by Sharon Owens
‘It’s very nice,’ she lied, and they went into the living room.
Alex fetched a couple of cans of lager from the fridge and handed Kate one, without the benefit of a clean glass. He switched on the television, which was resting on a milk-bottle crate.
Kate took a sip and told herself she was a modern girl; that she did not like Alex enough to see him again, but that he did have fabulous hair and lovely muscles and surely she was entitled to one night of passion, to compensate for such a disappointing meal? She was on the pill, and not really getting the benefit of it. It was three months since her last romance. So! Alex was good-looking and available. Maybe she’d have a cuddle on the sofa, at least?
Soon, Kate was shivering to keep warm and glad she’d kept her coat on. It actually seemed to be colder inside the building than outside. There were no radiators in the flat. They finished their drinks, and then, with the empty can still in his hand, Alex leaned across to Kate and kissed her. It was an average kiss. No fireworks. A strong taste of vindaloo. Just as she was deciding whether to kiss him back or not, he asked her if she would like to see him in his competition briefs. Designer briefs from America, they were. Brand new. Kate was so shocked, she said yes.
Alex said he would just freshen up first. He went into the bathroom and switched on the shower. Kate began to think this night might not be so bad after all. She switched off the overhead lights in the flat as the sight of Alex’s many pieces of training equipment was a bit of a passion-killer. Not to mention all the posters of his body-building heroes, which were Blu-tacked to the grey-painted woodchip. Kate couldn’t bear the way all their veins bulged, as if they might pop at any moment.
She waited in the gloom for him to return. The minutes ticked by. Suddenly, he began to sing – ‘The Final Countdown’. Which band, she couldn’t say. They all sounded the same to her. Bon Jovi, was it? No. Europe, that was it. After a few more minutes, Kate knocked gently on the door.
‘Are you going to be long in there?’ she trilled, like some sort of girl-guide leader. She wanted to go to the loo herself.
‘No, you’re all right,’ he replied. ‘Be with you directly.’
‘It’s cold in the sitting room,’ she ventured.
‘What? There’s an electric fire. You can switch it on, if you like. One bar, mind.’
‘Gee, thanks, big spender!’
She stomped across the room to look for the switch. She approached the fire and bent over to turn it on, and froze when she saw six tiny black eyes peering at her from the grate. Mice. Three very cold little mice. They didn’t even move when she jumped with fright and then whimpered a little bit.
‘Alex! Alex! There’re mice in here, and they’re not even running away from me!’
‘Don’t worry about them!’ he called. ‘They’re tame! They’re only looking for a crumb.’ And he resumed his singing.
‘What the hell are you doing in there?’ she shouted. ‘You’ve been ages and ages. I’m bloody freezing, and there’re mice in the fireplace.’
‘For God’s sake, will you hold your horses! I’m going as fast as I can. This oil is hard to apply, when you’ve just had a shower.’
But Kate had given up. Her heart was not really in this, anyway. And now, the moment was gone for ever. If he thought she was going to wait for him, like some kind of slave, while he pampered himself in there… And they weren’t even on an official date. What must he think of her? A one-night stand? Suddenly, the thought of Alex Stone in his competition briefs scared the hell out of Kate Winters. She had to get out immediately. On her way, she left him a little gift.
‘Sod the inheritance,’ she said to the mice. ‘I’m getting out of here, and if you’d any sense, you’d do the same.’ She fled down the dingy stairs when she heard the bathroom door opening. She had left the little present under the quilt for Alex, when he did finally manage to drag himself away from the bathroom mirror.
Alex marched into the sitting room and struck up his best pose but Kate was not there to appreciate his biceps. She was not in the kitchen either. He realized she must be waiting for him in the bedroom. What a girl! He stood at the door of his darkened boudoir, wearing only several handfuls of body oil and a black satin posing pouch with fake diamonds on it. He twanged the elastic on his minuscule knickers, suggestively.
‘I hope you’ve had your blood pressure taken recently,’ he said, and he took a run at the bed, and leapt into the air. ‘Paradise, here we come!’
