Flights of Angels (9 page)

Claudie nodded again, but her action and her belief weren’t one hundred percent connected.

Later that evening, when she closed her door behind her, she suddenly understood what Dr Lynton had been getting at. She’d been half-aware of what he was implying during their session, of course she had, but, as if protecting herself, she had chosen to ignore it, staring at his outrageously green socks instead, and waiting for the clock to chime four so that she could escape and go and buy one of her favourite musicals which had just been released on DVD. But now, in the isolation of her home, her hands started to shake, gently at first, almost as though tapping along to a friendly tune. But the tapping soon travelled up her arms until her shoulders were jerking as if they meant to hit her earlobes.

And then the inevitable. Her face fell into spasms, and, for the first time in weeks, she was crying. Hot tears blurred her vision, and the living room disappeared as she buried her head in her hands and just let go. There was nothing she could do to stop herself. She’d tried that once before - stopping her tears by sheer will power then leaving her house, forcing herself to walk into town. It had been a huge mistake. She’d broken down in the local newsagents and someone had had to call Kristen to come and take her home again.

She didn’t dare try to block her emotions any more but it was equally terrifying to give them free reign. Sometimes, if she’d had a particularly rough day, whole hours would be swallowed up, and she’d be spat out the other end feeling exhausted and isolated.

Sitting up from the sofa now, she tried to find a tissue in her pocket but there wasn’t one. Neither were there any on her bedside table so she had to make do with toilet paper. Not for the first time did Claudie think that widows should be entitled to free boxes of tissues for at least the first year.

Drying her eyes and blowing her nose, she dared to look at her reflection in the mirror and immediately wished she hadn’t. An ashen-faced woman with a tangle of brown hair and dull red eyes stared back at her. And then something rather strange happened. Looking at the reflection of her Gene Kelly poster on the bathroom wall behind her, she could have sworn she saw him smile and wink at her.

‘You’re not telling us everything, are you?’ Jalisa said, swinging her legs across Claudie’s computer screen in a most irritating manner.

‘I’m trying to type, Jalisa.’

‘Not before a full confession.’

‘What confession? I don’t know what you’re talking about,’ Claudie said impatiently, her fingers fast and furious across her keyboard.

‘Claudie - Mr Woo can spot tear stains with his eyes closed. You’ve been crying, haven’t you?’

Claudie stopped typing. ‘
Merde!
’

‘Pardon?’ Jalisa said.

‘
Merde!
’ Claudie repeated.

‘Language, please!’ Bert complained, waking up from a quick forty winks up against Claudie’s pen pot. ‘Most unlady-like.’

‘Yes! I didn’t expect you to come out with such things,’ Mary said, somewhat abashed.

‘What? Didn’t they have “shit” where you come from?’ Claudie asked, not in the mood to be lady-like.

‘Oh, yes!’

‘Streets full of it!’ Lily added with a giggle. ‘And, for your information, all the best swear words are old. Like arse and f-’

‘Er - that’s QUITE enough!’ Jalisa warned.

‘I’m just making a point,’ Lily said with a shrug of her shoulders which, today, she’d shoved into a cashmere cardigan in pale pink.

‘Goodness me!’ Bert exclaimed. ‘I’ve never known such language from women.’

‘Welcome to the twenty-first century, Albert,’ Lily said smugly, as if she were a modern girl herself.

‘You all so noisy,’ Mr Woo complained wearily.

‘Shut up, you old fart.’

‘Old fart yourself!’

‘EXCUSE ME!’ Jalisa bellowed from her favourite position at the top of the monitor. ‘Did you two learn
nothing
from the other day? Do you want me to send you back there?’

‘No,’ Bert said penitently, removing his hat and stroking his thinning hair flat.

Mr Woo didn’t say anything, probably anxious to avoid eye contact with the infuriated Jalisa. Claudie wondered what it must be like for him to suddenly find himself in this predicament: being bossed around by a young lady, called names by an ex-army troupe entertainer, and having to put up with the antics of the Tudor twins. All that, and cure her of her heartache too. Claudie couldn’t help but giggle as she saw him shake his head in despair before sitting down on her make-up bag to read his paper.

‘What are you reading, Mr Woo?’ Claudie asked, peering closely at the tiny print.

‘Express,’ he muttered.

‘The
Angel
Express,’ Jalisa corrected. ‘News still happens, even after life,’ she explained, seeing Claudie’s look of bemusement. ‘But we’ve managed to get right off the subject again, haven’t we?’

