by Penny Avis
‘You’ll never win the VuePharma pitch,’ said Lars.
‘Oh yes, and why’s that?’ said Meredith, daring him to answer.
Lars wasn’t remotely intimidated by her tone. ‘Because you don’t have enough confidence and your presentation skills aren’t good enough.’ He grinned at her in amusement and then shrugged. ‘Sorry, but that’s just how it is.’
Meredith couldn’t believe what she was hearing. She wanted to feel furious, but instead she just felt crushed. Why did he think that? He’d only ever seen her in internal meetings. She thought about the Beau Street meeting earlier that day, when she’d felt more confident than she had in ages. She was sure it had gone well. No, he was talking rubbish. He had to be, and she wasn’t going to let it get to her.
‘Nick clearly doesn’t agree with you, which is why he asked me to run the VuePharma pitch. And anyway, you need his permission to follow that sort of lead. Otherwise, we’ll just get ourselves in a mess. You need to stop, or I’ll have to tell him.’
Lars looked at her incredulously. ‘You wouldn’t!’
‘I’m afraid I would. And you’ve involved Alfred, which isn’t fair either. You can’t ask him to break the rules on your behalf. He’s very uncomfortable about it.’
‘Listen to you, Little Miss Perfect. Don’t tell me you’ve never bent the odd rule to get what you want?’
Meredith hesitated.
‘That’s not the point. The point is that you’re setting yourself up to be in direct competition with someone in your own team. That’s just plain wrong at every level.’
Meredith knew she was right. His ‘crime’ was much worse than hers.
‘Well, don’t come crying to me when you lose the VuePharma pitch and all the other options have gone begging,’ said Lars.
‘I don’t think there’s much chance of that,’ said Meredith.
Lars leant forward, his face taut with fury. ‘Alright, you’ll get your way this time. But you’d better look out. If this is how you want to play it then fine, but I’ll be watching you. If I get even a sniff that you’ve stepped out of line, I’ll be straight to Nick too. You want to play rough? Well then you’ve come to the right place.’
He got up and stormed off, leaving his barely drunk coffee on the table. Meredith sat back in dismay. What an arse. It was only her own guilt that had led her into giving him a chance by not going straight to Nick. And now she’d made an enemy of him. And worse than that, an enemy who was looking for her to slip up.
Meredith made her way slowly upstairs, still reeling from Lars’s comment about her lack of confidence. She was sure that wasn’t the image she was creating. Had he seen something she wasn’t aware of? She scowled and marched out of the lift back towards her office, trying to ignore the now fairly regular Mexican shiver from the analysts as she walked past. Today she probably deserved it, and in that moment, she realised she quite liked that they thought she was an ice queen. It was far better than Lars’s impression of her.
Alfred saw her return and came straight to her office. He shut the door behind him and sat down expectantly.
‘Well?’
‘He’s not happy, but I’m pretty sure he’s going to back down. No more chasing VuePharma’s competitors,’ said Meredith.
Alfred looked very relieved. ‘Was he totally furious with me?’
Meredith shook her head. ‘No, I took the brunt of his anger. I think it’s probably safe to say that I’m off his Christmas card list.’
‘Oh, that’s not good.’
‘Well, it’s done now. At least I can focus on the Vue pitch without worrying about him putting a spanner in the works.’
‘And we’re going to win it. I feel sure of it. Our credentials are great, and with your experience in France we should be right up there,’ said Alfred.
‘I’m sure you’re right,’ said Meredith, feeling exactly the opposite. Damn Lars.
Two days later, Meredith arrived at Daisy’s flat for dinner. She’d heard nothing more from Lars, not that she particularly expected to. She was sure he would bide his time. But she’d not been able to shake the worry that she wouldn’t win the VuePharma pitch. They were still waiting to hear whether they were through to the next round. Hopefully Daisy’s dinner party would take her mind off things.
