One?

by Jennifer L. Cahill

  ‘Susan?’ The receptionist smiled at her.

  ‘Yes, sorry, it was Susan, I’m covering for somebody who is on maternity leave?’ Zara stuttered, she was not too sure about this temping thing at all.

  ‘Ah yes, follow me… I know exactly which department now, have you had much work experience in advertising?’ The receptionist trotted ahead of Zara, chatting away.

  ‘Marketing mainly, but I am also really interested in advertising.’ Zara blushed.

  ‘Great, that makes it easier! Here you go, here is your temporary desk, I will send Susan down to you.’

  Zara sat down at her desk, she had a Mac with a massive screen, pink plastic stacked paper trays, furry pens and all sorts of bits and pieces. She couldn’t believe her luck. Could this really be work? It seemed much more like fun.

  ‘Thanks for your help,’ Zara called after the receptionist.

  ‘No problem.’ And she was gone…

  Zara looked up from her desk for the first time, there was music on in the office and there were all sorts of young people buzzing around. It was a real hive of activity. As she looked further down the office, she could see a circular space in the middle with an oval white pvc table, surrounded by transparent inflated couches, and very strange tall thin coloured plants. She felt like this is what it would be like working on Mars!

  ‘Oh my god everyone in here is gorgeous, I’ll have to dress up a bit more tomorrow. The girls are so thin!’ Zara was suddenly very conscious of her small but curvy figure, and her D cups! ‘I hope I can cope with this, temping in London is likely to be pretty heavy going.’ Zara stared at the Mac in dismay, she had never used a Mac before and she hadn’t a clue how to even turn it on! ‘Oh god! This is going to be a disaster.’ She had a sinking feeling in her stomach at the thought of looking stupid trying to turn the Mac on.

  ‘Zara, hi, I’m Susan, thanks for coming in.’ Susan arrived down to Zara’s desk, she looked like a model, amazing clothes, tall, thin, gorgeous.

  ‘Oh that’s fine.’ Zara was a bit taken aback, Susan was towering over her at her desk. This happened often, as she was only 5ft 2, but it made her feel about five years old, every time, without fail.

  ‘Joanna left some instructions, we are going to have you just do the general admin on the accounts while she is out, we have an account manager covering the meetings etc., ok?’ Susan continued.

  ‘Oh yes, that’s fine…’ Zara was reassuring herself at the same time.

  ‘Have a quick look through the manual, I’ll head down to get us some coffees…and then I’ll introduce you to the rest of the team.’ Susan flounced off down to reception.

  ‘Thanks.’ Zara looked down at the “manual” it was a pink PVC folder with a big white exclamation mark on the front of it. Zara couldn’t believe that this was considered “work”, it was so much fun already. The pink folder helped to calm her nerves considerably.

  ‘Ok, good start, she seems nice and these instructions look really really good. I have a good feeling about this now. It’s nice to have my own desk and phone and all that. I wonder how long Joanna will be out, I’ll have to check with the agency later. I’m so glad I did this now, Rob was right, temping is fun.’ Zara started leafing through the manual.

  Susan came back in a few minutes with two freshly made cappuccinos in beautiful cappuccino cups, she had a plate of chocolate biscuits, and a few marshmallows, that was it… Zara was in heaven!

  ‘Here we are, let’s just pop over to the coffee area so that we can have a chat…’ Susan said.

  Zara followed her obediently, trying not to stare at all of the gorgeous people chatting to each other and blabbering into their phones. She wasn’t looking forward to sitting on the perspex sofa, she was sure her bum would look huge in it! Zara sat down on the edge of her seat, not wanting too much flesh to be magnified through the perspex in full view of all the people who sat behind the sofa. She suddenly realised how bright the office was, and that there were floor to ceiling windows looking out onto Dean Street.

  ‘So, Zara, what do you know about Glitter?’ Susan arched one eyebrow as she spoke.

  ‘Erm, well, the recruiter told me that it was a full service advertising agency, and that it was full of young people, and that you work on some amazing accounts…’ Zara trailed off, she hadn’t really been paying that much attention, she was just thinking of it as a stop-gap at the time… now she had a whole new perspective.

