Читать книгу A Not Quite Perfect Christmas - Annie Lyons, Annie Lyons - Страница 11

Chapter Two

‘Lily, can you stop ordering things from room service, please?’ said Rachel, carrying another pile of towels into the bathroom where her daughter was having her third bath in less than twenty-four hours.

‘I love hotels,’ murmured Lily, lifting up a handful of bubbles and spreading them over her chin so that she looked like a miniature female Father Christmas. ‘When I’m older, I’m going to earn enough money so that I can just live in a hotel,’ she declared, blowing a handful of foam at her mother.

‘Can I come and live with you?’ asked Rachel with a smile.

‘I don’t think so,’ said Lily.

‘Don’t beat around the bush, Lils.’

‘I expect Will or Alfie will look after you,’ she said in an almost consoling way.

‘I live in hope,’ muttered Rachel, walking back into the bedroom. ‘Don’t be too long. We need to go and meet Granny for breakfast in a bit.’

‘’Kay,’ said Lily before sinking back into the water and breaking into a tuneless but enthusiastic rendition of Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer.

Rachel picked up her tea mug and took a large sip. She got the feeling she would be needing a few caffeine hits today after a night sharing a bed with her extremely kicky daughter, who also liked to sleep in a starfish position leaving approximately two feet of space for her mother. She peered at herself in the mirror, ignoring the dark shadows under her eyes. She pulled at her forehead to iron out the wrinkles before coaxing her fringe down to hide the most prominent lines. She scrunched at her hair in an attempt to give it more volume and scrutinised her roots. ‘The Darcy women never go grey,’ her mother had observed one day as if allowing this to happen might show a weakness of character. Rachel was glad; it was one less thing to worry about in the ageing process. She stood up straight, sucked in her stomach and pulled back her shoulders. There were saggy bits, it was true, but she was slimmer and fitter these days. Not bad for a woman approaching the big 4-0, she decided.

She picked up her phone and saw a text from Steve obviously sent before he went to bed.

‘Alf missing you. I’m missing you. Will missing the iPad.’ Rachel smiled. There had been a boys-versus-girls tussle over whether the family iPad would go to New York. New York and the girls had won. Rachel would have liked to phone the boys but she knew even her usually tolerant husband wouldn’t appreciate a call at three-thirty in the morning. She missed them too, she realised. In a way she wished that they’d all been able to come. She knew Will would have declared everything he saw to be ‘awesome’ and Alfie would have liked to have seen ‘the lady with the ice cream’, or ‘the Statue of Liberty’ as most people called it. She smiled at the thought of her chaotic family and of herself as a mother now compared to two years ago when she so nearly lost everything. It had taken the death of her darling dad to make her realise how lucky she was. She missed him every day. He would have found the idea of Diana, Rachel and Lily in New York vastly amusing and completely wonderful. Rachel composed a reply to Steve.

‘Missing you all too. Lady Gaga on a mission to use up all bubble bath in hotel. Call you later for proper chat x.’

She heard Lily getting out of the bath and went to see if she needed any help. She was wrapped in a gigantic towel and was attempting to fashion another into a turban for her hair.

‘Let me do that,’ said Rachel.

‘No, it’s fine. You always do it too tight,’ snapped Lily.

Rachel held up her hands in defeat. To say that Lily was an independent little girl would be like saying Bill Gates knew a thing or two about computers. From the moment she could speak, which in Rachel’s mind had been almost weeks into her existence, she had known exactly what she wanted. It was a self-confidence that astonished her parents, teachers and peers and, when coupled with the cleverness and steely sense of justice she also possessed, made her the small-girl equivalent of Marmite. Some people found her funny, charming and bright. Others found her precocious and irritating. Rachel had a foot in both camps.

At the parents’ evening towards the end of the summer term in Lily’s first year at school, her teacher had observed to Rachel and Steve, ‘I think you might have a future prime minister there.’

Rachel had shivered. It hadn’t been the first time that the comparison had been made and for Rachel, growing up in the eighties with the echoes of ‘Maggie Thatcher, milk snatcher,’ still in her head, she wondered at the monster she might have created.

‘She might be the first female Labour prime minister,’ said Steve when they got home. They heard Lily demanding that Will make room for her on the sofa or she would throw his Skylanders in the bin. Steve winced.

‘Or dictator of the first republic,’ said Rachel with a worried look. ‘And I know for a fact that I’ll be first against the wall.’

Rachel followed her daughter out of the bathroom and watched as she rifled through her bag, flinging tops, jumpers and leggings onto the bed. She decided to let her get on with it. There was a confident tap at the door. Rachel opened it to find her mother standing before her, dressed in a casual jumper and trousers with a scarf around her neck.

‘Morning, Mum. You look very nice.’

‘Don’t say “nice”, Rachel. It shows such a lack of imagination.’

Rachel rolled her eyes and wondered if she should just give up trying. Between her mother and her daughter, there was no hope of pleasing anyone. She longed for one of Alfie’s tight little hugs and breathy, ‘I love you, Mama,’ sighs into her ear.

‘Morning, Granny,’ said Lily, pulling a jumper over her head.

