Читать книгу The Start of Something Wonderful: a fantastically feel-good romantic comedy! - Jane Lambert, Jane Lambert - Страница 10

CHAPTER TWO

Diamonds Are a Girl’s Worst Enemy

May

THE BLACK, GAPING ABYSS YAWNS before her, the sharp smell of fuel burning her nostrils. She inhales deeply as she is swallowed up. Her eyes are blinded by the flickering, white lights, her ears deafened by the roar of engines above. She should never have got mixed up in this assignment. Not only was it dangerous, but doomed to failure. She should have walked away from the situation while she still had the chance and suffered the consequences. But there’s no turning back now, so she focuses on the sliver of daylight in the distance. Not much further …

Huffing and puffing, she is spewed out of the tunnel onto the relative calm of the road. She looks up. Terminal Two Departures. She glances at her watch. 0730. Just enough time to make contact, hand over the diamonds, and return to base. Mission accomplished.

No, sadly, I am not on the set of the latest Lynda La Plante thriller; on the contrary, I am starring in my very own drama, entitled Payback Time. And my crime? Smugness – displaying sheer, unadulterated smugness. You know how it is: you dare to pat yourself on the back for a job well done, and next minute, a giant Monty Python foot appears from above and squishes you into the ground. That will teach you for being so damned pleased with yourself!

Determined to win over Miss Cutler, who is on the verge of firing me on account of my poor sales record, I scrambled together an emergency marketing strategy, which happened to involve a bearded Scotsman and a one-thousand-five-hundred-pound diamond necklace …

‘I’m looking for something a teensy-weensy bit special,’ the unsuspecting browser had informed me as he entered the shop. ‘It’s my wife’s fiftieth tomorrow, and she’s feeling …’ he looked around cautiously, checking he wouldn’t be overheard ‘… the change,’ he mouthed exaggeratedly. ‘I’d like something with a wee bit of sparkle to cheer her up.’

‘I see,’ I whispered back discreetly. Here was my chance! Opening one of the cabinets, I said, ‘How about this pastel gem-set bracelet? Notice how it shimmers with all the colours of the rainbow.’ I tilted it back and forth, so the stones’ reflection danced tantalisingly around the walls, like a kaleidoscope.

‘I was thinking of something a bit simpler,’ he said.

‘Aah,’ I nodded, undeterred. ‘Well, in that case, how about this nine-carat gold pendant, hand-crafted in Italy?’

‘Erm …’

‘Or this eighteen-carat belcher-bar necklace? Its extra length means it can be worn as a belt, a choker, or a layered necklace,’ I gushed, whilst demonstrating its many uses, just like I’d seen those shopping channel presenters do. ‘Layered jewellery is featured on all the major catwalks this season, so your wife would be up to the minute with the latest fashion.’ He bit his lip.

I could feel Miss Cutler’s x-ray eyes burning through my head from behind the two-way mirror in the back office.

Please, God, let me make a sale.

‘Let me see now …’ I said, brain racing, eyes darting wildly about. ‘Aha, I know the very thing!’ I launched into the window, swiping a fourteen-karat, white gold, diamond choker from the black velvet display stand. ‘What woman wouldn’t feel a million dollars wearing this?’ I glanced at the clock – 5.26 p.m. – just four minutes to closing time; four minutes to save myself from the dole queue.

‘… and … and Princess Diana wore the exact same style of choker when she took to the dance floor with John Travolta at The White House in the mid-Eighties,’ I added quickly.

He toyed with his beard.

‘A high point in her short life,’ I whispered sombrely.

‘It’s a wee bit more than I intended spending …’ he said pensively, as he peered at the price tag.

‘Reaching fifty is quite a milestone,’ I replied, in a kind of cool, throwaway tone, shamelessly swaying the dazzling diamonds in front of his eyes, like a hypnotist’s pendulum, hope hovering.

He glanced at his watch: 5.28. Beads of perspiration glistened on his forehead.

‘I’m catching a flight to Edinburgh in the morning, and I suppose a box of Milk Tray from WHSmith’s wouldn’t go down very well.’ He sighed, fishing out his wallet, resigned.

‘Absolutely not,’ I squeaked, snatching his credit card before he had time to change his mind. I snapped shut the leather presentation case. Placing it carefully under the counter, I coolly sashayed over to the cash desk, struggling to quash my overwhelming desire to do a Highland fling right there, on the shop floor.

Transaction completed, I carefully gift-wrapped the box, not forgetting the curly-wurly ribbon effect with the scissors, which I did with a dramatic flourish.

