The Liberation of Alice Love

by Abby McDonald

  “They gave the role to Nick Savage. Do you know him?”

  Rupert shook his head.

  “He’s a new signing at Grayson Wells,” she explained carefully. “He’ll be working for less than scale. Vivienne arranged it.” Alice paused, and then, just to be absolutely clear, she said it again. “Vivienne arranged it all.”

  Rupert’s eyes widened in recognition. “But…” He trailed off. “Why would…? I mean, she didn’t say…”

  Alice didn’t blame him for his surprise. The client-agent relationship was a tricky one, but it was based on a foundation of blind, unquestioning trust. Your agent told you to grow a moustache and learn a Russian accent? You did it. Your agent said to hold out for another two percent? You swallowed that panic and obeyed. And if your agent said that there were no jobs going and that they were doing absolutely everything they could? Well, you believed it.

  “Are you sure?” Rupert said it quietly, as if even questioning Vivienne’s wisdom was sacrilege.

  Alice nodded. Now that she was actually doing this, breaking all the codes of confidentiality, it didn’t feel the way she’d thought it would—like a victory. No, it felt like she was trampling the hopes of a good man. She braced herself. “This guy, Nick, he’s the new number one priority. He’s you, but…younger, flashier, an utter arsehole.”

  “So in other words, the perfect leading man.” Rupert was deflating in front of her very eyes, shrinking back into the upholstery and becoming smaller, paler somehow.

  “Look, she shouldn’t have been putting you up for those roles in the first place.” Alice leaned forward. “You’re not cut to be the dashing hero, and I think you know it.”

  “Thanks.” He looked hurt.

  “Come on, Rupert, you know what I mean. They’re all, what, six three, with chiseled bone structures and muscular thighs?” Alice made a face. “You’ve got something different—you have the best comic timing, and there’s a…quirky charm about you.”

  Rupert was still slumped there, as if she were giving him an “it’s not you, it’s me” breakup speech, but Alice pressed on. She knew what she was talking about, despite what Vivienne may think. “I’m telling you, change things around, start going for the sidekick roles: the best friend. It wouldn’t be your name getting first billing, but you’d steal every scene.”

  He gave her a weak smile. “Or maybe I should just jack it all in. I’ve been tutoring, to bring some extra money in, and I could teach, perhaps…” Rupert’s face took on a tint of despair as he contemplated a future away from stage and screen.

  Alice fixed him with a stare. “You shouldn’t give up. This is hard, I know, but it’ll just take some work.” And a new agent. The words hung between them, unspoken.

  “I don’t know…”

  Alice sighed. She hated to see him so defeated, but she’d had to tell him. She couldn’t have watched him turn up for lunches, oblivious, until his savings ran out and no new parts materialized. “Think about it, please. I don’t know why she hasn’t been putting you forward for these auditions all along. It wouldn’t have taken anything extra.”

  “She said she had a plan,” Rupert protested weakly. “She didn’t want to devalue my image.”

  Alice gave a sympathetic sigh. “I know.” Something in her twisted when she thought of all the decent, paying parts Vivienne must have been passing Rupert over for. They weren’t flashy lead roles, of course, but work was work.

  “Think about it,” she said again, her voice sounding unnaturally upbeat. “This could be a good thing. A fresh start!”

  Rupert gazed back, clearly unconvinced. “Thanks,” he sighed quietly. “Anyway, I better be going…”

  Alice bobbed up to hug him good-bye, watching as he began to walk away, shoulders slumped and head down. “Call if you need anything,” she called after him. “And remember, any name but Napoleon!”

  Chapter Sixteen

  Rupert didn’t quit the agency. Alice spent the next week in a state of alert, waiting for Vivienne’s imperious cry, but no such summons appeared. Whatever change she’d thought her information would spur, Rupert apparently preferred denial, and Alice had to admit, there was a small—and rather guilty—part of her that hoped it would stay that way. Concerns about his future had slowly made way for worries about her own and what consequences would ensue when he confronted Vivienne. Although Rupert would never reveal where he’d got his information, she wasn’t a fool, and Alice had made her opinions clear; it wouldn’t take much to link events and produce a conclusion of disloyalty worthy of reprimand, or worse still, dismissal.

