Chapter 3
There was a time – long, long ago – when I semi-enjoyed my job.
I never jumped out of bed on Monday morning or came home feeling I’d changed the world, but starting out as a lowly intern, there was still that fizzing excitement of possibility, a naive belief that the world was my oyster, that I could make a difference.
Ten years, two pitiful pay increases (which, considering inflation, meant I was being paid less now than when I started) and one too many articles about prize-winning vegetables later, and that spark had been well and truly stamped out, pissed on and smothered into oblivion.
I’d been sat staring at the clock in the top right-hand corner of my computer screen for nine minutes, moving my mouse pointlessly around my desk so that my Teams status didn’t switch to inactive.
Six minutes until I could escape the nauseatingly fishy-smelling office.
Beryl, the office manager who had overly inflated ideas about her administrative responsibilities, thought it was socially acceptable to reheat her monkfish curry in the office kitchen (an instantly fireable offence in my opinion), and was making me miss the usual musk of damp, mouldy carpet.
‘Kitchen’ was probably an overly generous description.
A kettle, one impossibly small fridge and a sauce-splattered microwave balanced precariously atop the windowsill does not a kitchen make, however much the laminated KITCHEN sign Blu-Tacked to the window tried to convince us otherwise.
I twirled my engagement ring slowly around my finger, a habit that had me smiling at the thought of getting home to Joe.
Of curling up on the sofa together with a glass of wine, me warming my never-not-cold toes on that bit of exposed skin between Joe’s waistband and his jumper, much to his displeasure.
16:59.
I got to my feet a little too quickly, my office chair skidding backwards as though it too were desperate to escape, and I had to grab the headrest to stop it colliding into an unsuspecting Beryl.
(Although considering the whole fish incident, it was far less than she deserved.) As I turned, a man stood before me.
He was what my mum would call portly, his one-inch-too-short beige chinos straining across his protruding stomach, greying hair combed forcibly over to the right to hide the fact he was going bald. My boss. Derek Kingston.
‘How’s that story coming along, Jenny?’ he asked, aggressively clearing his throat as though trying to dispel a particularly stubborn piece of phlegm from the back of his tonsils.
‘Fine.’
Well, it will be fine. Once I actually start it.
‘Just fine? This is one of the biggest legal cases Hove has seen in years, Jenny; it’ll set precedent for years to come.
I’ve reserved Friday’s front page for you, so I’m hoping for a little more than fine ,’ Derek puffed, rocking up and down on the balls of his feet in that way he did that made it look like he was thrusting his pelvic region in your direction.
17:01.
For fuck’s sake. I was not paid enough to stay a minute longer in this place than contractually necessary. I just wanted to get home to Joe.
‘If it’s not too much for you, that is? I mean, if it’s too much pressure, what with everything else going on .
.?.’ He was looking over my shoulder as he backtracked, and I turned to see Beryl giving him a shrewd look.
Beryl had many hats. HR hat. Office Manager hat.
General Busybody hat. Her actual hand-knitted, oversized, bobble-topped hat.
Something told me she was wearing the first of those right now.
‘Great, it’s going great,’ I assured him, making a point of shoving things in my bag.
Keys. Water bottle. Stapler. The ‘legal case’ in question was 66-year-old Mr Beckles of 12 Wisteria Drive and 79-year-old Mr Gorringe of 14 Wisteria Drive’s ongoing dispute over who owned the 14cm-wide strip of gravel separating their two properties.
A pointless battle that had cost them both tens of thousands of pounds in legal fees, and me one pair of perfectly good ballet pumps that were now soaked beyond repair after standing for hours in the rain outside the grey, concrete monstrosity that was Hove Crown Court.
‘Fantastic! On my desk by midday tomorrow,’ Derek bellowed, glancing pointedly at his watch as I put on my jacket. As though leaving work on time was worse than skiving off early.
‘Got to run, Derek, woman’s appointment ,’ I mouthed in a dramatic whisper when he showed no sign of moving.
‘Oh .?.?. yes, of course, righto. Good luck! Break a leg and all that. What’s that, Roger?
Yes , coming! ’ He raised a hand in acknowledgement, walking purposefully in the opposite direction as though he’d just been summoned.
Clearly no one had told him Roger was off sick today.
I pressed my lips together, stifling a smile as I hurried down the corridor.