‘Have we?’ Claudie narrowed her brown eyes, and did her best to turn her attention back to the letter she was meant to be typing.

‘Yes! We were trying to find out what was wrong with you.’

‘Oh.’

‘Yes,
oh!
’ Jalisa said, starting to sound very matronly. Any minute now, Claudie thought, she’d stop dancing and develop an enormous bosom across which she’d fold her arms in disapproval.

‘I don’t want to talk about it.’

‘Talk about what?’ Mary asked, looking up at Claudie with her pale, bright eyes.

‘You can’t wheedle it out of me that way either.’

‘Have you forgotten that we’re here to help you? We’re not just here to keep you amused whilst you’re at work, you know,’ Jalisa pointed out.

‘I know,’ Claudie said, giving a little smile. ‘But do I have to tell you everything?’

‘It might help,’ Jalisa suggested, and Claudie watched as the five figures on her table fixed their eyes on her. They looked so sweet and caring that Claudie wanted to cry all over again.

‘I, er-’ she hesitated, looking from one tiny face to the next. Could she tell them? Could she explain to them how she felt? She looked at the Tudor twins whose eyes were both filled with the same concern. She looked at Bert, who’d removed his hat in preparation for a bout of head scratching. She saw Mr Woo, who looked as if he might be about to dig in his voluminous pockets to find some more herbs for her. And then Jalisa, whose eyes were wide and concerned. Yes, Claudie thought, she felt she could tell them, couldn’t she?

She took a deep breath. ‘I-’

‘Claudes?’ Kristen called from the other side of the room, oblivious to the confession about to occur at Claudie’s desk. ‘It’s your turn to get the drinks.’

Bloody hell, Simon thought, pushing the rotating door into the building society and picking up his badge from reception. What the hell am I doing here?

The receptionist beamed him a smile and pointed to where he was to use his swipe card, but Simon knew the routine all too well. He could do it all with his eyes closed. Through the door, turn right up the stairs, right at the top into the open-planned room he’d lived in for six years. It had seemed a lifetime then but, even though he’d only been away from it for a few months, it also seemed a lifetime ago.

As he trudged up the stairs, his feet feeling heavy for the first time in months, he looked around him, trying to spot a familiar face, but they were all new. It was the nature of the job. People came and people went. Few stayed longer than three years. A mixture of boredom and bad pay ensured a high turnover of staff.

Simon sighed. Yes, few stayed. And even fewer came back of their own free will. Trust him to be an exception.

‘Simon!’ Mark, his old boss, called in greeting as Simon entered the room. ‘Good to see you, mate.’ A quick handshake was all he managed. ‘You’re over there, next to Mandy.’ As ever, Mark was about to rush off somewhere. Too busy to string more than a couple of sentences together.

Next to Mandy. Bloody hell. Mandy the Man-eater. That was all he needed.

Mandy looked up as Simon crossed the room.

‘Hi, Si!’ she said, batting great, blue coated lashes at him from beneath her ebony-dyed fringe.

‘Morning, Mandy,’ he said, trying to keep things as formal as possible.

‘Nice to see you again,’ she said sweetly, swinging her chair round in order to give him a flash of her legs in an embarrassingly short skirt. ‘Didn’t think you’d be back here.’

‘No. Neither did I,’ Simon confessed, sitting down in the chair and adjusting the height. No. After his break for freedom last year, Simon had never thought in a million years that he’d be crawling back to his old job. It was the stuff of nightmares. But times were hard and he had more red bills than a flock of kittiwakes.

‘But it’s nice to have you back,’ Mandy added, her ruby smile positively glowing at him.

Simon had always tried to avoid Mandy, and bemoaned the fact that Mark hadn’t managed to get him his old desk back. He turned round to look at it ruefully. There was a new bloke occupying it. Straight out of college, Simon guessed. He had that youthful glow about him; enthusiasm as yet untainted by experience. Let him enjoy his moment, Simon thought cynically.

He looked around the desk he’d been parked at. It was appalling. Papers spewed all over it, two old cups of coffee even the cleaners hadn’t dared to touch, and a medley of photos peeping from between the pot plants. Simon looked at the faces staring up at him from out of the multi-coloured frames. Two mucky-faced children, a mother with a sleeping baby, a father with a child almost falling off his back, and a toddler being pulled across a patch of grass by a puppy. Well, Simon thought, it beat having a photo of a goldfish on your desk. He puffed his cheeks out at the thought. Was that all he had to show for thirty years on the planet? A photo of an animal that didn’t even respond when you came into the room?

