Читать книгу One in a Million - Lindsey Kelk - Страница 8

‘It’s shit, Annie,’ Miranda growled, blinking into the bright morning sunshine. ‘I feel like I just got told off by my dad for spending all my pocket money.’

We’d been to see the bank manager. It had not gone well.

‘Can we just go back to the office and talk about it there?’ I asked. Yesterday’s beautiful weather had turned into a sweltering, sticky day and all the things I loved about London in the summertime had been washed away by the sea of sweaty bodies pressed against me on the Northern Line. ‘I can’t be angry and outside at the same time, Mir, it’s making me feel stabby.’

There were many difficult factors in running a real business but far and away the hardest part was money. There was never enough. Every single month we had to find rent, we had to find wages and for some reason, clients kept expecting us to do things for them before they paid us. It made literally no sense. I didn’t walk into Topshop, pick up a frock and flash the girl on the till a peace sign with a vague promise to get her the money within thirty days. Also, no one ever paid within thirty days. Ever.

Even though I was insanely proud of owning our own business there were other downsides too. I couldn’t call in sick and take to my (non-existent) settee with a Terry’s Chocolate Orange and watch an entire season of RuPaul’s Drag Race when I was having a particularly bad day. Like today, for example.

Miranda and I started Content because we were out of other options. After spending the best part of ten years in miserable marketing and advertising jobs, me withering away at a giant agency, nursing a sense of integrity that just wasn’t welcome, in a dark corner – literally a dark corner, I couldn’t even see a window from where they’d shoved me – and Miranda bouncing between every company in London, we decided it was time to become masters of our own destiny. And so we pooled our meagre resources and decided to live the dream.

With hindsight, I did sometimes wonder if we mightn’t have been better off just going to Disneyland for a fortnight then getting jobs at McDonalds when we came home but, you know what they say, you live and learn.

‘I’m so pissed off,’ Mir said, rolling up the sleeves of her oversized white shirt only for them to flap back down by her sides like an angry penguin. ‘He talked to us like we were children.’

‘He wasn’t angry, he was just disappointed,’ I agreed, wiping a film of city sweat from my forehead. ‘But not nearly as disappointed as Brian’s going to be when he finds out we can’t pay him at the end of the month.’

‘We’ll work it out, we always do,’ she muttered before automatically checking her phone. ‘All we need is breathing room. Maybe we could get another company credit card? Or we could sell something.’

I looked at her while she angrily swiped at her screen.

‘Like what? A kidney?’

‘Not helping,’ she replied.

‘You’re right,’ I said, unable to stop myself from bending down and picking up the Starbucks cup and depositing it in the closest bin. ‘We need our kidneys. We drink too much.’

‘Didn’t we start our company because we didn’t want to spend the rest of our careers listening to sanctimonious old men telling us what to do?’ Mir was still lost in rantland while I melted into an Annie-shaped puddle on the side of the road. ‘I want to march back in there and show him just how badly I have overextended myself.’

‘We don’t give up and we don’t give in,’ I reminded her, blocking her path. I was fairly certain she wouldn’t really walk into Barclay’s and deck the business manager but there really was no telling with Miranda Johansson. ‘That’s our motto, isn’t it?’

She frowned and shook her head.

‘I thought it was “Yes, I will have another”?’

‘We can’t afford the first one, let alone another,’ I said. ‘Come on, let’s go back.’

‘Fine,’ she sighed, opening up a rideshare app on her phone. ‘We can work this out without the bank. I believe in us.’

‘I believe I’d rather not be bankrupt by Christmas,’ I told her, covering her screen with my hand. ‘We should get the tube back.’

Mir threw her head back and howled out loud, attracting the attention of more than a few confused onlookers. ‘But it’s so hot,’ she whined. ‘And the station is miles away.’

‘Mir.’

I hated it when she made me sound like my mother.

‘Fine,’ she said, grudgingly cancelling the car. ‘I’ll just sweat through my shirt and look like a skank all day.’

‘That’s my girl,’ I replied, patting her on her sweaty back. ‘One day we’ll have drivers at our beck and call, hot and cold running drivers, ready to ferry us here, there and everywhere.’

‘Hot, cold, moderate, I don’t care,’ Miranda said, rolling up her sleeves once more and putting her best foot forward. ‘I just want to actually make some money for a change.’

It was always nice to have a dream.

‘Morning.’

