‘You’re not at work now. You can use the big girl words.’
‘Most of the people at E11even don’t head to the toilet to tinkle. They go to do the white stuff.’
Daisy’s face is a picture, her eyes wide with shock. ‘They take drugs at work? I know you spend Monday to Friday in one of those painfully hip places, but—’
‘I’m just kidding, Dais. While I wouldn’t be surprised to find a good eighty percent of them partake in a couple of cheeky lines at the weekend, coke is verboten in the office loos. Unless it comes in liquid form in a can, I guess. And yes, the place is painfully hip as well as sometimes just painful.’
‘Like you’re not one of the cool crowd,’ she scoffs.
‘I am one of the least cool people in that building.’ I find myself grinning as I shake my head. It’s strange because as a child from a large family, I spent my late teens and early twenties desperate to be seen and heard and employed all manner of behaviours to be so. Being loud and opinionated, colouring my hair in a colour palette of sherbet, and the strange habit of donning ballet wear with boots more suited to dockyard workers. And now that I’ve reached a quarter of a century, I work in an office full of people who were as I was. Brash and opinionated. Misfits and attention seekers. People who want to be seenandheard, whether by virtue of wacky fashion choices or ridiculously expensive designer wear. Yet now, I’m not in the least bit interested in any of this. ‘And I dress like a middle-aged librarian.’ Which is mostly because my great-grandmother left me her wardrobe when she passed eighteen months ago. It’s not as dire as it sounds. She was something of a bobby dazzler back in the day, as she’d have said herself, which means I’m now the proud owner of some gorgeous vintage items including a silk Jacqmar scarf, which was a twenty-first birthday gift to her own mother, to a silk cocktail dress that, although bears no label, looks suspiciously like it could be Chanel.
While losing my great-granny, whose codename was Jammy because she never wanted to be called something as pedestrian as granny, was terrible, it came at the right time. I’d needed to reinvent myself, I suppose, and grow up a little. Besides, if I hadn’t ditched the tutus, I think Jammy would have come back to haunt me because she also left me her beautiful flat in Crouch End.
‘Rubbish!’ Daisy twirls a finger in the direction of my chest. ‘I’ve never seen a librarian who wears tight, fluffy twin sets and pencil skirts that make you wiggle when you walk. You’re vintage va-va-voom, but without the smell of mothballs. Like a modern-day sweater girl.’
‘I’m hardly Jane Mansfield,’ I say with a snort, my hands covering my breasts, almost as though my tiny A cup might hear and be upset.
‘No, but you’ve got her hair.’
‘Well, a girl can’t have locks the colour of cotton candy forever.’
‘It’s called candy floss.’
‘When you keep your hair pink by virtue of a box picked up in a pharmacy, becauseI’m worth it, it’s called cotton candy.’
‘Ah, the joys of being young and poor.’
As compared to being old and poor thanks to a mortgage and renovation in her case, I suppose.
‘I don’t know why you ever hid your hair in the first place,’ she continues. ‘Women pay hundreds to get your shade of strawberry blond and never get anywhere near.’
‘A change is as good as a rest,’ I demur, which is easier than saying the catalyst was being teased mercilessly at school. ‘As for my sense of style, while I do like a little vintage these days, I’m all about dressing for function, not attention. Not that I’m suggesting there’s anything to draw attention to.’ I glance down at my chest pointedly.
‘Self-deprecation is not allowed on your birthday,’ Vivi announces, taking her seat next to me. ‘You might not want attention, but you certainly gain attention.’
‘Agree. Usually when I say something stupid.’
‘No, I refuse to listen to this twaddle. Let’s order some small plates,’ she says, reaching for the rose gold-embossed menu.
‘When did tapas become small plates?’ Daisy muses.
‘When did small plates become a thing when, clearly, growing girls need big plates?’
‘This girl doesn’t need to grow any more,’ Vee mutters, smoothing her skirt over her thigh with her free hand. ‘Not all of us were blessed with a metabolism like yours.’
‘I’d swap it for your boobs. I’m tired of fried egg tits. I want Easter eggs!’ I declare as I mime holding a solid D cup. ‘It’s true,’ I protest as Vee throws her head back, laughing raucously. At the same time as she moves back, someone on the next table stands, the movement drawing my attention, and there follows one of those moments when you see something you know you weren’t supposed to see. This place may be buzzing for a Thursday night, but it’s also the kind of establishment with plenty of darkened corners and secluded booths, the kind of place a person might plan to meet someone on the down-low, so to speak, for a secret rendezvous.
‘What are you staring at?’ Vivi head turns, following my line of sight, and she actually inhales a sharp breath as she sees what I see. Or rather who.
‘My goodness. Who isthat?’
‘Archer Powell.’ A man whose ego possesses its own postcode, I’ve observed. ‘He’s an analyst at E11even.’ One of the more senior on his team. A business manager, maybe?
‘He can analyse me any day of the week. I can’t believe you work with that perfect specimen, and you never shared. Sharing is caring, Heather.’
‘Ha! That sounds like it could be his motto. And he’s far from perfect.’ Beyond his looks maybe, which I’m told once graced the catwalks of Europe following university. ‘I don’t really know him, but I’ve heard the rumours, and those gossiping whispers paint a less than pretty picture. What’s the saying, pretty is as pretty does?’
‘That’s the kind of pretty that can does, I mean do, what it likes. Or whomever it likes.’ With an impish grin, Daisy returns to chasing the two tiny straws in her drink with her mouth.
