The Model Wife

by Julia Llewellyn

  ‘Thanks,’ beamed Lolly, ‘you too. Nice to see you, Poppy.’

  ‘And you,’ Poppy said, realizing the game was up. She got out of the car, looked up at Brettenden’s Gothic facade, shiny in the rain. ‘Yuk. Return to Colditz.’

  ‘Didn’t you like BH?’ Lolly was astounded.

  ‘No, I hated it,’ Poppy said, as they hurried up the wet stone steps and pushed open the vast green doors that led into the entrance hall. It still smelt of polish and pubescent sweat and its walls were still covered with green boards where the achievements of OBHs, as they were known, were set out in gold leaf. Meena and Poppy always used to giggle about them. ‘Greatest number of doughnuts ever consumed without licking the lips: Meena Badghabi.’ ‘Largest number of excuses concocted to get out of netball: Poppy Price.’ Poppy turned her attention to Lolly, who, after exchanging animated boasts with Meena, was now tugging at her sleeve.

  ‘So, Meena’s an executive for the Holmes Place group. And what about you, Poppy?’

  ‘I’m married.’ A touch defensively, she added, ‘Happily married.’

  Lolly laughed. ‘No way! You are joking aren’t you?’

  ‘No,’ Poppy said as they walked in to the old assembly hall, full of screeching women. God, was that Amelia Crinch? She must have had a nose job. ‘I’ve got a baby.’

  ‘Really?’ said Lolly taking a glass of white wine from a trestle table and downing it in one. ‘How grown-up. I don’t think I could be coping with a baby just yet. Nappies, eeeuch! And sleepless nights. No thank you.’

  ‘It’s not that bad,’ Poppy said, a bit hurt she hadn’t congratulated her or asked to see photos. ‘What are you up to, Lolly?’

  ‘I’m an accountant.’ Lolly fiddled with one of her hair slides. ‘Got a traineeship when I graduated. It’s pretty amazing. I meet all sorts of interesting people and the money’s great too. I’ve just put a deposit down on a new-build flat in Paddington.’

  ‘I live near there! In Maida Vale.’

  She didn’t know why, really, because she’d never even liked Lolly who had the dubious distinction of being Brettenden House’s most boring girl despite stiff competition, but it was still a bit of a blow when instead of saying, ‘Oh how great, we must meet up some time’, she responded, ‘Oh. Right.’

  ‘Yes,’ Poppy said. She felt oddly humiliated. Her life was meant to be every woman’s Holy Grail: married to a handsome, successful older man, with a beautiful daughter, a lovely home in a desirable part of London and childcare to boot. Why did people with their nine to five office jobs look at her so condescendingly? ‘Must find the loo,’ she mumbled, ‘see if they’re still as stinky as they used to be.’ But as she turned on her heel, a voice cried.

  ‘Poppy? Is that Poppy Price?’

  A glamorous woman with short brown hair in a green minidress, long black boots and sporting what Poppy recognized as the latest Balenciaga bag came towards her. Poppy thought of pretending she had no idea who she was, but what would have been the point?

  ‘Migsy Remblethorpe!’ She’d been one of the coolest girls in the year, always surrounded by other cool girls who giggled at her catty put-downs and copied her outfits. Apart from asking Poppy to pass the salt a couple of times at dinner, they’d never exchanged a word. ‘How are you?’

  ‘Really well. Really well. It’s funny to be called Migsy, I’ve been Michelle for years now. So what are you up to?’

  ‘I’m a model,’ Poppy said. No way was she peddling the ‘mother’ line again.

  ‘Really? I thought they had to be, like, anorexic. How refreshing to see a real woman doing it.’

  Perhaps she shouldn’t have lied. ‘Well, I was a model, but I’ve got a small child now, so… How about you, Migsy?’

  Migsy smiled smugly. ‘I work for Wicked magazine. Do you know it? I’m the features editor. It’s so much fun. I get to travel all over the place and meet so many celebrities.’

  ‘Oh, yes. Like who?’

  ‘Well, tomorrow I’m going to interview Marco Jensen. You know? The gorgeous guy who reads the Seven Thirty News.’

  ‘He doesn’t read the Seven Thirty News! My husband does.’

  ‘Your husband?’ Migsy shouted, so loudly that the huddle next to them, including Fleur Mappleton-Wise, whose father apparently owned the whole of Northamptonshire, stopped talking and stared at them.

