A Moral Dilemma: A Romantic Comedy Chick Lit Story (17 page)

Jeremy arrived just a few minutes later and stood anxiously in the foyer scanning the restaurant, looking to see if he recognised anyone, the way he always did whenever we went out. Then with a disapproving, aka worried, look on his face, turned to me and said, “It’s a bit stuffy in here isn’t it. Let’s go somewhere else.” He’d probably spotted one of his many Friday night conquests, and to be quite honest I really didn’t care.

“No. I like it here,” I said simply.

“Well, I don’t,” he said abruptly and turned to leave. I smiled apologetically at the
maître d’ and followed Jeremy out onto the street.

“Now, where to go,” he said to himself, surveying the vast selection of bars and restaurants littered across Wood Street.

“Nowhere,” I said, standing purposefully, right outside
Finnegan’s canopied entrance.

“Sorry?”

“I don’t want to go anywhere with you Jeremy,” I said kindly. Hoping he would just get my drift and that would be that.

He didn’t get it. “Oh,” he smiled, “you just want to take me straight home do you. You naughty girl.”

I wanted to say:
Not if you were the last male species left on planet earth
, but
that
would not have been letting him down gently, now would it. “Jeremy, I don’t want to go anywhere with you. Ever again. It’s over between us.”

“Becky what are you talking about?” sounding a little irritated.

“The trust has gone Jeremy,” I explained. “There’s no hope for us. No future.”

“Of course there’s hope for us! For Pete’s sake Rebecca!” His voice was getting louder with each syllable and the unwanted attention we were attracting didn’t seem to deter him. “People do make mistakes! Granted. It’s going to take some time, but you
will
learn to trust me again.”

“The amount of time
that
will take, I really don’t want to waste spending it with you,” I said as calmly as possible.

“
You don’t want to waste
…” he repeated incredulously. Then, he half smiled and shook his head as if I were deluding myself. “Do you really think you’ll ever find anyone better than me Rebecca?”

I desperately wanted to say:
Hah! You mean someone who doesn’t think life is one big fuckathon! Someone who can actually open their mouth without lying?
Someone who doesn’t spend more time in the bathroom than I do and believe that the sole reason of my existence is to lick his arse and kiss his feet?!
Like I said; that’s what I had
wanted
to say. Instead I forced myself to inhale deeply and silently chanted:
I am a woman of peace and tranquillity. I am a woman of peace and tranquillity
, and said, “That’s not the point Jeremy.”

Jeremy, however, was oblivious to the words ‘peace’ or ‘tranquillity’, or even the word ‘discretion’ so it seemed, as he completely ignored the little group of sniggering city spectators gathered outside Finnegan’s, and shouted: “THEN WHAT
IS
THE BLOODY POINT REBECCA?!!”

Sniggering spectators all turned their heads accusingly toward me, as if
I
were the one at fault here! “Jeremy, I am not the one at fault here!” I said in my defence, loud enough so sniggering spectators could hear.

“Oh no?! Because YOU are the one Rebecca Hardy, who is, for some goddamn absurd reason, hell-bent on ending our relationship!”

I could almost hear the sniggering spectators tutting at me. At me! I could feel my blood boiling.
I am a woman of peace and tranquillity. I am a
woman
… OH Sod that!! “JEREMY!” I screamed back at him like a slap right across his hysteric face. Then I looked him right in the eye. “YOU Jeremy are a bloody lying cheating toe-rag!” Jeremy, now suddenly very much aware of the sniggering spectators, narrowed his eyes at me as if to warn me to shut it. “You Jeremy are, and now I come to think about it, have always been, an absolutely SHIT boyfriend!” I hurled at him. “And, just for the record…these,” pointing at my nipples, “these…look,” I encouraged as he turned away in embarrassment, “…these Jeremy ARE NOT radio dials. You will NEVER be able to tune into KISS FM no matter how much you twist and turn them!” He looked as if I’d winded him. With the sniggering spectators evolving into hyena-like spectators, I had kneed him right where it hurt the most. His pride. He looked at me with sheer loathing. I ignored it. “And just so we are absolutely clear…this ‘
relationship
’ ended when YOU DECIDED TO SNEAK AROUND AND FUCK SOME TART!!”

