by Blake, Rosie
Thalia left shortly after she arrived, a brief grunt of goodbye at Caroline, who rolled her eyes a fraction at me as we listened to her descending the stairs outside the office. Too kind to comment, Caroline continued to help me arrange auditions for a new voiceover campaign, sending over clips to the company and ensuring our artists were booked in and given all the right details. It was busy and the bustle and action worked as a distraction. Then Caroline received a call that made her face fall. She spoke into the phone. ‘No, well, you better, no, it’ll be too late for that, no, no he’s working now. I’ll come, they can wait here for me. No that’s fine. Okay, okay, thanks.’
She groaned as she put the receiver back. ‘Childminders are the bane of my life,’ she tutted. ‘Nic, would you mind? I’ve got two abandoned children this afternoon and a whole heap of work to get through. Can we bring them in here? They’ll be good. I’ll promise them McDonald’s and doughnuts for dinner.’
I waved a hand. ‘Of course,’ I said, pressing ‘Send’ on an email and looking back to the screen. ‘It’ll be fine. Don’t worry.’
Caroline grabbed her keys from her desk. ‘Great, I’ll go and get them now. Could you tell James? He’s less likely to shout at you.’
‘I’m less likely to do what?’ A voice came from the office. ‘Who is using my name in vain, Caroline Walker?’
‘Nic will explain,’ she called back to him, zipping out of the office door and down the stairs before I had a chance to refuse.
I sighed and got up, pushing open the door to James’ office. ‘She’s had a babysitter crisis and is bringing the kids in,’ I explained, turning to leave.
‘Nic … Nicola,’ he called after me. I looked back at him. He had a pen mark on his left cheek and his hair was a little dishevelled. ‘Thank you for this morning. It was sweet of you both and I’m sorry that, well, I’m sor—’
I cut him off. ‘It was Caroline,’ I explained, voice abrupt. I regretted the tone the moment I saw his face fall a fraction.
‘Yes, right. Anyway, it was a lovely thought and I just wanted to thank you.’
I replied in a quieter tone. ‘That’s fine, of course. Happy Birthday.’
He lifted a little out of his seat as if he was going to come over to me but just as quickly seemed to change his mind.
‘You know, Nicola, I think you might have the wrong idea about Tha—’
‘—I need to get on and work,’ I said, feeling silly, trying to regain the upper hand, behave professionally.
‘Yes, right. I have lots of work,’ he said, shuffling papers about.
I nodded at him curtly. ‘Best get on.’
Ben and Alice arrived in a whirlwind half an hour later. Caroline, climbing the stairs outside, called instructions of ‘calm’ as they rushed ahead. Ben ran over to my desk, grinning at me, and held something towards me.
Caroline appeared in the doorway, puffing and dabbing at her forehead as she entered the room, ‘Oh, this is going to be chaos, isn’t it?’
Alice was already upending the wastepaper basket. Caroline scooped her up and plonked her on her office chair to spin.
‘Come on, monkey,’ she said, making Alice squeal as the chair spun.
Ben was still holding up a little wooden item, a hexagonal-shaped piece of wood with legs.
‘He wanted to show you his cake stand,’ Caroline explained, laughing. ‘He made it at school and I told him you’d been doing carpentry too.’ She turned to Ben. ‘What did I tell you Nic made us in her class?’
‘A tray,’ Ben half-shouted.
‘Don’t shout, Ben. Do you want to see it?’ she asked.
‘Yee harrrrrr,’ he replied, which Caroline took to mean ‘Yes, Mother.’
‘I’ll get it,’ I laughed, pushing back my chair and already feeling a million times lighter as I took Ben’s stand from him and examined it. ‘Ben, this is really good,’ I said, ‘I love the way you’ve nailed the legs on.’
Ben grinned like he might burst.
I brought back the tray and he took hold of it with both hands, really carefully, like it might fall to pieces in his hands. ‘Cool,’ he said. Then he put it on the floor, loaded all his cars onto it and carried it around the room, nose in the air, like a butler.
Alice suddenly appeared at my side and was holding both her hands up to me.
‘She wants you to pick her up, Nic,’ said Caroline, looking at me a little nervously.
