top of the ocean water she was immersed in. She kicked on, ignoring Marcus, paddling and thrashing to hit the surface, lungs burning, but the surface never seemed any closer. As she started to slow down, spent, she spied something coming through the water, reaching for her. As her eyes closed, she heard someone shout for her. She prised open her tired eyes and, with her last ounce of strength, she forced her arm up. Her fingers just touched the hand, her slender digits brushing against it as it grasped hers, when she woke up.