The Chocolate Run (32 page)

But Renée was right about her being late – it was going on for eleven-thirty. Renée’s carrier bags clinked as she put them on the meeting table.

‘Don’t let it happen again,’ I said.

Renée laughed at my little quip, but didn’t bother to take off her white PVC coat as she headed for the middle filing cabinet along the wall. She went for the bottom drawer and fished out three of the twelve champagne flutes we kept in there for emergencies. (A champagne emergency was something like Halle Berry being in town and dropping by. We’d seem pretty amateurish if all we could offer her was warm wine in tea-stained mugs. All right, like the passport thing, it was a fantasy, but it was my fantasy and I loved it. Or, rather, I lived it.)

Renée clinked the glasses onto the meeting table, opened a carrier bag and took out a bottle of champagne. ‘You know I’ve been having a few days off recently and I’ve had a number of meetings with the big boys?’ she began, as her ultra-slender fingers unfoiled the champagne.

‘Yes,’ Martha and I replied.

‘Well, darlings, I’ve got two bits of news about that.’

She uncorked the champagne with a small pop, white wisps of vapour escaped before she poured the pale liquid into the glasses.

‘OK,’ Renée handed a glass to each of us, then picked up hers. ‘The first bit of news is that,’ she beamed, ‘I’m pregnant.’

My jaw hit the ground, scraping away the skin on my chin. I’d never thought of Renée as anything other than ‘The Boss’. And ‘She Who Must Be Obeyed’. Not a mother.

‘That’s amazing!’ I screamed.

‘Fantastic!’ Martha squealed.

‘That’s why I’ve been
such
a bitch over the past few months. First of all we were trying and it didn’t seem to be happening. I thought I’d never get pregnant and it was driving me crazy, which is why I was so on edge. And then when it finally happened, I couldn’t tell you because of the three-month thing and in that time I did become a little crazy because of my hormones.’ Renée waved her hand dismissively. ‘Anyway, I’m officially apologising for the way I was, especially “the stapler thing”, Martha, and the “I don’t know why I employed you thing”, Amber. It was my hormones and I’m sorry.

‘I want you both to be godmothers,’ Renée continued. ‘Seeing as, apart from my husband, I’ve put you two through the most incarnations of hell, I think you deserve it.’

‘Us? Haven’t you got any real friends?’ Martha said.

‘Isn’t this funny? Time was I would’ve bawled Martha out for that comment, but now,’ Renée moved her bony shoulders up and down in a shrug, ‘I don’t care.’ She grinned. ‘I guess I haven’t got any friends who are closer than you two. Even if I did, I’d still want you to be godmothers to my child. My children. You know, when I have more, you’ll be godmothers to them all.’

‘I’m so pleased for you. And honoured you want us to be godmothers,’ I said, making up for Martha’s Marthaness. ‘When’s he or she due?’

‘End of October.’

My heart skipped a beat. That was only six weeks after the Festival.

‘Which brings me to my next piece of news. It’s been agreed that Amber will take over while I’m away.’

I sprayed champagne through my mouth and nose. ‘That’s a joke, right?’

‘No. I’m not going on maternity leave until after the Festival, but I might go into labour early, so you need to be prepared. You can do the job standing on your head, I told them that. They had no real doubts, they were just worried who would replace you. So Martha’s going to get the joint title of Administrator and Senior Festival Assistant.’

Martha sprayed even more champagne.

‘We’ll then get a temp administrator, who Martha will oversee and a temp Festival Assistant. Amber, as Acting Festival Director, will oversee everyone.’

‘That’s really funny, Renée, I know they’re going to be getting someone in to oversee things,’ I laughed.

‘No they’re not,’ Renée said. ‘Don’t be so modest, Amber, you’re great at this. You’ve got so much sponsorship over the years, even when it seemed some companies weren’t interested, you found a way to wheedle cash out of them. You’re a great scheduler, you have a great imagination. You’re fantastic. You both are.’ Renée raised her glass. ‘Let’s make a toast, raise our glasses to my baby and your promotions. To us.’

Martha looked at me. I looked at Martha. ‘To us,’ we chorused. ‘I’m still not going to Cannes,’ Martha added before she drank her champagne.

