‘So you admit it,’ I say darkly, pouncing.
‘A little white lie,’ Vanna says airily. ‘And look where it got you! I’m coming over.’
‘I’m still at work.’
‘I’ll pick you up. It’s almost five thirty now.’
I glance towards Kitty’s office. She’s in there with Eli Roth, the two of them probably discussing my made-up location reports. Normally I hang around the office till six or later, but with my luck, Roth will come out here in his sharp suit and ask me too many penetrating questions and I’ll get caught. Mark Swan says it’s driving him nuts that he’s shut out of the Mother of the Bride decisions.
I wonder what Swan’s doing in LA right now.
Anyway, never mind about that.
‘Yes, come over,’ I hiss to Vanna. ‘In fact be as quick as you can.’
‘I’m just down the block, darling,’ she coos. Her offices are in Covent Garden. ‘Be there in a jiff.’
Vanna arrives ten minutes later in a cloud of glory. Or it could be Chanel No. 19. It’s hard to tell, frankly. She struts out of the elevator looking amazing in something tight and black, possibly Azzedine Alaia, complete with a devastatingly chic Prada mock-croc clutch, outrageous fifties style open-toed stack stilettos, and a huge pair of wraparound glasses. Despite her tiny size – even with the three-inch heels the girl is barely five six – people make way, drawing back from her path. She’s so formidable she makes Kitty look like Anthea Turner.
I quickly gather up a few scripts for cover but, possibly scenting a rival, Kitty has emerged from her office. Bugger. And Eli Roth’s right behind us.
‘OK, let’s go,’ I say hurriedly, but it’s too late. Kitty has sauntered over to my desk and is staring coldly at Vanna as though she’s a half-dead bird some particularly nasty cat has dragged in.
Vanna, however, does not flinch. She returns Kitty’s stare with an equally icy gaze. I look at her enviously. How I’d love to be able to face people down like that!
‘Can I help you?’ Kitty asks her.
‘I don’t think so,’ Vanna says easily. ‘I have a meeting with Anna.’
‘Oh really,’ says Kitty, giving a little laugh for Eli Roth’s benefit. I try not to look at him, but my peripheral vision sees him standing there, tanned lips set in a disapproving line. ‘Another of her friends being entertained during office hours?’
‘I am a friend of Anna’s, yes,’ says Vanna smoothly. ‘Who isn’t in London?’ I splutter, but manage to turn it into a little cough. ‘But I’m seeing her on business now.’
‘What are you guys meeting about?’ asks Roth, friendly enough. But not underneath the plastic smile.
‘Books,’ says Vanna. ‘She’s looking for new properties to adapt. Right?’
‘Right,’ I say meekly.
‘Oh dear,’ say Kitty, superciliously. ‘Another unpublished author. You really must stop this, Anna, it’s a waste of company time, and I do hope you weren’t thinking of leaving the office for this, or charging coffees to petty cash.’
‘I’m not an unpublished author,’ Vanna says. ‘I’m not an author at all. I’m the editorial director of Artemis Books. Of course, if Winning isn’t interested in discussing any of our titles—’
‘It’s Red Crest now,’ says Eli Roth, moving forward and effectively elbowing Kitty to one side. She stands there blushing as he hurries to repair the damage, smiling at Vanna with a full-wattage LA beam. ‘You must be Vanessa Cabot.’
‘That’s me,’ Vanna says coolly.
‘I make it my business to know the names of all the players,’ Roth says, smugly. ‘So you’re going to give Anna first look at some of your stuff?’
‘Of course. I heard she was working with Mark Swan.’
‘News travels fast,’ Roth says. He slaps me heartily on the shoulder. ‘Well done, Anna. Best get off to your meeting.’ He looks over at Kitty rather crossly, and she, in turn, shoots me a very fleeting but very nasty death stare. I shiver, but Vanna is smiling and dragging me away. Thank God.
‘You could have been a bit nicer,’ I protest.
Vanna gestures impatiently. ‘Darling, no I couldn’t. She was challenging me and therefore you. She has to do that, of course, because she’s so scared of you.’
I laugh out loud. Luckily I haven’t yet had a sip of my fat-free, taste-free cappuccino. It would have gone everywhere.
‘You’re so blind sometimes,’ Vanna sighs. ‘Imagine if you were – what’s her name?’
‘Kitty.’
