Five Go Glamping: An adventure in the countryside for grown ups

Ayesha had insisted it wasn’t her who took it, Doris was convinced it could be no one else. Ayesha had suggested it could have been one of the girls from finance – because if anyone needed bifidus digestivum, it was those lot. Doris had said that you couldn’t tell by looking at anyone whether they needed beneficial bacteria or not and Ayesha said that indeed she could because she had done GCSE Food Technology. This had upset Doris a lot because they didn’t have GCSEs in her day or Food Technology or Computers. But were they really still arguing over a yoghurt? Surely not?

‘Who likes my new mug, it’s gorgeous isn’t it? I bought it in Selfridges. And… it hasn’t got any cats on it. Ta dah!’ I did my best magician’s assistant impression and used my hands to frame the mug, drawing attention to it from different angles but no one seemed to be taking any notice so I added another ‘Ta-dah.’

I was disappointed with their lack of enthusiasm so I took a photo of my mug and uploaded it on Facebook.

‘Drink anyone?’

Doris said nothing, her head was bowed and Ayesha didn’t answer but was motioning to something behind me with her head, making her eyes big and raising her eyebrows. I recognised the look. Last time she did it was when she’d been to Global Gathering for the weekend, but this time it looked intentional, rather than involuntary. Puzzling.

‘What are you doing with your head, you mentalist?’

Then it clicked. How could I have not recognised the international distress signal for ‘Jurassic Bleach is behind you’?

‘Oh.’ The tea would have to wait. If I didn’t acknowledge him, maybe he would go away and find someone else to talk to about velociraptors and Domestos.

But it wasn’t him. It was something much, much worse.

‘Nice of you to join us Fiona, are you taking your coat off or not staying?’

It was Juliet Jackson. Regional Manager. AKA The Wicked Witch of The West Midlands. Like Doris, she had been with the company for forty years. She was the same age as Doris, but looked twenty years younger. She wore an expensive suit and always had the shiniest tights.

‘Juliet! Hi. I didn’t know you were visiting this week.’ Then I actually gulped. This woman was pure evil. She was probably going to sack me on the spot for being late. Last time she was here, she gave Phil in IT a disciplinary because she’d caught him on the internet looking at The Jedi Federation of Rowley Regis’s website in work time. He’d left the office in tears and spent the next week actually rocking. He hasn’t really been the same since. He wears a shirt and tie to work now instead of comic book T-shirts, and he’s stopped talking like Yoda when we ask him for IT help.

‘Can I have a word, Fiona? Pop into the office for a sec?’

Ayesha looked terrified. Doris looked up at me and smiled. This was bad, very bad.

‘Popping’ into the office sounded so innocent and fun, like there might be a tea party in there or puppies. And yet every bone in my body told me I wasn’t to go in that room. It was like a horror film when you know you are not really supposed to look in the basement because something bad will happen to you, but you feel compelled to even though you know there’s mad axe murderers hiding in there waiting to kill you and eat you. From where I was standing, I would rather fancy my chances with the mad axe murderers than Juliet.

Everyone in the office was looking at me as I made the walk of doom. Part of me hoped she would be kind and sack me on the spot for being seven minutes late – I couldn’t handle having to sit there rocking for a week like poor Phil.

‘Please. Sit down,’ she said and gestured to a chair.

‘I’m sorry I was late, Juliet, I had to get something on the way.’

She leant against the desk, towering over me in her four inch heels.

She didn’t say a word for what seemed like ages. Then she folded her arms.

‘I wanted to talk to you about Doris.’ She made a face as though she was intently listening to something very important I was saying, even though I was not saying a word. I was wondering whether it was a signal I should say something about Doris.

‘Well, Doris is…’ I searched for something to say.

Juliet waved a hand in front of me. This meant I should shut up. Rude.

‘As you know, Doris is retiring shortly and we are looking to fill her role…’

‘Actually, Juliet,’ I said, feeling brave. ‘I was wondering if it was possible for me to look into a different role in food development or somewhere else, away from the distribution centre?’

