All to Play For (21 page)

“Hmm.”

“What about another meeting? Maybe they could pitch their ideas and you could make a shortlist or something?”

Chris thought she had something there. Kill all the birds with one stone. “Good idea. Get Peter on the phone, would you?”

She did.

“Peter, how are you?” began Chris.

“Never better. You?”

“Fine, fine, although I have to say your lot aren’t backward at coming forward when they want you to know about their bright ideas.”

Peter smiled broadly and winked at his PA Vera, who was with him. He switched his phone to conference mode so that she could hear the conversation.

“I do hope no-one’s made a nuisance of themselves,” said Peter mildly. “Funnily enough
my
office has been a good deal quieter lately.”

“Yes, well, I do draw the line at masonic handshakes.”

“No, really?” said Peter, glaring at Vera who was rocking with repressed laughter.

“I want to have a meeting with the whole lot of them. They can pitch their ideas and I’ll respond on the spot, yes, no or maybe. We’ve got to put an end to it.”

“Whatever you say, Chris. Will your office organise it or shall we?”

“Selina will take care of it. Okay Peter. Bye.”

Peter put his phone down and raised his eyebrows at Vera, who pulled a face.

“He knows what he wants, doesn’t he?” she said.

Peter nodded sadly. “Is he going to get it?”

Vera shrugged. “It wouldn’t surprise me.”

*

Catherine still wasn’t pregnant and their bedroom was almost ready to move back into.

They had been to a private clinic for check-ups, where the consultant had assured them that there was no physical reason why they shouldn’t conceive. He suggested that they were too tense and should try to forget about it for a few months. Very often, he said, the Through-the-Looking-Glass approach was the one that worked.

Unfortunately for Catherine, the effort of trying not to think about it increased her tension markedly. One day she arrived at work, opened her briefcase and found a little note from Natasha:
I love yoo mumy from Tasha.
It was too much for her and the tears streamed down her face. Terrified that her colleagues and clients might interpret her emotional incontinence as a sign that she was no longer fully reliable, she feigned a migraine and went home again. It was her ovulation day. She knew her cycle so well now that she couldn’t help recognising the signs even though she wasn’t supposed to be looking out for them. She lay on the sofa bed and wondered whether to call Chris and ask him to come home, but reluctantly decided against it. He would be annoyed and probably think she had a screw loose, it was very uncharacteristic behaviour for her. In any case, he was bound to be busy. Instead she went to her health club for a sauna and massage; then she bought oysters for dinner, and a new dress.

When Chris arrived home at eight o’clock he thought she looked radiant, and felt a great relief. At last she was getting over it. Oysters for dinner made a nice change, and he appreciated the effort she had made. She said she wanted to put it all behind them, and he agreed heartily.

They were watching
Newsnight
together when Sarah the nanny dropped her bombshell: she was giving in her notice because she wanted to move north to be with her boyfriend. There was little they could do to keep her; they were truly sorry as she had been with them since Natasha’s birth. She was sorry too, especially to part with Tasha, but she wanted to start her own family and who could blame her? They all feared the impact on Tasha, who was very attached to Sarah. It was a severe blow, not only to their tremulous domestic tranquillity, but to the pleasant evening which Catherine had so subtly constructed in order to seduce her husband without him noticing.

When they were in bed she snuggled up to him sexily but he kissed her once and said he wasn’t in the mood tonight. She tried to conceal her disappointment but he knew her too well.

“Okay let’s give it a go.”

She turned to him and smiled. “Only if you really want to.”

“I do,” he lied, and began foreplay. Beneath his exploring hands she felt like a velvet cushion full of bedsprings, but he persevered manfully. She did all she could to help him, but ten minutes later he rolled over to his own side of the bed and gave up.

“Sorry Cathy.” He stared at the wall.

“Never mind.” She stared at the ceiling.

In the silence they heard Natasha downstairs, coughing in her sleep. Chris struggled with his feelings. He was angry, humiliated, inadequate. He realised now what Cathy had been up to, and hated her for putting him through it. How dare she treat him like a performing seal? He steamed in silence. Catherine merely felt despair, coupled with the humiliation of having been rejected when at her most vulnerable: naked and aroused. She tried to forget her own feelings and figure out what he was going through, he must feel a terrible failure.

