How Not To Shop

by Carmen Reid

  'Yes. To put it mildly,' Annie managed.

  'Right, well let me tell you what I'm looking for and what I liked about your showreel.'

  So Tamsin began her pitch.

  She had been offered a half-hour show on Channel 4. Channel 4! Annie told herself. Bob had been right. It really was proper TV this time! Tamsin wanted a pithy, speedy, buzzy half-hour.

  'A woman's magazine show,' she explained, waving her hands animatedly, 'full of tips, but fun! Not that sort of po-faced, we can improve you kind of crap. This is cheeky, where to get the amazing Topshop bangle and party dress, which face creams are as good at a tenner as the ones at a hundred pounds, what to buy at—'

  'The Pound Stores,' Annie cut in, 'and what to steer well clear of.'

  'Exactly! Which supermarket shoes—'

  'Are decent and which ones are total mingers,' Annie broke in again. Because she understood, she understood totally.

  'Yes! There's nothing quite like that on TV right now. Yes, there will be a makeover element, you'll pick someone from the street, take them to a shop and help them create a great new outfit, but not for a date.' Tamsin pulled a face: 'How sexist and patronizing is that? If anyone needs to learn about what to wear on a date—'

  'It's the bloody man,' Annie finished her sentence.

  'Exactly.'

  'This sounds perfect!' Annie was smiling. 'So it's what to wear for your job interview, for meeting your mother-in-law . . .'

  'Yes!' Tamsin broke in, 'dressing to meet your cancer surgeon, what to wear . . .'

  'In labour?' Annie suggested.

  'Brilliant! When I had Myrtel, all I wore for six hours was big pants and a TENS machine, I looked like something from backstage at MTV.' Tamsin spun the small framed photo on her desk in Annie's direction. It was a recent snap, picturing Tamsin with three children as strikingly attractive as her. A teenage daughter with the same long hair, a boy of Owen's age and on her lap a golden-haired baby of about eight months old.

  'You've got a baby?' Annie asked in surprise.

  'Yeah. I got broody at forty-two . . . and lucky,' she added, 'it's great this time round. Mind you, I'm a third-time mum. I wouldn't be a new mum again for all the Baftas in Britain! Was that not worse than being a . . .'

  'Teenager?' Annie offered.

  'Exactly, thank God for getting older. How old are your children?'

  'Sixteen and eleven,' Annie told her.

  'Going to have another? It's OK, you can tell me,' Tamsin added, 'pregnant presenters do not fill me with the Fear, unlike some male producers I could mention. In fact Botoxed, permanently youthful presenters fill me with the Fear.'

  'I don't think so,' Annie said in answer to the baby question, but then felt compelled to confide, 'My partner's desperate, though. But I don't think I can go through it all again.'

  'Which bit? Pregnancy? Birth? Babyhood? Sleeplessness? It's all awful, but worth it.'

  Annie thought for a moment. It wasn't any of those things. It was . . . it was hard to understand what her reluctance was . . . even harder to express.

  'I've never felt so frightened,' Annie began, thoughtful now, 'as in the weeks after Lana and then Owen were born. They were so tiny, I was so responsible and it wasn't just that . . . going to the registry office and putting their births down on paper, in that official red book. I felt as if I'd set something in motion that I didn't even understand.' She swallowed, but Tamsin gave a tiny nod to indicate that she should carry on. 'Once their births were recorded, with the time and the dates and the details, all I could think about was how one day they'd be in the black book the registrar keeps on her desk too.' Annie's memories of going to register her husband's death briefly swam before her eyes.

  'You're so vulnerable when you've just had a baby,' Tamsin agreed, 'I did some crazy things that I wouldn't have dreamed of doing if I wasn't in the post-birth state. It's as if you've been peeled, you're exposed to the world in a way you weren't before.'

  'Yeah, but I felt just like that when my husband died . . . I spent two and a half grand on a black Valentino dress for the funeral,' Annie heard herself confessing. And there were only two other people in the world who knew about that. 'I still have no idea what I was thinking. I just had this idea that it had to cost more than my wedding dress and I had to look amazing, just for him.'

  'Oh, I'm so sorry, yes . . . I read that bit about you in Screentalk. Roddy Valentine.' Tamsin looked straight at her and Annie could see the startled sympathy in her eyes. 'How awful . . .' she added.

  'It's OK,' Annie said with a smile, 'life's moved on. We've all made peace with it.'

  'Obviously from a telly point of view, we insensitively love it,' Tamsin said softly, 'Annie Valentine, the Nigella of budgeting.'

  Annie smiled and thought of Ed.

  'I can't tell you how many stupid girls I meet every day who are desperate to be TV presenters,' Tamsin went on, 'but meeting someone who wants to really connect with people – connect with the people on the show and with the viewers – that is rare. And it's a find.'