‘Thank you, miss. You’ve been very helpful. I cannae wait to see Morag’s face the morrow when I get hame.’

‘I’m sure she’ll be thrilled. Have a good flight back. Ooops! You dropped this,’ I said, handing him his air ticket and opening the door.

He kissed my hand as he exited. Yesssssssss!

In buoyant mood, I waltzed around the floor with the vacuum cleaner, singing to myself as I went. Saved from the humiliation of begging for an overdraft increase – again. From now on Miss Cutler would realise I was an asset to the shop and would be devastated when I inevitably had to give up my retail career for that of a West End star.

Then all at once Henry Hoover died. I spun round, and there stood Cruella, her head shaking.

‘Ah-hem! What is this, Emily?’ she asked coldly, holding up one of the presentation cases.

‘A jewellery box.’ I shrugged.

‘That is where you are wrong, Emily. This is no ordinary jewellery box,’ she snarled, face blazing, the veins in her swan-like neck pulsating madly. I stared at her, puzzled.

‘This is a jewellery box that contains …’ she said, milking every moment of her Wicked-Witch-of-The-West performance ‘… a very valuable item belonging to your customer!’

Opening the box, she dangled the choker in front of my eyes. OH-MY-GOD. I felt the colour drain from my face as my insides plummeted ten floors. I dropped the nozzle, realising with sinking horror that I had wrapped up the wrong box and sold nice, Scottish businessman one-thousand-five-hundred-pounds’ worth of diddlysquat.

‘Maybe we can trace him through his credit card? Or perhaps I could go to Heathrow tomorrow and try to …’

My voice fell away, as judging by Miss Cutler’s beetroot colouring, she was about to spontaneously combust.

So, that is how I come to be loitering around the airline check-in desks minus a ticket, a fifteen-hundred-pound diamond choker clasped tightly in my mitts.

The terminal is already abuzz with suited and booted businessmen on their way to Brussels or Belfast for a hard day’s wheeling and dealing.

I scan the concourse, looking for a tall, wiry, bearded Scotsman, clutching a boarding pass for Edinburgh and a beautifully wrapped box.

Couples cling to one another, off on romantic breaks to Vienna or Athens … Hang on a minute! My gaze rewinds to the Vienna check-in queue. Eyes narrowing, I move in for a closer look. It can’t possibly be. He’s ten and a half thousand miles away … and yet … I’d recognise that sunburnt, bald patch anywhere. (As a first class galley slave, you can spend a lot of time gazing at the back of pilots’ heads, patiently waiting, steaming-hot tea burning your hands, while they finish prattling on to air traffic control and punching buttons on the automatic pilot thingy.)

It is him, I swear. And who’s that woman he’s got his arm wrapped around? It’s not Beverley, his wife. She looks young enough to be one of his daughters, but she definitely isn’t. I know this because I once served his family in first class when he took them on a working trip to Houston at Christmas.

Swiping my shades from my pocket and pulling my cycle helmet down over my eyes, I venture nearer and take up position behind a pillar.

‘Vienna? Two passengers?’ says the check-in girl, switching on her Stepford-Wife smile. Taking their tickets, she taps furiously on the computer.

‘Any chance of an upgrade?’

Oh, yes, that’s our Mikey all right. The cheapskate, asking for an upgrade on his twenty-pound concessionary ticket. Bloody typical.

I’m tempted to walk right up to the desk and say, ‘Hey, Mike, what happened? Céline told me you were in Sydney.’ I’d love to see him try and wriggle out of that one. Talk about leading a double life – no, a triple life. How does he manage it?

‘Would all remaining passengers travelling to Edinburgh on BE2102, please proceed to gate five, where this flight is now closing. That’s all remaining passengers …’

Oh, Lord! In all the drama I’ve completely forgotten about finding Mr Beardy Man – Mr Soon-To-Be-Divorced Beardy Man if I don’t get my act together pronto.

Zipping my way in between trolleys and wheelie suitcases, I race towards the security gate. Standing on tiptoes, I spy him in the distance, collecting his coat, shoes, and a small gift bag from the conveyor belt.

‘Boarding pass,’ grunts the security man.

‘Please let me through. I need to give this to that gentleman down there – it’s really important,’ I beg, waving the box in the direction of the long line of travellers, waiting to be prodded and processed.

‘If you don’t have a boarding card, then this is as far as you go,’ he says firmly, darting me a scathing glare.

