I wish one of us had kept it, though, just to remind Olly of how far he’s come.
But I can’t just stand around out here waxing lyrical about plate-glass windows – I need to go inside and have a proper look at the place.
I can hear all kinds of banging and drilling and wood-planing sounds coming out of the open door, so either Nora and Tash are even more competent at DIY than I thought, or it’s Bogdan, labouring away with whatever Moldovan colleague he’s called in to help for the day.
I’m wrong about this, though, because just as I’m about to head through the door, I see Bogdan coming out of the newsagent’s next door, a newspaper in one hand and a packet of Frazzles in the other.
He raises a dusty hand in greeting and heads over to me.
‘Libby,’ he says, portentously, ‘you are having something to be telling me?’
‘Yes. I suppose I am.’ I take a deep breath. ‘First things first, you need to tell me exactly what you think is going on.’
‘Who am I to be saying this, Libby?’ Bogdan tucks his newspaper under one arm, opens the Frazzles and, mournfully, offers me one. ‘Is not up to me to be commentating on such a surprising turn of the events.’
‘No, OK, I get that. Obviously you might be having difficulty … processing what you saw.’
‘Not half,’ says Bogdan, extracting a solitary Frazzle for himself, putting it into his mouth and chewing, ruminatively. ‘Is not a thing that I am expecting to be encountering.’
‘Oh, trust me, it wasn’t a thing that I was expecting to be encountering either.’ I take a deep breath. ‘Though … well, it has happened before.’
‘This is the common knowledge.’
‘But last time, it was …’ I stop. ‘Sorry?’
‘The common knowledge. Is this not a phrase? Is my English being incorrect?’
‘No, no … I mean, occasionally your English is a bit wonky, yes, but—’
‘And how,’ Bogdan asks, pointedly, ‘are you progressing with the speaking of the Moldovan?’
‘I just don’t understand,’ I continue, ‘why you said it was common knowledge. What you saw, I mean.’
‘Because we are all knowing about this.’ For a moment he stares deeply into his Frazzles packet, as if he secretly hopes the meaning of life, and not bacon-flavoured snacks, might be concealed in there. ‘Is not exactly the big state secret, Libby. Is not the sort of thing that is popping up on the WikiLeak.’
‘Well, OK, OK, maybe it’s not WikiLeaks worthy,’ I say, feeling slightly shirty all of a sudden. ‘But are you seriously telling me that my friends have all known about this … phenomenon? And not bothered to even ask me about it?’
‘Libby!’ Bogdan looks rather shocked. ‘Of course we are not asking you about this! This is being your own private business.’ He takes a second Frazzle from the packet, then lowers his voice and says, ‘But am pleased to be hearing that is phenomenal, Libby. To be honestly with you, am never thinking it could be anything else. Not when it is Dillon O’Hara that we are talking about.’
OK. We don’t seem to be on quite the same page here.
‘Is it Dillon O’Hara that we … well, that you, anyway … are talking about?’
Bogdan nods.
‘And why,’ I go on, ‘are we talking about him?’
‘Because of pictures in paper.’
‘What pictures? What paper?’
‘Daily Mail,’ he says, pulling his newspaper out from under his arm. ‘And I think also Mirror. Am not being sure about Sun. Am assuming not Telegraph. Or Guardian. And am thinking definitely not Independent. Or Financial Times. Though am happy to be going back into news agency and looking inside these papers, Libby. Man behind counter is not liking the people who are looking and not buying, but am thinking that if we are getting another packet of the Frazzles … perhaps two …’
I take the copy of the Daily Mail that he’s holding out to me, opened about halfway through, and look down to see …
Photographs of me and Dillon, outside Grove House yesterday.
Terrific photos of Dillon, to be accurate, looking even more buff and lean and chiselled than he did in real life. And atrocious photos of me, of course. Looking even more drab and scruffy and in need of a full hair-and body-makeover than I do in real life.
And I’ll be honest: I think Marilyn might have a point about the black trousers.
BAD BOY ACTOR LEAVES REHAB, screams the headline.
