Leftovers (25 page)

He has a guilty look on his face. He knows I didn’t realise. He knows I am a tad crestfallen.

‘That looks like a super fun night out! Shall I get us another round?’ I say, my voice slightly higher than before.

‘You want another drink?’ he says. He’s now the one looking shocked.

‘Yeah, yeah, oh absolutely, yeah,’ I say, nodding, as if nothing whatsoever has changed, and no significant revelation has happened, or even if it has, so what? I am Mrs Super-Flirt, not Mrs Boring, after all!

I spend the next gin and tonic furiously over-compensating for the fact that I feel so humiliated. I am so relentlessly upbeat I could get a job presenting on CBeebies.

Jeff looks mildly uncomfortable throughout, and when we say goodbye his sense of relief is so palpable I could wrap my arms around it.

Is it called lying low because you only do it when you’re feeling low?

I can now confirm that it is not the worst thing in the world to lie in bed watching Ryan Gosling movies all day Saturday and most of Sunday. Unfortunately Ryan’s body of work is not quite extensive enough to last me through until Sunday night but it’s done pretty well nonetheless.
Blue Valentine
is so brilliant and so real and so sad – Michelle Williams is such an amazing actress. And
The Ides of March
, that’s a classy film, and those glasses make Ryan look so intelligent.
Crazy Stupid Love
?
I laughed out loud at that scene where they go to the mall. I didn’t realise Ryan could do funny. Ryan, Ryan, Ryan: how did you get to be so handsome and so versatile? And
Drive
? That scene in the lift where he kisses Carey Mulligan. Honestly? I thought I might pass out from Ryan’s sheer hotness.

You know what? I don’t have to feel bad about any of this.

First of all, it’s the weekend before Polly’s wedding and so I’ve managed to catch up on beauty sleep, paint my toenails, floss twice each day and exfoliate. If I’d gone to a spa I’d have paid a fortune to do those exact same things.

Second of all, that whole misunderstanding with Jeff. Yes I am still utterly humiliated to the point of feeling nauseous, though maybe that’s this quite acidic Sauvignon Blanc that’s been keeping me company.

But it was just a work crush. A big old work crush. Everyone needs a work crush to get them out of bed in the morning. Jeff doesn’t know quite how much I actually fancied him. He has no idea that I feel like a pinball, sprung onto the dating table post-Jake, being flung painfully between creepy young men, creepy old men and no men at all. He doesn’t realise that I need someone to help me shift this heartache; it’s too heavy to move on my own. How could he know that this, this latest disappointment, this Could Be Something but Actually It’s Nothing, feels like just that little bit too much to bear.

And more to the point he is
the
most outrageously flirtatious man I have ever met. He is utterly incorrigible. And I am encourageable. Or am I? Is that even a word? Well, according to Jacob’s Creek it’s a word. There really should be laws that say you are only allowed to flirt at that level once you’ve fully disclosed your relationship status. I mean really, ‘A girl like you deserves cake’ and ‘I think you’re great’. I could practically sue him for something or other, no doubt. Not that I’ll ever be in the same room with him ever again, I’ll make sure of that.

Thirdly, I haven’t only been lying in bed indulging in a Gosl-a-thon. No, I have been industrious in the extreme.

I’ve written down two awesome pasta recipes that are appropriate for a post-Jeff concussion. Pasta with crab, chilli and garlic, and pasta for when all hope is gone and all butter … I even took photos of the dishes while I cooked them, and have been teaching myself how to do a blog. It’s so straightforward I can’t believe I haven’t started one earlier. Literally all you have to do is type whatever you’re thinking and then upload photos from your phone or laptop – it is
so
easy and so much fun! I’ve called my blog ‘Some of my best friends are pasta’ and indeed that is how it seems to me this Sunday night … And another thing, did you know that De Cecco’s rigatoni number 24 is the perfect pasta shape of all time? Pretty, pretty curlicued edges, perfect length, I really love you, rigatoni …

So, life, I just want you to know these important things:

• I am productive.
  
• I am not a loser.
  
• I am not drunk.
  
• I am going back to bed now.
  

