by Rosie Nixon
And then it was over: the auctioneer’s hammer fell and Vicky won the kiss, which would be delivered during a dinner date to be scheduled for the following week at a top New York venue.
“That was the most fun I’ve had in ages!” Vicky exclaimed, as people began turning back around and the auctioneer got the bidding going for the next lot—an all-expenses-paid weekend for two at the Monaco Grand Prix.
I found myself speechless, my mouth visibly hanging open.
“Oh, come on,” she said, nudging me, as if she was surprised by my reaction.
“You just—”
“Yes, I know what I just did,” she continued. “And I don’t regret it at all. Trey will barely notice the money gone from his account. Besides, it’s going to a fantastic cause—I’ve always wanted to do more for charity.” She winked at me. Nothing is going to rain on Vicky’s parade this evening.
“How come you didn’t bid on the lot that was to build an entire school in a remote part of Uganda then?” I asked.
Vicky paused, but was saved from replying when a girl from the auction house approached our table, brandishing an iPad to take down her credit-card details, presumably before this mysterious winner could do a runner. The girl was wearing an expression to suggest she’d seen it all before. I suppose in her world it was common practice to see a young woman spend forty thousand dollars on something so inane.
“I swear that Noah guy was making eyes at me all evening,” Vicky said, once the girl had gone. “Come on, Amber, just be happy for me. If anything, it will be a great night out—one to tell my grandkids about. You and Rob could come and join us after the dinner if you like?”
I admired Vicky’s confidence; she was already certain the dinner would be a success. Joining them would probably be Rob’s idea of a nightmare though.
“Yeah, maybe,” I said diplomatically.
“Hey, Amber!” We were interrupted by Liv, throwing her arms around my neck from behind and pulling my head into her chest for a hug. I felt the eyes of the room on us as she took her seat next to me.
“Man, that was fun!” she gushed. “We must have made close to a million dollars this evening. It’s unbelievable how much money is in this room—you can smell it. Did you see some crazy bitch shelled out forty thousand for a date with Noah West?”
“Yes,” Vicky piped up. “That crazy bitch happens to be me. Champagne?” She poured a glass for Liv.
Liv wasn’t one to be embarrassed easily. “Honey, you nearly killed me,” she giggled. “You do know he’s gay, don’t you?”
I could see Vicky struggling to keep her face in a neutral expression, and I wanted to laugh out loud—as surely she would, had the tables been turned. Instead, I let out a grunt. Forty grand, on a kiss with a guy who prefers to date men. This is the funniest thing I’ve heard in ages.
“Yeah . . . course I-I do,” Vicky eventually stuttered. “Just doing my bit for charity.” And she promptly excused herself for the loo.
“That’s some mate you’ve got there,” Mickey commented as we all watched her disappear.
“Yes, one of London’s greatest philanthropic exports, bless her,” I muttered, before swiftly moving the conversation on to the reason we were here in the first place—Maurice and the Met Gala.
Chapter Eighteen
The next morning, I arrived for my interview at the Angel Wear offices in midtown Manhattan fifteen minutes early. Tightly clutching my iPad, I hovered by the entrance wondering whether to go in or not. The bright spring sunshine was making my all-black ensemble feel even hotter. Suddenly, I really wanted this job. Meeting Liv was fun, but choosing clothes for a naturist? Surely, a dead-end job for a stylist. Rob and Vicky had successfully convinced me there could be nothing bigger on a New York stylist’s CV than being the lead stylist for the Angel Wear show. I had been too nervous to eat breakfast, so now my stomach was audibly gurgling. It was hard to believe I’d been considering not even going for an interview. After wasting a few minutes debating whether I had enough time to neck a double espresso from the nearby Starbucks to help focus my brain and quell my tummy rumbles—I didn’t dare risk it—I leaned against the wall and decided to call Rob. A good-luck snog would definitely help. He appeared in the street minutes later.
“Baby! You look stunning!”
I smiled; his compliments still made me feel like the only girl in the world.
“Ron’s in a great mood today,” he continued, “but he’s running a bit late for the interviews. Why don’t you wait inside?” He squinted in the sunshine. “It’s boiling out here.”