‘Kitty. You’re a woman of a certain age in an industry that only values youth. You’re paranoid about showing even a wrinkle, so you have to go in for surgery and Botox. Your company just got bought out, and the only person with a viable script going is a young girl who works for you, so you steal the credit, but the young girl attaches a major director all by herself, and is his preferred partner from the producing team. What has this Kitty done? Nothing. And she knows her boss probably knows it.’
‘She told Roth that she found it.’
Vanna snorts. ‘And you don’t think he knows the truth? A shark like that?’
‘He can’t. He’s never given me any credit for it.’
‘Doesn’t mean he gives Kitty credit for it, honey,’ Vanna says cynically. ‘He knows. He’s not dumb. The only reason he hasn’t started firing people yet is he’s figuring out the most cost-effective way to do it.’
‘But Kitty won an Oscar.’
‘What for?’
‘Best Foreign Film.’
‘Doesn’t count,’ says Vanna dismissively – and somewhat accurately. ‘He won’t fire you, because you’ve found him something, got it off the ground. But he won’t give you much pay or credit either, unless you stand up for yourself.’
‘But why not?’
‘Because he doesn’t have to,’ Vanna says simply. ‘Do you remember when we were children and they said “I want doesn’t get”?’
‘Um, yes?’
‘In real life “I want” does get,’ she says.
‘Wow,’ I say. I’m really impressed. I wish I were like Vanna, so petite yet ferocious, elegant yet deadly, like a gorgeous Siamese cat.
‘But who cares about bloody business?’ Vanna exclaims. ‘Let me see the rock! Ooh. A ruby.’ She pulls my hand closer to her eyes, scrutinizing the stones carefully. ‘Darling, that is stunning. Rubies are getting very rare, you can’t find the good clear ones for love nor money … very attractive,’ she pronounces. ‘And tasteful.’
‘He does have good taste,’ I concede. ‘But don’t you think we’re going to look kind of silly?’
‘Silly? What do you mean, the height difference? Don’t be ridiculous,’ Vanna scoffs. ‘Nobody ever thinks millions of pounds are silly. You are going to be mistress of almost a hundred acres of prime English countryside, a bloody huge manor house that everyone I know would give their eye teeth for, including me, a lovely flat in London—’
‘It is a lovely flat.’
‘And entrée into society with a capital S.’
‘I don’t care about Society. With or without a capital S.’
‘I know, but you will,’ Vanna says comfortably. ‘Everybody does. They pretend not to, of course, but they do really. Just like people want knighthoods and never admit it. Now Charles doesn’t have an actual title, but he’s even better. His family is so old … I wonder if I have an old copy of Burke’s Landed Gentry anywhere.’
‘Vanna, you’re being ridiculous.’
She shrugs elegantly. ‘But darling, I’m just so happy for you! Everybody will be green with envy. Everybody. All those years of people saying cruel –’ she pauses, not wanting to give anything away, like I didn’t know already – ‘of people wondering why you weren’t married yet and now this! You couldn’t have done any better. Unless you’d bagged Prince Andrew, of course. I wonder…’ she muses, then shakes her head. ‘No, I suppose it’s too late now. Anna’s off the market!’
I smile weakly at her. �
�It is kind of amazing. But I don’t want to marry Charles for his money, you know.’
‘Of course not,’ says Vanna immediately. ‘It can only be true love. You’ll laugh at me now, but at that first dinner party I didn’t think the two of you were attracted to each other.’
‘We weren’t.’ I blush. ‘He grew on me,’ I lie. ‘And he’s nice, once you get to know him.’
‘And he treats you well? Not tight with his money?’
‘Oh no, he’s very generous,’ I say, looking at my huge sparkler and thinking of all the delicious meals and taxis and flowers.
‘And he makes you feel good?’
‘Yes.’
‘Supportive of your career?’
‘That too,’ I say. ‘Even when I had to let him down about the book.’ I swallow, thinking of how devastated he was by that, thinking of him crying in the orchard at Chester House. How small I felt. And now I’m going to try to write, is Charles being resentful? Not even slightly. He wants to support me while I labour over dialogue and third act breaks and inciting incidents.
‘So he’s the perfect boyfriend,’ Vanna says, triumphantly.
‘I suppose so,’ I say.
Vanna shakes her head. ‘You should be jumping up and down, Anna. Don’t you understand? You’ve just won the Lottery! And so has he, of course,’ she adds loyally.
