Playing James (3 page)

We were then treated to a lecture from the nurse about practical jokes and wasting hospital time. She moved swiftly on to the state of the NHS for which, it seemed, Lizzie and I were solely to blame. Darling Dr Kirkpatrick bustled around; he probably hadn't seen such pandemonium since the last time I was in and I'm certain I will be the talk of the hospital staffroom for some time. I can almost hear it now. I will become one of those stories that starts, 'And do you remember the time when …' Cue raucous laughter.

Now and then he patted a freshly weeping Lizzie on the arm and said, 'It's not that bad.'

I felt like roaring, 'Au contraire, Monsieur le Docteur, it is that bad. And don't pat her,

she

doesn't

deserve

a

pat.'

But it might have seemed a little uncharitable. Why I was worried about what would seem uncharitable in front of Dr Kirkpatrick after what he had just witnessed I will never know.

Excuse me, but I don't want to talk about this any longer. It's eleven o'clock in the morning and I have already been in a ruckus with a plain-clothes police officer and been man-handled by a nurse who believed me to be harbouring a condom with intent.

Sod the Jaffa Cakes. I'm just going to have the brandy.

T
he
Bristol Gazette
wasn't my first choice of newspaper when I started work fresh out of university four years ago. I had planned to live in London and was desperate to get on to one of the national newspapers, but applicants needed some really good work experience. My only work experiences were picking strawberries in the holidays (and I must be the only person alive to actually be fired from that) and some waitressing work. I realised I would have to lower my sights when I opened my twentieth rejection letter, and I would have taken ANYTHING by the time this job in Bristol popped up. And I was very lucky to get it because you have no idea of the sort of lies I had to tell to bag the position of sports correspondent. Really. You just don't want to know.

When Joe made the lightning deduction that I knew absolutely nothing about sport, which may have been at the same time I asked if Tiger Woods was seeded in Wimbledon, he put me on to features. I am the most junior of the junior members of the features team, which basically means I get all the jobs no one else will do. I seem to specialise in pet funerals at the moment. But it's very hard to show off one's superior writing skills when waxing lyrical about a cat: '… and Persil's virgin white coat looked like driven snow against …' Yes. Exactly.

It's Friday and I am late into work as usual. Even though the paper's offices are only a ten-minute drive across town, I just can't seem to bring myself to make it there on time. As I stand waiting for the lift which will take me to the third floor, I try desperately not to think about yesterday's hospital incident. The mere sight of white coats starts me twitching nervously. The lift arrives and the doors open. I zip in, only to run full-pelt into Smug Pete, the crime correspondent. He is carrying a large cardboard box. Such is the force of our collision, I nearly invert my own breasts.

Smug Pete and I don't get on. I think he is smug and he thinks I'm annoying (fair enough, I probably am). Luckily we don't go through the pretence of liking one another.

'Pete!' I gasp with a wince, resisting the temptation to sink to my knees clasping my mammaries, 'what's the box for? You're not leaving, are you?' I add on hopefully.

Smug Pete has a self-satisfied smirk on his face. I don't do it very often, but this time I seem to have inadvertently banged the nail square on its proverbial head. Damn.

Pete smiles a smug smile. 'Just handed in my notice. Got a job with the
Daily Mail
. They've said I don't need to work my notice so I'm off.'

'Right. Well. Best of luck with that,' I spit out.

'Thanks.'

We shuffle around each other as he gets out of the lift.

'By the way, Holly,' he says as the doors start to glide shut, 'Joe wants to see you.' He smirks once more and the lift doors clunk home.

I take a swift left towards Joe's office on arrival at the third floor and knock on his door, just below the 'Editor' sign. I am answered, as usual, by a bellowing, 'COME!'

He's on the telephone and so I gaze round his office while he continues to lambast some poor bugger. It is the most impersonal room I have ever seen. It never ceases to amaze me how a man so large in life, metaphorically and physically, can have so little effect on his surroundings. He has no photos on his desk, just mounds and mounds of paperwork. There are no pictures on the wall or indeed any evidence of personal effects whatsoever. Ironically, I think this is because he loves his job so much. He puts the receiver down.

'Joe, hi.'

'Holly! How's that cousin of yours? I looked for him in the Spanish Open last night.'

While I was trying to get the post of sports correspondent, I made up an imaginary superstar sportsman cousin called Bun tarn. I was about to call him Bunbury after Oscar Wilde's fictitious invalid in the country, but as soon as the first syllable was out of my mouth I realised Joe might get the literary connection. Buntam, bless him, clinched the job for me. The problem is that he plays championship golf (I'm nothing if not ambitious).

'He was ill. Couldn't play.'

'Too bad! What was wrong?'

'Er … flu.'

'Flu?' Now he says it, flu doesn't sound serious enough to keep Buntam out of a major championship.

'Well, flu-like symptoms. It was typhoid actually.' I nod vigorously.

'Typhoid? In Spain?'

'Well, he didn't catch it in Spain,' I hedge.

'Of course he didn't!'

'That's right! You know your tropical diseases, don't you?' I beam at Joe. It's just a pity I don't know mine. Or where to catch them. 'He caught it in, er, Africa?' Poor old Africa seems a large enough continent to harbour all manner of epidemics and Joe seems to be nodding sympathetically at this so I add more firmly, 'Yes, Africa.'