Troubled Irish star Dillon O’Hara was discharged from a west London rehabilitation centre yesterday afternoon, the story continues, after treatment for drink and drugs addiction. He was greeted by a woman in her 40s—
‘Forties?’ I yelp. ‘I’m not even thirty-bloody-one!’
… who, it was last night claimed by sources close to the actor, might have been his housekeeper.
Great. Just bloody great.
I mean, it’s not like I wanted the papers to print these wretched pictures of us in the first place, but if they were going to do it, couldn’t they at least have made me sound exotic and exciting? A mystery brunette … a former flame …?
Still, I suppose they’ve called it as they’ve seen it. And I do look bloody awful in those trousers, with that stained hoodie, and with my hair all sort of grungily pulled into a messy, grubby-looking bun.
‘Dillon is looking in the tiptop shape,’ Bogdan observes, coming round behind me to look at the newspaper, and crunch Frazzles, over my shoulder. ‘Am thinking that the prefab has been good for him.’
‘Rehab. But yes,’ I murmur, ‘he does look good.’
‘And you are looking …’ He pauses for a moment, perhaps trying to work out the kindest way of saying something. ‘Tired.’
Which is kind, I suppose.
‘And little bit flabby.’
Which isn’t quite so kind.
‘And in urgent need of doing something with the dull-as-dishcloth hair—’
‘The expression,’ I snap, ‘is dull as dishwater.’
‘Ah.’ Bogdan nods. ‘Am preferring this. Also is more accurate to describe particular problem with your hair. Cloth that is used for washing of the dishes might be bright and colourful shade of blue or green. Whereas water that has been used for washing of the dishes is dirty-looking, and sludgy-brown …’
‘Yes, all right, thank you. Point taken. Dillon looks like a Greek God and I look like a—’
‘Greek salad,’ Bogdan supplies, helpfully. ‘By which am meaning, a bit of a mess. And suffering the effects of too much of the cheese.’
I’m just about to come up with a withering reply when there’s a loud engine very nearby, and a motorbike pulls up to the pavement right beside us.
It’s a sleek, super-fast-looking black Yamaha, with one person driving it and a passenger, riding pillion.
The passenger gets off the back of the bike, pulls off his helmet, and grins at me.
It’s Olly.
Which means, I assume, that it’s Tash’s bike, and that she’s the person at the handlebars.
And I’m right about this, because a moment after Olly’s removed his helmet, the driver does the same, to reveal a bouncy, honey-blonde ponytail, and Tash’s pretty, smiling face.
She waves at me. ‘Libby! Hello!
‘Hello!’ I say, trying to sound as perky as she does. ‘I love your bike.’
‘Ancient and slow, compared to the one I hired,’ Olly says, in a teasing tone of voice.
‘Yeah?’ Tash raises her eyebrows at him as she swings long, leather-clad legs off the bike. ‘Well, at least it’s an ancient and slow bike that’s actually mine. Not some poncey rented thing I had to drop off at Superbikes as soon as I got to London.’
Olly laughs, good-naturedly, before breaking off from all the banter with Tash to come across the pavement and give me a hug. ‘Hi, Lib. You look … wow.’ He blinks. ‘You look … great.’
‘Thank you,’ I say pointedly, with a glare in Bogdan’s direction. ‘That’s nice to hear.’
And I’d like to keep it that way.
Anyway, Tash is striding over to join us, and leans down (she seems taller than I remember, but perhaps it’s just the sexy, Emma Peel-type boots she’s wearing with all her leather bike gear) to give me a kiss on either cheek. ‘Bogdan, good to see you this morning. And it’s so great to see you again, Libby! It’s been ages!’
‘Great to see you, too,’ I say. And then feel bad that I don’t mean it. Because she’s really, really nice, Tash: friendly, and warm, and good for a laugh.
Honestly, I don’t have a single bad thing to say about her.
Or to think about her! I mean, I just don’t. You’d have to be some kind of seriously sour-faced cow to find Tash anything other than delightful.
I like to think I’m not a sour-faced cow.
