Chapter Ashleigh Fitch and Remy Hughes 2002 Aged 40 #3
‘I don’t know, Archie. You? Why don’t you have a word with Hector and see if you can work from home or take her into the office with you?’
He had stared at her, the slow rise of his Adam’s apple suggesting he wasn’t entirely on board with the idea.
‘Maybe help is a good idea,’ he’d conceded.
It made her smile, even now, to think of Marguerite’s rather unorthodox interview.
‘So you’d be looking after Evie, as I’m going back to work in a few weeks.’
The woman had nodded. ‘Yes.’
‘Do you like babies?’ Ashleigh had prompted, feeling her enthusiasm slipping away at the woman’s rather no-nonsense attitude. She had hoped for someone like her mother or Remy, someone with that lovely, soft, maternal edge.
‘I’m not sure, but I figure I don’t have to like them to do a good job.’
Ashleigh had laughed out loud, uncertain if the woman was joking.
It became a moot point almost immediately.
Marguerite’s face when she saw Evie for the first time was something she wouldn’t forget, the wide smile, the sweet burbles of affection she lavished on her.
She had hired her immediately and Marguerite had fallen in love with Evie, who loved her in return.
‘I have a dinner tonight,’ Archie informed her.
‘Fine. To be honest, I’ve got such a day, I’ll probably be fast asleep by the time you fall through the door.’ She drained her glass and winced, unable to find a liking for this brand, but she’d persevere, a little obsessed with the whole idea of juicing and cleansing her gut.
‘It’s not a boozy one, strictly business with a complete bore. A partner in the Berlin office.’
‘Won’t he want beer? Isn’t that what Germans drink?’
‘I have no idea what Germans drink.’ His hand appeared from behind The Times and reached for the mug of coffee. ‘And actually, Ashleigh, I can’t remember the last time you didn’t have such a day, or, come to think of it, a night when you weren’t fast asleep by the time I got home.’
It was true.
But today promised to be a stressful one, an early meeting in her Chiswick office with the rather fed-up owner of a 2.
3 million-pound Edwardian villa on Hartington Road, who was fuming about a lack of progress on his house sale.
The fact she had valued it at ￡1.5 million and the listed price was at his insistence was frustrating.
It happened sometimes, when pure greed and not sound demonstrable property and land variables dictated the asking price.
Ashleigh knew theirs was the third agent to take the property on, and while it looked good on her books, she knew it was a case of lowering the price or she’d be having these conversations with the fuming vendor on a regular basis.
The thought alone was depressing. Having so far only dealt with his nervous wife, she wondered if it was worth the hassle.
Maybe she’d tell Guy to pull the plug, tell him it was a case of ‘new price’ or ‘adios’ – yes, she’d get Guy to do it, depending on how their chat went this morning.
‘You’re right, Archie, there is always a meeting, and I’m always in a mad rush. I guess it’s not my fault my business is so in demand that I’m permanently rushed off my feet!’ She put her empty glass in the sink.
‘Hmm, I don’t think it’s being in demand that’s the problem.’ He lowered his newspaper. ‘In fact, I’m pretty sure if I came in and spent a day looking at your processes, your admin procedures, your—’
‘I’ll stop you right there.’ Her husband might be a very fine management consultant, specialising in streamlining and re-financing inefficient businesses, but she would never, could never, let him get his hands on her mini empire.
It was the one thing that was hers and hers alone.
Her success, her validation. ‘Guy and I have built this from the ground up.’
‘I know. I was there when it was first suggested and have been there every day since!’
‘Yes, but my point is, it runs how we like it, and it works, for us.’
‘And my point is, people pay a hefty daily rate for my expertise, and I would do it for you, in exchange for no more than sexual favours and roast lamb on Sunday.’
‘Think I’d rather pay your hefty daily rate,’ she half-joked, and he again shook his newspaper before hiding behind it.
‘Maybe I should go to Gigi directly? Isn’t he the senior partner?’ he goaded, and ducked as if she might lob something at him. He was not wrong. Sadly, with only her phone and a glass fruit bowl within reach, she had nothing to hand that wouldn’t cause serious damage either to his head or the item.
‘In name, yes, and only because we were advised to do it that way by our accountant because Guy’s mother put up surety for the first loan. Which we paid back a while ago now,’ she reminded him.
‘I’m joking, of course. We all know you’re the brains of the outfit.’
