What She Wants

Sam sat in the back and made heroic efforts with her Clinique base. However, being mere base and not miraculous make-up straight from the Jim Henson creature shop, it couldn’t hide her blotchy, feverish skin, or make her look anything other than a sick, 39-year-old woman who hadn’t slept well. To compensate, she made her eyes up heavily, hoping they’d distract from the rest of her.

‘…so I says to him, don’t go busting me, mate. I’m just doing my job…’ said the taxi driver.

She got into work at ten past nine to find a chirpy Lydia behind her desk.

‘You look rough,’ Lydia said.

Sam glared at her and wondered where she’d gone wrong in the choice of this particular assistant. Normally, her assistants would never volunteer such personal opinions. She must be getting soft in her old age. The only consolation was that Lydia was proving to be very efficient, despite her breezy, carefree demeanour.

‘Thank you for that, Lydia,’ Sam replied, ‘and thank you for giving me your flu.’

‘You poor love,’ Lydia was sympathetic. ‘It was a bad dose. Do you want me to get you tea or some tablets?’

‘Tea would be nice,’ Sam said tiredly. ‘Any calls?’

‘Yeah, Steve Parris’s assistant’s assistant, wondering where you were because you’d missed the half eight meeting.’

‘Shit!’ Too late, Sam remembered the all-important breakfast meeting. She was forty minutes late, unforgivable. Well, unforgivable when the person you were meeting was Steve. Her mind sprinted through several plausible excuses but the only real one was a no-no. She’d already heard that Steve was phobic about illness. He’d have the entire office fumigated if he thought anyone in it was ill. Not for the rest of the staff’s benefit, mind: for his own.

Lying was the only option. She phoned his assistant and lied that she’d been sure the meeting was for half nine. ‘It’s my fault,’ she said apologetically, ‘my assistant was away and I mistakenly scribbled it in the wrong line of my appointments book.’ She dutifully wrote ‘Important meeting with S Parris – NNB’ on the half-nine line of her book just in case Steve appeared and asked for proof. She wouldn’t put it past him.

‘The meeting’s over and Steve isn’t happy,’ said his assistant in nervous tones.

Steve was never bloody happy, Sam groaned. He’d been born bad tempered. After knowing him for two weeks, she knew this to be true.

‘Oh gosh, I’m so sorry. What do you think I should do to make it up to him?’ she asked sweetly, knowing that if anybody knew how to handle Steve, it was the poor woman who had to put up with him all day.

‘Grovel,’ was her advice.

Grovelling didn’t work. Steve roared into her office just before lunch, evicting the two publicity people who’d been discussing a forthcoming album release with Sam. He hadn’t waited until they’d fled before he’d started shouting abuse at her. Sam sat calmly, then apologized for her mistake.

‘But,’ she said, naked steel in her voice, ‘coming into my office and screaming at me is not the answer. That isn’t the way I run my office and it’s not the way I expect to be treated, Steve. I am not some junior you can intimidate.’ Her tawny eyes were as hard as nails. She glared at him.

Faced with resistance, Steve backed down. ‘Yeah, I guess I get a little riled occasionally.’

Sam smiled glacially, wishing he’d lose the American accent. He was from Liverpool.

‘I’m glad we understand each other,’ she said, then, knowing that it was time for her to kowtow a bit, added with a large dollop of fake enthusiasm: ‘and I loved Density last night. They were incredible on stage, they just blew me away. They were one hell of a find.’

Steve smiled smugly. ‘It was a good gig, wasn’t it?’

‘We’re going to make a fortune with them,’ Sam added.

Steve practically swelled with pride.

He was so pathetically easy to manipulate. Was it because he wasn’t used to women standing up to him? Most of the female staff were so many levels below him that when he barked at them to make him a coffee, he almost expected them to hop. A woman who gave as good as she got unnerved him. Perhaps that was why Steve had been so keen to hire a man and not Sam. She sighed silently. This job would kill her if she had to go up against Steve Parris every day.

It was a frantic Friday. Sam managed to eat half a sandwich at her desk before she had to attend the weekly marketing meeting. Then, she had to work on paperwork, talk to someone in production about a glitch in an album cover and return all her phone calls and internal e-mails. Lydia went at six and so did most of the rest of the staff but Sam stayed at her desk until half seven, wearily returning e-mails. The pain of her sore throat and throbbing headache were almost eclipsed by her exhaustion. On her way out, she popped into the loo and grimaced at her reflection. She looked like death microwaved up, all pale and pasty.

The security guard nodded as Sam left. Outside, it was dark and raining, typical October weather in London. It was hard to remember that only a month ago there’d been a week of Indian summer sunshine. Feeling miserable, Sam trudged along to the Underground, stopping only to buy some milk and a couple of lemons for her lemon and honey tea.

She got a seat on the train and sank into it gratefully. Around her, people were visibly relaxed, happy that the week was over. A crowd of young women all dressed up to the nines stood like colourful birds of paradise just inside the train doors, too fired up to bother sitting down even though some were wearing ankle-breaking stilettos. Sam leaned back in her seat and watched them laughing and chatting. She remembered being like that once, young and thrilled to be going out. Full of joie de vivre and enthusiasm for life. Now, the only thing she felt full of was flu remedy. What was wrong with her? It wasn’t just being sick; it was something more. But what? At home, she boiled the kettle and made herself some lemon tea before heading to her bedroom to change clothes. On the off chance that Hope might have sent her an e-mail, she switched on the computer while she drank her tea. Hope had been in touch. Sam grinned. Why was it that she loved the words: ‘you’ve got mail’ when she was at home and hated them in the office? Probably because the home mails were nice, friendly ones and the office ones were generally staccato demands to get statistics, information and updates now!