Just what I needed. I looked up from my important tea-making activities to see Martin and Charlie flanking either side of the office kitchen. Rather than reply, I offered a tight smile and kept my eyes on the kettle hoping it was politely rude enough to send them on their way. On the walk back to work, I’d made a deal with myself. If I managed to call in at least one invoice and made it through the entire day without brutally murdering the first person to mention Matthew’s proposal, I was ordering Domino’s for dinner.

‘How are you feeling this morning?’ Martin asked in a sympathetic tone of voice I assumed he usually reserved for his grandmother’s best friend.

‘Amazing,’ I replied without looking at him. ‘Thank you for asking.’

Keep your eyes on the prize, I told myself. There’s pizza at stake, don’t murder them.

If only they hadn’t approached me in the kitchen with all its bright and shiny sharp things.

‘Everyone’s been talking about last night,’ Martin said while Charlie hovered at his elbow, monitoring my expression. ‘Must have been weird for you?’

‘You don’t really expect to turn on the game and see your ex getting engaged in 4K HD, do you?’ I replied. Deep, calm breaths. Think of the garlic dipping sauce. ‘Seems like more of a Facebook thing.’

‘Seems like you’re well out of it to me,’ Charlie said, passing me the milk from the fridge. ‘What a cock.’

They mean well, the voice in my brain whispered, let them live and you can have garlic bread as well.

‘The only thing that’s getting to me is having to talk about it, to be honest,’ I said as I aggressively dunked my teabag. ‘It’s really not a big deal.’

‘My mate Will just got dumped. I could set you up with him if you’d like?’ Martin offered helpfully. ‘I‘ll give him your number.’

They’re only trying to help, do not disembowel them with a Nespresso pod.

‘Recently dumped Will sounds lovely,’ I said with as much grace as I could muster. ‘But just because my ex got engaged, it doesn’t mean I’m desperate for a boyfriend.’

The two of them exchanged a glance and I knew what they were thinking.

It was the same thing I was thinking, lying in bed, wide awake at three o’clock that morning and scrolling through Bumble, Tinder, Happn, Hinge, Huggle and god help me, even Farmers Only. As soon as you ended a relationship you were in a game of snakes and ladders with your ex, there was always someone keeping score and, right now, Matthew was winning. Any points I’d earned from technically doing the dumping had been wiped off the board by his proposing to his supposed soulmate twelve months after we called it quits.

‘I’m dying of thirst, Higgins. Where’s my tea?’ Miranda strolled into the kitchen, having traded her oversized shirt for a cropped neon yellow T-shirt. She was the best, all faux leather trousers and fuck-you attitude. It was something I needed more of. The attitude, not the trousers. I got thrush from just looking at them.

‘Martin offered to set me up with his friend,’ I told her, handing over her My Little Pony mug. It didn’t really go with the rest of her look but when it came to a cup of tea, Mir would have drunk it out of a lightly rinsed bedpan if it was the only option. ‘Because I’m a sad and lonely spinster.’

‘Are you joking?’ she asked, looking astounded. ‘Have you seen this woman? Annie’s amazing. Any man alive would jump at the chance to go out with her. She’s funny, she’s clever, she’s generous, she doesn’t mess about and have you seen those getaway sticks? Annie, pull up your jeans, show them your legs.’

‘Get off,’ I muttered, slapping Miranda’s hands away from my knees. ‘Can I go back to my desk now please?’

‘Obviously, Annie is amazing,’ Charlie spoke extra loudly to make sure we knew he really meant it. ‘And if it’s all right for me to say so, you have got a cracking pair of legs there, Higgins.’

’It isn’t,’ I assured him. ‘But thank you.’

‘You’re looking at the empress of social media,’ Miranda was really on a roll. ‘She’s a kingmaker, best in the world at what she does. The fact you even get to stand in the same room as this woman is mindblowing to me. She’s the Meryl Streep of socials. In fact, I’m fairly certain you should bow whenever you see her.’

‘Yeah, yeah, she turns in a good tweet,’ Martin said, looking at the door and clearly wondering how his morning had taken such a wrong turn. ‘We’re all very impressed.’

‘What did you just say?’ Miranda slammed her cup down on the table, hot tea spilling eveywhere. ‘She turns in a good tweet?’

I winced as I sipped my tea. What an idiot.

Martin paused and looked at Charlie. Charlie shook his head. Martin did not take the hint.