“It’s all right darling,” she whispered, stroking his shoulder. “There’s always another time.”

“Don’t fucking patronise me!” his outburst amazed them both.

“What do you mean?”

“Sex isn’t something you do on demand,” he replied tersely. “It’s supposed to be a spontaneous act of love.” He sat up. “I can’t remember the last time I made love to you just because it felt right and I wanted to. It must be months ago. There’s no
joy
left in it.”

Catherine’s body turned to stone. Oh God, she thought, it’s all fallen apart. Maybe this is the beginning of the end. He had never spoken to her like this before. She had nothing to say.

“I’m sorry,” she whispered.

“I’m fucking sorry too. I’m really, really fucking sorry that our happy, relaxed, satisfying love life is out the fucking window. You’ve turned it into
sex by numbers
. The only thing I want, the only thing in the whole fucking world, is for you to get fucking pregnant so we can get back to normal.”

Catherine was too stunned to cry, but she was no doormat. “We both want the same thing then. What do you suggest?”

He glared at her.

“I know,” she continued. “Why don’t you wank into a bottle, stick it in the freezer, and I’ll inseminate myself with the turkey baster once a month. Then you won’t have to touch me at all.” She held eye contact defiantly until he had to leave the room, unable to think of an appropriate response.

Downstairs he poured himself a large whisky and put the telly on. His mind was blank with fury. He carried the bottle with him and slumped on one of the huge sofas, wishing he had some cigarettes, although he hadn’t smoked for years. He switched the telly over to the satellite dish and began surfing through the channels, looking for anything that would occupy his mind. All crap. He settled for a Dutch entertainment show that was so bad it comforted his bruised ego. BBC2 was the Shakespeare of channels, and it was
his
channel. He poured another whisky and relaxed a little.

The programme finished and was followed by an erotic performance of extraordinary explicitness by British standards. He watched, fascinated and embarrassed to start with, and then realised that he actually found it quite titillating. In fact he was becoming aroused. He gazed objectively at this very attractive woman as she undulated for the camera as if she was enjoying herself, and had an idea.

Twenty minutes later he climbed back up to the loft room and put a turkey baster and a cup of semen down next to Catherine. She was lying awake, re-playing the row in her head and trying to make sense of it all.

“There you are,” he said irritably. “It’s all yours. I’m sleeping in the living room,” and stalked off again. Catherine’s jaw fell open and he had gone before she thought to reply.

At breakfast the following morning the atmosphere was dire. Sarah tried to keep a low profile, assuming that it was because she was leaving. Chris felt bad for her and tried to lighten up by asking her whether she would look for a new post in Edinburgh right away, unfortunately Natasha was listening and wanted to know what was going on. On realising that her beloved Sarah was leaving her she wept inconsolably and Chris set off for work feeling a total bastard for not waiting so they could break the news to her gently. Catherine said nothing about it but he knew exactly what she would be thinking.

Even Selina’s pleasant smile failed to crack his misery, and the prospect of a morning with the Drama Department was enough to make him seriously consider calling it off. He wasn’t
required
to go through this process, he could deal entirely through Peter if he wished. However it would look a lot better if he saw it through. This time the conference room had a huge table down the middle, equipped with water jugs and stacked plastic beakers. The woody smell of French tobacco hit him as he crossed the threshold. “Let’s have a vote on smoking. All those in favour?” A few hands began to rise as people caught on. He continued quickly. “All those against?” Twenty hands went up. “That’s clear enough. Cigarettes out please gentlemen.” Chris briskly opened the meeting, reminding them that he was looking forward to hearing their pitches for all the slots he had available. “Okay,” he concluded. “Let’s start with the contemporary serial. Who’s first? Or shall we just go round the table?”

There was a brief pause, then Peter asked Fenella to summarise the situation.

“We have a number of projects under option, with two leading contenders ready to go, more or less. One by Tony Scott, one by Billy Trowell.” Chris nodded, remembering his recent conversation with Billy’s agent with distaste.