I’ve been promoted
.
I
had been promoted. I’d never thought this would happen. I’d thought it was a miracle that I’d been promoted to the inflated position of Deputy Festival Director. (So had Mum, Dad and Dad2. They’d all been so grateful to Renée for giving me a job in the first place, then giving me an important-sounding title, I sometimes wondered if they’d paid her to do it.) I’d never had a real career plan. As I told Greg, my dreams, my ambitions were so impossible I never seriously considered realising them; I never thought about ‘what next’. ‘What next’ would probably be a promotion to Festival Director, but that would mean Renée wouldn’t be around and that wasn’t something I liked to think about. For all her hysteria and beauty, I did like Renée. I loved her, in fact. Loved her like the brandy liqueur truffle she was. She was a constant in my life.

I’d once been offered a job as Senior Festival Assistant with the London Film Festival, which would’ve meant a pay rise; working with more people; schmoozing with a different class of celeb; and being far more high profile but I’d turned it down because I couldn’t bear the look on Renée’s face as I went to tell her I was leaving. Naturally, when Renée pissed me off, as she often did, I wished I’d taken the job.

Now, I’d got a promotion. And Renée wasn’t going to be gone for too long. It was the perfect solution. BLOODY HELL! I’VE BEEN PROMOTED.

‘Right, you two, drink up, lunch is on me today,’ Renée said.

‘Where are we going?’ Martha asked, necking her champagne.

‘Granary Wharf ?’ Renée replied.

‘Oh yes, that’s classy enough for me . . .
Now that I’ve been promoted!
’ Martha squealed. She grabbed her bag, informed us, ‘I’m off to put me face on,’ then disappeared to the loo.

Renée’s mobile rang and she picked it up, started talking in French.

I scuttled over to my desk, snatched up the phone to spread my good news. I dialled 2, then stopped.
Who you gonna call?
I asked myself. Jen, my best friend? Or Greg, my boyfriend? Had I been going out with Sean, I would’ve called Jen, no question. She came first. I wasn’t with Sean, though, I was with Greg Walterson.

And, as Mr Walterson had pointed out, I was always putting Jen first. Since three weekends ago when he’d asked me to move in with him, I’d been more aware of how he viewed my involvement in our relationship. He’d been quiet for most of that Saturday, not sulking quiet, more sad. We’d chatted and stuff, but when he thought I wasn’t looking he’d stare off into space, a picture of heartbreak. He hadn’t brought it up since, but it was there, always there, not being talked about.

Since then, though, I knew that while I’d been happy to muddle along as we had been, that muddling along translated into him thinking I didn’t care as much for him as I did. My actions didn’t speak louder than words and, if he found out about this second, he’d see it as further proof that he wasn’t highly important in my life.

Jen. The way she’d been recently, she’d probably ask me if I could do the job. But, like not resigning because of the look on Renée’s face, I couldn’t tell Greg first because if Jen ever found out I couldn’t handle the betrayal she’d feel. As things lay I was dreading the day she’d find out about me and Greg because she was going to drown in hurt and betrayal. I knew Jen, that’s how she’d feel. Better not add to it with this small thing.

Unbidden, anger washed over me, almost dousing the flame of excitement I had burning inside me. This was a fantastic day: one of the best days of my life, and those two – my friend and my lover – had tainted it. I couldn’t enjoy the moment; I was, instead, fretting about who to call. This was what it was like with my parents. Who did I call first? Who would be pissed off that they got to hear second my degree results; that I’d got a job; that I was settling in Leeds.

I’d known an age ago that I wasn’t going to get married. Not with my family. I couldn’t contemplate getting married without Dad2, the man who’d brought me up from ages ten to eighteen, the man who called me every weekend even if Mum didn’t, being there. It’d hurt, really hurt, that he and Eric hadn’t come to my graduation ceremony because Dad1 was there. They watched it on video, but it wasn’t the same. So, even if I did believe in marriage, I’d not be able to do it because part of my family wouldn’t be there.

This was what Jen and Greg were doing to me again. Thirty and still,
still
being torn apart by two people. I didn’t like Matt, Matt didn’t like me, but I never gave Jen a hard time about putting him first. I tried to like him. I didn’t do what Jen and Greg were doing.

I pushed down the button on the phone to cut the line, then called the one person who’d be happy for me and wouldn’t be offended when I called them. Eric. I called Eric and decided to tell Jen and Greg, or Greg and Jen (whichever) when I saw them in the pub later. That way, nobody would feel left out. My parents would have to be fretted over another time.

chapter twenty-six

beware the ex

I was enveloped by the evening air as I left the building. It was the perfect evening for seeing my mates down the pub.