  ‘That’s right, and it’s very busy as I’m sure you can see, the creative floor is downstairs, I will take you down there after lunch, we are working on a huge pitch at the moment and the client is in. You will mainly be covering our account manager who is off on maternity leave at the moment, I think she has left you great instructions, so you should be alright with those. If you need anything just let me know… I sit three desks down from you. I will bring you around to meet everyone a bit later. Have you worked in Soho before?’ Susan took a sip of her cappuccino.

  ‘Erm, no, you see…’ Zara stopped herself before she told the whole story, no negativity! She wanted to start this on a positive note… ‘I have been based near Covent Garden mainly,’ Zara stammered, pleased that she had managed to keep it positive.

  ‘Great! Well if you enjoyed it around there I’m sure you will love it in Soho. We go out a lot after work, but then again, having our own bar is largely to blame for that! The people here are a friendly bunch and they are always keen to get to know new people!’ Susan beamed at Zara, she was really impressed about how calm Zara was, most people were so nervous even when they were temping there. Everyone was dying to work at Glitter and they were keen to make a good impression, and it was practically impossible to get an entry-level job there. It was well known that temping was one of the routes in. Susan had no idea that this hadn’t even occurred to Zara yet!

  ‘I was going to ask you about the bar actually, is that our bar?’ Zara was pleased that she had had the insight to use the word ‘our’ showing that she was a team player from day one.

  ‘Yeah, we all congregate there after work. It’s so handy! Then we usually head out later around the corner in Soho Square.’ Susan filled Zara in.

  The two of them drank their coffee and got through a biscuit each, then it was time to get back to work. Susan went off to her desk, and Zara went back to her new, temporary desk. She followed the instructions to log onto her computer. As soon as she touched the keyboard an explosion of glitter appeared on the screen as it booted up. The glitter fell to the bottom of the screen, to reveal a more normal looking desktop, much to Zara’s relief. For a second she thought she might have broken it! She logged into Entourage and got through the first few emails. She couldn’t believe her luck landing this job, Glitter was amazing, it was like working in MTV land. She couldn’t wait to get stuck into the work and get behind the scenes of some of the ad campaigns.

  She logged onto her webmail and emailed Rob…

  To: Bobbyfun@yahoo.com

  From: Zara.Stephens@yahoo.co.uk

  Sent: 10.13am

  Re: I’m back!

  Hi Rob,

  I miss you so much! How are you? Are you working yet? Or are you still enjoying your millions? You are not going to believe this but I have started temping already. I only registered with an agency last week. I thought nothing of it, and then next thing I know I’m working in Soho on Monday morning. I’m in this office, it’s so cool… there is a bar downstairs and everyone is gorgeous! It is called ‘Glitter’ do you know it? I can’t believe the money as well … I’m on way more money as a temp than I was on as a permanent employee, life is good…I love London!

  Zara xxxxxxxx

  Now that Zara had contacted Rob, she felt much better, what was work in London without him! The next thing the phone rang.

  ‘Hi Zara, this is Tim from facilities, can you drop down to the lower ground floor to collect your security pass please?’ Tim enquired.

  ‘Sure, I’ll be down in a minute.’ Zara made her way down
stairs in the lift. She had been in Glitter just over an hour, and already she felt right at home. By the time she got back to her desk, there was already an email from Rob…

  To: Zara.Stephens@yahoo.co.uk

  From: Bobbyfun@yahoo.com

  Sent: 10.17am

  Re: Re: I’m back!

  Hello Darling!

  I can’t believe you are working at Glitter! Talk about good luck, how on earth did you manage that?! My friend Bubbles, real name ‘Jonathan’ works there. I will send him an email and get him to keep an eye out for you… you can’t miss him, he is gorgeous! He is six foot two, white hair, looks Scandinavian! I know loads of people who are dying to work there. I am still making the most of the amazing weather… working on my tan here in the back garden, but I have my CV out and about there, so any day now…

  Going by you, I quite fancy doing a bit of temping,… do you think they would take me on at Saatchi!? ;)

  Anyway, no real news with me… when are we meeting up for drinkies!?

