I Never Fancied Him Anyway (29 page)

‘Cassandra, dear, sit down and let me get you some tea,’ says Mrs Henderson, kindly pulling out a chair for me. ‘You were up there for ages, wasn’t she, Louise? At least an hour. Everything all right now, do you think?’

‘Yes, Mrs Henderson, I think so,’ I say simply, not wanting to go into too much detail, not when she has company.

Was I really there for that long? Bloody hell.

‘Oh, let me introduce my new neighbour, who I’ve only just met myself. Louise, this is Cassandra. You know,
Tattle
magazine Cassandra.’

‘Oh, it’s so lovely to meet you,’ says Louise, warmly shaking my hand. ‘I’m a big fan, you know. In fact, you’re the only reason I buy that awful magazine at all these days as quite frankly it’s really gone down the tubes lately, all that malarkey about how celebrities stay rake thin and those “What’s hot and what’s not” lists. Honestly, as if your average reader cared about whether or not it’s now uncool to be seen drinking double tall iced mocha frappucinos or whatever it is they’re calling an old-fashioned cup of coffee now. Would you agree, Mrs Henderson?’

‘Oh absolutely.’

‘
Tattle
magazine used to have lovely knitting patterns and very easy-to-follow recipes in my day, but now Cassandra’s column is the only thing worth reading at all. Am I right or am I right?’

‘Completely. And please, call me Liz.’

‘Liz.’ The two of them beam at each other and it’s lovely to see.

‘So you live near by, Louise?’ I ask, gratefully taking a mouthful of tea.

She nods. ‘Right next door. I was just saying, it’s very remiss of me not to have paid a visit earlier, but, it’s a
terrible
thing to admit, I didn’t really feel comfortable calling here after the awful tragedy that happened.’

‘I’m sorry, what was that? What did you say?’ says Oliver, suddenly all ears.

‘They were a lovely family, you know,’ Louise goes on. ‘I remember them so well. The Jordans. She was absolutely delightful. Arty type – Oh, you know the sort, Liz, she used to go around without a bra. She was a painter and her little boy can’t have been more than about six when that terrible car accident happened. Ethan was his name, a right little scamp, always in trouble, but you could never be angry with him because he was just so adorable.’

‘What happened?’ asks Oliver, being his usual persistent self. I say nothing, though I’m actually dying to know myself.

‘Car accident. It happened on Christmas Eve; I’ll never forget it. It was the lead item on the six o’clock news. Hit by a drunken driver, God love them; sure they never stood a chance. The poor husband was only heartbroken, you never saw grief like it. I think he had this house on the market first thing that January. Must be coming up to two years ago now.’

I say a silent prayer, just to say thank you that the poor woman and her lovely little boy, Ethan, are now, finally, at rest.

‘And then it was just the strangest thing,’ Louise goes
on
. ‘There I was, passing by your house this morning and, after all this time, I just got the strongest urge to pop in and introduce myself. I really hope you don’t mind, Liz.’

‘Of course not. I’m absolutely delighted to meet you. Call in any time.’

I’m not joking, Mrs Henderson actually looks as if a physical weight has been lifted from her shoulders and I’m just thinking how pleased I am to have been able to help her, when suddenly I get a flash. Ooh, it’s a nice one.

I see Liz and Louise, bosom buddies now, at the airport on their way to New York for some Christmas shopping. The pair of them are happy as sandboys, especially Liz, who is just looking so delighted to have finally made one good, true pal. An ally, someone she can have a bit of fun with. And after everything she’s put up with over the years, no one deserves it more. The pair of them are chatting and laughing away, planning all the discount stores they’re going to hit and the Broadway shows they’re going to see, all delighted with life, when suddenly Liz’s mobile rings
.

It’s Gerry, her husband. I can see her looking at the number coming up, smiling quietly to herself and switching her phone off
.

Hours and hours later, when I’m tucked up in bed, absolutely wrecked tired for some reason, my mobile
gives
a beep-beep noise to let me know there’s a text coming through. ‘Shit,’ I say sleepily, hauling myself up and staggering over to wherever I dumped the phone. Forgot to recharge it, as usual.

I don’t believe it: it’s from Jack. Why is he texting me?