  Annie's nervousness seemed to have been replaced with a dizzy, breathless giddiness.

  Channel 4? Nigella? Women's magazine show? Fun, funky? Tamsin was saying all the right things and seemed to have in mind exactly what Annie longed to do, just what she'd hoped the Finn show would be all about.

  'How did you and woohoo Finn get together?' Tamsin wanted to know.

  'Ah well, I did a personal shopping session with his wife at The Store,' Annie replied.

  'The haircut?' Tamsin broke in. 'Were you responsible for the haircut?'

  Annie flashed back to the day Kelly-Anne had come into her personal shopping suite with her long black, lacquered locks and Connor had appeared and interfered and got his blazer buttons all tangled up in the hair, and Svetlana had cut the locks right off. Kelly-Anne had just about died of shock.

  Annie looked at Tamsin's mane and wondered if being responsible for a long hair massacre was a good thing. 'Not exactly,' she fudged, 'but I thought it did look good.'

  'It's fantastic, I'd get one too but . . .' she flicked her long hair over her shoulder, 'maybe not just quite yet.'

  'Your hair's beautiful,' Annie complimented her, 'but I think I'm going to go short.' She tugged at her ponytail.

  'Great!' Tamsin enthused, 'but do it on the show, please. We'll start you off with the ponytail and then third episode in or so, we'll hand you over to Nicky Clarke or someone like that for the chop.'

  'Wow!' Annie could feel her cheeks glowing. Was she going to get this job? Was Tamsin really going to make her dreams come true?

  'OK, running away with myself here,' Tamsin said. 'We have to talk about money. Women must talk about money. Even though we're conditioned not to. Are you the biggest earner in your family?'

  Annie nodded. Well, it had been true in the past.

  'Yeah, me too. It's so common, but bloody men in this industry always assume you've got some wealthy husband propping everything up at home and your wages are a lovely "extra" for everybody. Anyway, it's going to be about eight thousand pounds an episode.'

  Before Annie could gasp with astonishment, Tamsin went on: 'We'll talk again in detail about the whole idea and make sure we're both really happy to go forward together. It will be a six-episode contract, then if it does well, we'll renegotiate and all make more money. If it really takes off, then you'll be loaded. For as long as it lasts . . .' came the warning. 'Who's your agent?'

  'Well . . . I think Ralph Frampton-Dwight, or maybe someone in his office is possibly going to handle the contract side of things for me . . .' Annie stumbled. This is what Connor had told her to say, but as she hadn't spoken to Ralph or any of his underlings, she was hesitant to nominate them.

  Tamsin pulled a face. 'Well, that's very generous of you. But he didn't set this deal up. Anyway, I think Ralph's a twit,' she said bluntly. 'If you're not signed up with him, will you please phone this woman?' she opened up the orange Filofax on her desk and extrac
ted a business card. 'I'm not saying this because I'll get you cheaper this way. In fact Jenny will probably cost me extra. But she's the business. Anyway, we girls have to stick together.' Tamsin shot her a wink.

  'Now, before I wind this up – ' she looked up at the clock on the wall behind Annie's head – 'because I have to get to a lunch on the other side of town for more willy-waving,' she confided, 'I'm sure a very stylish girl like you will want to know about the presenter's clothing allowance. Not that we're frivolous,' Tamsin winked, 'not that we let clothes rule our lives or anything. It's just an interest.'

  'Yeah,' Annie agreed, 'men have football and we have fashion.'

  Chapter Forty-one

  Fern goes to the doctor's:

  Camel skirt suit (Paul Costello)

  Patent bag (Annie's Chloé cast-off)

  Silk scarf (Accessorize)

  Comfy loafers (Ecco)

  'I'm fine! I'm fine!'

  'So you're going to be on Channel 4? Presenting your own show? And it starts filming in two months' time?' Dinah, sitting in the passenger's seat of the Jeep, asked her sister once again. She just wanted to be sure she'd got the details right.

  'I know,' Annie confirmed, more than a little amazed herself, 'it's going to be called How Not to Shop.'

  'I still can't believe it,' Dinah laughed.

  'Neither can I, but my . . . a-agent,' Annie stumbled over the word because it was just so new and so exotic.

  'Your agent?' Dinah had to chip in, 'get you!'

  'I know, my agent and Tamsin are talking. I've not signed yet because they're still agreeing details and . . .

  the fee. But we're due to sign later this week.'

  'Oh. My. God. You're going to be rich and famous!'

  'I think it's more like I'll be earning a good wage and people might start giving me those "do I know you?" looks on the street. Let's not get carried away.'

  'It's absolutely amazing . . . but I always knew something amazing was going to happen to you.'

  'Did you?' Annie asked, surprised.

