Dog Handling

by Clare Naylor

  “You have zero messages.”

  Yes, of course you know. You always bloody well know. She made a contemptuous growling noise and went for her shower. At least her surfing had been good this morning. She was definitely improving. Certainly Justin seemed to think so. He’d led her out to the Bronte Express and let her surf in on her own. No matter that the waves were flatter than pancakes and that she spent more time under her surfboard than on top of it, she was getting better. And as she ran up the beach Baywatch style with her boogie board under her arm, her legs no longer wobbled in such an environmentally unfriendly way as they had a few weeks ago. Always a bonus.

  Liv had her Just Right out on the deck. She also covered her shoulders and put on a sun hat so she didn’t end up like Brigitte Bardot. Then she opened the letter from Alex. Except it wasn’t from Alex; it was from Amelia. On perfect silver-embossed letterhead at the top of the hand-rolled rose petal–encrusted notepaper.

  Dearest Liv,

  I just wanted you to know that after chatting to Alex at some length about your business plans I’d be delighted to accept the role of the face and body of Greta’s Grundies. I love your product and am very much looking forward to the launch. Can’t wait.

  With warmest wishes,

  Amelia Fraser

  Liv read the note several times before she fully understood what it said. She also had to check it against some of Alex’s writing to make sure it wasn’t a hoax. No wonder she’d been so shifty at the weekend, Liv thought. Feeling guilty and running me baths and making me stand on my head and telling me I looked dishabille. She’d invited Amelia into their business and not said a word to Liv.

  “I don’t want her onboard. The last thing in the world that I need right now is to spend my working day in the company of Perfect Amelia!” Liv yelled into Alex’s mobile. “We don’t need her.”

  “I have not invited Amelia Fraser to join our company, okay? Whatever she’s said is her own idea. I promise, sweetheart. But having her as our spokesmodel isn’t such a bad idea. Think about it. In fact, it could be the difference between a small-time company and an international player. Remember, Sophia Loren is her godmother.”

  Liv put the phone down and felt all meagre again. Why did she only have snotty nouveau riche godmothers who weren’t icons of the twentieth century? Anyway, Alex was probably taking the whole thing too seriously. International player. The face of Greta’s Grundies. Spokesmodel. For heaven’s sake it wasn’t as though it were the house of bloody Lancôme or Christian Dior, was it? But Alex was probably right. Amelia could secure them more column inches than Hugh Grant’s blow job. If only it wasn’t Amelia, Liv thought as she crossed off a few people from the party guest list. She didn’t want her work and her revenge life to be all mixed up like this. Still there was the party. Liv consoled herself by drawing up a list that didn’t include anyone who wore hipsters and was just beginning to draw up a for and against list for inviting her parents when the phone rang.

  “Hello.”

  “Liv?” asked the voice. Not Ben, surely.

  “Yes?” Liv sucked her pen hard and got a mouthful of Biro sludge.

  “It’s Tim.”

  “Tim who?” she asked absentmindedly, and then nearly swallowed the Biro whole.

  “Erm, Tim Evans.” Holy-stuff-and-ohmygod-and-how-hysterical-because-she-never-but-never-thought-that-the-day-would-come-when-she-not-only-wouldn’t-fall-off-her-chair-if-Tim-called-but-not-to-even-recognise-his-voice-and-well-ohmygod.

  “Tim. I’m sorry. Of course. Hi,” Liv said without the use of her tongue, which she was busy dabbing with a tissue to remove the Biro ink.

  “So how are you?” Tim attempted valiantly even though it was clear that she was doing very nicely without him, thanks, despite her present navy-blue-ink plight.

  “Yeah, fine, thanks.”

  It was weird hearing his voice after all this time. And it had been ages. No phone calls, no letters, no anything except the communiqué via Alex’s old hairdresser about the girl he’d been spotted with in Sainsbury’s. And he sounded odd. Slightly nasally and his voice in no way sounded sexy or heart-stopping or made her knickers melt. And he didn’t sound anywhere near as drippingly wonderful as Ben did. If she was allowed to think that and still keep up her vendetta against Ben. “And are you well, too?”