Unfortunately, the slender bundle beneath the quilt was not the eager warm body of Kate Winters, but a small pile of stainless-steel hand-weights. And they were very cold and very hard. Luckily, Alex’s handsome face landed on the pillow and was not marked in any way but he bruised his rhinestone pelvis quite badly.
‘Ungrateful witch!’ he yelled, as he rubbed his tender skin, and felt for the light switch. ‘Ungrateful, bloody witch! Of all the mad, stupid, mad, crazy…’ But he couldn’t think of anything to say as the pain went right through him like a spear. Two of the diamonds had fallen off, as well. Fifty pounds down the drain: his best competition briefs were ruined.
12. Old Battleaxe Strikes Again
Kate was very subdued for a few days after that. She didn’t go to Hogan’s the following Saturday night. She didn’t even go shopping for handbags on the Sunday, which led her parents to speculate that she might be catching a cold. It was the beginning of September, after all. Kate was normally a big devotee of the recently introduced Sunday shopping.
Mrs Winters made a big pot of chicken soup, and turned up the central heating. Her father bought some vitamin C tablets for the whole family, and left them on the kitchen window sill, so that nobody would forget to take one each morning. Shirley noticed that Kate’s hands were a little bit unsteady, on Sunday evening, when she was buttering a slice of toast. She was filled with horror that Kate might be developing a drink problem. Shirley didn’t say anything at the time, but she decided to try and reduce Kate’s drinking opportunities. And that meant not going to Hogan’s for a while, even if Declan Greenwood might be there. If Kate fancied a night out, Shirley would suggest they go to the cinema instead.
Monday morning arrived, and brought with it the Back-to-Work blues. Kate and Shirley sat on the bus in silence, each lost in her own thoughts. Shirley was daydreaming about Declan and wondering whether or not she should splash out on a new winter coat with fake-fur trim. There was a gorgeous one in Top Shop. Kate herself was also in a deep reverie. She was feeling very strange these days, as if she had lost her way somehow. The incident in Alex’s flat had pulled the carpet out from underneath her, emotionally. She’d felt suffocated in that cold little sitting room with the mice and the dust and the body-building posters. Even the thought of Alex’s beautiful body could not make her relax enough to spend another minute in the place.
There was a note on her desk, telling her to come right away to Miss Bingham’s office. For the first time in ten years, she would not be opening the daily post from the dear old dole-ites. She made her way down the corridor, knocked nervously on Miss Bingham’s door and went in. The supervisor was sitting behind her pristine desk, with her arms tightly folded. Kate noticed again that Miss Bingham had not personalized her office in any way. There were no family photographs or plants in the little room. Just one pot of very sharp pencils.
‘Take a seat,’ Miss Bingham said, and she slipped a red folder out of her top drawer. She shuffled through a few papers, stretching out the moments of tension. Then, she looked at Kate for a few further seconds before she spoke.
‘I’m sure you know why you have been summoned here today.’
‘Have I been promoted?’ Kate asked, with a broad smile. ‘Oh, goody!’
‘You have not been promoted. Certainly not.’ The older woman snorted a blast of air down her nose, like a racehorse on a cold day at Ascot.
‘Well, then I’m afraid I’m at a loss.’
‘There’s no point trying to deny it, Miss Winters.’
‘I’m sorry?’
‘You alerted Mr Alex Stone to the fact that he was under observation by this department. A serious breach of –’
‘Was he alerted? It wasn’t me, honestly. I don’t know where you got this information. Sure, he knew we were on to him, when he got the letter asking if he was working in Hogan’s.’
‘You were seen talking to him.’
‘Where was I seen?’
‘You know where. In Hogan’s ballroom. You spoke to him for ten minutes. You were photographed.’
‘Hell’s bells! Is nothing sacred, any more?’
‘Please don’t use language like that in my office.’ Miss Bingham was enjoying this interview immensely, and she wanted to make it last as long as possible. Before she told Miss Winters that her position here was at an end.
