Maximum Exposure: The Heartlands Series

by Harper, Jenny

  ‘Could you squat down here,’ she indicated a spot on the floor of the warehouse to the young man she was trying to photograph, ‘and look through the spokes of the bicycle, like this.’ She demonstrated. It was hard work. She’d tried a few different poses, but the guy was one of the shy ones.

  ‘So how many bikes are you sending out to Africa?’ Sharon asked from somewhere behind her.

  ‘Three hundred, first off,’ said the man, Bob Sampson, curtly. He might be charitable but no one had schooled him in media relations.

  ‘Three hundred?’ Sharon was incredulous. Pedal People was a charity set up to provide unwanted bikes so that poverty-stricken Africans could make the long commute, see family, get into the towns more easily, but Sharon had been pretty bored by the story – until she heard the figure. ‘Where’re you going to get them all from?’

  Bob shrugged. ‘Round and about. The church has put out an appeal. We go out in the van and collect ’em. Do ’em up a bit. Check the brakes ’n that.’

  Daisy leant forward and moved the bicycle a fraction so that the wheel spokes, rather than the frame, were in front of Bob’s face.

  Click. Click click. She snapped away as Sharon talked to him, eliciting the facts she needed for the story. It didn’t take long and within half an hour they were on their way back to the office. The warehouse where they’d been interviewing Bob Sampson was a short walk across the river, in one of the unlet units the charity had managed to secure for the project. They were strolling back into Hailesbank across the picturesque old sixteenth-century pedestrian bridge when Sharon raised the question of the paper again.

  ‘Ma Ruby was telling me there’ve been more complaints. Some guys wanting to set up a fiddle band tried to get a piece in and were told they’d have to place an advertisement.’

  Daisy, not thinking, said, ‘Don’t worry, Shar, it’ll be all right now. I had a really good chat with Jay over dinner last night and he …’

  ‘Over dinner?’

  ‘Yeah, he came to fetch me from Kelso ’cos I got stuck in the snow and we got stranded.’ She giggled. ‘We ended up sharing a room, it was so funny …’

  Sharon stopped dead. ‘You shared a room with Jay Bond?’

  Daisy, still giggling at the memory of pulling her jeans on under the bedclothes in case Jay came out the bathroom before she’d got them on, looked at Sharon, saw her face, and came to an abrupt halt.

  ‘It wasn’t anything, Sharon. Honestly. It –’

  ‘Fucking hell, Daisy Irvine, you know how I feel about Jay. I told you. And yet just a few days later you go and try to steal him from me. “Wasn’t anything”? Christ! The oldest excuse in the book. “It didn’t mean anything”. Do you think I came up the Clyde in a banana boat? Dinner for two, sharing a room for God’s sake! What a bitch you are, Daisy.’

  ‘I didn’t … we didn’t … It wasn’t like that.’

  ‘No? So what was it like? You shared as room with Jay Bond and you just looked the other way? Christ Almighty, Daisy, you expect me to believe that?’

  Daisy frowned. ‘Just because you wouldn’t, Sharon, you’ve no right to think everyone else is the same as you.’

  ‘Fucking preaching now are you? What a sodding hypocrite you are.’

  Sharon’s face was contorted with anger, the clear green eyes were blazing, her usual prettiness turned ugly by seething emotion.

  ‘Listen, Sharon, nothing happened. Honestly. Anyway, he’s still in love with his wife. He told me so.’

  Designed to take the edge off Sharon’s anger, her words had exactly the opposite effect. Sharon started towards Daisy as if she was going to attack her, then she stopped short, opened her bag, rummaged inside, and pulled something out.

  ‘Well fuck you, Daisy Irvine. I trusted you. I fucking trusted you!’

  She was holding the object high in the air, her fist tight round it, she was shaking it around. Daisy, looking upwards to see what she had in her hand, caught a glimpse of it a second before she threw it into the river.

  ‘Noooo!’ The scream wrenched out of her in a long, high-pitched wail that sounded unlike her own voice.

  The object was Tiny Ted. Her beloved bear. Her comfort bear from the days of her childhood. The bear she kept in her pocket, whose presence soothed her and calmed her. The bear that had protected her from her father’s wrath for as long as she could remember. Her amulet, her talisman, her good luck charm. Carelessly, she’d left him in the office – and Sharon had obviously spotted an opportunity to wreak revenge. So now all she could do was watch helplessly as he arced high into the air and fell with barely a splash into the fast-flowing waters of the Hailes far below them.