She thought for a minute, looking at me with a puzzled expression, and then simply said ‘No.’ and waved me away.

No. Just like that, she wouldn’t even consider it.

Over the weekend I had felt like everything I had planned for was slipping away from me, but maybe this was the thing that got my plan back on track. Clearly, a move to another department was out of the question, which just left Doris’s job. Could I take it? With Doris’s salary, I was fairly sure I could buy a place of my own straight away. Taking Doris’s job would be the sensible option and it didn’t mean I had to be like Doris, I didn’t have to get four cats.

‘Right, okay then, well of course, I’d love to accept Doris’s position.’

‘Oh you are funny, Fiona’ Juliet said and she touched me on the arm, smiling a tight smile which looked like it was causing her pain. ‘Now, be quiet while I explain’ she snapped.

‘As you know we are legally required to advertise the role, but you stand a very good chance of getting the position. Of course, we couldn’t have any more repeats of this morning. Lateness isn’t acceptable and I will be observing you all this week. I’ll be looking out for how you operate as a team, to see how you are all getting along. Then we can touch base at the end of the week. Off you go.’

I’ll admit, this wasn’t the change I had hoped for. Not only did she dismiss me moving to another centre, she wanted me to actually apply for Doris’s job. Even though I had started to fill in the form already, this now left me unsettled because it meant I would be choosing to do Doris’s job.

Doris looked relieved to see me back so quickly. Ayesha got up, put a comforting hand on my shoulder for a moment before picking up the mugs. She grabbed the mug she was using, Doris’s three cat mug and my beautiful new Cath Kidston mug and started towards the kitchen muttering something about emergency biscuits in case of shock. She was stopped in her tracks by The Wicked West of The West Midlands.

‘Sit down please, Ayesha. What time is it?’

‘Twenty past nine’ she said.

‘And what time is tea break?’ The whole office had eyes on Ayesha.

‘I don’t know.’ Ayesha shrugged. ‘Is it whenever you fancy a cup of tea?’

‘No, Ayesha.’ Juliet glared at her ‘Tea breaks are at half past ten, and three p.m.’ She turned to face the rest of the office. ‘And that goes for everyone.’

She took the mugs from Ayesha’s hand and marched off to the kitchen with them. So I couldn’t even look at my beautiful new mug. What a cow.

The kitchen was completely rammed at ten-thirty. Ayesha came with me. Everyone was very gentle with Phil in IT and we let him use the urn first. He seemed okay at first but his hands must have been shaking as his R2D2 mug banged against the urn. Poor Phil.

I found Doris’s mug. I wouldn’t be able to get away with making her a Coftea today, not with all these people around. I looked again, but I couldn’t find my new mug, and I didn’t want to use my old cat one, so I had to use a funny metal tin mug thing. I pretended it was a camping mug and that I was on a fake-cation, but really it was more like a mug you would have if you were in prison and wanted to protest about something or other by rattling it on your cell door.

*

After work, I filled Steph and Sinead in on my disastrous couple of days and Sinead’s response to whether I should apply for Doris’s job was that I should ‘Follow my heart, that’s the only way to make sure you were happy.’

I admired Sinead’s optimism, but ‘following my heart’ was such a vague thing to do that it struck me as one of those things people say when they don’t have a bloody clue what else to do. It was like an excuse to be irresponsible.

I’d also quizzed Steph on what I should do and she’d said ‘Wait and see what happens.’ Brilliant.

I hadn’t bored them with the details about Connor, because I reckoned they were sick of hearing about him and I was sick of thinking about him. I still hadn’t called him back despite even more missed calls and apologetic texts. So I was going with the See What Happens approach on that one.

‘Anyway,’ said Sinead. ‘You’ll feel loads better after seeing Chelsea Aurora Moonbeam, everyone does.’

I wasn’t so sure.

‘You do know where this place is, don’t you?’ Steph asked Sinead.

‘I do! It’s round this next corner.’ insisted Sinead.