Just Between Us

CHAPTER THREE

Four days later, Stella’s sister, Tara Miller, deeply in love with her husband of six months and deeply nervous about the awards ceremony she was attending, stood in the ladies’ room of the ultra posh Manon Hotel and hoisted up her dress for about the tenth time that evening. The problem with wearing a strapless evening gown and boob-enhancing plastic falsies – ‘chicken fillets’ to the initiated – meant that only industrial adhesive could keep everything in place. Toupee tape didn’t have a hope. The ladies’ cloakroom at the National Television & Radio Awards was full of famous TV stars, and was not the ideal place for major body repairs; however, Tara had no option but to reach down the front of her silver dress and manhandle each fillet up. ‘Built-in bra, my backside,’ she muttered at her reflection as she wriggled, hoping everything would fall into place in a vaguely booblike shape.

‘Ooh, Tara,’ cooed Sherry DaVinci, floating into view from one of the cubicles, ‘that dress is lovely.’

‘Thanks,’ said Tara faintly, as Sherry squeezed in beside her and unpacked half the Mac range from her Louis Vuitton evening purse. Tara could see why the casting director had been so keen to get Sherry DaVinci to play a sexpot hospital receptionist in the hit television soap opera, National Hospital. And it was nothing to do with Sherry’s acting ability.

Shoehorned into a clinging, gold, sequinned mini dress, Sherry was a porn-fan’s dream, her ample breasts sitting perkily under her chin like two tanned melon halves that threatened to escape at any moment. She didn’t need chicken fillets, Tara thought ruefully, comparing Sherry’s buxomness with her own flat chest.

‘Hi, Sherry,’ said a fellow soap beauty, smiling at Sherry in passing and ignoring Tara.

Feeling invisible, Tara wondered why the beautiful people weren’t given their own loos at glitzy events, so that ordinary, non-beautiful people didn’t have to face the perfection of the ‘talent’ when they were fixing their tights, rearranging falsies and painting gloss on thin lips. Not, Tara reflected, that Sherry was what you’d call talented. But she pulled in the viewers and she was a sweet girl. Her limitations only became obvious when you were a script writer trying to write lines she wouldn’t screw up. As a storyline editor and one of the team of contributing writers on National Hospital, Tara spent a lot of time writing lines which Sherry then delivered with all the élan of the postman delivering a credit card bill. Which all went to prove that looks weren’t everything, as Isadora, Tara’s colleague, muttered bitchily every time Sherry fluffed her lines.

Feeling as if she’d better make an effort, Tara investigated the contents of her handbag (black satin, borrowed, no visible logo). Underneath her mobile phone and a notebook and pen in case she had any brilliant ideas for the love triangle storyline she was working on, was a red lipstick, a very elderly concealer and her glasses case.

There had been a pair of tights in there for emergencies but she’d had to break them out after the smoked salmon starter when her watch had twanged a thread on her existing pair.

‘Do you want a lend of anything?’ asked Sherry, concentrating on applying eyeliner with a professional’s touch. She was expertly using a tiny angled brush, Tara saw.

‘Er, no thanks,’ Tara said. She slicked on a speedy coat of lipstick, and looked critically at herself to inspect the effect. Standing beside Sherry was a mistake. Tara was straight as an ironing board while Sherry was all glowing curves with sparkling gold dust on her silken skin.

Sometimes Tara wondered, in an idle sort of way, what it would be like to be beautiful rather than clever. Her mother, Rose, was beautiful, still beautiful, even in her late fifties. The family teased her about how the Kinvarra postman was besotted with her and how he nearly crashed the post van whenever she appeared. And Stella, her elder sister, was stunning too, with melting dark eyes and a serene, smiling face that made people gravitate towards her. And Holly, who had more hang-ups about her looks than a catwalk full of teenage models, was incredibly pretty in an arrestingly luminous way. But the beauty gene had clearly skipped out when it had come to Tara.

Not that she minded, really. Tara knew she’d been given a gift that made up for not being a head-turner – a brain as sharp as a stiletto and a talent for putting words together. A gift that had brought her here tonight.

She grinned as she thought of her Aunt Adele’s mantra at Miller family get-togethers: ‘Thank the Lord that Tara’s so clever.’ Tara knew that this was shorthand for ‘It’s lucky that Tara doesn’t have to rely on her looks.’ Her mother used to glare at Aunt Adele whenever Adele said this but it had no effect. Her aunt was one of those people who thought honesty and tactlessness were pretty close to Godliness in the hierarchy of virtue, and felt that speaking her mind was not just important, but compulsory.

