Chapter 2 Honor
Honor
When my driver and security detail, Di, pulls up outside Elaine William’s immaculate townhouse, I physically sag with relief.
It’s been a bloody nightmare of a day. I’ve tasked my executive assistant, Lydia, with researching at-home and hospice care options for Mum.
The secret to my efficiency, and kind-of sanity, is having very firm boundaries around the best use of my time.
Giving Mum all the emotional support she needs, and taking time to process my own feelings, are things I need to make time for. Researching logistics is not.
Still, it’s hard to compartmentalise my worries over Mum and tend to everything else.
The paps trailed us when I dropped Rollo off at school this morning in South Ken.
Then they trailed us to my offices in Soho.
Jackson’s been in Manchester today with Leila, his co-star, doing some BBC interview, and the cosiness of their body language on the breakfast TV sofa has sent the tabloids into a frenzy.
What is it about that man and breakfast TV sofas?
We met on an identical sofa, in an identical TV studio, when I was hosting one of the biggest breakfast shows in the UK and he was my very sexy guest. Clearly, my otherwise intelligent husband has a short memory, because Leila’s doe-eyed face and his best Blue Steel impression stare out at me side-by-side from this afternoon’s Evening Standard, which Di has unhelpfully left on the back seat of the Mercedes for me.
I turn the paper over. I can’t deny Leila is gorgeous.
Jackson’s a sucker for a fragile look and a vulnerable vibe.
I suspect I had it when I met him. Though he’s made me far more vulnerable and fragile after years of infidelity.
And that teacher—Jenna—had it in spades.
He seems to confuse his on-screen and off-screen identities.
He’s always the action hero: never able to ignore a damsel in distress.
‘There are still some paps around, babe,’ Di announces cheerfully. She walks around the car to open the door for me, and as I step out onto the leafy, tree-lined street off High Street Kensington, there’s the collective click of several cameras and the sound of my name.
‘Honor! Over ‘ere, love!’
‘How’s your day goin’, Honor?’
‘What do you think of your bloke doing the dirty on you again?’
I ignore the shouts. Keep my head down. Carefully pick my way up Elaine’s perfectly even sandstone steps.
I’m not sure what’s happened to our little arrangement with the press, but everyone seems to regard Jackson and Leila as fair game.
Jackson’s unlikely to want to cooperate in shutting it down; it’s brilliant publicity for the show ahead of its launch this autumn.
At least I look perfectly groomed for the paps.
One of the perks of owning a cosmetics brand is that I have makeup artists on hand at all times.
Before I left the office, I dictated my answers to a US Vogue interview while submitting to a quick face mask and a dewy, iridescent makeup look suitable for this balmy summer evening.
A uniformed server answers the door almost immediately and takes me through to Elaine’s beautiful double living room on the upper ground floor. We take it in turns to host these soirees. Experience has taught too many of us that our secrets are safest behind the closed doors of private residences.
The sound of raucous laughter that strikes me immediately is at odds with the decorous surroundings.
It appears a few of the others have already arrived.
Stacey’s guffaw stands out and has the instant effect of helping me mentally change gears.
The paps are outside, and that’s where they’ll stay.
I’m here now; I’m with my girls and an evening of laughter and fellowship awaits me, as well as heavenly champagne, thanks to the drinks business Elaine runs with her husband.
The raucousness reminds me of that fabulous scene in Bridgerton where the newly wed Daphne arrives at Lady Danbury’s soiree for married women and discovers that, behind closed doors, they can leave their carefully curated public personas behind and do whatever the hell they like.
My friends and I are all in different fields, but the parallels between us are striking.
We’ve known each other for years and we meet up monthly, although our schedules are booked up months in advance and closed to mere mortals, because we find each other’s company highly gratifying and endlessly entertaining.
These women are like a tonic. God knows I need that tonight.
I take a full champagne flute from the server and make my way over to the others, who are gathered towards the back of the room, near Elaine’s double doors, which are open onto the terrace overlooking the communal garden behind them.
The blossom is long gone, but the French doors frame a perfectly verdant square of a view.
Elaine, always the consummate hostess, notices me first and breaks away to kiss me.
Elaine Williams is the oldest in the group by at least a couple of decades, but her perfectly silvered coiffeur is as elegant as those of anyone else in the room.
She looks as though she’s come straight from the salon.
She puts a hand on my arm. ‘How are you doing, my dear? I’m so sorry about the papers. And I’m even sorrier about your mother. You poor little darling.’
The kind words make my eyes sting a little. Elaine does have a maternal vibe.
‘Typical of Jackson to add to your plate when it’s so piled high already.
’ She tuts. ‘I hope you don’t mind, but I’ve asked my son, Noah, to stop by this evening.
Just briefly—he’s a palliative care doctor.
I thought he might be a useful person for you to meet.
Runs his own hospice. No pressure, but he may be able to steer you in the right direction. ’
‘Goodness. Thank you. That would be—great.’ Right now, I’ll take all the handholding and free advice I can from people like Elaine and her family.
I vaguely knew Elaine’s son was a doctor, but the information failed to settle in my brain in the way that most information that isn’t directly relevant to me does.