“Interviews plural?” I said, slightly surprised. I didn’t want to come across as presumptuous, but . . . “I thought I was the only person he was seeing today?”
“There’s someone else, too,” he revealed, looking shifty.
“Well, tell me who, won’t you?”
He pulled an expression that suggested I probably didn’t want to hear the answer. And he was right. “He’s seeing Mona for her official interview, too.”
“But—” He stopped me from blowing up by placing both hands on my shoulders.
“Look, he’s got to go through the motions, and it’s all good for filming. She won’t get the job.”
Filming?
“Rob. First Mona, and now you casually mention my interview is going to be filmed? You know how much I hate surprises—and surprises on film is probably my biggest nightmare. I would have spent longer on my makeup. Jesus, I was fifteen minutes early, I could have gone to Sephora for a free five-minute makeover—and now I barely have time to powder my forehead.”
He calmly cupped my head in his hands and smiled, as though I was amusing him. “Amber, you look absolutely gorgeous, believe me, and you’re an amazing stylist. You don’t need heavy makeup to prove anything. This will be a walk in the park, I promise.”
I looked at him with exasperation. “I wasn’t talking about heavy makeup, just some makeup. And Mona? Jesus, Rob.”
“I told you before, Mona’s not going to get the job—I’ve told them how impossible she was when we were filming last year. It’s purely a formality, to keep her quiet and make life easier for Ron.”
“Quiet?” It wasn’t a word generally used to describe Mona. “When’s her interview then?” I squirmed, feeling incredibly exposed standing right outside the entrance to the building. Mona was probably watching us right now, through Louis Vuitton binoculars.
“It’s after yours, so she won’t be here yet. Anyway, let’s head in.” He put his arm around me protectively and we entered the building.
Inside, a security guard gave Rob a familiar smile, and two women, who looked remarkably like Angel Wear models themselves, looked after reception behind a slick white-marble desk. The taller one, with a sharp, jet-black, elfin hairstyle and immaculately applied makeup, lowered her headset as we approached. I studied her face enviously.
“This is Amber Green, she’s here for an interview.” Rob spoke for me.
The woman looked me up and down.
Not, er, for modeling, obviously, I felt the need to add.
“Go through,” she ordered. “Rob will show you where.” I was slightly perturbed by the affectionate smile she gave him. Hey, giraffe features—that’s my boyfriend.
I noticed my palms were sweaty as I entered Ron Angel’s penthouse office. It was a large room with white furnishings, a gigantic zebra-patterned rug on the floor. Taking up almost the whole of one wall was a huge photograph of the five Icons dressed in sexy lingerie and linking arms on the catwalk; they looked even more intimidating in double height and with seriously big glamorous hair being blown off their faces by what must have been an industrial wind machine. On the opposite wall hung another large image, this time of Ron’s face, created from what appeared to be a collage of images of the models’ body parts barely covered in skimpy underwear. Inevitably, Ron was a man who appreciated a pert, tanned bottom. Ron’s desk stood in front of a big window, and there was a clear glass confer
ence table to one side, around which the camera crew were set up. A light was already trained on Ron, sitting at the head of the table and engrossed in his laptop. Another light was set up by an empty swivel chair to his right, presumably reserved for me.
Rob had to cough a few times to announce our arrival and, at last, Ron stood to greet me. He was a tall man with a puffed-out chest, long slim legs and a Brillo Pad of salt-and-pepper hair. He wore a black suit with a white T-shirt underneath; the suit looked expensive and I’d bet the T-shirt wasn’t from GAP. He was reasonably good-looking, in a classically American kind of way, and when he smiled his eyes closed to slits. He probably thinks he looks like Pierce Brosnan, but in actual fact he’s more Phillip Schofield crossed with Simon Cowell.
