Once in a Lifetime

‘Yes, just leaving.’

‘Drive carefully.’

Charlie hung up and then deleted the missed call symbol on her phone. Her mother had phoned twice. Once at five minutes to three and again half an hour later. Staff on the floor at Kenny’s weren’t supposed to have their mobile phones on their person during working hours unless there was a specific reason for it. So Charlie, along with most people, left hers in her locker with her bag. Brendan, Mikey, and Mikey’s school all had the direct line into the Organic Belle department, and could reach her in any emergency. The only person, therefore, who left urgent messages on her mobile was her mother.

‘I’m at the doctor’s surgery, in the waiting room. I felt faint and I got a taxi to take me. There’s a long queue, mind you. But I’m sure Dr Flannery will see me quickly. He knows my heart’s not good, and that’s more serious than what’s wrong with most of the people here. Call me when you have time. I may need a lift home.’

Charlie felt the familiar tightening of her temples that foretold a massive tension headache and wondered if she had any ibuprofen in her handbag. Only her mother could leave such a message, dismissing everyone else’s ailments as nothing compared to hers, with the entire surgery waiting room listening.

The second message was more succinct:

Dr Flannery wants to do cholesterol tests on me. He’s worried. So am I. I knew this morning that something wasn’t right. I’ll be at home if you can spare the time to phone.

Charlie clicked off, then switched the phone off totally. Was that what Shotsy meant when she said ‘detach with love’? Charlie wasn’t sure. Between the news about DeVere’s and her mother’s double volley at both ends of the day, Charlie felt wrung out. She wanted to go home, eat dinner with her darling family and not talk to anyone else. What she didn’t want was to be at the beck and call of her mother. Was that too much to ask?

4 (#ulink_28086b55-4d10-5f9a-8c65-2819c0d78b87)

When you’re annoyed, don’t speak from that place inside yourself that nurtures all past hurts. That will just make it all worse.

Friday was Valentine’s Day. Passing a man carrying a big bouquet of red roses on her way to work, Ingrid thought of her daughter getting ready to go to Lizzie’s wedding. At the television studios, the security guard on reception was hauling a big bag of fan mail with red envelopes spilling out of the top, through the inner security doors to the offices.

‘Valentines for Ken Devlin?’ she asked.

‘Don’t know what they see in him,’ muttered the guard, panting. ‘He’s got a face like a robber’s dog. And he’s a midget, you know. Five foot two is all. A midget. Looks taller on television, of course.’

Ingrid nodded noncommittally, thinking of Marcella. One person’s midget might be another person’s love god.

It seemed there was no escaping St Valentine, even in the office. The Politics Tonight team was divided into two camps: those who thought Valentine’s Day was a ruthless marketing ploy by flower shops and card-makers, and those who saw it as an expression of pure romance to have love declared in public with the gift of flowers or chocolates.

Ingrid found that where people stood on the matter largely depended on their current experience with the opposite sex. Martin, one of the producers, was in the throes of a vicious divorce and was muttering grimly about having been nearly knocked off his racing bike on his way into work by a fleet of flower delivery vans.

‘Waste of time and money,’ he was heard to snap. ‘It’s not as if it even makes any difference. Buy her flowers, cut your wrists, whatever! Like the bitches actually care.’

Ingrid had enormous sympathy for Martin because reliable rumour had it that his wife had hired one of the country’s top divorce lawyers, a woman whose motto was ‘Take him for everything he’s got.’ It wasn’t a snappy motto, but it worked. Outraged ex-wives were queuing up to hire her.

Meanwhile, Jeri, the show’s production assistant, was deeply in love with a new man she’d met on a blind date–a teacher, who was ‘…kind, funny, has a dog and does triathlons!’ She was walking around in the glorious haze that only came from receiving a public display of affection that showed the people she worked with that she was Someone’s Special Person.

‘Twenty-four red roses,’ whispered Gloria, Ingrid’s personal assistant, ‘and a teddy bear holding a red satin heart that says I Heart U.’

‘Gorgeous,’ said Ingrid with pleasure. She hoped it would last. Jeri was a sweet girl and deserved someone nice.

‘Wait till you see your bouquet,’ Gloria added.

Ingrid was surprised. David didn’t normally go in for the whole red roses schtick.

