The Model Wife

by Julia Llewellyn

  31

  Two drunks trading insults beneath her window woke Poppy about seven. She groaned and tried to open her eyes, which the fairies appeared to have superglued shut in the night. She rolled out of bed and padded across the hall to Meena’s room. Meena was curled up under a blanket, mascara streaked down her face, hair a bird’s nest, snoring slightly. She didn’t look pretty but she had survived the night.

  Poppy showered, taking in the bathroom’s greying grout, the lukewarm, dribbly water, the damp patch creeping up the wall. Suddenly she felt desperate to be back with Clara in smart, clean Maida Vale. Home.

  She dressed hastily in last night’s clothes and, having scribbled a note for Meena, hurried as fast as her heels could carry her down the shabby stairs and out into Kilburn High Road, lined with pound shops selling cut-price shampoos and baby wipes, obscure fruits and vegetables and tight-fitting, synthetic clothes.

  As she headed towards the bus stop, guilt about her behaviour the previous night alternated with a fantasy about a possible different life that had opened up to her. What she’d done was wrong, but at the same time it had been so wonderful. Wonderful kisses with a wonderful man, a man who couldn’t remember the heyday of the Beatles, who wasn’t a few years away from collecting his Freedom Pass.

  Poppy stopped dead, turned round and walked a few steps back down the road to a newsagent’s she’d just passed. There, on the stand, nestled between Closer and Now was this week’s copy of Wicked. A huge picture of Jordan on the cover. MY BABY AGONY, the headline screamed. Then a smaller picture of two contestants from The X Factor – kelli and nargess: our feud – and then in the bottom left-hand corner a tiny head shot of Poppy, winking just as the photographer from Wicked had asked her to. ‘Introducing Our New Columnist: the Bimbo Bites Back.’

  Poppy stared mesmerized. She wasn’t sure about this. Had there been talk of calling her the Bimbo? But still… ‘our new columnist’. Hands shaking, she picked up a copy.

  ‘Oi!’ yelled the Indian man behind the counter, ‘no browsing.’

  ‘Sorry!’ She paid him one pound twenty, flashing the magazine in front of him, hoping he’d notice the resemblance between the glossy siren on the cover and the raddled hooker going home after a busy night’s trade who stood in front of him. Unsurprisingly, he didn’t. She thought about exclaiming: ‘That’s me! That’s me!’ but there were many mad people roaming Kilburn and she knew she’d be dismissed as one of them.

  On the top deck of the bus, Poppy read the column, then re-read it. She was rather shaken. All the comments she’d made to Migsy about people’s hideous outfits and appearances were there in black and white. Poppy hadn’t realized Migsy was going to print what she said, she thought it had just been giggly girls-only gossip. And those vile things she’d said about Hannah were now staring at her from the page. God only knew how she’d retaliate. Poppy shivered nervously, but at the same time couldn’t stop grinning at her photograph, at her words in print. All right, they were a little unkind but she was a published writer. She wondered what Luke would think. And Mum. And Meena. And Toby.

  ‘You look badly, Mummy. Do you catch sickness from yer mate?’ Brigita turned to Clara, who was sitting in her high chair, spooning Weetabix and banana all round her mouth. ‘Come on, Clara, eat your breakfast then we go to the museum.’

  ‘Ug,’ said Clara.

  ‘The museum?’

  ‘The Science Museum. It’s our favourite place, isn’t it Clara? I teach her all about the solar system: Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune, Pluto.’ She filled Clara’s beaker from the tap. ‘And how is Luke? I just hear on the news that Minnie Maltravers has adopted a little Guatemalan baby. Do you think he will meet her? She is my idol that woman. Bloody gorgeous, in’it?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ Poppy said. ‘I haven’t heard from him.’ And I hadn’t even noticed, she thought, surprised. Normally Luke’s silence when he was away drove her to distraction. She reached in her bag. ‘Have a look at this.’

  Silently, Brigita read the column. Then she looked up smiling at her boss.

  ‘Did you really write this? I don’t think you’re so cleverclogs. Look, Clara, look. And they take nice photo too! Is amazing what they can do with lights and on the computer.’

  ‘More banana.’

  ‘More banana, please,’ Brigita corrected, as Poppy said, ‘I think I’ll have a little lie down if that’s OK.’

