Читать книгу The Law of Attraction - Roxie Cooper - Страница 14

CHAPTER 6

The first month of pupillage whooshes past in a blur.

I’ve literally spent the last month being dragged around every Crown Court in the north of the land, doing advocacy exercises for Skylar and… not much else. Well, I’ve been trying really hard to gracefully integrate into Chambers as best I can, but seeing Marty in action truly is something else. I’ve had to watch him professionally seduce virtually all members of Chambers and I honestly don’t know how he does it. He seems to pick up on their weaknesses and exploit them to his own advantage. It’s excruciating. For example, last week, I heard ‘Livvy’, another barrister in Chambers, telling him how she failed to get tickets for her favourite ballet in town. Marty put on his best smug/sympathetic/I’m-about-to-make-all-your-dreams-come-true face, informed her that his mother was on the Arts Council of SomethingOrOther in London, and that not only could he get her tickets, but it would be his ‘absolute pleasure’ to do so.

What. A. Fucking. Creep.

Everyone at the Newcastle Bar is giddy on this particularly leafy day in October because it’s their turn, among other legal centres on the North-Eastern Circuit, to host ‘Mess’. Despite the fact he’d rather be just about anywhere else on the planet, Skylar is taking me; he’s decided I’m ‘ready’, whatever that means.

‘Mess’ is basically a really formal, traditional dinner full of barristers, with frightening judges in attendance. From what I can gather, it’s all terribly hilarious and much wine is consumed. Obviously, for a baby barrister like myself, it’s a rather daunting process, not least because I will be expected to drink wine and, as a result, my personal standards will slip. I do not want to relax so much that I attempt to debate the new storyline in Hollyoaks with a High Court judge.

As the new pupils in Chambers, Marty and I are expected to go with our pupilmasters. The dress code is ‘formal suitwear’ for women and ‘lounge suits’ for men. I mean, seriously, what the hell is a ‘lounge suit’ anyway? Does anyone even know? As per the unwritten rule, pupils don’t pay for it, but Skylar makes a fuss, as usual. When I ask him for the payment to give to the Mess secretary, he gets his cheque book out and mutters something under his breath; the only audible words I can decipher are ‘bloody traditions’. He rips the cheque out with unnecessary vigour and gives it to me.

I have been told members of Chambers are meeting in Nevo Bar at 6.30 p.m., but when I arrive at 6.20 p.m. it appears Marty and his admirers have got there much earlier and are all sitting together in a booth, Marty in the middle, looking like the cat who got the cream.

‘Heeeyyy Mandy! Think it’s about time you were let off Skylar’s leash for a night! Why don’t you tell us all about this dancing job you had in Ibiza?’ creeps a barrister named ‘Beaumont’, who is old enough to be my biological grandfather. He winks as he says it, so I don’t think he wants a technical lowdown of what my job actually involved, but rather a demonstration of what he thinks it was, that is a free lapdance where I shake my tits in his face while artistically waving glittery fans about. Or something. I actually dread to think.

‘Yes, Amanda! Come on! Give us a demo! Consider it a Chambers initiation!’ yells Percy SomethingOrOther, as the rest of the Bad Boy Bar Crew clap and holler.

Thankfully, Skylar walks in at this very moment and trundles me off to the bar to get a drink. By this point, I need one.

The Mess is being held at the Liberty Gentlemen’s Club. It has a fairly normal exterior but the interior is something else. Grand staircase upon entering, the whole place dripping in chandeliers and one of those hideous patterned carpets throughout, which looks like it’s been there since time began.

The meal itself is in a large dining room containing several large round tables. It doesn’t matter where you sit, but it DOES matter in which order you walk into the room.

Of course it does.

‘You have to enter the room in order of seniority,’ says Skylar, as if this is a perfectly normal thing to do.

People start forming a line. All the old folk who have been at the Bar hundreds of years (or so it appears) stand ceremoniously at the front, emanating a great sense of achievement. Then there’s me at the end and a whole load of middle-aged people in the middle.