But Tara, after a few pointless years of secretly longing to be a beauty, was perfectly content with the way she looked. She’d never be pretty but instead was a combination of quirky and unusual looking, with a sharp little chin, a mischievous full mouth, and a long nose which might have dominated her face were it not for deep-set hazel eyes that glittered with amusement and brilliance. Even beside a raft of golden-haired lovelies, people always noticed Tara’s clever, vibrant face. And once they got talking to her, they loved her because she was witty and funny into the bargain.

By the time she’d got to college, Tara had worked out a clever and eccentric look which involved very trendy clothes, short, almost masculine hair and fire-engine red lipstick. It helped that she was tall, so masculine clothes and hair worked on her. Now, at the grand old age of thirty-two and thanks to the confidence that came from having a career she loved, Tara was utterly at home with her looks. Her dark hair was expertly cut and its exquisitely tweaked style owed much to the salon wax she scrunched through the ends each morning. Trendy, dark-rimmed glasses gave definition to her eyes and drew attention away from her nose. She’d toyed with the idea of rhinoplasty for years but Finn had told her she didn’t need it.

‘I love your nose the way it is,’ he’d say, running his finger down it lovingly.

Tara’s face softened as she thought of her husband of six months. Darling Finn. Theirs had been the ultimate whirlwind courtship. They’d met a year ago at a party, fell madly in love and got married within six months, confidently telling astonished friends that once you met your soul mate, you knew instantly. Finn was everything Tara wanted in a man: funny, sexy, kind, clever – and drop-dead gorgeous. A rangy man with sleepy, fun-filled eyes, tousled dirty blonde hair and an air of languid sexuality, Finn was genuinely movie-star stunning. People told her he could have been Brad Pitt’s stand-in, but a proud Tara retorted that Finn was infinitely better looking.

Even his voice was sexy, automatically reminding her of making slow languorous love even when he was just asking her how much milk she wanted in her coffee.

It would have been lovely to stroll into the ballroom with him on her arm. He looked good in a dinner jacket; but then he’d look good in a sack.

At their wedding, Aunt Adele hadn’t failed the Miller family and had pointedly said, at least five times, that she couldn’t get over how Tara had netted such a good-looking boy. As if Tara had gone out with a huge fishing rod and reeled in the first gorgeous specimen she saw.

‘Your aunt keeps looking at me and shaking her head,’ said Finn at the reception. ‘Is she shocked that a creative genius like you has married a stupid computer salesman?’

Tara laughed. ‘On the contrary, she thinks I’ve won the lottery. Aunt Adele has been preparing me for spinsterhood for years by reminding me I’m not a great beauty, so she’s astonished I nabbed a hunk like yourself and actually got you to marry me within six months of meeting you. And you’re anything but stupid.’

Finn pulled her close for another kiss. He couldn’t seem to get enough of her. ‘Well,’ he conceded, his lips brushing her cheek tenderly, ‘maybe not that stupid. After all, I’ve just married a brilliant wife. And a beautiful one, too.’

If only he were here, Tara thought now with a fresh pang of longing. Finn knew how tense she was about things like awards ceremonies, and knew just how important this one was to her. The exact opposite of her; he was laid-back about everything and would have calmed her nerves better than a pint of Rescue Remedy. But tickets to the National Television & Radio Awards were like gold dust and not even all the show’s writers had been able to get one. There was no way Tara could have brought Finn with her. She’d phone him quickly, just to say hi, that she missed him. Switching her phone on, Tara dialled rapidly. The phone in the apartment rang out without being answered. She smiled at the thought of Finn rushing across the road to the twenty-four-hour garage to buy something, forgetting to turn the answering machine on. She loved the little things he forgot. They were so endearing. She tried his mobile but it was off too. Idiot. But she was smiling.

‘Perfume?’ asked Sherry, spraying the contents of a tiny bottle of Gucci Envy down her cleavage.

‘Yes please,’ said Tara, sorry that she hadn’t thought to bring the Coco Mademoiselle that Finn had given her for her birthday. The ballroom was murderously hot and the combination of a spicy main course and too much red wine meant that everyone had red, flushed faces. None of which would look good on television. Tara had a sudden horrified vision of her shiny, lobster-pink face being all that people remembered when the nominations for the soap awards came up.

She took the proffered vial of perfume, sprayed it liberally down her front and gave a final blast to her wrists. ‘Sherry, I’ve changed my mind. Can I borrow some make-up? I think I need it.’