‘Yes, I know. I – I’m really thrilled,’ I tell her. I suddenly feel overcome with tiredness and have to smother a yawn.
‘You go home and get your beauty sleep,’ Vanna says, dropping a note on the table. ‘You’ll need your strength. We have a huge engagement party to plan. Charles wants to make a really big deal out of it.’
I smile weakly. ‘Sounds terrific.’
Vanna drops me home before rushing back to leafy Barnes to break the news to Rupert (I can just imagine him at the engagement party, can’t you? Red-faced and florid, probably braying to all and sundry how lucky I am to have been taken off the shelf) and I walk up Tottenham Court Road back to the flat. It’s early evening and I feel drained, but I keep glancing at my ring as if for strength.
There’s a ring on that finger. A bloody expensive one, too. Not the diamond chip a good-size salt crystal could put to shame that I’d been expecting from some loser, some day, if I got lucky. And even though I’m not looking forward to Rupert Cabot pointing it out, I am in fact off the shelf. As I thread my way past drunk students on their way to an eighties night at the Astoria and a wino passed out in front of the off-licence, it strikes me that I won’t have to do this any more. Walk back to Lily and Janet’s, I mean. I’ll be sharing a bedroom and some expensive Persian rugs with Charles in Eaton Square splendour. No more Pot Noodles for supper either. It’s the Ritz all the way …
And suddenly all I really want is to get back to our flat above a shop, our cheerful, coffee-stained IKEA sofa, and my aggravatingly gorgeous, bathroom-hogging room-mates. I pick up my pace, almost jogging, and sigh with relief as I reach the little alley next to the Moon Goddess bookstore, enter our doorway and step into our ancient, coffin-sized lift.
But of course this is only nerves, isn’t it? Fear of change. Which is utterly ridiculous, for years now my main fear has been staying the same.
I paste a big, hearty smile on my face as I fling open the door. They’re both there; Janet is flicking through Heat with her headphones on, and Lily is drawling on the phone to someone or other. I can hear a few ‘dah-lings’ and ‘sweethearts’, though that doesn’t necessarily mean it’s a bloke.
‘Hi!’ I say, gamely. ‘Big news!’
They ignore me.
‘Big news!’ I repeat enthusiastically, in the manner of an American cheerleader.
‘Do you mind?’ Lily hisses.
Janet looks over at me, fingers on her headphones. ‘Waiting for tonight,’ she warbles tunelessly. ‘When you would be here in my arms – woah-oh…’
‘You shut up too!’ Lily spits. ‘Sorry, sweetie,’ she coos into the phone. ‘Can’t get a second’s peace…’
I make exuberant hand gestures, giving them a little wave and waggling my fingers like a Playboy bunny but they still don’t notice.
‘I got engaged!’ I shout. Loudly.
That does the trick (subtlety has never been Lily’s strong suit). She quickly says, ‘Call you later, baby, ciao bella,’ and hangs up. ‘What?’
Janet slides the headphones off her ears. ‘What?’
‘I’ve. Got. Engaged.’ I thrust my hand towards them waggling it wildly, and as luck would have it, thrust it into one of the last rays of the setting sun blazing dustily through our windows. Little bursts of light sparkle all over the room.
‘Oh. My. God.’ says Janet.
‘No. Way,’ says Lily.
We must stop speaking in Morse code!
‘Yes way, actually,’ I say, proudly. ‘Charles proposed. And I accepted!’
Janet screams. ‘Aaaargh! Aaaaargh!’ She leaps up from her chair and jumps up and down like a mad yet gorgeous baboon. ‘Aaaaaaaaaaaarrrghhhhhh!’
‘Ssh,’ I say, frightened that next door will hear and call the police.
‘I don’t believe it,’ Lily says faintly. ‘Chester House. Eaton Square.’ She looks sick. ‘Chester House,’ she says again. Then she gives herself a little shake. ‘Congratulations,’ she manages, with an effort. It’s almost as though she and I were facing off in the finals of Pop Idol and I had somehow bizarrely won. ‘Let me see the ring,’ she says with a forced smile. I have to give it to her, though, she’s at least making an effort.
I thrust it forward a bit further.
‘Oh my,’ says Janet, excitedly. ‘Bling bling!’
