Chapter Forty
Miranda
Miranda thought she had it all figured out. She would leave Argostoli, drive back to the hotel, then order herself a cocktail at the bar and quietly drink it in Evelyn’s honour. It seemed a fitting tribute after the ashes-scattering, and she was pretty sure Evelyn would have approved. So much for the best-laid plans, though– because as soon as she reaches the bar, the bartender puts down the glass he’s holding and says sincerely how sorry he was to hear that Ms Chambers had died, which prompts Miranda to instantly burst into tears. Talk about embarrassing. Talk about making a show of yourself. The one single consolation is that the annoying young blonde woman who’d filmed her by the pool the other day isn’t on the scene, attempting to make a follow-up viral sensation.
The bartender– and obviously it’s the same guy she drunkenly flirted with that time– is absolutely lovely, thank goodness. Wiping his hands on his apron, he rushes round from behind the bar to hug her. It’s so nice to have a gorgeous young man put his arms round her that she does feel better pretty quickly. ‘Thank you,’ she says, as he releases her. ‘Oh dear, I’ve made a wet patch on your shirt now,’ she adds apologetically, seeing the damp splodge she’s left, but he waves away her concern and asks what he can get her to drink.
‘Iwas actually going to have a cocktail in salute to Evelyn– Ms Chambers,’ she tells him, perching on one of the high bar stools. The day is still humid and feels airless; she picks up a menu and fans herself. ‘Idon’t suppose you can remember what she liked to drink, can you?’
He tilts his head, considering. He’s very attractive, she thinks again, with those soulful brown eyes and the angled planes of his cheekbones. Then she notices his perfectly bladed eyebrows, and belatedly registers how nice he smelled when he was hugging her. Oh, she thinks, her gaydar finally catching up. Perhaps it’s not all that surprising that he resisted her flirting if her hunch is correct.
‘Idefinitely mixed her a Greek Mimosa one evening,’ he replies. ‘It’s made with tsipouro, a Greek spirit, as well as lemon juice, cinnamon syrup and Greek sparkling rosé. Would you like to try one?’
‘Sounds delicious,’ Miranda replies. ‘Yes, please.’ She watches him as he sets to work, his hands deftly straining the lemon juice into a gleaming silver cocktail shaker, measuring the tsipouro, adding syrup. ‘Wow,’ she says when he eventually pours the mixture into a champagne flute and tops it up with the rosé. ‘That looks amazing. How much do Iowe you?’
He waves a hand dismissively. ‘For you, it’s on the house,’ he tells her. ‘Ithink your Ms Chambers would want me to say that, yes?’
Miranda smiles. ‘She probably would,’ she agrees. ‘Thank you very much. Maybe Icould buy you a drink then, instead?’ Evelyn would have done so, she thinks. And a person could do a lot worse than modelling themselves on Evelyn Chambers. ‘I’m Miranda, by the way,’ she adds, with that in mind.
‘Konstantinos,’ he says, holding a hand over the bar. ‘It’s good to meet you, Miranda. And thank you for the drink. We can toast her, perhaps.’ He mixes himself something fruity, with strawberries, cucumber and mint, and they clink their glasses together.
‘To Evelyn,’ Miranda says. ‘Rest in peace.’
‘Rest in peace,’ he echoes, then holds his glass up. ‘ Yamas .’
‘ Yamas ,’ she replies, sipping her Mimosa. It’s delicious, cool and citrusy, the bubbles frothing on her tongue. ‘Thank you, this is perfect.’
‘My pleasure,’ he says. It’s quiet at the bar, with very few people around, and after a moment he asks, ‘Do you want to talk about your friend? Ionly met her a few times but Iliked her very much. She told me all about her wife, how happy they were together. It was nice.’
