The Dish (21 page)

My hand freezes inches from the warm flatbread.
Honourable
? He might as well be speaking Farsi for all the sense he’s making. I have never dated a man of honour. If a guy on Tinder is not texting me about
a threesome before we’ve even met for a coffee I now assume he’s asexual.

‘Don’t look so dumbstruck,’ says Will.

‘Will? Have you ever tried dating men in London?’ I say, ripping a piece of bread and popping it into my mouth.

‘Not recently . . .’

‘Don’t. I have: online, offline, friends of Jess . . . I can safely say the concept of honour is not one I’ve encountered in the last four long years.’

‘Soph, tell her to stop being a cynic. Perhaps this guy wants to get to know you first? Perhaps he doesn’t know if you’re interested in him?’ he says, looking shyly at Sophie.

‘This one took forever to make a move,’ she says.

‘
This one
was being a gentleman,’ says Will, taking her hand.

‘You two worked together, it’s different – you have to wait until the Christmas party to jump colleagues.
Why do you think Adam isn’t asking to see me after he finishes his shift?’

‘You’d find a two a.m. booty call more romantic?’ says Sophie.

‘I’d find it more normal!’

‘Just give him a chance, it’s only been two weeks,’ says Will, moving the plates aside so the waiter can set down the metal platter of chargrilled chicken and lamb. ‘I’m popping to the loo, if you’re still talking about this when
I return I’m going into the back room to watch football.’

‘It’s probably a good thing you’re not getting a chance to shag him yet,’ says Sophie. ‘You might get lost in the hot sex cloud, all that oxytencin.’

‘The spot cream?’

‘Oxycontin, oxytocin, floods your brain, clouds your judgement.’

‘Maybe you’re right. Oh my God, and I finally ate his food!’ I whisper, though Will is nowhere within
earshot.

‘And?’

‘Ridiculous. Literally the best thing I’ve eaten this year, better than the crab ravioli at Galvin, better than that beautiful prawn dish we had at Moro . . .’

‘He pulled out all the stops for you!’

‘Soph, it was beans on toast and an omelette. But he’d sweated the background veg in the beans for
four hours
– most people would do that for twenty minutes.
That’s a genius idea,
but you’d only do it if you were a perfectionist. And his plating, this oil he put on top – the colour of it was like an emerald – his ideas, the execution . . . flawless.’

‘So you’re going back?’ says Sophie, refilling our glasses to the brim and in the process creating three red circles on the paper tablecloth.

‘I have to. I just hope Roger won’t freak . . .’

‘Why?’

‘Well . . . in theory
he might be OK, some American newspapers send their critics back multiple times – but they have bigger budgets – and I’m talking about a restaurant that charges sixteen pounds for eight quadruple cooked chips . . .’

‘Ouch.’

‘But it’s more that. I made such a fuss about having boundaries between personal relationships and work . . .’

‘But if you slate the food and every other critic praises
it, won’t that be weird?’

‘Exactly – it’s my credibility on the line too.’

‘What are you whispering about?’ says Will, sitting back down, eyebrows shooting north as he sees we’ve devoured all of the lamb and half the chicken.

‘There’s loads of green pepper left,’ says Sophie.

‘Yeah, I came here for the green pepper,’ he says, laughing.

‘I didn’t even tell you –
I met the mother,
’ I say. ‘I
was saying goodbye and she turned up . . .’

‘And?’

‘Lovely – one of those women who instantly makes you feel comfortable.’ My ex mother-in-law used to blanch if I didn’t move my soup spoon to the outer edge of the bowl while eating her consommé. ‘And she knew about me!’

‘He’s told her about you,’ says Sophie, clasping her hands to her chest and looking at Will. ‘Told the mother, already! So
did you have a cup of tea?’

‘Well, no. It was kind of weird. She said she’d love to meet me properly, but said they had family matters to talk about, and gave me a look that was kind of . . . I don’t know . . .’

‘Enough with the paranoia. Meanwhile, guess who’s put in an order for their “Fortieth” with me?’

‘Give me a clue.’

‘Dolly-bird celebrity chef, face of Fletchers’ Fat Bird range . .
.’

‘If Celina Summer is forty, I’m still doing my GCSEs – do GCSEs even exist anymore?’

‘I’m not sure if I should take the job,’ she says, frowning.

‘Tell her to stop being an idiot,’ says Will.

‘It’s not the fact she’s insufferably smug and pretends to eat like a normal woman but doesn’t. It’s two things – firstly, she wants New Ideas – which she’s blatantly going to steal . . .’

