by Lynda Renham
My hair looks lank and miserable, rather like me. I pop a Ferrero Rocher in my mouth.
‘We have loads over,’ Lucy repeats.
You won’t by the time I’m finished I think. Why is it hairdressers have such stark lighting. You’d think they’d soften it to make you feel a little bit better about yourself. Wesley picks at my hair with a gruesome look on his face. Jesus, he’ll be telling me I’ve got nits next.
‘Oh dear, we have let ourselves go haven’t we? Brittle, brittle.’
I bow my head in shame.
‘Lucy, wash this will you,’ he orders, making me sound like a poodle at a dog parlour. He pushes me towards the freckle-faced teenager with a tartan bow in her hair.
I drop my head back into the little curved basin and feel my neck crick.
‘How are you today?’ Lucy asks sweetly, lifting my head to put a towel under me.
‘Mmm fine,’ I reply.
‘Comfortable?’
‘Oh yes,’ I say, feeling my neck go into spasm.
She blasts me with scalding hot water and I fight the urge to cry out. Holy shit, what happened to the pampering? This is torture.
‘Is the water too hot for you,’ she asks kindly.
Has she got asbestos hands? Can’t she tell it is scalding me?
‘No, that’s perfect,’ I lie in a high-pitched voice. It’s probably giving me tiny blisters but God forbid I should admit to anything.
‘Did you have a nice Christmas? She asks.
Is she taking the piss or what?
‘Bloody awful actually,’ I say honestly, ‘but you really don’t want to hear about it.’
‘Oh dear,’ she responds with a falseness that makes me cringe and then proceeds to squirt shampoo into my eye. It would have to be the bad eye wouldn’t it? She could at least have aimed for the other one.
‘Oh well, at least you got a break from work.’
She continues massaging my head for all she’s worth. Yes indeed, I got a lovely long break thanks to my wanker boss.
‘Yes,’ I say with a sigh.
‘Going anywhere nice this year for your holiday?’ she persists.
‘Actually no, I’m not having a holiday this year …’
‘Oh that’s nice,’ she says. ‘At least you’ll save some money.’
Not if I’m not earning it I won’t. I move my head to allow some water to dribble out of my ear.
‘Is the water okay for you?’ she repeats, rinsing off the shampoo.
I’m adjusting.
‘Yes lovely, thank you.’
Why can we never speak up at hairdressers? We are paying after all.
‘Saving up for something nice instead are you? I’m saving for my wedding, so we’re not going away either.’
I feel a lump in my throat.
‘That’s nice,’ I say in the same monotone as her. I feel water run between my breasts.
‘What are you saving for? Oh don’t say your wedding as well,’ she laughs.
Okay I won’t then. She wraps a towel around my head and I feel an earring pinch my earlobe and I wonder why this is called luxury. Still, at least I’ll look good to see the solicitor this afternoon. I’m led back to my chair and I dab carefully at my watery eye. I glance towards the door and fight back a gasp as Brown Nipples walks in. Oh no, I’m sitting with a turban on my head, without a scrap of make-up on, and to top it all I’ve got lines. Any dignity I had left disintegrates into little pieces. I quickly hold the Hello! magazine up to my face and struggle to read it out of my one good eye. I’ll need an eye patch soon.
‘Amanda darling,’ cries Wesley. ‘Look at you, you’re looking amazing. You don’t have an appointment chérie? You certainly don’t need one.’
So that’s her name. I think I preferred it when she was anonymous. How dare she come to my hairdressers? That’s just plain off isn’t it? The bitch, I hope she bursts into tears and says how it’s all falling out and bald patches are sprouting everywhere.
‘I’ve come to buy some shampoo,’ she says in a sultry voice.
I hope it gives her a severe case of alopecia.
‘Binki, can I get you another coffee?’ asks Lucy.
A double whisky would be good but they don’t offer you that in the hairdressers do they?
I shake my head. Please go away. Besides, I still have one cold cup of coffee to get through. I pretend to be engrossed in an article on Victoria Beckham, guaranteeing myself a reputation as a true bimbo for life.
‘Well you so deserve it, chérie,’ Wesley says loudly.