Some random man I’ve never seen before comes to the front of the line with a kind of sceptre-stick thingy, stamps it on the floor three times and the general guffawing and chattering comes to an abrupt end. He declares that ‘Dinner shall be served!’ and everyone begins walking in.

As people spew into the dining room, they clamber around for the best seats. Obviously, Marty is beckoned over to the ‘old boys’ table consisting of his fan club from Chambers. Skylar really couldn’t have picked a worse table, but he’s been left with little option. It includes Angela and her Hot Bar Bitches Club (Flick, ‘Jazz’, Lottie and the passive-aggressive Clarinda) and a fella called Rupert, who is clearly tickled pink to be surrounded by women. I’m Enemy Number One to the ‘The Girls’ since HairGate and they just ignore me/giggle whenever I get anywhere near them (with the exception of Angela, because she’s in my Chambers so has to talk to me, but I know she’s only doing it to feed information back to the others, so I’m all over it). I’m sandwiched between Rupert and Skylar, so I don’t actually have to talk to them.

Angela is wired tonight. She’s joining Circuit, which basically means becoming a member of the Northern Barristers’ Organisation. That’s it. But, being the Bar, they can’t pass up the opportunity for a performance and so she has to participate in the most ridiculous tradition I’ve come across yet.

After dinner, she has to stand on a chair on one leg and recite her intention to be an honourable member of Circuit, then down her drink. As per the tradition, you invite all your friends to watch and they have to heckle you to try and put you off and, if they do, you have to start from the beginning again.

I’d managed to completely disgrace myself in week four of pupillage, one lunchtime in the Chambers lounge. Angela was wittering on about the ridiculous tradition and, naturally, being a normal person of this world, I assumed she was joking, so absurd did the whole thing sound. I started laughing, attempting to integrate myself into the conversation by saying, ‘Gosh, can you imagine if that was even a thing?! How pretentious!’ The entire lounge went deadly silent and everyone looked at me. Everyone except Skylar, who just took a deep breath, gazing at his homemade sandwich and doing a massive cringe face. I paused for a few seconds, frozen in mid-laugh, before saying, ‘That’s really a thing, isn’t it?’ Dolus scowled at me before uttering, ‘These kinds of traditions are taken very seriously in our world, Amanda. If you want to be part of it, I suggest you don’t mock them.’

‘Our’ World and ‘My’ World. Clearly, a million miles apart.

I’m in a bit of a quandary about what to drink as I’m scared of needing the loo in the next three hours because, as Rupert informs me, once the meal has started you’re not allowed to exit. ‘Why?’ I ask. ‘Tradition,’ he says, matter of factly.

Ah, of course.

‘But if you desperately need the toilet, you must request permission from the Circuit Junior to leave the room,’ Skylar goes on.

All tradition, apparently.

Conversation as we’re waiting for the meal to arrive truly is a universe away from my life. Rupert tells us all about his new baby (‘Maximilian, not Max’) and how he and his wife are currently searching for a new house.

‘Well, the problem is, Amelie just hasn’t been happy with any of the places we’ve seen so far. And there’s no point in rushing these things so we’ve decided to rent until we find the perfect place.’

‘Oh, yeah. Absolutly, Rupes. Are you renting locally?’, Flick empathises.

‘Yes. Just a small farmhouse, only six bedrooms. Got a bit of land for Amelie’s horses. Nothing extravagant. Just until we find our “forever home”, I believe the saying is!’ he laughs.

They all chuckle, like this is the most normal thing to say as you’re waiting for your tea to arrive.

I have absolutely nothing in common with these people.

Given the current company, I’d much rather eat in silence, but Angela puts a stop to all that by loudly proclaiming her (fake) concern about getting the speech on the chair right.

‘Oh! Can you imagine how embarrassing it will be if I get it wrong and have to start from the very beginning again?!’

I’m sure you’re counting on it, I want to add. The Covern (as they shall be known from here on in) giggle and indulge her.