‘Ionly met her a few times as well,’ Miranda confesses. ‘But she sort of barged her way into my life, in the best possible way. Ican’t believe Iknew her less than a week, because she was so’– She tries to find a nicer way to say ‘nosey’– ‘so interested in other people,’ she settles on eventually, ‘and so open about her feelings. She was pretty good at telling me to sort my life out, to be honest. Ijust wish she was still here to. . . to help me with that.’ She laughs but it’s somewhat shaky, the sort of laugh that could easily turn into a sob. ‘Although I’m still hoping she’ll pull a few strings for me on the karma front, so who knows?’ He frowns as if he doesn’t understand what she means, and she’s just about to explain when her phone pings with a message.
‘That’ll be her now,’ she jokes, ignoring it, only for it to ping again, and then again. She glances at the screen to see that a load of notifications have appeared, including, most recently, a message from a number she doesn’t recognise, asking if she wants to comment on the story. Oh God. What story? What is this? Ping. Now there’s one from Todd, her former co-star on Amberley Emergency , the preview reading: FYIbabe xxx
‘Something important?’ she hears Konstantinos say.
‘Um. . . I’m not sure. Excuse me a moment,’ she says, then takes another gulp of her Mimosa, terrified that this ‘story’ might be some awful new scandal with her at the centre. Her brain whirls with possible disaster scenarios. What if Charles, Evelyn’s ex-husband, has gone to the tabloids accusing her of killing his beloved ex-wife? Or she’s been papped scattering Rose’s ashes and talking to sea turtles? Oh Christ. She’s not sure she can cope with another battering right now.
She opens Todd’s message to see a link to his Instagram page. Okay, she thinks, none the wiser, as she clicks it. They’ve always got on well, so, unless he’s randomly thrown her under the bus today, it’s hopefully not a new worst-case-scenario situation after all. She scans his latest post, screenshots he’s taken of his Notes, and gasps. ‘Oh my God,’ she says under her breath. ‘No way.’
‘Is everything all right?’ Konstantinos asks, but it’s impossible to drag her eyes from the screen long enough to even glance at him.
‘Ithink. . . maybe. . . it might be?’ she says uncertainly, then takes another glug of her drink and reads the words again.
Hi everyone, Todd’s post begins. Some of you may have noticed a few stories about me in the press over the past few months but what you might not know is that almost all of them have come from personal conversations I’ve had with friends. Believe me, it’s a uniquely horrible thing, wondering if a close friend or family member has gone around sneaking stories to the press, and in the last few weeks I’ve felt myself becoming guarded– paranoid, even– about what I’ve said, and to whom. Ieven wondered if Iwas being spied on, or if my phone was tapped. But then a story appeared last week that confirmed my worst suspicions. Perhaps you saw this particular story? It was the one about me supposedly being scared that my studio dressing room was haunted, because the lights kept flickering on and off at strange times, and my sunglasses were never where I’d left them, that sort of thing. What was even more peculiar than a haunted dressing room was the fact that a) it wasn’t true (shame on you, press, for printing absurd lies) and b) Ihad made the whole thing up, to see if Icould get to the root of what was going on.
I’d realised by now that all the stories that had ended up in print had been from conversations I’d had, either in person or on the phone, in the privacy of my own dressing room at work. (Isay ‘privacy’ but please read that word with a heavy dose of sarcasm.) Was my phone bugged? Idecided to do a little test by pretending to call my mum and tell her all about the (fictitious) haunting, only with my phone completely switched off. Ifelt a bit insane doing this but, then again, I’ve had to do crazier acting jobs over the years so gave it my all.
Iwasn’t paranoid, Iquickly realised, when the story appeared in one of the tabloids the very next day. (SUCKERS. Do better research next time.) It looked as if my phone wasn’t bugged– but now Istrongly suspected that my dressing room was , and that somebody had been listening in on all my private conversations, then taking the recordings to the press. But now the joke was on them, because they had taken my lame, completely invented and not even very interesting story about the haunted dressing room, and it had ended up in print. Iwent straight to Geoff Underwood, the Amberley director, and presented him with my suspicions. (Move over, Jessica Fletcher, am Iright?) Long story short, the person responsible has been rumbled– and fired. Similar recording devices have been found in other actors’ dressing rooms, as well as the hair and make-up rooms, wardrobe etc. Iam livid to think about how many secrets and confidential pieces of information this particular piece of shit listened to. What is wrong with people???? All Ican say to the person who did this is– Karma is a bitch, and you’re gonna get yours, honey.