And for a moment I’m not sure if he means my coffee, or her shampoo?
‘You’re too sweet,’ she says huskily.
‘How are things at Mansill Enterprises? Those men under you working hard are they?’ Wes laughs.
Oh, they’re under her all right at least one of them has been, the rotten bastard. She laughs huskily. I so want to scratch her eyes out.
‘Kelly, a bottle of Miss Rowland’s shampoo please.’
Oh my God, Rowland. Amanda Rowland. She’s Oliver’s boss. No wonder she looked familiar. I met her at last year’s Christmas party. Oh God, was she shagging him then too? What the hell is he thinking of shagging the bloody boss? Now I know he is crazy.
‘You’re a darling, Wes.’
Oh it’s Wes is it? I somehow feel her coffee never goes cold and the water is probably always warm. I hate the bitch more than ever. She didn’t deserve my boyfriend, that’s for sure. I should tell her so. I turn the page to an article and focus on George Clooney and plead for her to hurry up and leave. I hear the sloppy sound of kisses and then thankfully she has gone. I lower the Hello! magazine and beckon to Lucy for a fresh coffee. I’m not sure why I bothered though because as soon as it arrives Wesley pushes my head forward and starts snipping at the back. Not until blow drying do I make another attempt to reach for the coffee but I am yanked back from the cup with such force that I decide to give up and eat a chocolate finger instead.
‘Did you have a lovely Christmas darling, lots of sex and mince pies?’ he laughs.
Oh not again.
‘Crap Christmas, no sex, too many mince pies and a broken relationship. ‘
‘Oh God, I’m sorry love. Bloody Christmas, I always said it should be banned. Never mind, you’ve got good old reliable Wesley to make you shine again. You’ll have a new man in no time.’
Yes well, it’s not quite like buying a handbag is it? I wipe my tears and stuff another mince pie into my mouth, after all Lucy did say they had tons over didn’t she?
Twenty-five minutes later and I am a new woman. My long blonde hair is shiny again and looking thicker with lovely layers, courtesy of Wesley.
‘I’ve taken ten years off you my dear,’ he smiles.
I wouldn’t quite say that, unless he gave me a face lift when I wasn’t looking. He’s right though, I do look much better.
‘Bugger him,’ Wesley says, kissing me on the cheek. ‘The sod isn’t worth crying over. Bad hair styles yes; men never.’
‘Thanks Wes,’ I say.
Stick that in your 38D Brown Nipples. I leave the salon feeling ten times more confident than when I arrived. I also leave ten times poorer than when I arrived but hey, beauty doesn’t come cheap right? And I’m a woman of means now, a landowner. I can’t believe I tipped Lucy two quid though. I should have put it towards the skin graft I’ll need on my scalp.
Chapter Eight
I’m thirty minutes early. I don’t know whether to go in and hope Mr Hayden will see me, or drive around for another fifteen minutes. Parking in London is such an ordeal. If I park now it gives me one hour on the clock, and you can be sure that one minute before my time is up there will be a warden standing at the side of my little Kandy, dribbling with pleasure at the thought of slapping a ticket on the windscreen. The trouble is I can’t be sure of being seen early, which means I will certainly go over the hour. I could drive around and hope there will be another space but if there isn’t I’ll
most certainly be late. I chew my nails and decide to take my chances and grab a Starbucks to kill some time. Hopefully what I make on the house will more than pay for a parking ticket. I stroll into Starbucks and order a latte to take out. My stomach is fluttering with butterflies. I’m so excited and nervous all at the same time. I’m trying not to raise my hopes and tell myself that the property is probably only a tiny run down cottage and is only worth a few bob, but right now even a few bob would balance my bank account very nicely. Maybe I can do it up, not my bank account obviously but the house. After all, I’ve got plenty of time on my hands. That’s all I’ve got plenty of, mind you, as my credit card bill practically wiped me out. Christmas, why do we have it? I wonder if there is furniture in the cottage. I pull my phone from my bag and text Muffy and take a sip of latte as I turn the corner towards Hayden and Carruthers Solicitors of Repute, and bang. My latte and phone are knocked out of my hand, and my handbag slips from my shoulder as I collide with a hard firm body. I feel myself lurch backwards as I try to recover the handbag. The latte splashes over my hand, down my coat and onto my boots. Oh great. They’re only real suede and cost over a hundred quid. The contents of my handbag are strewn all over the street and I watch miserably as a black cab squashes my make-up bag.
