‘Perhaps when we are doing the individual shots,’ he said thoughtfully.
Lulu caught Ginger’s eye, saw the anguish in them. It was one thing to pose with the other girls but quite another to pose on her own.
‘No,’ she said, ‘group shots: that’s it. We are not doing this again, we are going to do some amazing group shots and we are going to look at them here and we are going to pick out a variety of ones which work.’
‘Hey,’ said Jack, ‘that’s not how I work. You can look at them on the computer but you don’t get to pick them.’
‘Sorry,’ said Lulu, ‘but I’m the stylist and I’m in charge of Ginger here. She no likee the picture, the picture no appearee in the paper.’
‘Yeah and that goes for me too,’ said Fiona. ‘No picture that I don’t like is going in, because I’m not letting Mattheson – or whatever sub she currently has under her thumb – decide what shot of me to put in.’
‘I agree completely,’ said Jodie nervously.
‘You can bully me all you want,’ said Jack, ‘but I just take the shots and I send up the ones that I think work.’
‘Yes,’ said Lulu, smiling, sort of an evil smile. ‘We all like that idea – but they’ll be the most amazing shots as chosen by us or no shoot.’
‘I’m not someone you can boss around, ‘said Jack. ‘I’m a journalist, honey, I’m in a union.’
‘Good for you, big boy,’ smiled Lulu. ‘We ready to rock and roll, or what?’
Ginger had never worked so hard in her life. It was exhausting: wearing the killer heels was exhausting, holding the poses that Lulu told her to hold was exhausting. She was in the middle for some reason. And beside her, Fiona couldn’t help bitching about how boring it all was and how much work she had to do.
‘But I guess I am getting to learn Krav Maga properly,’ she added. ‘I always wanted to do that. It’s worth looking like a moron in this shoot. What’s your thing, I forgot?’ she asked Ginger.
‘Personal trainer in CrossFit,’ said Ginger, sucking her waist in and giving a sultry look straight down the lens at Jack as directed by Lulu. ‘Haven’t met him yet. Monday.’ Ginger didn’t add that she was mildly sick at the thought. What if he wanted to weigh her? He would want to. She knew it.
‘Handy to get a few free personal workouts,’ shrugged Fiona. ‘That’s the problem of working in an office – it’s so sedentary. It’s good to kick-start yourself with some exercise.’
Ginger waited for the moment when she’d feel humiliated by this remark, but it didn’t come. Fiona didn’t mean it in any rude way, not the way Liza had meant it that horrible night at the wedding. Liza had implied that Ginger was just too lazy to do any exercise. Fiona was saying, ‘Yes, fitting in working out is hard but it’s possible.’
‘Do you work out much?’ she asked.
‘I used to do more,’ said Fiona, ‘but I moved in with my girlfriend and she’s got a little boy. We spend all our time with him, it’s fun.’
‘Wonderful,’ said Ginger. ‘How old is he?’
‘Three,’ Fiona’s eyes lit up. ‘He’s a beautiful little boy. I want to adopt him. That’s why I don’t let Carla Mattheson get to me,’ she said, ‘because I’ve got something else going on, another life. That’s the trick,’ she said, ignoring Jack yelling at them all to stop talking because he was going to start shooting again. ‘Work is just work. My dad always said that when you die you’ll never wish you had spent more time at the office.’
‘Will you stop talking,’ yelled Jack impatiently, ‘I want to get some pictures here before the entire day is over. At least models don’t talk.’
When the shoot was over, they all stood clustered around Jack’s computer looking at the digital images. There were hundreds, literally hundreds. But even Ginger – who simply couldn’t bear to look at herself at first – found that she looked great in the pictures. She wasn’t thin, but she was curvy and ... sexy? Yes, she definitely looked sexy and she’d never looked sexy in her life. Not once, not ever.
‘You like?’ said Jack, looking up at her, a little glint in his eye.
‘Yes,’ she said, utterly straightforward.
‘You’re a strange one,’ he said. ‘It’s like you’re surprised or something.’
‘Just happy,’ said Lulu, intervening. ‘Ladies, why don’t you all get changed and I will go through the photos with Jack here,’ she put a firm hand on his shoulders. ‘We’ll nail it down to the ten that we like best.’
‘Ten?’ said Jack.
‘Ten,’ said Lulu,
‘I’ve got your number, babe, just wish you’d give me yours,’ muttered Jack.
‘You old smooth-talker,’ Lulu said, without an ounce of softness, ‘but when we have a deal on the pictures, we’ll discuss numbers. Until then, no dice.’