  ‘Of course, Mummy. You definitely need to sleep. Look at those black circles under the eyes. I’m going to call my friends and tell them to buy Wicked. And I must send copy to my parents. They will be so chuffed. I am working for not one but two famous persons now. I feel honoured.’

  ‘Don’t be silly.’ Poppy laughed, secretly delighted that she was suddenly seen on a par with Luke. ‘I’ll see you later, Clara sweets.’

  ‘Ug.’

  She slept and woke an hour later. Turning her phone on, she found she had two messages. One was an over-excited rant from Meena, who’d seen the column.

  ‘I loved it, loved it, loved it. It’s hilarious, Poppy, much funnier than the normal celebrity bollocks you read. And thanks for getting me home last night. I owe you my life.’

  The next was from her mum.

  ‘Hello, Poppy. Seen the column.’ A pause. ‘It’s not quite what I had in mind for you when I sent you to Brettenden House, but it’s still a job of sorts, and some of it I actually found quite funny. Talk soon. Bye. Oh by the way, I’m off to Marseilles for my spa weekend. Fingers crossed. You never know, I could be returning with a new father for you.’

  Normally, Poppy would have been infuriated by such a message but now, her mind on Toby, Louise’s words drifted over her head. Poppy wondered why he hadn’t called. She remembered what she always told Meena in these situations – he was probably just playing it cool. Or he’d be at work. This concierge stuff was obviously very demanding with rich clients wanting you 24/7. Poppy dozed off again. When she woke up it was four o’clock and the phone was ringing with a voice message from her agent, Barbara.

  ‘Darling, brilliant column.’ A chuckle. ‘I didn’t know you had it in you, you always looked so sweet and innocent. Phone’s been going crazy all day with various offers. Call me.’

  She called. Barbara was on the other line, but this time Jenny on reception knew exactly who she was and organized a lunch date for the following week.

  Then Poppy called Migsy.

  ‘Wicked magazine, Michelle speaking!’

  ‘Migsy, I mean, Michelle, it’s Poppy.’

  There was just the tiniest of pauses, then Migsy exclaimed. ‘Poppy! We have been talking about nothing but you today and how great you are. The column’s been a huge hit. Readers have been emailing us all day saying how much they like it.’

  ‘You said you were going to let me see it before it went to print.’

  ‘Oh? Didn’t you get my email? I wondered why you didn’t get back to me.’

  ‘You didn’t send an email.’

  ‘I did! Oh don’t tell me it didn’t get through? We’ve been having a nightmare with our server recently. But there wasn’t a problem, was there?’

  ‘Well…’ Poppy was torn. She wanted to carry on doing the column, but she had to let Migsy know she knew she’d duped her. ‘I just didn’t realize all those nasty comments were going to be printed.’

  ‘What did you think was going to happen?’ Migsy sounded defensive.

  ‘I don’t know… I thought our conversation was private. I thought you were just going to… you know, list the people I’d seen.’

  Migsy tutted. ‘I have no idea what gave you that impression. Of course we’re interested in your opinions. You’re a fascinating woman.’

  ‘But I didn’t say all those things. I mean… you put words into my mouth.’

  ‘But you agreed with them!’

  Poppy was feeling too hungover to argue. ‘You won’t do that again, will you?’ she tried feebly.

  ‘O
f course not. God, I’m so sorry if there was a misunderstanding but like I say, it really is all’s well that ends well, because you’re a star now. And I tell you what, how about I negotiate a rise for you? Say five hundred pounds a column in future.’

  ‘Oh.’

  ‘Or six hundred.’ Migsy had mistaken her surprise for stalling.

  ‘All right,’ Poppy said.

  ‘Great. Now, I have to go, but I’m going to bike round a pile of invitations tomorrow morning for next week’s parties. I’ll call you on Thursday at eleven again for the lowdown. But honestly, Poppy, well done. You’ve done terrifically well.’

  Poppy stared at the handset. She didn’t know quite what to think. Six hundred pounds a week was very tempting, and the feedback she’d had so far had been so positive. So she’d come across as a bit bitchy, but she’d been mauled plenty in the papers before and survived, hadn’t she? Why shouldn’t someone else take a turn in the ring?

