Me and My Sisters (32 page)

29

Louise

Clara was a different child. She had stopped screaming after all her bottles. She still woke up sometimes at night, but settled back quickly. I felt so much better. I’d even started running again. I was back in control, back in charge.

I decided to go to Dublin to see my family. I wasn’t afraid to travel with Clara now that she was settled. I wanted to take her back and let her get to know her grandparents. I also wanted to hand-deliver Julie’s present and apologize in person for forgetting her fortieth birthday. Mum seemed worried about Sophie, so I’d look in on her too. Before leaving I called Gavin. I had bought him fifty pounds’ worth of credit for his mobile so he’d stop calling everyone and reversing the charges.

He answered his phone on the first ring.

‘How’s it going?’ I asked, looking out of my office window at the teeming summer rain.

‘Pretty crap. The tent leaked again last night. I thought the whole camping thing would be OK over here because you sometimes get good summers in England. But all it’s done is bloody rain. I’m sick of being wet and I can’t handle another week of berries and tofu. I need meat.’

‘Why don’t you pack it in?’

‘Because you have to fight for –’

I cut across him: ‘I know you have to fight for what you believe in. I get it. But you can do it from a dry office. You can do it via different and more effective routes, like the article you wrote. It was pretty impressive. It was well thought out and convincing. Stop living like a homeless person and start campaigning with your brain. Write more articles, do interviews on TV, film documentaries, work for Greenpeace or Amnesty or whoever you want, just get out of that bloody tent and do it properly.’

‘What about Acorn?’

‘She must be fed-up too. And if she isn’t, then the whole tree-hugging road is hers to follow. But you’ve tried it and you know it’s not for you. You don’t like it and you could be much more effective on dry land.’

‘Actually, Acorn is fed-up.’

‘So she’s not hard-core, after all.’

‘No – her brother Forest is, but she’s more like me. She likes the idea of it, she believes in the cause, but she doesn’t want to fight it from a leaky tent in a muddy field.’

‘Good for her. At least she sees sense.’

‘So what should I do?

‘Pack up and go home. It’s time to get your shit together.’

‘The thing is, we don’t have any cash.’

‘So what else is new? Look, I’ll book you both on my flight to Dublin. I’m taking Clara back on Friday. You can come and stay on Thursday night to shower and wash your clothes so Mum doesn’t have a heart attack when she sees you.’

‘Thanks, sis, I owe you one.’

‘Gavin, you owe me hundreds. Just go home and save the world with a salary.’

‘By the way, what’s up with Sophie? I’ve left loads of messages for her and I told her I wasn’t looking for cash, just calling to say hi because I had credit on my phone. Have you heard from her?’

‘No, I haven’t. Mum’s really worried about her. I’m going to call into her when I’m home. Why don’t you come with me?’

‘Cool. Has Julie forgiven you witches for forgetting her birthday?’

‘You know Julie – she can’t hold a grudge for long. She’s too nice. But she was really annoyed with me. I’ve never heard her so angry.’

‘Well, it was a big deal for her and her life is pretty stressful. Seriously, those little dudes are hard-core to look after. I’m always totally wiped out after an hour with them.’

‘Now that I have a child, I think she’s Superwoman to cope with four.’

‘Jeez, Louise, did you actually admit to a weakness?’ He laughed.

‘No, Gavin. I just said it was a challenge.’

‘A big one?’

‘Bloody huge! See you on Thursday.’

Now that I was getting sleep, work was fun again. The Gordon Hanks purchase of the Lifechange TV station was almost complete. We were just finalizing some late changes. Their head lawyer, Hamilton Goodge, had played hardball, but so had I. Gordon said I was doing a great job and that he was glad to have a ball-breaker representing him. Alex was very pleased and I was both delighted and relieved.

It was fantastic to feel like myself again. I had my life, my energy and my focus back. The deal was closing tomorrow at five and then Gordon was taking me – and Dominic, unfortunately – for celebration drinks at the Blue Bar in the Berkeley Hotel. While they would be celebrating the close, I’d secretly be celebrating the fact that my baby was finally sleeping.

That evening, as I was packing up to leave, Alex’s head popped around my door. ‘All on schedule for tomorrow?’ he asked.

‘Yes, Alex, everything is on track. We’ll close at five. I’m waiting for Lifechange’s lawyers to email me their final changes in the morning, but there won’t be any surprises. It’s all down to marginal changes of wording at this point.’

