Best Supporting Role (12 page)

While Rosie sat herself down and checked on Will, I went to fetch some glasses. “I thought you were on the wagon while you were breast-feeding,” I said, setting a couple of champagne flutes down on the coffee table.

“I am, but I’ve decided that one night off can’t hurt.”

Rosie popped the cork and poured us each a glass. I’d barely taken a sip when the thumping started upstairs.

“Oh, crap,” Rosie said. “Your kids must have heard me come in. I’m so sorry.”

The children appeared in the living room, bleary-eyed, but curious.

“Who’s this?” Ella said.

I did the introductions. Ella was fascinated by Will. “He’s so tiny. Does he suck your boobies? Phoebe in my class, her baby sister sucks her mummy’s boobies. It’s weird. And then she gets sick on the sofa and it’s really stinky.”

“Yeah, babies can be a bit stinky,” Rosie said, grinning.

“Does it hurt when he sucks your boobies?”

“Not really.”

“If he sucked really hard,” Dan broke in, “could they fall off?”

“Fall off?” Rosie was clearly baffled by the question. “Not really. Boobies tend to be fixed pretty firmly.”

“But wouldn’t you have preferred a hamster?” he went on. “Or a puppy? You can take them for walks and train them to do tricks.”

“I have to admit that Will is a bit lacking in the tricks department. Tell you what, when he’s older, I might get him a puppy and then maybe you and Ella could take him for walks.”

“Cool.” Dan turned to me. “Mum, did you check on the computer to see what starfish eat?”

“Not yet. I’ll do it before I go to bed and let you know in the morning.”

But he was already sitting at my laptop, tapping the keys. “Wow. Did you know they eat other starfish? That means they’re cannonballs. Alfie at school, his brother’s got the DVD of this film about people who start eating each other. They’re in a plane crash, but only
some of them get killed and because they’re in the mountains and there’s no food, they have to eat the dead bodies.”

“Stoppit,” Ella cried. “People don’t eat other people.”

“Yes they do. It’s called cannon-ball-ism.”

“Mummy—tell Dan to stop teasing.”

“I’m not teasing. It’s true. Mum, tell her.”

Rosie was looking at me, grinning all over her face as if to say, “So how are you going to handle this one?”

“OK,” I said. “Under very, very extreme circumstances, which almost never happen, people have been known to eat bits of other people.”

“Which bits?” Ella demanded.

“I don’t know.”

“Bums,” Dan said. “Bound to be. That’s where there’s most meat.”

“I wouldn’t let you eat my bum.”

“Why would anybody want to eat your stinky bum?”

I glanced at Rosie, who by now was struggling to keep a straight face.

“Kids, if I gave you each a packet of Monster Munch, would you forget about cannonballs and go back to bed so that I can chat to Rosie?”

Instead of nodding, they made a joint dash to the cupboard and had a fight about who should have the last packet of salt and vinegar flavor. I told them that if they didn’t settle their differences immediately, nobody would get anything. Dan backed down and agreed to have cheese and onion.

“Night, kids,” Rosie said.

“Night,” Ella said. “Nice to have met you.”

“You, too, Ella . . . and you, Dan.”

“I have no idea who taught my daughter such good manners,” I said after the kids had disappeared upstairs. “My mother, probably. As you can see, I spend most of my time bribing my children with junk food instead of teaching them social etiquette.”

Rosie laughed. “That’ll be me in a few years.” She took a sip of prosecco. “So, come on, dish. What’s going on with this bloke of yours?”

“How long have you got?”

“Oh, God . . . as bad as that. Tell you what, if this is going to be a long session, I think I should avail myself of the facilities.”

Rosie disappeared to the loo, tiptoeing on the stairs. I peeked into the Moses basket. Will was blowing milky bubbles in his sleep.

The
Sunday
Times
was lying on the coffee table. I hadn’t so much as glanced at it all day. As I sifted through the various bits, a headline in the business diary section caught my eye.