‘Please. I can’t explain now, but if I don’t get this to him …’

‘Stand aside,’ he growls, as a queue of red-eyed travellers starts to form behind me, brandishing their boarding passes, impatient to proceed.

There’s nothing else for it – filling up my lungs to maximum capacity, I push out my diaphragm and emit a rip-roaring, show-stopping ‘WAIT!’

It’s like someone has momentarily pressed the freeze-frame switch. All eyes swerve in my direction – all eyes but those of the one person whose attention I so desperately desire. He is now trundling along to gate five, blissfully unaware of the brewing storm about to hit north and south of the border.

Back on the road, my mind is buzzing with the thought of what I’m going to say to Miss Cutler, and more importantly, do I tell Céline that Mike is not in Oz, but on a romantic, Viennese mini break with … with … another mistress?

It’s just like one of those letters you find on the Cosmopolitan problem page:

Dear Irma,

One of my best friends has been dating a married man for ten years. He keeps promising her he’s going to leave. I saw him at the airport today, canoodling with another woman, who was not his wife. He’d told my friend he couldn’t see her as he was going away on business. Do I tell her and risk ruining our friendship, or do I turn a blind eye?

Yours,

Anonymous.

Do I really need an agony aunt to advise me what to do, when the answer is spelt out before me in ten-foot, flashing, neon letters? TELL HER.

‘Oi! Look where you’re going, willya! Bloody cyclists!’ hollers an irate taxi driver, through the open window.

* * *

‘I’m afraid head office has taken the matter very seriously,’ gloats Miss Cutler. ‘My hands are tied. I have no alternative but to let you go.’

‘If you could just give me one more chance …’ I grovel, panic rising.

‘If I were you, I’d go back to what you do best – serving ready meals and selling novelty goods to tourists,’ she says in a condescending, I’m-telling-you-this-for-your-own-good sort of way. ‘It’s a tough old world out there, and jobs aren’t easy to find – even for the young.’ Ouch.

She presses the door-release button; I draw a deep breath and exit the shop, cycle-helmeted head held high.

I am in a kind of daze, oblivious to the pushing and jostling of hurried passers-by. This is serious; I now have no job, my meagre savings are fast disappearing, my overdraft has reached its limit, and I am barely able to cover the monthly minimum payment on my Visa card. An empty, lost feeling takes hold of me. Perhaps Miss Cutler is right; perhaps I should have stuck with my safe, familiar job and my secure life, instead of foolishly casting myself adrift without a set of oars. I’ve lost my way. I used to be so focused, so positive that despite all the hardships, things would work out in the end. I feel like I got six winning numbers in the lottery and now I can’t find the ticket.

Grabbing a mozzarella and tomato panini, I head for the river to think.

As I chain my bike to the side of the bridge, my thoughts turn to Céline. I pull out my mobile from my bag and scroll for her number. My finger hovers over the green button. Why am I hesitating?

As one of her closest friends, it is my duty to tell her, but how? Taking a bite of my sandwich, I rehearse what I’m going to say:

‘Céline, are you sitting down? I’m afraid I have some shocking news for you …’

No, too dramatic.

‘Céline, as much as it pains me, as one of your closest friends, I feel duty-bound to tell you …’

Nope, too convoluted – just cut to the chase.

‘Céline, Mike’s not in Australia. He’s in Vienna with another woman.’

The number rings once then diverts to voice-mail. A wave of relief breaks over me. I compose this text instead:

<Mike not in Oz. In Vienna with a woman I’ve never seen b4. So sorry. Call me. Luv E x >

I stab the SEND button and off it flies, like winged Mercury, into cyberspace – and the deed is done.

THE SCENE IS THE WELL-FURNISHED LIVING ROOM OF A SEMI-DETACHED HOUSE ON THE OUTSKIRTS OF EDINBURGH. A SWEET, HOMELY COUPLE ARE SIPPING CHAMPAGNE AND GIGGLING.

MAN: Cheers! Many happy returns, pet. (HE TAKES A BEAUTIFULLY WRAPPED BOX FROM UNDER THE CUSHION.) This is just a wee something to show you how much I love and appreciate you.

WOMAN: Ach, you shouldnae have. (DABBING HER EYES AND SMILING, SHE KISSES HIM AND OPENS THE BOX. IT IS EMPTY. SHE BURSTS INTO FLOODS OF TEARS) Is this some kinda cruel joke?