‘Okay, I’m sorry. Look, I was talking to him, that’s all. I didn’t tell him anything about the investigation. It was just a casual, social chat.’
‘We were already observing him, as it happens. He’s done this kind of thing before, you see. We’ve been watching him for some time.’ She puffed up with civic pride.
‘I see, Miss Bingham. Listen, I’ll contact him and make arrangements for him to pay back the amount he owes.’
‘It’s too late for that. He’ll be summoned to appear in court.’
‘Oh.’ Kate felt sorry for Alex, now. But not too sorry, remembering his antics on the night she went back to his flat. ‘I’m sure he was pretty desperate for money, to do what he did. And he doesn’t have many qualifications. And he is a very good doorman.’
‘He could get a full-time labouring job; there are plenty available. And still work as a doorman in the evenings, if he really wants to hang around such degenerate places. That is not my problem. Fraud are in control of that case, now. You, on the other hand, are in some considerable trouble, yourself.’
‘Me?’
‘You passed on confidential information to Mr Stone.’
‘I did not.’
‘I found the letter in your desk. It should have been filed in his case folder.’
‘That doesn’t prove I told him anything.’ But her face was suddenly as red as a red-hot chilli pepper.
‘I’m sorry, but a decision has already been made.’
‘What decision?’
‘Regarding your employment status.’
‘I’ll go to a tribunal. I will. This is just discrimination. You just don’t like me because I’m young and a free spirit.’ Somewhere, in the back of her mind, Kate knew what was coming. A song from the ballroom came back to her, suddenly: ‘Damned Don’t Cry’ by Visage.
‘Now, really. This is a serious situation. Talking to Mr Stone was only one thing on a long list.’
‘What do you mean?’ Kate’s heart seemed to turn right over. She could feel the arteries and veins straining to hold it in place.
‘Poor time-keeping, taking and making personal calls, a negative attitude to the customers, eating and drinking at your desk, lack of respect for senior management, not to mention careless filing, and playing tasteless practical jokes which contravene health and safety regulations.’
‘What! Those things are not serious! Everybody in the building does things like that.’
‘Oh, please! Stop trying to bring innocent people into this.’
‘They do. They all do. We’ve drunk tea and coffee at our desks for years. Come on, now! It’s not a high-tech lab we’re working in.’
‘We have very high standards here. You just don’t make the grade for the civil service, I’m afraid.’
‘The civil service is full of people who couldn’t hack it in the private sector. We’re very sensitive and delicate types. Except for you, of course, Miss Bingham.’
‘How dare you!’ Miss Bingham stood up, snorted air out through her nose again, and then sat down. ‘You cheeky little – Oh, I won’t say it!’
‘No, you don’t understand. I meant that as a compliment. That you’re tough. You know? Tough as old boots! Oh, no; I didn’t mean that the way it sounded.’
‘Miss Winters, I regret to inform you that your position here has been terminated.’
‘What? I thought I was getting a written warning, or something. You’re sacking me?’
‘Indeed, I am. How dare you slander the civil service!’
‘All I did was state a true fact.’
‘There are no slackers here. Besides yourself.’
‘You’ve no compassion at all. Poor Mrs Kelly was in tears last week. Did you know that?’
‘What rubbish!’
‘It’s true! Twenty-eight letters she had to send to one claimant, to recover a four-pound over-payment, because you wouldn’t let it go. If you were a decent boss, you’d be nice to your staff, instead of prowling round the desks like a starving panther, picking off the weak and the vulnerable.’
‘This interview is concluded.’
‘Alex Stone calls this building Gestapo HQ. Put that in your secret file.’ She called Miss Bingham a witch under her breath, too, but the outraged supervisor heard her.
‘You may leave right away.’
‘Is there no way to appeal this? What about my human rights? My loss of dignity?’
‘Leave this building now, before I lose my temper. Go on, off you go. I thought you hated it here. What’s your problem?’
‘I will go, and gladly. I never liked you, if you want to know the truth.’ There was the trembling. Check. And the palpitations. Check.