‘Correct!’
She spoke with her hands on her hips and was not about to confess to her husband that she and Guy were a little worried about their pipeline.
Sales were slowing, instructions taking longer to come on board, commission percentages were being whittled by penny-conscious vendors, and with the uncertainty of the world economy, people were, it seemed, a little reticent about rushing into huge mortgages or upsizing when neither jobs nor financial stability was guaranteed. They’d figure it out. They always did.
‘Better dash. See you later.’
She grabbed the gold knot earrings from the mother-of-pearl trinket dish next to the oversized orchid on the counter and put them into her ears, tucking her neat, straight, blonde hair behind her ears.
Hair that she kept in check via her permanent hair-straightening treatment that set her back a small fortune every six months to fix any curly regrowth.
It was, in her book, worth every penny to rid herself of those darned ringlet curls that had been the bane of her younger life.
Popping her sleek head into the den, she found six-year-old Evie lying recumbent on a vast leather beanbag, still in her soft pink pyjamas.
The girl was indeed transfixed by a loud, flashing animation of high-kicking ninjas, whose saccharine-sweet, squeaky voices were akin to nails on a chalkboard. For Ashleigh, at least.
‘Mummy’s leaving, darling.’
‘’Kay.’ She didn’t look up from the screen.
‘Marguerite will be here any second and Daddy’s in the kitchen.’
‘Yep.’ Evie inserted her index finger into her nose. Ashleigh looked away.
It was another ritual that felt a little pointless, her explaining to her daughter every morning when she was leaving, where everyone was, as the child seemed to pay her no attention.
A throwback no doubt to her own childhood, when it had always felt important to Ashleigh to know these things.
Although, in fairness, in her parents’ small home she had always known where everyone was as she could either see or hear them, but still.
‘I shall try and be home before supper, and we can have a chat then. How does that sound?’
‘Good.’ Evie laughed then, not at her, but at one of the high-kicking ninjas who had fallen on his bottom with an accompanying wail of distress that made her ears ring.
She left her to it, unsure what to say next, what to do next, aware of the invisible barrier that made her hold back and which had always been there.
It was her secret shame. And it wasn’t that she didn’t love the child, she did, would die for her!
But that didn’t mean she was comfortable with her or knew how to be one of those mums who grabbed their kids and wrapped them in love.
‘Morning!’ Marguerite hung her coat on the stand in the vestibule, removed her book from the pocket, and slipped out of her Ugg boots, which she paired and placed by the front door. Revolting, sloppy things, Ashleigh thought, and knew she wouldn’t be seen dead in them.
‘Morning, Marguerite. What are you reading?’
‘The Lovely Bones, by Alice Sebold.’ Their housekeeper held up the pale-blue cover.
‘Ooh, what’s it about? I don’t have time to read, so I have to live my reading life vicariously through you!’ There was the undeniable throb of sadness in her breast at this truth.
‘It’s about a girl who has been raped and murdered and she watches her friends and family from heaven and sees what happens next. It’s beautiful.’
‘Oh!’ It wasn’t quite what she had expected. ‘It sounds . . . anyway, only Evie for supper. Archie is out for dinner, and I’ll probably just grab some crackers or whatever’s in the fridge.’
It was partly how she kept trim, not sitting down for big meals. It also meant less time wasted when she could be catching up on work admin.
‘Okay.’ Marguerite smiled. ‘Have a lovely day.’
‘Yep, she’s in the den, watching that awful cartoon. She’s had a croissant.’
‘I’ll turn it off.’ The woman spoke matter-of-factly and without the guilt that would have made the task almost impossible for Ashleigh. ‘She needs to read to me before we go to school.’
‘Right.’ Ashleigh nodded and swallowed the uncomfortable lump at the base of her throat.
It had been easy for her to conceive, she’d had a dream pregnancy and the birth was straightforward.
Her heart lurched for all those she read about or knew personally who struggled with all three.
What she could never confess was that the conception, pregnancy, and birth had actually been the easy bits.
It was all the stuff that came after she struggled with, caring for and spending time with a child she had nothing in common with.
It was a mystery to her, how at ease Remy was with all three of her kids.
Ashleigh knew she didn’t fare well in comparison to her sister, the brilliant homemaker.
The one doctor she had confided in had told her that it would happen in time; the bonding, the love, the emotional investment.
Well, her little girl was now six years old, and she was still waiting.