‘That’s what you do, isn’t it?’ he replied. ‘Twitter?’

‘Do you even know what we do?’ Miranda asked. ‘Do either of you have any clue?’

Martin shook his head. Charlie apparently knew better than to react. Mir sighed sadly and gave me the look. I shrugged apologetically and leaned back against the counter to watch the show. This wasn’t the first time we’d had to explain our actual jobs and I very much doubted it would be the last.

‘OK, so, Charlie, say you’re trying to think of a clever tagline to go on your thirty-second advert for a chicken cooking sauce?’ Mir began, gesticulating wildly as she went. ‘And you’re dead excited because the advert is going on in the middle of Coronation Street.’

He nodded.

‘You’re wasting your time,’ she said, clapping her hands right in front of his face. ‘No one watches the adverts any more. They’re all on their phone, interacting with content we created instead.’

‘There are twenty million Instagram accounts in the UK,’ I said, picking up where she left off. ‘Our influencers alone have more than a hundred million followers between them. You couldn’t even dream of getting close to that many people with an advert these days.’

‘I know social media is important, but you don’t really think what you do is more powerful than what I do?’ Charlie said, his hackles somewhat raised. ‘I’m sure you’re very good at arsing about on the internet, but we all know real advertising, real marketing is still what matters most. Everyone knows social media is the paid-for opinions of kids.’

‘Arsing about on the internet?’ I repeated, almost sure he must be joking. ‘Paid-for opinions of kids? Is that really what you think we do?’

Charlie picked up a pink wafer biscuit and bit into it while responding to me with a very, very brave shrug.

‘Annie is a goddess,’ Miranda hurled a tea towel in Charlie’s general direction as Martin winced. ‘She could take any old man or woman off the street and turn them into a superstar. Or any tiny brand or business. She can get a million eyes on you without even trying, you write bad jingles and rip off movies to make shitty adverts for crap cars.’

Ooh, that one had to hurt. Fired-up Miranda wasn’t always very kind and throwing a hangover and a bad bank manager meeting into the mix, was just asking for trouble.

‘We had the idea for the talking raccoon first and you know it!’ Charlie said, turning beetroot red. ‘The only people who get famous online are either rich, fit or related to someone else who is rich and fit. Bonus points if you’re rich and fit and can afford to have lots of photos taken on sandy beaches while standing in a yoga pose so people can crank one out over your feed at bedtime.’

Miranda gagged as I wrinkled my nose.

‘Good to know what we’ll find when the police go through your search history,’ I muttered. ‘Tell me you clear it every single night, please.’

Charlie looked unimpressed, Martin looked as though he would like to be literally anywhere else on earth and Miranda was ready to draw blood. I couldn’t quite work out how things had escalated so quickly.

‘You can make anyone famous, can you?’ Charlie asked, steely eyed.

‘Yes,’ I said with all the confidence in the world. ‘We can.’

‘Fine,’ he said. ‘Prove it. Make me famous.’

‘I could,’ I replied. ‘But even the internet doesn’t deserve that.’

’Yeah, yeah, whatever,’ he answered with a not-so-friendly chuckle. ‘You talk a good game, I’ll give you that.’

I pressed my lips into a tight thin line and planted my hands on my hips, fighting the urge to knock him out of the window. Charlie leaned against the fridge, a cocky smile on his handsome face that was seemingly designed to get me worked up in all the wrong ways.

‘Is it me,’ Martin muttered, breaking the silence, ‘or did things just get very tense in here?’

‘Oh, Annie, ignore them,’ Miranda said, tugging on my shirt sleeve. ‘Come on, you’re going to be late.’

‘I’m not done with this,’ I warned them as I abandoned my cup of tea. ‘Just so you know.’

Charlie threw me a thumbs-up as we left and my heart pounded in my chest. I couldn’t work out if I felt more insulted, furiously angry, incredibly turned on, or all three.

Life could be so confusing.

‘I know, I’m sorry, I’m late. I’ve had the most ridiculous day,’ I said, barrelling through the door without knocking. It was already ten past one, I’d lost ten minutes of my time, we could manage without the usual pleasantries.

Rebecca held out her arms for my jacket as I threw myself on her chaise longue.

‘We’ll get it out of the way,’ I said as I stretched out. ‘You’ve heard about Matthew, obviously.’

She nodded.

