Precious You

by Helen Monks Takhar

  “So, who goes to your writing group, then? Just young ’uns like you, is it?”

  “Not necessarily. It can be pretty diverse. Members come and go all the time as well. I’m very flexible.”

  Ask me, Iain.

  “And what kind of experience would someone need to get involved?”

  Just ask. Ask so it doesn’t look like it’s my idea.

  “I run a pretty broad church. I’m easy. Except on the two-drinks rule of course.”

  Go on, Iain.

  “So, do you think that maybe I could come along one time? I’ve been meaning to get back on the horse for ages.”

  Gotcha.

  “Sure. If you make your way to The Rose and Crown at seven this Friday, I’ll be there. Give me your email, I’ll send you something to critique and you reply with something you’re working on. Got it?”

  “Got it. Yeah…Thanks, Lil. I’ll be there.”

  Of course you will. You’d do anything just to sit next to me again.

  I call it a day when I realize I’ve let myself drink way too much. When I get to my building, I’m so thankful the concierge isn’t there. But having been in the company of KR and Iain for a couple of hours in a hot pub, I suddenly feel cold and alone. The alcohol in my brain is swilling out memories, panning for heavy stuff I don’t want to see again. I’ve tried to write all over them, but my drunk mind keeps going back to places I don’t want it to.

  Ruth.

  When everything started to go wrong.

  But being around KR and Iain all afternoon like that, hearing about their long-past failed attempts to make a better life, I can understand why so many people their age think they need to get bombed the whole time. They never learn it doesn’t make anything better. I’ve already worked that out. And unlike them, there’s still time for me to put right what I need to.

  When I left the house for work on Monday, I was entering a changed world, unarmed. I was mortally hungover. It would definitely be a dial-it-in day. I needed to keep my distance from you, somehow, while I thought about my next move. I wanted desperately to ask Iain more about what he’d found out about you that afternoon, but hadn’t been able to bear bringing you up in conversation. The last thing I needed was to show Iain how much I hated it when he said your name.

  As I walked down the steps into my road, I wondered how many times you’d watched me doing just that and what you would have gleaned from your observations. You could have seen every time I’d swallowed down my anxiety, breathing it in, pressing it deep into my chest as I walked toward the bus stop. Were you watching me right then, in that moment, from your dark modern high-rise looming over my subsiding Victorian home? From there would you be able to detect the boozy flush of my face, read my nervous habit of checking and rechecking that I had my phone on me before leaving my front step. You may have seen all the times I’d sighed, straightened myself up, and summoned a voice in my head to tell me, Today is a good day. Before I’d even left my home, you would see you were already winning.

  When I got to my desk, you were already at yours. A coffee from you waited for me.

  “Good morning. How are you today?” There was some guilt in your voice, some expectation, something intimate and private—we’d seen each other socially and I’d read your blog post. I knew you’d been reaching into my life since well before that day in the cab. You wanted to know what this had done to me. I planned to outmaneuver you by showing it had left me wholly unmoved.

  “Thanks for this.” I moved the coffee to one side. You weren’t going to mess with me that way again.

  “How was the rest of your Sunday?”

  “The usual.”

  “I just wanted to say, I had such a lovely time with you both. Thanks so much again for letting me tag along. I didn’t mean to stay out as long as I did, but we were just talking about writing and, well, writing mostly.” You seemed like you were on the back foot, where I liked you. But how did you look so amazing after a skinful of booze? Your hair like a new conker, clear eyes, and the general demeanor of the teetotaler you’d let me believe you were. Were you just pretending to drink? I wouldn’t put it past you to know how to fool me in some impossible way. I let you go on. “You guys are soooo lucky, you’re totally the sweetest couple.”

  “That’s a kind thing to say.” I stared at my screen to maintain my unruffled demeanor. But you wouldn’t have it, because there you were, shining at me again in my peripheral vision. It was impossible for me not to turn and look at you directly. And when I did, I saw your orange lips part as you smiled so broadly; such affection you displayed, as if you were basking in the glow of my relationship. I felt the cold and fear over you leave me, warmth seeping in again. Incredible.

  “Your blog was very…interesting. It wasn’t what I was expecting at all…Lily, that day in the taxi, you didn’t mention anything about you seeing me already? Knowing exactly who I was, about you reading up on Leadership, my pieces? You knew who I was, but you didn’t say. Another person might have been somewhat surprised. Shocked, even.” Not me, of course.

  “I’m so sorry. You did seem familiar, but I couldn’t place your face at first. Have you not ever done that, Katherine, looked at someone somewhere and thought you knew who they were, but your brain just can’t make the connection, or maybe your subconscious is thinking that person is someone you should know? I’ve been trying to find a way of saying it, rehearsing what I could say to not completely freak you out: I’m a bored weirdo with no friends and a total overinterest in people-watching and middle-market trade titles? Are you angry? Do you think I’m completely crazy?” Your dark eyes begged me to understand you, a hand reaching across the desk and toward mine. And I was disarmed by you again.

  “Maybe no more than the rest of us,” I said, before I could help myself. Smiling back at you, your shoulders seemed to fall a notch; mine followed. “I’d better get on with some work.”

