Chapter 2 #3
‘Don is pretty straightforward about doctors,’ Bella told her.
‘Not one tiny bit alternative. I’m not either, really.
Hell, I even work for some of the drug companies.
So, the boys are up-to-date with all their injections and Don’s keen to let them have Quintet as an added precaution against this outbreak.
Why?’ Bella wanted to know, ‘Do you know something?’
‘Well, you know me. I always want to be the sensible face of health reporting and I’ve done plenty of stories on anti-vaccine conspiracies and scares and they have all turned out to be false, so I’ve sort of turned into the pro-vaccine voice,’ Jo replied.
‘Unfortunate, really,’ she added, ‘Because I would love to be the journalist to break a really good story about Evil Big Pharma. That would put my name in lights.’
‘Do you want your name in lights?’ Bella wondered.
‘Well… I am a journalist. We’re always after the big story and the fame…’ But was that true, Jo wondered. ‘Oh, I don’t know,’ she said, ‘I still feel a bit undervalued by my paper maybe. And… even though we’re divorced, I would like to show Simon that sometimes my job is as important as his.’
‘Ah…’ Bella said. ‘Try not to think about Simon too much. You’re no longer defined by Simon, or your job, or your kids. And if you’re undervalued, you need to look for another job with a Big Fat Pay Cheque.’
‘Wise words,’ Jo told her.
‘Anyway, this whooping cough is bad,’ Bella went back to their original conversation. ‘The children in hospital are really ill.’
‘Yeah, we need to get our kids the new vaccine. Keep them extra safe,’ Jo said, but then she couldn’t help thinking that nothing in life was totally safe.
Not even lying fast asleep in your own bed.
She’d once done a story about a couple who’d been crushed to death by their chimney, which had fallen through the roof on top of them in the middle of the night.
But that was the problem with news reporting.
You spent most of your life thinking and writing about the bad stuff.
The phone rang and her heart shrank a little at the thought that it might be Simon, sitting in bed with Gwen – euwwwww – thinking of some aspect of her parenting he had to criticise before falling asleep. ‘Jo Randall,’ she said into the receiver.
‘Hello, Jo Randall. Can I come and see you later, Jo Randall?’ That mix of teasing and sincere, confident and unsure, sexy and funny – it was him.
‘Oh… hello there.’ Something about the way she said it caused Bella’s eyebrow to shoot up comically.
‘I’m… er… there’s someone here. A friend.’
Bella stood up, slid her feet into her mules, picked up her handbag and shook her head to indicate that she was out of there.
‘Well, actually, she’s not staying much longer,’ Jo went on.
‘Why? Am I not allowed to meet your friends? Are you embarrassed about me?’ Big tease in the voice now.
‘No, no, don’t be silly…’ She felt all wrong-footed now.
‘You’d like her. It’s just…’ Well, face it, Jo, she acknowledged, Marcus hasn’t been allowed to meet your friends, your parents, your children or anyone else because you don’t want to admit to his existence.
You don’t want to admit to being freshly separated and already involved in a casual fling, sleeping with a twenty-something chef. That headline would write itself…
My romps with five times a night chef!
‘He’s my tasty dish of the day,’ says Greenwich mum, Jo Randall, 35.
Noooo, stop it! Was her brain going to boil her life down into the worst kind of tabloid headlines forever?
‘I won’t be finished here till after eleven. Is that going to be too late?’ he asked.
It was too late. She had work tomorrow, but then again, she didn’t have to do the girls’ packed lunches and the school/nursery run because her mother would be here in the morning.
Her mother…! If Marcus could be gone before her mother arrived, then maybe it was possible.
She heard his breath rise and fall down the line. Knew how much she would like to hear that breath rise and fall over her. Against her ear, against her neck.
She hadn’t seen him for ten days and it felt like longer.
‘You’ll have to leave early,’ she warned him.
‘But can I stay up late?’ he asked. The tease.
‘I’ll see you later, then.’ Jo caught Bella’s eye and suddenly couldn’t keep the smirk from her face.
Once she’d hung up, Bella flicked open her mobile and called a cab.
‘You don’t have to go just yet,’ Jo insisted. ‘He’s not coming for another hour or so.’
‘Aha, I do so have to go. Look at you…’ Bella gave a nod in Jo’s direction.
‘You look lovely to me, my darling, but let’s face it, you’ve got to shower, shave everything, change, change again, do your hair, then mess everything up a little, as if you haven’t tried, as if you’ve just been hanging about all evening looking gorgeous. ’
Jo laughed at her. ‘I do not,’ she said. ‘Well… maybe a bit… What shall I wear?’ she asked, immediately wishing she could strip the dress from Bella’s back because it would be perfect. ‘Everything’s in the wash from our holiday.’
‘A miniskirt and frilly pants,’ Bella suggested. ‘Don’t think he’ll notice much else after that.’
‘A miniskirt! I haven’t worn a miniskirt since…’ Since when? School?!
‘You’ve got great legs,’ Bella advised her, swinging her soft, jangling suede bag over her shoulder. ‘Have fun.’
Once Jo had closed the front door on her friend, she flew round the house, clearing the kitchen, making the bed, throwing dirty laundry into the basket, then ransacking the remains of her wardrobe.
She headed to the bathroom for the makeover, ignoring her ringing phone as soon as she saw it was Simon.