Bedtime Reads

by Janet Pywell

  I’m not the only one who fancies her.

  There are boys much younger and far more agile working on the team. They are braver than me. They’ve even tried it on with her and she flirts back. She’s good at that. She handles them well. She laughs off their advances with a pat to their six-pack or a squeeze of their bicep. Sometimes she ruffles their hair or taps their cheek but with me she’s different.

  I guess it’s because I’m older and I’m married. I’m not as enthusiastic as the young bucks and they make me smile. Half the time I stroll around with a nonchalant smile on my lips. I won’t be turned down or patronised or made a fool of and she knows this. Sometimes she gives me a playful wink over their heads or across one of the computer screens that separate our workstations.

  It’s a complicit look. It’s one that says: see how I put up with these guys? See how I handle them? But I love it!

  Sometimes I nod back. I’m flattered that she singles me out. I’m different. She feels safe with me. She trusts me.

  Alan, one of the young bucks, said it was because I was an old codger. He said that she feels sorry for me but I know that’s not true.

  Angie values me. She took me into her office only last week and said she appreciated the research I was doing. Many people my age would find it a drag going to work but I told her I love it. Angie also said, I was good at my job and that I might get a fat bonus at Christmas.

  I hug my bomber jacket closer to my chest and inhale deeply from the minuscule butt just as Angie raises her voice.

  ‘I can’t keep taking this risk, especially if you’re going to bugger everything up.’

  Shocked.

  I tilt my head. I’ve never heard Angie swear before and it brings a smile to my face, she’s got grit, so I move closer to the window and risk a quick peak inside.

  Her hair is long and lustrous as if she’s washed it in some magical oil that makes it shine. Her profile shows a stubby nose and a determined chin. She leans over her desk, her short blue dress barely covering her arse and her long legs disappearing into infinity. Golden bangles clatter on her wrist as she writes, then she pushes the tip of the pen between her purple-coloured lips concentrating on a computer print-out like the ones she allocates to us each day. She monitors all our calls, the names of the people and phone numbers.

  Alan reckons Angie is a still water and runs deeper than we think. He thinks there’s another side to her and she isn’t all she seems. He thinks she’s putting on an act. He called her a tiger but he’s probably got some sexy fantasy going on in his head.

  ‘Look, I’ll give you another one but this time do it properly!’

  She runs her eyes down the list and if I stand on tiptoe I see the list is the one from yesterday. It has been highlighted with yellow and pink marker pens.

  ‘Erm, let’s see, this one. This isn’t too far. It’s Ashford,’ she pauses, stands up and scratches her scalp with the biro. ‘It’s an hour. Anything closer might be suspicious. We agreed two or three hours, max. What about Margate?’

  I bring the fag to my lips wondering if I have time to roll another. Smoke rises and stings my eyes and when I rub them they fill up and feel sore and prickly.

  Margate would be two hours from here easily. That’s a long way for whatever it is.

  ‘This one is out all afternoon. There’s someone in after five.’

  I bounce up and down on my heels. That wind is fresh today. Angie must be on to Graham arranging appointments.

  Hang on?

  Hadn’t she called him Miles?

  I thought it was Graham who organised the salesmen’s visits. I wonder if he’s left. I liked Graham. He was decent, and more importantly, he had a nice way with the old dears on the phone. He always told the sales guys to call first so as not to alarm the old folk. They may be having a nap or watching TV or something, so it was always best to call twenty minutes earlier. They can pop the kettle on, he said. When Graham gave us the sales course he said, ’It’s important that people like you. If they won’t buy you a coffee or make you a tea it’s because they don’t like you and no-one, no-one,’ he stressed, ‘would buy anything from you. Not if they didn’t like you. Double-glazing or not. It didn’t matter, and old folk could get a real bee in their bonnet. If you messed up then the guys like me, the guys in telesales, suffered because their commission went down.’