‘Excellent. Now, get stuck into your bubbles, and come join in the fun. Stacey’s very excited to be here, as you can hear.’ Elaine’s tone is dry.
Stacey is indeed on flying form. I’ve known her for years, through Evelyn and Astrid, both of whom are here tonight.
Stacey is American, an extremely impressive former Rhodes scholar who runs a FinTech company.
She left her husband, Jack, a couple of years back, and fell madly in love with the guy who should have been her plastic surgeon, Ariel Bloch.
She and Ariel seem to do a great job of juggling two big jobs, as well as Stacey and Jack’s four kids—four! I can’t even imagine it—and Ariel’s two. She’s a gorgeous, glossy blonde with an effervescent personality. She’s clearly living up to her role as life and soul of the party tonight.
‘Hey girl!’ She throws her arms around me and gives me a smacker on the cheek. Stacey has never quite adopted the European double-kiss.
‘Honor was the last to arrive,’ Elaine interjects. ‘Shall we do our thing, and then we can have some fun?’ She taps a knife against her flute, and the other women drift towards them. ‘It’s time, ladies.’
We have a little tradition—it sets the tone every time we get together.
Everyone takes a second to say one thing that’s bothering them, something they’re not likely to discuss with their broader circles.
It reminds us we all hold each other’s confidence in our hands, but on a more practical level, it means we know what’s got inside everyone’s head.
Sometimes we can help each other out—or help each other drink through it.
‘I’ll go first,’ Stacey says. ‘A guy at work is being a jackass—my COO. I think he has to go, but he’s been at Lokk since the start. It’ll be tough.’
She holds up her glass, and we raise ours, murmuring encouragement.
‘You want to go next, Honor?’ Astrid Carmichael asks.
She’s the perfect embodiment of her designer fashion brand; her platinum blonde hair is swept back in a chignon and she’s in ankle-length, dove-grey silk pleats.
She’s been a great friend to me over the years and is well versed in Jackson’s indiscretions.
I take a deep breath. Here goes. ‘Right. My current headaches are that my mum’s been diagnosed with terminal pancreatic cancer, just this week, and as the entire world is aware, Jackson appears to be shagging his gorgeous co-star from Vet, and the paps won’t give me or the kids a moment of peace.’
I pinch the bridge of my nose as the others respond in horror. Stacey lunges forward and envelops me in a huge, heavenly-scented hug.
‘That guy is such a douche. I know he’s divine, and he’s Jackson James for chrissakes, but he needs to grow the fuck up and remember he has a wife and kids.
Get your nasty little pit-bull-fixer-guy to take care of it for you, and I am so sorry to hear about your mom, sweetie.
That’s just awful. What do you need—what we can we do to help? ’
‘Thanks.’ It’s lovely to be held and heard, and to be in this safe place with my girls. I feel my shoulders drop a little as Stacey releases me. ‘Ally and I are still reeling, to be honest. As is Mum. But Elaine said her son’s going to drop in later—he runs a hospice, apparently.’
‘Oh, yes.’ Stacey winks at Elaine. ‘The delicious Dr Noah. He’s just what you guys need. Seriously, wait till you see him.’
‘Keep your paws off my darling son, Stacey Fisher.’ Elaine’s tone is steely, but she returns the wink.
We work our way around the circle of women.
Siobhan Quinn, event planner extraordinaire, has split up from her husband and is struggling to cope with the huge onslaught of events requests that have popped up from so many top brands as restrictions have eased and face-to-face socialising has become possible again.
Astrid’s dealing with a similar ramp-up in demand for her clothes, which is a high-quality problem.
And wonderful Evelyn Macleod, who I secretly hero-worship, just beams and hugs her glass and tells us she has everything under control.
Evelyn is one of the most impressive humans I know.
She was one half of a celebrity power couple—a bit like me and Jackson—when her very attractive husband, Seb Macleod, got outed as gay by the paps a couple of years ago.
Evelyn and her little boy fled down to her friends’ gorgeous resort, Sorrel Farm, in Kent, and promptly fell madly in love with the farm’s even more gorgeous farm manager, Angus.
She and Angus are now married, and last year they added a baby daughter to their family.
Evelyn is now the farm’s Commercial Director and is in the process of turning it into a mega-brand. It’s one of my favourite retreats.
I’m in awe of how endlessly smiley and upbeat Evelyn always seems to be, in the face of everything life has thrown at her in the past few years.
Her personality seems to be in stark contrast to mine.
I feel like a bag of nerves, even at the best of times.
Neurotic is how I’ve been described in the press.
Fragile. More than once. And I know I do a worse job than others of holding it together, of juggling all the balls, of wearing my privilege lightly and shrugging off the first-world problems and worries and scandals that instead seem to bear down on me all too heavily.
But life seems particularly exhausting at the moment, and as I stand there and drink in the heady company of these incredible women, it’s easy to feel fragile and neurotic and inadequate and bloody exhausted.
Despite how much I need this evening and this camaraderie (and this champagne), I also need a teeny little break to catch my breath.
Gather my thoughts. Be totally alone. And so, after a few minutes of fielding lovely and well-meaning commiserations about Mum and Jackson, I slip off for a moment, to the little powder room downstairs, to pull myself together.