Chapter 2
The next morning, I got to the staff car park at seven-thirty and waited in my car for Anna to arrive.
I planned to intercept her before she reached the office.
Whatever she had to say, I’d rather no one overheard, especially Lee – not that he ever turned up before nine.
By the time her car pulled in, half an hour later, I was cold and my muscles stiff, but I rushed to greet her.
‘Anna! Hi!’
‘Jesus, Maggie.’ Anna clutched her chest as she climbed out. ‘You scared the life out of me.’
‘Sorry, sorry, it’s … well, you know what it is.’ I rubbed my arms to get some life back into them. ‘I’ve been on tenterhooks since yesterday. And when you didn’t answer my call—’
Anna shut the driver’s door and walked to the passenger side to retrieve her laptop bag.
‘Or your emails, or your WhatsApps or texts, or the voice note you sent me four hours ago which woke me up.’ I winced; not getting enough sleep was her main topic of conversation after the diet of her six-year-old and her husband’s inability to stack the dishwasher. ‘Because I said I’d see you at nine.’
‘You did, I’m sorry.’ I registered that Anna wasn’t making eye contact. Not a good sign. ‘I needed to know what happened after I left. And what’s going to happen to the contract.’ I swallowed hard. ‘And to me.’
Anna looked at me properly. ‘You look like shit.’
No surprise there. I hadn’t even bothered going to bed.
The idea of lying in the dark staring at the ceiling and dwelling on my increasingly pointless future had been too depressing.
Instead, I’d brought my duvet to the sofa, made a plate of toast and watched every single video I possessed of Bronte and cried and laughed and cried some more until my tears ran dry.
‘I know. A lump of very repentant shit.’
She cracked a smile. ‘Come on, get in my car. We’ll go to the drive-through and get coffees.’
I was desperately in need of a caffeine hit, but I glanced over my shoulder at the office. ‘Shouldn’t we …?’
It was past eight o’ clock. I hadn’t arrived at work this late since Bronte had left home and gone to university. That first hour of the morning when the corridors were quiet and nobody bothered me was my most productive. Now I’d be behind for the entire day. Assuming, that was, I still had a job.
‘No we should not.’ Anna jerked her head at the car. ‘In. We can talk on the way.’
I did as I was told, scenario after disastrous scenario playing out in my head as she got in.
I must be getting fired, why else wouldn’t she even want me in the building?
Did she think I was dangerous? Or was this her way of sparing me the humiliation of being dismissed in her office with other employees within earshot?
Or perhaps she thought it would be easier to have this conversation while she was driving so that she didn’t have to look me in the eye while she cut me adrift from my job – my only remaining lifeline, the frame around which I shaped my existence.
‘Okay,’ she said, once she’d driven out of the car park. ‘What’s going on?’
‘Nothing, honestly,’ I protested.
‘Seriously?’ Anna stared at me grimly. ‘After yesterday’s antics, you’re going with nothing ?’
I’d told her as soon as I came back after a short stint of compassionate leave that I didn’t want to talk about Bronte at work, that it was the only way for me to maintain a professional attitude without breaking down every five minutes.
But it looked as if I wasn’t going to be able to get away without giving her something.
‘The bog-standard losing your twenty-three-year-old daughter stuff.’ I stared out of the window, avoiding her eye.
‘Want to talk about it?’ she asked gently.
I felt a lump in my throat. ‘Bronte would have been going travelling about now. I can’t stop thinking about what should have been the most exciting time of her life and instead …’
‘Oh bloody hell. I’m sorry.’
‘Instead, people like Kevin Armstrong behave like arseholes, treating drinking and driving like it’s a joke, oblivious to the destruction they cause.’
‘I totally get it.’ Anna nodded. ‘It’s natural to be angry. Anger is part of the grieving process. When my granddad died, I—’
And this was why I didn’t want to talk about Bronte. Because other people felt obliged to share their own stories – which nine times out of ten did not compare to mine at all. Her granddad , for heaven’s sake.
‘I’m aware of the grieving process,’ I interrupted. ‘I’m fine. Of course, I’m sad, but I’m dealing with it.’
‘I don’t think you’re dealing with it at all.’
‘You sound like my counsellor.’
‘So you are getting therapy?’ She looked pleased. ‘That’s great.’
‘No, of course I’m not.’ I folded my arms. ‘I already know what they’d say, and I don’t need to hear it.’
An uneasy silence descended.