‘Unless it’s your secret lover,’ Gloria went on, seeing the surprise on her boss’s face. ‘I just assumed they were from David–’

Ingrid burst out laughing. ‘Secret lover, indeed! Where would I find the time, Gloria? And can you imagine the fun the political parties would have if I did have a man hidden away somewhere? They’d never answer a question of mine again–they’d be too busy smirking at me on-air, ready to say “Don’t ask me anything, Ms Fitzgerald, until you tell viewers where you were last Saturday…”’

Gloria giggled.

Ingrid’s first thought on seeing the arrangement of creamy Vendella roses was that only a secret lover with exquisite taste and pots of money would send flowers so beautiful. Displayed in a cut-glass vase, with pale pink crepe tissue and a hand-tied satin bow around them, they were lovely.

She surprised herself at how touched she felt as she read the card: Happy Valentine’s Day, love David.

She hadn’t got him anything; they rarely exchanged cards or gifts today. David wasn’t prone to romantic gestures, and, anyway, romance shouldn’t be confined to one day in the calendar, Ingrid felt, a theme she’d elaborated upon many times. And yet here she was, feeling as moony as a teenager at the sight of her beautiful bouquet.

David was amazing. He could still surprise her after all these years.

She wished she could meet him for lunch to say thank you, but she was seeing her sisters today. They met up every month for lunch and she couldn’t let them down.

But she could make a special dinner tonight, perhaps ask Mrs Hendron, their housekeeper who came twice a week, to buy some fish so that Ingrid could make her special fish pie, which David adored but which she rarely made any more because it took so long and was so fiddly. She phoned David’s direct line in Kenny’s and Stacey, her husband’s assistant, answered.

‘Hello, Stacey,’ Ingrid said, surprised. David’s personal line was sacrosanct. It was unusual for anyone else to answer

‘Hello, Ingrid,’ Stacey trilled. ‘Mr Kenny’s at a meeting. He won’t be long now, I’ll tell him you rang as soon as he gets back.’

‘Oh, not to worry,’ Ingrid replied. ‘I just wanted to thank him for the flowers.’

She felt that shivery thrill again, and it was a lovely feeling. The man in her life had sent her flowers. Was she finally turning into a girlie-girl in middle age?

‘Did you like them?’ Stacey asked eagerly. ‘They’re part of the new range in the last-minute gift department, came in last week and I hear they’re flying off the shelves today. It was all Claudia’s idea. That girl is a marvel. She’s only been with us a few months and she’s smashing, worth her weight in gold. She insisted all the men send the flowers to their wives,’ Stacey went on guilelessly.

Ingrid recovered in an instant. ‘Yes, they’re lovely,’ she said automatically. ‘What a marvellous idea of Claudia’s.’

‘She’s so young and so sparky, and she never stops,’ Stacey went on. ‘Here till all hours at night, working on new stuff. I don’t know what Mr Kenny would do without her.’

‘No, me neither,’ Ingrid replied.

She found it hard to concentrate on work that morning. At the pre-production meeting for the next night’s show, a special weekend broadcast because of the by-election, all the talk was about what the wrong result would mean for the government. Old surveys and political swing sheets were reprinted, and comparisons were made with the last time the government had lost a by-election. Ingrid found her mind drifting aimlessly, running back over David’s strange mood and the flowers sent, ostensibly, by Claudia. Something felt not quite right, but she couldn’t put her finger on it.

David loved her, she knew that, but he was anxious about something and not sharing it. He wasn’t the sort of person to cheat on her with someone else. She’d bet her life on that. But there was something.

It was tied up with the store and he was keeping it to himself. She knew business had been tough over the past year. She was a director of the company, albeit not an active one, so she’d seen the profit and loss accounts. But if there had been a serious problem, David would have called a directors’ meeting and she’d have been invited, along with Tim, the company’s chief financial officer, and Lena, marketing director. And he hadn’t.

‘Men!’ she muttered.

‘Ingrid?’

Everyone around the coffee-ringed meeting table was staring at her.

‘Just remembered that the computer repair man is due at my house today,’ she improvised.

Everyone nodded. Repair men and their cosmic black-hole schedules: they all understood.

Ed, the director, put in his own story about the dishwasher repair man who needed wooing to get him to come at all.

‘That’s what you get when you have a fancy dishwasher with two separate compartments,’ teased Jeri.