There were two other people sitting opposite the empty chair around the table. One was an effeminate-looking man introduced as Dimitri, the lead Angel Wear in-house designer, and another a face I recognized as Caroline Bourne, a leading celebrity makeup artist, who I had met during awards season in LA last year. Thankfully, we had parted on good terms. She smiled warmly in recognition. It was reassuring to see a friendly face as I took my seat with not enough caffeine inside me, in front of the boss of one of America’s biggest fashion retailers, about to be interrogated—on camera.
Rob whispered “good luck,” as he attached a small microphone to the inside of my blouse. I remembered the first time he had done this when I met him last year, how I had squirmed and prayed I didn’t smell of BO or that he hadn’t caught a glimpse of my graying M&S bra. How things had changed. Except for my menagerie of old M&S bras!
Rob then announced: “Three . . . two . . . one . . . Action!”
And Ron began speaking: “So, Amber, tell us—why is fashion such a powerful medium for you?” He took me aback with such a philosophical line of questioning. Why is fashion such a powerful medium? I hadn’t really thought of it like that before. I paused for a few seconds. I thought about Maurice and how his words in the coffee shop had resonated with me—how there could be no mistaking that fashion was in his blood. What was it he said again?
“I suppose I like telling stories with clothes,” I replied, eventually. “I guess I think of my life in outfits—I can remember what I was wearing when I had my first kiss, on my first date with my boyfriend,” (I avoided looking at Rob) “and on my first day in New York.” I stopped, wondering if this was the kind of answer he was looking for. His expression gave nothing away. “But most of all, I like the idea of turning someone into the woman they always dreamt they could be.” I had Jas very much in mind when I said that—my former boss at Smith’s boutique in London said such things all the time and I had learned so much from her. I spared a moment to imagine being back there, safely ensconced in the stock room, away from the rolling camera.
“Great. Good answer,” Ron said, leaning forward and rolling up his sleeves. He wasn’t as cold as I’d imagined. “So how will you apply this to Angel Wear?”
“Clothes define moments,” I replied, buoyed by his reaction, and Caroline’s encouraging nodding. “Though the audience may not remember every single item they see on the catwalk, I want them to leave the Angel Wear show remembering the feeling it gave them. I want to empower the audience—make them proud to be a woman.”
“There certainly won’t be many clothes to remember!” Dimitri interjected, smirking. “We’re talking about a lingerie show, after all.”
“Of course, and that’s even better,” I said, undeterred. “I want each woman there to feel proud to be female.”
The room tittered in response. I became aware that I was clasping my hands inordinately tightly, so I took a moment to relax a little, to unfurl my fingers and take a sip of water. I was shaking slightly as I lifted the glass to my lips.
“I always think, with styling, that less is more, anyway,” I quipped.
Another ripple of laughter. “You can say that again.”
“What I mean is that we don’t need to show the entire collection to make an impact. It’s about the theater of the moment and a few choice pieces on the Icons’ incredible bodies—the spectacle of the hair, makeup, visual effects and music will do the rest.”
“Great vision,” Ron said, without giving away whether he really meant it, or whether he was trying to bring the interview to a close. “Thanks for your time, Amber Green. We’ll be in touch. Great name by the way.”
Dimitri was disarmingly quiet as the interview finished and, although Caroline gave me a wink as I got up to leave, I wasn’t sure if she was just offering me moral support. I thought I’d given it my best, but had no idea which way this was going to go—Ron hadn’t even asked to look through my portfolio.
* * *
Rob led me out of the room and back toward the lifts.
“You were brilliant!” he gushed. “Seriously, that comment about wanting each woman to feel proud to be female—it was inspired! Honestly, no one could give better answers. I think Ron was impressed.”
“Really?” I quivered. “But what about that Dimitri guy? He was a cold fish—he barely said a word.”
“He’s always like that,” Rob assured me. “A tortured-designer type. Plus, I think he’s had so much work done to his face, he can’t actually show what he’s thinking anymore. Caroline would love to work with you again—I heard her telling everyone so as you left, and Ron listens to her.”
