The Great Escape (43 page)

This faint flicker of optimism leads Kerry to picturing Rob selling their London home (although it’s on with an agency, Rob is adamant that estate agents are clueless, and that as deputy editor on a men’s magazine, he’s far better equipped to point out its numerous Unique Selling Points). Reassuring herself that the house
will
sell, and that Rob will soon join them in Shorling, Kerry turns her attentions to the large, square chocolate cake sitting solidly on the table to her right.

In contrast to her shoddy needlework skills, Kerry can decorate cakes pretty nicely, if she says so herself. Nothing fancy, no detailed scale models of Loire valley chateaux – just intricate piping that usually garners her a few brownie points at the kids’ birthday parties and partly compensates for her inability to style Mia’s unruly dark hair in a ballerina-style bun (leaving those wretched ballet classes is one bonus of moving to the south coast; Kerry suspects that Mia, who used to stomp around the hall like a navvy, is relieved too). For Freddie’s last birthday – his fifth – she replicated an entire comic strip from his beloved Tin Tin book, and for Mia’s seventh she crammed the entire Simpsons cast, including many lesser-known characters, onto a ten-inch Victoria sponge. She even created a replica magazine cover to mark Rob’s tenth anniversary of working at Mr Jones, ‘The Thinking Man’s Monthly’, as the famous tagline goes.

This cake, too, is for Rob, but Kerry can’t decide what to put on it. A simple ‘Happy 40th Darling’? No, too generic – plus, Kerry can help worrying that people who call each other Darling are usually on the brink of divorce. She could do a portrait in glace icing but, while her beloved is undeniably handsome with his striking, dark-eyed Italian looks, she wouldn’t be able to resist exaggerating the strong nose and full, curvy mouth (trying to do a
flattering
portrait on a cake would be ridiculous, surely?) and he might think she was taking the piss. He’s been a tad touchy lately, possibly due to this approaching milestone birthday when the rest of Mr Jones’ editorial team are young pups in their twenties. No – better tread carefully with this cake.

She ponders some more, deciding that if she doesn’t get a move on the icing will set in the piping bag she’s clutching, leaving her with a cone of solidified sugar. Think,
think …
Taking a deep breath, and a large sip from the glass of now tepid white wine at her side, Kerry pipes carefully, transforming the slab of cake into an elaborate book cover with delicate curlews all around its edges. In the centre, in her fanciest curly-wurly writing, she pipes:

ROBERTO TAMBINI

THIS IS YOUR CAKE!

Yep, that’s pretty good. Kerry knows he finds exclamation marks vulgar, and is tempted to add more (CAKE!!!!!!!) but manages to restrain herself. Anyway, he’ll be delighted when she turns up to surprise him tomorrow morning at their London home. He’ll be wowed by the cake, plus the smoked salmon, bagels and champagne she plans pick up on the way for a birthday brunch. The plan was for Rob to head down to Shorling late tomorrow afternoon, after showing more prospective buyers around the house. However, Kerry’s spent the past week hatching secret plans. They’ll celebrate his birthday by having a whole, much-needed child-free Saturday together in London,
and
a child-free night (she has already shaved her legs in readiness). And on Sunday morning they’ll head down to Shorling where the children will present him with home-made cards and gifts and they’ll have a big family lunch together.

It’s just what he needs, Kerry reflects, clearing up quickly, heading upstairs and peeking into Freddie and Mia’s rooms before running herself a bath. Come tomorrow, she’ll be up with the lark and tackle those name tapes with nimble needlework fingers. Then she’ll drop off Freddie and Mia at her old friend Anita’s before hopping onto that London-bound train.

This year, she feels certain, Rob’s birthday will be perfect.

Chapter two

‘Are you planning on staying here all night?’ Eddy calls good-naturedly across the spacious, pale grey carpeted office. Rob swivels his gaze from his screen to where his new editor is pulling on his jacket by the door.

‘Yep, just got a few things to tidy up here …’

‘Oh, c’mon, Rob. It’s Friday night and it’s gone nine o’clock! We’ve had a full-on week. Why don’t you come out for a quick drink? Nearly everyone else has been there since seven …’

Rob shakes his head. ‘Thanks, but I think I’ll just head off home. Got people to show round the house tomorrow, better make sure it’s ship-shape …’

Eddy makes a bemused snort. ‘Just a quick one. It’ll do you good. What’re you working on now anyway?’

