The Secrets of Primrose Square

by Claudia Carroll

  ‘I do,’ Nancy told him baldly.

  ‘No, no, I mean real passion,’ he stressed, making the word sound genuinely sexy in his Spanish accent, and beating his chest as he said it.

  ‘Absolutely! I’ve so much passion – passion for the show, for the source material, for Jane Austen, for the National, for the theatre . . . ’

  ‘You no understand,’ Diego had said, sadly shaking his head.

  ‘No!’ Nancy had insisted. ‘I understand you entirely and if it’s passion you’re looking for, then trust me, I’m the assistant director for you.’

  At that stage, she thought, she’d happily have said anything to get the gig. To get out of London for the fresh start she needed so badly. The thought of losing out, having come this far, would have killed her.

  ‘No! You not listening to me,’ Diego had insisted. ‘You must have passion with my English.’

  Oh, Nancy thought. He means patience. It was mortifying, yet not so mortifying that she wavered for even a second as soon as the job offer came through.

  *

  ‘So here we are then,’ said Mbeki, waving around proudly as she showed Nancy inside the rehearsal room, ‘the nerve centre of the whole operation. Pretty cool, isn’t it?’

  ‘That’s putting it mildly.’ Nancy grinned back, suitably impressed.

  They were standing right in the middle of a huge room on the top floor, a bit like a dance studio, except with comfy chairs dotted around a giant table in the centre of the room, with dozens of chairs placed around it, all set for the first cast read-through. Huge glass windows dominated the room and what little sunlight there was on a grim, wintry day flooded in, so the view really was spectacular.

  ‘Come on then,’ Mbeki said, sliding open one of the glass doors and waving at Nancy to follow her onto the terrace outside. ‘I know it’s freezing today, but trust me, you have to check this out.’

  Nancy did as she was told, stepping through the door and on out into the icy, bracing wind outside. And oh dear God, she thought a second later, was it worth it or what?

  The National Theatre was situated just across the River Liffey from the Customs House, just beside the Rosie Hackett Bridge, and from where she and Mbeki stood, the view really took your breath away. It seemed like there was nothing you couldn’t see from that vantage point, stretching right the way across from the National Conference Centre to the 3Arena and beyond. Mbeki was a tireless tour guide and helpfully picked out everything for Nancy, from the Pro-Cathedral right behind them, to the GPO on O’Connell Street, which seemed like it was barely a stone’s throw away from that height.

  ‘Worth getting a dose of double pneumonia for, isn’t it?’ Mbeki grinned cheerily.

  ‘Well worth it.’ Nancy smiled back as the sharpness of the wind started to numb her face.

  ‘Smokers’ terrace, we call this,’ Mbeki went on. ‘And even if you don’t smoke, just coming out here is the greatest destresser there is in this building. Take it from me, when the going gets tough, here’s where you need to be.’

  ‘To regroup, I suppose,’ Nancy said, thinking aloud. She’d certainly done more than her fair share of regrouping lately.

  ‘Or throw yourself off, if the need arises. You’re going to be working with Rumpelstiltskin himself. You’ll find yourself spending a lot of time out here in the freezing cold, is my guess.’

  ‘Why do you keep calling him Rumpelstiltskin?’ Nancy asked, checking over her shoulder to make sure the rehearsal room behind them was still empty. If Diego Fernandez had been unusually short with a habit of sticking his foot through the floorboards, then she’d get it, but he wasn’t. At least, not that she was aware of.

  ‘You’ll see, honey. You’ll see.’

  Moments later, the rehearsal room behind them started to fill up fast, as cast and production crew filed in together, all clutching freshly printed copies of their scripts along with take-out cups of tea and coffee from the coffee shop across the street.

  Soon the whole room was buzzing, as actors who’d worked together before exchanged squeals and gossip, air kisses and hugs. Nancy and Mbeki stepped back inside and all you could hear was a chorus of: ‘Hi, it’s great to meet you, I’ve always wanted to work with you! No, really!’

  One elderly diva, who was proper ‘telly famous’, was chatting to another equally well-known actress of about the same vintage.

  ‘I saw your last play and it really was terribly good, you know,’ she was saying, ‘in spite of what everyone said. Shame it closed so early, darling. Bloody critics. What do those idiots know anyway? I hear you closed after – what was it – five performances, is that right?’