‘Fletchers
rip off your ideas every six months anyway,’ says Will. ‘All they have to do is look on your website –
sincerest form of flattery
and all that.’

‘I’m a one-woman business and they’re a giant supermarket, so I don’t see it that way – but it’s not just that. It’s three hundred guests, August Bank Holiday – plus goody bags, it’s full on.’

‘And that’s why she’s offering you a healthy chunk of change,’
says Will. ‘And you’ll get new clients.’

‘I can’t do it on my own, though.’

‘We’ll help you,’ I say.

‘But I’ll need full-time help the whole month before. It’s massive on top of the day job.’

‘Say yes now, worry about it later,’ says Will.

‘You would say that,’ she says, laughing. ‘You’re a man.’

A
fter dinner the three of us walk home together, stuffed with carbs, humming with red wine.
How wonderful to eat like a king, then lie down next to someone you love, I think, as I kiss them goodbye outside our front doors.

How un-wonderful to rattle round your landlady’s bathroom with mulberry-stained lips, knocking over tubes of overpriced serums, playing over the embarrassments of your afternoon – all three of them.

God, that ‘I love you’ mime was awkward.

And Adam’s mum turning
up when we were snogging on the doorstep was not ideal either, as first impressions go – but she seemed cool about it.

But I am most tormented by the shame of grilling him about another woman. It was utterly insecure. I should have hidden that side of myself better – there’s nothing more unattractive than neediness.

I drag a warm, wet flannel across my face, wipe it clean.

He is not Tom.

Not all men are liars.

The only way I’ll stay sane is if I trust him.

‘Good weekend, Roger?’ I say, as we’re heading to the boardroom on Monday morning.

‘I finally managed to FaceTime Gemma at midnight,’ he says, wearily. ‘She’s found herself a job on this tiny island they’re staying on – some sort of a beach bar . . .’

‘Oh Roger, it’s only for a few months. At least she’s actually working.’ Rather than scrounging off you, like she normally does. ‘Listen
– can I have a quick word with you after Conference?’

‘If we make it out alive.’

Heather and Sandra are already in the room, heads close in conversation, and Azeem and Jonesy turn up a minute after Roger and I do. Before I’ve even finished pouring the coffee, Jonesy’s chomping at the bit. ‘So where are we at with the cover, on or off?’

‘I thought I’d been extremely clear about the fact this
issue will be embargoed till day of sale if Bechdel’s on the cover?’ says Sandra, frost in her voice. ‘Bechdel is represented by Manderbys. If Manderbys get wind of it they’ll slap an injunction on us before it’s out the door. Obviously we’ll need to be watertight on leaks, it’ll be going into the chain at the last minute – no internal copies.’

‘Yeah I know all that, Sandra, I’m not a novice
– what I’m asking is – are we running the Bechdel or not?’

‘We’ve been through the revised draft on Friday,’ says Heather.

‘There are half a dozen allegations that still need going over with a fine-tooth comb,’ says Roger, his hand inadvertently forming a fist, which taps his mouth.

‘We’re not yet in a position to call it either way,’ says Sandra, straightening up in her chair. ‘Currently the
risk of litigation is too high. The possible resource in cash and time that a libel case from the Bechdel camp would demand is prohibitive. The last time he took a paper to court it was a five-year battle. He lost, but we cannot afford to enter those sort of battles.’

‘If we can’t get the former account director at the charity to talk on record, we can’t touch the charity stuff,’ says Heather.

‘Why won’t she talk?’ says Jonesy.

‘Her boyfriend still works for Bechdel, she’s scared it’ll come back on him.’

‘She’s probably right,’ says Roger, shaking his head in disgust. ‘What else have we got?’ He picks up a piece of paper from his file and I hand him his glasses as he scans down the list. ‘Right – charity fraud, still relying on an un-named source,’ he says. ‘The proclivities –Heather,
no way the ex-wife will be persuaded to talk?’

‘Sitting by the pool in Monaco with eighteen million reasons to stay loyal.’

‘But we could still get the lifestyle angle from the London or Oxfordshire staff?’

‘Hearing back from the chauffeur’s lawyer at three p.m.,’ says Heather. ‘If we get the chauffeur, we get the housekeeper – then we get the Berkeley Square townhouse. We’ve got all the transcripts,
it’s just not on the record yet.’