‘Of course I’m happy for him,’ I said, lying back and focusing on the same crack in the ceiling as always. One day, I was going to have to bring some Polyfilla with me. ‘For both of them. Not that I know Karine at all, but she seems nice enough and Matthew is a good person. An OK person.’

I glanced over at Rebecca, who looked back in her steady, measured way with her notebook in her lap.

‘Matthew is a person,’ I said.

She pulled the cap from her pen and scribbled something down.

‘I’m not jealous,’ I insisted, running the pendant of my necklace up and down its chain. ‘Just because she’s younger than me and littler than me and she’s got the most perfect nose I’ve ever seen in my life. It doesn’t mean anything, my life is going brilliantly. I own my own company, I have amazing friends, I’m up for three big awards and what’s she? She’s engaged. Bravo, Karine.’

I rubbed the bare third finger on my left hand, I gave a very heavy sigh and counted all the framed certificates on the wall. Bachelor’s degrees, master’s degree, certificate of this, certificate of that. Everything you’d want to see on the wall of a therapist’s office.

‘Did I tell you we’ve been nominated for three awards? Three! I think it’s a record for a new company. I’m definitely doing so much better than when I was with Matthew. Don’t you think?’

Rebecca made a non-committal sound across the room.

‘Well? You’re the therapist.’ I sat up so I could see the expression on her face. ‘What do you think? In your professional opinion?’

‘In my professional opinion,’ Rebecca replied. ‘I thought you were bringing me lunch.’

I blinked at my sister before pulling two Prêt a Manger sandwiches out of my handbag.

‘They were out of hoisin duck, sorry,’ I said, chucking one of them in her general direction and unwrapping my own cheese-and-pickle baguette. ‘Got you this instead.’

‘They were out of duck so you got tuna?’ my big sister wrinkled her nose and abandoned the sandwich. ‘I can’t eat that, you dickhead. I’ve got patients all afternoon and no one wants to share their innermost thoughts and feelings with a woman who smells like Flipper.’

‘Sorry,’ I replied, trading her for my cheese and pickle. ‘I know you like tuna, I just didn’t think.’

‘Colour me shocked.’ She unwrapped the sandwich and took a big bite. ‘How many times do I have to tell you I am a therapist, not your therapist. You can’t treat your little sister, no matter how big a nutcase she’s turning out to be.’

‘But you’re so good at giving advice,’ I said, covering my mouth with my hand. A courtesy not extended by my elder sister, who I knew for a fact was not raised in a barn. ‘You’re trained in it. You’re a professional advice-giver. Advise me, please.’

‘That’s a lovely way to describe an agonizing five-year psychology degree,’ Rebecca muttered. ‘But since you asked, my professional opinion would be a diagnosis of FOMO. Get over yourself immediately.’

I swallowed and shook my head slowly. Becks loved to remind me her degree was far more advanced than mine. Me and my piffling BA in Psychology and English. Her with her fabulous doctorate.

‘Six years at uni and the best you can come up with is FOMO?’ I said, grinning when she finally cracked a smile. ‘Becks, you’re not even trying.’

‘I don’t even have to,’ she reminded me. ‘You’re not my patient.’

‘No, but I am your little sister and you’re stuck with me, so help.’ I gave her my best attempt at eyelash fluttering as I finished my sandwich. ‘Why do you think no one has ever delayed the start of a massive sporting event to propose to me?’

‘Oh dear god.’ She picked a fleck of mascara from her cheek and sighed.

As big sisters went, Rebecca was far from the worst. Too clever for her own good, obviously, but there wasn’t much I could do about that. She was five when I was born and she did not take the news of a little sister well. Apparently, she’d expressly requested a guinea pig. Instead, I came along to ruin everything. According to her.

‘I haven’t had sex in so long, I no longer own nice underwear,’ I said. ‘Shaving my legs above the knee does not occur to me. If I was confronted with a penis, I wouldn’t know what to do with it.’

‘If you are confronted with a penis, you should call the police,’ Rebecca advised. ‘And for your information, I have sex and I don’t shave my legs above the knee.’

I pulled a face and spared a thought for her poor husband.

‘Annie, if you really wanted to be in a relationship, you’d be out looking for one,’ she said. ‘I have never known you to fail at anything you set your mind to. Which isn’t necessarily a compliment, by the way.’

I looked at her, my puzzled cheeks full of tuna.

‘How is it not?’ I did not understand.