Me, the newly promoted woman.

A little shiver of excitement went through me every time I thought about that. Promoted. Temporarily, but still. I started down the road, walking in a haze of champagne and good food. We’d had a four-hour lunch break that had involved more champagne for Martha and me. Time back in the office had sobered me up a bit, though. We’d got proofs for the brochure cover and the repro house had somehow managed to cock it up. The dates, the number and the name were wrong – WLIFF, indeed. When the designer had sent it off it’d been fine but, somehow, between leaving her computer and getting back to us it’d gone horribly wrong.

I wandered up through town. People were out enjoying the light evening and warm air. I felt a part of them. All of them. Even though I didn’t know any of them personally, wasn’t part of their groups or families or lives, I felt like I belonged. The air was so hazy and gentle, it seemed to bind us together. I was probably smiling at people as I passed them, which would explain why I got so many odd looks. It was either my smile or I had ice cream around my mouth. I was heading for Black Prince’s Tavern. We’d managed to avoid that particular establishment since our unfortunate adventure, but not tonight. I’d been on at Greg to get Matt and Jen to meet somewhere else, but Greg had said it was Matt’s favourite pub so if he was going to convince them, he’d have to tell them what happened. (A bit of a lame excuse considering the man had talked his way into more beds in Leeds than I cared to remember, but I’d let it slide.) I smirked as I trundled down the alley towards the pub. If you thought about it, it was funny – trying to have sex with your boyfriend in public and getting caught by the police. But it was only funny now, and only to me. My humour wouldn’t stretch to laughing about it with anyone else.

I pushed open the pub door and spotted Matt’s short blond hair and Greg’s long bluey-black hair at the same round, rickety table we always sat at. I checked the bar to see if Jen was getting a round in, but there was no sign of her among the bodies stretching over the bar, trying to get the barman’s attention.

‘So, the upshot is, I’m going to buy somewhere,’ Greg was saying as I approached their table. ‘I think.’

‘You’re a good lass, you,’ Matt said, his green eyes sizing me up from my trainered feet and down from my bobbed black hair.

‘I’m a what?’ I replied, slipping off my jacket and wondering why I’d got such high praise from Matt. It’s a wonder the words didn’t stick in his throat.

‘You’re the only girl I know who could get this one to settle down,’ Matt explained.

‘I’ve
what
?!’ I said.
OK. Be calm. Don’t panic. Greg wouldn’t have told Matt about us
. Would he?

I turned to Greg, hoping my terror wasn’t plastered across my face.

‘I was telling him how you came out flat-hunting with me the other week and that by the time we’d looked at everything you’d put the buying somewhere idea into my head.’
Course he hadn’t told Matt, Matt wasn’t gagging, was he?

‘Here we go,’ Jen said, settling a tray onto the table.

I turned to smile at her and the smile froze on my face. I wasn’t actually looking at Jen. I was looking at some creature with Jen’s voice but nothing else that was Jen-like. Not only had she lost weight and started wearing designer clothes – I was still concerned about how she could afford them with a teacher’s salary and a tight toffee of a boyfriend – she’d had her hair butchered. Her sensuous, silky blonde locks that used to tumble down over her shoulders to touch the top of her back had been hacked back to just below her cheekbones, bullied straight with a blow-dryer and shaped into a bob.

The shortened hair emphasised her weight loss. Of which there had been more since I last saw her. Her skin was now clinging onto her cheekbones for dear life, scared as it was of sliding off along with the rest of her body. Some people were naturally thin, small framed and petite and they looked good with it. Jen wasn’t one of those people. She was naturally slender, not rake thin. Ill-thin. Added to the new and very ill-advised dusky pink lipstick, and heavily kohled eyes, she’d been transformed into a much older version of Jen. Almost as though she’d been aged on a computer. Shades of her mother came through in her look. Not only shades of her mother . . . her new look put me in mind of someone else. Possibly some teen’s sexy mother. The kind of mother other mothers inspected with snide envy at parents’ evenings because she was turning their teenage sons’ heads.

‘Oh, hi, Ambs, how you doing?’ Jen smiled. Her face seemed far too small for that kind of smile.

‘Great. How you doing?’ My voice was stiff, almost rigid. Nobody would guess I was talking to my best friend. I didn’t recognise her and I couldn’t speak to her normally.