  ‘Oh, never mind about me, what about you?’ cooed the other, batting off the sting with a smile that didn’t quite reach her eyes. ‘It must be wonderful for you to actually be working again. I’d say it must make a lovely change for you, because it’s been quite a while, hasn’t it? You know we share an agent and she was telling me only the other day that it’s been nigh on impossible to get you seen for extra work these days.’

  ‘Oh Christ,’ Mbeki hissed, ‘that’s our Lady Catherine de Bourgh and Mrs Bennet having a proper go at each other. And the day has hardly even begun.’

  ‘Fireworks between actors,’ Nancy whispered back, ‘are best saved for the performance, I always find.’

  The mighty Diego Fernandez was late, but Nancy had been reliably informed that was perfectly normal for him, as apparently he considered himself well above and beyond something as mundane as a humble call-sheet. So she grabbed her chance and got busy introducing herself to anyone she hadn’t already met yet, welcoming everyone while the going was good.

  Pride and Prejudice was probably Nancy’s favourite book of all time. To say that she was honoured to even be in that room was an understatement. And that’s before you even got started on the cast, who were a who’s who of general hotness in the entertainment world.

  Among the seventeen-strong cast and creative team standing around chatting and gossiping, there was a Tony award-winner, six IFTA winners and an actual, bona fide Academy Award nominee, for costume design. Were this room to blow up right now, Nancy thought, the entertainment industry in this country would take a long time to recover.

  ‘Such a pleasure to meet you, my darling,’ Mrs Bennet said, wafting over to Nancy and gracefully shaking her hand, a bit like the Queen on a state visit.

  ‘And you too,’ Nancy said warmly. ‘I’m so looking forward to working with you.’

  ‘And I with you, my dear. We have lots of people in common over the pond, you know. You worked at the Kensington Theatre for a time, didn’t you? A few years ago?’

  ‘Yes,’ Nancy replied, hoping this conversation wasn’t going where she feared it was.

  ‘So you’d know Peter Wallace and all of his team over there, wouldn’t you, my dear?’

  Nancy kept breathing. She probably blinked. Outwardly, she stayed calm and professional and limited herself to saying, ‘Yes. I have very happy memories of my time at the Kensington.’

  And then – There is a God, she thought – she was rescued just in the nick of time.

  ‘Hey, Nancy, great to see you again,’ said Alan Vaughan, a guy about her own age, with bright copper-red hair, a faceful of freckles and a London accent. ‘Last time we met was at my audition, and I was a such a bag of nerves, I was even trembling, do you remember?’

  ‘Well, if it isn’t our very own Mr Wickham.’ She smiled back warmly, shaking his hand, her heart hammering at the near miss she’d just had. Mrs Bennet thankfully drifted off to air kiss someone else, so for the moment at least, Nancy had escaped. For now, she thought.

  Of course she remembered Alan’s audition well; it was the very day after she’d just been hired herself and he’d really been fantastic. He’d read the part so perfectly, it was like he was born to play it. In casting terms, he was what you called a CNB. A complete no-brainer.

  ‘Anyway, thanks for going easy on me at the audition,�
� he chatted away casually.

  ‘Great to see you again, Alan.’

  ‘You too,’ he said, with a big crinkly smile. ‘You know, if you ask me, we Brits really need to stick together on this gig. I mean, look around you: we’re well outnumbered by the Irish.’

  ‘So how are you finding life in Dublin?’

  ‘Scary,’ he said, ‘but amazing at the same time. This is a massive break for me and my agent was practically shoving me onto the flight.’

  ‘Oh, come on now, you’ll be fantastic,’ she said warmly, really meaning it too. Nancy had seen Alan onstage before in several theatre productions over in London and he’d always been terrific. He’d got two of the rarest things going for him onstage, she thought: easy, lighthearted charm and effortless charisma. Perfect for a character like Wickham.

  ‘Well, I’ll certainly do my best.’ He grinned. ‘It really means so much to me just to make it as far as this room. There was no way in hell I was turning down a job like this.’

  ‘Whereabouts are you staying?’ she asked, her own homeless situation never far from her thoughts. ‘Somewhere close by?’

