Anybody Out There - Marian Keyes (4 page)

have a great idea, it wasn't my fault, it just happened. The only thing I will say in my favor is
that I'd stopped at Saks on the way home the night before, picked up a CG brochure, and learned
about their products.
"Perhaps you might even consider changing the name to Time-Reversal Morning Cream," I
suggested. But a tiny fierce head shake from Ariella stopped me. I'd said enough. I was getting
overconfident.
Lauryn tinkled. "Well, isn't that the thing! I saw those alarm clocks, too. I--"
"Shut up, Lauryn." Ariella cut Lauryn off with terrifying finality, and that was that.
It was my finest hour. Ariella got the account and I got the job.
4
D    inner chez Walsh was from the local Indian takeaway and I did well: half an onion bhaji,
one prawn, one chunk of chicken, two okra fingers (and they're quite big), approximately thirty-
five grains of rice, followed by nine pills and two Rolos.
Mealtimes had become silent battles where Mum and Dad forced cheer into their voices,
suggesting another forkful of rice, another chocolate, another vitamin-E capsule (excellent for
preventing scarring, apparently). I did my best--I felt empty but never hungry--but whatever I
ate, it wasn't enough for them.
Exhausted by the madras-based tussle, I retreated to my room. Something was rising to the
surface: I needed to talk to Aidan.
I spoke to him in my head a lot, but now I wanted more: I had to hear his voice. Why hadn't this
happened before now? Because I'd been injured and in shock? Or too subdued by the knockout
painkillers?
I checked on Mum, Dad, and Helen, who were deeply ensconced in the kind of TV detective
drama they're hoping will be made out of their lives. They waved me in and began elaborate
shifting along the couch to make room, but I said, "No, I'm fine, I'm just going to--"
"Grand! Good girl."
I could have said anything--"I'm just going to set the house on fire," "I'm just going round to
Kilfeathers to have a three-in-a-bed romp with Angela and her girlfriend"--and I'd have got the
same response. They were in a profoundly unreachable state, similar to a trance, and would
remain that way for the next hour or so. I closed the door firmly, lifted the phone from the hall,
and took it into my room.

I   stared at the little piece of machinery: phones have always seemed magical to me, the way
they pull off the unlikeliest, most geographically distant connections. I know there are perfectly
good explanations of how it all works, but I've never stopped being amazed at the wondrousness
of people on opposite sides of oceans being able to talk to each other.
My heart was banging hard in my chest and I was hopeful--excited, in fact. So where should I
try him? Not at work because someone else might pick up. His cell phone was the best idea. I
didn't know what had happened to it, it might have been disconnected, but when I hit the number
I'd called a thousand times, there was a click and then I heard his voice. Not his real voice, just
his message, but it was enough to stop me breathing.
"Hi, this is Aidan. I can't take your call right now, but leave a message and I'll get back to you as
soon as I can."
"Aidan," I heard my voice say. I sounded quavery. "It's me. Are you okay? Will you really get
back to me as soon as you can? Please do." What else? "I love you, baby, I hope you know that."
I disconnected, feeling shaky, dizzy, elated; I'd heard his voice. But within seconds I'd crashed.
Leaving messages on his cell phone wasn't enough.
I could try e-mailing him. But that wouldn't be enough either. I had to go back to New York and
try to find him. There was a chance he mightn't be there but I had to give it a go because there
was one thing I was certain of: he wasn't here.
Quietly I replaced the phone in the hall. If they found out what I'd been up to, there was no way
in the whole wide world they'd let me leave.
5
How I met Aidan
T    he August before last, Candy Grrrl was preparing to launch a new skin-care line called
Future Face (and the eye cream was called Future Eye, the lip cream Future Lip, and you get the
picture...). Constantly on the quest for new and innovative ways to love-bomb beauty editors, I
had a middle-of-the-night, lightbulb-over-the-head moment and thought I would buy each editor
a "future" to tie in with the "future" theme of the launch. The obvious "future" to buy would be a
personalized horoscope, but that had already been done for See Yourself in Ten Years' Time, our
time-defying serum, and had ended in tears when the assistant beauty editor of Britta got told
that she'd lose her job and her pet dog would run away within the month. (Funnily enough,