  She turned on the television and watched a bit of an afternoon film, then switched to Sky News. A reporter somewhere hot was standing in front of a beaten-up-looking shack.

  ‘So yes, Elsa, I can tell you it has now been confirmed that Minnie Maltravers has adopted a nine-month-old Guatemalan baby called Cristiano Morales. From what we’ve been able to discover, his mother died in childbirth and his father is unknown. His grandparents raised him for a while, but then, finding themselves unable to cope, had put him in an orphanage. Minnie Maltravers is believed to have left Guatemala. Sources report she has returned to Scotland, where she and her husband Max…’

  So that was what Luke was doing. She should try and remember to watch the Seven Thirty News, she supposed. Poppy was shaken by the indifference she suddenly felt towards her husband. For nearly three years thoughts of him and how to win him had consumed her, but now she felt a creeping anger at how he’d ignored her.

  She reached for the pile of invitations at the side of the bed and as she leafed through them, she picked up the phone.

  ‘Meena, it’s me. Take a couple of Berocca and some Red Bull because we’re going out again tonight.’

  32

  Even though Minnie had slipped away in the dead of night, the story of the adoption had gathered pace like a runaway sledge. The world’s media descended upon the tiny village in the middle of the jungle where Cristiano Morales had been born, with the result that on Monday Cristiano’s aunt was telling everyone who dangled a hundred-dollar bill under her nose how happy she was that her nephew would grow up in the bosom of one of the wealthiest women in the world. By Tuesday she’d changed her mind and was saying how tragic it was that Cristiano had been ‘stolen’ from his family by gringos.

  Meanwhile dozens of aggrieved women who had been refused permission to adopt a Guatemalan baby came forward to complain. Every psychologist in the land was under siege from journalists wanting opinions on Minnie’s character and whether such a hard-core hedonist could ever make a good mother. Everyone was discussing the rights and wrongs surrounding the issue. Everyone except the Seven Thirty News which had a different agenda.

  On Thursday evening, Thea was sitting in the gallery – the programme’s main operations room – watching the bank of screens in front of her. Bernie, the day’s usual programme editor, had impetigo so Dean had decided Thea should take over.

  ‘You’ve programme edited before, haven’t you?’

  ‘Of course,’ Thea lied, eager to impress him.

  It had been an adrenalin ride, but everything was going to plan. They’d just finished the first third of the show, covering the Russian presidency battle, the new targets for carbon emissions, the German serial killer jailed for life for the murder of fourteen prostitutes and now the adverts were running.

  Some of the screens showed Marco and Emma being touched-up by the make-up girls. One showed a still of a giant rubbish dump, the opening shot of Luke’s report from Guatemala, which was coming up next.

  ‘OK, Marco, Emma,’ said Jayne, the PA, whose job it was to time each second of the programme. ‘Going live in three, two, one, on air.’ Emma swivelled her chair towards the camera.

  ‘Good evening, and welcome back to the Seven Thirty News, and now over to Luke Norton in Guatemala City for the third in this week’s special reports on the lost children of Guatemala.’

  Hilary, the director, pressed the button and the gigantic rubbish tip filled the screen. The camera moved in to highlight two beautiful children dressed in rags sifting through the garbage. Luke’s voiceover kicked in:

  ‘On this rubbish dump, just outside Guatemala City, Pablo aged six and his sister Juanita, eight, are trying to make a living. They haven’t seen their parents for two years since the end of the bitter civil war that tore this country apart…’

  Thea sat back with a smile. Tick. Another report under way. Two more to go and they’d have fulfilled their side of the bargain and then Jake Kaplan had better deliver the goods. After Minnie’s disappearance, Thea had been more or less constantly on the phone to him. He’d reassured her that even though Minnie was no longer in Guatemala, she’d been seriously shaken by the vicious media coverage and was seriously considering giving an interview to defend herself. Meanwhile, the best thing the Seven Thirty News could do was keep its team in place.

  ‘Minnie’s people are delighted with your guys’ work,’ he’d told her that afternoon, ‘and they love the fact you’re the only network not questioning her decision, just showing what a wonderful job she’s doing helping these poor people.’ Thea smiled at the undercurrent of sarcasm. Jake continued, ‘They all met Luke while they were out there and they thought he was just charming and they’ve assured me that if she speaks to anyone it’ll be to him.’ A slight pause. ‘And Martin Bashir.’

