The Start of Something Wonderful: a fantastically feel-good romantic comedy!
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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.’
CHAPTER THREE
Looking for Lara
September
IT’S 5.30 A.M. I’M WEARING RUBBER GLOVES and wielding a loo brush. How did my life come to this? I left Amy Air so full of hope and promise, now here I am, not even a year later, with my arm stuck down a toilet. I hate my job, I hate my life, and I hate myself for having got into this mess.
What was I thinking of? I should have carried on flying; okay, so it wouldn’t have altered the fact that Nigel left me and some other woman stole the life I should have had, but at least I would have been a comfortably off singleton. Thanks to some hare-brained that I could become the next Meryl Streep, I am now an impoverished forty-something without a place to call home, my life packed away in bubble wrap at a warehouse off the M4.
Who needs therapy or self-help books to mend a broken heart? All you need do is follow these three easy steps: a) Give up your well-paid, secure, and interesting job. b) Sell your comfortable home and move into someone’s poky back room, complete with resident psychocat. c) Forgo all luxuries and live from hand to mouth doing menial jobs.
Et voilà! You’ll have so many majorly serious problems to contend with (like SURVIVAL) that being dumped by your boyfriend will seem a minor blip by comparison.
My positive side tries to persuade me that jobs like this are all good, character-building stuff. Besides, should The Rovers Return or The Queen Vic be casting for a cleaning lady, my hands-on experience may just give me the edge over actresses who’ve never operated a squeezy mop or emptied a Dyson.
Pah! Dream on. It’s time I faced up to the fact that I’ll never make it as an actress. One thing I have learned over the last few months is that acting isn’t just about remembering lines and moves; you have to let go of your inhibitions, be a little bit daring, and take the plunge. Something always holds me back – fear of making an idiot of myself, I guess, and the harder I try, the more awkward and nervous I feel.
‘Stop thinking so much,’ Portia keeps telling me. ‘Thinking about how we sound or look makes us self-conscious. Be brave, go with your instinct, and don’t analyse situations. It destroys the magic.’
I shudder when I think of the huge sacrifice I’ve made – and for what? I squirt another dollop of Toilet Duck and scrub furiously, tears plopping into the bowl.
‘G’day!’
Startled, I wheel around, toppling over onto my bucket of cleaning stuff.
‘Sorry, I didn’t mean to scare you,’ says the tall, young stranger, crouching down and handing me my grubby J-cloth and can of Mr Muscle. His Pacific-blue eyes hold my gaze.
‘I’m Dean. New night security. I must have been on patrol when you arrived.’
‘Emily,’ I sniffle, proffering a yellow, rubber-gloved hand. ‘The cleaner … in case you were wondering.’
‘Well, Emily, nice to meet you,’ he says, treating me to a dazzling smile. ‘Maybe see you around tomorrow.’ And with that he is gone.
* * *
That evening, as I climb the steps of Dramatic Ar s for the very last time, I stop to admire the full moon.
I close my eyes and centre myself by breathing deeply. Faye believes this is a time for cleansing, for new beginnings, for emotional and spiritual growth. She told me to make a wish out loud in front of the moon then visualise it coming true.
She also said it’s a time for looking in the mirror and saying nice things to yourself. I draw the line at that one though.
I came to drama school to learn how to make sense of Shakespeare, how to walk in a bustle and corset without keeling over, to flirtatiously flutter a fan, and to move and sing simultaneously without getting breathless. No one warned me that you had to take part in a Jeremy-Kyle-type reality show before you were allowed to pass ‘GO’. If they had, I think I would have stuck to serving chicken and beef at thirty-two thousand feet.
Maybe now it’s time to put stability back into my life. I should forget my dream, wake up, and behave like any normal middle-aged woman, by getting a proper job with a pension scheme and Christmas bonus.
* * *
‘You’ve had twenty-four hours to think about this, and now you’re telling me that your motive, the event that’s going to get those anger juices flowing, that’s going to fuel your performances in time to come, is the fact that you had a puncture, were late for your first day at work, and your boss was mean to you?’ says Portia, scrutinising me with a look of despair in her kohl-rimmed, piercing green eyes.
Here we go again. I must be some kind of masochist, to have spent the last nine months putting myself through this kind of torture.
I’m realising that the optimist in me has been telling lies – encouraging me to keep on keeping on, because any day now I’ll find the key to that secret door that leads to the actor’s holy grail; that special place that separates the truly talented from the merely mediocre. But let’s be realistic for once: I’m never going to find the key, am I? With no Plan B, where does that leave me? Bitter tears sting my eyes. I swallow hard. God, please don’t let me cry. My toes clench together in my jazz shoes, my face and neck flushing the colour of a strawberry smoothie.
‘Come on, Emily, surely you can do better than that? Haven’t you ever been accused of something unfairly or had your heart broken in two?’
‘Sure, but …’
‘Well then, how did that make you feel?’
‘I … I …’ I murmur, shrugging my shoulders and casting my eyes downwards, wishing I could silently slither down a gap between the floorboards.