  “Are you sure you have to go in today?” Flora found Alice in the kitchen one morning at the end of the week, hunting through her large carryall for a stray contract she’d taken to finish at home.

  “It’s Friday, Flora. Of course I have to go in.” Alice checked the front pocket again, flustered.

  “But I thought maybe you could ditch today, and we could go to the spa!”

  “What?” Alice looked up. She was about to dismiss the indulgent suggestion, but something made her pause, frowning. “Flora, are you OK?”

  “Sure.” Flora bounced up onto a stool and swung her legs. “It’s just, Stefan’s gone for a long weekend again, and I thought it could be fun. A sister bonding thing?” She beamed at Alice expectantly.

  Alice stifled a sigh, feeling every one of the five years between them. “I have a job, Flora, I really can’t.”

  “But—”

  “Flora!” Finally locating the contract, Alice scooped up her keys. “It’s a sweet idea,” she added hastily. “Maybe another time? When I’m not so busy. I really have to go; my old landlord called, and I have to pick up some post before work.”

  “OK…” Flora trailed after her as she hurried to the door. “Will you be back for dinner tonight?”

  “I’m not sure,” Alice replied, pausing over her umbrella. The skies were clear, and her bag was full, so…No. Not today. “I’ll call when I know.” She gave Flora a quick smile. “Why don’t you do the spa thing with one of your friends? Ginny, or—” she searched her memory. “Mimi, isn’t it? You haven’t seen them in a while.” Not waiting for a reply, she scooted down the front steps. “See you later!”

  ***

  It rained, of course, clouding over and drenching the city with cold sheets of water almost as soon as she reached the bottom of the hill. By the time Alice had dashed from the Tube to the office, her thin ballet flats were wet through and unpleasant rivulets of water had begun a slow trickle down her neck. She flung open the door and hurried into the foyer, shivering.

  “Can you not stand there?” Saskia beamed insincerely at Alice over the reception desk. “I only just tidied, and you’re dripping all over the floor.”

  Alice narrowed her eyes.

  “You should probably go clean up before anyone arrives,” Saskia added sweetly, from her warm, dry vantage point. “We can’t have clients seeing the place like this!”

  Ignoring the request, Alice pulled a stack of damp contracts from her bag and set them down on the desk with a thwack. “These need to be faxed right away,” she said, matching Saskia’s beam with one of equal insincerity. “Cover letters and details are stapled to the front of every file.”

  Saskia picked one up between thumb and forefinger with a grimace. “I’ll see when I can get to it.”

  “Right away,” Alice repeated, her friendly tone slipping. “Before eleven.”

  Saskia glared. Alice glared back.

  “Fine.” Eventually, Saskia admitted defeat. “I’ll do it now.”

  “And then the hand towels in the bathroom will need replacing. Since I need to stop dripping on your floors,” Alice added, turning on her heel and stalking up the stairs.

  She did what she could with the aid of paper towels and a flannel, but Alice was still decidedly damp and bedraggled when, at last, she settled at her desk and surveyed the thick stack of bills she’d had to collect from her old flat. The landlord had l
et them mount for weeks before remembering to call, and now she faced bold printed warnings on every envelope for her “immediate attention.” Bracing herself, Alice tore open the first. Six hundred pounds still owing on a store card, legal action, immediate steps. It didn’t say what the money had been used for, but Alice already knew: something unexpected, something fun. She tossed it aside and reached for another. More monies owning, even less time to pay. Another. Another. She made her way through the stack, the catalog of a life Ella had been living without blame or consequence. And Alice was left to tidy up after, as usual. As always.

  The floor was littered with torn envelopes by the time Alice was almost through. She’d have to sort them all, of course: make copies and forward them to the solicitor and file them away neatly along with the rest. She sighed, listlessly flicking through the final stack of hateful slim letters, with their clear windows and typed addresses. Then she paused.

  A postcard.