  ‘Are you kidding?’ He laughed. ‘Have you seen what they charge for rents in this town?’

  ‘Don’t remind me,’ she groaned back at him.

  ‘I’m actually staying with my brother and his partner out in Lucan. He fell in love with an Irish girl and moved over here years ago. Mind you, when I say “staying with”, I actually mean that I’m sharing their box room with my three-year-old niece. But hey, it’s a roof over my head, it’s not too far out and as long as I earn my keep in babysitting and can sing along to Peppa Pig, then all is good. For now.’

  ‘Lucky you,’ Nancy said enviously. ‘I’m in the throes of trying to find somewhere and it’s a complete disaster. If I decide to live centrally, then every penny I earn will go towards rent, and yet if I move out to somewhere that I can actually afford . . . ’

  ‘Then it’s the equivalent of living in Brentwood, facing a three-hour commute in and out of London, day in and day out,’ Alan finished the sentence for her, summing the whole sorry situation up.

  ‘Which, when you work late nights in the theatre, is far from ideal.’ She quickly bit the words back on her tongue, afraid that she might sound narky and a bit ungrateful, but then she was facing another two flat viewings later on that evening, with that awful woman Irene from the estate agency. One flat was in Celbridge and the other was in Maynooth. Both so far away from the theatre, Nancy thought, and both so extortionately expensive, she might as well have saved herself all the bother, stayed in London and just commuted back and forth every day on cheapie Ryanair flights.

  ‘Hey, it’s great to see you guys,’ said Clara Devine, bouncing over for a chat. She was a doe-eyed young ingénue, who looked about seventeen and had the most translucent skin you ever saw. Clara was playing Lydia Bennet, Nancy reminded herself, the wild child youngest sister, and this was her first professional job.

  Mind you, Nancy thought, the fact that Clara was straight out of drama school and stepping onto the stage of the National Theatre hardly seemed to faze the girl at all, she was so brimming over with confidence and giddy high spirits. At the callback audition stages, she’d breezed in as a complete unknown and blew everyone in the room away with her lively, spirited reading of the part.

  ‘Would you mind reading the part of Kitty Bennet for us as well?’ Nancy had asked her, just to be perfectly thorough and to keep an open mind, casting-wise.

  ‘Can’t, I’m afraid.’ Clara had shrugged, tossing her auburn curls over her shoulders. ‘I don’t know that part. I only bothered to read Lydia’s bits.’

  Ordinarily, that would immediately rule out an actor for a part; coming into any audition unprepared is such a no-no. But Diego Fernandez seemed to work to the beat of his own drum and the minute she’d left the room, he turned to Nancy and said triumphantly, ‘Ahí va nuestra Lydia Bennet. That is her, she is perfecto! Self-absorbed, as you say in Eeenglish. Only thinking of herself and no one else. That is my Lydia Bennet!’

  *

  ‘Did I interrupt you guys?’ Clara asked brightly. ‘You looked like you were talking about something waaay too serious for this ungodly hour of the morning.’

  ‘Only about how hard it is to rent anywhere affordable in this town, I’m afraid.’ Nancy smiled back. ‘All deeply boring.’

  ‘Oh, you should think about trying homesitter.com.’ Clara beamed. ‘Mummy and Daddy rent out their pied à terre on it all the time whenever they’re in Barbados. You can land the most fabulous places in brilliant locations for, like, half nothing. You should totally check it out! After all, what have you got to lose?’

  What indeed?

  Susan

  From the journal of Susan Hayes

  Oh my darling girl.

  It was your very first day in primary school, all those long years ago. Do you remember? My eldest girl Ella, my wild child, taking the huge leap to proper, big school.

  ‘Family photo!’ Frank had insisted, before we’d even left the house.

  ‘But Dad, Melissa is only a baby in her pram and she’s not even awake!’ you had protested, stomping your little five-year-old feet impatiently. ‘She’s not going to school today – I am. It’s MY day – like my birthday!’

  ‘Still and all,’ Frank had insisted, clustering us all together and waving his digital camera in the air, to squeeze all four of us in. ‘This is a huge day for the Hayes family and I want us all in the photo. Trust me, Ella, love. You’ll be glad when you’re twenty-one and you look back on this happy day.’