  Daisy stared at Sharon, too shocked to speak. Even through the reporter’s fury, the horror on Daisy’s face seemed to register.

  ‘Well,’ she muttered defiantly, snapping her handbag shut and slinging it back across her shoulder, ‘you can’t fucking blame me.’

  There was no time for recriminations, no time for tears. Daisy simply turned and sped off the bridge and down to the path by the river bank. Tiny Ted. She had to find him. She simply had to. Running along the path, she scanned the waters for signs of her precious bear. He was nowhere to be seen. A mile. Over the stile that marked the end of the tarmac, where the path turned onto the edge of the fields. Nothing. Stopping every few yards to scan the water, Daisy stumbled on. Tears were coming now, streaming down her face, blurring her vision. She dashed them away with the back of her hand, ran on.

  After twenty minutes, she had to admit defeat. Tiny Ted was gone. It was crazy, but her heart ached for her little bear. There had never been a time in her life when she couldn’t remember having Tiny Ted near her. She could almost feel his little nose under her finger now, sense the softness of his fur. Except that her pocket was empty. An essential part of her life had gone. Simply vanished – and all over nothing.

  When she finally got back to the office a couple of hours later, still trembling, a paper bag lay on her desk. Dumping her camera bleakly on the table, she twisted it open. A small golden bear nestled inside. She glanced over to Sharon’s desk, but the chief reporter was obviously out on another story. Daisy shoved the bag into a drawer in her desk and closed it. The bear was worthless. Nothing could make up for the loss of TT. Except Jack perhaps. More than anything, she longed to feel Jack’s arms around her. He’d understand. He knew how she felt about Tiny Ted. Only Jack could help to make up for this loss. Mechanically, she downloaded the images from yesterday and from this morning’s shoot. Ben, passing behind her desk as she brought the snow pictures up on screen, stopped.

  ‘That’s good.’

  She glanced round, her eyes red and the lids heavy. ‘Thanks.’

  Was it? Yesterday she’d felt perhaps she was capturing something special, but now she wasn’t sure she could make a clear judgement. Nothing seemed to matter to her any more. Maybe they were good. She hadn’t taken pictures like this in a long time.

  ‘No, I mean really good, Daisy. Fabulous.’

  She brought up another image. Looking back the way she’d struggled up the hill. In the distance, behind the wall she’d stumbled over, she could see her car, its back end in the air, half smothered by snow. It was a scene of utter desolation.

  ‘Perfect,’ Ben said approvingly. ‘I’ll put it on the front page.’

  ‘Really?’ His praise distracted her momentarily.

  ‘And Dais – ’

  ‘Yeah?’ She swivelled round to look at him.

  ‘You should have an exhibition sometime you know. Show these.’ He waved at the screen. ‘Work on some others. You’ve got real talent.’

  ‘Do you think so? Thanks, Ben.’ His unexpected words brought a small feeling of warmth into one corner of a very chilled heart.

  Daisy’s mobile trilled. She picked it up and Sharon’s voice hissed in her ear. ‘Dais?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘I’m in the car park. Can you come out?’

  ‘Why?’ She wa
s suspicious. What else could Sharon do to her now? She’d hurt her to the core already.

  ‘Please?’ Sharon sounded agitated.

  ‘You destroy the one thing that really mattered to me and now you …’

  ‘Please, Dais. I need to talk.’

  Reluctantly, Daisy pulled on her jacket. Sharon was standing out of the chill wind in the far corner of the car park, next to the recycling bins. She was drawing heavily at a cigarette. Daisy saw the smoke first, Sharon’s blonde head a second later, and finally, the bright pink of her jacket.

  ‘Hi.’

  ‘Hi.’ She stared at Sharon curiously. Her face was streaked with tears and her hands were trembling. ‘You OK?’

  ‘You didn’t sleep with Jay, did you, Daisy?’

  Daisy shook her head. ‘No. I told you.’