Clementine Montecute Quits over Storm in a D Cup

Lingerie tycoon Clementine Montecute, supplier of bespoke bras and corsets to crowned heads as well as Hollywood royalty, has shut up shop amid accusations that she lied to customers about her credentials as a lingerie designer. It would seem that before opening her atelier, she did not—as she had previously claimed—work as a designer for some of the best lingerie houses in France. The nearest she got was working
as a junior PR assistant for La Perla. Moreover, her Mayfair atelier—which Montecute claimed employed some of the best lingerie makers in the world—was a sham. Instead of being “handmade in Mayfair,” orders were outsourced to a women’s co-op in Bulgaria. One customer, who asked to remain anonymous, said: “The quality of the lingerie was no better than average, but because she was meant to be the best, nobody dared question it. It was a case of the empress’ new underwear. Clearly, the wealthy are easily deceived. What was more, she ripped us off shamelessly. Montecute was paying her workers pennies to make garments which cost her customers hundreds of pounds. This kind of profiteering almost amounts to fraud.”

Clementine Montecute was a charlatan? I had to read the article three times before it sank in.

It seemed that in order to get away with her scam, Montecute had spent thousands of pounds buying people’s silence. In the end one person had started demanding more money. When Montecute refused to pay up, the woman leaked the story to
Paris Match
. Kate and Pippa Middleton were thought to have withdrawn their patronage, along with several Hollywood A-listers, as yet unnamed. My heart was thumping. This changed everything. With Montecute gone, there was a chance. I had a chance.

I hadn’t noticed Rosie come back into the room.

“Sarah, you OK? You seem miles away.”

I turned to look at her. “Rosie, do you believe in taking risks?”

“Hang on, I thought we were going to talk about your bloke.”

“We are. . . . It’s all connected. . . . So, do you take risks?”

Rosie shrugged. “Depends what you mean by risk.”

Twenty minutes and half a bottle of prosecco later I’d told her the whole story—about Aunty Shirley and the shop, Steve and his controlling behavior, the Clementine Montecute scandal. Rosie sat there, barely saying a word.

“So,” I said finally. “What should I do?”

“About the shop or Steve?”

“Both.”

“To be honest, I don’t think anybody can tell you what to do—it has to be your decision—but if it were me, I would absolutely give the business a go. You’re not keen on your job, Montecute’s gone and you’ve got the aunties to help. I’d say you’ve got a hell of a lot going for you.”

“Except money.”

“OK, first you need to get your lawyer to put some pressure on the landlord. There must be some legislation that forces him to keep the building up to standard. Plus it’s in his interest as well as yours.”

I agreed. I said I would call him. “So you think it’s a risk worth taking?”

“If you don’t take it, I think you could live to regret it. You’ll always be asking yourself ‘What if?’”

“And if I fail?”

“If you fail, you’ll always be able to say that you gave it your best shot. Life isn’t about certainty. If it were, it would be very dull.”

“Which brings me to Steve.”

She topped up both our glasses. “OK, after Mike I can see why
you fell for him, but from what you said, the man sounds like a bit of a bully.”

“So you think I should dump him.”

Rosie raised both hands in front of her. “I’m only telling you what I think. Ending it has to be your call.”

Just then her cell rang. She took it out of the Moses basket and looked at the number.

“Sorry . . . it’s a client. I really should take it. Maybe I should go. I mean it’s one thing me doing this in my house. . . .”

“No, stay. I’m sure the kids are asleep. I’ll go upstairs and check on them.”

They were both dead to the world. Dan was cuddling his Monster Munch packet as if it were a soft toy. Ella was lying on her back with her mouth open, snoring gently. Her Monster Munch packet, still half full, was on her nightstand, propped up against the lamp. I kissed them both, straightened their covers and opened the window a crack to let in some air. “Sleep tight,” I whispered.

Downstairs, Rosie was on the phone, going through her usual spiel. “Of course I’m wet for you, Brian,” she said, chipping away at her nail polish.

I thought I might go and unload the dishwasher. When I’d finished, she was still on the phone.

“What? . . . . Your wife’s back? . . . OK, but you’ve still got to pay me for the time you’ve had. . . . Brian, are you there? Brian, don’t you dare hang up on me. You owe me money.” Rosie looked up at me. “Brian’s wife came home and he hung up.”

“So I gather.”

“Crap. I hate it when that happens.”

Will was stirring. Rosie looked into the basket and then at her watch. “Time for his feed.” She picked him up. “OK, noodle, your late-night snack awaits.” A moment later he was guzzling happily.

“Of course,” Rosie said, “if you decided not to take over your aunty Shirley’s business, you could always do what I do.”