  ‘Martin Bashir?’ Thea’s voice was so loud, the phone was redundant. She could easily have been heard on the moon, let alone Guatemala City.

  Jake sounded sheepish, ‘Yeah, Martin Bashir on ABC. Minnie likes him because he’s the guy who interviewed Princess Diana. But that’s an American network. You’re the front runners to get the only British interview.’

  ‘You never said anything about a British and an American interview.’

  ‘I didn’t know until about twenty minutes ago.’

  A vision of chopping off Jake’s head and dipping it in boiling oil floated through Thea’s mind. ‘You bloody owe it to me to let us have this first,’ she’d hissed.

  Minnie’s people had to be pleased with this report, anyway, she thought, concentrating again on the screen.

  Luke was on vintage form: succinct, moving, with just the slightest hint of anger about a world that only took an interest in the plight of the poorest when someone like Minnie became involved. As he listened to Maria, aged ten, who lived under a piece of tarpaulin and whose only pleasure in life was sniffing glue, Thea noticed a stillness in the room, her colleagues sobered by what they were seeing. Only one was immune to Luke’s spell.

  ‘Fucking hell,’ Dean barked from behind her, making her jump. Unlike Chris Stevens who always watched the programme in his office accompanied by a large Scotch, Dean had an unnerving habit of entering the gallery unannounced and making running, critical commentary. ‘I’m still worried about this, Thea. We’re the only people not debating the Minnie issue and doing worthy reports instead. If we don’t get the interview off the back of this we’re going to be a laughing stock.’

  ‘I know, Dean,’ Thea said, keeping her voice low so the others could concentrate. ‘But this is the game plan. We can’t abandon it now or we’ll have wasted everyone’s time.’

  ‘What’s your Guatemala Children contact saying?’

  Thea took a deep breath and told him about her and Jake’s last conversation. Unsurprisingly, Dean was unamused.

  ‘You’re telling me the silly cow’s going to talk to Bashir first?’

  ‘I don’t know. Hopefully not. It depends which country she’s in.’

  ‘She – mustn’t – talk – to – Bash
ir – first.’ Between each word Dean jabbed his finger in the air. ‘I want the world exclusive on this, Thea.’ Noisily, he left the narrow, dark room.

  ‘Well, I think it’s a brilliant report,’ Jayne said, never taking her eyes off her stopwatch. ‘We should be running this kind of thing regardless of what Minnie says or does.’

  ‘Thanks Jayne.’ Thea’s phone started ringing. She picked it up.

  ‘Hi.’

  ‘Thea!’ yelled Greg Andrews, the Westminster producer. ‘I’ve got a hot one for you. The Home Secretary’s going to resign in the next twenty minutes.’

  ‘Really?’ Thea sat up, heart thundering. In the past couple of days there’d been a handful of prison breakouts. Everyone had been demanding a resignation, but the government kept saying it wasn’t going to happen. ‘Are you sure it’s not just a rumour?’

  ‘Yes, but we’re getting confirmation anyway. Be back to you in five.’

  ‘Shit! Have you got a package prepared?’

  ‘Amazingly, we do.’

  ‘You darlings!’ In theory, the political team were meant to spend quiet afternoons preparing packages summing up the careers of senior politicians to have them ready to run in exactly these circumstances. In practice, they almost never bothered, preferring to use their rare spare time in Annie’s Bar or doing their expenses, but for once someone had been diligent. Thea thanked the God she didn’t believe in.

  Mouth dry, she called down to the newsroom and ordered a photo of the Home Secretary to display in the background when Marco announced the news. As she instructed Bill, the news editor, she checked the rivals’ websites. Nothing there, but that didn’t mean they weren’t on the case. In the studio, Marco was in the middle of a two-way with the arts correspondent about the shortlist for a literary prize. The plan was to finish with an item about a dog who’d fallen over a cliff and been found alive three months later. But Thea didn’t want that. Thea wanted a good old-fashioned scoop. She looked at the clock. Why hadn’t Greg called back? She dialled his mobile. Busy. Good.