‘Are you still coming on Saturday?’ she asked, throwing me a paper napkin. ‘I’ll have wine on Saturday. This would be a much easier conversation if I had wine.’

‘I don’t know, I might have to work over the weekend,’ I replied quickly. ‘I’ve got an event with one of our vloggers next week and I’ve a feeling it’s going to take a fair bit of time.’

‘And an event with a vlogger is more important than dinner with your family?’ Rebecca asked, head cocked to one side. Definitely something she learned in therapist school.

‘Please don’t make me lie,’ I said. ‘Because you know the answer I’m going to give is not the one you want to hear.’

‘There’s something wrong with you,’ she replied. ‘You know that, don’t you?’

‘Is that your professional opinion?’ I enquired. ‘Because if it is, it’s a shit diagnosis. I’m going to kill you on Yelp. My work is important to me. This event is important to me.’

‘Of course it is, but work shouldn’t be more important than spending time with actual humans who love you.’

Sometimes I wondered if we were even related at all.

‘It would be brilliant if you could be supportive right now,’ I told her. ‘I’ve literally just walked out of an argument with two idiots in the office making fun of what I do. Making the company a success is very important to me and you know that.’

‘As it should be,’ Becks said kindly. ‘But you need to find a balance. We both know how competitive you can be.’

‘Don’t exaggerate,’ I said with a theatrical sigh. ‘I’m no more competitive than anyone else.’

‘Annie. You were banned from the school sports day for trying to take out that other girl in the sack race.’

I chomped into my sandwich and grimaced. ‘It was the three-legged race, and why do people keep bringing that up?’

‘You get it from Dad, you know,’ she said, nodding confidently. ‘This is classic Higgins behaviour through and through.’

There were some buttons that only family knew exactly how to push.

‘I ought to be getting back,’ I said, fishing for my phone in my handbag. Thirty-two unread emails in the last half hour. ‘I’ll text you about dinner.’

‘Have you heard from Mum this week? I need to give her a call.’

’I talked to her yesterday, she’s gone on that yoga teacher-training course,’ I reminded her. ‘No phones allowed.’

‘Your worst nightmare,’ Becks smiled. ‘Please try to make dinner on Saturday. The girls would love to see you and you know Dad always brings amazing booze.’

‘Dad also always brings Gina,’ I replied. ‘Which is why you need the booze.’

‘You need to be nicer to her,’ my sister said, shaking her head. ‘I think he’s sticking with this one.’

Only time would tell.

I stood up, stretched and looked out the window. Fantastic. It was raining. It had been blazing sunshine when I left the office, not a cloud in the sky. Now it looked like I’d be treating London to a solo wet T-shirt contest on the way back to work.

‘There’s an umbrella by the door,’ Becks said, finishing her sandwich. ‘Take it.’

‘Thank you,’ I kissed the top of her head, ignoring her protests. ‘You’re a good sister. Terrible therapist but a good sister.’

‘That’s because I’m not your therapist,’ she insisted. ‘And please don’t tell anyone that I am. I don’t want to be considered responsible for what goes on inside your brain.’

‘Love you too,’ I called as I left. ‘I’ll text you about dinner.’

‘You’ll see me Saturday,’ she corrected as I closed the door. ‘You knob.’

I knew she loved me really.

When I walked back into the building, Miranda, Martin and Charlie were sitting together in the coffee shop, finishing their respective lunches. I’d managed to convince myself, as I power-walked through the rain, to let go of our argument earlier on. They’d caught me at a bad moment. I was upset about Matthew, I was stressed about our financial situation, I wanted a pizza and I was ready and waiting for something to set me off. There was no point in letting a man’s ego get in the way of a little light flirting, was there? Besides, if everyone who got annoyed with the opposite sex stopped getting it on, the human race would be extinct within two generations. I knew how good I was at my job and I knew how hard I worked. I didn’t need Charlie bloody Wilder or Martin dickhead Green to tell me so.

‘Oh look, it’s the Meryl Streep of social media,’ Charlie said, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. ‘Afternoon, Professor Higgins. Been out racking up the likes?’

And then everything went red.

I dropped my sopping wet umbrella on the ground, splashing everyone in a ten-foot radius, and slapped both my hands on the table. Martin and Charlie looked up at me with wide eyes while Miranda just cleared her throat as she swept droplets of rain off her leather trousers.

‘Pick anyone in this room,’ I declared. ‘And I will make them Instagram famous in thirty days.’