  “Yeah. I’m great. Thanks.” Scintillating. Why ever hadn’t they got married?

  “So?”

  “The thing is that, well, I’ve been wondering what to do with my airline tickets from the, erm . . . honeymoon for a while and I thought that I needed a break and the only place that’s really sunny this time of year is Australia, so I’m coming out there for a couple of weeks and wondered if maybe we shouldn’t get together. Have a beer or something. What do you think?”

  “Sorry?” Liv had been cutting split ends off her hair with a potato peeler.

  “We could catch up maybe. Now that we’re on the other side, as it were. Now that we’ve moved on.”

  “Sure. Call me when you arrive. That’d be nice.”

  “Okay then, well, erm . . . see you in a couple of weeks then. Bye.”

  Did time really heal all wounds? Or had she just become a weird emotionless freak?

  “I’m telling you I’m sure she’d didn’t suspect that you had sex with Ben.” Alex was actually on her hands and knees for a very different professional reason than the usual one. She was folding 500 G-strings and stuffing them into leopard print envelopes that no fashion editor or department store buyer could fail to miss when they landed on her desk.

  “But what if we’re working together and somehow she finds out? I mean she must have noticed that both Ben and I were missing from the party at Mardi Gras. And why the sudden interest in my business if not to spy on me?”

  “You’re just being paranoid. Anyway, so what if she does know? It’s over between you and Ben, isn’t it?”

  “Yeah, it’s well and truly done. I just think that we should be prepared. I get the feeling I shouldn’t mess with Amelia. Especially not as the future of our business and our ability to put our children through private schools depends solely on her support.” Liv lifted her leg in the air and inspected her toenails.

  “Well, I’m telling you she doesn’t know or she’d have taken action. She’s not a slouch. Which is how she’s managed to score this Vogue photographer to do our catalogue next week. So just give up the ghost. Has Will the Weasel called yet?”

  “Last night. He wanted to take me to dinner, but I told him he had to come to the pub tomorrow night instead. Are you quite sure all the guys will be there?”

  “Positive. I asked Rob and he said there’s some huge rugby game on.”

  “I hope Will doesn’t manhandle me. He has cellulite on his elbows, you know.” Liv closed her eyes in fear. But in the name of redressing the injustices done to women everywhere, well, herself and Laura Train Wreck anyway, Liv knew that it was her duty to well and truly shaft Ben Parker. And if Will got squashed underfoot on the way then that was something he should have thought about earlier, too. Was there a Nobel Prize for Justice Meted Out? she wondered.

  The photographer Amelia had persuaded to snap her for the Greta’s Grundies catalogue generally liked to mutilate his models in the name of starting new trends—shave off their eyebrows, dye their hair red, and paint them green, the usual stuff—but naturally he loved Amelia just as she was.

  “You’re such a beautiful woman without makeup that you’re practically a freak anyway,” he told her. Or so she’d related casually to Alex and Liv in this morning’s board meeting. Bored meeting more like, as all it seemed to consist of were how-much-my-hairdresser-loves-running-his-fingers-through-my-silky-tresses anecdotes and how many times she and Ben had had sex last night and how she was going to have to have the dining table French-polished again after a particularly ecstatic moment involving a jar of raspberry jam. Like I want to know, thanks. Liv tapped her pen loudly on the table and thought of England.
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br />   Not that either of the girls had much time to do any thinking at all recently. Whole days seemed to be eaten up with the organisation for the launch party and the need to get Greta’s Grundies up and running in time. Not only was Liv constantly deluged with calls from fashion editors asking if they could bring a friend and had she any more samples she could send them, but Liv also had to organise the whole Amelia shoot. Which, unfortunately, meant she had to spend more time than was desirable (i.e., a minute) with Amelia. And the more time Liv spent with her the more appalling she became and Liv really did begin to feel a bit sorry for Ben, given that he had elected to spend the rest of his life with this monster.

