Never Too Late (48 page)

Dame Street branch was going to Mars on a space shuttle

for the rest of her life instead of to Sydney for a year.

Nobody could party like the bank people, Cara thought

ruefully. It must have been looking at all that money every

day and not being able to touch it that made them aware

of how fleeting life was and how they had to enjoy it now.

Or something like that. She had a vague memory of

discussing this theory with somebody in the men’s toilet

when she and all the bank girls had barged in past a couple

of frightened blokes, claiming there was an endless queue

for the women’s and they were desperate.

Cara hoped that was the worst thing they’d done. She

couldn’t keep up with those women. They must have

constitutions of iron because when she’d finally decided

she had to go home at half-eleven, they were all warming

up for a night in Club M where the guest of honour was

promised a ducking in the Jacuzzi, clothes or no clothes.

It was small compensation to think that somewhere in

the city of Dublin, there had to be a few people who were

feeling more hungover than she.

Unfortunately, that tiny glimmer of pleasure was

dimmed by the fact that she hadn’t been up in time to see

Phoebe that morning, so her plan to apologise for storming

out of the flat hadn’t come to fruition. She hated not being

friends with someone, hated uncomfortable silences. It was

bad enough engaging in a Cold War with Evie, without

starting battles with anyone else. Before long, she’d have

no friends, she decided mournfully.

‘Cara,’ said a voice and she whirled around to see

Bernard Redmond staring at her in an unnerving way, as if

she were a rare species of bug and he was a collector with

a net who’d been searching for something new to pin in a

glass frame. ‘I was hoping I’d find you here.’

Instantly on her guard, she looked at her boss warily.

Bernard never looked pleased to see anyone except his

bank manager and his sweet sleeping partner, Millicent. If

he did look pleased to see you, experience had shown the

staff that it was only because he was looking forward to

screeching abuse at you for something.

Bernard didn’t drink, smoke or hang around bars so he

only had two hobbies: sneaking around the building,

surprising people who’d taken a crafty early fag break in

the ante-room off the canteen, and screaming blue murder

at people for no reason whatever. Cara didn’t smoke, she

was at her desk working - in theory, anyway - so it had to

be a bollocking. She prepared herself for it.

‘Hello, Bernard,’ she responded carefully.

‘We are alone?’ he asked, as if someone very small was

lurking behind the filing cabinet in the corner.

‘Yes.’

‘Good, good. I need to talk to you. Privately.’

Cara gulped. This didn’t look good. Ewan. He knew

about Ewan, that had to be it. Fraternising with colleagues

was bad for business and meant nobody got their job done

properly, she guessed.

‘I believe Zoe is looking for another job,’ he said

conversationally, sitting down on her chair and fixing Cara

with his best television evangelist’s stare.

If Cara had been expecting anything, it wasn’t this. She’d

been waiting for Bernard to launch into a speech about

employees dating each other and how this wasn’t allowed

by the company. But Zoe! How the hell did he know she

was contemplating leaving? The place must be bugged. She

wouldn’t put it past him. Transmitting toilet rolls in the

ladies’ and concealed microphones in the light sockets,

that’d be Bernard’s idea of keeping up with what the staff

were up to.

He was frowning less than usual, which meant he was

attempting to look quizzical, expecting an answer.

He could stuff it, Cara thought with a momentary surge

of rebellion.

‘Really?’ she said in astonishment. ‘Gosh,’ she added,

blinking and trying to look like the sort of person who said

‘gosh’ instead of the ‘for fuck’s sake!’ she’d have normally

used. ‘She’s never mentioned it to me.’

The quizzical expression disappeared and his gimlet eyes

got even smaller, if that was possible. ‘Yes, she’s leaving,’ he said. “I thought you’d have known.’

‘I’m sure I would.’ She paused. ‘If Zoe were actually

leaving.’

Bernard swiftly recovered from his shock at Cara actually

being impertinent.

‘Well, she is,’ he said smoothly. ‘And I have another

applicant for her job. I expect you to make the transfer of

accounts run smoothly. This is an important department

within the company.’

He never said that at wage review time, she reflected.

But Ewan was right. Zoe’s going meant she’d have to do

twice the work until her replacement was up to speed.

‘She’s the daughter of a dear friend of mine,’ Bernard

emphasised,’ so be nice to her.’

Correction, Cara thought grimly, make that twice the

work forever. Any daughter of a pal of Bernard’s was

bound to be some intellectually challenged bimbo who

didn’t know one end of a pen from the other and would

require babysitting for at least six months before she was

capable of drawing a straight line or finding the coffee

machine unaided.

‘Of course,’ she said automatically. ‘But,’ she added

hastily, ‘if Zoe isn’t going …’

Bernard didn’t let her finish the sentence. ‘She is.’

Zoe took the news remarkably well for someone who’d

only been toying with the idea of leaving and was now as

good as fired. The last person who’d decided to leave was

given half an hour to clear their desk and Bernard had

made the deeply embarrassed security guard stand over

the recalcitrant employee as he packed a bin liner with his

possessions.

‘I still have a month to work out my notice,’ she said.

‘He’ll probably tell you not to bother coming back as

soon as you hand your resignation in,’ Cara fretted.

‘Remember Dino. You’d have thought he was going to steal

half the computers in the place the way Bernard had him

watched.’

Zoe shrugged. ‘If that happens, it happens, Cara. Besides,

the interview went very well this morning. I’m sure they’re

going to offer me the job and I’d like to work there. Better

than here, apart from working with you,’ she added, seeing

Cara’s downcast face. ‘Come on, think of the leaving party

we’ll have.’