And, more importantly, I realize that if it is a tiny bit annoying that Tash is so eternally upbeat, and naturally pretty, with all the glowing good health that comes from her ever-so-slightly galling habit of running half-marathons and – when she’s not being all boyishly sexy on her motorbike – taking hearty cycling holidays across her native Northumberland … not to mention the fact that she’s got an even more impressively grown-up and serious job than Nora, administering specialist care to tiny pre-term newborns at a world-class neo-natal unit …
Well, if the combination of all these things is, just occasionally, a little bit irritating, I’m fully aware that most of the problem is my own. That I’m guilty of a touch of the green-eyed monster. It’s not Tash’s fault that she’s so sorted, and confident, and not remotely the sort of person who’d accidentally date a closeted gay man, get her head stuck in his puppy’s safety gate and have to be cut out with a hacksaw.
‘So, Nora said you’ve got a conference down here?’ I go on.
‘Yeah, but only tomorrow and Friday morning. The rest of the time I’m at Olly’s beck and call. Oh, that reminds me,’ she says, turning to Olly, ‘did you want me to call your mum and tell her to expect me and not Nora this morning? I don’t want to just turn up and interrupt your parents doing anything, you know, private, that they wouldn’t want an outsider to see.’
‘My parents are incapable of doing anything private,’ Olly says. ‘If you’re really unlucky, Dad will probably even show you the jar with his gallstones. Anyway, you’re not an outsider. And all Mum will need is five minutes’ notice to get the kettle on and whip up a batch of flapjacks to pop in the oven.’
‘Oooh, I love a good flapjack,’ says Tash.
‘Then you’re in luck. Mum’s are the best in the whole of Chiswick. Isn’t that right, Libby?’
It’s been a long time since I’ve had one of Olly’s mum’s flapjacks; in fact, it’s been a long time since I’ve gone and hung out there, full stop. I used to spend vast tracts of time at the Walker house at weekends, and during the holidays; even after Nora moved up to Scotland three years ago, in fact, I’d still pop round there with Olly pretty often for a cup of tea and something home-baked to eat. And to enjoy the experience of feeling like part of a proper family for a change. But this past year or so, everything has been so busy, and sort of … in flux, that months and months have, I realize, gone by without me managing to get over to Chiswick to see them at all.
‘I could go,’ I say, which isn’t an answer to Olly’s question. ‘Out to your parents’ house, I mean. Do whatever it is Nora was meant to be doing over there.’
‘Oh, I’m just picking up the cushion covers Olly’s mum has made for the booth seating areas,’ Tash says. ‘Nora’s stayed back at Olly’s. She’s got a bit of a stomach upset.’
‘Ha!’ says Olly. ‘Too much sampling of the menu when you were here last night, more like.’
So they were all here tasting the food last night, while I was in my flat alone? Or, OK, in my flat with Marilyn.
I know it’s pathetic; I know I sound like a whiny seven-year-old. But why wasn’t I invited?
I mean, I’ve told Olly how keen I am to help with anything at all regarding the restaurant this week, and I’m pretty sure he’d have known menu-sampling would have been a forte of mine.
I guess I should have called him at some point yesterday, really, to ask what I could do to help … but what with schlepping all over London with Cass’s belongings, and then, yes, getting a bit side-tracked by Dillon, I suppose I forgot.
‘Honestly,’ I say, to Olly, now, ‘let me go to your mum and dad’s and get the curtains—’
‘Cushion covers,’ says Tash, brightly.
‘Cushion covers,’ I repeat. ‘Of course. It’s silly for Tash to go all the way, when she … when you,’ I go on, turning to Tash, so I can address her directly, ‘could be taking advantage of a conference-free day to do anything else you might want to do while you’re down here – some shopping, sight-seeing, a matinee … I hear The Lion King always has seats available, and the puppetry is meant to be spectacular.’
Tash laughs, heartily. ‘Thanks, Libby, but no thanks! I took my goddaughters the last time I was down here and it took me six months to recover from all the Hakuna flipping Matata-ing! Anyway, it’s just the day for a nice ride over to west London. Not to mention I’ve been promised flapjack now. And trust me when I say you don’t mess with a northern lass and her flapjack.’