Daisy lived in an old grain warehouse by the river that had been converted into a series of quirky flats. The building had old metal staircases and huge arched windows that had been cleverly blended with a very modern finish. When Daisy had rung Meredith in France to tell her about it, she had tried to point out that buying a flat simply because ‘the light was spectacular’ was not the greatest plan, even for an artist. But Daisy loved it, and that had been that. Meredith had only been there a couple of times since she’d been back, but she had to admit Daisy had done a great job with it, despite its out-of-the-way location and lousy travel links.
At Meredith’s knock Daisy opened her huge wooden front door. She was dressed in a pretty, sixties-style, yellow-and-black-patterned dress. Her cropped blonde hair was feathered around her face, making her look younger and rather more vulnerable than she was. Meredith suddenly felt rather ‘corporate’ in her tailored trousers and blouse. She should have known that a more bohemian look was the style for the evening.
‘You look lovely,’ said Meredith, hugging her friend.
‘Thanks. Come in. You’re not the first. Finn is already here and another couple you’ve not met before, Debs and Vinnie. Vinnie and I worked together at Design House before I took on the gallery. Debs is his new girlfriend, so I’ve not met her before either. But if first impressions are anything to go by, she seems like a hoot. And she’s an interior designer, no less. She might be a useful contact for the idea you had about linking up with one at the gallery.’
Daisy tapped the side of her nose, hooked her arm through Meredith’s and led her into the open plan kitchen/sitting room. Dougie, Daisy’s boyfriend, was standing by the kitchen worktop opening some wine.
‘Meredith! How are you?’ He came over and kissed her on both cheeks. He had wavy, short brown hair that Meredith had always thought looked rather like wall-to-wall carpeting, as it was cut to exactly the same length all over. But it did give him a rugged, outdoor look that matched his two-day-old stubble perfectly. ‘Can I get you a drink?’
Debs and Vinnie were standing by the dining table chatting to Finn, Daisy’s assistant from the gallery. Each of them happened to be wearing a brightly coloured piece of clothing, which made them look rather like a group of children’s TV presenters: Vinnie was in a grey shirt with a red tie, Debs had on a bright green jacket with puffy sleeves and Finn was wearing a t-shirt with a lurid rainbow motif on the front. They couldn’t be more different from the safe, corporate colours that she was usually surrounded by.
Meredith took her drink from Dougie and went over to join the conversation. As they chatted, the doorbell rang and Julie arrived with her other half.
‘Julie, you remember Meredith? You met at the drinks we had a couple of weeks ago.’
‘Of course.’ Julie beamed at Meredith, accentuating her natural dimples. She had tamed her red hair into a ponytail secured with a plait down each side of her head, giving her a rather Nordic look. Behind her hovered a rather timid-looking, bespectacled man dressed in jeans and what was clearly his ‘best shirt’.
‘This is Stefano,’ said Julie.
Stefano smiled shyly at them. ‘Hello,’ he said in a heavy European accent.
‘Are you French?’ Daisy asked.
‘Italian,’ replied Julie, raising her eyebrows to display that she was proud of her catch.
After a few more drinks, the eight of them sat down to dinner. Meredith had Finn on one side and Stefano on the other. She hoped that the others didn’t think that Daisy was trying to set her up with Finn. He was far too young.
Her thoughts were interrupted by Dougie serving her starter. It was French onion soup, with a chunk of bread floating in the middle that ha
d been covered in cheese and toasted.
‘It’s delicious,’ said Debs. ‘Is it tricky to make?’
‘It is if you don’t buy it from M&S,’ said Daisy, causing everyone to laugh loudly. ‘The toast is all my own work, though.’
‘So I understand that you’re an interior designer,’ said Daisy to Debs.
‘That’s right. I do anything from a single room makeover to whole houses. I just love working with colours and light. Bit like you, I guess.’
Meredith threw Daisy a ‘go get her’ glance and turned to talk to Stefano, so that Daisy could concentrate on reeling Debs into her gallery turnaround plan.
‘So how did you and Julie meet?’ Meredith asked.
‘On an internet dating site,’ said Stefano.
‘Oh,’ said Meredith, slightly taken aback by his honesty. ‘I guess that’s becoming quite common.’