Jacob was leaning against the exit. As a reluctant five-foot-seven (and a half) male, Jacob’s hair added at least an extra inch – sometimes two – and today looked like a new record, his gravity-defying quiff curling like a scoop of soft-serve ice cream as he hid his smile in the ridiculously cavernous turtleneck of his jumper.
‘Another woman’s appointment, is it?’ he sniggered, guessing I’d just played my over-utilised trump card. ‘What’s that, the third one this month?’
‘Fourth actually,’ I shrugged. ‘Anyway, since when is it a crime to leave work on time?’
‘You’re asking the wrong person. I’m rarely here after 4 p.m., in fact I’m surprised I’ve not burst into flames by now .?.?.’ Jacob gave himself a quick once-over as though checking for scorch marks on his beloved cream cashmere.
Like me, Jacob also worked at the Brighton Tribune. He was our resident photojournalist but, unlike me, viewed our contracted hours of 9–5 more as a loose guideline than an actual rule. Luckily for him, though, he was a man and therefore immune from passive-aggressive digs from Derek.
‘Woah, where do you think you’re going?’ Jacob asked, looping his arm through mine as I made to turn left and commence my usual route home.
‘Umm, home?’
‘Oh no, we’re going to the pub tonight, remember?’
I had a vague memory of a calendar reminder to that effect pinging up on my phone earlier and my ignoring it. The first of Mum’s live music nights she was hosting at the pub. Her latest initiative to support local artists and hopefully drum up some more business during the midweek lull.
‘Is that tonight? Look, Jacob, I’m exhausted, it’s been a long week .?.?.’
‘It’s only Tuesday.’
‘I’m just not feeling that great, honestly, I think I ate something dodgy at lunch.’
‘You seemed fine when you were scoffing down seconds of Lucy’s birthday cake an hour ago.’
‘I’m just—’
‘Out of excuses?’
I scowled at him, hating that he knew me so well.
‘Come on, Jenny, you’ve bailed on the last three drinks we’ve organised and that bottomless brunch place I practically had to sell a kidney to get a reservation for last month.’
A lump formed in my throat that I couldn’t swallow. He was right. I had been flaky recently.
‘Come on, just one drink,’ Jacob cooed. ‘Alice switched shifts and everything.’ As a junior doctor four years into a highly competitive six-year specialist training programme to become a Cardiothoracic Surgeon, time off during sociable hours was a rarity for Alice.
The fact that she was spending said time off with us rather than going home to sleep, another rarity, made my heart squeeze a little for my other best friend.
‘Fine, but just one.’
‘Another round!’
My brother, Matt, raised an amused smile from behind the bar as I wobbled precariously on the rungs of my stool, holding my empty wine glass aloft.
My mum, on the other hand, was sporting her concerned mother hen look that, if the crowd surrounding the bar wasn’t three people deep, meant she would have been over here like a shot.
I had to hand it to her, I’d never seen it so busy on a Tuesday night.
Every table was occupied, a crowd of people stood nursing pint glasses and tapping feet against the flagstone floor in time with the guy strumming his guitar in the far corner, his voice deep and sultry.
I tried to focus on the lyrics. Something about being each other’s sunshine and kissing in the rain.
I quickly tuned back out, reaching for my wine glass before remembering it was empty.
‘For someone who hasn’t been out in months, you sure are making up for lost time.’ Jacob eyed the three empty wine glasses I’d consumed whilst waiting for Alice, balancing the paper umbrella from his Sex on the Beach behind one ear. He was exaggerating, of course. It hadn’t been that long. Had it?
‘I’m just thirsty. These nuts are super salty.’ I popped another peanut in my mouth, but I could feel the warm, comforting buzz of tipsiness wrapping itself around me like a blanket.
‘Hey, I hear you. Nothing worse than an overly salted nut.’
‘Speaking of salty nuts, how was your date the other night?’
Jacob gave a small shudder, either at my choice of segue or in recollection of said date. Seeing as Jacob was Mr Innuendo, my money was on the later.
‘That bad?’
‘Well, other than the fact he showed up half an hour late, called me sweetcheeks, and apparently had never heard of a napkin, because I spent most of the evening staring at various bits of food caught in his beard, it was fine.’
‘At least this one didn’t bring his mum,’ I shrugged, remembering the infamous evening in question when Jacob had had to sit through a Spanish-inquisition-style grilling from his Tinder date’s mother.
‘The fact that’s the positive we can take from this says everything about my dating life,’ Jacob guffawed, doing that thing where he tried to pretend being single in his thirties didn’t bother him. ‘Honestly, you’re so much better off, trust me!’