HEY. SORRY TO DISTURB U SO LATE. HOPE TODAY WENT OK. OLIVER WANTS TO USE SOME BREAKFAST CLUB FOOTAGE FOR HIS DOC, BUT I WON’T GIVE HIM THE GO AHEAD UNLESS U R HAPPY.

OK. Fine.

Right then.

He’s just being professional, I know, I know, I know. It’s my own stupid bloody eejit fault that this very businesslike message is making my heart race.

I hop back into bed, remembering that Charlene is only in the bedroom right next door. Nothing else to do, really, is there? I delete the text, switch off my phone and fall straight back into a deep, deep sleep.

Chapter Twelve

THE TAROT DECK

THE DEATH CARD

Ok, First Of all, don’t panic. Technically, yes, this card symbolizes an ending, but on the plus side it’s also the card of renewal and transformation. A major event may unfold either in your life or in that of a close friend. It may feel traumatic, but in the long run the old lifestyle just wasn’t valid any more. It wasn’t working and a change was long overdue
.

A time to let go of who- or whatever is holding you back and to embrace the new, looking forward confidently to the future. Even though
things
may be rough in the short term, remember that life can only get better. Think positive and don’t give the past a backward glance
.

In other words, sometimes what seems like the worst thing that could possibly happen often turns out to be the best. Honest
.

From:
[email protected]

To:
[email protected]

Subject:
From Hero to Zero

Dear Cassandra,

I’ve been a fan of your column for so long now that there was a certain sort of fated inevitability that I would one day contact you looking for advice.

OK, here goes. I’m old enough to wonder why I’m not married, young enough still to have kids (I hope) and am now in the throes of what feels like a mid-life crisis. I’ve even given myself a nickname: the One before the One.

At this point, it’s almost like a self-fulfilling prophecy, Cassandra; every time I get seriously involved with a guy, he will inevitably end up marrying the one who comes along next. Every, every time. This has now happened so often that my friends are starting to ask me if I’ve been going after some kind
of
Olympic recognition all this time. Take my most recent ex, and you can publish the bastard’s name for all I care and I only hope he reads this and is suitably mortified, it’s Tom Kirwan of 28 Avondale Terrace, Bray, Co. Wicklow. There, I said it. Good enough for him. When I first met this guy, his idea of long-term faithfulness was to bed only one woman at a time and his contribution to a cleaner, greener environment was to make the same pair of underpants last four days. So, what did I do? What all the women’s magazines, yours included, are constantly telling us never, ever works. I nabbed him, dragged him home and spent the best part of two years sanding down all his rough edges, scrubbing and polishing him until I had successfully moulded him into the image of my perfect life-partner. If this were a production of
My Fair Lady
, I’d be Henry Higgins and he’d be the Eliza Doolittle character. And then, the curse of the One before the One strikes yet again. He breaks up with me and before I even have time to go through our CD/DVD collection to figure out what belongs to who, he’s moved on to someone else. Who, subsequently, after a disgracefully short length of time, he marries.
Of course
the next woman who came along grabbed him for herself while the going was good; I had already done all the hard work for her. I had broken him in, housetrained him, if you will, and now all she has to do is sit back and enjoy the foot rubs and back massages which I taught him how to do. From pig to
Pygmalion
. I should go into business.

My question is this, O mighty Cassandra who everyone I know reads and raves about. When, when, oh when, will the curse be broken?

Yours in single-woman solidarity,

Amy Lennox, officially the unluckiest woman in Ireland

THE OFFICE IS
deadly quiet and I’m really able to concentrate. It’s not quiet because I’m at my desk at some ungodly hour of the morning, you understand, it’s just that the Dragon Lady is in residence and the place is a humming hive of activity. Until lunchtime that is, when, with a bit of luck, she’ll bugger off for a few hours and let us all get back to messing, chatting and having a bit of crack like we normally do.

Lately, the Dragon Lady has taken to having very long lunches and the highly overactive
Tattle
magazine rumour mill has it that she’s seeing someone. Romantically, that is. All very new, all very hush-hush, but everyone keeps turning to me wanting gory details, as if I’m some kind of psychic private detective. I, however, have decided for once in my life that discretion is the better part of valour and that I’ve a far better chance of hanging on to my job by keeping my mouth shut. Plus, it’s never really a good idea to ‘out’ your boss before he or she is ready, really, now is it?