Five minutes later, Tara was expertly revamped. In those few moments in the ladies’ she felt as if she’d learned more about Sherry than she had over several months of work. Sherry chatted away about how her mother had helped her shop for the dress she was nearly wearing, and how her whole family were going to meet up the next night when the awards were broadcast in case they spotted Sherry. They never missed an episode of the show, either. They were so proud of her.

‘I used to be a beautician, you see,’ Sherry said as she dextrously brushed eye shadow onto Tara’s lids. ‘Mum was worried when I gave it up for drama school.’

‘You’re brilliant at make up,’ Tara said enthusiastically as she admired her newly-sultry eyes, dark and intense thanks to smoky shadows.

‘Thanks,’ Sherry said happily as she zipped up her bag of tricks.

Tara felt bad that she couldn’t say how Sherry was a marvellous actress too, but she hated hypocrisy.

Together, they braved the ballroom. A vast, high-ceilinged room decorated with giant swathes of purple velvet to go with the gilt and purple chairs, it was crammed with every sort of television and radio worker. Actors and presenters rubbed shoulders with writers and producers, all pretending to have a roaring good time because the show was being filmed, and all trotting out the standard remark: ‘It’s such an honour just to be here: being nominated/winning doesn’t matter.’ Which was rubbish because it was all about winning.

The ceremony itself was going to make up ninety-five per cent of the TV show, but nobody wanted to risk glaring sourly at a rival and ending up with that broadcast to the world. Or even worse, being included in the inevitable out-takes video which would change hands as soon as the show was over. So the whole place was awash with smiles.

Tara lost Sherry within seconds, as the actress spotted a camera crew and wove her way through the crowds, her shapely hips undulating sexily as she shimmied along. Marilyn Monroe was said to have deliberately had a quarter of an inch taken off the heel of one shoe to give her that sexy lilting walk. Sherry had clearly upped the ante and had taken off an entire inch on one side, leaving her with a hip movement that Tara reckoned a passing bishop would surely declare an occasion of sin.

Weaving her own way through the tables, Tara said hello here and there but didn’t stop. She’d worked in television one way or another for nine years and knew loads of the people here: if she stopped, she’d never make it up to her table in its much envied place at the front.

As she passed the Forsyth and Daughters table, she nodded at an old work-experience pal of hers who now wrote for the series.

‘Good luck,’ said Robbie encouragingly. ‘I hope you win.’

‘You too,’ said Tara. Which was true because she hoped he would win. It was unlikely though.

Robbie smiled weakly and Tara passed on, knowing there was nothing she could say to raise his spirits. Forsyth and Daughters was a five-year-old show about a family of female lorry drivers and not even ER’s Dr Luka Kovac, manfully wielding the cardiac paddles, would be able to bring it back to life. The scripts were tired, the storyline was exhausted and the only option in Tara’s opinion was to can the whole series. Robbie and his team hadn’t a snowball’s chance in Hell of winning anything, while the National Hospital team were hot favourites for a whole raft of awards.

A voice on the microphone was asking people to take their seats as Tara reached her place.

National Hospital, as befitting one of the nation’s hottest home-grown soaps, had two tables at the ceremony and, now that the empty bottles and the plates had been taken away, they looked bare and untidy with wine stains on the white tablecloths. The actors had been allocated a table close to the stage, while the writers and production people were behind them. There was nobody at the actors’ table because, as soon as the meal was officially over, they’d all rushed off to get their photos taken and to work the room. The writers, on the other hand, insisted that they didn’t believe in networking and sat getting dug into the wine and trying to out-do each other bitching about rival shows. The truth was that nobody was interested in taking pictures of writers, which galled them. They wrote the words, they created the canvas on which the actors shone, so why did nobody know who they were?

‘Did you hear the one about the bimbo who wanted to be in movies?’ muttered Tommy from the depths of his glass, as Tara slipped into her place beside him. Tommy was one of the show’s long-timers. ‘She went to Hollywood and slept with a writer.’

‘Yeah, yeah,’ murmured the assembled group, who’d heard it all before.

Isadora, who’d moved so she had a better view of the stage, was now sitting on Tara’s other side. Isadora was another one of the storyline editors, writers who shaped the way the show developed and came up with long-range plotlines. She and Tara worked closely together and were great friends.

‘You look nice,’ said Isadora. ‘Have you been beautifying yourself for your acceptance speech?’