“Well,” he said sounding like pure evil, “…she may have been a tart Rebecca, but at least she had a decent pair of tits!” And with that he turned and walked off down the street, leaving me standing on the pavement like some cheap street entertainer, as the cheeky
hyena-like spectators started to roar, repeating Jeremy’s hateful punchline. I wanted to walk away. In fact I wanted to run. But for some inane reason my feet just would not move. So I just stood there, wide-stanced, rooted to the spot, holding onto my handbag, feeling about as attractive as Nora Batty, grateful that I’d insisted on meeting Jeremy here in the City. Imagine if he had met me from work and we’d had this slanging match on Sheridan Place! Portia would’ve found the whole scene unforgettably hilarious and Gwendolyn would’ve probably fired me on the spot for being so pathetic! At least here, in the City, it wouldn’t matter that I had completely lost all self-control and made a complete and utter arse of myself. I didn’t know these people. I didn’t care what they thought. At least I would be able to lock this serenity-relapse deep away in the vaults of my mind and pretend that I had never been so weak. That this whole embarrassing episode had never even happened. The spectators, content to have something more amusing than work to talk about over their evening boozing session, started filing into Finnegan’s, slapping each other on the back. I glared at them. I hated them for having watched. For having laughed. For having heard Jeremy admit that I was basically inadequate and that’s why he’d cheated. I looked down at my chest. OK. So it’s flat. Big deal! Jeremy’s a dip-stick! Most men know and appreciate that there’s far more to a woman than tits and arse. Don’t they?

I was still standing there like a nomad, scrutinising my chest, when suddenly, out of nowhere, he appeared in front of me:

“Are you OK?” Charles bloody Coombs asked quietly.

I felt like the stockings I wasn’t even wearing, had fallen down around my ankles and a whole flock of birds had just
defecated my hair and face. I looked at him defiantly and snapped off: “I’m Fine!”

“Look,” he sighed, as if going against his better judgement, “…I overheard your argument.”

“Hah! You and everyone else in the square mile!” I sulked, discreetly trying to cover-up my non-existent chest, realising that he too must have heard Jeremy’s punchline.

He looked at me and…strange…but in the daylight, his eyes didn’t seem quite as steely or his face quite as evil like before. “I’m sorry,” he said. Then he hesitated and looked away at nothing in particular. “It’s not very nice when someone you care about cheats on you.”

“No. It’s not,” I moped, thinking what the hell he could have possibly known about it! No one but no one could ever understand the wretchedness of having the once supposed future father of my children resorting to having sex with common trollop, just because I have small tits! OK, NO tits. I hugged my chest tighter…trying to hide it.

“You mustn’t take it to heart, you know. What he said.” Then with a reticent nod at my chest, “That’s his short-coming. Not yours. Some men actually…ahem…have a penchant for more…ahem…
unassuming
…women.” I looked up at him furiously, thinking he was messing with me, but my scathing reply got stuck in my throat when faced with his coy boyish smile and eyebrows raised as if to say:
I’m really putting myself all out here. Please don’t hurt me.
I opened my mouth to say something. Anything. Make a sound even! But my voice was pure Judas. “I’m sorry. I don’t think we’ve ever actually met
properly
.” Extending his hand, “Charles. Charles Coombs. But please, call me Charlie,” then added with a twinkle in his eye, “…just so long as no one’s within earshot,” and laughed lightly.

I gave him my winning dimpled smile and shook his hand. “Rebecca Hardy. My
friends
call me Becky.”

“Well Rebecca Hardy, I do hope you will come to count me as a
friend
,” and smiled at me with soft eyes. “I think you’ve had quite an eventful evening so far. So, come on,” taking me by the arm, “let’s go and get you a coffee. See if we can neutralise things a bit.” My stubborn feet undeservedly dressed in Louboutin mules, started clacking along beside him, as though they had never been momentarily paralysed. As though they were waiting for this exact pair, of hand-crafted, Cleverley shoes, to come rescue them. I followed where he led, feeling as though I were in a Salvador Dali painting. This was Charles Martin Coombs. The target. Taking
ME
out – unprompted – for a coffee. Computer…please compute?! Hmmm. He did seem to be genuinely concerned about me. But. But maybe it wasn’t concern. Maybe Isabella really did know her husband better than he knew his own self, and this…this was just him finally taking the bait?