‘Gella, don’t worry, we’re you’re bezzies! We’re here for you!’ they chorus.

Just to ensure everyone knows how seriously she’s taking it, ‘Gella’ closes her eyes tightly, clenches her fists and recites the speech in a whispery, overexaggerated way, much to the amusement of Skylar, who looks on in disdain. Rupert laps it up and encourages the drama, presumably in an attempt to curry favour with The Covern.

Skylar and I eat in silence, ignoring the hullabaloo around us, unprepared to participate in it in any way whatsoever. I look at my watch and realise it’s only 8.37 p.m. – two more courses, speeches and eight barristers to join Circuit before I can go home. The things you have to suffer for your profession.

As the meal progresses, the wine flows and the room becomes louder with general yakking. Spontaneous loud roars of laughter keep erupting, filling the room with noise. The candles in the room, in conjunction with the number of bodies in it (along with the fact that the doors are locked owing to stupid tradition) means the temperature is rising.

Suit jackets start coming off, which is ideal for some of the women because it means they get to loosen their shirt buttons and show a bit of cleavage. The men lap it up. No wonder they’re in no rush to get home. Except Skylar, of course. He keeps looking at his watch, willing the next course to come so he can escape. I can’t blame him.

‘It’s something you just have to tolerate, Amanda,’ Skylar says. ‘Some people belong to this crowd and some people don’t. You have to make your peace with it, but learn to work with it.’

He has a point. If these are the people I have to work with – and who will decide my future – I’ll just have to get along with that. Doesn’t mean they won’t fuck me off, though.

For example, at one point, Angela, bored of the predominantly female company on our table, wanders over to the next one, which is occupied by the Bad Boy Bar Crew, and finds a ludicrously tenuous route to inform them (loudly) that the gap in her front teeth is a sign that she’s a ‘very sexual, sensual person’. So all of our lives are better for knowing that.

After approximately thirty years, the meal comes to an end and we move on to the next part of the event: speeches.

The Recorder of Newcastle (the most senior judge in the city) gives a long, boring spiel about what an honour it is to be part of Circuit. Blagh blagh blagh… important to feel a sense of belonging to your professional domain… blagh blagh.

Quite.

Then the visiting guest, Mr Justice Slyggenhyde (Oh, I know) delivers a really long speech about how wonderful the north-east is and how it’s been a pleasure sitting up here presiding over cases… blagh blagh. Everyone is flagging at this point. The wine has run out and it’s boiling hot. There is no air left in the room because the Recorder and High Court Judge WhatsHisFace have used it all up bleating on about advocacy in the provinces. Everyone is literally on the cusp of dropping dead due to lack of oxygen when thankfully the ‘staff’ fling the doors open (after two hours!) and everyone dashes out to breathe and go to the toilet.

I decide to wait, as the prospect of hovering in a queue with these women fills me with dread.

As I come back into the room, I see that more wine has arrived and everyone is gearing up to do their joining Circuit initiation.

The ‘Master of Revels’ stands up and starts talking about things which aren’t funny, but everyone finds it hilarious so I’m obviously missing all the jokes.

The joiners of Circuit are called out in alphabetical order. The first one is a guy from another Chambers and he gets an awful heckling, having to go back to the beginning of his shizzle about ten times before he finally finishes it.

‘Did you have to do this, Richard?’ I ask, amazed he would ever do such a thing.

‘I refused,’ he replies.

‘You can refuse? But you’re a member of Circuit,’ I ask, confused.

‘Rules are there to be broken, Amanda…’ he says with a wry smile and wink.

By the seventh candidate, everyone is getting a bit bored of the process and clearly wants to go home. They don’t realise the worst is yet to come.

‘The eighth and final candidate applying to join Circuit is Angela Waites,’ the Master bellows. A flash of annoyance crosses Angela’s face as she yells, ‘Oh, Master! It’s An-gella!’

Skylar and I just look at each other. No words, just a look.