  I’d never understood the ins and outs of business but that had made sense and again, like Angie and because I was older, he had singled me out for a nod of the head and a wink. When the training was over, he had slapped me on the shoulder saying he wished there were older folk like me with gumption and stamina to go out to work.

  ‘56 Mooreton Road,’ Angie’s voice floats past me.

  I stop bouncing.

  That address rings a bell. I peer through the window, the butt of my cigarette burns my fingers. I curse silently.

  ‘Yes, Mooreton Road. M – O – O…’ Angie hoops glossy hair behind her pixie ear and like most of the boys in the office, I have also thought about kissing those ear lobes. I’m taking the final drag from my butt. It’s almost time to start work and I move away from the window, cough and bring up phlegm.

  ‘Mrs Childer,’ she says.

  Mrs Childer is my client. I called her yesterday. Had she lived in Margate? She’d said she was going to London all this week but she would be back on Sunday.

  I hope Angie wasn’t making a mistake. She was on the ‘call again to confirm next week’s list.’

  I blow out the smoke. The acrid taste is strong and it makes me want a coffee but I return and stand in my place under the window. I want to have my facts straight, then I can tell Angie she’s made a mistake. I’ll tell her the truth; that I was having a fag before work and I overheard her.

  I check my watch. I’ve three minutes until I have to be at my desk.

  ‘Look Miles, if you’re going to screw up, I’ll find someone else.’

  So it was Miles and not Graham she’s talking to.

  ‘Don’t tell a soul. I don’t care that he’s done jobs with you before. This is for you to do alone. So get on with it!’

  Miles?

  He must be one of the new sales reps. He must have been shadowing one of the more experienced sales men and now she wants him to do this job on his own. I’m surprised that Angie is so heavily involved with the sales reps’ visits. She always said she had nothing to do with them and that they were always planned via the head office ‘up north.’

  ‘I Googled it. It’s behind a bloody great hedge.’

  Angie really does her homework – she’s thorough. It sounds like Miles hasn’t got a great amount of experience but he would soon get better. The company is really hot on training. I’ve lost count of all the courses I’ve had in the past month.

  ‘I’ll destroy it. They’ll never know. Text me when you get there. It looks massive.’

  That’s kind of Angie to offer support. There would be a lot of windows. That’s why we target so many of the older population. Statistics show that they invariably live in old houses that need upgrading or modernising and they have the disposable income. It’s our job to get them to spend money on renovating their homes. It’s good insulation and it will keep them warm and reduce their heating bills. I couldn’t cold-call old folk if I thought it wouldn’t benefit them – it wouldn’t be fair.

  ‘And make sure you wipe it clean.’ Angie’s voice is harsher than I expect.

  I stand on tiptoe and she’s tapping the biro on my print-out sheet.

  Angie is kind like that. She never seems to mind that I don’t make appointments or that I don’t know when the old folk are in but I do know when they are out. I engage them in small talk and they always want to tell me when they’re going out or if they’re going away. I remember what Graham said – be kind and take an interest and it’s easy for me I’ve got all the time in the world.

  I decide to roll another cigarette so it’s ready for my mid-morning break. It saves time a
nd I’ll be able to bring my coffee outside and have a few minutes longer – perhaps time for two smokes.

  Mrs Childer is away this week. I’ll have to tell Angie not to send Miles or any other salesman round, especially if they are going to travel all the way to Margate.

  Then it all begins to make sense. Of course, Miles is replacing the windows with double glazing. It’s a big house, so maybe they’ve already got the contract if she’s telling this Miles chap to ‘wipe it clean.’

  Fingerprints can leave terrible smears.

  I pop the new roll up behind my ear.

  That was a quick sale. On Monday Mrs Childer was enthusiastic about her trip to London. She must have cancelled it and arranged to have double glazing installed over the weekend. She must have liked me a lot. I wonder which salesman went to see her and if I’ll get any commission. She was my client.

  Angie said I might get an extra bonus at Christmas so it’s probably best I don’t say anything. I won’t cause a fuss. I’m sure a company this size has it all under control.