  It was tucked between two plain brown envelopes, a small burst of color with blue skies and some bustling town square scene. Alice pulled it out, flipping to see the back, and the handwritten message scribbled at an enthusiastic slant: “I love Italy! The men are divine, and oh, the gelato—it’s even better! See you soon. xx Ella.”

  Alice stopped, her heart suddenly racing. Ella was contacting her now, after everything? She reread the few short lines with disbelief. What could Ella possibly be thinking, giving police a trail to follow like this? Or was it a game, to gloat over her victory?

  Quickly, Alice checked the date. Over two months ago.

  Her excitement dropped as quickly as it had risen. That was when Ella was supposedly at that conference in Rome, the exhibition of beauty firms and PR agencies that she had sighed over, as if she really had been facing three days in an airless exhibition centre, plying the latest skin-care technology. It was nothing new, after all. She must have just sent it to maintain the façade, to fool Alice a little longer while she made her escape.

  Alice turned the card over in her hands, feeling a strange sense of disappointment. It would have been nice to know Ella was doing well, somewhere, and that she had thought of Alice—enough to risk detection. She often wondered where the other woman was now, and if she considered Alice with scorn or affection.

  “Alice?” Saskia’s voice suddenly sounded through the intercom, bored. “I can’t read any of these cover sheets, the ink’s all smudged. You need to come redo them.”

  Alice gazed another moment at the idyllic foreign scene before placing the card aside. The rain drummed against her window, and her feet made an unpleasant squelch as she slipped them back into her damp shoes. Yes, she sighed with resignation. This was going to be one of those days—she could just feel it.

  ***

  By lunchtime, she hadn’t revised her judgment. Or, at least, by what should have been her lunchtime: it was half past two, and Alice was so buried under paperwork and “urgent” letters that she had yet to leave her desk. She’d found half an uneaten cereal bar in the dark crevices of her bag, but that small sustenance aside, she was growing hungrier by the minute and decidedly irritable.

  Her phone rang again, and she snatched it up. The credit companies had evidently outsourced to another, even more aggressive collection agency, which had been calling every twenty minutes since the start of the day. “I’ve told you already,” she began, angry. “The police are dealing with it, and my solicitor has been in touch!”

  “Whoa, calm down, Aly.” Julian’s voice was taken aback.

  “Oh, sorry.” She exhaled. “They’ve been badgering me all morning. I’ve had it up to here.”

  “Can’t you take the phone off the hook?”

  “No, I get real calls on this line too.” Alice gazed longingly at a banner advertisement for McDonald’s that had appeared on her screen. And she didn’t even like McDonald’s. She dragged her eyes away. “So, how are you?”

  “I’m great.” Julian sounded relaxed enough, but then he’d probably eaten more than a handful of grapes in the past eighteen hours. “And I’ve got some good news. Yasmin’s managed to wrangle up those festival tickets, some sponsorship thing with her company.”

  “Which tickets?” Alice was confused.

  “For the literary festival, next weekend?” Julian reminded her. “Remember, we were saying how much fun it would be?”

  Alice had no such memory, but the idea of spending a full weekend with Julian and Yasmin gave her plenty of pause. “She got tickets for me, too?” Alice managed to keep the surprise out of her voice. Well, most of it.

  “Well,” Julian hesitated. “Actually, she could only swing the pair, but there were still some available online, so I got the extra.”

  “Julian…”

  “I know what you’re thinking, but we won’t be roughing it,” he reassured her quickly, as if tents and sleeping bags were her only concern. “She booked a hotel nearby and worked out the train schedule. You won’t have to lift a finger to organize anything. Won’t that be a change?”

  Alice sighed. Somehow, the usually intuitive Julian was managing to remain utterly oblivious. “Have you told Yasmin about inviting me?” she tried.

  “Of course.”

  “And is it all right with her?”

  There was the smallest pause. “Sure,” Julian insisted. “‘The more the merrier,’ she said.”

  “Right.” Alice couldn’t imagine Yasmin ever saying those words, let alone meaning them. She sighed again, but this time with more impatience than bemusement. “Well, I’m sorry. You should have checked before booking everything. I don’t think I should come.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I mean, I’ll pass on it this time.” Alice checked her cardigan, hung up to dry along the radiator. Still damp. “But you two should have a great time.”

