‘Stupid cow,’ Cass spits, only to flash a huge smile, moments later, at the lorry-load of scaffolders who are driving past us on Baker Street, honking a horn and cheering.
It takes me a moment to realize that the reason for this – more than just the usual interest Cass gets from lorry-loads of scaffolders – is that the waffle robe she wrapped around me is the one she must have been wearing when she exited the gym. All she’s wearing right now is her sexy red swimsuit which – thank the Lord – is doing more than anything else could to finally take all the attention off me.
I’m opening my mouth to croak out a thank you when the fire alarm, mercifully, stops.
It’s a bit like that moment when a plane lands: the air hostesses tell people not to use their phones until they’ve actually stopped the engines, and everyone ignores this and starts up their phones in a frenzied free-for-all. Despite Pippa yelling at everyone not to return to the building until the all-clear is given, the entire membership of FitLondon heads for the entrance doors all at once, desperate to return to their interrupted workouts and disrupted spa treatments before any of them gains so much as a millimetre of fat or develops a stray wrinkle.
‘God, she’s a bitch,’ Cass says, as we watch Rhea, at the front of the crowd, elbowing a heavily pregnant woman out of the way to get through the entrance first. ‘She has amazing hair, though. Do you think I could ask her where she gets her extensions done?’
I’m still too speechless to say anything. So I simply reach both my arms around Cass’s bare shoulders, and hug her tightly to me.
‘Get off,’ she says, though not unkindly, as she bats me away. ‘You’ll mess up my hair.’
I do as she asks, even though I know it’s not really about her hair. The thing is that for all her love of the spotlight, the last thing Cass wants, when she’s done something like this, is any acknowledgement. It’s exactly the same as the night of my sixteenth birthday, when the entire day had come and gone without Dad bothering to call (a new low in a long list of birthday-related failings, even for him). I was silently crying beneath my duvet when I heard my bedroom door open and shut, and a moment later felt Cass creep into bed beside me. She didn’t utter a single word, just stroked my hair until I fell asleep, and then, at some point, crept back to her bedroom again. She shut me up when I tried to mention it over breakfast the following morning, and neither of us has ever mentioned it since.
I expect neither of us will ever mention this horrific bum-on-show moment ever again either: from my point of view because I just want to pretend it never ever happened, and from Cass’s point of view because she’s already blowing kisses to the gaggle of workmen digging up the pavement on the other side of the road, and has moved on already.
In fact, she’s enjoying all the attention so much that it’s a good couple of minutes before – thank God – the chill in the air finally gets to her and she reluctantly agrees to be dragged back indoors.
‘Where’s Mum?’ I ask, just about managing to speak in a normal voice again, as we head towards the spa entrance. Because I’ve only just realized that she didn’t emerge in the exodus the way all the other guests did.
‘Oh, she’s probably still in the juice bar. She refused to leave. She said she’d rather be burned alive than pay your dad half the money from the house, anyway.’
Absurd, narcissistic, vexing beyond belief this may be, but it suddenly fills me with a rush of affection for my mother. Coupled with one of Cass’s rare but beautiful moments of sisterliness, it’s all a little bit overwhelming.
I’ll forget, for now at least, that I only came out here in the first place to get that closer look at the picture in Dad’s article. Investigating my (possibly) haunted sofa from (possibly) Pinewood Studios is going to have to wait.
I tuck the now-somewhat-muddied InStyle under one arm, and hold the spa door open for Cass.
‘Let’s go out for a late lunch after your treatment,’ I suggest. ‘You, me and Mum. Cheer her up for her birthday.’
‘Well, OK …’ Cass is already squeezing a nonexistent roll of fat on her swimsuit-clad tummy. ‘But nowhere with chips. And you can’t let me have any bread. Or dessert. Or booze. Especially not champagne, because it bloats me …’
She’s still listing the long catalogue of pre-audition contraband as we make our way back towards the juice bar to find the birthday girl.
Again, just when you might actually want a visit from Audrey Hepburn, ghostly or otherwise, she won’t make an appearance.
