Chapter 12
Sitting in her tiny office at Merris several weeks later, Bella could feel pinpricks of sweat break through under her arms. Her hands were shaking slightly. This was the first meeting with the senior team to outline the full findings from her consultation.
She was delivering bad news, probably worse than they expected, but she hoped they would trust her. She had to convince them that she was right and that she had the correct plan to get them out of this rapidly accelerating decline.
Her outfit had been carefully chosen that morning to project maximum authority and gravitas, which is hard to do with a comical-looking bump protruding from your middle. She’d gone for the black fitted dress, along with diamond earrings and a gold necklace, then she’d added serious make-up in the hope of looking older than twenty-eight.
The figures, the reports and the spiel she was going to give them had been replayed over and over in her mind, but she mentally ran through her intro again.
Just nerves, she told herself.
A glance at her watch told her it was eight minutes to nine, so time to get down there. She gathered up her laptop and papers.
Once everyone had settled down round the conference table, Merris went through the introductory formalities, then Bella stood up and took in the attentive eyes turned in her direction. ‘Gentlemen,’ she began, then she gave it to them straight.
Arms were crossing defensively; mouths were drawn into tight lines and she could even hear irritated sighs. She carried on, unfazed, in a quiet, firm voice. Why were there no plans to overhaul the online presence? Or to meet the new regulations head on? Or to prepare for the pension holders going back to court? she asked.
Now everyone, apart from Merris, who’d already heard this from her, was looking furious and somewhat shocked.
So, time to swoop down and cheer them up. She started to outline her solutions: new and enticing financial products, fresh marketing initiatives, an online rebrand and better strategic planning to deal with the other problems.
‘I’ve spoken to all of you individually and heard a lot of great ideas. It won’t take long to get Merris Group back on course,’ she said encouragingly. That was putting it kindly, but she might as well be a little bit nice.
‘So, I’m sure you are all wondering how so many big new initiatives can be financed?’ Several heads were nodding vigorously.
‘Well…’ She knew her number one suggestion was not going to be popular, ‘I think Merris Group needs to bring in a partner or a parent company.’
There was a collective wave of shocked in-breaths.
She ran through the other options, not looking up much because she knew their faces would be horrified. Yup – like patients faced with a rectal exam.
When she’d finished, she sat down and looked squarely at Merris himself.
‘Thank you very much, Ms Browning,’ he said neutrally. ‘Does anyone have any questions?’ he added. Surprise, surprise no one moved. If this bunch had any courage in their convictions, they weren’t about to reveal it now.
‘Well, perhaps it would be best to discuss this amongst ourselves, and Ms Browning – we’ll call you back in for any clarifications.’
‘OK.’ She stood up, gathered her papers together and tried not to feel hurt. What had she expected? A standing ovation?
Quickly she walked out of the silent room and headed back to her office to wait. This was horrible. Either she would be told ‘thank you very much, but we won’t be requiring your services further’ or the Merris Group executives were going to have to bite some hard and unpalatable bullets. She drank a cup of coffee, which only added to her jittery nerves, and waited.
Finally, the phone buzzed.
‘Hello, Ms Browning?’ It was Merris’s secretary.
‘Yes,’ she answered, feeling her heart hammering high up in her chest.
‘You’re wanted back in the conference room to discuss your report.’
‘Thanks, I’ll be right there.’ She walked along slowly and calmly, not wanting to jump to any conclusions. This should be OK… shouldn’t it?
And, yes, it did turn out to be OK. The team was still in shock and she wasn’t sure if they all fully believed her gloom and doom predictions yet, but at least they were prepared to listen some more. And Merris appeared to be on her side.
One of the few uplifts in the long week that followed was an excited call from the estate agent, who told Bella that he believed he had found her perfect new home – brand-new to market – and when could she get along to look?
There was also a message on her mobile from midwife Declan, informing her:
‘Bella, you haven’t been for a check-up for six weeks. Get yourself in here as soon as possible or you are in so much trouble with me.’
On Saturday morning she and Don got into his Jeep to go and view the house for sale. As she opened his car door and climbed up, she surveyed the scene. Compared with her neat-as-a-pin sports car, this was disgusting. The back seat was strewn with newspapers, empty coffee cups and sandwich wrappers. In the front was a tangle of wires – computer extensions, mobile chargers – and, although Don didn’t smoke, his photographer colleagues sure did, so the ashtray was overflowing and ash was scattered all over the floor and the seats.