“Me? Giving phone sex? You have to be joking. I wouldn’t know where to start. Embarrassment wouldn’t even begin to describe it. I’d be totally tongue-tied. And . . . don’t take this the wrong way, but for me at least, it would feel really dirty.”

“You soon get over that. Like I said, once you’ve memorized the script, it stops being real. It’s more like doing some kind of kinky corporate presentation.” She paused. “I could teach you if you like.”

I burst out laughing. “No, you couldn’t. I’d be useless. My mind would go totally blank.”

“I bet you’d be brilliant.” She picked up her phone. “Go on . . . take it.”

“What? No.” But I’d already taken it. “You do realize,” I said, giggling, “that I’m only doing this because I’m drunk.”

“OK, here goes . . . ring-ring . . . ring-ring . . .”

I knocked back some more prosecco. “Hello?”

“Right, let’s pretend his name is Otto.”

“Otto?”

“Yeah, he’s German. . . . So, Sarah . . . vhat are you vearing?”

“Oh, I’m just in my bra and panties. I’ve been lying on the bed waiting for you.”

“Excellent,” Rosie said in her real voice. “See—you’re really getting into it.”

“So, Otto . . . would you like me to take my panties off?”

“Ach . . . Jawohl!”

“OK, I’m slipping them off now. . . .”

“Gott in Himmel!”

I snorted with laughter.

“Absolutely no laughing,” Rosie said, barely containing her own. “You have to stay focused.”

“OK, Otto . . . That’s it, big boy. Take me! Take me!

“Mein Gott! Mein Gott!”

“Oh, Otto! Otto!”

“Sieg heil! Sieg heil!”

By now we were both in hysterics—me more than Rosie because I wasn’t trying to breast-feed at the same time as laugh. Then, suddenly she stopped laughing. She was looking past me. I turned round to see Steve.

“You two seem to be having fun,” he said, clearly not amused.

“Steve . . . what are you doing here? How did you get in?”

“The front door was open. Didn’t you see it? Anybody could have walked in.”

The catch had been sticking. I probably didn’t close it hard enough after I let Rosie in. At the back of my mind I must have been thinking about not waking the kids.

Rosie was rearranging herself. “I think maybe I should be going.” She looked at Steve. “I’m Rosie, by the way.”

He gave her a sniffy look. “Yes, I’d guessed that much.”

“Rosie, don’t go. Stay and have another drink.”

By now Will was back in his basket and she was tucking him in. I handed her back her phone.

“No, I really ought to get going. Speak to you tomorrow.”

I nodded. “Sure.”

She scooped up the Moses basket, said a quick good-bye to Steve and was gone.

“Did you have to be so bloody rude?” I said to Steve.

“Me rude? Correct me if I’m wrong, but it would appear that your new best friend is schooling you in the finer points of phone sex.”

“Christ, why do you have to be such a jerk? We were messing around, that’s all.”

“And that’s your idea of fun?”

“Yes, as it happens.”

“What if one of the children had come down?”

“For your information, I’d just been up to check on them. They were both sound asleep.”

“So, you won’t sleep with me, but you’re happy to act out this . . . filth.” He spat out the word.

“It was a joke. Let it go. . . . Now why don’t we sit down?”

He lowered himself into an armchair. I took the sofa.

“So you still haven’t told me why you’re here?”

“I came to apologize for last night. I was out of order. I’m sorry.” He still sounded huffy. He wasn’t about to forgive me for Otto anytime soon.

“Apology accepted, but I’ve made a decision. I’m taking over the shop.”

“Fine. Do what you like. I’ve said all I’m going to say.”

“Hang on. Hear me out. Things have changed. I just read this article in the
Sunday
Times
and apparently Clementine Montecute has
gone out of business. Now that she’s no competition, I’m prepared to take the risk.”

“OK, but for the record I still think you’re crazy.”

“That’s all you can think about, isn’t it? . . . The risk, the failure. Has it occurred to you that I might succeed? I can’t live the way you do—like a permanently scared rabbit. I have to make something of my life.”

He handed me a newspaper clipping. “It’s a list of local government job vacancies. There are a couple in the town planning department I thought might suit you.”

“Steve, we’ve had this conversation. For the umpteenth time, I’m not about to take a job in local government. I’m taking over the shop.”

“Well, I hope you’re not expecting any help from me.”