  It’s one minute to nine when I slip inside and sit at my desk. I switch on my computer, ignoring the banter from the team around me thinking I might buy a steak pie tonight and a bottle of wine to celebrate.

  Angie leans against her office door holding a new computer print out and she singles me out for a smile. She really is a kind-hearted soul and I like her more each day. A lot of people call this job a real drag but I think I’m good at it.

  ‘Morning Angie.’ I tilt my cap at her and smile. I’m ready for another busy day of phone calls. She places the list on my desk and for some reason today, as she bends over me, her freckle looks remarkably like Corfu.

  I'd Lie In The Road For You

  ‘I’d lie in the road for you,’ she said.

  I was never sure if Auntie Marjorie actually meant it or if she was just joking and I never found out. Sadly, a year later Marjorie was knocked down by a truck in Spain and she died.

  I missed her.

  She was bright and funny and she’d often said silly things to me: ‘You’re like a tadpole jumping in and out of the water all day.’

  I’d replied:

  ‘How could I look like a tadpole? I’m a fifty year old with cellulite, and besides paddling in the sea with my trouser legs rolled up hardly constituted jumping in and out.’

  I never went back to Spain and ironically I started speaking to her much more after she died. I didn’t have to bother with a phone or Skype and it was much easier to walk Mitzy and gaze up at the stars and imagine Marjorie in heaven looking down on us.

  In the woods, by the sea or up on the Downs where it’s quiet. It didn’t matter. Sometimes in winter when the evenings were darker I’d wait for a break in the cloud to spot a shining star and I’d imagine it was her, up there, with her twinkling eyes laughing at me as I sheltered from the rain.

  ‘Silly sod, you should have put on a warm hat, a tea cosy would do - it would be an improvement,’ she’d tease.

  Then it was Trevor’s turn.

  I began to speak to him almost the day he died - even before the funeral. Trevor was my husband’s brother. Cancer took him at the age of forty-two. We nursed him, well - I did. Toward the end I’d spoon fed him and told him the cricket results.

  ‘Kent won,’ I’d say and I’d read to him how many runs, ducks and overs there had been. It meant nothing to me but a lot to him. I got quite used to looking at the scores and commenting on the players. I liked the anticipation of his interest and his happiness in what I was saying. I missed it.

  My ex travelled to India after Trevor died. He said he couldn’t cope and had to have some time out. That’s when he became my ex. It turned out that I didn’t miss him at all in India.

  It was Trevor who stayed in my heart. He understood me more than his brother ever did. He’d always been kind and I enjoyed looking after him. We talked about anything and everything. He never laughed at me or judged me. He just listened and nodded and said things would always work out - and they do.

  Most days I look up at the sky and speak to him.

  ‘You know what Trevor? Today is easier. I don’t feel as low as yesterday.’

  I always tried to tell him good news, something positive and optimistic. He’d been so poorly toward the end but now I imagine him happy and laughing up there with Aunt Marjorie, sharing a whiskey nightcap and a joke and probably even the cricket results - she liked the game too.

  ‘He’s a fine looking chap,’ Marjorie told me one evening when I was searching for Mitzy who’d disappeared nose first into a rabbit hole. A light was twinkling in the night sky and I paused to look up at her.

  ‘She’s a lovely nutcase,’ Trevor replied. His star was also shining brightly, right beside hers.

  I scanned the ground and eventually found Mitzy and put her on the lead.

  That’s when I thought about Dolly. We had been at school together. We’d grown up in the same street and we’d gone to the same school. We were closer than sisters but when she married Frank I was as surprised as the next person. She’d never shown any interest in him. He was a wide-boy, always on the make and money was king but Dolly went along with it all and when the children came along I think she turned a blind eye to his wandering eye and the ladies who made him laugh out loud.

  I saw him once. He was snuggled in the corner of a pub whispering into the ear of a girl, younger than his daughter. I saw the way his hand travelled up her skirt. I probably should have said something to him but I didn’t. I didn’t tell Dolly either. Dolly didn’t need me to tell her what he was like.