  “I don’t understand, I already booked the ticket.” To her surprise, Julian sounded annoyed. “Come on, Aly, it’ll be fun.”

  “Thanks, but no.” She said it firmly, wondering where he got it in his head to think of the cozy trip at all. She, him, and Yasmin, playing cards together on the train down? It wasn’t the most attractive of invitations, surely he could see.

  “What’s the problem?” Julian’s voice rose a notch. “I thought you’d like it, I planned everything as a surprise.”

  “I thought you said Yasmin planned it all,” Alice pointed out.

  “But it was my idea, as a special treat for you. Something fun, after all this stress you’ve been under.”

  “That’s sweet.” Alice tried to understand why he was being so belligerent about this. “But I’m fine—really I am.”

  “No, you’re not,” Julian informed her.

  Alice’s eyebrows shot up. “Oh, really?”

  “I’ve been worried about you,” Julian continued, in an authoritative tone she’d never heard before. “I can never get hold of you on the phone anymore; you’re always rushing off to these mysterious classes of yours. It’s all right,” he reassured her, voice softer now. “I understand—this has been a tough couple of months. But I really think you need some time out, to recover.”

  “And how, exactly, would tagging along on a couple’s weekend help with that?” she retorted.

  “What do you mean by that?”

  “Oh, come on, Jules!” Alice finally exclaimed. “You’re in an adult relationship—I mean, you’re living together, for God’s sake. Surely you don’t need a chaperone anymore, in case you get bored of spending all that time alone with her.” It had been understandable, when they were younger, to go on group trips to dilute the effect of all that togetherness, but by now, it was safe to assume that being locked in a hotel room for three days with his partner wasn’t the worst fate a man could face.

  “What? I don’t…” Julian spluttered. “I mean, I don’t know why you’re being this way. I try to do one nice thing—”

  “Without asking me, Jules. You didn’t ask. And if you had, I would have told you it was a
terrible idea!” Alice knew she was exaggerating somewhat; perhaps she wouldn’t have come straight out and said it was terrible—then. Now, however, Alice was hungry, worn out, and in no mood to dance politely around his strange bouts of denial.

  “You’re having a bad day,” Julian told her, annoyed. “It’s OK, we’ll talk about this some other time.”

  “Jules, this has nothing to do with—”

  “I’ll call later, and we’ll talk.” He cut her off. “Bye.”

  Alice stared at her handset, confused. He had hung up. He had patronized her, become illogically angry, and then hung up. Wonderful. She put the phone down with a clatter, only for it to ring again.

  “Alice Love? This is Thornhill Collections calling—”

  This time, she was the one to slam the phone down. Giving her files a final, hungry look of disdain, Alice pulled on her still-damp cardigan and headed for the door. She would need fuel to face the rest of the afternoon, that much was clear.

  A thick, toasted panini, a bag of crisps, and a delicious slice of gâteau later, Alice’s blood-sugar level may have improved, but her mood certainly hadn’t. Was it her, or had the world conspired to send the most inane, tedious paperwork to her desk that day? Staring at subclauses until the print began to blur, Alice wondered if she had time to sneak away for a dance class before returning to the breach once more. It would relax her, at least, to be Ella for an hour and worry only about footwork and her line rather than the division of residual payments. But would the momentary escape be worth the risk of—”

  “Alice?” The call buzzed on her intercom, Vivienne’s voice faint but determined. “A word, please.”

  Leaving her gym bag untouched in the corner, Alice descended, but not without a small flash of trepidation. It could be anything demanding her attention—a contract issue or a client query or even just Vivienne wanting company for an afternoon tea at the Ivy—but just as easily, it could be concerning Rupert, and Alice’s oh-so-helpful advice.

  “Sit down with me a moment.” Vivienne’s tone was even, seated behind her long, bare desk. The drapes were half open, and perfume was thick in the air; Vivienne was draped with one of her velvet shawls, her lips painted a bright red. She gave Alice a warm smile. “How are you, darling?”