And then she says: ‘Fantastic, you have no idea what this can do for your career. Oh Freya, you’re such a novice sometimes. I have no idea how you have got this far in life, because you can’t see the wood for the trees. There you are, going along with your little happy pictures and saying that blueberries and muffins are like animal poo which is ridiculous. And then, this unbelievable thing happens, this will have you on every paper, on every talk show in the country. This will give you an in into the UK because you finally have something to talk about. I mean, who wants to talk about bloody recipes? There’s got to be more of a story to you ...’
I tune out and look over at Lorraine who is making cutting noises with her fingers across her throat to imply that I should hang up.
‘You said people didn’t want to hear my problems,’ I say anxiously.
‘Yes but I meant small problems. This isbig!’
‘Oh, Nina, there’s something wrong with the line,’ I say and I stab my finger on the end call button.
There is a horrified silence in the office.
‘I won’t say I told you so,’ Lorraine says and she goes to the cabinet where she keeps the chocolate which we only take out in emergencies. Very expensive chocolate that costs an absolute fortune, but makes an enormous difference in food. And frankly, we’ve been going through it in the office. She breaks both of us off a few big lumps. My stash is bigger.
‘For the shock,’ she says and hands it to me.
I sit back in my office chair, shaking. The phone starts ringing again frantically, then my mobile starts ringing, all Nina.
‘Ringing from two phones at the same time,’ I say, ‘that’s a trick for sure.’
‘Yeah, when she’s really excited all her alien flippers come out and she can make phone calls with them,’ Lorraine snaps. ‘You know she’s an otherworldly being and I don’t mean aniceotherworldly being. She’s one of those aliens who come here to take over the world and you just happen to be caught in the way. She has no empathy and she will walk on your grave if she thinks it will get her a sale of some sort.’
I grin at Lorraine.
‘Tell me what you really think,’ I say.
‘Freya, if you want to go theMy Secret Hellin the papers route, that’s fine but I know you and you don’t. So ring her, tell her you’ve been on to your agent and if she spills a word of this, you’ll sue her. You’re doing that big interview of hers tomorrow and if she breathes a word of it, then she is dead.’
‘Dead? Is that legal?’
‘Say it the posh way,’ Lorraine grins. ‘Say you’ll sue her clothes off her back, then.’
‘That’s the posh way?’
‘Yes.’
‘Right.’ I sigh. ‘I wish I hadn’t done that. But I thought if I had said what had happened, she’d understand.’
‘She understands cash signs,’ says Lorraine sombrely.
The next day, I’m getting mymake-up done in a propermake-up chair, with a lovely woman discussing the right sort of base for my skin and I’m onlyhalflistening.
This means I’m stressed out of my head.
You see, I do want to know the right foundation for my skin: I’m obsessed with it, actually. When your hair is this pale it’s very easy to look like the undead without the correct base. Finding a colour that suits is vital, so on every shoot I have ever been on my first question has been: ‘What colour base do you think will suit me?’
We are having exactly the same conversation but my mind is almost entirely elsewhere – on Nina and her promises that we have a secret and she will go ‘to the grave, dahling’ before she tells anyone about my terrible experience.
I feel anxious.
I’m nearly ready to go. Nearly, in that my hair is beautifully styled and held back with little clips to give themake-up artist room to do her work. Hair first,make-up afterwards, then clothes.
The shoot for the interview Nina has been talking about for months is taking place in an elegant country hotel with an exquisite spa, fabulous gardens, and two championship golf courses round the corner. But Nina clearly doesn’t want Lorraine here and she’s taking tiny little bitchy swipes at her. This is a clue that Nina’s angry that Lorraine knew all about my mugging – and she didn’t.
Lorraine drove me to the shoot, which had Nina raising her eyebrows and saying. ‘I could have picked you up, darling, if I had known you wanted a taxi.’
And suddenly I know we have a problem.
First she has Lorraine running up and downstairs getting all the coffee orders which, with the two hair stylists, amake-up artist, someone from the magazine, a photographer and his assistant, and a stylist there, means a lot of up and downs because people keep changing their minds and the cappuccino with almond milk suddenly becomes a skinny flat white, if they have it. I don’t ask Lorraine to get me coffee, I can get my own coffee thank you very much.