She dramatically glugs the dregs of her wine and stands on the chair, hitching her (already short, tight) skirt up in doing so. She does a few fake deep breaths and then starts her stuff. Problem for her is that everyone has been through this seven times so they’re all a bit bored of it now. Sensing this, she feels the need to up the ante.

‘Ladies and gentlemen. There’s nothing I love better than a challenge. And so, as the final candidate to be admitted to Circuit, I am going to declare my intentions… in Spanish!’

Oh, for fuck’s sake.

And off she goes. Everyone cheers. The showstopper of the evening. Wow, those nerves disappeared quickly once she decided to switch to a language that wasn’t her own. She steps down and does a curtsey that wouldn’t look out of place on a Shakespearean stage.

‘Right, that’s me done,’ Skylar says, throwing his napkin down on the table. ‘Would you like a lift home, Amanda?’

‘Yes, please,’ I reply, a little too enthusiastically.

Skylar and I are the first ones out of the room and make a quick dash towards the exit. As I close the door, I feel the weight of it taken off me by someone behind, only to turn and see Sid, who smiles at me.

‘How was your first Mess, Amanda?’ he asks.

‘It was quite the experience.’

‘Well, that’s a good way of putting it,’ he smiles.

‘I don’t think I’ll be joining any time soon.’

‘And that’s another! Richard, do you remember the evening I joined Circuit?’ he yells ahead of me.

‘When you got so drunk you fell off the chair and broke your wrist? How could I forget?’ Skylar recounts.

‘I still finished my speech, though…’ Sid says proudly.

‘Yes… in the ambulance,’ Skylar recalls disapprovingly.

‘No way?!’ I squeal.

‘Oh yes. Sid caused me no end of trouble in pupillage. I almost got rid of him on countless occasions. Only reason I never went through with it is because he’s one of the best bloody barristers I’ve ever come across.’

Coming from Skylar, that’s quite the compliment. I’ve never seen him speak so highly of anyone before.

‘Oh, come on, Richard. I wasn’t that much trouble,’ Sid says, playfully.

Skylar gives Sid the look I’ve come to know as the Look of Death and Sid just smiles cheekily at him.

‘Yes, you were. I get ALL the troublesome pupils…’

‘Erm, what’s that supposed to mean?’ I ask, mock-offended.

‘You’re both “characters”,’ Skylar says with a worried look on his face.

Sid and I both glance at each other.

‘Anyway, come on, Amanda. We have an early start tomorrow.’ Skylar points out as he heads off towards the car.

‘See you both tomorrow,’ Sid says, doing a kind of ‘see you later salute’. Probably the lighting and the fact we are standing in the darkness with the stars and whatever, but oh my goodness, Sid looks super-dreamy tonight. And he’s in his three-piece suit with his tie off. And his eyes really are so twinkly. I watch him walking away, ridiculous grin on my face.

Skylar interrupts and cuts it dead.

‘Don’t go there, Amanda.’

‘What?!’

‘I saw the way you were looking at him.’

‘I was doing no such thing.’

‘I’ve warned you about this,’ he says in his best dad tone.

‘Oh, Richard. Honestly. Stop it. I am not a lovesick teenager. I am a woman completely in control of my emotions and I do not form crushes on work colleagues.’

Even as I’m saying it, I make a mental note to file this quotation under ‘I Don’t Fancy Sid Ryder and Other Lies To Tell Your Pupilmaster’.

The conversation naturally ends with the revelation that Skylar has received a parking ticket, which sends him into a furious rage. Nothing upsets him more than having to fork out money, especially for something which is unavoidable. He witters about it all the way to my flat then barks at me that I need to be in Chambers ‘BY 7 a.m.’ because we have a big sentence.

It’s almost midnight by the time I crash into bed and I’m physically and mentally drained from the evening’s events. But one thing’s for sure: it’s given me a valuable insight into my colleagues, the people behind the wigs and robes, the ones I’ll be working with and who I’ll have to impress to win this tenancy, and that can’t be a bad thing.