Olly laughs. ‘I don’t think any of us would dare, Tash.’
‘Too right.’ Tash grins at him, then at me, then at Bogdan.
‘Trust me,’ Bogdan says, in a rather scared tone of voice. ‘Am not planning on coming anywhere near your flapjack.’ Then he turns to me, and hisses, in an all-too-audible tone of voice: ‘What is this flapjack, Libby? Is slang word for lady parts?’
There’s a moment of silence.
‘Aaaaanyway,’ Tash says, ‘talking of shopping, I think you and I are meant to be finding the time this week for a quick bridesmaid’s dress sesh, aren’t we, Lib?’
I’m too taken aback at her confident use of the shortened ‘Lib’ to reply for a moment, but when I do, I say, ‘Yes, absolutely. When’s good for you?’
‘Well, I’m going to say Friday, seeing as I expect Olly will have all the staff in place that day getting everything ready for the opening party, and he won’t want too many cooks spoiling the broth?’ Tash glances over at Olly, who shoots her a casual thumbs-up. ‘Great! Does Friday work for you, too, Lib? My conference should finish before lunchtime.’
‘That’s fine. Terrific,’ I add, in an attempt to inject my reply with the same levels of enthusiasm as she greets everything she does.
Though I can’t help noticing she seems most enthusiastic of all when she’s talking to Olly.
Or, if we’re being honest here, flirting with Olly. Which I’m pretty sure is what she’s doing.
I’m just not absolutely certain, yet, whether Olly is definitely flirting back.
‘Perfect!’ Tash says, going one better than my ‘terrific’, and then starts to fold her perky blonde ponytail up into her helmet like some kind of glam, karate-kicking Charlie’s Angel. ‘So I’ll call your mum when I’m a few minutes away, OK?’ she tells Olly.
‘Great, thanks, Tash. And while you’re there, maybe ask Dad if he’s had the time to go up into the attic yet and get down any of those old picture frames he was telling me about. I’ll need something to frame those pictures you and Nora unearthed at Spitalfields Market yesterday.’
Bloody hell, they went art shopping, as well as did food tasting?
‘Sure. Will do!’ Tash is striding back to her bike and throwing a sexy leather-clad leg over the saddle. ‘Good to see you, Libby … Bogdan … See you at home later, Ol,’ she adds, before revving up the bike and roaring off towards the traffic lights.
‘Force of nature, that one,’ says Olly, cheerfully, before turning and heading for the restaurant doors.
‘Absolutely!’ I say.
‘She is definitely,’ Bogdan mutters, as he follows us, ‘force of something.’
I hate myself for the tiny little kick of pleasure I get from the fact that Bogdan, it appears, finds Tash almost as much of a trial as I do. But there’s not much time to delve any deeper into my pool of guilt, because I’m distracted, immediately, by the sight before me as we walk through the doors.
It’s a hell of a lot less like a building site than it was the last time I was here.
The floor, which was concrete only a few weeks ago, has been laid with huge, charcoal-coloured slate tiles; the ceiling, which didn’t really exist a few weeks ago, is now securely in place and has been hung with dramatic movie-set-style lights. There’s a discernible bar area towards the back, near the swing door that leads to the kitchen, which is currently being finished off by a (presumably) Moldovan carpenter, almost as huge and tragic-looking as Bogdan. There’s evidence of actual tables and chairs, neatly and carefully stacked away under huge dustsheets near one of the windows. And – most excitingly of all – there’s a completed reception area, with a wooden lectern and a small leather sofa, which Olly heads for right away and pulls the dustsheets off.
‘Well?’ he asks, after he’s given me a moment to take it all in. He looks nervous. ‘What do you think?’
‘Olly, it’s … I can’t believe it.’
‘I can’t believe it good?’ he asks, in the neurotic, self-critical tone of a man who’s been spending far too long with Bogdan, ‘or I can’t believe it bad?’
‘Good! Very, very good!’
‘You like the floors?’
‘I love the floors!’
‘The lighting?’
A Night In With Marilyn Monroe Page 13