I made several efforts to ‘summon’ her, if that’s what you’d call it, when I got back from our post-spa lunch yesterday evening, and a couple more attempts this morning, but nothing. Niente. Nada. Zip. So I haven’t managed to discuss the whole haunted-Chesterfield thing with her at all, which is seriously annoying. I mean, if anyone can make some sense of it, it ought to be her, the horse’s mouth.
In the absence of the horse’s mouth, though, I’ve decided to speak to another bit of the horse instead: Uncle Brian, the props-store security guard, who was responsible for the mix-up with the furnishings in the first place. After all, if there’s anyone who should know about the history of all that stuff in the props store, it’ll be him, surely. He’s worked here for donkey’s years, and when I met him, briefly, the day I went with Olly to pick out my furniture, he seemed a sensible, twinkly-eyed, avuncular old chap. I’m not going to go and ask him straight out if he’s ever seen ghosts in his warehouse, obviously, but I’m hoping that he might say something that will make a bit more sense of this whole crazy situation. So I texted Olly late last night to ask if he could meet me at Pinewood this morning, because I really need him for moral support. Just in case everything tumbles out all wrong, and I start sounding like a rambling lunatic, Olly will have my back.
I’ve made it to Pinewood earlier than our agreed meeting time, though – it’s still only eight a.m., and Olly isn’t due to meet me outside the main gates until half past – and the young, bored-looking guy on duty at the security cabin this morning must recognize me, because I’ve only been loitering outside for about fifteen seconds before he glances up from his newspaper and waves me through.
I make my way through the gates and towards (yes, it really is called this) Goldfinger Avenue, where the props store is to be found. I might as well head straight there, and text Olly to let him know where I am. After all, maybe it would actually be a good idea to try to have a quiet word with Uncle Brian about all this stuff alone, before Olly arrives. Because there’s a chance, isn’t there, that Uncle Brian might know exactly what I’m talking about? That when I start gibbering about haunted sofas he’ll simply nod sagely, pop on the kettle in his little prefab office and – over a cosy cuppa or two – reassure me that I’m by no means the first person to come to him with a tale of this sort; that he himself has long suspected that the spirit of Alec Guinness inhabits a velvet-upholstered ottoman right at the very back of his warehouse.
It’s a bit of a hike, past rows and rows of post-production suites and an entire building’s worth of workshops, but eventually I reach the huge corrugated-steel warehouse halfway along Goldfinger Avenue. The door to the little prefab office is ajar, so I wander up and peer round the door … but there’s nobody here. There is evidence of recent Uncle-Brian-esque activity – a half-drunk cup of tea placed on top of a folded copy of today’s Mirror – but no sign of the man himself.
‘Oi! Gorgeous!’
When I turn round, I see that the person who’s just shouted this at me is none other than Dillon O’Hara.
He must have clambered out of the black Lexus that’s just pulled up alongside the pavement – one of the fleet of black Lexuses that are used to ferry star actors in and out of Pinewood, while the rest of us schlep here by bus from Gerrard’s Cross station – and he’s walking towards me.
He’s wearing Ray-Bans similar to the ones I borrowed from his bedside table the other morning, jeans and T-shirt, and a sort of chunky cardigan with a belted waist that
ought to make him look, ludicrously, as if he’s raided his granny’s wardrobe, but in fact just makes him look sexier, in a louche sort of way, than ever.
‘Well, you’re a sight for sore eyes this morning,’ he says as he reaches me, taking off his Ray-Bans. His own eyes look fresher and brighter than I’ve seen them before, as if he’s had a decent night’s sleep with no boozing for once. ‘And talking of sore eyes …’ He lifts a hand to touch my left eye which – thanks to the magic of about eight layers of concealer – is actually looking a lot better this morning. ‘Looks like all that ice did the trick. Either that, or my amazing healing hands.’
‘What … what are you doing here?’
‘Well, I’m on my way to work, my darling. I’m needed on set at nine sharp this morning. Due in make-up at eight fifteen, a full morning’s shooting ahead of me. And people say acting’s not a real job.’
He stops, clearly working out, from the stony expression on my face, that I’m not in the mood for his particular brand of banter just now.