  Love Rob xxx

  PS How is the love life??

  Zara beamed at her computer as she read the email, she couldn’t believe her luck. This was so much better than Organicom, it was all coming together, it felt like it was meant to be… Zara couldn’t wait to tell Penelope all about it.

  ***

  At 6 pm, Zara shut down her computer and gathered her bits and pieces ready to leave, she turned around and was startled to see Susan towering over her again…

  ‘… and where do you think you are going?’ Susan said sternly…

  ‘Shit! Was there other stuff that I was meant to do?!’ Zara panicked; ‘Well, erm, I just thought that…’ Zara’s sentence trailed off…

  ‘You didn’t’ think you were going to escape did you?’ Susan grinned at her!

  ‘Erm, well… I…’ Zara began.

  ‘We have a rule here Zara, that on your first day, you have to be initiated into Glitter!’ Susan started leading her down towards the lift. Susan pressed the G button, and Zara was having palpitations, she had no idea what was going on!

  As the lift doors opened, she saw that a lot of the company were standing around the bar in the lobby, they all had one thing in common… a shot of Sambuca!

  Susan handed Zara a shot from a tray and took one herself…

  ‘Hi guys, this is Zara and she is going to be with us for the next few months, she is covering the fmcg account management admin, so drop by and say hello to her won’t you… cheers!’ And they all shot the Sambuca. Zara couldn’t believe this… what a warm welcome! It was only her first day, but she already loved Glitter!

  Zara wandered down to Tottenham Court Road Tube station, with a warm fuzzy glow, partly Sambuca induced and partly due to a great beginning at a fantastic new job. She hopped onto the Tube and was home in no time.

  As she walked into the kitchen she bumped into Penelope, and she filled her in on her day. She had the feeling that something had been bugging Penelope ever since she came back from Paris, but she didn’t know her well enough to ask her directly.

  ‘That is fantastic news Zara, and to think you were so distraught about losing your other job, if only you had known at the time that something much better would come along! You seem so much happier, did going home that weekend help?’ Penelope asked.

  ‘Yeah, in a way it did, it definitely helped, now that I have more of my clothes and shoes down here, it feels more like home. I brought loads of my photos too, so my room is less bare now!’ Zara considered this as she answered Penelope, the trip home definitely did help, and she loved having more of her things down in London.

  ‘Oh, that’s good, there is nothing like having all of your bits and pieces around you! Do they really have a bar in work?’ Penelope was astounded.

  ‘Yeah, it’s amazing, and they have proper coffee machines and baristas, it’s great, I love it already. I never knew there were jobs like that.’ Zara beamed.

  The girls headed upstairs to get an early night, there would be plenty of late nights ahead of them during the week, that’s the way it goes in London… it was so unpredictable. It was always sensible to have an early night on Monday, and Tuesday too… if you could get away with it.

  Chapter 21

  Flower Power

  ‘Morning Penelope’ there is a delivery for you.’ Penelope looked confused as the post room guy popped his head into her office.

  ‘Really? I’m not expecting anything, I wonder what it is?’ Penelope got up and followed him out the door, mentally filing through any recent online purchases that she might have forgotten about.

  ‘Oh my god! Roses! Who are they from?’ She was astounded when she spotted the big bouquet of roses.

  ‘Hi, it’s me, you are not going to believe this… but… Richard… has sent me a dozen red roses, a huge bouquet, they are gorgeous!’ Penelope gushed as soon as George picked up.

  ‘No way, he is unbelievable. Have you phoned him to thank him yet?’ George was very impressed.

  ‘Not yet, I just got them now.’ Penelope was pleasantly flustered by it all.

  ‘Well, go on… give him a ring then.’ George advised her warmly.

  ***

  ‘Richard, hi, it’s Penelope. Thank you for the flowers, they are beautiful,’ Penelope gushed.

  ‘Ah, you got them, I’m glad you like them, I was wondering if you are free this weekend if you would like to come out for dinner?’ Richard asked her.

  ‘Em, yes, well I am free as a matter of fact.’ Penelope smiled down the phone.