  When you’re twenty-one.

  Oh Christ, Ella . . .

  At the school gates, my heart had gone out to other parents trying their best to cope with frightened little kids. Some of them were in tears and clinging on tightly to grown-up hands, terrified to make this seismic leap into the big, scary world of teachers and schoolbags and so many intimidating new faces.

  Not you, though, my darling. You didn’t even need to hold my hand as we wove our way through the crowd of other parents and kids in their brand new little uniforms, saying their teary goodbyes. Instead you kissed me goodbye, then skipped, actually skipped, towards the school gates.

  ‘Hi,’ you said, bouncing over to another little girl, a pale, delicate-looking thing, who seemed to be on the verge of tears. ‘I’m Ella and I’ll be your friend if you like.’

  ‘This is Sophie,’ her worried mum had said, clinging to her little girl’s hand as the child seemed to be struck dumb with shyness.

  ‘Don’t be afraid,’ you said, taking Sophie by the hand. ‘Come into school with me – we can play together, if you like? Do you like Dora the Explorer? That’s my favourite and I bet they have Dora in here!’

  The smaller child’s pale face burst into a big smile as you led her up to the school door, confident as you like.

  ‘Goodbye, Ella, sweetheart,’ I called out to you, furiously snapping photos on my camera. ‘Be a good girl and have loads of fun!’

  ‘It’ll be brilliant, Mum!’ You grinned back, that adorable cheeky, gap-toothed little grin that I miss so much. Then you tossed your wild, unruly mane of strawberry blonde curls and laughed. ‘This is going to be so exciting, I can’t wait!’

  The two of you scooted inside, with you boisterously leading the way, as I watched you go, ready to burst with pride. You were so confident, so secure in yourself, such a happy, easy, outgoing child, and yet so considerate to everyone around you. A dream girl. My little angel.

  ‘Is that your daughter?’ the other mother said to me, wiping away a tiny tear.

  ‘That’s my girl, all right,’ I said proudly.

  ‘She’s a very special child. You’ve done a great job with her. Did you see how kind she was to my Sophie?’

  ‘That’s Ella for you.’ I smiled. ‘And don’t worry a bit about Sophie – Ella will look out for her. That’s a promise.’

  Oh Ella, Susan thought, reading b
ack over what she’d just written. How are we supposed to go on without you?

  Jayne

  19 PRIMROSE SQUARE

  In the end, Jayne heard them before she saw them. Jason and Irene were bickering on her doorstep in low voices, but still, loud enough for her to hear from down the narrow hallway as she fumbled about for the door keys.

  ‘Honestly, Jason, did you have to park that monstrosity right outside?’ Irene was saying. ‘It’s bad enough being driven around in it, but I don’t want anyone on Primrose Square seeing me getting out of the bloody thing. For God’s sake, we know people here.’

  ‘Excuse me,’ Jason retorted, ringing on the doorbell, ‘I’ll have you know “that monstrosity” is what’s keeping our kids in fancy schools and you in all your Botox jabs.’

  ‘Jason, please, will you shut up about Botox?’ Irene snapped back, just as Jayne threw open the hall door, wondering what it was about them, that they always seemed to bring out the worst in each other.

  At a glance she took the pair of them in: Jason sweaty and uncomfortable-looking in a suit and tie, and Irene as bony and pinched as ever. And there, right behind them, Jason’s ice cream van was parked on the square, attracting attention from a gang of kids who were kicking a soccer ball around.

  ‘Givvus a ninety-nine, will you, mister?’ one of them yelled at Jason.

  ‘Not now, I’m off duty,’ Jason shouted back.

  ‘Arsehole!’

  ‘Piss off with yourself, so!’ said Jason, waving two fingers back at him.

  ‘Now, now, there’s need for bad language, son,’ Jayne chided him gently, pecking them both on the cheek. ‘Come on in, won’t you? Dinner is almost ready. Irene, you’re looking lovely, as always.’

  ‘This is for you, Ma,’ said Jason, thrusting a warm bottle of white wine at her. ‘Have you any tins of cider in the fridge? I had a really crappy day and I could do a proper drink.’

  ‘You are categorically not drinking cider at the table, Jason,’ Irene said. ‘We have wine with dinner. How many times do you have to be told?’