  'Yeah,' Dinah assured her, 'you're just such a trier. What's that phrase? "God loves a trier".'

  'And you are going to have another baby,' Annie told her with complete confidence, 'didn't I tell you that long before Billie arrived, and I was right, wasn't I?'

  'I'm much older now,' Dinah pointed out.

  'Oh forget age. Age is just a number,' Annie said, trying to sound convincing.

  'Yeah right, I'll remind you of that on your birthday, Botox babe.'

  'Tamsin says I'm to stop fudging my age and injecting my face. She thinks it's sexist and she's very down on sexist behaviour, especially by women,' Annie said.

  'That's very interesting . . .' Dinah said thoughtfully, 'I still can't believe you froze your face.'

  'Yeah and no-one, not one person, noticed!'

  It was 9.45 a.m., the worst of the weekday rush hour traffic was over and they were heading out of London and into the Essex countryside to accompany their mother to an important doctor's appointment.

  Fern was only 64 but she was going to be assessed for early senile dementia. Annie and Dinah were chatting so lightly and jokily because they both felt filled with anxiety about what lay ahead this morning.

  Annie had already imagined their mother's file being stamped with the irreversible word 'dementia' from which there would only be decline. When the sisters had gone with Fern to visit her doctor the last time, he had offered hope that perhaps the medication for the high blood pressure was making her confused. But even when the dosage had been reduced, she was still saying and doing things that suggested all was not well. There had even been a phone call from a neighbour who had wanted to know if there was any reason why Fern should be gardening at 11.30 at night with an anglepoise lamp rigged up to an extension cable.

  Annie switched on the windscreen wipers to deal with the light drizzle on the glass. When the rubber blades smeared across her vision, she squirted a jet of cleaning fluid over the windscreen.

  'Oh good grief!' she turned to Dinah with a pained expression on her face as the vapours drifted into the car, 'what's wrong with that stuff? It stinks! Maybe I didn't dilute it properly.'

  'What?' Dinah wondered.

  'The window cleaning fluid. It's making the whole car stink,' Annie complained.

  'Well, open a window if you like, but I can hardly smell a thing,' Dinah told her.

  The test took some time.

  Fern sat nervously in her chair opposite Dr Bill, her small patent handbag in her lap. Annie and Dinah sat in the chairs pushed to the side of the room, looking on even more nervously than their mother.

  'Just relax everybody, it really isn't so serious.' The doctor attempted to jolly them along. 'We do this test several times because everyone can have an off day, so really, take a deep breath and let's try not to worry.'

  Annie looked at her mother, all neat as a pin today, her hair brushed and sprayed down into its bulky brownish-grey bob. A silk scarf was tied at her neck and she'd put on her most comfortable lace-ups. Fern had been a podiatrist before she retired, so she didn't hold with any kind of foot-deforming heel.

  Dr Bill began slowly, but soon the questions were rattling along and Fern was doing fine. She was cheered by how well it was going and how much she was remembering.

  'When did the Second World War end?' the doctor asked.

  '1945,' Fern answered quickly and confidently.

  'Who's the current prime minister?'

  'Gordon Brown.'

  After current affairs, came more personal questions: 'What's your full name? What are your children called?'

  It was all going so smoothly that Annie risked a glance at Dinah and a confident smile.

  'Nearly there,' the doctor said reassuringly. 'Now, can you tell me what day it is today?'

  'Erm . . .' All of a sudden, Fern looked totally unsure of herself, 'it's erm . . . oh for goodness sake . . .' she looked round at her daughters, but they weren't allowed to help, 'Tues . . . Friday . . . no, Wednesday,' she decided finally.

  It was Monday morning.

  'OK and finally,' the doctor began with a smile, 'what's my name?'

  Again Fern looked completely thrown.

  Annie and Dinah stared at her with surprise. How had she managed to forget the doctor's name? She loved him! Ever since they'd arrived at her house to take her to the surgery, she'd been talking about him, convinced that if anyone could help her, it was Dr Bill.

  Fern looked deeply uncomfortable. 'I can't believe I've forgotten this!' she exclaimed. 'Apart from anything else, it's so rude of me.'

  'OK, well not to worry,' Dr Bill said and made a few notes on the papers in front of him.

  In the conversation that followed, Dr Bill offered advice and what he hoped was reassurance. He spoke about the possible need for a home help and wondered how often Fern's daughters could phone and visit to check up on her. Then there was the matter of more appointments to track the 'progress' of the 'dementia'.

  Annie could feel nervous sweat pricking in her armpits. This was her mum. Fern wasn't even 65 yet. She was in good health, Annie had assumed she would have at least another twenty years ahead of her. The thought that she might spend those years in a confused and foggy place, unable to recognize the people around her, her family and friends, was just terrible. She could see the shock registering on her mother's face as well.