He saw me off by the lifts with a lingering kiss on the lips and a promise to come home early. I was rushing to leave the building, to get to Maurice’s house to discuss the Met, when I nearly bumped straight into Mona Armstrong in the foyer. She was camera ready, dressed up in her big round shades, skintight leather jeggings, billowing cream silk shirt, Christian Louboutin ankle boots, oversize tomato-red tote, and a bizarre matte-black whistle hanging on a chain around her neck. Probably Chanel, but kind of odd. The thought crossed my mind that it could be her latest way of keeping her current assistant in check—blow one for a macchiato, two for Nurofen. The poor person. Thank God, she’s not my problem anymore.
Before I could back off in the direction from which I came, Mona spotted me.
“Satisfied?” she spat.
I risked a glance over my shoulder, just to check she was in fact talking to me. Mistake. She was striding toward me now, looking menacing, desperate to engage with me.
“Hey, Amber? Haven’t you even got the decency to say anything to me?” she was shouting.
I had two options: keep walking backward and end up reversing into the lift, or answer back and try to make her stop. I thought about Rob’s comment the other night, about not being a pushover, and I took a deep breath.
“What do you mean?” I said, hedging, in case she didn’t know why I was here.
“Why would you make such an effort with your outfit? You never used to.” Cheap punch. “You fucking planned it all,” she barked. “You used me to climb your way to the top.”
A couple of people turned to see who the dressed-up woman was shouting at.
“I’m sorry, Mona, but I don’t know what you’re talking about. I was asked to come to an interview today—just as you were. Now, if you don’t mind, I’ve got somewhere to—”
“Was,” she seethed, sticking her arm out to stop me passing. “I was going to be interviewed today—and before you, you conniving little bitch—but you got in there first and told them not to bother seeing me.”
“Told them what?” I said, feeling my cheeks redden. We were causing a scene and I felt uncomfortable, but I couldn’t let Mona walk all over me. “I said no such thing!” I replied, raising my voice.
“Well, why has Ron just called to tell me not to bother coming up then?” she screamed.
“I have no idea!” I said, truthfully. “I certainly didn’t say anything to him.”
She stopped for a second and stared at me, as though she was trying to work out if I was telling the truth or not, her eyes like icy blades.
My mind was galloping. If Ron doesn’t want
to see Mona, could this mean I’ve got the job?
“Yeah, right!” she fumed.
“Maybe my rates were cheaper,” I replied, faint-heartedly, feeling immediately annoyed with myself for being apologetic. I really wasn’t in the mood for this today. A few more people had noticed the raised voices and stopped walking to wherever they were going to stand and gawp. I swear a few were sniggering behind their hands. I hated Mona for making us both look ridiculous.
“Yeah right, stupid cow,” she said. “And after I gave your big legs a hoik up the ladder. You were just a shop girl when I met you. You seem to have forgotten that fact.”
Big legs. I turned away, looking toward the water machine. I needed a minute to work out how to get out of this horrible situation. Just a shop girl. My cheeks were burning and the women on reception were anxiously looking around, trying to locate the security guard.
“I think you need to wash your mouth out, Mona,” I said, finding inspiration from the water cooler and turning back to face her, slightly thrilled to have thought of a half-decent comeback in time.
“Really? Well, you can pour yourself a great big glass of shut the fuck up, Amber,” she said; before muttering, “What kind of fool do they take me for?” as she called for the lift. Luckily for her, the doors opened before I had a chance to consider throwing a full glass of cold filter water over her silk shirt.
“Hey, ma’am—you haven’t been signed in!” shouted one of the women on reception, just as the security guard skidded onto the scene and asked me if everything was all right.
But the lift doors had shut and Mona was heading to the penthouse floor to give Ron a piece of her mind, too. Poor guy.
As I raced out of the building I felt a mixture of emotions—disbelief at how rude some people could be and exhilaration that perhaps Ron did want me for the job. One thing I knew for sure: I hope I never have to see that pathetic excuse for a woman again.
* * *
When I reached Maurice’s apartment to give him the news that we might not be able to style Liv after all, there was no reply on the intercom and, looking up at the windows, his floor was bathed in darkness. I loitered around outside for ten minutes, just in case he was taking a while to come to the door. It was odd, considering (a) he knew I was coming over and (b) he is a self-confessed recluse.