‘Didn’t you feel betrayed, wounded, bloody furious?’ she probes.
‘Of course, but …’
‘Well then, now’s your opportunity to break through those emotional boundaries and tell us what’s in your heart. No one’s going to laugh at you. If you’re serious about becoming an actor – a good actor – then you have to live on the edge, bare your soul. Acting is all about trust, Emily.’
‘I know, I know,’ I reply sheepishly. ‘It’s just that, well … I’m not entirely comfortable with all this touchy-feely stuff. Please don’t get me wrong,’ I add quickly, desperately searching for the right words, ‘I … I’m not exactly the stiff-upper-lip type … far from it … I mean, I cry at Britain’s Got Talent … but … well, it’s just that …’
‘Do you want to be one of those actors who believes they’ve done a good job so long as they remember their lines and don’t bump into the furniture?’ continues Portia, tearing into me. ‘Or would you rather be the type of actor who inhabits a role, who sets the stage alight, who can hold an audience in the palm of their hand, make them squirm in their seats, move them to tears, or cause them to laugh uncontrollably?’ Her eyes are flashing now, as her amethyst ring catches the light, sending a whirlpool of lilac light around the room, like a glitter-ball.
‘But isn’t acting all about pretending?’ I say weakly. ‘Don’t tell me you have to have committed murder before you’re eligible to play the villain in an Agatha Christie.’
All eyes hit the floor, and an uncomfortable silence hangs in the air. I flush even harder.
‘Acting is about finding the truth in imaginary circumstances,’ says Portia matter-of-factly.
I know she’s right. All the same … some things are personal. How I wish this were over. I can’t carry on just staring at the floor though. It’s humiliating. Got to do something … oh well, here goes …
‘Those years we spent together, the plans we made – did it all mean nothing to you?’ I say, quietly, haltingly. ‘You were the one who brought up marriage and children, not me, and then when I said I was ready, you kept me hanging on. And all that stuff about “finding yourself” … what a joke! You bastard. You didn’t even have the decency … no, let me finish … you didn’t even have the decency to tell me what was really going on.’
All the bottled-up emotions swirling around inside me since that hideous night come flooding out, filling my words with a mixture of anger and sadness. A big tear slides halfway down my cheek, attaching itself to my nostril, and my legs turn to Plasticine. I grab the corner of the chair.
‘Why couldn’t you have sat me down and told me the truth? That you’d fallen out of love with me and met someone else? But no … you wanted me to think you were having some sort of mental breakdown, when all the time you were sleeping with her. And I was too in love to see through you … even blamed myself. Hah! You’re nothing but a coward and a liar … Come back! Don’t walk out when I’m talking to you! Why must you always bury your head in the sand? Come back …!’ I cry, my outstretched arm flopping limply by my side.
My performance is greeted by complete silence. Moments pass.
‘Are you all right?’ asks Portia gently, handing me a tissue.
‘I’m fine, really I am,’ I say, giving my nose a blow that could warn shipping. I’m not faking it; I really am all right. In fact, I’m more than all right; I’m elated, in a strange sort of way. I did it, and it feels great – liberating – like this huge, tangled mass of poisonous emotions wrapped around my heart has been hacked away and has finally lost its stranglehold. I wasn’t just saying those words; they came from somewhere deep inside me.
‘At last! It took you to the very end of the course to get there, but I knew you had it in you,’ says Portia, with a note of pride. ‘Now, hold on to that emotion and file it away under ANGER, ready to be unleashed as and when the part calls for it,’ she continues, squeezing my arm.
I rejoin the group, sitting in a circle on the floor. I suddenly feel as if everything has fallen into place. Up to this very moment I have been stumbling, muddling my way through, putting on a brave face to the world, pretending to myself that I’m better off without Nigel. It’s now rapidly, brilliantly dawning on me that I truly had been clinging to a lost cause, and I’m free at last.
Thank you, Stanislavski. I think at last I’ve got it.
* * *
It’s Karaoke Nite at The Dog & Whistle. James and Sally take to the stage to give their Dolly and Kenny rendition of ‘Islands in the Stream’. My mind rewinds nine months and that first awkward meeting. What a long way we have all come: the emotions, the secrets, the triumphs and failures we have all dared to share.
‘To you all and the great adventures that lie ahead!’ announces Portia, popping open another bottle of Prosecco.
‘To us!’
I look around at our merry band, so full of hope and anticipation. I wonder how many of us with dreams of becoming actors will become Hot Property, and how many will end up scraping together a living as market researchers or living statues.
My tyres hiss as I weave along the rain-drenched road home. I freewheel down the hill, feet off the pedals, head tilted back, face cooled by the sudden downpour. I feel lighter somehow, as if at any given moment my bike and I could soar up into the black night to the moon, just like in E.T.
I have no idea what the future holds or how I’m going to survive, but tonight, for the first time since embarking on this mad journey, I feel I’m taking tentative steps towards reclaiming the confidence and self-esteem I lost during Nigelgate, and I’m filled with – not sure what, but this much I do know: I am no longer afraid of being alone.