‘If that wasp-bottomed sow whispers “you need some serum, sweetie” in my ear just one more time, I’m going to ram her precious Rolodex down her throat, the fucking flat-chested bitch.’
‘We’re not all lucky enough to have tits so versatile we can sling one over each shoulder and tie them together like a halterneck, you know.’
‘Sorry.’
‘Just try and be a bit more sensitive to those of us who ended up in the fried egg queue when they were giving out bosoms.’ Hopefully a bit of flattery will cheer her up a bit.
‘Well, I never asked to get any,’ she snaps. ‘You’re welcome to mine.’
Oh dear. Wasp Bum, Janice’s boss, has a terrible self-confidence problem. She has far too much of it. As do most of the other girls who work in her office. Janice won’t admit it, but I think she constantly feels she has to prove herself because she thinks she isn’t good enough.
‘I thought you were doing fantastically at work.’ I light a cigarette and deliberately waft the smoke in Fat Claire’s face. ‘You’re always being promoted and getting cars and pay rises and stuff. Look at me. Still on ten pee a word. Compared to me, you’re practically executive.’
‘That’s just the problem,’ she grumbles. ‘Being solely responsible for the anti-cellulite bum cream account isn’t as glam as it’s cracked up to be. Actually, it’s really starting to get me down.’
‘Why?’
‘Well, it seems the more I’m paid, the more work I’m expected to do.’
‘That’s ridiculous,’ I exclaim, shocked. ‘Everyone knows that when you’ve climbed your way to the top, all you have to do is boss other people about. Why don’t you just tell her to stick her serum where the sun don’t shine and get the hell out?’
‘I can’t,’ she says glumly. ‘I’ve made certain lifestyle choices. Unlike you, I’m a homeowner. I’ve got a mortgage to pay. There’s no way I can even think about giving it all up until I’ve found Filthy Rich. Then I’ll tell her exactly where she can stick her precious job. Right up her wee hole.’
‘Ouch.’
‘Oh, Katie,’ she groans. ‘What am I going to do? My job gets right on my tits, and to top it all my mother wants me to go over for “tea” on Sunday. And she doesn’t mean afternoon tea either. She means dinner. Which means I’ll be expected to sit at the top of that rancid tower block and eat something overcooked that comes with damp cabbage. And you know that makes me depressed.’
‘Do you want me to come with you?’
‘Nope. I’m going to try and get out of it if I can. Just looking at that cupboard I slept in for the first eighteen years of my life makes me want to slit my own throat.’
‘Hmmm.’
Janice’s mother—bless her—recently redecorated Janice’s old bedroom. She found copies of Elle Deco and Living Etc. at a jumble sale, then splashed out on bright paint and touchy-feely cushions in an attempt to lure Janice home a bit more often. But now that Janice has escaped, it’s going to take a bit more than a potful of Exotic Pink and a couple of sequin-sprinkled throws to drag her back to her roots. She’s got her own place now; a little oasis of clean lines and calm and she ain’t going back for no one. It’s a bit sad, really.
‘And that marriage agency I joined was a total disaster,’ she goes on.
‘Oh no.’
‘Oh yes.’ She sighs miserably. ‘So far, I’ve done breakfast with Too Short, lunch with Too Sleazy—honestly, after the way he kept grabbing his crotch I couldn’t even think of ordering the sausages—and dinner with Too Spotty.’
‘Oh dear.’
‘Then there was Cats with Too Poor—he made me go Dutch—and Les Mis with Too Married. Which just goes to show how thorough they are with their checking. I’ve wasted enough time and money on buying new outfits for that shower of losers. I’m thinking of moving on.’
‘Good.’
‘So will you come with me after work?’
‘Where? To the marriage agency? But I don’t want to get married.’
‘No. Somewhere else. Tell you when we get there. Shall we say Balham tube at six thirty sharp? By Pigeon Poo cab rank.’
It’s an order, not a question.
‘Kay.’
I might as well. I don’t have anything else to do. And now that my train of thought has been interrupted, I don’t see myself getting much more work done this morning. I might as well go to the loo for a kip.
I nip into the Ladies, stealing a furtive glance right and left as I go in to make sure I haven’t been seen, then enter a cubicle, flip down the lid, park myself firmly on top and rest my head against the cool plaster of the adjoining wall. Usually, I can stay like this for up to an hour, depending on how much traffic there is on any particular day. Sometimes, if there’s an important editorial meeting, or if a celebrity chef or TV interior designer is visiting, you get a glut of people in here at once, all chatting, squirting hairspray, caking on mascara and re-doing lipliner in preparation, and it’s almost impossible to get any shut-eye at all. But sometimes, it can be a full thirty minutes before anyone comes in and, even if someone does, I can usually manage to stay hidden. As long as I’m not snoring, of course. If I’m silent, people are lulled into a false sense of security. They think they’re alone. And it can be comforting to hear board directors and such like come in, hooting out big trumps and then leaving without washing their hands.