  “The photographer’s coming round at seven tomorrow morning, so if you could come and just kind of make tea for the crew and sort out invoices and stuff that’d be really helpful,” Amelia had said on Liv’s answerphone. Liv had stomped her feet a bit, then stopped because Alex was starting to look a bit hassled and Liv didn’t want to add to her burden and the whole “whoops, I’m having another man’s baby” dilemma she was facing.

  “What on earth am I going to say to Charlie?” asked Alex. It was the day of the shoot and she and Liv were standing behind the glare of tungsten lighting holding up reflective trampoline things to give Amelia even more luminosity and cheekbone than nature had blessed her with.

  “You’re sure that you’re going to stay with Rob? I mean it’s all going to work out?” Liv asked, not wanting Alex to end up homeless and Prada-less if Rob was just going to tell her to bugger off the minute it looked like it might be getting serious. And it was Liv’s home at stake, too. Where on earth would they live if Charlie chucked Alex out on her ear?

  “Rob and I are in this together. It’s fantastic. And you know I can always move in with Rob and I know Charlie likes you and wouldn’t mind letting you stay at the beach house. I mean he lets Laura stay. It’s no skin off his nose.” Alex tried to reassure Liv, “I mean it’s not like I’m going to be able to hide it for much longer, is it?”

  “True. Why not tell him tonight then?” Liv’s arm was beginning to ache; she waved it around a bit to whip up her circulation.

  “Oy, hold still. She’ll end up with dark lines and a moustache!” the photographer yelled.

  Liv was tempted to waft her arms around like Don Quixote but didn’t like the look of the photographer’s winkle pickers. Besides, she kept having to remind herself, this was not Amelia, Inc., that she was doing it for. It was Alex and Liv Get Rich. If the pictures were fantastic, then it was definitely better for business. If not for Liv’s ego.

  “Okay, now that the Polaroid’s done. Take off your top, Milly, and we’ll get Stella to dust a bit of blusher between your boobs. Gorgeous.” Everyone on the set turned and admired Amelia’s embonpoint chest. Liv put the kettle on.

  “Now for the real thing.” The photographer called everyone back to position and turned up the radio. So not only did Liv have nothing better to do than watch Amelia be desirable and desired, but she couldn’t even bitch about it because the radio was so loud that Alex couldn’t hear her.

  “It’s not much fun, you know, doing little comparisons in my head. Her tits. My tits. Her flat stomach. Mine. Not,” Liv said later as she and Alex picked up all the empty canisters of film from the floor of Amelia’s apartment. “Poor Ben, no wonder he never called me again, given what he was used to.”

  “Ssshhhh, she’s here,” Alex hissed, and plastered a grin to her face. “Hi, Millie.”

  “Don’t I look fuckable in that one?” Amelia handed over a picture of herself to Liv. “Now, I wanted to talk to you about the party next week. Do you and Alex have a budget in mind for the dress you want me to wear? Only I’ve seen this Dolce dress . . . it’ll be worth every penny.” So bang went Liv’s hopes of fiddling the books just enough to buy herself a dress from the market for the party, and bang went her hopes of outshining Amelia on the one night that really mattered to her. The night she intended to reduce Ben to rubble as the champagne flowed and the freshly picked magnolia blossoms scented the night air and the fairy lights sparkled from jacaranda trees.

  “And, you know, I can show you how to stop your hair frizzing up like that. I know you’re going to want to look your best for the party,” Amelia gushed before opening a bottle of beer with her back teeth and offering Liv a swig.

  When Amelia had been firmly deposited back in front of the camera the girls continued to get to grips with the nittier-grittier business of party planning.

  “Now how many waitresses do you think we need to cover the party? Fifteen enough?” Alex asked.

  The accountant in Liv’s soul leapt up in horror. “Fifteen. Don’t be ridiculous; that’d cost us half our yearly takings. You and I can take round a tray of canapés each. If Tim’s coming, then he can make himself useful, and I’m sure a few of the fashion editors won’t mind pouring out the odd glass of champagne for themselves. I can borrow the table Laura uses for wallpapering and set it up as a buffet,” Liv improvised hastily, seeing no reason why they should bankrupt themselves before they’d sold their first bra.