  ‘Yes.’ Poppy could almost feel her chest puffing up. ‘His name’s Luke Norton.’

  ‘Luke Norton?’ Migsy shrieked, so the sleek blonde heads turned again. ‘What? You mean the cad?’

  ‘I…’

  ‘You’re the Bimbo?’ From the expression on her face, you’d have thought Migsy had unearthed Lord Lucan disguised in a gymslip.

  ‘Well…’

  ‘God, Poppy, I love those columns. They’re hilarious. And they’re all about you. Oh my God.’ A slow smile crossed her face. ‘We should keep in touch. Are you on Facebook?’

  ‘Um. No. It’s not easy for me to do stuff on computers, my daughter keeps pulling the wires out.’

  ‘Not on Facebook?’ Migsy looked as if Poppy had admitted to a fondness for pulling down her knickers in public. ‘Right. Well. Do you have a card?’

  ‘I’m afraid not. Sorry.’

  Migsy fumbled hastily in her huge green tote bag and pulled out her phone. ‘Quick, what’s your number?’

  Poppy told her and Migsy jabbed it in.

  ‘Great,’ she said, kissing Poppy on both cheeks. ‘I’ll give you a call really soon. Let’s go for a drink. Catch up on old times.’

  ‘I’d like that,’ Poppy said, and wondered what her life had come to that she actually meant it.

  20

  Shortly before Poppy and Meena set out to dazzle Brettenden, Thea was standing knee-deep in water on the village green of Fordingley, somewhere on the border of Wales and Gloucestershire. She was wearing an unflattering cagoule and mascara was streaked down her face. One hand held an umbrella over her head, the other held a mobile phone.

  ‘Yeah, I’ve just sent you the package,’ she was saying smugly over the noise of the drumming water to Johnny, that day’s programme editor. ‘Village devastated by worst floods in thirty years; people canoeing down the High Street; mother with newborn baby homeless; everyone complaining that the government knew this would happen but did nothing to intervene.’

  ‘Excellent, Thea. And well done for getting it over to us so early. I’m well impressed.’ Thea beamed. Getting a package in a whole hour before the show kicked off was quite a feat, but then she was superbly efficient. ‘So is Marco ready to do his live?’ Johnny continued. ‘It’s scheduled for seven oh eight.’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘Is he there now? I’d like a quick word.’

  ‘Um. He’s not actually, he’s just popped into the pub to use the loo.’

  Actually, this wasn’t quite true. Marco was in his bedroom at the Pig and Whistle, the local pub where they were staying, probably reapplying his foundation. Thea was delighted to have a break from him. He had been a pain in the arse ever since nine that morning when he had climbed into the company Ford Galaxy, driven by George the cameraman, which was carrying the three of them to the worst-flooded village in Britain. From the minute Marco emerged from his Chiswick cottage, Thea knew the day was going to be a long one.

  ‘Christ,’ he groaned, getting into the front seat (as ‘the talent’ he automatically got to sit there). ‘I can’t believe Johnny’s assigned me this story. I’ve got a fucking awful hangover. I was out with Jonathan and Jane last night…’ He paused slightly. Like all namedroppers Marco never attached surnames to his famous friends because that would imply he didn’t know them quite as well as he claimed. But at the same time, he had to be totally sure everyone knew who he was talking about. It was a thorny dilemma.

  ‘Out with Jonathan and Jane,’ he continued when Thea and George refused to rise to the bait. ‘Bloody great laugh. Jonathan’s very naughty given he has to record his talk show today, b
ut he’s such a pro—’

  ‘Do you mean Jonathan O’Connor? Oh no, it’s Des O’Connor, isn’t it?’ Thea grinned at George’s sarcastic tone. There was no point trying to impress a cameraman, the breed were so jaded that if Kate Moss had climbed in the back naked and asked to be driven straight to the nearest five-star hotel and ravished, they would barely blink.

  196

  ‘Jonathan Ross, actually.’ Marco could resist no longer. ‘Great, great mate. Got to know him doing Sports Relief last year. Anyway, I’ve got this freakin’ hangover, plus it’s Stephanie’s birthday tonight and she’s bloody furious. I should be making reservations for the Ivy, not heading off to the wild west to talk to a bunch of sheep shaggers.’

