Secretary On Demand

In retrospect, it was the worst thing he could have said. In retrospect, Shannon liked to think that she wouldn’t have done what she had if he’d acknowledged her. Looking at her coolly and blankly and pretending that he didn’t have a clue who she was, it sent all the vanished colour rushing back into her cheeks. Her frozen hands began to tremble with rage.

‘Maybe you don’t. How disappointing,’ she agreed. She heard her mother’s voice telling her to always count to ten because her temper would get her into trouble one day, and made it to two before she removed the plate from the tray and tipped twelve ounces of medium-rare steak, dripping with Alfredo’s special sauce, accompanied by potatoes and vegetables, straight onto the pristine jacket and well-tailored trousers.

It was intensely satisfying to hear Eric Gallway’s yelp of pain as hot food hit the thin covering of expensive wool. It reverberated through the restaurant like the crash of breaking crockery in a china shop. He stood up and frantically began wiping the food with his napkin, while everyone in the restaurant stopped eating and positioned themselves the better to look at what was going on.

‘How dare you?’ he growled. ‘How dare you throw a plate of food over me? I don’t know who the hell you are, miss, but I’m damn well going to make sure you’re sacked! Get me your boss! This instant!’

Shannon had a strong urge to laugh and covered her mouth with her hand. No need to get her boss. Alfredo was hurrying over towards them while trying to encourage the other diners to carry on with their meals. Perhaps pretend that this was nothing but some simple Italian jollity.

‘What is going on here?’ Alfredo ignored Eric’s frantic cleaning-up process and stared at Shannon who hung her head. Hopefully, he would interpret that as a gesture of shame instead of an insane desire to stifle her mirth.

‘What,’ snarled Eric, ‘do you think the problem is? This…this…so-called waitress of yours has dumped a plate of food all over me and let me tell you right now that unless she’s sacked immediately, I’ll sue you for everything you possess! I’ll personally make sure that this restaurant is out of business!’

‘It sort of fell, the plate,’ Shannon said, her green eyes wide and luminous. If he could pretend not to know who the hell she was, then she could pretend that it had all been an unfortunate accident. ‘Sorry.’ She grabbed a serviette and made a flicking motion, which was venomously brushed aside. ‘I think some of the carrots oozed into your pocket, sir…and there are a few mange-tout on your left shoe…’

Eric seemed incapable of responding to the helpful observations and stared at her murderously as Alfredo launched into a profuse apology, ending with assurances that any dry-cleaning costs would be covered.

‘Oh, dear, your lovely patent leather shoes seem to be ruined,’ Shannon observed with extravagant seriousness.

‘Please, allow me to offer you a full replacement for your suit and your shoes.’ All eyes followed a path down the soaked trousers to the ruined shoes under discussion. Someone burst out laughing a few tables away.

‘You sack this creature immediately, my man, or you won’t be able to afford your next loaf of bread, never mind my clothes. And let me tell you something, I happen to know quite a number of people in high places!’

‘I think it’s time you took yourself off to the bathroom and cleaned up,’ drawled a familiar voice. ‘You’re making a spectacle of yourself.’

For a minute, Eric looked as though, now in his stride and regardless of the state of his clothes, he was more than prepared to stand his ground and continue his litany of threats, but after a few seconds he nodded and walked off, watched by everyone in the restaurant. Someone yelled for an encore and Shannon felt a rush of appreciation for the bawdy clientele who frequented their establishment.

‘I hope your friend will calm down,’ Alfredo began worriedly. ‘Of course, it was a dreadful accident, but all these threats of closing down my restaurant…well, I have a family to support! Perhaps I better go see what is happening in the bathroom, hope he listens to reason…’ He extracted a handkerchief from a pocket to wipe his brow and then hurried off towards the direction of the bathroom.

‘Sit down.’

Shannon slowly turned to look at the man, who seemed to be the only person in the restaurant unaffected by what had just taken place.

She slumped into a free chair and rested her head against her hands.

‘Feel better?’

She looked at him for a while in silence. ‘Not really, no, but thank you for asking.’

‘What was that all about?’

‘I’m very, very sorry that I ruined your lunch.’ She stared at the congealing halibut on his plate. There was nothing funny about what had just happened, she realised. Alfredo had had nothing to do with anything, but he had taken the brunt of it and it had all been her fault.

‘Forget the lunch,’ he said drily.