Sir Bob wafts in and instantly cops on that she’s here.
Mind
you, the stone-cold silence
is
a bit of a giveaway. Normally at this hour of the morning we’d all be fruitfully employed watching TV, reading out each other’s horoscopes and having our mid-morning contest to see who can eat a doughnut without actually licking their lips.

‘Have some rather juicy gossip from last night, my dear,’ he says to me in a low voice, drifting past my desk, ‘but I’ll tell you when we have a chance for a proper natter. My goodness me, the effect that dreadful Dragon Lady has on this establishment. Really, we should consider hoisting a flag outside the building so we can all be warned when she’s in residence. Just as the royal standard is flown whenever Her Majesty is at Buckingham Palace, you know.’

I don’t actually have the first clue what he’s talking about, but I nod and smile anyway out of politeness and mentally remind myself to tell him about my adventures with Obnoxious Oliver when, suddenly, without warning, I get a flash.

Ooh, for once it’s a lovely one. This is the kind of news I adore giving people.

It’s Amy, the lady from the letter, and she’s hand in hand with a guy on a beach . . . somewhere in Ireland, I think, because it’s freezing cold and drizzling rain . . . but the sense of love and romance I’m getting is just palpable. Then – yes! He’s
producing
a ring box from his jacket pocket . . . she’s looking stunned . . . Oh my God, this is it, he’s proposing! And the funny thing is, I feel they know each other from a long, long time ago . . . I don’t believe it! He’s one of her exes. But not the guy she wrote to me about, a different one, from her distant past. And I feel he loved her doing a Henry Higgins number on him, as she calls it, and missed her all the long years they were apart and now he wants to spend the rest of his life with her
. . .

There’s nothing like a storybook ending, is there? Can’t beat it. Only wish I was heading for one myself. I’m just about to scribble down my notes while it’s all fresh in my head when I get a scary sense that someone’s standing over my shoulder.

Oh shit.

The Dragon Lady. Looking very smart, actually, in a black trouser suit; I’d almost swear she was wearing tinted moisturizer and are they
heels
she has on?

‘Cassandra, remember I asked you to get me the contact details of that guy who phoned into your
Breakfast Club
slot?’

There’s never a preamble or, God forbid, a hello, good morning, how are you, with her, just straight to the point, direct as a missile.

‘Emm, ehh . . .’ I mumble, like a schoolkid who hasn’t done her homework, all the time thinking, What the hell
is
she talking about? Bugger, bugger, bugger . . . Then I remember. Valentine. The guy who phoned into the
Breakfast Club
because he couldn’t get a date. Who I got flashes of being pursued by scores of gorgeous women, a bit like in a Benny Hill high-speed chase sequence. Who I predicted would get his own column.

OK, so I didn’t exactly see that it was with
Tattle
magazine but, bloody hell, I was close enough. I really will have to start writing things down.

‘It’s on my “to do” list, emm’ – shit, why can I never remember her real name? – ‘Amanda.’ I smile, as brightly and confidently as I can. ‘I’m just going to work my way through all of these,’ I add, indicating the huge mound of unopened letters all marked ‘Cassandra.
Tattle
Magazine’, as if to remind her that I haven’t exactly been sitting here scratching my head all morning. ‘And then I’m straight on to it.’

‘I want it done by the time I get back,’ she says in such a tone that you can almost hear the unspoken ‘dear’. She must be in pretty good form, though. Time was you’d have had the head chewed off you and found yourself threatened with the back of the dole queue for less, far, far less. ‘Well, carry on, then,’ she says, rapping her fingers on my pile of letters as she moves away.

Well, I’ll be. She’s even had a manicure.

OK, nothing for it then. I pick up the phone and dial directly through to the
Breakfast Club’s
production office.
Half-eleven.
Great, they’ll be off the air and, with a bit of luck, someone, somewhere will still have Valentine’s contact details. His last name, for instance, would be a start.

The phone rings. ‘Good morning, the
Breakfast Club
, Lisa speaking.’