‘Oh,’ I said, startled. Then, without really thinking, bent down and picked Alice up, returning to my desk to sit with her on my lap. She was lighter than I expected and up close her skin was so smooth I nearly asked her what moisturiser she used. Then I remembered she was three years old and that that was the answer. I’d never liked being around children before but this was easy. It was nice. Alice sat quietly on my lap and I tapped out an email, talking her through the very boring job I was doing. She seemed happy to sit there and Caroline and I actually managed to achieve something, if only for a few minutes. Ben rolled his cars around the floor, seeming very focused on lining them all up into ‘one long traffic jam’.
‘That’s nice,’ Caroline muttered in response. ‘It looks just like the M5, darling, well done.’
Ben beamed and proceeded to make the queue longer.
Alice got bored and turned to look at me. She put both hands on either side of my face and squashed together. I puffed my cheeks out.
‘You’re very pretty,’ she announced.
I felt my cheeks getting hot under her little hands before she released them. ‘Thank you, Alice. You’re very pretty too,’ I said.
‘Can you brush my hair?’ she asked, running to grab a small hairbrush from Caroline’s bag.
‘I suppose so,’ I replied, taking the brush from her and slowly dragging it through her fine, strawberry-blonde hair.
James emerged from the office at just that moment and practically tripped over the M5 tailback. ‘Whoa there,’ he said, bending down to look at what Ben was doing.
‘It’s a traffic jam.’ Ben grinned proudly.
‘It certainly is,’ agreed James, ‘like on a Bank Holiday.’
Ben nodded.
James gave him a high-five and then stood up, looking over at me with Alice on my lap.
‘She’s pretty,’ Alice repeated pointing at me and looking at James.
‘She is, isn’t she,’ agreed James.
I squirmed in my seat but couldn’t turn away as I was pinned down by Alice. Focus on the hair brushing, I thought, feeling my whole body get hotter under the scrutiny. When I took a peek back up, James was still looking right at me, a small smile on his face.
Chapter Thirty-Five
Walking home at the end of the day, I thought about dinner. Lightly buttered asparagus with some Parma ham, a hot slab of ciabatta, maybe some melted Camembert for dipping. Before I started salivating onto the pavement, I fished in my bag for a stick of chewing gum, rooting around past stray receipts, loose coins and kirby grips. When did my handbag get this messy? How had I not noticed? My hand lighted on the gum and I pulled it out triumphantly. I was about to put it into my mouth when I felt a hand on my shoulder. I yelped and spun round, holding the gum out like a weapon. My attacker looked at me coolly and I nearly dropped the gum in surprise.
‘Thalia,’ I said, the shock apparent in my voice.
‘It’s Nicola, isn’t it?’
I frowned, questions swimming around my mind. ‘Can I help?’ I asked, noticing her usually tanned face looked paler than usual, and that her eyes, normally carefully ringed with kohl, were a little red-rimmed. ‘Are you okay?’
‘I wanted to talk to you,’ she stated.
‘Okay.’
‘There’s no need to be sarcastic,’ she snapped.
My mouth clamped up. I hadn’t meant to sound sarcastic. I felt a stirring of annoyance. What did she want? Couldn’t she take her glossy, Armani-clad body off and get out of here? I had lightly buttered asparagus to eat. I was definitely going to hav
e the Camembert. I waited for her to say something else, both of us standing on the street as commuters steered round us.
‘I wanted to ask that you leave him alone.’
I didn’t need to ask her who she meant by ‘him’.
I felt the blood rush to my face. ‘I’m not, I don’t …’
‘I know all about girls like you,’ she announced, eyes narrowing. ‘And I won’t let you make trouble for me. I hear what he says about you. Oh, it’s all very cosy up in that office, isn’t it?’ She stressed the word ‘cosy’, drawing it out so that I grimaced with every letter.
What had he said about me? What about our office? I fought the urge to ask, a little bubble of, what was it – hope? – suddenly sparking in my stomach.
‘Thalia, I’m not doing anything,’ I said, gesturing with my arms.
‘You know what you’re doing.’
‘I’m not doing anything,’ I repeated.