C
hapter Twelve

I studied my reflection in the bathroom mirror, scrutinising the arc of my brows. Hmm. One was definitely a couple millimetres higher than the other. I would have to work on that. Amazing how my skipping facial exercises for one week could make such a difference. I really just cannot afford to slack off like this again. My face will shrivel up in a month at this rate! Then, remembering the reason for my ‘slacking off’, my face softened with an impish smile. Though not quite sure why I was smiling at the memory, or if indeed I should even
be
smiling! After all, it was for all sense and purposes, just a job. And maybe I was just doing it very well. Or…maybe, just maybe…it was possible that someone as established and notable as Charles Martin Coombs, could actually really like me…for me. Hence the reason why he’s called me every day this past week, for “
just a quick hello
”, which lasted until the wee hours of the morning. Interesting. Humph. Nah. Not possible. Someone like him could never have any genuine interest in someone like me. Isabella probably had good cause for concern. He probably just saw me as one of his potential Friday night conquests!

I used the palm of my hands to apply tension to my forehead and tried bunching my brows in an attempt at erasing the frown that was crossing them. Of course I knew that Charles Coombs’s interest in me was most likely completely sordid, but it
was
interesting how when he took me out for coffee last week, he seemed…well…awkward, and quite uncomfortable to be frank. Plus he made a repeated point of telling me that he was married and even showed me photos of his two sons. Isabella had dismissed this when I’d told her about it. “
Oh, that’s probably just his way of letting you know off the bat that he’s not looking for anything serious. But he obviously is looking for something
!” I told her I wasn’t quite so sure. Especially as he hadn’t done, or said anything, that could be even slightly misconstrued as a pass. Even his phone conversations had been wholly respectable and amusingly friendly. It seems we’d innocently spoken about everything, and hadn’t actually talked about anything that could be considered at all borderline. And his invitation to take me out to dinner tonight was just…just…a polite response to my mentioning that I’d never actually been to a ‘proper’ dinner dance. That really was all it was. Nothing more. Isabella of course didn’t agree, and she felt sure that her husband’s intentions tonight were far less than honourable.

I tied my hair back, located my keys, threw my mobile into my bucket bag and was just about to throw the BlackBerry in there too when I decided to place that one in my jeans pocket. Just so I could feel the vibration if it rang. Not that I was expecting Charles Coombs…or Isabella…to call. But just in case.

The underground was heaving as per usual, and as per usual I lost the race of scrambling for the one free seat which was usually available, and had to stand for the entire four stop journey to Knightsbridge. I held on as best I could with one hand, as the carriage threw me around, and used the other hand to check if the BlackBerry had a reception signal. It didn’t. Not at all sure why I thought it would, as my mobile never has a signal on the tube. But no harm in checking. The train arrived in Knightsbridge but failed to open its doors for some inane ‘technical difficulty’. I huffed and puffed impatiently silently cursing London Underground for threatening to make me late yet again. I didn’t care that this ‘technical difficulty’ had lasted less than ten seconds – it was ten seconds of my time, where I should have been racing down Sheridan Avenue.
Or
checking my BlackBerry for messages. The doors finally opened and I, amongst hundreds of other frustrated, suddenly claustrophobic commuters, rushed toward the escalators. I legged it up the left hand side, barged through the barriers – holding up the BlackBerry like a beacon, so it could catch the slightest whiff of a signal – and for some totally unknown reason, my heart leapt in my chest when the device started to vibrate in my hand. I slowed my pace and checked the screen. I had one new message. I stood still in the middle of rush-hour manic Knightsbridge station, biting my bottom lip and grinning like a buffoon at the same time, as I read his message:
Are we still on for dinner tonight? C.

“You look rather happy today,” Lauren teased as I stepped into the reception area, having changed into my salon tunic. I raised my eyebrows at her as if to say:
Oh well.
“So, are you and Jeremy back together?”

“What? No! Definitely not!”