‘That is nice,’ says Lily, seizing on it. She holds it up to her eyes. ‘Princess-cut ruby, about four carats, translucent, two trillion-cut diamonds, two carats apiece, cut is very good, colour’s a D, clarity … hmm … S11 to S12,’ she rattles off.
‘Lily knows her jewellery,’ says Janet wisely. ‘She’s been given so much of it.’
Nothing as nice as this, though. She knows it and I know it. I can see that Lily thinks this situation is so mad as to be psychedelic. She, the most radiantly lovely, blonde, tiny elfin model, has been upstaged by a great strapping size fourteen with a big nose.
‘What does that mean?’ I ask innocently.
Lily swallows drily. ‘Retail? About thirty grand,’ she says.
Thirty thousand pounds? I feel sick. Charles didn’t let me see the price tags when we were choosing the ring. I want to rip it off my finger and lock it in a safe somewhere.
‘After the marriage that’ll be yours to keep,’ she says. ‘Very portable asset,’ she adds longingly.
‘What are you talking about? They won’t be getting divorced,’ says Janet loyally. ‘I think it’s wonderful. Congratulations, hon,’ she says, kissing me on the cheek.
‘Thanks, Jay-Me,’ I say, squeezing her trim waist.
‘Yes, well done,’ says Lily. She forces another smile. ‘Well done indeed,’ she adds, turning away quickly. She really has gone very pallid. ‘I’m very tired, I think I’ll be off to bed. Congrats,’ she repeats faintly.
I’m touched, at least she’s being civil.
‘I expect you’ll have one of these soon,’ I say. ‘From Henry.’
‘Yes,’ Lily says, shaking herself again. ‘No doubt. And he’s loaded,’ she adds, more to herself than me. But her heart doesn’t seem to be in it. ‘Goodnight, guys,’ she says, and goes into her room, shutting the door quietly.
Janet hugs me again, oblivious to Lily and her moods. ‘This is so brilliant, Anna. Tell me everything, you’ve got to tell me everything. Did he go down on one knee? Was it totally romantic? Was it, you know, like the great love of your life and everything?’
No. No. And no.
‘It was more just a conversation, but it was really nice,’ I say, sounding defensive, but I can’t seem to stop myself. ‘Anyway, I’m actually pretty tired too so I’m going to turn in as well. See you t
omorrow.’
‘OK,’ says Janet, uncertainly. ‘Fantastic news!’ she calls after my retreating back.
I shut the door to my closet-sized bedroom and feel my racing heartbeat slow down. Thank God that’s over; nobody else left to tell, besides Mum and Dad. I pick up Mr Bear, my imaginatively named teddy, and hug him close to my chest as I crawl on top of my duvet, clothes still on, ready to pass out. Just before I sleep I look in the direction of my ring for some sparkly reassurance, but it’s gloomy in here and I can’t see it glitter.
There is one more person I have to mention it to, I think as I drift off.
Mark Swan.
10
I wake up in the morning feeling a bit disorientated. Maybe it’s because I’m now cold, with no covers on. Or because I fell asleep in my clothes even though I wasn’t drunk. Hastily I pull them off and stuff them in my canvas laundry bag, and put on my ratty brown towelling dressing gown so nobody realizes what a total slattern I am.
‘Morning,’ says Lily brightly as I emerge. ‘It’s the bride-to-be!’
I start, then it comes back to me.
‘You can have the shower now,’ she adds generously. ‘Janet left already. A shoot. Though who knows who’s booking her,’ she adds with a touch of contempt.
‘Vogue, I expect,’ I say loyally.
‘Yeah, right,’ says Lily, contemptuously. ‘Anyway, you can use my Aveda shampoo if you want,’ she offers, with very uncharacteristic generosity.
I goggle. ‘Are you sure?’
‘Of course I’m sure. You know you’re always free to use any of my stuff,’ she says airily. ‘What’s mine is yours.’
‘Are you feeling OK?’ I ask, gingerly. Lily marks the level of her cosmetics on her bottles with wipe-off magic marker and has threatened legal action over my occasional sneaking of a squirt or two of one of her expensive potions. I got my own back, though. Diluted them with water. And once I decanted her entire bottle of Perlier bubble bath and replaced it with Safeway’s own and she never knew the difference.
‘Of course,’ she says briskly. ‘You know me, share and share alike.’ She smiles at me winsomely. ‘You have to keep up your bridal beauty,’ she says, smiling.
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