‘We’ve got the hotel on record, so we’ve got the escorts, and at least four household names.’ Roger throws the list back down on his desk. ‘Right – we start with the money, that’s watertight. The property portfolio, the trading anomalies and the tax avoidance. You put that lot together, that’s front-page news in itself, and more than anyone’s got on him before.
We’ve got witness corroboration and the ex-employee testimonial. Work on the basis that’s all we’re getting and let me see how that looks in layout,’ he says.

Roger, Sandra, Heather and Jonesy spend the next twenty minutes having a heated debate about whether they should do a sidebar on Bechdel’s younger brother. He’s MD of one of the biggest ad agencies in London – and allegedly has two ex-members
of staff on permanent paid leave, nursing toddlers who look remarkably like him, poor things. His wife is in the shadow cabinet, and is vehemently pro tax breaks for
traditional families
.

‘I don’t give a monkey’s where he puts his todger,’ says Roger, ‘it’s about the wife’s hypocrisy in lambasting single mothers, when her husband’s affairs aren’t clean.’

‘The wife possibly doesn’t know?’ I say.

‘The wife always knows – at some level,’ says Sandra.

‘If you attack the brother you’ve got twenty blue chip clients at his agency who’ll pull their bleeding campaigns from the mag for the rest of the year,’ says Jonesy.

‘So shall we just run editorials that praise the scions of our most corrupt media dynasties? Perhaps we should print a hagiography of Stalin while we’re at it?’ says Roger.

‘What the fuck’s a hagiography?’ says Jonesy.

‘A book about Sandra,’ Azeem whispers to me.

‘Roger,’ I say, checking my watch. ‘You’ve got a twelve thirty with Sandra and the auditors – they’re probably waiting in reception. Do you want me to go and babysit them for twenty minutes?’

‘No, it’s fine,’ he says. ‘Team – let’s take a view tomorrow. If we get the housekeeper and the chauffeur, we drop
the sidebar on the brother, if not, Jonesy, you’d better polish your shoes because you’ll be pounding those streets, hustling. Laura, go fetch them – and grab me a cup of sweet coffee on the way back up, I need some caffeine.’

‘You look exhausted,’ I say, quietly.

He waves me away. ‘Time difference, Thailand. Stop fussing.’

It
’s peculiar, it’s 2.15 p.m. and Roger should be out of the auditors’
meeting he was just in with Sandra and Jonesy, but there’s no sign of him, even though The Laminator’s back at her desk crunching on Ryvita, and I saw Jonesy leave for a lunch a while ago.

I do a thorough check of the building, try Roger’s mobile twice, then pop round the corner to The Eagle where he sometimes disappears for a pint after a confab with Jonesy – but he’s nowhere. Eventually I’m
forced to ask Sandra if she knows his whereabouts.

‘Last time I looked at your job spec you were in charge of his diary,’ she says, scraping a smidgen more fish paste over her cracker.

‘Sandra he’s meant to be in his office, and he’s got a two-thirty with the Press Association. You were just with him earlier?’

She shrugs.

‘Did he say where he was off to after the meeting?’ Perhaps he went
to buy a sandwich, though it’s hardly like Roger to do the practical things like feed himself. He might have popped out for some fresh air.

An hour later he texts me:

Can you shift today’s appts to tmrw please?

You’re at a seminar all day tomorrow. Where are you, anyway?

Shift the appts to Wednesday then, ta. Fancied a round of golf.

Which is sort of a strange message.

Because not only has
it started to rain. But when I go back into his office to double-check, I see his golf bag, standing in the corner in its usual resting place.

Roger is at an all day Governance seminar on Tuesday but he phones at noon.

‘Manning the fort, Parker?’ he says, cheerily.

‘It’s so quiet – Heather and Azeem are up in planning, Jonesy’s out to lunch.’

‘Hold the front page . . . Any messages?’

‘Elizabeth rang about Gemma’s allowance, and the Head of the BRC wants to move your lunch to next week, if you’re happy, I’ll change the booking?’

‘Uh-huh.’

‘And . . . Dr Fabelman’s secretary rang. You left your umbrella in their waiting room . . .’

There’s a pause. ‘You wanted to ask me something yesterday? We never got round to it.’

‘Oh – it can wait, I’d rather ask you in person. Though actually – would you mind if I took a couple of hours off this afternoon? There’s something I’d like to do.’

About nine months after I started writing
The Dish, shortly after I won my first award, I received an anonymous note in the post: it wasn’t a love letter. It said I was totally unqualified and was doing a shit job: ‘Stuffing your gob for a living isn’t hard
.
’ Of course they were right: my job isn’t hard – being a nurse or a soldier is hard. Being a food critic is not
entirely
easy though.