‘Excellent. You’ve done a wonderful job. It was important to me personally that this acquisition went smoothly. I would only have allowed my brother-in-law to be represented by the best. I must confess, Louise, I was becoming a little concerned that you were no longer at the top of your game. You looked very tired and you seemed somewhat below par. But I’m delighted you’ve ironed out whatever problems you had.’

‘Don’t worry, Alex, everything’s back to normal. I had a minor adjustment period, but it’s all under control now.’

‘I’m very glad to hear it. Senior partners need to be committed and dedicated. It’s part of the job description. I’m afraid it doesn’t leave a lot of time for family. I was concerned when the child was born that you would find it difficult to juggle everything, particularly as you’re the sole parent. But I can see that you’ve found a solution and I must say it’s good to have you back, firing on all cylinders.’

‘Thank you, Alex. You know how dedicated I am to my job and this firm. I would never let anything come in the way of my work.’

‘Excellent, glad to hear it. Well, carry on the good work. Gordon is really pleased with your handling of this case. You may be getting more business from him in the future.’

‘That’s very good to hear.’ I was thrilled. Alex was not someone who gave compliments lightly. I had been so worried that he was going to start sidelining me because I was a walking zombie. It was also fantastic to know Gordon was thinking of sending business my way. He only did big deals.

‘Well, goodnight, Louise,’ Alex said. ‘I look forward to a celebratory drink tomorrow.’

‘Me too.’ I beamed at him.

When I got home, Agnes had collected Clara from the crèche and was giving her a bottle of water. The apartment smelt of vomit.

‘Clara sick,’ she said, as I took my coat off.

‘What’s wrong?’

‘I collects from crèche and when I brings her home, she vomit three times. She have temperature of thirty-eight point four.’

I went over to pick Clara up. She was very pale and miserable. I touched her forehead: it was hot. I took her temperature – 38.6.

‘It’s gone up. Damn. Do you think it’s just a tummy bug?’ I kissed my daughter’s hot little cheek.

‘Yes. The lady at the crèche say that three of babies have sick tummy.’

‘What do I do?’

‘You must keep giving drinks, water and milk, and for temperature give Nurofen and Calpol and check her every one or two hours.’ Agnes picked up her bag. ‘If temperature is not going down, give her a cold bath.’

‘Is there any way you could stay and help? I’ve got a really important day tomorrow.’

‘Louise,’ she said, looking me in the eye, ‘you always having very important day.’

‘But this really is a big one.’

‘I sorry. I needs go home now.’ She kissed Clara’s forehead. ‘I will looks after baby tomorrow. She must not go crèche. I be here at seven.’

As the front door closed, Clara vomited all over me …

The alarm went off. It couldn’t be six. It just couldn’t be. I peeled my eyes open. Christ, it was six. Clara was lying across my chest, breathing deeply. During the night she had vomited four more times and her temperature had spiked up and down. I had ended up giving her a cool bath at two a.m., which had brought her temperature down considerably. We had both finally fallen asleep at three.

I carefully slid from underneath my baby, who remained fast asleep, and stood in the shower. I felt like death. As I got out, I felt my stomach rumble and threw up. Shit! Clara had given me her bug. The combination of no sleep and the bug made me feel dizzy. I grabbed hold of the sink to steady myself. Damn – of all the bloody days.

Skipping work was not an option. I slowly got dressed. Put some makeup on to hide my grey face and threw up again. When I looked up, Agnes was standing by the door watching me. ‘You have bad tummy like Clara.’

‘Yes.’ I wiped my mouth.

‘You no go to work. I minding baby, you go to bed.’

‘I can’t. I have to go in. It’s a really –’

‘Important day.’ Agnes shook her head. ‘Louise, you needs to have energy to minds Clara tonight. If you going to work, you being too tired. The baby needs Mummy. Work is not number one. Baby is number one.’

‘I know, but today work has to be number one or I won’t have a job and you won’t have a job and Clara won’t have a home.’

I left before she could lecture me any further. I felt wretched. I hailed a cab, feeling too weak to walk, but then I had to get out because I thought I was going to throw up. Typical. Just when I’d thought I had everything under control, it all went pear-shaped again. I took a deep breath and prayed to get through the day.

Dominic was waiting for me when I arrived. ‘You look ill,’ he said.