‘Yes, I suppose so. Julie was featured in “New This Month”, and of course I just contacted her right away.’ He gave Julie a misty-eyed smile.
‘Of course,’ repeated Meredith, feeling rather mystified about what was drawing these seemingly very different people together. Maybe he was an artist too.
‘What is it you do?’
‘I’m an actuary,’ said Stefano.
Meredith stifled a laugh. No, not an artist then.
‘I’m sorry, but I don’t know what that is,’ said Finn, politely joining their conversation.
‘It’s someone who evaluates risk using maths,’ explained Meredith.
‘Oh, I see,’ said Finn, looking none the wiser.
‘What area are you in?’ Meredith asked.
‘Pensions,’ said Stefano. ‘You know death rates, likelihood of disease, all that sort of thing.’
‘Sounds a bit grim,’ said Finn.
‘Not really, it’s actually quite fascinating once you get into it,’ said Stefano.
Finn looked far from convinced but said nothing. Meredith decided it was time to change the subject, despite the fact that she was secretly delighted that there was someone at dinner whose job would be deemed by the others to be even more boring than hers. She was about to speak when she heard her phone beep with a text message. Instinctively she reached into her bag.
We won the care homes pitch! Thanks for all your help. Can I buy you a drink… assuming this is the right number, that is. Jamie
Meredith grinned at the message. Maybe she should call him. It might be a bit more interesting than the life and times of being an actuary.
‘Good news?’ Finn asked.
‘Err, yes it is, pretty good actually. Daisy, will you excuse me for a minute? I just need to make a quick call.’
Meredith got up from the table and walked out to the hallway. There was no door to the living area, so she opened one of the other doors in the hallway, which led to a small utility room. She shut the door behind her and sat on the washing machine. She felt a bit ridiculous, but she didn’t want all the others listening to her conversation.
‘So, I did get the right number then,’ said Jamie as he picked up the call. His voice sounded warm and steady and Meredith couldn’t help comparing it with Ryan’s brash American tone.
‘So it would seem,’ said Meredith. ‘Great news on the pitch. You must be thrilled.’
‘We are. It’s a great project and will keep us all busy for most of the year. Just what we needed.’
‘All that stalking of your potential client at the healthcare conference clearly paid off.’
‘Yes, it did. We used loads of the ideas from the speech in our pitch. But the email you sent me was totally brilliant. It really helped us understand the market. They said that out of all the companies they’d heard from, we were the most in tune with their plans for the future.’
‘I could do with some of that sort of feedback,’ said Meredith, thinking about her impending VuePharma pitch.
‘Why’s that?’
Meredith hesitated for a moment. Maybe he could help her.
‘I have a big pitch coming up too, and I think I need to take a leaf out of your book. You know, find out everything about the company, give us some sort of edge. Otherwise I’m worried that we might lose it.’
‘You don’t strike me as a worrier,’ said Jamie.
Meredith considered this comment. No, normally she wasn’t, but this Lars thing had really spooked her.
‘Someone in my team is convinced that I won’t win it.’ Meredith bit her lip. Too much detail.
Jamie laughed loudly. ‘That sounds like someone who’s jealous to me.’
‘Maybe,’ said Meredith. ‘He’s really competitive, so perhaps he’s trying to play mind games with me. He was really mad that my boss didn’t give the pitch to him.’
‘Ah, now I think we might be getting to the crux of the matter. That sounds much more likely to me.’
A loud shout of her name made Meredith jump. Daisy opened the door of the utility room and looked in surprise at Meredith perched on the washing machine.
‘Everything okay?’ said Daisy.
Meredith covered the mouthpiece of her phone. ‘Sorry, work call. Nearly done. I’ll be out in a sec.’
‘Okay, main course is on the table,’ said Daisy and she shut the door.
‘Sorry, Jamie. I’ve got to go. I’m at a dinner party and the food is ready.’
‘Okay. Look, I’d really like to say thank you in person. How about a drink in a couple of weeks’ time, when work’s calmed down a bit? We’re pretty snowed getting the project kicked off at the moment.’
Yes, why not. No harm in having a drink with him, and Brightside Care Homes was just the sort of company she’d like to get to know better.