  I looked at the coffee and, with a tiny shake of the head at my own craziness, took a sip. Bitter. So disgusting my mouth puckered in protest. Was there a way I could put my mind at rest? “Hey, Lily. What do you have there?” I said, pointing at your hot drink.

  “Hot lemon with a little manuka honey. Why?”

  “Don’t suppose we could swap. Coffee isn’t doing it for me today, but I’m completely parched for something wet and warm. I’ve only taken a little sip. Would you mind?” I said, holding out my cup to you.

  “I’m not much of a coffee drinker really.”

  “Please. For me?”

  You looked at me quizzically. “Of course. Here.”

  We swapped cups, you watching me all the while.

  I took a sip of your infusion. It was possibly fouler than the coffee you’d got me. I noticed you put my cup on the desk next to you. You had no intention of drinking it, but the reasons why were inconclusive.

  “Hey, Lily. Congrats on the shout-out. Nice work.” Asif had appeared over your shoulder, as had become his way.

  “God. Thanks. Embarrassing really.”

  “Nah, you’re a natural. Own it.”

  “Thank you, Asif, that’s really so sweet of you to say.” You returned to your typing, before shooting me a demure tick of a smile. Asif may as well have ripped out his heart, and his balls, and presented them to you on a plate. So smitten, he hadn’t even asked me how my weekend was.

  It didn’t take me more than a second to discover that one of the first stories you’d filed had been selected by Tradeweek.co.uk as one of the best pieces from all UK trade titles in the past seven days. The write-up praised your “lively style” and “refreshing take on well-trodden paths.” Next, I checked out Leadership.co.uk’s “Most read.” The top ten were all yours, save for the tenth. That was mine. It languished at the bottom, but it was there all right. I reread it. It was neither particularly interesting nor well written, but it had sp
arked a conversation among our readers that was keeping it in the rankings. The comments posted on it included the following:

  This piece is so tired. What’s the point of having new owners and a revamp if they don’t change up the content too?

  Totally agree. I think it’s time for a new direction. New editor. I think it’s time for Katherine Ross to hang up her leather, or whatever lady hacks of a certain age do when it’s time to call it a day.

  With you there. If things don’t improve, I think you’ll find subscriptions sinking even lower, IMHO.

  And on it went. The sickening truth: My readers were clicking on my story not to engage with the insight, the voice of experience, but to rubberneck at my being pilloried by people who may once have feared me.

  That afternoon, I received this message:

  To: k.ross@leadership.uk; l.lunt@leadership.uk

  From: g.lunt@leadership.uk

  Subject: Copy camp

  Lily and Katherine,

  Your copy camp is scheduled for Thursday. I’ve booked some space for you at the Rosewood. You’ll have a meeting room, lunch included. Lily, we’ve discussed the objectives of the day. Katherine, Lily will have prepared a day of exercises and workshops for you.

  I think you’ll both get a lot out of it.

  Best,

  GL

  On reading this, it was all I could do to grab my phone, leave the office to go sit in the yard of St. George’s, and gaze into the air in front of me. I’d been earning money from the written word since you were in nappies, now I was going to have to sit and be lectured by you on how to do it properly.

  I couldn’t do my job anymore, not Gemma’s way, not your way. Irrelevance. Humiliation. Aged forty-one, with the phrase “on the scrap heap” hanging around me. And when I got back to my desk, this was waiting for me:

  To: g.lunt@leadership.uk

  Cc: k.ross@leadership.uk

  From: acceptableinthenoughties@gmail.com

  Subject: Fit for work?

  Does Leadership’s new code of conduct mean anything, or is it as much puff and nonsense as a typical Katherine Ross editorial? Shouldn’t you be under the limit when you show up for work? No wonder everything she writes reads like it’s been phoned in. Just sayin’. I share in the opinion it’s time to put Ms. Ross out to pasture, give Leadership a chance of being followed again.

  I could see through her office walls that Gemma had opened the message at the same time I did. She shook her head and looked through the glass in a way that said, Don’t give it another thought. You kept typing, but gave me the most beatific smile when you caught me staring at you.

  I emailed Gemma telling her the email had sent me off-kilter. I still didn’t want to investigate, but would it be all right if I went home for the day? She emailed back:

  Absolutely. Do whatever you need to do.

  When I got home, Iain was buzzing. He was only just pouring his first drink of the day. He was revisiting something he’d written a few years ago. This is what you’d done to him. It meant I couldn’t bring myself to tell him about what had landed in my in-box that day, or all the shitty comments on my story, thus associating myself with a problem, with being old and needy. “Past it” to your “Making it.”

  The night before our copy camp I’d ended up matching Iain gin for gin. I’d woken up parched in the small hours, fallen back asleep, and had the horrific dream that must have somehow made me sleep through my alarm. When I woke again, Iain’s absence and the light bleeding around my curtains told me it was late. This sort of thing used to happen a lot when I got sick. Sleep became perverted. Sometimes I’d be so tired the only place I could be was in bed, but once there, I wouldn’t drop off. I’d lie for hours, my body like lead, my mind wired with stress hormones that only became more concentrated as I begged it to switch off and let me have my oblivion, shave another few hours off my life. And when sleep finally came, it did so vengefully, plunging me deep enough into the darkness so I couldn’t hear my phone trying to summon me to a new day.