  ‘Fuck. Listen, I’m sorry. Honest. I should’ve believed you. I was just mad. You know, that you’d spent all that time with him when I’ve been fantasising about it for ages.’ The cigarette glowed red again. ‘I lied about him, Daisy. He never was all over me. I just wanted him to be. And when you told me … I thought. Shit.’ She tossed the stub away and fumbled for the packet in her bag so that she could find another cigarette. ‘I’m pissed off, Daisy, that’s the truth of it. His wife you say? He’s still in love with his wife?’

  Daisy nodded. ‘Amelia. Yes. That’s what he said.’

  ‘Shit. I can’t believe it. The first guy worth making a play for in Hailesbank for years and he’s still fucking hung up on his wife.’

  ‘Sorry.’

  She looked up at Daisy and flashed an apologetic smile. ‘No I’m the one who’s sorry. I know how much you loved that fucking bear, Daisy. I shouldn’t have thrown it in the river.’

  This time she stamped the cigarette out under her heel, grinding it to and fro on the tarmac.

  ‘I am sorry. Really.’

  She buried her face briefly in her hands then rubbed it roughly with her sleeves. A smudged streak of mascara betrayed her earlier tears, but Daisy didn’t have the heart to tell her about it.

  Tiny Ted. Gone. She still couldn’t believe it. This must be how people felt when a favourite dog died. She remembered Cosmo last year when one of his labs had pegged it. He’d been inconsolable, wandering around town with a face so long you could trip over it. She should still be furious with Sharon. Throwing TT in the river had been an act of pure malice – but looking at Sharon’s face, still twisted with emotion, Daisy couldn’t help but feel sorry for her. In all the years she’d known her, Sharon Eddy had never managed to settle into the kind of loving relationship she’d had with Jack. Despite her sexiness, she’d always flitted from one man to another. Daisy had always thought she was simply sexually voracious, but another explanation occurred to her. Was Sharon Eddy just lonely, hungry for love?

  Impulsively, she reached forward and hugged her. ‘It’s OK,’ she said. She could feel Sharon’s body trembling and for the first time in all the years she had known her, she felt as if she were the stronger person.

  In the afternoon Jay called a staff meeting. They were all present, clustered round the water cooler, notepads and pens at the ready.

  ‘Right.’ Jay began, his voice very firm, his arms crossed defensively.

  What was coming? Nervously, they looked at each other, each surreptitiously trying to gauge the feelings of the others.

  ‘I have three things to say. First, I have only ever had the interests of the Herald at heart. Second, I knew nothing about the threat of closure that I believe has been made. And third …’ He glanced around them all, engaging each with his glance before moving on to the next. Then he reached his arms out in front of him, spread his hands wide in broad appeal and said, ‘third, I’d like to ask if we could start again. As a team this time. If you’re willing.’

  ‘Christ,’ Murdoch muttered.

  ‘Holy shit,’ Dave hissed.

  Sharon gave a small moan.

  Ben, sitting passively at the back, lifted one reddish-brown eyebrow and Ma Ruby, in a cloud of Givenchy and hair spray, burst into tears.

  The plan they agreed on was simple. The clubs and societies would be reinstated immediately. Sir Cosmo would not only keep supplying the horoscopes, they would add a photograph of him, and Sharon would write a full feature of the local toff with a gift for astrology. To get more local faces in, they would do a ‘personality of the week’ – any age, any gender, any walk of life – and they’d talk to all the schools in the area about sponsoring a special social responsibility prize. ‘Maybe something for the team who come up with the best ideas for reducing their carbon footprint?’ suggested Sharon. ‘Or recycling?’ came from Murdoch. ‘Or charity venture?’ – Ma Ruby. The competition could run for a few weeks so that they could up the interest, week on week.

  They discussed the work Sharon had been doing on the investigative side. Clearly, they didn’t have enough resource for proper investigative journalism, but Sharon had news. ‘I might be on to something with Provost Porter.’

  ‘Really? What?’ Murdoch was agog.

  ‘Can’t say yet. But let’s say Fat Doris won’t be too pleased if I’m right.’

  ‘No!’

  ‘Christ! He’s not screwing around?’

  ‘Who’d have him? Yeugh.’

  Sharon looked important and pursed her lips. ‘I’m saying nothing. But if I’m right, we might have a great story sometime soon.’

  ‘That’ll sell papers,’ said Murdoch, rubbing his hands at the thought of it. Provost Porter, for all he had been re-elected, had his party sewn up, but was not generally popular in Hailesbank. No one quite understood the hold he had on his people, but Daisy suspected that even some of his own might rejoice in his downfall.