‘I was just on my way in,’ he goes on, ‘when I saw you snooping into this office here, so I asked my very nice driver Steve to stop and let me out.’
‘I’m not snooping,’ I say, in a frosty tone I’m actually quite proud of. ‘I’m just here to meet my friend Olly.’
‘An early morning assignation with another man?’ Dillon says, sliding his arms over my shoulders and walking me backwards, gently, through the door and into the privacy of Brian’s little office. ‘Careful, Fire Girl. You’ll make me jealous.’
I stare up at him. ‘Are you kidding me?’
‘That I can get jealous? You misunderstand me, Libby. I’m a very jealous kind of person. Yes, it may appear that no other man on the planet can hold a candle to me, but I still have my—’
‘That’s not what I meant.’ And, by the way, he obviously hasn’t worked out that I’m not in the mood for his banter right now. ‘You’ve just popped back up and started … flirting again.’
‘And you were hoping for what, exactly?’ He looks, for a moment, genuinely confused. ‘Instead of the flirting, I mean? Because I have to warn you, Libby, that if you’re looking for a man with a more serious conversational style, we’ll have to take someone like Stephen Hawking with us on our next date. He can satisfy your burning need for in-depth discussion on string theory and quantum mechanics, and I can get the beers in and fill in the awkward silences with dirty jokes. And, if I play my cards right, satisfy a few of your other burning needs after Hawking’s trundled off home for the night—’
‘Just stop it!’ I pull his hands off my shoulders and shove them back towards him. ‘Seriously, Dillon, stop. It’s unfair. Actually, you know what, it’s cruel. Talking like that. As if you … want me.’
He blinks, more confused than ever; either he’s a significantly better actor than his recent TV performances would suggest, or he really has no idea what I’m talking about.
‘But I do want you. I mean, I’m slightly afraid to say it in case I’m accused of inappropriate flirting again. But I really like you, Libby Lomax.’
I actually laugh out loud. ‘Right. Then I dread to think how you treat people you don’t like.’
He raises a quizzical eyebrow.
‘Well, I’m just wondering if you always walk out on people you like the morning after they spend the night with you, without so much as a goodbye. Or a note. Or a phone call, or a text …’
I’m starting to sound, I realize to my horror, quite a lot like Mum did yesterday, trying to get me to do her dirty work with Dad. But luckily Dillon interrupts me before I can say any more.
‘Christ, I’m a fucking imbecile. I should’ve known that’s what you’re upset about.’
‘I’m not upset!’ I say. Which would be more convincing if I didn’t sound so, well, upset. ‘It would just have been, you know, common courtesy. That’s all. A one-line note: Morning, Libby, mugs and tea in the cupboard above the sink and help yourself to toast if you’re hungry.’
‘Libby …’
‘Other than that, I wasn’t bothered in the slightest! I mean, obviously you’re a free agent, and you’re perfectly entitled to go off and sow your wild oats—’
‘Woah, woah, woah.’ He holds up both hands. ‘Since when do you have me sowing wild oats with anyone else?’
I give him a meaningful look.
‘Since I was with you the other night, that is,’ he adds, with frank (and I suppose sort-of-refreshing) honesty. ‘OK, look, I don’t deny for a minute that I should have left you a note. And if I’m guilty of anything, it’s just plain old bad manners. But I promise you, Libby, on my mother’s life: there hasn’t been any oats-sowing. I left in a hurry in the morning because I had an audition.’
‘An audition,’ I repeat, flatly, ‘at six thirty in the morning?’
‘No. At two o’clock in the afternoon. In New York. I just got back last night.’
I stare at him.
I’m torn, right now, between two incompatible responses: 1) to snort loudly and derisively, and tell him that I didn’t just fall down in the last rain-shower; or 2) to tumble into his arms, weak with relief and sorry I ever doubted him, and suggest nipping through the internal door to the warehouse itself to make up properly on one of Uncle Brian’s (non-haunted, preferably non-doggy-smelling) sofas.
‘I didn’t remember to tell you before we went to sleep,’ Dillon continues. ‘And you were so obviously knackered – because you slept right through my alarm, by the way – that I didn’t want to wake you.’