CUT TO AIRPORT. A BALDING, MIDDLE-AGED MAN AND AN ATTRACTIVE YOUNG WOMAN APPEAR THROUGH THE SLIDING DOORS OF THE ARRIVALS HALL. THEY ARE HOLDING HANDS, LAUGHING AND JOKING, PLAINLY HAPPY IN ONE ANOTHER’S COMPANY. A TALL, STRIKING WOMAN IN AIRLINE UNIFORM APPROACHES THEM.

FRENCH WOMAN (TO THE MAN): ’ow was Sydney?

MAN: I … er … what the blazes are you doing here?

FRENCH WOMAN: I could ask you the same question.

YOUNG WOMAN: Aren’t you going to introduce us, darling?

FRENCH WOMAN PULLS REVOLVER FROM HANDBAG AND SHOOTS …

CUT TO A POLICE INTERVIEW ROOM. IT’S 2 A.M. DI JACK TEMPLETON PACES THE FLOOR WHILST SIPPING COFFEE FROM A POLYSTYRENE CUP.

A DISTRESSED WOMAN SITS AT THE TABLE, HEAD IN HER HANDS, SOBBING.

DI TEMPLETON: Don’t lie to us. Your fingerprints are all over the necklace – and the box. As if that wasn’t bad enough, you’ve got the bleedin’ gall not only to gift-wrap the empty box, but to do the curly-wurly ribbon effect as well! Jeez, I’ve seen some callous, premeditated crimes in my time, but this …

EMILY: How many more times? I swear it wasn’t planned – please, please, you’ve got to believe me …

I awake in a knot of sheets and a cold sweat, heart banging wildly in my chest. I switch on the oriental lady bedside lamp and peer at the clock – 0345. I close my eyes tight and toss and turn. I wish I could sleep, but Céline’s pale, tear-stained face and reddened eyes haunt my semi-consciousness. I listen to her message again:

Mike explained everything. We try again, because we love each other. Why you never accept this? I am sorry, but we cannot be friends. Please … don’t call. Jamais. Never.

There’s an iciness in her voice I’ve never heard before, and it chills me to the core. How can she take back that untrustworthy snake – again, and make me the villain of the piece?

In my method acting class I’m learning about Stanislavski’s ‘magic if’, which asks you to put yourself in the shoes of the character you are playing. What would I do if I were in these circumstances? What would you have done, Céline, if you’d known about Nigel’s infidelity? Would you have stood by and allowed me to be duped and ridiculed? I don’t think so. And what about Mike’s wife in all of this?

What a day! Not only have I succeeded in ruining a menopausal woman’s milestone birthday, but tragically worse, I’ve also blown apart a precious friendship. Ten years deleted with the press of a button.

I seem to be lurching from one disaster to another; I’ve lost my job, one of my dearest friends, and at the grand old age of forty, am sleeping in a single bed in a home I don’t own, an assortment of kitsch knick-knacks and an ancient moggy who hates me for company.

AARGH! In a fit of pique, I hurl my mobile at the wall. The Smurfs scatter in all directions, Action Man topples over onto Diana, who is sent crashing onto the tiled hearth, taking the Eiffel Tower snow globe with her, which starts manically playing ‘Jingle Bells’.

Horrified, I gawp at the shattered pieces.

Bzzz! Bzzz! Scrambling through the devastation, I grab my phone. New message: YES! Please, pleeease let it be Céline, telling me we shouldn’t let a stupid man destroy our friendship …

<We need to talk. Call me. Nigel.>

* * *

Five days. I have just five days to prepare for the most important audition of my life. I was voted off first time round, but now I’ve been recalled; this is my one chance to prove that whilst I may not be the youngest or most glamorous contestant, I have got what it takes: that je ne sais quoi, the X-factor.

‘It’s only dinner,’ I told Wendy breezily. ‘It’s no big deal.’

‘Please don’t rush back into his arms. Promise me, hon,’ she said, face darkening. ‘You’re just starting to resemble your old self again, and I don’t want you going back to square one.’

‘I give you my word. I won’t do anything stupid,’ I replied, secretly wondering if forty is too old to wear white …

* * *

I wipe the steam from my recently prescribed reading glasses and peer at my face in the bathroom mirror, in all its 3-D glory. Blimey. When did that happen? Those lines. When did they appear? And those grey hairs? And oh, my God, who stuck them there? Those gorilla legs?

I scrabble in my toiletries bag for a razor: there’s a squashed tube of foundation, a bottle of Tesco Value body wash, a few crumbs of blusher, and a blob of sticky lip gloss. Is this the same woman who, not so very long ago, thought nothing of spending $90 on mascara and a makeover at Macy’s?