‘Good morning.’ I ignored him, walked into my office and sat down. He followed me in, chomping a bacon sandwich. The smell made me want to vomit.

‘I’ve checked the email from the Lifechange lawyers,’ he said. ‘They’ve made a few final changes to clauses seven and eleven – they’re a bit cheeky so we’ll need to go back to them on those.’

‘I’d like to go through the document now myself. I’ll call you when I’m finished.’ I dismissed Dominic and his pungent sandwich.

I opened my email, went into the amended document and scrolled down through the two clauses. Their changes were red-lined. They had altered the wording relating to the warrantee provisions and the indemnity clause. I was going to print out the documents and go through them by hand, but I was too tired and I knew that these two clauses were the only sticking points we’d had left.

This had been going on for days now: we needed to find a compromise. I decided to tackle it head-on. I called Hamilton Goodge directly and thrashed it out with him on the phone. After hours of toing and froing with draft after draft – and me retching into my wastepaper bin – we finally agreed on the exact wording of clauses seven and eleven. They sent over the amended copy. I checked it, called Hamilton to say it was all fine, and he said he’d draw up the execution versions for signing.

I sank back into my chair and gingerly sipped some water. I felt awful. Tiredness washed over me, but I felt too ill to drink coffee or eat anything to give me energy. I was utterly worn out. I looked at my watch. It was four o’clock. Thank God today was nearly over. Once the execution versions had been checked, we’d go over to Hamilton’s office where the Lifechange team and Gordon Hanks would sign, shake hands and I could go home and die.

Dominic came in for the tenth time that day. ‘Is it done yet? Gordon’s on his way. He’ll be here in twenty minutes. I’ve ordered a car to take us to Hamilton’s at four thirty.’

‘The execution copies are being printed out as we speak. We’re good to go.’

‘Do you want me to look over the final draft – second pair of eyes?’

‘No, Dominic, I don’t need a babysitter. I’ve been doing this for twenty years.’

‘OK, Louise, no need to bite. You look dreadful. Are you ill?’

‘No, it’s just been a stressful day. Excuse me a minute.’ I got up and went to the bathroom to put on some makeup. I didn’t want to scare Gordon Hanks. The reflection in the mirror was that of a ghost. I looked horrendous. I piled on makeup, blusher and bright red lipstick to try to distract from my green hue.

When I got back from the bathroom, Dominic was telling Gordon and Alex about some golf competition he had played in. Gordon looked genuinely interested. I was going to have to take up golf. Even if I had to strap Clara to my back while I did it. I needed to get into it. The older I got, the more important a networking tool it seemed.

We piled into the car and headed over to Hamilton’s office. Gordon was in a very good mood. He praised me and Dominic for our hard work and the speed with which we had finalized the paperwork. Alex smiled at both of us. I was annoyed that Dominic was basking in my limelight. I had, after all, done most of the work on the deal. He had only done a small amount, but he soaked up the credit.

‘We’ll be drinking brandy and smoking cigars tonight.’ Gordon beamed at us as I tried not to retch.

In the company boardroom, Hamilton laid the twenty documents in front of Gordon. I double-checked clauses seven and eleven and then told Gordon he was OK to sign. He went straight to the execution pages and scrawled his name across each, as did the Lifechange representatives.

We all shook hands. Hamilton then opened a bottle of champagne and we toasted the deal, wishing Gordon luck in his future with the TV station. I pretended to drink, but the smell made me nauseous.

Then we headed to the Berkeley to celebrate. I had to go along for a while as it would look really bad if I went home now, although I was almost fainting with tiredness and weak with lack of food. I was planning on staying for an hour and then slipping away. I was furious that I was feeling so awful. This was a great opportunity to stay and talk to Gordon. I could have done some schmoozing and tried to confirm future business deals. But I knew I couldn’t last much longer and bloody Dominic would be there all night, drinking and smoking and talking about golf and crawling up Gordon’s arse. Damn. Damn. Damn.

Alex had insisted on personally bringing the signed documents back to our office for safekeeping. He said he’d join us in half an hour. Gordon, Dominic and I got a nice table in the Blue Bar and Gordon ordered a bottle of Richard Hennessy cognac and some cigars, which thankfully they would have to smoke outside. I silently cheered the non-smoking ban. My stomach could not have taken cigar-smoke fumes. While they knocked back their brandies, I pretended to sip mine.