I slouch against the wall, suddenly feeling itchy and uncomfortable, even the make-up on my face suffocating me.
“Bloody hell,” Holly mutters at my side. “She’s wasted.”
“She surely fucking is, talking like that.” I shake my head, putting my champagne glass down on the table beside me. “I just hope no one overheard her.”
“I don’t think so,” Holly says, casting a quick glance around us. “This night can’t end soon enough.”
“We’ll stay for Joanne’s speech and then we’ll go,” I say, and Holly nods.
I force myself to engage in a little more small talk before we all take our seats, the minutes dragging by painfully until we’re all served our ridiculously enormous plates with a tiny sprig of food in the middle. It’s green and foamy, and I decide not to eat it. Rich people food still has me scratching my head.
The other WAGs at the table chatter happily, asking me about my dress, my latest campaign for Dior, admiring my hair and asking how I get it so shiny. I indulge them, reminding myself it’ll all be over soon and they’re probably as bored as I am.
Finally, there’s a tinkling of metal on glass, and all conversation hushes to silence as Joanne takes the stage. She’s met with polite applause, and she waves gaily as she positions herself behind a glass podium.
“I am so grateful to see so many of you here tonight, I am forever in awe of the dedication of the women of this community to stand behind these causes and to use their influence for good,” Joanne says, dipping her head demurely when more applause patters in the ballroom. “Now as many of you know, the children’s hospital is a cause that lies close to my heart. My own son, Isaiah, spent 6 weeks in hospital when he was born prematurely.”
A picture pops up on the screen behind her, of a tiny baby in an incubator, a little knitted cap on his head and the rest of him obscured by wires. A collective sound of gasps and “Aww”s goes up from the group, and Joanne turns to look at the picture, a hand to her chest.
“That’s my Isaiah, the day after he was born,” she says, and more soft applause sounds. “It was a hard time for our family, Isaiah being our first baby, and we could not have gotten through it without the support of the staff at the Great Ormond Street Hospital.”
The picture behind her changes, to one of Peter, sitting in a chair, no shirt on, and this tiny, wire-covered baby on his chest.He’s looking down at him, his face a combination of joy and fear, Isaiah’s tiny hand curled around his finger.
Joanne turns to look at the picture, and I don’t know if anyone else notices the tension in her stance, but I sure do. She looks at the picture for a beat too long, the women around me starting to shift in their seats.
“Oh dear,” Holly mutters under her breath.
Joanne spins back to the podium, blinking rapidly. “Sorry, that picture always makes me so emotional. It was… It was such a hard time, and without my husband, I don’t know… I just don’t know…” She wobbles a little on her feet, gripping the podium with white-knuckled determination. “I couldn’t have done it without him, I wouldn’t have been able to manage at all, and…” A sob hiccups out of her, and there’s shared glances of alarm thrown around my table, and no doubt the room.
Joanne sobs again, louder this time. “My husbandloves me,” she snaps into the microphone, and the room is deathly silent. “He does, and he always has.”
“Oh shit.” Holly says it loud enough for the other women at my table to all snap their attention to her.
“I can’t…” Joanne gasps from the stage, and I start to hope that someone, fuckinganyonefrom Joanne’s team goes to help her. “I couldn’t have done it without him, and that meant something. Itdid.” Joanne slumps forward, her sobs carried over the microphone to echo around the room. “He’s not leaving me! He’snot!” She straightens back up, her hair sticking to the sweat on her forehead and mascara running down her cheeks. “And I know you’re all saying he is! I know you’re all saying he’s going to leave me, but he’snot! I won’t let him! And all you bitches smiling here and eating my food saying he will when your own husbands are probably shagging your fucking PAs, well fuck you!”
A woman in a suit finally darts out from stage right and takes Joanne’s arm. At first she fights back, jerking her arm out of the woman’s grasp, and stumbles backwards.
“No, I’m not - I won’t let them talk about me like that, Iwon’t!” Joanne shouts, pointing a finger at the room.
The woman gets closer to Joanne again, and mutters to her quietly. She’s joined a few seconds later by a man, and through their combined efforts, they manage to wrestle Joanne off the stage amidst her tears and accusations.
The woman returns a moment later to go to the podium, and gives us all a warm smile.
“I’m so sorry, ladies, but Joanne has taken something of a turn, and the event will have to be cut short,” she says. “We do thank you for your attendance tonight, and our ushers will see you all out. Have a lovely evening.”
I turn to Holly, who rewards me with wide eyes, lifting her hands.
“I’m not shagging Archie, promise.”
I bite back a laugh, because that would be so inappropriate. “Well, that makes two of us.”
Holly similarly is trying not to laugh, and reaches out to take my hand. “Oh my god, I’m sorry, I laugh when I’m nervous.”
“What the fuck was that?” I ask under my breath as the women around us get to their feet and begin to leave.
“That’s a man destroying a woman and leaving her to deal with it in the public bloody eye.” Holly grasps my hand and gets to her feet, pulling me up with her. “Come on, let’s get out of here and go get some real food.”
Outside, the press are waiting for us, the veritable cascade of WAGs, a paparazzo's dream. The lights flash wildly, and names are called out as cars arrive to ferry us away.