‘Christ,’ I exclaim as the scalding liquid runs over my hand.
‘Nathan, I’ll call you back,’ says the firm hard body in a deep well-cultivated voice.
‘I’m sorry, are you okay?’ he asks, pushing his phone into his jacket pocket. His soft fragrance wafts over me.
Do I look okay? I’m covered in latte and half my life is strewn all over London. Bloody typical city ponces, prancing around and conducting their businesses on their mobile phones. God forbid us mere mortals should get in their way. They think they own half of London.
‘Perhaps if you hadn’t have been chatting to Nathan in the first place this wouldn’t have happened,’ I snap, rubbing at my coat with a tissue. ‘Don’t you have an office to go to?’
‘I think you walked into me. You’re making a terrible mess of your coat.’
I look down at the coat to see it is covered in bits of tissue. Bugger it. I look at my boots and sigh.
‘You’ve ruined my boots,’ I say, kneeling on the ground to retrieve the contents of my handbag. He scoops up my phone and a bottle of aspirin.
‘I think you’ve lost a few of these.’
‘Well that’s the suicide cancelled then isn’t it,’ I say sarcastically. ‘I was looking forward to that too.’
‘I’m sure things aren’t that bad.’
I lift my head to look at him. Mr firm hard body has a gorgeous face to go with it. His dark curly hair has been combed back expertly revealing a high forehead. His grey eyes are twinkling and his lips have a half-smile on them. I stare at his appealing cupid’s bow. His perfectly tailored suit has escaped my latte. Yes, that’s about right. He’s as cool as a cucumber in his dark blue shirt.
‘I’m very sorry about the boots. Let me pay for the dry cleaning of the coat at least,’ he says casually, pulling out a leather wallet from his pocket.
Oh that’s right, pay off the peasant.
‘Are you offering to pay for the skin graft on my fingers too?’ I ask.
‘You don’t even take part blame do you?’ he says smiling, handing me a fifty-pound note.
‘You walked into me,’ I insist, feeling rather glad I had my hair done.
‘You were on your phone too. This should cover it.’
I stare at the fifty-pound note. God, I feel sure my eyeballs are whizzing round like a one-arm bandit arcade machine. Fifty quid, I mean, every little bit helps doesn’t it? But I can’t take money from a stranger can I, especially in the middle of London? Good God, it looks almost sordid.
He looks at me curiously.
‘You don’t think it’s enough?’ he says questioningly.
‘No, I mean yes,’ God what do I mean? ‘It’s just I don’t often get offered money by men in the street.’
What do I mean often? I never get offered money by men in the street. What am I talking about? I never get offered money by men, period. What will he think of me?
He raises his eyebrows.
‘I assure you it’s only for dry cleaning,’ he says impassively.
Oh God, I didn’t mean. Is that what he thought? He is no doubt thinking the worst of me now.
‘Well obviously,’ I say blushing.
‘Would you be more comfortable sending me the dry cleaning bill,’ he says in matter-of-fact voice and offering his card. I wonder what he’ll be offering next. Binki, what is wrong with you? Men are off the menu remember. And this one would be a very expensive item and has probably been purchased cooked and consumed already. Ooh what a delicious thought. He smiles and his eyes crease into a sultry gaze. I take the card and glance nonchalantly at the name printed in gold lettering, ‘William Ellis, Investment Consultant.’ Well, I won’t need his services in the near future will I? The only thing I’ll be investing in is the Notting Hill job advertiser if this bloody inheritance turns out to be a park home.
‘Thanks but no thanks. I’m sure it will come out,’ I say, reluctantly handing back the card. I push my hands into my coat pockets so as to stop myself from snatching the fifty-pound note off him.
‘If you’re sure?’