  ‘Great, how does Friday suit you?’ Richard continued.

  ‘Em, yes, that’s fine, yes Friday is fine…’ Penelope looked down at her diary.

  ‘I will let you know the arrangements once I have booked somewhere.’ Richard didn’t want to chat for long on the phone.

  ‘Ok, thanks Richard… and thanks again for the flowers, they are beautiful…’ Penelope replied.

  ‘Don’t mention it…’ Richard sounded courteous.

  As soon as Penelope had hung up, she dialled George’s number again.

  ‘What did he say??’ George was dying to know.

  ‘He asked me out for dinner on Friday.’ Penelope sounded in great form for the first time since Paris.

  ‘Nice, did you say yes?’ George pressed her.

  ‘Of course, well I couldn’t not say yes after the flowers…’ Penelope responded.

  ‘Good, well it can do no harm.’ George mused.

  ‘You are quite right, and I am actually really looking forward to it, I’m so impressed with the flowers.’ Penelope sounded sincere.

  ‘I hope she is right. The last thing I need to do is to go from the frying pan into the fire. I really care about Richard, and I’m surprised that I had never thought about him in that way before, he is quite good looking in a classic kind of way. I normally prefer dark guys, but it doesn’t look like I’ve had a great amount of success with my normal types. Better get back to work…’

  ‘Penelope, what is your take on the proposal?’ Simon popped his head around her door.

  ‘It looks secure enough to me, let me just do a few more calculations…’ Penelope glanced down at the document on her desk.

  ‘Fine, drop into my office when you have decided, thanks for your help.’ Simon was impressed with how little time it had taken her to work through it.

  ‘Anytime, I will be there shortly.’ Penelope aimed her red pen at the document.

  ***

  ‘Pen, you look lovely,’ Richard smirked at Penelope as he stood back to let her walk out in front of him.

  ‘Oh, erm, thanks, eh… where are we off to?’ Penelope was a bit taken aback as Richard ushered her out the front door, she constantly felt like he was driving.

  ‘Well, I thought we could stay localish for you, is that ok?’ Richard reassured her.

  ‘Yes, perfect, there are lots of nice places around here.’ Penelope sighed, relieved, staying local would make it easier to make a quick getaway if th
e night turned out anything like the first time.

  ‘Let’s get a drink first,’ Richard suggested.

  ‘Right.’ Penelope smiled at him. ‘Let’s go to SO.UK on the high street, it’s one of my favourites,’ she suggested.

  ‘Ok this is going ok so far, George was right, it’s good for me to be out with someone, it definitely provides a good distraction. He has improved his manners thank god! I hope he doesn’t try to get me drunk again. I couldn’t cope with that at all. I’ll take it easy on the wine tonight.’

  As soon as they were sitting down on the brown suede couches, and their drinks had arrived, Richard launched into a name-dropping frenzy. Penelope could barely get a word in.

  ‘I was out with Andrew Dawson the other night, do you remember him Pen? He was doing medicine… well he has gone into plastic surgery now, worth a bloody fortune, just got engaged too.’ Richard droned on and on about ex classmates, and ‘people to know’.

  ‘Erm no, I don’t remember him.’ Penelope gazed off into the distance as Richard droned on and on, she had no interest in these people.

  ‘You must, remember he used to be on the rowing team, constantly hammered, stripping off…’ Richard was on a roll, delighted to be so informed about everyone.

  ‘That kind of rings a bell.’ ‘Oh god… I hope he doesn’t start going on about all the guys from school and college… that’s so boring! I have no interest in how much money they are earning.’ Penelope had a pit of regret sitting in her stomach, this was not a good idea, she would do anything to be with Alyx… ‘Oh no, here come the tears again.’ The tears started welling up, but Penelope managed to distract herself to stop them just before they spilled out over her eyelids and onto her cheeks.

  ‘… seems to be getting married to Bettina, do you remember her, she was doing media studies… she has turned into something of a PR guru now, they are such a power couple…’ Richard smiled gleefully.

  ‘So, Richard, are you still in touch with any of the girls, Ruth, Nancy and all of that crowd?’ Penelope interjected.