  I found Iain in the living room looking at something on my laptop.

  “Hi?”

  “Good morning!” He jumped up and snapped my computer shut.

  “What are you up to there?”

  “It was making a weird noise. Here, does it feel a bit warm to you?”

  I went over to him. He was quivering. He was often a bit shaky in the morning, but this seemed different. “No, seems fine. You OK?”

  “I’m great, love.” He handed me the tea he’d been drinking.

  “You’re a bit late today. Trying to dodge the old copy bullet?”

  “It’s coming for me whatever I do. Better get on.”

  “You do that, love. Eggs?”

  “No thanks, I’m late already.” I turned to leave. “May as well pack that now.”

  “What?”

  “My laptop?”

  “Sure. Here you go.”

  He gave me my computer and I handed back his tea. It felt awkward. It wasn’t like us. I put my computer in my bag, the tea back on the coffee table.

  I went back to our bedroom, closed the door. I checked he’d not tried to access my emails. No. I viewed the browsing history to find it was just as it should be.

  But I had forgotten about a file that lived in what I thought was a hidden zone; a folder within a folder within a folder in My Documents, one I kept quietly and only for myself. I should have hidden it deeper.

  No time for makeup, even after the quickest of showers. I grabbed my black biker and went back to the living room to say goodbye to Iain. He was in the kitchen, rendering or tempering some foodstuff or other that would become our dinner, some kind of time-consuming and pointless culinary process that would end up down the toilet just as soon as I’d consumed it. But how could I tell him I didn’t need him to do his one job in the world? Iain put down whatever utensils he was using, turned off the gas, wiped his hands, and brought me toward him for a hug. He held me tight and close. I breathed him in. We kissed. I felt as if I was safe again.

  But I wasn’t.

  And neither was he.

  I texted you from the cab before you could let Gemma know I was late. I didn’t even bother with an excuse, just told you I was running thirty minutes behind schedule. So exhausted, I just wanted to get through the day.

  I got to the Rosewood and scanned the lobby before checking in. I’d been there or somewhere like it before. Coming to hotels like this every week with some of my favorite male contacts was another lifetime ago. It was the time you could still feel kind of sorry for “online reporters,” the era just before the door finally closed on the long lunch. Back then, I still believed London would deliver, that my writing would elevate me. I used to love being wined and dined by my contacts, but to me, I was only filling time; getting leathered on the corporate shilling, as I passed through to my real destiny. That day, the Edwardian grandeur and vivacious, groomed women stalking the lobby seemed to mock the old me. They were rubbing it all in my face; Look at the lives we have, look at the lives we still have ahead of us. Anyone would tell you the Rosewood is beautiful. That day, it looked beige. Everything was beige, including me.

  Then there was you.

  “Want to know a secret?” You came up behind me.

  I gasped. “Christ, Lily. Did you want to—” the words Try to kill me suddenly came into my head. “Did you want to give me a heart attack?”

  “Sorry, sorry. I couldn’t resist. You looked like you were in a dream world. Everything all right?”

  “Yes?”

  You held my gaze with shining eyes. “So, wanna know a secret?” You slipped your arm under mine as you led me away in the opposite direction of the business center.

  “OK.”

  “But you have to say yes first.”

  “I can’t
just—”

  “Oh please. You won’t regret it,” you said, linking my arm, blasting the air around me with your youthful scent.

  “What have you done, Lily?”

  “If you come in on this with me you’re going to have such a better day.”

  “Just tell me what you’ve done.”

  “Only found a great way we can get out of copy camp.”

  You stopped and looked me in the face with mischievous glee.

  “So, I canceled the room and the lunch and swapped them out for some massages!”

  “Did Gemma OK that?”

  “Oh please, I can handle Aunty Gem, don’t you worry about that. Come on, what do you say?”

  “I don’t know, Lily.”

  “How about yes? Come on, we know I can square things with Gem. We’ve seen me do it before, right? Why don’t you just let me make a good day for us?”

  We.

  Us.

  I couldn’t help it. I still liked how that sounded. And I preferred the idea of a massage over the nightmare of you telling me everything the modern reader would find wrong with my writing, especially given my hangover and the strangeness of my morning with Iain. And how much trouble could I possibly get into with Lily dearest, the apple of Gem’s eye anyway?

  “Go on then.”

  “OK, as long as you’re absolutely sure.” You sought my consent again.

  “Sure.” Of course I wasn’t, but the alternative was too awful to contemplate and you knew it.

  “OK, great! So, because Gem’s made the booking under your name, we just need your scribble here and here to amend it.” You whipped out a suede clipboard and pushed it into one hand, a heavy silver ballpoint pen into the other.

  “What’s this? Do I really have to sign something? No, I’m not so sure. You sign it.”

  “I would if I could, but they’ve made it so I can’t. But if you don’t want to, I completely get it. I’ll rip this up. Sorry, let’s just get on with the copy stuff.”