“Oh,” she said, sounding slightly baffled.

Portia leaned her lithe, Chanel-adorned body against the reception counter, smiling knowingly. “She’s met someone else.”

“I have not!” I snapped off, feeling suddenly hot in my face.

“Oh no?” she taunted, circling me like a panther studying her prey. “Then why are you blushing Rebecca Hardy? And why oh why are you risking losing your job by walking around with your BlackBerry tucked into your tunic?!” And before I could think of a thing to say, her nimble thieving hands plucked the BlackBerry out of my tunic pocket. “Very nice too,” she mused, looking it over.

“Portia! Give that back!”

Lauren looked alarmed. “Becky! Gwendolyn will freak if she finds out you’re carrying your phone around the salon. Why would you do that?”

Portia laughed. “I told you why. She’s met someone. And she’s in lurrrve.”

I glared at her. “Oh fuck off Portia!”

“Oooooh. Touchy.”

“As usual, you have absolutely no idea what you’re talking about!” Then turning to Lauren more calmly, “I’m waiting for an important phone call,” I explained. Lauren looked at me blankly as if that did not at all explain why I was risking my job. “From an aunt,” I added. “A
close
aunt. She’s…poorly.” Portia laughed and Lauren gave me a look as if to say not even she was that gullible.

“Well,” Lauren sighed, “I’m sure your ‘
poorly aunt
’ doesn’t want you losing your job, so I’d put that well away before Gwendolyn gets here.”

None of us heard her as she entered the salon. “W
ho
has to put
what
away?” Gwendolyn asked in a cool matter-of-fact tone. She stood at the salon entrance elegantly shrugging off her cashmere jacket, assessing us, as if she were trying to decide whether she either liked or disliked, now that Portia and I weren’t at each other’s throats all the time, the obvious new personnel dynamics.

“Oh good morning Gwendolyn,” Lauren offered in an attempt at buying us more time to think up an answer.

Gwendolyn studied the three of us expectantly, and gave an ever so slight incline of her head, a sure sign of her growing impatience. “Who has to put
what
away,” she repeated coolly.

Portia held up my BlackBerry. “Oh…this,” she started. I gulped. “I was just showing them my new BlackBerry and I guess I lost track of time,”
she smiled sweetly. Gwendolyn looked at Portia’s confident smiling face and then at my panic-stricken one.

“Yours is it?” she said sceptically as she headed toward her spiral staircase.

“Yes,” Portia quipped. “Top of the range.” The three of us held our collective breath until Gwendolyn’s stilettos disappeared up the spiral staircase, and then we collapsed in a silent giggling bundle. Portia placed my BlackBerry firmly into my hands and theatrically wiped hers clean. I smiled a thank you. Breathed a huge sigh of relief. And then…Gwendolyn’s voice trilled from the top of the spiral staircase:

“Rebecca Hardy.” My heart stopped. “I want to see you in my office. Right away.” I literally hopped from one foot to the next in panic; throwing the BlackBerry to Lauren and like a hot potato she caught it and threw it back to Portia who held it out toward me in one hand whilst she mouthed the words: “
No Way
!!” I hopped to the spiral staircase, clasping my hands together, mouthing the words “
PLEASE!
” pretending to tighten an imaginary rope around my neck and hang myself.

Gwendolyn dropped her jacket and handbag onto her couch as she sauntered over to her desk and when the eyes in the back of her head spotted me, said: “Well, don’t loiter Rebecca Hardy. Come. In.” I stepped into her office and stood in front of her desk. She perched on the edge, crossed her legs and looked at me. And when she motioned for me to sit down on one of the cold Philippe Starck chairs I squeezed my eyes shut for a second and pressed my lips tightly together in resignation. In all the years I’ve been working at this salon, I had never before been asked to ‘sit’ in her office. This could not be good. “Rebecca,” she started cautiously, “it seems you’ve been hiding something from me all this time.”

I almost passed out. How on earth could Gwendolyn have found out about what I’d been doing for Isabella? Maybe she, not giving two hoots as to whether I lost my job or not, had told her! No. Isabella needed me too much right now.
Didn’t she?
I opened my mouth to say something, anything, in my defence but failed to find a suitable sound let alone a whole word.