  ‘You should have made a reservation for the Ivy months ago,’ said Thea. ‘If you haven’t done it by now, you’re better off leaving town.’

  ‘Daring, don’t you know who I am?’ Marco said it in a silly voice, so Thea would think he was joking. But she wasn’t fooled. ‘I am a celebrity, my sweetness. Able to get a table at the Ivy at the drop of a hat. I’ll have to take you there some time.’ There was silence. George drove steadily. Thea continued researching the story on her BlackBerry. Marco loathed the thought of nobody listening to him. ‘Why couldn’t someone else have covered this and I could have stayed in the nice, dry studio?’

  ‘Because it’s a really important story, Marco, and as one of our best reporters you were the natural choice to cover it,’ Thea said patiently above the whine of the windscreen wipers. George was a demon driver but in these conditions even he could only manage 4omph and she was terrified the competition would get there first.

  ‘Whatever.’ Marco shrugged. ‘It’s bandit country where we’re going. You know Fred West is from round there. Best thing that could happen to those yokels is to have them all swept away.’

  Determined not to rise to the bait, Thea was relieved to hear her phone ring. ‘Hello, Thea Mackharven. Oh, hello, Mrs Emory. Yes. A Seven Thirty News team is on its way to Fordingley now and as chairwoman of the village association we’d love to interview you… it’ll be Marco Jensen. Yes, I know!… Well, he can’t wait to meet you either… Did you like Emma’s necklace on yesterday’s show?… Of course, I’ll pass the compliment on.’ She hung up, happy, having persuaded Mrs Emory to find her a homeless mother of a newborn baby to speak exclusively to Marco.

  ‘I still can’t believe this is getting such attention,’ Marco whined on like a particularly persistent mosquito. ‘Do we have to stay the night?’

  ‘Yup. Until the rains abate Dean says he wants us there.’

  ‘Christ. It’ll probably be like Noah’s flood, forty days of it, to punish the peasants for sheep rustling and incest.’

  ‘So where are we staying, Thea?’ George interrupted. He was a man of few words but his question was vital. ‘Does it have a bar?’

  ‘I would imagine so. It’s rooms in the pub.’

  ‘Rooms in a pub!’ Marco exclaimed in horror as George cried, ‘Nice one.’ It was the same with all cameramen. No matter how important the story or exotic the location they were in their priority was always the bar. Nine Eleven: great, New York hotels have fantastic bars. Diana’s funeral: will we be able to slip away and get to the bar? Saddam Hussein’s execution: Iraq better than many Muslim countries for availability of alcohol. First daytrip to the moon, news teams invited. Fine, but will the bar be open?

  Of course once they’d arrived in Fordingley it had been an entirely different story. George had been efficiency itself, while Marco had charmed Mrs Emory with autographs and exclamations that she didn’t look a day over forty-five. He’d blown raspberries at the homeless mother’s baby. Thea watched in grudging admiration. Just like Luke, he’d got whatever it took to charm serpents down from trees. It was a source of much irritation among all producers that the ‘talent’, aka the presenters, got paid so much more than them. But wielding their charm, they could wheedle the devil into unlocking the gates of hell.

  Now Marco was shaking his head sympathetically as Mr Willis of the village council complained how they’d lobbied for years for effective flood barriers but nobody in power cared.

  ‘Though it’s a bit different this time what with the election coming up,’ he added. ‘I would have thought some of the bigwigs might have wanted to suck up to us, but it seems even the thought of winning our votes isn’t enough to swing it.’

  ‘Politicians. What do they know?’ Marco said, shaking his head.

  ‘I think he was confusing me with someone who actually gave a fuck,’ he sniggered an hour later as they sat on the lumpy double bed in Thea’s room at the Pig and Whistle. They’d spent the past two hours putting the package together, a process that involved editing the footage and Marco doing a voiceover. All that was needed now was the ‘live’, which would take place once the show was on air, when Luke – via satellite link – would ask Marco, standing in the wettest possible corner of the village, for an update on the situation.

  ‘All done,’ he said briskly, after viewing the package for the second time. ‘Nice work. I’m going to phone Stephanie and then I’ll have a quick kip. See you later.’

  ‘Be back at the village green at six fifteen,’ Thea warned him as he headed to the door.