although the dog stayed put, the job bit actually did come true; she had a total career change and
now works as a hostess at the Four Seasons.)
Instead, I decided to buy some of those investment things, called "futures." I hadn't the first clue
about them except what I'd heard about people pulling down millions of dollars working on Wall
Street. But I couldn't get an appointment with a Wall Street futures analyst, even if I'd been
prepared to pay a thousand dollars for every second of his time. I tried several and got
stonewalled over and over. By then I was sorry I'd ever started, but I'd made the mistake of
boasting about it to Lauryn, who'd liked the idea, so I was forced to work my way through less
and less famous banks until finally I found a stockbroker in a midtown bank who agreed to see
me and only then because I'd sent Nita, his assistant, tons of free stuff, with a promise of more if
she could get me in.
So along I went, taking the rare opportunity to strip myself of as many kooky accoutrements as
possible. Let me explain: all McArthur publicists have to take on the personality of the brand
they represent. For example, the girls who worked for EarthSource were all a bit Hessian-ey and
rough-woven, while the Bergdorf Baby team were Carolyn Bessette Kennedy clones, so
etioliated, creamy-haired, and refined they were like another species. As Candy Grrrl's profile
was a little wild and wacky, a little kooky, I had to dress accordingly, but I was so over it, so
quickly. Kookiness is a young woman's game and I was thirty-one and burned out on matching
pink with orange.
Thrilled to have the chance to dress soberly, I gloriously denuded my hair of all stupid barrettes
and accessories and I was wearing a navy skirt suit (admittedly dotted with silver stars but it was
the most conservative thing I had) and clopping along the eighteenth floor looking for Mr. Roger
Coaster's office, passing neatly dressed, efficient-looking people, and wishing I could wear
severe tailored suits to work, when I rounded a corner and several things happened at once.
There was a man and we bumped into each other with such force that my bag tumbled from my
grasp, sending all kinds of embarrassing things skittering across the floor (including the fake
glasses I'd brought to look intelligent and my coin purse that says Change comes from within).
Quickly we bent down to retrieve stuff, simultaneously reached for the glasses, and bumped our
heads with a medium-to-loud crack. We both exclaimed "Sorry!"; he made an attempt to rub my
bruised forehead and in the process spilled scalding coffee on the back of my hand. Naturally I
couldn't shriek in agony because I was in a public place. The best I could do was shake my hand
vigorously to make the pain go away, and while I was doing that and marveling that the coffee
hadn't done more damage, we realized that the front of my white shirt looked like a Jackson
Pollock painting. "You know what?" the man said. "With a little work, we could get a real
routine going here."
We straightened up, and despite the fact that he'd burned my hand and ruined my shirt, I liked
the look of him.

"May I?" He indicated my burned hand but didn't touch it because sexual-harassment lawsuits
are so rife in New York that often a man won't get into an elevator with a lone woman, just in
case he gets landed with a witness-free accusation of trying to see up her skirt.
"Please." I thrust my hand at him. Apart from the red scald marks, it was a hand to be proud of.
I'd rarely seen it looking better. I'd been moisturizing regularly with Candy Grrrl's Hands Up,
our superhydrating hand cream, my acrylic nails had been filled and were painted in Candy
Wrapper (silver), and I'd just been de-gorilla'd, an event that always makes me feel joyous and
skippy and carefree. I have quite hairy arms and--and God knows, this is not easy to talk about
--but some of my arm hairs kind of...well...extend to the backs of my hands. The naked truth of
the matter is that unchecked, they resemble hobbit feet.
In New York, waxing is as necessary to survival as breathing and you are only really acceptable
in polite company if you're almost entirely bald. You can have head hair, eyelashes, and two
sliverettes of eyebrows, but that's it. Everything else must go. Even your nasal hairs, which I
hadn't yet been able to face. I would have to, though--if I was planning on having a successful
career in beauty.
"I am so sorry," the man said.
"A mere flesh wound," I said. "Don't apologize, it was no one's fault. Just a terrible, terrible,
terrible accident. Forget it."
"But you're burned. Will you ever play the violin again?"
Then I noticed his forehead: it looked like an egg was trying to push out through his skin.
"Oh God, you've a lump."
"I do?"
He shifted the light brown hair that fell across his forehead. His right eyebrow was split in two
by a tiny, silvery thread of a scar. I noticed it, because so is mine.
Tenderly he rubbed the lump.
"Ouch," I said, wincing on his behalf. "One of the finest brains of our time."
"On the verge of breakthrough research. Lost forever." He pronounced "forever" as "forevah"
like he was from Boston. Then he looked at my temporary ID badge. "You're a visitor here?
["visitah"]. Would you like me to show you the bathroom?"
"I'm fine."
"What about your shirt?"

