How Not to Shop (5 page)

'This is so great,' he told her as they crammed into the bare white space together, 'I am so proud of you. A major new development!'

'OK, a little less Hollywood please,' she warned, 'this is me you're talking to now. Not some snazzy producer.' She scanned his face.

'How are you?'

'I'm fine,' he said, smiling reassuringly.

'And Hector?'

'Great,' Connor answered for the partner he'd taken out to LA with him: 'getting even buffer and browner than me.'

'It's fantastic to see you,' Annie couldn't help telling him. 'I miss you. Spend every free minute you have over the next few days at my house. OK?'

Connor nodded his agreement.

'But there is a problem,' Annie went on immediately, knowing she only had a few moments this evening with the one person in her life who knew all about TV. 'It's airing on a tiny digital channel and they've brought in a third presenter. She's a name, so they have to pay her properly and I'm supposed to do this series, the whole series, for £3,600.'

Connor's face didn't change. She'd expected him to gasp with astonishment, or at the very least shoot up an eyebrow or two.

'Is there a lot less money in television than I thought?' Annie asked: 'is this something you've not told me? Is working on TV something that only people with a private income can do?'

'No! Don't be silly,' Connor replied, 'but starting salaries are low. Everyone puts up with them because they want their shot at the big time. And that's what you've got to do.' He took hold of her ponytail and ran it smoothly through his hand.

'OK,' he went on, 'have you and Ed got enough to live on for the next few months if you take this job?'

'Ha! I've been trying to work out how we can scrape through . . . maybe just. But
only just
.'

'OK. Scrape,' Connor told her. 'Scrape and work your butt off for the TV company. Something else will come of this. I promise. If the show is great, someone big will buy it. If you're fantastic, someone else will hire you. What's the worst that can happen?'

Annie noticed the transatlantic twang, not to mention vocabulary he was developing.

'The worst that can happen? Let's see,' Annie began in exasperation, 'my children can't go to St Vincent's any more, because I can't afford the fees, I lose our house because I can't afford my share of the mortgage and The Store doesn't take me back, so I'm unemployed.'

'Well . . . yes, that's all quite bad,' Connor admitted, 'but what are you honestly going to do? Give up now,' he challenged, 'before you've even started?'

'No,' Annie said, with a hint of a smile.

'No way!' Connor confirmed. 'So, I have two things to say to you: get out there with a big, successful smile on your face, because the show must go on. And never, ever make another deal without my agent.'

Helena's speech was very kind. Although Annie's boss had only been in the job for five months or so, she let everyone know what a valuable member of staff she was losing. She finished by assuring Annie that if it didn't work out in front of the camera, she'd be welcomed straight back behind the velvet curtains, and this stiffened Annie's resolve to leave. She was going to go forward now. She couldn't come back. Even if she wasn't going to work in TV beyond her three-month contract, she couldn't come straight back to this same job. It was definitely time to move on.

Annie's eyes met Paula's and suddenly her vision blurred. Then she was blubbing hopelessly into a cocktail napkin and hoping that Trish, the make-up artist, had thought to use waterproof mascara.

The goodbyes took too long and felt too sad and final. What had begun all fizz and nerves, like a wedding, was ending with weeping and hugs like a funeral. Until finally, Annie was outside on the pavement with her family around her for comfort.

Both Ed and Owen had their arms around her waist as they walked away from The Store, while Lana kept up a cheerful commentary on her impressions of the evening.

'How are you doing?' Ed wanted to know.

'I'm OK,' Annie tried not to sniffle, 'I'll be fine . . .'

'You were great,' he reminded her. 'What did Helena call you again? Annie V, queen bee of shoppers. Here – ' he held out a crumpled, but clean, man-sized tissue fished from his trouser pocket, 'I came prepared.'

'Thank you.' Annie pressed it to her eyes.

'So, TV star, are we going home by taxi or by limousine?' Ed joked.

'Oh look!' Annie began to break into a jog, 'there's the bus!'

Ed's school uniform:

Tweed jacket (can't remember)
Thin silk tie (Cancer Research)
Checked shirt (Hackett's via Annie)
Chinos (Gap)
Battered briefcase (his mum)
Total est. cost: no idea

'It's my turn to bring in the biscuits.'

'So when you say you don't know what to wear, what do you mean exactly?'

Ed was still lying in bed, although the alarm clock had gone off exactly seven minutes ago.

Annie was already up. She'd slept restlessly and woken early. She'd spent a whole forty minutes in the bathroom, twiddling with make-up and tweezers and re-doing her ponytail about twenty-seven times until it was satisfactory.

Because today was the first day of her new life. Today, at 9 a.m. sharp, a car was arriving to whisk her off to the studio where she would meet the rest of the production team and make the very first steps towards filming.

