‘What is he like? He really loves himself that guy.’
‘Shush,’ I say, ‘he’ll hear you.’
‘Don’t care if he hears me,’ she says.
‘No, he’s lovely, he was welcoming us in.’
‘Yeah, right,’ says Lois.
She shuffles off and before I can think about it any longer, Michelle appears with a mission for me to deliver some papers to an office up the street.
‘Course,’ I say, bright, shiny. ‘That’s what I’m here for.’
‘Yup,’ says Michelle.
I don’t really think she likes me and I don’t know why. But as Mum always says, strangers are just friends you haven’t met and Michelle and I haven’t made friends properly yet, that’s going to take time, maybe. But we’ll get there, I know.
It’s Friday night and normally the partners are gone a bit earlier than us. They have dinners to go to, wives to go to. It’s a very male practice, with the exception of people like Michelle and ourselves and the accounts and legal secretaries. There’s not much of anafter-work culture. I’m sitting at my desk tidying up some loose ends, still determined to be the best employee ever. I’m going home tomorrow morning to Rivendell and I can’t wait, because it’s just been such an amazing two weeks and I have been telling Mum and Stefan all about it. And I’ve told Vilma I’ll bring her a lovely present. I’ve got her a really pretty little zippy rucksack with sparkles on it, and I know she’s going to love it. I’ll have money, wages, it’s really exciting. I’m trying to think what I’ll get, maybe some wine, although Mum is not much into wine. Stefan really likes beer, but wine seems like the sort of thing you bring home after your successful first two weeks as a woman with an actual job. Oh and chocolates, I might bring chocolates – some of those fancy ones that are handmade and have cream in them. I’m thinking this, as I’m tidying up my desk and pretty much everyone is gone. There’s a guy cleaning the offices, pulling along the big red Henry Hoover. He’s nice and we nod, but don’t talk and I smile in a sort of, ‘Hi, how you doing’ way, and he smiles in a ‘Hi, I’m doing OK’ way, but we haven’t got as far as actual conversation yet. I know I’m shy, I’m really trying. Nobody ever thinks I’m shy. Everyone assumes that if you are brought up in a place like Rivendell, you must have loads of friends and be marvellous at talking to people.
‘Hello, Sidonie, you’re working late,’ says a charming urbane voice.
I look up and there’s Alex.
‘Oh, hi, hi,’ I say, and I know I sound like some idiot kid with a crush on a movie star or something. But he seems so glamorous, like someone from another world. He’s the big boss and he knows my name.
‘Lovely name, Sidonie,’ he says. ‘You must come from an interesting family, I think?’
‘Yes,’ I say, all bursting enthusiasm and then wish I hadn’t sounded like such a moron. I have to try to appear cool. ‘I’m just getting ready to go,’ I say. ‘I thought I was the last one here?’
‘No, just you and me, that’s all.’
He doesn’t appear to count the guy dragging the hoover around. For a second I feel shocked by Alex Quinn. He doesn’t count the man cleaning. But maybe the Alex Quinns in the world don’t notice someone who does the cleaning, and I don’t like that. Still, as Mum always says, ‘People are strange, not everyone thinks the way we do.’
‘I am just about ready to finish up,’ he says, ‘but I finished a big case today and it’s all gone very well. Litigation is the toughest, you have got to be able to fight,’ he says. And I swear I can see his canines as he says it. Beautiful canines too, it has to be said. Lois thinks he’s too full of himself and says he’s got veneers and probably a sunbed tan.
When she said this, I replied: ‘No, no, I’ve heard from Glenda that he’s got a boat, and people with boats are always tanned, aren’t they?’
‘I was just about to open a bottle of wine to celebrate,’ he says now. ‘But you can’t open a bottle of wine on your own, can you?’
I don’t know how to answer this.
Myself and Daisy only open bottles of wine together in the teeny apartment, and even then they are really cheap,screw-top ones.
‘I’m sure you can’t,’ I say and, astonished at my daring: ‘you could bring it home and have it with your wife to celebrate?’
‘She’s got a committee meeting this evening, Lady Captain stuff.’
‘Golf?’ I question.
‘Yes.’ He seems amused by the question. ‘You don’t play golf, do you?’
I shake my head. All I know about golf is that people who play golf have bigger cars and kids who go to private school, because that’s how it was in Greystones and I personally don’t know anyone who plays golf. I mean, there were lots of people who played pitch and putt, but that’s different. I don’t think they have lady captains in pitch and putt. But I could be wrong.
‘Could you do me a favour, lovely Sidonie?’
‘Yes,’ I say, sitting up perkily. Work, I can do more work, I am a working machine.
‘Come into my office and share a glass with me and then I will have laid this case to rest. I can go off for the weekend feeling it is put to bed.’