"I'll pretend it's a fashion statement. Really, I'm fine."
"You are? You promise?"
I promised, he asked if I was sure, I promised again, I asked if he was okay, he said he was, then
he went off with what remained of his coffee and I felt a little deflated as I carried on my way
and found Mr. Coaster's office.
I tried to get Nita to explain to Mr. Coaster why I was splattered with coffee but she had zero
interest. "Did you bring the stuff? The base in--"
"--Cookie Dough," we said together. There was a waiting list a month long for the base in
Cookie Dough.
"Yes, it's in there. Lots of other stuff, too."
She began tearing the Candy Grrrl box apart. I stood there. A while later she looked up and saw
that I was still standing there. "Yeah, go on in," she said irritably, waving her hand in the
direction of a closed door.
I knocked and took myself and my dirty shirt into Mr. Coaster's office.
Mr. Coaster was a short, big-swinging-dick superflirt. As soon as I introduced myself, he gave
me an overly twinkly grin and said, "Hey! Is that an accent I hear?"
"Mmm." I gave the photo of him--and who I can only presume were his wife and two children
--a hard stare.
"British? Irish?"
"Irish." I gave the photo another meaningful eye flick and he shifted it slightly so that I could no
longer see it.
"Now, Mr. Coaster, about these futures."
"`Now, Misthur Coasther, about dese fewchurs.' I love it! Keep talking!"
"Ha-ha-ha." I laughed politely, while thinking Fuckhead.
It was a little while before I managed to get him to take me seriously and then it was only a
matter of seconds before I discovered that "futures" were more of a conceptual thing, that I
couldn't just waltz out the door with a handful of gorgeous futures, take them back to the office,
wrap them in handwoven boxes from Kate's Paperie, and have them messengered over to ten of
the city's most powerful beauty editors.

I'd have to come up with some other bright idea, but I wasn't as disappointed as I should have
been because I was thinking about the guy I'd bumped into. There had been something. And not
just the synchronicity of our his 'n' hers scars. But when I walked out of this building today the
chances were that I would never see him again. Not unless I did something about it. If you don't
ask, you don't get. (And even then it doesn't always work.)
First I'd have to find him, and this bank was a big place. And if I did manage to locate him, then
what should I do? Stick my finger in his coffee and suck it suggestively? Immediately I ruled this
out. (A) the heat of the coffee might melt the glue on my acrylic nail, causing it to fall off and
swim around in the cup like a shark's fin and (b) It was a revolting thing to do anyway.
Mr. Coaster was explaining expansively and I was nodding and smiling, but I was far away
inside my head, riveted by indecision.
Then, like a switch had been flicked, I fixed on a plan of action. I was suddenly certain: I was
going to be up-front and honest, and I decided to enlist the help of Mr. Coaster. Yes,
unprofessional. Yes, inappropriate. But what was to be lost?
"Mr. Coaster, sir," I interrupted politely. "On my way in here, I bumped into a gentleman, which
resulted in him spilling his coffee. I'd like the opportunity to apologize before I leave. I didn't
get his name but I can describe him." I spoke quickly. "He's tall, at least I think he is, although
I'm so short everyone looks tall to me. Even you."
Shite.
Mr. Coaster's expression went instantly very stony. But I pressed on, I had to. How to describe
my mystery man? "He's kind of pale, but not in a bad way, not like he's sick. His hair is light
brown now, but you can tell he was blond as a baby. And his eyes, I think they might be green..."
Coaster's stony face remained stony. He could have given those statues on Easter Island a run for
their money. He cut in on me. "'Fraid I can't help." And with lightning speed, I found myself
outside his office, with the door shut firmly behind me.
Nita was studying herself in a compact; she looked like she'd tried on every single product
simultaneously, like a little girl who'd gone berserk in her mother's makeup drawer.
"Nita, can you help me."
"Anna, I am totally in love with this gloss--"
"I'm looking for a man."
"Welcome to New York City." She didn't even look up from the mirror. "Eight-minute dating.
Like speed dating, but slower. You get eight minutes instead of three. It's totally great, I got four
matches last time."