She scoffed quickly, her eyes glinting.
Was I doing anything? Was I causing trouble? I tried to look at it from her point of view. The woman in the office, the birthday party, the brief moments when we’d shared a laugh or a joke. That look … Hadn’t I had a few thoughts like this in recent weeks? Hadn’t I considered … I shook my head, I hadn’t done anything, though.
Something gnawed at me. Colleagues were close, they shared some funny times, they spent time together, that’s all it was. And she couldn’t know what I felt. I felt tears sting the back of my eyes. I brushed at my face, feeling suddenly angry. I would not stand here and let this woman see me cry.
I focused on the space above her head and talked to the air. ‘You have nothing to worry about.’
‘Oh I know that.’ She laughed, a high, mean little noise.
‘Well then,’ I said quietly, head dropping.
‘I just wanted to be crystal clear about things, Nicola. I wanted to tell you that I know what you’re doing and I wanted to spell out what I think about it, what I’ve seen. And don’t you dare think of talking to James about this, because I’ll deny we spoke. And you’ll look even more pathetic with those little doe eyes following him around. It’s pitiful.’
Was it? Was I pitiful? The tears threatened to spill over. I swallowed, trying to recover myself.
She was done with me. She smiled widely. ‘I’m glad we talked.’ She spun around, long glossy hair flying out behind her, one hand on her black leather handbag, the other hailing a nearby taxi.
I stood on the street looking after her, all purpose forgotten, utterly miserable. I wanted to throw up. I shuffled slowly over to a bench just up the hill, sank onto it, the little stick of gum, hot from me squeezing it, dropping to the floor as I sat.
Chapter Thirty-Six
Single girl WLTM unattached man who she doesn’t work with and who doesn’t have a nasty supermodel girlfriend with great clothes.
Contact: Box No. 5790
Dragging myself back to my feet, I realised I had left all the notes for my meeting tomorrow back in the office. I would need something to take my mind off things that evening and so I trudged back down Park Street to fetch them. Believing everyone to have gone home, I was alarmed to hear a voice and realised that James was talking on the phone. I was in no hurry to see him and walked quickly over to my desk to scoop up the notes and get out of there. The door to his office was open and I was relieved to hear him tell whoever it was that he was going away over the next couple of days, ‘working’ (if you could call your hot supermodel-type girlfriend wrapping her legs and Louboutin-encased feet around you in some kind of spa hotel ‘work’). I was just about to escape when I heard him click down the phone. ‘Is that you Nicola?’ he called through.
Damn.
Frozen to the spot, I closed my eyes. Could I simply creep out? Pretend I wasn’t here? Why couldn’t I have just gone straight home?
He stepped out of his office.
‘I thought it was you,’ he said, one hand through his hair, a hint of a smile on his face. ‘I thought I saw you outside just now.’
I nodded. I desperately wanted to flee the scene, magic myself home.
‘That was Chris on the phone,’ James said. ‘He’s renewed his contract with us, so thank you for er … well whatever you did to persuade him, I’m grateful.’
I bristled with the suggestion. ‘I didn’t do anything.’
‘I know. I’m sorry, that isn’t what I meant.’ He took a step towards me. ‘So, why are you back here, Nicola?’
‘I was just popping back for some notes,’ I claimed, shuffling the papers on my desk.
‘Was that Thalia I saw you talking to in the street just now?’
‘Yes,’ I replied.
I didn’t need him to say anything more. I wanted to get out of there, to get home and hide under a duvet and block the world out. I shoved the notes in my bag and left the office without another word.
Maybe Thalia was right and I was trying to capture James’ attention at work, trying to muscle in with him, forge a closeness with somebody. Had Thalia seen me for what I was? The guilty party? I walked down the street and cringed as I thought of the New Year’s Eve and my behaviour with Chris, a married man – something I had always said I would never do. And fine, I hadn’t known he was married but maybe I was that girl, a girl that didn’t care about others, just selfishly going about doing whatever she liked and stampeding over the relationships of other people. All these efforts to bag a man in time for Valentine’s Day had simply done one thing – highlighted how much I wanted to find a match, someone I could laugh with at the same stupid things, be myself with and not be afraid to show the ugly bits or worry they’d be put off if I was just me. I wanted the nights in together mooching about cooking food, watching films and planning trips away. More than that I wanted to make plans with someone else, travel with them, share a flat with them. I wanted my life to change.