‘Oh my God,’ Miranda says again, hardly able to believe what she has just read. Other actors’ dressing rooms. . . hers too, presumably. Does this mean. . . ? The penny drops and it feels like a lead weight. It’s a warm day but she suddenly feels cold all over as the implications unfold in her head. She’d been so convinced that Bonnie was the one responsible for all the smear stories about her, but. . . what if she wasn’t? What if, in fact, she had never betrayed Miranda at all?
Dazed by the bombshell, Miranda blindly reaches for her Mimosa and drains the rest of it in a single swallow, still unsure if this could really be true. Because if it is. . .
‘Can Ihave another drink please, Konstantinos?’ she asks faintly.
‘But of course,’ he says, sounding not a little worried. ‘What’s happened? Are you okay?’
‘I’ve just had some weird news. Sort of good but also sort of bad,’ she says, biting her lip.
I’m in shock! WTAF??? she replies to Todd . Who was it??
‘Another Greek Mimosa coming right up,’ she hears Konstantinos say.
‘Thank you,’ she says distractedly, reading Todd’s post for a third time. She’s still trying to process everything, while simultaneously reliving the way she’d turned on Bonnie, screaming at her in public like a banshee. Slapping her so hard she’d broken the other woman’s skin. A deep, deep shame envelops her and for a moment she has to grab the bar in front of her because she thinks she might topple off her stool. What has she done?
Then her phone pings again with a reply from Todd.
Emma-Lou, it says . And if Iever see that rancid guttersnipe again, it’ll be too soon. Apparently she thought it would be good PR for the show, having us dragged through the mud in the press every week. Can you believe the neck of the woman?? Ibet she stirred things up for you too, M, the disgusting shit-hag.
Miranda’s mouth falls open. But of course it was Emma-Lou. She’s– or rather she was – the show’s publicist, who’d made that glib remark about Miranda’s awful sacking. Looking on the bright side, we’re getting a lot of press about this . Yes, it all made sense now. How she must have laughed behind Miranda’s back, rubbing her hands together in glee no doubt when the whole thing snowballed. The absolute– to steal Todd’s phrase– disgusting shit-hag.
Miranda feels a pain in her chest, thinking of the unnecessary anguish her sister has gone through because of Emma-Lou’s callous disregard for privacy, her desperation for column inches. The humiliation caused to Bonnie when Miranda went off on one. Sure, she appreciates now that slapping people is not the answer to anything, but my God, put her in a room with Emma-Lou and she’d be sorely tempted to. . . well, kill her, the mood she’s in right now.
Oh, shit. She also owes Bonnie the most gigantic apology. More grovelling than she’s ever had to do before. I’ll tell you what really helps– saying sorry, she hears Evelyn’s voice in her head, and it’s hard not to groan aloud. No kidding, Evelyn.
‘Your Mimosa,’ says Konstantinos, setting it down on the bar in front of her.
‘Thank you,’ she says grimly, getting out her debit card. ‘Oh, Konstantinos, I’ve made such a bad mistake. Have you ever had that feeling where you just want to hide away from the world for the rest of your life and not come out again?’
‘Of course,’ he replies. ‘And the worst thing is, you will have to come out again.’ He pulls a funny face, pretends to flick lint from his shirt. ‘Trust me, Iknow, coming out is not easy.’
‘No,’ she says, smiling ruefully at him.
Another two women have arrived at the bar and are waiting to be served. ‘But Ibelieve in you, Miranda,’ Konstantinos tells her over his shoulder as he heads over towards them. ‘You’ve got this!’