‘I’m too hungover even to think of having an alcoholic

drink ever again,’ Cara said gloomily.

‘Spoilsport,’ Zoe said. ‘A couple of Screwdrivers and

you’ll be right as rain, I promise.’

‘Why is it that whenever anyone says “I promise”, it’s

always detrimental to my health,’ Cara muttered.

Retail therapy, thought Olivia, swinging the shopping bags

into the passenger seat, was definitely one of the most

enjoyable pastimes in the world. Better than sex. Far better

than sex, she corrected herself. Her current sex life was

hardly very therapeutic since it consisted of no sex when

Stephen was away (endurable because it meant he wasn’t

bossing her around either) or the sort of soulless encounter

she found herself tolerating (because actually to discuss

what was wrong with their relationship would be to start

them on a rocky road from which there’d be no turning).

Under the circumstances, spending a huge chunk of a

month’s wages she hadn’t even been paid yet on clothes

for her TV appearances was fifty times more therapeutic

than any lovemaking.

She patted the selection of orange Karen Millen and

cream Kilkenny bags fondly. If scientists could bottle the euphoria you experienced after buying new, change-your life clothes, then no woman would need Prozac, she decided.

In the teacher’s loo in St Joseph’s, she changed into

one of her new outfits: a pinstripe grey trouser suit

which was cut with the sort of sharp modern tailoring

she’d never worn before. Stephen liked her in classic

clothes, double-breasted blazers and elegant twin sets you

could wear with pearls and scarves with horses on them.

The sort of thing her mother had by the drawerful but

which she loathed.

She was sure he’d disapprove of this Karen Millen suit

with its fashionable edge and outrageous red lining. Yet it

gave her a surge of confidence to wear it.

Of course, it wasn’t precisely the sort of outfit you’d

wear to teach 3A but Olivia needed to try it out, to get

comfortable in the suit before she wore it to the television

studios the next day. A trial run with the worst-behaved

class ever to tramp down the once-silent halls of St

Joseph’s would be perfect.

It was a different Mrs MacKenzie who walked calmly

into the big Home Economics room ten minutes later.

Her face didn’t have the hunted look teachers’ faces

usually had when about to face the bane of their lives.

Instead, she looked quietly confident, a look her pupils

were not familiar with. They took very little notice when

she shut the door to the classroom. Mrs MacKenzie, along

with the young Geography teacher with the stammer,

wasn’t the sort of person to strike fear into their souls.

Seriously in need of painting, the room stank of a bizarre

mixture of cookery smells, most of which were overpowered

by the stench of burnt onion from some previous

culinary experiment.

3A were already at their desks, some waiting quietly, the

remainder shouting at the top of their voices in the happy

expectation of an undemanding class where they could

chat, tell jokes and discuss which member of Westlife they

wanted to marry without any fear of Mrs Mackenzie

stopping them.

‘Good morning, class,’ she said. Apart from a few

mumbled hellos from the good kids, who were too afraid

of the troublemakers to be seen to be paying much

attention to the teacher, nobody responded. The noise level

continued unabated.

‘I said, good morning, class. Now sit down and be quiet.’

Her voice was harder, louder and brooked no opposition.

She gave them a cool, clear stare, a look that had worked

well when she’d tried it in front of the camera.

The class sat up straighter and most of the noise

stopped, which was a first, Olivia realised smugly. Only the

few troublemakers kept talking, the secondary’ school

version of giving someone a two-fingered salute.

Cheryl Dennis, Olivia’s particular bete noire, chatted the

loudest. You can’t touch me, she seemed to be saying,

running a hand through her short dark hair unconcernedly.

Olivia gazed at the pupil who’d tortured her for so long,

the girl who was singlehandedly responsible for making

her reconsider her career as a teacher. Before Cheryl, she’d

been a decent teacher and had never lost control of a class.

But from that first day Cheryl had stared at her shrewdly,

sensing like a temperamental horse with an inexperienced

rider that here was a person who could lose command in

an instant, Olivia’s confidence as a teacher had plummeted

like a stone.

Her fear of losing control in class had spread to every

lesson she took, until the point where she’d entered even

the first years’ class with trepidation. She’d endured it for

the seven months since Cheryl had moved - meaning

expelled, they reckoned knowledgeably in the staffroom from

another school. Not anymore.

Olivia eyed up her opponent, trying to remember how she’d stared Nancy Roberts down. Cheryl was short, tomboyish and made her school uniform look as

un-uniform as possible with the addition of blocky fashionable

shoes, a seriously turned up skirt and an overlarge

school jumper. Her eyes were rock hard and bristled with

attitude.

Action was required, Olivia decided. If she could quell a

television studio with her performance, she could certainly

shut up a little cow like Ms Dennis.

‘I said, be quiet,’ she said, staring straight at the troublemaker with menace in her voice.

The class, sensing something was very different today,

fell silent. Even Cheryl.

Olivia walked to the back of the classroom, as slowly

and casually as if she was going for an afternoon stroll. She

did look different today, very cool, admitted a couple of

the girls to themselves grudgingly.

‘Nice suit,’ whispered one fashion-conscious soul longingly

to her best friend, recognising superior tailoring, the

sort of thing they admired in their mothers’ magazines.

They both yearned to look like Mrs MacKenzie, all slim,

blonde and elegant. It was just that she was such a

pushover. They didn’t want to be like her. They wanted to

be strong, powerful women. But it occurred to at least

some of them that Mrs MacKenzie wasn’t acting her usual

pushover self today.

Mrs MacKenzie stood beside Cheryl, staring down at her

with an amused expression on her face.

The girl stared back at her insolently.

Olivia, knowing that this had to be done and silently