  ‘Six fifteen? Don’t be silly, that’s miles too early. I’ll be there for six thirty.’

  ‘Six fifteen, Marco.’

  ‘To stand around in the rain for an hour? What for?’

  Thea smiled sweetly. ‘Marco, in these conditions all sorts of technical things could go wrong. Six fifteen.’

  ‘Whatever.’ He shut the door just a little too loudly behind him. Thea stared at it with dislike. When she’d left for the States, Marco had been an eager beaver, volunteering to work weekends, Christmas day, bank holidays and his mother’s funeral in order to get a leg-up the ladder. Now he did the occasional presenting he’d transmuted into a prima donna who’d give Mariah Carey a run for her money. Once again, Thea was struck by a wave of weariness. Not so long ago she’d adored this life: the never knowing where she might end up that night, the challenge of getting the right interviewees, even the arguments with the reporters. Yet increasingly, she was thinking she’d seen and done it all before. She was turning into George – minus the beer belly and the rather dubious Clark Gable ’tache. But where did you go from the best job in the world? Anything else would be a come down.

  Perhaps she should book a holiday. Have something to look forward to. Egypt could be good this time of year; she could do some diving. Only a year ago, she’d have called Rachel and asked if she fancied a break, but now of course that was impossible. Thea was going to be one of those women people pitied who ate dinner alone with a book and had to wear a wedding ring to fend off the attentions of amorous waiters wanting a British passport. Still, too bad. She’d always wanted to see the sphinx and pyramids. The thought of ancient Egypt took her mind back to the bimbo and bumping into her in the British Museum the other day. Thea often went there when she wanted a break from the office, but finding Poppy Norton there had seemed about as likely as stumbling across Paris Hilton at a brain surgeon’s convention.

  Thea wondered how on earth she filled her days. Dean had mentioned in passing that she’d hired his nanny, so she didn’t even have to look after her child any more. How could any woman stand not to have a career? It was a concept as far removed from Thea’s understanding as women who had little pictures of ponies painted on their nails or wore jeans endorsed by Victoria Beckham. Mind you, the bimbo probably did both of those things. How could she have wasted so much time on a man who liked that kind of thing? Thea berated herself, slamming shut her laptop. Thank God, she had finally seen the light.

  No point sitting brooding in this dingy room. She pulled on her rainwear and went down to the bar, where, sure enough, George was nursing a pint and chatting up the barmaid.

  ‘Sorry to break this up, but it’s time to get down to the village green and set up for the live.
’

  ‘Okey-dokey.’ George downed his pint in one. ‘Truth be told I was getting a bit paranoid in here, Thea. Everyone else is still working. It’s making me nervous, as if we’re missing something.’

  ‘We’re not missing anything, we’re just super-efficient,’ she replied. ‘But that’s why we want to set up now, in plenty of time.’

  It was just a five-minute wet walk from the hotel to the village green, hidden under three feet of water. All the other networks were already in place: the BBC, Sky, ITN, Channel 4. Thea waved at them, as she and George splashed towards the corner they had designated as theirs.

  ‘It’s twenty past six,’ George warned her once everything was in place. ‘Shouldn’t Marco be here by now?’

  ‘Yes, he bloody should,’ Thea said. ‘I told him six fifteen, but I’m sure he’s on his way. He’s just got a few sweet nothings to whisper down the phone to his girlfriend.’

  ‘Maybe you should raise him.’

  ‘I will, I’ll call him.’

  But Marco’s phone went straight to voicemail. Thea left a message telling him to hurry up, then continued checking everything was in place. Five minutes later, she called again. Five minutes later, a third time.

  ‘Fucking hell, he’s cutting it fine.’

  ‘He’s only a five-minute walk away,’ Thea said, determined not to reveal how much she was inwardly fuming. ‘If he doesn’t turn up by six forty-five I’ll just run to the pub and physically drag him here.’

  As she spoke, there was a shout from behind them. Thea whipped her head round and her jaw dropped like a cartoon character’s. Just a few yards behind them stood the prime minister wearing waders. A small team of minders stood round him as he held both Mr Willis’s hands in his and listened to his concerns.

  ‘Fuck! What the hell is he doing here?’

  ‘Making a frigging flying visit,’ George said, picking up his camera and starting to wade towards him. ‘Shit, look. Everyone’s descending on him.’