‘Well, you said you wanted some alternatives to the strapline …’ Secretly, Rob strongly believes that ‘The Thinking Man’s Monthly’ does the job perfectly well, conveying the message:
Listen, mate, we run features on politicians and shiny leather briefcases. If you’re looking for topless women you’ve come to the wrong place because we are, officially, Too Posh For Boobs.
This policy pleases the magazine’s high-end advertisers and slowly dwindling, but still respectable readership of mainly straight, thirty-plus men. However, Rob can’t admit his reluctance to tamper with the tagline because clearly, Eddy thinks it’s not ‘dynamic’ enough.

Mr Jones isn’t supposed to be bloody dynamic,
he mouths silently at the screen as Eddy banters with Frank, the art director.
That’s the whole point of it. We once ran a feature on the history of Gentleman’s Relish and that’s what our readers expect.
Biting his bottom lip, and sensing tension spreading from his back and shoulders towards his neck, Rob glares at the straplines he’s managed to dredge up from the dusty recesses of his brain.

For men who means business.

The discerning man’s glossy.

It’s a man thing.

For men who think.
‘Think what?’ he mutters under his breath. ‘Think, “What the hell have they done to my favourite magazine?”’

Life, style and luxury – every month for men.
No …
for men every month. For monthly men …
God, he can barely cobble together a coherent strapline any more. In a flash of rebellion, he types:
No naked girls here – we’re too fucking refined for that.
Then he adds, smiling to himself,
Although we do feature the odd, deeply patronising sex tip which suggests that our ‘thinking’ readers aren’t actually that hot in the sack.

He sits back, about to add to his little personal rant when he realises with alarm that Eddy is hovering behind him, grinning at his screen. ‘Actually,’ he says, ‘I’m thinking of upping the sex content, Rob. We should run a few more features, practical advice, A-Z of foreplay, all the usual get-her-into-bed stuff but delivered with a punchy edge …’

Rob turns in his chair and blinks at Eddy. Try as he might, he cannot get his head around what an ‘A-Z of foreplay delivered with a punchy edge’ actually means. ‘Well,’ he says, frowning, ‘if you really think our readers –’

‘What, have sex?’ Eddy guffaws. ‘No, you’re right, Rob. The uptight little farts probably aren’t getting that much. All the more reason to help them, eh?’

‘Er, I suppose so …’

Eddy laughs and slaps a large, pink hand on Rob’s shoulder. ‘I don’t mean we’d do it tackily. It’d be really tastefully done, intelligently handled …’

Nodding sagely, as if taking all of this on board, Rob wonders if now might be a good time to grab his jacket and head home. ‘
You
could write it,’ Eddy adds.

‘Oh, I don’t know,’ Rob says quickly. ‘I’ve got a lot on and I’m sure we could find a good freelancer, an expert, I could start putting out some feelers …’

Eddy shakes his head vehemently. ‘You’re the best writer here. On all the magazines I’ve edited’ – Christ, the guy’s only about twenty-four, did he start editing moments after emerging from his mother’s womb? – ‘I’ve never come across anyone as versatile …’

‘Really?’ Rob asks, flushing a little.

‘God, yeah. You can turn your hand to anything, can’t you? Interviews, travel, food, politics … You come across as this serious, keep-things-ticking-along type, but actually you’re a pretty intelligent guy!’

‘Um, thanks, Eddy …’
Why don’t you patronise me a bit more at nine o’clock on a Friday night, arsehole in your pink shirt and Dolce & Gabanna suit …

‘… So don’t tell me you can’t knock out a monthly sex column, under a pseudonym of course, we’d have to make out it was by a woman, a sort of
what’s going on in her mind
thing …’

Rob nods mutely.

‘We could call you Miss Jones!’ Eddy announces, triggering a loud snort from Frank.

Rob blinks at his boss. ‘We could just commission an actual woman,’ he says levelly.

Eddy exhales through his nose. ‘Yeah. Well, let’s think about it. It probably needs some kind of angle. But anyway, that’s enough about work – can I drag you out for that drink or what?’

‘Yeah, come on, Miss Jones,’ Frank sniggers.