‘Bloody hell,’ Bella said. ‘Have you been entertaining again?’
‘Come on, woman, get in, at least you’ll be able to stretch your legs and enjoy the view.’
‘I’m perfectly comfortable in my car,’ she said clambering up, thankful she was wearing the wipe-clean maternity leathers.
They were running slightly late as they whizzed through north London and into the not very glamorous borough they could soon be calling home. Looking out of the window, Bella took it all in. The high streets full of kebab shops and launderettes, the gloomy tower blocks and council estates which loomed round almost every corner, the rows of Victorian housing, looking shabby and unloved.
‘This can’t be right?’ She looked at Don.
‘’Fraid so, we’re the second on the left here.’
He turned the car into a long street of tall Victorian terraced houses which looked grey and grimy. Then they turned left at the bottom and suddenly they were in a lovely little tree-lined crescent.
The houses here had repainted windows, elegant wooden shutters and brightly coloured doors. The brickwork had been spruced up, railings had been repaired and there were even some jaunty window boxes.
They soon spotted the ‘for sale’ sign.
‘This must be it,’ said Don, pulling up into a nearby parking space.
As they got out of the Jeep, the driver’s door opened on a car parked right in front of the house.
‘Hello, you must be the Brownings.’ The young, smartly dressed estate agent was coming towards them, hand outstretched.
‘Bella Browning,’ said Bella, shaking his hand, ‘and this is Don McCarthy, my husband.’
‘Hello, I’m Stephen Rennie, so, shall I show you round?’
They walked up the steps, Bella taking in the smart bay window and the glossy wine-coloured front door.
‘The owners are away for the weekend, in case you’re wondering,’ Stephen told them as they entered a vibrant orange hallway. On the left was the big living room painted such a deep navy that it looked strangely dark and old-fashioned despite the huge bay window and multicoloured rugs.
In its favour, the room had a lovely old wooden floor. Everything had been neatly tidied and stacked away, but there were obvious signs of young children all over the place: boxes crammed full of toys in the corner, a pile of dog-eared picture books on the coffee table, Disney DVDs beside the TV.
There was a sofa and comfortable armchair next to the open fireplace.
‘The fire is in working order,’ said Stephen, following her gaze. ‘Smokeless fuel zone though, obviously.’
In the second living room, behind the front room, the windows at the back overlooked a small patch of garden with high ivy-clad walls and a bright swing. Bookshelves had been set up in this second room and, at a glance, Bella spotted cookbooks, gardening manuals and more children’s books.
She heard herself asking all sorts of efficient questions. How old was the central heating system? Would the windows need work done? But she felt a strange mixture of excitement and sadness.
She already loved not just the house but the whole lifestyle it suggested. It was a warm, family home, cuddly but groovy. It was a stay-in-bake-cakes, go-out-get-muddy kind of home and although she knew she was never going to be that kind of person, some part of her now seemed to be longing for that.
Must be the nesting hormones coursing through my bloodstream.
They went up the stairs which were worn and bumpy underneath the blue runner carpet.
The main bedroom was bright pink with a wooden sleigh bed and a beautiful chest of drawers. There was a white fitted wardrobe and dotted all around the room were framed and unframed pictures of two adorable blond boys and their smiley parents.
‘Yes, that’s the owners,’ said Stephen, driven by a need to fill in the long silences as Bella and Don looked around. ‘They’re moving to the country, Cumbria I think.’
‘I see, and have they found somewhere to move to?’ asked Bella sounding all businesslike, but meanwhile she was thinking, of course they are, so they can do dogs and wellies and I think I’m going to cry and what is the matter with me?
‘I believe they have, yes,’ the agent confirmed. ‘So every chance of a straightforward sale.’
Don added, ‘It’s a good-sized room,’ which sounded as if he wasn’t risking anything controversial.
Bella headed into the next-door bedroom. It was smaller with a bunk bed, obviously shared by the boys. Everything was brightly painted. Two of the walls were light blue, two were yellow. The chest of drawers and the wardrobes were painted in yellow and blue stripes. Shelves bulged with toys, trucks, Lego, books and games.
She was feeling a little odd now. Here she was looking into other people’s lives and she felt a weird combination of regret and longing. She wished she had grown up in a warm, colourful house like this, with a brother or sister and a happy family life, and she wondered if she and Don could ever create such a happy, cosy childhood like this for their baby.