The night before, Annie had thought it was all sorted, her crucially important first outfit of the first day. She'd laid it out so carefully: the new Chloé blouse, a tight red skirt, purple tights and the black patent shoe-boots which had looked just so sexy, so slinky and so perfect then. But now, as she held the boots and the skirt up in front of the full-length bedroom mirror, she wasn't so sure. Was this outfit not a bit over the top? A bit too much for day one? There wasn't going to be any actual filming today, it was 'team talk' and 'getting to know each other' sort of stuff. That's what Finn had told her.

'You're not wavering, are you?' Ed asked, propping himself up on his elbow to get a better look at her, 'You've spent hours and hours over the past few days organizing your TV wardrobe haven't you? And weren't some very expensive purchases involved?'

'I'll be taking some of those back,' she reminded him.

'Yeah . . . might be an idea,' he agreed.

The night she'd returned from Svetlana's house with news about the TV deal and her slim salary, she'd needed to pour them both a generous glass of wine.

At first Ed had been even more shocked and disappointed than she had.

'Do you still want to do this?' he'd asked, but then answered the question himself: 'Of course you do. You've left The Store and it's a great chance for you.'

'Can we manage?' she'd wondered. 'It's just three months and I'll try and sell some stuff on eBay . . . at least make a few pounds that way. But we still have the mortgage and school fees and . . .'

'You have to give TV a try. We'll manage,' he'd assured her. 'I've got some savings that will help tide us over.'

'You have savings?' she was astonished.

As a woman who lived on the very extreme edges of her budget, whose credit card bills were a source of monthly concern, the idea of savings was just so alien. But then this was Ed, a different kind of person altogether.

'Why do I know nothing about your savings?' she'd asked.

'I wonder!' he'd answered with a smile. 'Maybe because I don't want my savings to be translated into "really great investments" like Miu Miu shoes or Hermès handbags.'

'Oh Hermès!' she'd informed him, 'Hermès is so over, only corporate lawyers carry those things.'

Facing the mirror now, with her tight orangey-red skirt in one hand and her ankle boots in the other, Annie had to confess, 'I'm having a last-minute panic. It's not so unusual, you know.'

'No,' Ed agreed. He pushed back the duvet, and went through his endearing morning ritual of yawning, stretching his arms up, then running a hand through his tangled mop of brown, curly hair before coming over to stand naked behind her.

He put his arms around her waist, kissed her neck, then they looked at each other via the mirror in front of them.

'Please stop fussing,' he told her, 'you're going to look great, because you always look great.'

'But that's because I fuss!' she told him.

'Well, I know, but try not to worry. You're going to be brilliant at this. I just know it,' he assured her, 'you're really, really good with people and you'll be a natural on TV.'

With Ed's warm hands on her stomach, Annie's churning nerves calmed. With Ed's warm hands holding her, she could almost believe his soothing words. With Ed's support, she sometimes felt she could do just about anything.

'You're great,' she told him, putting her hands over his, 'I really don't know what I would do without you.'

'You'd be just as fantastic,' he insisted.

'No, I definitely wouldn't!' she objected. 'And you need to know that.'

She held his hands tightly in hers for a few moments. 'Thank you for having so much faith in me,' she told him: 'it helps. It definitely helps.'

'Wear the boots,' he urged, 'and I love you in that skirt, it makes your bum look like a ripe . . .' he pinched her buttock to make the point.

But that was it: she dropped the skirt on the floor in horror. If the camera was going to add ten pounds to her already quite ripe enough behind, the skirt would be staying here.

'Let's just try not to burn too big a hole into my savings over the next few months,' Ed warned as he watched the skirt being tossed aside.

'No! Definitely not, I'm going to be working so hard,' she said, 'I won't have the chance to go shopping or spend anything.'

At this, Ed's eyebrows shot up and a broad smile broke over his face. 'Right well . . . this will be very interesting,' he said, certain that just because Annie didn't work in a shop any more, that was hardly going to stop her being seduced by beautiful things.

'And no cheating with your credit cards,' he warned. 'You're on a tiny budget!'

With a parting kiss, he went to take a shower, leaving Annie, still in a frenzy of indecision, in front of the mirror.

'KIDS!' she directed a loud shout at the ceiling, because Owen and Lana had attic bedrooms directly above, 'GET UP!'

It was ten past eight when Ed, Lana and Owen were finally dressed, breakfasted and ready to walk to school. Annie stood at the front door to kiss each of them goodbye.

Ed was first in his music teacher uniform of tweedy jacket, thin silk tie, slightly too baggy chinos, holding a battered brown briefcase. His hair was still all over the place because he liked it that way but Annie made him stand still so she could take off his little gold-rimmed glasses and clean them for him.

'C'mon,' he hurried her, 'I have to get to the staffroom early today . . .'

'Ooooh, the headmaster's handing out big new promotions,' she winked at him.

'No, it's my turn to bring in the biscuits.'

'Ah.'