‘Goodbye, Miss Winters. Don’t bother to clear your paperwork.’
‘I never liked this job. It’s boring. I’m overqualified to be a clerk.’
‘Goodbye, Miss Winters.’
‘I’ve got ten O Levels, you know. You’re just a horrible, hateful old witch! How many O Levels have you got? Or didn’t they do exams in the Middle Ages?’
‘Get up!’
But Kate couldn’t get up. She felt dizzy. Her legs had turned to jelly. Even her feet were shaking now. She staggered to her feet, wobbled forward for a couple of steps and then tried to sit down again. But Miss Bingham had her by the elbow and was pushing her out of the door and into the corridor. She summoned a colleague from across the hall and told her to fetch Shirley Winters, as soon as possible, please. A white-faced Kate was helped into her coat, and escorted by a security guard to the front door, where he gently removed her security pass. He felt awful having to do it, but orders were orders. That old Bingham woman had no feelings, he knew. He smiled sympathetically at Kate to show her he was not enjoying his task. The sight of a friendly face helped Kate to recover slightly. She stepped out of the building and took a deep breath, her face turned upwards to the morning sun. The security guard stayed with her for a couple of minutes, talking gently about the weather. They both ignored Miss Bingham, who was pacing the foyer, spoiling for another argument. Kate’s breathing returned to normal. She noticed that although the trembling had also stopped, her heart was still racing. Shirley came running, then, and Miss Bingham explained the situation.
‘Oh, Kate. What have you done, Kate?’ Shirley tried to put an arm round Kate’s shoulders, but Kate turned away and began to walk in a crooked line, down the street. Miss Bingham was thrilled to have the troublesome Kate out of her way at last. She followed the sisters for a few moments, squeezing every second from this exciting small-scale drama.
‘Take her home, dear. I think she should see a doctor. She’s very emotional. I’ll expect you back at your desk tomorrow morning, Shirley.’
Shirley nodded.
‘It’s not a crime to be emotional! Old witch! You’ve done me a favour, do you hear me?’ Kate began to cry then, and several fat tears rolled down her cheeks. ‘You and your stupid rules! I’ll be rich one day. Because I’ve got a mind of my own. And I’ll use it and I’ll be rich! And you can go to hell!’
Miss Bingham went back inside, having safely seen a disgruntled ex-employee off the property, and with some choice goss
ip to report to the other supervisors. The two sisters were left standing on the street.
‘Do you want to go home, Kate?’
‘Sorry about that, Shirley, old bean. I think I said a couple of things out of turn, there. God, I feel weird. I thought I was going to crack up there, for a minute or two. Took a turn of some kind.’
‘Never mind. You’ll be okay in a couple of days, and then you can put all this behind you. I’m sure you can get a doctor’s note to say you haven’t felt so well recently, and fight the dismissal. Hormone trouble, or something.’
‘I need a drink, Shirley.’
‘Do you think that’s wise, Kate? It’s only half-past nine in the morning.’
‘I can’t go home and tell Mum I’ve lost my job.’
‘Come on! When have you ever cared what she said? Look, I think the drink is making you unstable. To tell you the truth, Kate, I think you might have a little problem with the old firewater. To be perfectly honest.’
‘Give me strength!’
‘Don’t be cross with me, but have you noticed that it makes you a little bit irritable? That could be the craving.’
‘I need a drink. I’ve just been sacked by the most awful woman. Talk about solidarity among the sisterhood! She didn’t even give me a verbal warning. Never mind a written one. I’m having a drink. And that’s final.’
‘Oh, God. Well, where do you want to go? We’ll have to wait somewhere, until opening time. I take it you’re not going to start drinking on the street?’
‘Shut up. We’ll go to the Crown Bar. I want to sit in a private snug and get quietly hammered.’
‘Now, Kate. Think of your poor liver. It’s taken a bit of a bashing over the years.’
‘Are you coming with me, or not?’
‘I’ll come, I suppose. To keep you out of trouble.’
‘Right. Come on, then.’