Status report:

• Get revised Celina Summer script from new team – URGENT URGENT
  
• Avoid Jeff at all costs
  
• Give up alcohol (after the wedding, and before the wedding, just not at the wedding)
  
• Book taxi for wedding
  
• Tinker with some-of-my-best-friends-are-pasta.co.uk
  

Worst. Monday. Evah …

Even if I didn’t have a violent hangover, this mauling I’m sitting through in Berenice’s office would be intolerable.

‘… You’ve destroyed Karly and Nick’s motivation … We’ll have to find another team with no time left … Personally I am deeply disappointed by what I’ve observed of your working style … For someone who was hoping to be promoted at Christmas …’

There is no point explaining to her that I’ve done them all a favour – saved Fletchers from a potential PR disaster – and that she should actually be presenting me with a magnum of champagne. And as for Karly and Nick walking off the project? That right there’s a reason to pop the cork …

‘Really, Susannah, I don’t know what you think you’re playing at, suggesting that we research scripts so late in the day. A colossal error of judgement.’

‘I didn’t actually suggest it,’ I say, realising the minute that it’s out of my mouth that I should not be drawing her attention to this point.

‘Whose idea was it then?’ she says, scornfully.

‘Well … Martin Meddlar’s …’

‘Why on earth would Martin be advising you on that level of detail?’ she says. ‘Oh. But of course you’ve been spending time with him …’

‘No! Not at all.’

‘I saw you together the other week.’

‘Berenice, I bumped into him in the lift and he asked me how it was all going.’

‘If you need advice at senior level I am here for you. My door is always open. I am your first port of call.’ Yes, and what a warm welcome you give …

She tips her head to one side and looks at me. I sense her change tack. ‘You do realise, Susannah, that Martin has certain … proclivities, don’t you?’

Yeah of course. Sam tells me everything about what goes in or up anyone in this building.

‘And he is extremely charismatic,’ she says, nodding sympathetically.

I feel my face flush with shame though I have done nothing wrong. I mean, the man could be a double for Gollum, though she’s right, Martin is charismatic. Mind you, I suppose so is Gollum, in his way.

‘Berenice. I don’t have any interest in Martin Meddlar like that.’

I actually want to say that I have no interest in him because I find him to be oleaginous and a bit scary; but regardless, she should mind her own bloody beeswax. But I can’t say that for obvious reasons. I don’t know how to pronounce oleaginous (is that g hard or soft?) I can barely spell it. And I’m not entirely clear what it means, apart from sort of slimy. And I mean, obviously I can’t tell Berenice to mind her own beeswax.

‘It’s not you, it’s him,’ she says. ‘He doesn’t just go for pretty little things … He probably looks at a thirty-six-year-old unmarried woman and sees an easy target.’

Wow. Ouch. Wowch.

‘I’m just looking out for you,’ she says. Interesting – feels quite the reverse.

‘Berenice, I’m meant to call Devron with an update now, so do you mind if I head off?’

She shakes her head and raises both hands in the air in exasperation. ‘This is a disaster.’

Tell me something I don’t know.

I need some fresh air to clear my head and work out what to do about this Celina Summer script. As I head out of the revolving doors I see my new best friend Martin standing in the street, waiting.

‘We must stop meeting like this,’ he says, giving me a kiss. We must if Berenice is spying on me from her window … ‘How did your research go, darling?’

‘You haven’t heard? Ah. Well it brought some clarity, in that all the respondents hated the scripts.’

‘Ah. Well, some you win, some you lose. At least we discovered that before we went ahead and made the ad.’

‘Exactly! But now I need a new creative team urgently, to tidy up Karly and Nick’s script, and I’m just trying to figure out how to broach the subject with Robbie …’

‘Would Andy Ashford do?’ he says. ‘We’re off to Rules now for a catch up, I’ll see how busy he is.’

‘Really? Andy Ashford would be the perfect person. But don’t I need to go through Robbie?’

‘No no, Robbie does what I tell him to. Leave it with me.’

Given that we’re shooting the biggest ad of my career next week and we have no script; given that Berenice has accused me of trying to seduce Martin Meddlar and insinuated my demotion is imminent; and given that I’ve spent the last five days having to email Jeff about work and pretend that whole thigh-squeeze thing didn’t happen last Thursday night, I’m surprisingly un-suicidal.