‘Good morning, Lily.,’ Diana smiled. ‘How did you sleep?’

‘Very well, although Mum hogs the bed a bit,’ she said confidentially.

Rachel ignored the comment. ‘What about you, Mum?’

‘Oh, I never sleep for long these days,’ said Diana. ‘I watched some of that American television. Most of it was advertisements for things I’d never heard of.’

‘Well, I don’t know about you two but I’m ready for breakfast. Bacon, maple syrup and pancakes anyone?’ said Rachel.

Diana wrinkled her nose. ‘Sounds revolting.’

‘It’s actually really yummy, Granny,’ said Lily. ‘I had them at my friend Daisy’s house. Her mum’s American and they were delicious. Mum tried to make them once but she burnt them all.’

‘Well, you’ll have to show me,’ said Diana, taking her granddaughter by the hand.

Rachel shook her head and followed them out of the room.

******

Emma pulled the belt of her emerald-green wool coat tighter around her slim waist and shifted her bobble hat over her shoulder-length hair. She looked up at the clear blue sky and thought how much she loved New York. Before she had lived here, she had never considered there to be a city as wonderful as London. It was her birthplace and her home and its history, beauty and crazy, bustling cosmopolitanism had kept her happy and occupied for as long as she could remember. It also made her think of her dad and, like him, was the bedrock of her very existence.

New York was different but, two years into her secondment, she couldn’t imagine going back home. Not yet at least. It was like a thrilling roller-coaster ride that she didn’t want to end. On her first day in the city, she had strolled along the streets soaking up the atmosphere like a sponge. All she could think was, It’s just like in the movies. Here are the yellow taxis, here’s the steam coming up from the ground, here are the ‘Walk, Don’t Walk,’ signs, here’s a man selling knishes, I have no idea what they are, but I want one. And on and on it went. Fifth Avenue, Central Park, the Empire State Building, the Flatiron Building, Tiffany’s oh Tiffany’s, it was all there, just as the films she had watched since the age of twelve had promised. And she loved it. And the best thing of all was that the offices of Allen Chandler Inc. were on Broadway. Broadway! Added to this, the supremely efficient office administrator, Delia, had found her an apartment on the Upper West Side so she could walk to work through Central Park. Central Park!

‘You just want to pretend you’re Rachel from Friends,’ Martin had joked. Emma had laughed, but it was partly true. You couldn’t help getting swept up by the romance of the place as you strolled through the park towards the heart of the city. Emma had felt immediately at home here. She loved the place, the people and their sense of humour. It was very like the British sense of humour: dry but less self-deprecating. She found that New Yorkers liked her because she was British; they were wryly amused by her in an indulgent way. She was having a ball.

As she approached the Allen Chandler building she looked up at its magnificent high-rise splendour and grinned. She pushed through the revolving doors and was immediately greeted by Don, the regular security guard.

‘Ooh, is he like Don Draper?’ Rachel had asked when Emma told her about him.

‘Hmm, not really,’ she replied, considering Don’s nineteen-stone bulk. ‘But he does a good impression of Joey from Friends.’

Don fixed her with a side-on grin. ‘Hey, Emma. How you doin’?’

‘I’m doing quite well, thank you, Donald,’ said Emma in the English aristocrat’s voice she reserved for their morning banter.

Don slapped his considerable thigh as he chuckled. ‘You crack me up. “Quite well, thank you, Donald.” That’s funny. You have a good day, now.’

‘You too.’ She smiled.

She was about to climb into the lift when a voice behind her shouted, ‘Hold that elevator!’ She turned to see Wendell Burke, fellow editor and a man as irritating as a bad case of piles, marching towards the lift. Emma sighed. Not everything about New York was perfect. They had wankers here too.

‘Good morning, Wendell,’ she said.

‘Emma Darcy. Why, the pleasure is all mine,’ he said in a terrible English accent. He thought he was being funny and clever. He was neither. ‘So how is project Brit-Lit coming on?’

‘Very well, thank you,’ said Emma.

‘I told Michael way back, why would you want to bring over this editor from England with her books on baking and football and the royal family? It’ll never work.’

‘Well, it just goes to show how wrong you can be.’

Wendell looked unimpressed. ‘You’ve had one book in the New York Times bestsellers and it was about Kate Middleton. You could sell diapers with Kate Middleton on.’

‘Look, my brief was to import anything British that captured the American interest. That is what I am doing. Michael is quite happy, so I don’t see what business it is of yours.’

Wendell shrugged. ‘It’s not, I guess. I’m happy to concentrate on proper literary works while you swan about with books for the masses. Actually, I’m doing a tour with an author you used to know. Richard Bennett?’

Emma kept her face very still but she could feel her heart start to beat a little faster. ‘Oh, yes?’

‘Yeah. His new book’s been picked up by Oprah so we’re going to get him over for a few days. We should all go out for dinner.’

‘That would be lovely,’ lied Emma. ‘Oh, this is my floor. Excuse me,’ she added, sidling past Wendell.

‘Good luck with your One Direction books,’ he jeered. ‘And have a nice day, now.’