Despite my vacillations, I must be giving him a pretty suspicious, didn’t-fall-down-in-the-last-rain-shower look, because he starts to fumble in his jeans pocket, producing a crumpled piece of A4, which he holds out to me.
It is, indeed, a printed-out plane ticket, in his name, for a Virgin Atlantic flight to JFK at eight-forty-five am the day before yesterday.
‘Libby, look, if you still don’t believe me, I can show you the stamp on my passport …’
‘No, no, God, no, there’s no need for that!’ I say, hastily, because he’s suddenly made me feel like I’m some harpy of a wife complaining about being stuck at home with our brood of kids while he goes off gallivanting. ‘I believe you, Dillon. Honestly.’
‘That’s sweet. And rare.’ His face softens, and he puts one hand to my cheek. ‘Girls don’t usually believe a single word that comes out of my mouth.’
I’m tempted to suggest that it would help if he cut back on some of the smart-arse witticisms and cut out all the indiscriminate flirting, but I don’t.
‘And by the way,’ he adds, little-boy-excited about this now, ‘it was the best audition I’ve done in months! And for a part in Martin Scorsese’s next movie, would you credit it? Not a massive part – I’d get bumped off halfway through by Ciarán Hinds – but it’s what my agent Caroline calls a pivotal one. And who the fuck cares how big a part it is – it’s a Martin Scorsese movie, for Christ’s sake!’
‘That’s fantastic, Dillon,’ I say, and really mean it.
‘Well, it’s the first time a movie audition has actually gone my way. With pretty fucking perfect timing, I have to say, because it’d be gutting if I’d blown this one. And you know who I have to thank?’
It sounds like the start of an awards-ceremony acceptance speech. ‘Er … your agent? Your high-school drama teacher?’
He looks at me. ‘You,’ he says.
I laugh again. Even louder, this time.
‘I’m serious,’ he says. He puts both hands back on my shoulders, rests one thumb on either side of my neck, and caresses, ever so slightly. ‘I thought all about it on the plane, on the way home. I mean, look, I’ve been going on movie auditions for the last six months, and they’ve all been unmitigated disasters.’
‘I’m sure they weren’t that bad.’
‘One casting director told my agent I was so wooden she wouldn’t even cast me in a kindergarten Nativity play.’
‘Ah.’
‘Well, OK, that does sound quite bad, actually.’
‘And now here I am auditioning for the biggest break of my career, exactly the sort of thing I’d usually screw up at the last minute, and … well, something happened to me in that audition room, Libby. I’m not saying I suddenly turned into Daniel Day-Lewis, or anything. I just felt … I don’t know … actually good about myself for once.’
‘For once?’ I ask, not even bothering to keep the scepticism from my voice.
‘Hey, come on, just because I’m handsome and charming and successful, not to mention frighteningly gifted in the bedroom department, it doesn’t mean I sit around all day feeling like I can walk on water.’ His tone is odd; it’s more of his unstoppable banter, yes, but it’s suddenly got a serious edge. More than serious: bitter, in fact. ‘But after that night with you … that incredible night with you …’ he adds, more gently, ‘I woke up feeling like maybe I could.’
This is, by quite some distance, the most amazing thing anyone has ever said to me.
Though, to be fair, he’s probably never spent the night before with anyone who was quite as enthusiastic as I was. You could be the most insecurity-riddled man on the entire planet, and you’d probably have walked away from that super-king-size bed feeling not only as if you could walk on water, but also, for your next trick, heal the lame, cure the lepers and turn water into wine.
After Rhea, and her particular brand of bitchy indifference … after the sort of girls he’s become accustomed to … well, is he only attracted to me because I make him feel like more than just a pretty face?
I think, perhaps, that’s a question best examined when he’s not standing two inches away from me, his hand gently caressing my cheek and his eyes fixed onto mine as if I possess knowledge of the inner workings of the entire universe.
‘You know what I’ve decided, Fire Girl?’ he murmurs. ‘I’ve decided that you must be my lucky charm.’
Completely carried away by the moment, I murmur, in a sexy, throaty voice, ‘You mean sort of like a leprechaun?’
A Night In With Audrey Hepburn Page 22