  There were plenty of people around here who’d do that.

  At first Dolly had laughed it off. Then she began to look tired and withdrawn and after going to the doctors she was manically happy again. I said I wanted some of those happy pills she was taking and she’d looked at me for a fraction of a second with very sad eyes before bursting into laughter and the moment was past.

  Gone.

  Then so was Dolly.

  Two days later.

  Frank found her hanging in the garage.

  It’s hard not to look up at the sky and imagine Dolly suspended from the stars, dangling, swaying, laughing and saying, ‘these happy pills are fantastic you should try them.’

  So when I take Mitzy out I’m never really alone. There’s always Marjorie, Trevor or Dolly.

  I chat away with them all. I ask them their opinion. Just like I did yesterday again. It’s been on my mind for so long and it’s affected me so much that I’ve been on sick leave from the bank for a few months now.

  It isn’t like me to be ill but these youngsters come in with their big ideas for change and training courses filled with ambition and motivated by careers and quite frankly I’m tired of it all. It’s like I’ve been left behind. My energy and youthful positive zest has been replaced by keeping up to date, to learn quicker ways to get a job done.

  My supervisor is twenty years younger than me but I’m paid more than her because of my length of service. I know it seems wrong and I would feel guilty but she’s so nasty to me I don’t feel any guilt at all. I only feel the bubbling of her hatred and bullying attitude and it causes me to shake and my body rattles in my own skin like I’m permanently cold.

  I walk Mitzy and I look up. I ask my friends up there, what I should do?

  ‘Spill hot soup over her?’ Marjorie suggests.

  I shake my head. The days when that would make me laugh seem over.

  Dolly who has known me longer than anyone is always in two minds. She can never decide. Eventually she says, ‘Take her out for a drink and tell her what a shit she is. Then, after you’ve cleared the air, you’ll feel better.’

  ‘But that could make things worse,’ I argue with the twinkling star.

  ‘Then put up or shut up. Leave! There’re more jobs out there. Don’t stress it.’

  I know Dolly is right.

  Trevor always gives sensible advice. ‘Go to your line manager.
Tell them how you feel and how she overlooks your contribution in meetings or is constantly nagging at the way you do things. Get your job description clarified.’

  I smile up at him. He’s the star that shines the brightest.

  I’m only human. It keeps me awake at night.

  I went back to work and I said nothing.

  I have a busy head and it’s my undoing because each day gets worse. I’m good for nothing. I’m constantly tired and I find it hard to concentrate.

  My supervisor said, ‘Maybe you’ve come back to work too early.’

  The next day she said, ‘Maybe you need a refresher course.’

  And yesterday. ‘If this continues I’ll have to report it. There will be an investigation.’

  That’s when I shake even more. It’s like I rattle when I walk. My frame is fragile and I think my knees might collapse. So I take Mitzy out and up onto the heath.

  I gaze up at the stars but it hurts my neck so I lay down to look at The Plough. The grass is wet under my head, my back and my bottom but it’s comforting to feel the damp earth soaking into my body. Mitzy must like it too because after licking my face she settles under my arm for a snuggle.

  I say: ‘So, Marjorie, are you awake up there?’

  ‘Of course I am, tadpole. What you need is a holiday. You don’t need to put yourself through all of this nonsense.’

  ‘What’s it all about? What’s it all for?’ I ask.

  ‘Just carry on what you’re doing and it will all work out. They’ll see she’s some little upstart and soon get rid of her.’

  ‘They’re promoting her,’ I reply.

  ‘Oh well, maybe she’ll move from your department.’

  ‘My new supervisor is only twenty-five. She’s heading for the top.’

  ‘That’s understandable - she’s young,’ Trevor interrupts. ‘There’s nothing wrong with ambition.’

  ‘Why does it have to make you so unkind?’ I whisper.

  ‘It’s power. It’s a heady mix. Some people can’t handle it and it goes to their head,’ he replies.