Tara laughed. ‘Sherry did it. It’s good, isn’t it?’

‘Very.’ Isadora was impressed. ‘Can she do something for me? I need emergency work. All this red wine has my face looking like blue cheese.’

‘Crumbly?’ inquired Tommy.

‘No, heavily veined,’ Isadora replied tartly. ‘But still, my veins aren’t half as bad as yours, sweetie.’

‘Miaow,’ Tommy retorted.

The lights went down and there was a frantic dash as people raced back to their seats. The babble of conversation went down to a low hum while the audience waited for the show to begin.

Watching the monitors to the side of the stage, Tara and Isadora could see what the cameras saw. The lenses panned across the room, coming to rest on the big male stars of the day and on the most beautiful of the women, all of whom had nearly killed themselves to wear the most talked about gown of the evening. Slit-to-the-navel, slit-to-the-thigh and slit-in-both-directions dresses were par for the course at these events. The more famous stars didn’t bare as much, while the wannabes craved attention and tended to look as if they hadn’t enough money to pay for a whole dress.

‘Leather is big this year,’ Isadora commented, glancing around. ‘Look at that woman from that kids’ Saturday morning show. That’s not a dress; that’s a python-skin bikini with a see-through overdress.’

‘I dunno why they call it an overdress,’ muttered Tommy. ‘Doesn’t look like overdressing to me.’

‘She’d better be careful,’ Isadora continued. ‘She won’t be the darling of the exhausted early morning mums and dads if she wears that type of hot little outfit. They want blue jeans, wacky sweaters, spiky hair and overall purity for their Saturday morning televisual babysitters.’

Silence reigned for a brief moment until the awards’ theme music blasted out over the sound system and the show began. Finally, the nerves began to get to Tara. This was an important evening for her. She’d been working on National Hospital for three years and in April, she’d been promoted to storyline editor. The youngest person ever to get the job, Tara had had a lot to prove. But she’d done it. Thanks in no small part to her input, the scripts since then had been ratings grabbers. The critics loved the show, the production company loved the show, now, it was time to see if the people who gave out the prestigious Soap of the Year award loved it too. They’d been nominated for the past three years but had been narrowly beaten by Ardmore Grove, their nearest rival, every time. If only tonight was the night to claim the prize for National Hospital. Tara felt sick with the anxiety of it all.

Across the table, Aaron, the show’s director, sat with his beautiful blonde wife. Tara thought of Finn sitting at home waiting for her phone call. Her nerves wouldn’t have been nearly as bad if Finn had been beside her, his hand holding hers comfortingly. But only people like Aaron were considered important enough to get two invites to the ceremony.

Onstage, clips were being shown of the best animated films. Tara glanced at her watch. Twenty minutes gone. Although the show wasn’t live, it would still run pretty much to time. The soap category was in the first hour but there was ages to go.

The veteran Irish actor on stage was slowly opening the purple envelope for the animation award. He read it out and a table at the back of the ballroom erupted with squeals of joy. Everybody at the National Hospital tables smiled. The whole ballroom smiled. They were on camera, after all.

Three more awards trundled by. Winners gravely thanked everyone from their kindergarten teacher to their Pilates coach. The only excitement was when the forty-something Best Actress gave rather an over-enthusiastic kiss to the teenage boy band member presenting her with the award. The audience applauded with delight. At last, somebody behaving badly.

‘Give him another Frenchie,’ yelled a drunk at the back of the room.

‘That’s one comment for the cutting room floor,’ Tara grinned.

‘Were there tongues involved?’ demanded Isadora eagerly.

‘Not on his part,’ Aaron said. ‘The poor guy looked scared out of his head.’

‘He should be,’ Tommy pointed out. ‘She eats boys like him for brekkie.’

‘Don’t be ageist,’ snapped Isadora, who was feeling sensitive about arriving at the big four-oh herself. ‘Just because she’s over forty, she’s not a figure of fun, you know. It’s perfectly allowable to snog younger men. You’re no spring chicken yourself, Tommy, and I bet you wouldn’t say no to a big kiss from a teenage starlet.’

‘Now, children,’ remonstrated Aaron calmly, ‘let’s not fight. We have to look like we’re happy. Save the fighting for the studio.’

Everyone grinned. Tempers often got frayed when they were under pressure at work.

‘After the break, we’ll be seeing who’s the Radio Presenter of the Year, who’s the Best Actor, and, which soap has won the Best Soap,’ said the MC suavely. The crowd applauded obediently.