Having rejected every outfit in my wardrobe, I end up buying a little, classic black dress from Autograph for £85. Now, before you throw your hands up in despair, I’ll let you in on my shameful secret: I haven’t cut the price tag off, and provided I don’t spill anything on it, I give my word that I will return it to the customer services desk after D-Day.

* * *

‘You look amazing,’ says Nigel, unusually nervous, as he pulls out a chair for me. (Wow! He hasn’t done that since 2011.)

‘Thank you,’ I reply frostily, as I surreptitiously shove my cycle helmet under the table and demurely pull the hem of my tight LBD below the knee. I take a dainty sip of water and pretend to study the menu. I mustn’t make it too easy for him. It will take more than a curry and a compliment to win me back.

‘You’ve been on my mind a lot lately,’ he continues in a low voice, pouring me a glass of wine.

Don’t say anything. Play it cool. Let him do the talking. Dilemma: do I put on my reading glasses so I can actually read the menu, or do I order blind for the sake of vanity? If I am to spend the rest of my life with him, then surely I should feel comfortable being myself. After all, this is the man who held my hair back when I had my head down a toilet after one rum punch too many on The Jolly Roger in Barbados; the same man who’s seen me sans mascara, wearing a green face mask, a tatty towel on my head, and a brace on my teeth. But maybe that’s the whole point: the very reason he left; maybe he wants a wife who looks her best all the time, not one who scrubs up well only when the occasion calls for it.

‘Whenever I’m in LA I can’t help thinking about our trips to Disneyland, and how we used to act like a couple of crazy kids,’ he continues, swallowing hard. ‘And only last week, I was on the Star Ferry in Hong Kong and remembered the time your scarf blew off into the sea, and how we’d lock ourselves away in my suite and make love for hours, living on room service and Dom Perignon. So many amazing memories. You will always have a special place in my heart – don’t ever forget that.’

A huge current of relief and ecstasy surges around my body. ‘Oh, Nigel, I’ve been thinking about you too …’

‘But I’m worried about you, Em,’ he says, reaching for my hand. ‘I heard you jacked in the job and are studying drama and living in a rented room. Don’t you think you’re a little too old to be changing courses? You’ve got to think of the future.’

‘You only get one life and when you left …’

‘But that’s not my main reason for wanting to see you,’ he interjects.

Stay calm. Play hard to get. Deep breaths …

‘I’ve something important to tell you …’

‘Yes?’ I whisper, heart doing the quickstep.

‘I thought it best to do the decent thing and tell you face to face before you hear it from someone else.’

My stomach does a backward flip. I feel the colour drain from my face. I twist the corner of the tablecloth tightly between my fingers, knees wobbling like crème caramel.

‘First of all, despite what you might have heard, I want you to know that I didn’t sleep with Maddie until we broke up.’

‘What? Who’s Maddie?’ I say, sharply pulling my hand away from his.

‘She’s new … you … you don’t know her. She … she only joined at the end of last year. Anyway, nothing happened until …’

‘Whooooa! So all that stuff about self-destruct buttons and “finding yourself” was a cover-up?’

‘Not exactly … no. Let me finish, please. You don’t know how hard this is for me …’

‘You had me believing that you were having some sort of mental breakdown, when all the time you were sleeping with some young bimbo. How could you?’ I snap, throwing down my napkin, unsure of whether to fling myself on the floor or fly out of the door.

‘Keep your voice down, Em, please,’ he says through clenched teeth, nervously looking around at the other diners.

I stare at him in disbelief.

‘Typical! That’s all you care about: what people think of you. You are so damned self-centred! You invited me for dinner to relieve your guilt. Worried about me? Hah! Don’t bother. I’ll be fine,’ I say, snatching my jacket, helmet, and bag.

Grabbing my wrist, he mumbles, ‘I still care about you, Em. You’re like family to me … I can only move on with my life if I know you’re going to be okay. Maybe in time, we could even be …’

‘Oh, pur-lease, don’t say it! Let go of me! What an idiot I was to even think of getting back with you.’

I stagger out of the restaurant into the street, finding it hard to breathe. I unchain my bike from the lamppost, hands trembling.

‘Don’t be like this,’ comes a voice in my ear. ‘At least let me give you a lift home, Em, please.’

‘Not necessary,’ I hiss, jamming on my helmet and flicking on my lights.

‘There’s just one more thing you should know,’ he blurts out, face ghostly in the silvery beam of the streetlight. ‘Maddie’s pregnant.’