  “Style, Liv. Style. We can’t be serving up Scotch eggs and jam tarts. It’s not a picnic in Bournemouth; it’s the launch of one of the world’s most exclusive and desirable ranges of lingerie. That lot wouldn’t pour their own champagne if you threatened to strip them of their Prada discount cards. And anyway, I’m not carrying bloody canapés and risking my unborn child’s health. Do you think I’m some kind of barbarian?” Alex asked as she stole a drag of the photo assistant’s cigarette and then spent five minutes patting her stomach guiltily.

  “You’re preggars, are you?” a voice squealed behind them. “Bloody oath! Well done, darling.” Amelia leapt forward and hugged Alex in an unborn-baby-squashing way. “You’ve snagged one helluva bachelor there. Christ, you’ll be the envy of Sydney. Of course we’ve all been in love with him since we were fifteen, but to father your child . . . good going, Alex,” Amelia gushed forth with utter sincerity. Liv couldn’t say that she’d noticed Charlie being the object of desire of every woman in the Southern Hemisphere before now, but maybe he looked gorgeous in the rugby scrum or when he was muddy from polo or something.

  “Thanks, Amelia. Only you know I haven’t told him yet. You know, waiting till the moment’s right and all that. It’s a bit delicate.” Alex was obviously going to take the hush-hush approach to the whole thing and let them think that it was Charlie’s baby. Just sit on the time bomb until it blows up under your bum.

  “Of course I won’t breathe a word. Trust me.” Amelia put her finger to her lips and darted off to hear the photographer tell her one more time how photogenic she was.

  “Well, I guess I’ll just have to trust her, won’t I?” Alex said philosophically. “Must say, though, I never realised Charlie was considered such a sexpot. I mean he’s all right, but . . .”

  “Would it have made any difference?” Liv asked, thinking maybe it wasn’t too late for Alex to face practicalities and pass the baby off as Charlie’s. So what if it wasn’t tall and strapping and handsome and good with horses and women? He wasn’t likely to notice until the child was in its twenties, by which time he’d probably have traded Alex in for a younger version or a new polo pony. “It’s just that sometimes I wonder how you’ll get by without any money or luxuries or even a decent education. Rob can’t make any money doing what he does, and well, I know you and I have dreams of running a billion-dollar empire, but you can’t rely on that to keep your baby in Weetabix and Pampers, can you?”

  “We’ll make it work somehow, Liv. Now we ought to crack on—we’re supposed to be at the pub for your hot date with Fat Will in an hour.” Alex and Liv ran out the door before they could be roped into agreeing to pay for any more massages or collecting any more dry cleaning for their new spokesmodel.

  The girls wandered down Oxford Street to Fiveways to stretch their hunched shoulders and worked-to-the-bone limbs.

  “I’m turning into a cro
ne with all that bending and scraping to Amelia. Look, I’ve got a hunch, haven’t I?” Alex said as they sauntered along William Street without so much as a peek in Colette Dinnigan.

  “Did we just walk past Colette Dinnigan because you’re pregnant and can’t fit into her clothes anymore or because you can’t afford them?” Liv asked Alex in wonder. They had never ever walked past Colette Dinnigan’s shop before without entering the airy portals for just a few seconds to fantasise about scones with the vicar in a transparent navy blue polka-dot tea dress or a night of Elizabeth Taylor tantrums resplendent in a shimmering slip dress.

  “Neither. I just want to see Rob and show him the photos of the ultrasound,” Alex said as she also ignored the equally dream-inducing handbag shop on the corner.

  “So when exactly do you think you’ll tell Charlie?” Liv asked.

  “Charlie’s making his own getaway. I haven’t had sex with him for a week and yesterday I found a pink Versace miniskirt in his apartment. He tried to tell me it was his sister’s, but only weathergirls wear pink Versace miniskirts—and I think I know the one. Pretty redhead after the ABC regional news at six. I’ll talk to him tomorrow,” Alex promised as they rounded the corner and climbed the steps to the Royal. “We’ll end it in a mutually amicable way.”

  The tables were steadily filling with the Friday night after-work crowd gearing up for a big one and men getting in the pints before the rugby game.