‘Yes, okay. I’ll give you a ring in a couple of weeks and we’ll make a plan.’
Meredith left the utility room and headed back to the table. The others were already eating.
‘Really sorry about that,’ said Meredith. ‘Work call. You know how it is.’
‘It must be very important for them to call you in the evenings,’ said Julie.
Meredith thought of the hundreds of evenings she’d spent in the office over the years.
‘Not really. It’s just the way it is in banking. Anyway, done now and this smells great,’ said Meredith, tucking into her plate of hearty beef stew. She’d barely taken a couple of mouthfuls when her phone rang. It was Ryan. She couldn’t take another call; that would be too rude.
‘Sorry, I’ll turn it off.’
As she switched her phone to voicemail, she realised that it was the second time that Jamie had caused her to avoid Ryan’s call.
After the main course, Daisy cleared the plates and returned to the table with a large bottle of dangerous looking green liquor.
‘Right, time for a few drinking games, I feel.’
Debs rubbed her hands with glee. ‘Ooh great. I know loads.
Meredith looked round the table in surprise. They didn’t strike her as the typical drinking games crowd. Julie looked far too sensible, Finn looked terrified and Stefano just looked confused.
‘What do we have to do?’ he asked.
‘Oh, it’s pretty simple. Play some silly games, and if you’re the loser, you have to drink a shot of this.’
‘What is it?’ Finn looked at the bottle nervously.
‘Absinthe,’ said Daisy. ‘Also known as the Green Fairy.’
Dougie opened the bottle, filled a single shot glass and placed it in the centre of the table. ‘Right, let’s start with any easy one: letter association. I name an object and the person on my left has to name another object that starts with the last letter of my object. So if I say “dog”, the next person needs to name an object that starts with “g”, like gate. You can’t repeat the same object and the first person who can’t think of an answer within ten seconds drinks the shot. Everyone got it?’
Meredith watched the rather hesitant nods around the table with amusement. This was going to be fun. She’d played this with Daisy many time
s before. The trick was to keep saying words that ended in ‘y’, to make sure that all the obvious answers got used up quickly.
‘Right, I’ll start,’ said Daisy. ‘Monkey.’ She looked at Vinnie on her left.
‘Yacht,’ said Vinnie.
Meredith shot Daisy a knowing glance; Daisy grinned back. The game went round and round the table and it didn’t take long for Stefano to get stuck.
‘Comb,’ said Finn, turning to look at Meredith.
‘Butterfly,’ said Meredith, stifling a laugh.
‘Y, y, umm, err.’ Stefano scratched his head.
‘Time’s up!’ shouted Dougie, looking up from his watch.
They clapped and cheered as Stefano dutifully downed his shot, wincing with the strength of the alcohol that hit the back of his throat.
The game continued until they decided to take a break and have some cheese and biscuits, by which time Stefano was quite drunk, having been on the losing end of the game more times than anyone else. Daisy turned up the music, and as they got the cheese platter ready, she and Dougie jived and twirled behind the kitchen counter.
‘Go, girl!’ shouted Stefano, making Meredith jump. To her amusement, he got up and started dancing too by the side of the dining table. It could have been the trigger to get everyone else up too, but his flailing display of the worst ‘dad dancing’ Meredith had ever seen was just so funny that they all sat rooted to the spot. He lurched from side to side, so out of time with the music that Meredith almost wondered if he was listening to a different track. His Jackson Five-style spin – eyes shut, hand on hip, arm in the air, finger pointed at the ceiling – caused most of the table, except for Julie, to start giggling. And his disastrous attempt at moonwalking made Meredith spit her mouthful of wine across the table. Just as she thought it couldn’t get any funnier, far from being embarrassed, Julie leapt up to join Stafano. She had never seen a more unlikely pair bump and grind to the music like they did. It was quite spellbinding.
Eventually the disco tracks were replaced with a slower number and they both sat back down, smiling at each other like love-struck teenagers who’d just shared their first dance. Hats off to them, thought Meredith. It takes all sorts and they seem really happy together.