“Yes, I’m aware of both projects,” he said confidently. I have the Scott scripts in my office I’ll be reading them shortly. What about the Trowell scripts?”

“Ah… how are they coming on, Stewart?” Fenella innocently passed the buck to Stewart Walker, who always produced Billy’s shows, although she knew perfectly well that they had fallen out badly and were not currently on speaking terms. Stewart adopted a thoughtful expression.

“It will be compelling. Original. Dark, perhaps very dark. Challenging, certainly. Controversial. Powerful.”

“When can I see the scripts?”

“When they’re ready. I never circulate scripts before they’re at final draft. You can take my word, Chris. I always deliver what I promise.” Chris absorbed Stewart’s words sagely, and saw an opportunity to rid himself of the whole problem by simply doing nothing.

“That’s fine, I understand. You must work in the way you choose. Who am I to interfere with the artistic process?” He smiled pleasantly and Stewart inclined his head in acknowledgement, his vanity allowing him to believe that Chris had come round to Stewart’s point of view. Chris was relieved that the Trowell problem could be shunted out of sight into the future. He already expected to go with the Scott project. Selina’s enthusiasm meant more to him than the egotistic hyperbole of those he considered drama queens. He was about to ask for cult series proposals when another voice piped up.

“Actually I have another project for this slot, may I show you?” A young woman half-hidden down the side of the table waved a proposal and slid it up the polished mahogany surface, he caught it neatly and read the front page aloud: “
Poetic Justice
, by Geraint Vaughan. A story of Wales: of farmers, poets, national identity and struggle.” He turned the page and read swiftly. Nothing grabbed his interest. It looked dull, as far as he could see. He sighed. “Is Wales interesting right now?” No-one replied, taking his question as rhetorical. “I’m not sure this really hits the contemporary cutting edge nerve,” he offered, deciding that it was time to show how decisive he could be: he would turn this one down. “Poetry, sheep… it’s a bit
Under Milk Wood
, isn’t it?”

“Not at all!” Maggie leapt in. “It’s completely original, it’s absolutely on the nail in terms of rural life. Why does contemporary drama always have to be about urban deprivation?”

It was a good point. It deserved an answer.

“I want something more… how can I put it… sexy?” Maggie leaned back in her chair and blew out her cheeks. She and Geraint had worked really hard on this proposal. She knew it was good, and different. And now unwanted. “I’m sure you know what I mean,” said Chris, sliding the proposal back down the table a little too hard so that it sent a stack of beakers rattling onto the floor. It had to be passed back to Maggie, who was frowning furiously at it. She kept her own counsel, tight-lipped.

Peter chose this moment to suggest, in the mildest possible tone, that it was regrettable there were to be fewer opportunities for authorial contemporary drama. “These projects are so often the cherries in our fruit cake. We’ve never allowed them to compete against each other like this. Do we really need to rule any out at this stage?”

Chris felt irritation rise from his stomach, he wasn’t going to keep going over these arguments. “I promised you all a clear yes, no or maybe. If I give everyone a maybe, nothing’s changed, has it? I think it’s quite wrong to have masses of expensive projects sloshing around which are never going to reach the screen. This is the nineties, not the seventies. We need new ways of managing development. Let’s move on to the cult slot.” He looked to his right and saw Penny Cruickshank looking calm and collected. She was a cheerful, matronly woman who would have made the ideal Brown Owl. “Penny?” he said expectantly.

She hesitated, prefacing herself with a thoughtful look. “I don’t quite know how you plan a cult hit, I always thought a cult following came afterwards – but I
do
have something which might fit the bill, Chris. It’s a series based in a recording studio, somewhere like Abbey Road, right now.
Music
you see. It will feature in every episode, not just as a soundtrack, but actually part and parcel of the action. We’ll appeal to a
lot
of people that way – after all,
everyone
likes music don’t they?”

Chris frowned. “Music is divisive, not inclusive.”

Penny stopped short in surprise. Around the table people considered this aphorism: there was some truth in it, music had become so diverse these days that the audience was fragmented. Penny was lost for words. “Oh,” she said.