The bathroom on the same floor was a cramped sink, loo, shower-in-bath affair. The blue lino was tatty and so were the black and white tiles on the walls, but the bath was a lovely old tub, either vintage or original to the house.
After looking round the small third bedroom, they went up a narrow set of creaky stairs to the loft conversion. ‘Ah, the home office,’ said Don, who got there ahead of her. But no further comment, as he was giving nothing away.
The sunny yellow gabled room was crammed with books, pictures, photos, files, papers, all sorts of strange knick-knacks, including an old stuffed salmon, and lots of cardboard boxes. There was a long desk with two computers on it.
‘What do the owners do?’ asked Bella.
‘I’m not quite sure,’ Stephen answered. ‘Something creative… graphic design, media, something like that. So, shall we go down to the kitchen and the garden?’ he asked.
The kitchen at the back of the house was just as Bella imagined it would be – wooden kitchen cupboards, apricot walls, a range cooker, a large round wooden table, plants on the windowsills. Double doors led out into the garden and four pairs of wellie boots were lined up along the wall beside the door.
‘And the garden…’ Stephen unlocked the doors and they all stepped out into an unremarkable patch of lawn fringed with untidy bushes and plants. The swing dangled in the chilly breeze. Bella cast her eye round the toys close to the wall of the house: the sandbox shaped like a frog, the faded plastic trike and dirty bucket and spade.
They all looked at each other.
‘Is there anything you’d like to see again?’ asked Stephen.
‘Let’s go back to the sitting room,’ Bella suggested.
All carefully wiped their feet on the doormat in the kitchen and went back into the room where Bella and Don walked around and looked out of the window onto the street. The entrance to the park was just four houses along at the end of the crescent.
Bella sat down on one of the sofas, hoping another angle on the room would reveal something more, give her another clue as to whether or not this could be their future home.
Finally, they were walking down the front steps as Don was telling Stephen, ‘Thanks so much. We’ll talk it over and then give you a ring.’
They climbed back into the Jeep and watched Stephen manoeuvre out of his parking space and start off down the road before they said anything.
‘So,’ Bella turned to Don. ‘What did you think?’
‘You’re asking me to go first?’ he answered cautiously.
‘Yup, definitely. I want to know what you think first.’
‘OK, well,’ he paused, ‘I’m going to take a chance here and tell you that I really liked it. And there’s a park and the whole area is very promising. It could suit us… the three of us… very well.’
Then he sat back and smiled, waiting for her response.
‘Don!’ she exclaimed. ‘The whole place needs replastering, repapering, repainting, the wiring looks dodgy, the bathroom has to be replaced, and really, we’re going to need a second bathroom somewhere… the kitchen is ancient… and there’s probably one hundred other things wrong with it…’ she paused to look at him, ‘but I love it. I think it’s perfect. Let’s buy it!’
His smile broke into a wide grin and he gave a gentle laugh.
‘I didn’t think it was very you,’ he said, ‘I was expecting something with a lot more white, black and chrome.’
‘Yeah… I didn’t think that was going to be my kind of home either… but…’ she paused, ‘Don? We are going to be good parents, aren’t we?’
‘Hey!’ he reached over to put his arm around her, somehow understanding all the angst in her question. ‘Of course we are, of course,’ he insisted, ‘all we need is love and we’ve got so much love to give – in a house, in a flat… we’ll be happy wherever,’ he assured her.
‘Are you sure?’ she asked.
‘Never been more sure of anything,’ he said.
‘Shall we buy this place then? Unless you think we’re rushing in and we should look at some other places first?’ she added.
‘Of course we’re rushing in…’ he began. ‘But I like it, you love it and this isn’t going to be the first thing we’ve rushed into together, is it? And so far, so good.’
They grinned at each other.
‘How much is it?’ he asked.
She told him and his response was a whispered, ‘F*ck me,’ followed by, ‘Are you sure you don’t want to buy a French chateau instead?’
‘The commute might get boring.’
‘You’re right. So, crumbly Victorian terrace in the outer reaches of north London it is, then.’
‘There’s a Tube station just two streets away, you know?’
‘Well, that’s settled then. Phone Stephen up.’
So, she did and by the end of the afternoon their offer had been accepted, and there was talk of decorators… and moving in by the end of the following month.
Bella just hoped their bank accounts could take the strain.