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‘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:
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 …
* * *
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.’
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