Valentine’s Day is round the corner and I’ve lost the dare, I haven’t managed it. I’m going to be alone again.
My mobile trilled. ‘Sis,’ came Mark’s voice. ‘That was quick.’
‘Hey.’
‘You normally force me to leave you voicemail, I—’
‘—I’m on my way home,’ I interrupted him.
‘You okay?’
I made a noise somewhere between a ‘Huh’ and a ‘No’.
Mark lowered his voice. ‘I’ll pop over for an hour.’
I could feel the tears threaten again.
I gulped and whispered a quiet, ‘Thanks’ and hung up.
Wrapping my coat around me, I traipsed back to my empty flat. I felt so tired, like I’d been running for ages. I needed to sit down.
Mark came over as promised and I let him in with a smile, already feeling lighter just looking at him, beloved helmet under his left arm, leather jacket slung over his right.
‘You worried me, sis. It’s not like you to sound so down,’ he announced, drawing me in for a one-armed hug.
‘I’m alright,’ I said, giving him a small smile and walking through to the kitchen. ‘Let me get you some tea on.’
‘Hey, sis,’ he said as I poured the boiling water into a mug.
‘Yeah?’
Mark looked shyly at his toes. ‘Carol agreed to move in with me,’ he said, not able to keep from grinning.
‘That’s brilliant news,’ I said, butting him affectionately with my hip.
‘Hey, you know you’ll work it all out too,’ he said.
‘I hope so,’ I admitted, handing him his tea and pouring myself a glass of milk.
‘You will. You’ll meet someone perfect for you. You’re a cracking girl. Although,’ he paused, ‘you do currently have a milk moustache.’
I swiped at my face and gave Mark a push for good measure when I heard the flat buzzer going. Frowning at Mark, I hurried through to the living room and pushed down on the intercom to hear James’ voice crackling over the line.
‘I work with her …’ he was saying in an insistent vo
ice.
The unmistakeable Portuguese reply was clear. ‘I’ve not seen you here before.’
‘It’s okay, Julio,’ I called into the intercom. ‘I know him.’
Without a moment to compose myself, and hastily wiping at my face for any last traces of milk, I watched in slow motion as James walked up the stairwell. He was wearing the camel-coloured winter coat that I loved and seemed flustered when he appeared at the top of the stairs.
Catching my perplexed expression as I stood in the doorway, he glanced behind him. ‘You have quite a bouncer downstairs,’ he laughed. ‘I had to prove my honour or he wouldn’t let me pass.’
I smiled in a slightly stunned way, questions buzzing around my head. ‘That’s Julio,’ I said, in an oddly high voice.
James started to thrust objects awkwardly into my arms. ‘I thought you looked a bit pale earlier. I thought you might be ill. I brought you some get well gifts,’ he explained.
‘Oh, thank you,’ I said, feeling redness creep up my neck, embarrassed that he was bringing me presents when I was perfectly fine, just feeling upset after being confronted by his girlfriend.
A chisel and a box of Maltesers.
‘I know you’ve taken up carpentry so I assumed you might find some use for it, the chisel that is, the Maltesers are just for eating.’ He gave a quick laugh and put a hand up to the back of his neck. If I hadn’t known better I would have guessed he was embarrassed too. Why couldn’t I be better in these situations? Why couldn’t I put him at ease?
‘Thank you, that’s very kind,’ I said, smiling. Despite myself, I felt some of my earlier happiness returning. James had come to see me, he’d brought me gifts.
‘Look, Nicola,’ he started. ‘I know you spoke to Thalia. And the thing is, I wanted to be clear with you that—’
Just then Mark’s voice called out, ‘Tea or coffee?’
James took a step backwards. ‘I’m so sorry, I’m interrupting, you have company already, of course you do, I’ll go,’ he said, turning around to leave.
‘No, it’s fine, come in and have tea,’ I said, concerned I sounded pathetic. ‘He’s just—’