I’m not in the least sure. He crouches down to pick up my scarf.
‘Sorry again,’ he says and before I know it he has turned the corner and the soft fragrance of him has gone. What an idiot. I should have at least taken the business card. No, I am resolved not to have a man in my life. I sigh and check my phone. Shit, I’m late. Typical that it should be a man who messes up my plans yet again.
*
I burst into the solicitor’s office and almost pass out from the heat. A girl with bleached hair and bright pink lips smiles at me. Her top is cut so low that I can see the swell of her breasts; it seems that I am destined to be reminded of Miss Brown Nipples everywhere I go. I pull off my coat and fan my face. It’s hotter than the Caribbean in here.
‘Cold out there isn’t it?’ she says.
‘Lovely and warm in here though,’ I say as I feel a bead of perspiration run from my forehead.
‘How can we help you?’
‘I’m Binki Grayson,’ I say, feeling the temptation to remove my jumper but not wanting to compete with her huge breasts. Why is it that everyone has bigger tits than me?
‘I have an appointment with Mr Hayden. My aunt has left me a property,’ I say excitedly. ‘I’m here to collect the keys.’
She chews her lip as she checks her computer screen.
‘You know,’ she drawls, ‘that appointment was for two.’
I follow her eyes to the clock and to the minute hand that shows I am ten minutes late.
‘I had a little accident on the way here,’ I say apologetically.
‘With some coffee?’ she says, wrinkling her nose.
God, does she have to rub it in?
‘Still, I’m only ten minutes late,’ I say cheerfully.
She studies her purple painted nails.
‘Mr Hayden has a tight schedule,’ she says, making him sound like the bloody prime minister.
‘Yes well, I’m not here to discuss world peace so I shouldn’t be with him too long,’ I say sweetly.
‘I’ll see if he is free,’ she says nonchalantly.
‘Oh why, did you have him tied up?’ I say with a chuckle.
She gives me a stony stare. Obviously no sense of humour with the solicitors of repute then.
‘Right,’ I say. ‘Thank you.’
‘First door on the right,’ she says while checking her nails.
I open the door and step into a smoke-filled room. The smell of pipe smoke sends me reeling.
‘Miss Binki Grayson, a pleasure,’ says a grey-haired man wreathed in smoke. ‘An unusual name,’ he adds questioningly.
‘Yes, I suppose it is,’ I say, not wishi
ng to explain that my mother, when she was expecting me, found the name in a novel. I should be grateful I suppose. I could have been Scarlet, or Vanity or God forbid, Constance. Still, it would have been nice to have been named after a classic rather than a Mills and Boon romance called Hot Surrender.
I shake his hand.
‘First of all, let me wish you a Happy New Year,’ he smiles. ‘I trust you had a good Christmas.’
I sigh.
‘An unusual one,’ I say, staring at his grey bushy eyebrows that have a yellowish tinge from the tobacco smoke. And there was me thinking it was illegal to smoke in a public place but I refrain from saying anything.
‘Lovely, now let’s have a look at what your aunt left you. A property in Hampstead Heath, a lovely part of London. Very much sought-after area and Driftwood is a nice little house I’m told.’
I’m beginning to feel like I’m in an estate agent’s office.
‘Although, I can’t tell you much about it I’m afraid. We don’t even have a photograph.’
He sucks on his pipe making it emanate a little squeak. I half expect him to swallow the damn thing as he is sucking it so hard.
‘Is there anyone living in it?’ I ask.
‘Maybe the odd bit of driftwood,’ he snorts.
I roll my eyes.
‘No, not unless it has a poltergeist,’ he laughs heartily, his laugh turning into a fit of coughing by virtue of the pipe smoke. I stare at him stony faced.
‘I always carry a crucifix,’ I say in a deadpan voice.
‘Erm yes,’ he mutters. ‘The thing is, we don’t even know if it is habitable. Best you take a look. Obviously we would be happy to handle the sale if you decide to move in that direction.’
I splutter on his pipe smoke and pull off my jumper. I’m thinking I should make a hasty exit before I end up stripping off completely.
‘Did you know my Aunty Vera?’ I ask.