‘I’ll have whatever bastard day I want, you oily toss-pot,’ muttered Emma, making her way to her desk. She switched on her computer and took off her coat just as Delia was wandering past with her coffee pot. Delia was the über-efficient office administrator, a proud New Yorker who had taken Emma under her wing from day one. Her impressive, immovable thick black bouffant was almost as big as her fearsome reputation for knowing everyone and everything there was to know about Allen Chandler. Emma loved her.

‘Who crapped in your purse?’ she asked with a cheery grin.

‘Guess. And good morning, by the way.’

‘Aww, not that dumbass Burke again. I told you a hundred times. Ignore him. From what I hear, he ain’t so shit-hot after all.’

‘Do you think?’ asked Emma.

Delia tapped the side of her nose. ‘I know it, honey. He’ll have his day, you mark me. Now, do you want a cawfee or not?’ she said, holding up the pot.

‘Please.’

Delia nodded and made her way to the kitchen. Emma sat down at her computer and fired up her e-mails. The top message had been sent early that morning and it was from her boss, Michael Allen, who also just happened to be the CEO’s son.

‘Emma, can we meet for a chat this morning, please? Give Alex a call as soon as you get in.’

Emma took a deep breath. She got on well with Michael, but it was always unsettling to be summoned by the boss. She phoned his PA, Alex, and arranged a meeting for later that morning. Delia returned with her coffee and Emma settled down to read her e-mails and plan her day.

******

On the other side of Manhattan, Lily was complaining. ‘My feet really hurt. And I thought we were supposed to be going shopping, not looking at boring old historical stuff.’

Rachel sighed. ‘You can’t come to New York just for the shopping. You’ve got to have some cultural experiences, haven’t you, Mum?’

‘If you can call it culture,’ said Diana, glancing suspiciously at a man standing on a street corner dressed as a hot dog.

‘Well, we all enjoyed the Empire State Building, didn’t we?’ said Rachel.

Diana and Lily muttered affirmatives. ‘It’s a shame King Kong wasn’t climbing up the outside of it like in that film,’ said Lily.

‘Yes, yes, that is a shame,’ laughed Rachel. ‘Anyway, I think you’re going to like our next stop.’

‘Is it far?’

‘Not too far,’ said Rachel uncertainly, eyeing the street they were crossing.

‘The Apple Store!’ cried Lily. ‘We could buy Granny an iPad! They’re much cheaper here.’

Diana laughed. ‘I struggle to use the telephone, Lily.’

‘No, it’s not the Apple Store but it’s not far away,’ said Rachel, pointing towards a tall shopfront, where two soldiers dressed in red were smiling for photos and ushering excited children through their doors. Its windows screamed, ‘It’s Christmas!’ in the manner of Noddy Holder about to sing his festive hit.

‘A toy shop!’ cried Lily. ‘A really big one! Wait until I tell the boys about this. They’ll be well jell,’ she declared, skipping towards its open doors.

‘Cultural experiences, you say?’ murmured Diana, following her granddaughter through the entrance.

‘This is modern-day culture,’ said Rachel, taking a photograph of Lily next to the toy shop’s soldier she was hugging just a little too tightly.

Diana raised her eyebrows quizzically. ‘Oh, yes?’ she said, watching as a toddler had an impressive textbook tantrum, falling into a pile of rainbow-coloured unicorns.

Lily was skittering left and right like a sausage in a pan, for once unable to speak as she tried to take it all in. She dashed back to Rachel and Diana.

‘Right, I’ve got to get something from Hello Kitty, The Muppets and possibly Paddington. Oh, and there might be some cool American stuff so I’ll have to look at that too. Come on, we’ve got so much to do!’ she cried, leaping from foot to foot.

Diana shook her head but smiled indulgently at Lily as they headed towards the escalator. Rachel nudged her mother. ‘Well, at least she’s got her energy back,’ she whispered. ‘And anyway, who doesn’t like a bit of shopping? Lily, will you look at the size of that panda!’

******

Michael Allen’s pewter-blue eyes were fixed on Emma and to be honest it was making her mouth go a bit dry. If it weren’t for the fact that he was gay, Emma would have had a knee-trembling crush on this man. In fact, sod it; she did have a crush on him. He was a bit Tom Ford with an air of George Clooney and frankly what wasn’t to like in that combination? She almost forgot what she was saying.

‘And so given the success of the first royals’ book, we’re thinking of rolling out the format to other members of the royal family for publication next May.’

‘Okay, good.’ Michael nodded. ‘But let’s be selective, shall we? Harry would be an obvious candidate, I would say.’

‘Absolutely,’ said Emma. Wendell Burke, who was sitting in the chair next to her, gave an expansive yawn.

‘Late night, Wendell?’ asked Michael, bringing his hands together in prayer position.

‘Sorry, Michael,’ said Wendell with a sly smile. ‘I was just up late reading the new Richard Bennett. The guy is Grade A.’ Emma bristled.

‘Oh, yes, this is our new Oprah boy. Isn’t he British, though?’ asked Michael, glancing over at Emma.

Emma swallowed. ‘He is.’