‘Poor Alfredo,’ she said miserably to herself. ‘I shouldn’t have dropped the plate of food all over your friend. It was wrong of me.’

‘He’s not my friend. You certainly know how to create a scene, don’t you?’

‘Were you very embarrassed? I’m very, very sorry.’

‘Will you stop apologising? And, no, I wasn’t embarrassed. It would take rather more than that little incident to embarrass me. Tell me what you’re going to do now.’

‘Resign, of course.’ She stood up and his eyes followed her thoughtfully. ‘What choice do I have? Alfredo will never trust me with another plate of food, and I couldn’t blame him. Who needs a waitress with a talent for flinging food over customers?’ Besides, she knew Eric Gallway and she knew that he was more than capable of doing his utmost to get what he would see as just revenge for his humiliation.

‘Resign, reds? And who will serve me my morning coffee and bagel?’

He was trying to be nice. In the midst of her misery, she realised that he had called her ‘reds’, a reference, she assumed, to her bright red hair, and the softly spoken intimacy was almost as powerfully unsettling as the prospect of her future without a job.

‘I’m going to pack up my things,’ she said glumly. ‘Thanks for being so understanding.’ She reached out to shake his hand, for some unknown reason, but instead of a shake, he casually linked his fingers through hers and squeezed her hand gently, then he reached for his glass of wine and sipped some, with his fingers still interlinked with hers. He rubbed his thumb idly against hers and she felt a curious sensation of prickling down the back of her neck. Then he released her.

‘I don’t suppose you’d like your meal replaced?’ she joked half-heartedly, and he raised his eyebrows, appreciating her attempt at humour.

Funny, during all their speculations about him, she had never noticed how strongly the curves of his mouth spoke of compassion and humour. Or maybe anyone would have seemed compassionate and humorous alongside Eric with his infernal vanity and monstrous self-absorption.

‘Strangely, I appear to have lost my appetite.’ He gave her a little half-smile.

‘Well.’ She heaved a sigh. ‘The halibut was very good. Trust me. Much better than the wretched steak.’

She walked the long walk back to the kitchens, and by the time she’d told Alfredo she was resigning, said her last goodbyes to everyone and cleared her desk of what belonged to her, her usual buoyancy was back with her.

She would find something else. She wasn’t fussy. Hadn’t she ended up enjoying Alfredo’s even though initially the early start had put her off and the hours were often longer than her contract demanded? She would find something else and she would enjoy it. And if she didn’t, then couldn’t she always head back up to Dublin?

True, it felt good to be away from the claustrophobia of having all her large family around her but if she did decide to go back to Ireland, she knew that she would settle back in without any real difficulty. And after all this time, they would have at least stopped oozing sympathy about her wrecked love life and making endless remarks about adulterous men and young, impressionable girls.

Things would work out. She had a sudden, wild memory of the man with his fingers entwined with hers and felt a little shiver of regret. One face lost to her for ever. For no reason whatsoever, the thought depressed her, and she was so busy trying to analyse the foolishness of her reaction that she didn’t notice him until he was standing in front of her. Towering over her, in fact. Shannon just manage to stop before she collided with his immovable force and it was only when her eyes actually trailed upwards that she recognised him and gave a little gasp of surprise. Mostly because he seemed to have materialised from the sheer power of the thoughts in her head.

‘How did it go?’

‘What are you doing here?’ She wanted to reach out and prod him to see if he was real.

‘Waiting for you, as a matter of fact.’

‘Waiting for me? Why would you be waiting for me?’ It wasn’t yet four-thirty, but the light was already beginning to fade and there was an unholy chill in the autumn air.

‘To make sure that you were all right.’

‘Of course I’m all right.’ She stuck her hands in her pockets and stared at his shoes. She hadn’t realised how big a man he was. Not just tall, but broad-shouldered and powerfully built. ‘Why shouldn’t I be?’ She raised her eyes to his and made fleeting contact.

‘Because, reds, you looked pretty shaken up back there in the restaurant.’

Shannon debated whether she should tell him to stop calling her ‘reds’ and decided, perversely, that she liked the nickname.

‘Did I?’ she said airily. ‘I thought I handled myself very well, actually. I mean, losing a job isn’t the end of the world, is it?’ Bills. Rent. Food. Not the end of the world but not far off.’

‘Look, it’s cold trying to hold a conversation out here. Why don’t you hop in my car. I want to talk to you.’

‘Hop in your car? I’m very sorry but I can’t do that.’