The only reason why is because I’m in Andy Ashford’s office. Andy is my favourite creative in the building. He’s a dream: talented, polite, genuine, accommodating, helpful – if I could work with him on every brief then I don’t think I’d drink quite so much. Even though he’s the oldest creative here by a good fifteen years, he has a vitality and a twinkle in his brown eyes that other teams lack.

He’s actually made
me
a cup of tea – unheard of! And when I sit down and deliver him the brief from hell he’s totally unfazed.

‘Have one of these, it’s elevensies,’ he says, reaching over with a pack of dark chocolate digestives as I apologise for the sixth time since entering his office for dumping this on him.

That’s another thing I love about Andy! His office! It doesn’t have Pirelli calendar girls on the wall. It doesn’t have rude words illustrated in Gothic fonts, or framed Chelsea shirts. It has posters of his favourite ads of the last fifty years, including one with my favourite line of all time. It’s from an old campaign for Rich Tea biscuits: “A drink’s too wet without one”.

Brilliant; it gives you an excuse to eat a biscuit every time you have a cup of tea.

‘So Susie, all you need me to do is tidy this up, make Celina a bit more likeable and say the pizzas are half the calories?’ I nod. ‘Does 2 p.m. sound alright?’ he says, smiling.

I go round and give him a little hug. ‘You’re a life-saver, Andy. It’s better than alright.’ Because now I can send Devron a script this afternoon that I know he’ll approve. And then I won’t have to think about work, and instead I can think about enjoying myself at the wedding.

I bump into Sam as I’m leaving the office at 6 p.m. ‘You look remarkably happy,’ he says.

‘Happy client, for once; he’s just signed off the new script,’ I say, smiling and feeling a little bit of excitement about tomorrow start to creep in.

‘You should do happy more often, Susie. It suits you.’

Today’s the big day: Polly’s wedding!

Most of my friends got married in their late twenties. Back then, every other month saw us trekking to Hampshire or across to Bath or up to Derby, to beautiful old churches, and country house hotels and marquees. Mostly my friends had classic wedding cakes, iced and white, flowers and bows. And then there was the occasional cake that was a cheese cake – not a cheesecake, but an artful piling up of cheeses, tiered to look like a cake, with jars of ‘Ben and Lucy’s Wedding Chutney’ for every guest to take home. Back then there were no wedding cakes that were stacks of cupcakes.

The last wedding I went to was four years ago, out in Cape Town. Jake’s boss, Steve-O, a confirmed bachelor, was tying the knot with a South African girl he’d met seven months beforehand. It had been a lavish affair, a different wine and wine glass with every course, champagne all night and a sparkling view out over Camps Bay. I’d worn this dress for it: a lovely jade silk number from Anthropologie. Yet standing looking at myself now in my bedroom mirror I suddenly have a horrible flashback to the way I had actually felt at that wedding: desperately unglamorous compared to all the women wearing statement jewellery, micro-clutch bags and Gina platform heels.

Weddings are all about accessories, I figure, and that’s one thing I’m rubbish at. I should have made more effort to keep on top of trends. That’s another thing that’s making me feel … not
old
, just not
young
. I need a spruce. This outfit just looks boring. Nice. But boring. Anthropologie dress and a blazer from Zara. Classic round-toed black heels. Nice. Boring. Nice. Boring. I could be going to an AGM dressed like this. It doesn’t feel fitting for the occasion.

I’ve booked an appointment at a chi-chi hairdresser in Hampstead that has fifty per cent off with Groupon. I’m due there in half an hour – my timings are already screwed as it is. But this will not do. I never thought I’d find myself in urgent need of a fascinator, but I definitely need something – something sparkly or frivolous, to put some oomph into this outfit.

Oh no! Maybe it’s actually the dress that’s wrong … Why did I not treat myself to a new dress for this wedding? I knew I should have. Why did I let those silly girls in the boutique deter me so easily from my mission? I should have gone to Westfield instead of Regent’s Park; or Selfridges one night after work last week.

And now I look at myself it is most definitely the dress that’s the problem, not just the lack of accessories. I hate this outfit,
I hate it
. I take off the blazer and fling it on the bed. This is a party, damn it! A celebration of hope and of love and of happiness, not of increased profitability and like-for-like growth.

I wade through my wardrobe …

No, too short.

Too tight, that never fitted properly first time round …