‘Look,’ Anna began again, ‘I’m under pressure from the board.’
‘Don’t fire me,’ I blurted out. ‘I know what I did was bad.’
She gave me a sideways look.
‘Okay, worse than bad, it was unforgivable.’ My stomach lurched as I realised the hole I was digging. ‘No, unacceptable . That was what I meant.’
‘Maggie, I appreciate you have experienced a major trauma, but we cannot have our staff, especially senior managers, verbally and physically abusing clients.’
‘Of course not, and I regret what I did.’ I didn’t regret it at all, even now, faced with losing my job. ‘I promise it will never happen again.’
‘Damn right it won’t.’
My shoulders slumped. Of course it would never happen again – because I wouldn’t get the chance. I was out of a job.
We arrived at the drive-through and Anna pulled the car up to the hatch and shouted her order. ‘Flat white with oat milk, please. Maggie, what do you want?’
‘A second chance?’ I said meekly.
She raised her eyebrows and waited.
‘A large cappuccino with an extra shot, please,’ I supplied.
‘Coffee fiend,’ Anna said, chuckling. She paid and we pulled up to the next window to collect our drinks.
‘So? What happened with Kevin after I left?’ I took the lid off mine to blow on it.
Anna put hers in the cup holder in the central console and we headed out of the car park.
‘We went back inside the pub. I got him another drink – coffee, before you ask – and he demanded a plaster for his cut hand. Honestly, you’d have thought it was severed at the wrist, the way he was cradling it and sucking it any time anyone went near him.
I offered to drive him anywhere he wanted.
Assured him that ShopSwift would cover all his expenses getting the keys replaced, et cetera. ’
‘I’m sorry you had to deal with my mess.’ I did feel guilty about that; Anna would have had to arrange for someone else to collect her son from after-school club because of me.
‘He called his wife to bring him his spare car keys. She was fuming.’ Anna let out a giggle. ‘She was only little, but my God she had a good set of lungs on her.’
‘Poor woman, being married to him,’ I mumbled.
‘She took one look at Kevin, sniffed his breath and let rip. I got the impression it wasn’t the first time she’d been called to rescue him. Before he had a chance to protest, she’d frogmarched him outside and bundled him into her car. I wouldn’t have wanted to be in his shoes on the drive home.’
I conceded a smile. Whatever came next for me, at least I’d prevented another accident caused by too much booze and not enough common sense.
‘I guess I’ve cost us the business.’ I sipped my coffee; it was too hot and burned my throat. It felt like a penance, and I gulped again, blinking away tears of pain.
‘We won’t be working with Kevin Armstrong.’ Anna took a bend rather quickly and I grasped the cup with both hands. ‘The managing director of Vap-A-Rise called me last night.’
‘Oh God.’ I held my breath, shame pulsing through me.
The managing director, Peter Rufford, was a sweet man.
When he’d found out about Bronte, he sent me a voucher for a spa day.
I hadn’t used it yet – I hadn’t wanted to book a day off – but it was a thoughtful gesture. ‘So Kevin told him what happened?’
Anna nodded. ‘His wife made him own up. Peter fired him for gross misconduct. Apparently, he’d been given several warnings about his drinking, and this was the last straw.’
‘Good.’ I didn’t normally wish anyone harm, but Kevin ticked all the boxes for reasons never to set eyes on someone ever again. ‘And the contract?’
‘It’s ours.’ She grinned. ‘Just the paperwork to sort out, but we did it, Maggie.’
‘Oh, thank heavens.’ I felt light-headed with relief.
We’d put hours into our pitch; the mood at work was going to be celebratory for the next few days. I hoped I got the chance to join in.
‘I got the impression that we may have even done Peter a favour by giving him a reason to remove Kevin from the company,’ Anna continued.
‘So I didn’t screw it up after all.’
‘Lucky for you, no.’ Anna slowed as we approached a queue of cars. ‘But your MD isn’t impressed with you either.’
‘Don’t fire me,’ I repeated my plea. Without Bronte, without my work, who was I? What was my purpose? What was the point of me? ‘I’ve lost Bronte; I can’t lose my job as well, I’ll … I’ll have nothing left.’
‘Maggie, that’s not healthy.’
She frowned, but there was kindness in her eyes, and I sensed that she was exasperated rather than angry. She took a sip of her coffee while we were stationary.
‘It gets me up in the morning,’ I ploughed on. ‘It keeps me looking ahead, without it I’d …’