Rob takes a moment to consider what to do next. He knows he should socialise, and he did from time to time with the old team – the ones Eddy shuttled off onto less prestigious magazines within the publishing group, like Tram Enthusiast and Carp Angler (Rob has already vowed that, if he ever finds himself working on a magazine that gives away little packets of bait on the cover, he’ll be forced to find an alternative career). He is also aware that he doesn’t quite fit in with the new
dynamic
attitude which Eddy announced would replace the ‘stuffy, gentlemanly tone’ before he’d barely had chance to peel the lid off his cappuccino on his first day. So he really should make an effort and try to get to know everyone. He’s lucky to still have his job, he realises that – yet, unlike the new team with their braying voices and unwavering self-belief, at least Rob knows how to put together a magazine on time and on budget (as well as writing roughly a third of it), which is possibly why he’s still here. Rob is a grafter, a hard-working family man with a wife and two young children. It’s all very well being ‘out there’ and ‘promoting the brand’ over lavish lunches but, in his view, someone has to know what the hell’s going on in the office.

‘So? Can we drag you away from the coalface?’ Eddy is beckoning him out of the office now, with Frank looking bemused at his side.

‘Well …’ Rob hesitates before shutting down his computer. ‘I don’t see why not.’

‘Great, everyone else is down there already …’

‘Er, so where are we going?’

‘Jack’s.’

Rob nods approvingly, wondering how to negotiate this. He’s not a member of Jack’s, but feels obliged to point out that does in fact belong to another private members’ club – the one in which he and the old team used to have the odd meeting or drinks after work. But now he’s worried that even a casual mention of The Lounge will remind Eddy of his vintage, and he’ll make a mental note to bung him over to Horticultural Digest first thing on Monday morning.

When did life become so worrying? The move to the Shorling, too – that’s stressing him out. Oh, it makes sense in theory: great primary
and
secondary schools (must think ahead, right?), all that bracing sea air and a pretty house with a garden instead of their gloomy two-bedroomed terrace with a back yard no bigger than a tablecloth. But is he really ready to leave London?

‘I’m not actually a member of Jack’s,’ Rob says breezily as the three men head for the third floor lift, as if this is a mere oversight, something he’s forgotten to attend to.

‘That’s fine, you’ll be my guest.’ Eddy pushes back his geeky black glasses and jabs the lift button.

‘Great. Thanks.’ Rob’s mouth forms a tight line. The lift doors open, and they ride down in slightly awkward silence (despite the invitation, Rob suspects Eddy’s only asked him out of politeness) and it’s a relief when they step out in the early evening bustle of Shaftesbury Avenue. The warm September evening, and the good-natured hubub around him, raises Rob’s spirits a little. He experiences a small pang of missing Kerry and the kids, and reminds himself that this time tomorrow they’ll all be together in Shorling. Maybe he’ll even treat his family to special lunch on Sunday at that glass-walled seafood place, see what Freddie and Mia make of the crustacean-crushing implements.

At Jack’s, just a few streets away from the office, Eddy and Frank make a big show of being on first names with Theresa on the door, who hands Eddy her clipboard so he can sign Rob in.
Just one drink
, Rob tells himself as the three descend the narrow stairs to a basement bar where the young people go.
Just a quick one so I don’t seem like a stand-offish old bugger, then I’ll head home and give the place a good scrub and hoover and make sure yesterday’s boxers aren’t strewn on the bedroom floor. Then I’ll call Kerry …

Despite Kerry and the kids only having moved out three weeks ago (Kerry wanted them to be all settled in before school starts), the Bethnal Green house has started to look a bit sad. It’s acquired a single-man-living-alone vibe, a barely perceptible staleness which Rob notices only when showing around potential buyers and suddenly seeing it through their eyes.
I’ll clean it from top to bottom tonight,
he tells himself.
I’ll make a really good job of …
His thoughts are cut short as he follows Eddy and Frank into the bar and realises that
all
of the Mr Jones editorial team are here – even Nadine, the unnervingly attractive young temp with the cute gamine haircut who doesn’t seem to like him that much. And they’re not only just here, having a casual drink after work, but assembled before him in a rabbly semi-circle, all grinning and staring as they burst into song:
Happy birthday to you, happy birthday to you, happy birthday dear Robbeeeee …

Robbie? It sounds as if he’s in a boy band. Rob’s never been a Robbie, but never mind that because here comes a cake, ablaze with candles and dusted with sugar (clearly, Jack’s is too cool for the kind of garish iced creations Kerry makes) carried on a white circular board by a beautiful girl with red hair tumbling down her back. Shock has morphed into pleasure as someone hands Rob a drink (how did they know he likes vodka and tonic?), and his colleagues cluster around him as the cake is cut.