Hi Sam,

You sound terrible, you poor thing. I bet you’re not looking after yourself at all. I know you: all work and no play. And never feel you can’t moan to me about work and stuff. That’s what sisters are for. Matt says thank you for your card. He had a dinner party that was more corporate hospitality than wild fortieth birthday party. But I do have one piece of news. Matt and I are thinking of moving to Ireland for a year. I know it sounds a bit sudden but we’ve been thinking about it for ages and now seems like a good time.

He thinks he can go on sabbatical and it’s not as if I’m exactly on the fast-track to promotion in Witherspoon’s. It’s still only a plan right now so I’ll tell you more when I know more. It’s a bit of a long story. See you soon, love, Hope.

Sam stared at the screen, stunned. Move to Ireland? Matt taking a sabbatical and Hope giving up her job? Weird wasn’t the word for it.

Hope always discussed things with Sam; it was so strange of her not to have even mentioned this startling new plan, unless…unless. Sam’s eyes narrowed. Bloody Matt. This was some damn fool plot of his, she’d swear to it. As ever, Hope was going along with it. Sam quickly checked out the train times to Bath on Saturday mornings, then phoned her sister. Flu or no flu, Hope needed sense talked into her and face to face was the only way to do it.

They stowed Sam’s small weekend bag in the boot of the Metro with the groceries, Hope marvelling that her sister could always look so immaculate and yet bring so little with her. To look half-way decent when she travelled, Hope needed a giant suitcase and would still forget something vital. Though very pale, Sam looked Vogue-fresh with just a small, squashy bag. Her flu had improved miraculously, probably due to the quantity of anti-flu capsules she’d been consuming.

‘Let’s go for a coffee in town before heading out,’ suggested Sam to her sister, pleased that, for once, Hope hadn’t brought the kids, which gave them the opportunity to have a private chat about the madcap idea of moving away for a year. In fact, Hope hadn’t told the children their beloved aunt was coming so she could have some time alone with her sister. If Millie had heard the news, she’d have thrown a complete tantrum wanting to go along too. Hope had also told Matt she preferred to pick up Sam alone: Matt wouldn’t have been able to resist arguing with Sam if she criticized his precious plan.

‘Is this quiet cup of coffee on our own so that you can give me the “are you insane?” lecture without Matt butting in?’ inquired Hope with a faint twitch to her mouth. She wasn’t stupid. Her sister wasn’t given to last-minute visits and you didn’t need to be a nuclear physicist to figure out why she was here now.

‘Yes Sherlock, that was precisely the plan,’ admitted Sam, grinning. ‘I’m shocked that you saw through me that quickly. I must be losing my touch. I can remember the far off days when we were small and I could make you do anything I wanted purely by using the correct tone of voice.’

‘I remember that too,’ Hope remarked, ‘and I have moved on a bit.’

‘Only a bit,’ Sam retorted. ‘Matt certainly manages to make you do exactly what he wants.’

Hope locked the car. ‘How about we have a cease-fire on the question of our trip, at least until we’ve got a cup of coffee in our hands.’

‘Done.’

It was only half ten in the morning: a crisp early October day with a watery sun low in the sky. They strolled past the Abbey, vast and majestic in the sunlight.

‘This is such a beautiful city,’ Sam sighed. ‘I never seem to get the chance to spend any time here, just wandering around like a proper tourist.’

Hordes of tourists meandered through the streets, some excitedly wielding high-tech cameras and taking endless photos, others looking weary, as if the tour bus had just dumped them there and they were feeling the strain of a whistle-stop tour of the hot spots of Britain.

Hope and Matt had done all the touristy things when they’d moved there first. They’d sipped the sulphuric water in the Pump Room. ‘Disgusting,’ gasped Hope, wishing she could spit it out. ‘A bit like tonic water,’ said Matt, reflectively. They’d toured the Roman baths and listened to stories about when the city was Aqua Sulis, the Roman stronghold with lots of gracious villas complete with proper underfloor heating. Matt’s favourite part of the tour had been the Roman sites, while Hope’s romantic soul loved the Georgian history of Bath. As a teenager, she’d secretly adored the Georgette Heyer romances where Bath often featured as the fashionable watering hole for wealthy aristocrats. She was fascinated by the Assembly rooms where both Jane Austen and Georgette Heyer’s heroines had swirled around in Empire line dresses; she loved the Museum of Costume and she liked nothing better than idling around the pretty, curving streets with their yellow sandstone colonnaded buildings, imagining ladies stepping from carriages and sedans into the houses.

The sisters walked past a trio of classical buskers playing something that Sam instantly identified as Mozart. Two years as product manager of a classical label had taught her a lot, and she no longer immediately thought of the Lone Ranger theme music when she heard the first strains of the ‘William Tell’ Overture.

‘It is lovely here, isn’t it?’ said Hope, who practically never came into Bath to do anything other than rush into work or rush into some shop or other. Simply coming in to wander around aimlessly was sheer heaven.

Sam insisted on going into Sally Lunn’s cake shop, a spot where Hope insisted that true Bathites would never set foot.

‘It’d be like you walking round London’s Piccadilly Circus with your mouth open in awe or having your picture taken right outside Buckingham Palace,’ she said as Sam dragged her into the cosy, tourist-filled spot where the scent of the unique Sally Lunn buns rose into the air. ‘My reputation for being cool and trendy will be ruined. Locals don’t “do” Bath!’

‘Don’t be a spoilsport,’ said Sam, suddenly aware that she’d eaten practically nothing for the past few days because of her flu. She could murder one of those Sally Lunns covered in salmon. ‘Next time you come to London, I promise I’ll get my picture taken with a Beefeater. Deal?’

‘And in Madame Tussaud’s and outside Harrods too?’