‘So what have you been up to?’ Mandy began again, innocently enough, but Simon was immediately on his guard. She had a habit of this - talking about the weather, or holidays or some such rubbish and then
wallop!
She’d be pestering you for a date.

Whatever he did, he mustn’t let on to her that he was no longer with Felicity. He’d once made the mistake of buying Mandy a drink after work, and she’d hooked onto him as it they meant to bond for life. He’d dropped enough hints but she was one of those women who didn’t understand the word no.

‘Not much,’ he said, raking over the last ten months of his life with half a sentence.

‘Well, how’s business?’ She stretched her left hand out in front of her to examine her perfectly polished cherry-red nails. Simon felt himself squirming. He’d always got the impression that she meant to slide them down his back when she did that. Only ten minutes in the office and he was already beginning to feel the strain. How on earth would he make it to lunchtime, let alone home time? He ran a finger along the inside of his shirt collar. ‘Er - business?’ he hesitated, wishing she’d shut up and leave him alone. ‘It’s a bit slow at the moment,’ he said quietly, not wanting anyone to hear.

‘I’m sure it will take off soon,’ Mandy said. ‘You’ve always been brilliant, Si. I’m sure things will work out for you.’

He felt himself stretch his mouth into a smile quite independently of his better judgement, and immediately wanted to kick himself for doing so because she inched forward across the table.

‘Between you and me,’ she whispered conspiratorially, pouting her mouth prettily, ‘everyone else here is a waste of time. But you, Simon,’ she breathed his name out as though it were an incantation, ‘
you’re
different.’

‘I, er - ’ he stuttered, wishing she had a delete button he could hit.

Luckily, his phone went. The office workers had woken their computers up and were breaking them already.

‘I’ll be right with you,’ Simon promised the distraught sounding lady from Human Resources. ‘No - don’t touch anything just yet. I’m on my way.’ He got up from his chair and hurried out of the office, his heart beating like a jungle drum in his ears. Human Resources was on the third floor. If he took his time and visited his old mate, Brent, in Accounts on the way back, he could, he thought, be away from Mandy for at least twenty minutes.

‘Spot of lunch in the pub?’ Mandy asked hopefully as the clock approached one, giving her lips another slick coat of the letterbox-red she was so fond of.

‘No, thanks. Going to meet Fe-Felicity,’ Simon stumbled over the name.

‘But I thought she’d left you?’

Simon felt a rush of fear chill his body. Who’d told her that? Felicity, probably - in a moment of spite.

‘Where on earth did you hear that?’ Simon said, standing up hastily and scratching his head in an anxious manner.

‘Oh, you know, word gets around.’

‘Yes,’ he said knowingly, cursing living in a place the size of Whitby where everyone knows more about you than you do yourself.

‘So, if you’d like to join me for lunch,’ she said, tossing her hair back coquettishly.

Simon could feel sweat breaking out on his forehead. ‘I’ve got a few errands to run actually. You know-’

‘I can come with you if you like.’ She was on her feet in a millisecond.

‘No!’ What could he say? How could he make this woman go away? ‘I’m meeting someone.’

‘Are you?’ Mandy didn’t look convinced. ‘Well,’ she said slyly, ‘I know it’s not Felicity.’

‘No,’ he said, defeated. ‘You’re right. It’s not.’ He paused for thought. ‘It’s a little bit delicate actually. So I’d be grateful if you didn’t say anything. You know - keep things quiet for a while. I know I can trust you,’ he said, putting his best smile on in an attempt to win her over.

It worked. Mandy beamed back. ‘You can rely on me,’ she winked at him. ‘But does she know how lucky she is?’

Simon’s smile faltered as Mandy brushed passed him and wiggled her way out of the office.

Blimey, he thought, he was only half-way through Monday morning and he already felt like he’d never left the place. Thank God he was only doing holiday cover for a fortnight.

By the time Claudie came back with drinks for their department, the angels seemed to have forgotten about her big confession. Lily and Mary were arguing over who should wear the cashmere cardigan, and Bert was trying to look at Mr Woo’s paper, much to Mr Woo’s annoyance. They’d all forgotten about her. Except Jalisa.