  ‘So we’re all agreed? Chantelle –’ Jay turned to the head of the advertising team ‘– will you be able to get the advertising back up, do you think?’

  Chantelle, a sharp-faced, lank-haired bony woman who’d been at the paper for years, shrugged. ‘I’ll try, of course. Might need to get an issue out first, give everyone a taste for the new Herald. Make it a corker, can you?’

  ‘Good issues ’r us. Corkers take a little longer.’

  ‘We’ll see what we can do.’

  ‘OK, team?’

  ‘OK,’ they chorused, grinning.

  For the first time since Jay Bond had arrived, they felt inspired to work with him for the benefit of the paper.

  Chapter Seventeen

  Ben, happily crushed close to Daisy by the crowd, watched her crooning out the words the band was singing, swaying to the seductive beat of the music, her arms above her head, waving in time with the rest of the concert goers.

  He wasn’t really listening to the lyrics. Something about school … ?

  School. The smile on his face grew even wider. Daisy Irvine as a schoolgirl had been the bonniest thing that walked the planet, so far as he could remember. You didn’t see it, of course, when you grew up with someone. He’d been – what – seventeen when the hormones had kicked in and he’d realised that his fourteen-year-old companion had something to recommend her other than her ability to hopscotch across a burn on wobbly stones without falling in.

  Blue spotlights arced across the skies then swept over the crowds. Daisy was momentarily bathed in the rich deep colour. He saw her like a blue angel, her dark hair bouncing round her face, sapphire glinting in every strand. Her eyes, usually so strikingly pale and grey, seemed to absorb all the colour of the beam and assumed for a few seconds the hue of velvet, rich and sumptuous. She looked brilliant. He put his arms around her and hugged her close. For a moment she melted happily into his embrace, then pulled away and continued to dance, in the dark again, one among thousands.

  ‘Enjoying it?’ she shouted at him, the whites of her eyes and the gleam of her teeth the most visible part of her as the song died and the X Factor runner-up segued into the final part of the concert.

  He nodded and grinned. Enjoying it? The music was
good, yes, but being here with Daisy, so comfortably, so happily together – yes he was enjoying it. And the rest.

  ‘You know I love you …’

  Love? Hard one, that. He’d loved Martina, or he thought he had. But it had faded, over time, among all the pressures of life. She’d changed. People changed. Why would it be any different with Daisy, if he could ever move this relationship on?

  Love. Yes. ‘Whatever love means.’ Who’d said that? Of course. Prince Charles. Famously, on getting engaged to Diana Spencer. What an odd thing to say. It had jarred at the time and had come back to haunt him. But he’d been right, in a way. Love was many things to many people, something quite different, no doubt, to a prince of the realm. He was no prince, though, and Daisy no princess.

  The band struck its last chord, the cheers were deafening, the calls for encore even louder. Ben put his hand under Daisy’s elbow and began to steer her towards the exit.

  ‘Must we go?’ He could sense, rather than hear the words.

  He nodded. They had to make their way back to Queen Street Station in time for the last train so it was essential to beat the crowds out of the stadium.

  ‘Pure, dead brilliant,’ Daisy muttered sleepily as Ben’s car hiccupped cheerfully along the road from Edinburgh station back towards Hailesbank.

  ‘My ears are still humming.’

  ‘Pardon?’ She peered at him through the darkness. ‘I didn’t hear you, my ears have gone a bit deaf.’

  Ben laughed and steered the car onto the city bypass. Soon they were speeding along the empty road. They’d be home in twenty minutes at this rate. Would she ask him in? Could he kiss her tonight? Much as he longed to, the transition from work-mate to lover was not an easy one.

  ‘Fancy a coffee?’

  ‘Sure. Quick one. Thanks.’ Quick? He hoped not. It just sounded polite. Late though it was, inside the cottage the lights were still ablaze and he could hear music. They stepped straight into the kitchen.

  ‘Have a seat.’ She pulled a chair out from the table, folded a newspaper that had been left open, tidied a pile of paperwork and moved some dirty plates across to the sink. ‘Coffee? Tea? Glass of wine? Whisky? I think we’ve got some whisky,’ she opened a cupboard and peered into it hopefully.