“I had no idea,” she continued, “just how ambitious you really are.” My eyes stopped rolling around in my head long enough for me to register her underlying tone
of…of course I could be mistaken…but it sounded an awful lot like…like admiration. “First the personal shopping. And now this?” She looked at me as though she were seeing me for the first time and wasn’t quite sure if she liked what she saw. I looked back with a blank dufus expression. “You have no idea what I’m talking about do you?” I looked up at her with an apologetic dufus smile. She shook her head in amazement. “You’re booked in with Mrs Dobson today are you not?” I nodded. “Well thank heavens you’re aware of that much,” she said sarcastically. “Well, Mrs Dobson has booked twelve personal
facial exercise
lessons for her daughter!”

I blinked. Wondering what the hell all this had to do with me as we did not offer facial… “With me?!” I asked wide-eyed.

Gwendolyn looked amused. “Yes, Rebecca Hardy. With you.”

“Oh My God!” I screeched, completely forgetting whose presence I was in. “I can’t believe it!”

Gwendolyn rolled her eyes, but I definitely saw a faint smile on her lips. “Well believe it because her daughter wants to get started right away apparently. She wanted you to see her on Thursdays but I told her you did personal shopping on Thursdays. So you will have to call her and arrange an appointment that fits with her schedule.” She slid a card across the table to me with
Anita Grasby’s
details. “And be sure to call her soon. Understood?”

“Oh definitely, Gwendolyn. Definitely,” I grinned, suppressing a sudden desire to give her a hug.

She hopped off the table and sat in her swivel chair behind the desk and started flicking through her diary. “That’s all Rebecca.”

“Oh. Oh sure Gwendolyn,” I almost sang as I leapt out my seat and almost skipped to the door.

“Rebecca,” she called just as I was about to step out of the office into my new dawn, “…I do hope these…
facial exercises
really work,” she said without looking up.

Refusing to let her pour water on my fire, I gave the eyes in the top of her head my winning smile and said: “Oh they
do
Gwendolyn. They do.”

“And what’s all this I hear about you doing personal shopping nonsense?” Mrs Dobson grumbled as I applied her facial mask. “You’re not in league with that awful Portia are you?”

“No. No, not at all” I whispered, aware that Portia was still in the salon and feeling suddenly hypocritical for my weekly verbal thrashings about her with Mrs Dobson. I placed the gauze over her face and laid cucumber slices over her eyes. “I’m not really a personal shopper at all actually. I’m only doing it because one client specifically requested me.”

“Why would someone request you for personal shopping?” Mrs Dobson asked sounding as surprised as I had initially been.

I laughed. “That’s exactly what I first thought.”

“So, who is this mysterious client?”

I hesitated, feeling torn between a sense of loyalty to Gwendolyn’s salon rules for not discussing
one client to another, and gratefulness to Mrs Dobson for buying a block of facial exercise sessions. I decided that Mrs Dobson with her insatiable appetite for
information
probably wouldn’t let the subject go until I’d told her. It really wasn’t gossip worthy, and she’d probably never even heard of Isabella. “Isabella Coombs,” I said.

Mrs Dobson removed the cucumber from her right eye and looked at me curiously. “Not Isabella
Martin
Coombs?”

Oh shit. “Yes. Do you know her?” I asked trying to sound casual.

“I’d say,” she sniffed looking like she suddenly smelt something real foul in the air. “And what does
she
want from you?” She spat the word ‘she’ as if it were repulsive hideous poison.

“
From me?
Nothing,” I lied in alarm, disturbed by jolly Mrs Dobson’s suddenly grim tone. “I’m just helping her pick out a few outfits.”

“Humph. Trust me dear; Isabella Coombs doesn’t need anyone’s help! She just uses people until she gets what she wants and then discards them like rubbish!” I’m no Einstein but I got the distinct impression that Mrs Dobson was talking from experience. “She’s pure evil that one. Even her own parents have washed their hands of her!” Mrs Dobson looked at me with concern. “Now you be careful Rebecca. If Isabella Coombs is spending time with
you
, she must be after something. And whatever it is can’t be any good. Just you make sure she doesn’t get it.”