'What was he doing out there?'

'In Africa?' I ask needlessly to buy some precious thinking seconds. Joe nods.

'Er, well. He was playing golf, of course. For charity.' An unlikely vision flashes before me of the rugged plains and forests of Africa interspersed with twee little golf courses.

Happily, the same vision doesn't appear to Joe. 'Gosh, that was unlucky!' he exclaims.

'Well, you know Buntam. Disaster seems to dog his every footstep!' I resist the temptation to fan myself with one of the wads of paper from Joe's desk.

'He's certainly jinxed! I mean, he's played how many tournaments this year? Two? And both times I was away. And the things that have happened to him! Shame. Maybe I'll catch him next time.'

'Maybe!' But don't count on it, I add silently to myself.

I am so exhausted after the effort of my verbal gymnastics that it takes me a few seconds to remember why I am actually here. 'You wanted to see me?'

'Yeah. That was a good article you wrote yesterday on the Stacey fraud case.'

'Oh, thanks.'

'Is your friend OK?'

'Lizzie? She's OK.'

'Good! Your story is part of the reason I wanted to see you. Pete is leaving.'

'Yeah, I know. I just met him in the … er … in the …' I stumble as I remember that I shouldn't be in the lift at a quarter past nine. I should be in the actual building. Joe waves my amnesia to one side.

'But it's good news for you! What's the phrase? A foul wind that blows no fair? A fair wind that …' I think he may have got it right the first time. This is a nasty habit of his, mixing his metaphors. It's quite tricky working out what he actually wants to say. I stop the agonising.

'Is it?' I ask warily.

'Yeah, yeah, great news!'

'It is?'

'Yes, because do you know who the new crime correspondent is going to be?' Old Colshannon here may be slow on the uptake but I'm getting a pretty good idea. I blink nervously. Crime correspondent is a despised position and Smug Pete was on it in a last-ditch attempt to improve relations with the local police department (why Smug Pete would seem the obvious candidate I will never know). From what I can make out, the police are really aggressive towards us, we're aggressive back and write bad stuff about them and so it goes on. When the police post becomes vacant, folks hide under their desks for days. It is a career black hole and I'm about to be sucked into it.

Joe gets out of his chair, walks around to the front of the desk and perches on the edge of it. Do I feign enthusiasm for the moment and get out of it later? Or do I try and do it now?

A girl's got to eat so I opt for the former and give a little gasp of joy. This seems to please Joe and he positively beams at me. Good decision, Holly.

'It's you! I'm giving you this chance!'

'That's great! But, but … do you think I've got enough experience for something like the police beat?' Mock horror. Please say no. Please say no.

'Yes! Of course you have!' Rats. 'I'm giving you this chance! You deserve it!' He tilts his head and adopts a more serious note. 'Holly, I want you to make a go of this role. In the past we have always had the best people on it …'

OK, OK, what's he saying?

'… but they have been too aggressive, too pushy. I want you to build a better relationship with the police force. Pour oil on, er, you know, murky waters. Eat humble tart. Don't upset the apple pie. Do you understand what I'm saying?'

Er, no, not really, but I'll nod my head anyway.

'The
Journal
has always had a really good relationship with the police and it's been showing recently in their crime stories.' The
Bristol Journal
is the second largest paper in the region and our main competitor. We've taken it personally ever since they called our paper 'a debauched office party that can't tell the difference between Tony Blair and Tony Bennett.' I would dispute that wholeheartedly if only I knew who Tony Bennett was. They retracted the comment the next day under threats of litigation but steam still comes out of Joe's ears every time their name is mentioned.

He frowns deeply and continues, They always seem to be one step ahead of us when it comes to crime leads. I think they must have someone on the inside. Anyway, I need you to take the bear by the horns on this one.'

He pats my shoulder. 'I'm pleased we've had our little chat. I feel better now. Much better.'

Well, I'm glad someone does.

'Start Monday. Have a good weekend if I don't see you. Give Buntam my regards,' he adds breezily as he waves me out of the office.

Last year we had a swear box in the office for six months and all the proceeds went to charity. It had only been going for three months when we received a letter from The Guide Dogs for the Blind Association thanking us for our donations and saying that the money was now supporting four golden retrievers. Well, I was responsible for at least two dogs and one leg of the third. As much as I am in favour of such a worthy cause, my salary only goes so far and apparently swearing is not an attractive quality in a woman. So I devised a new swearing system using fruit and vegetables which, I am happy to say, caught on here in the office. Fruit and veg you hate are bad stuff, and those you love are good. So, my new position on the police beat is TURNIPS but Pete leaving is something like apples (obviously not strawberries or anything
really
yummy because that's reserved for the absolutely brilliant stuff). Now the office is littered with phrases such as, 'Can you believe it? That is really, like, swede, you know?'

Clearly the system is open to interpretation. There is one girl here who always yells, 'That is so kiwi!' down the phone. We wondered if we ought to explain the system to her again until someone pointed out that she has a lifelong allergy to kiwi fruit. I really have got to find something better than this to put on my CV.

So, the police beat is SWEDES, MARROWS, BRUSSELS SPROUTS and anything else horrible you care to mention.

'How's your day been?' Ben asks earnestly.

I look at him sardonically. There's a loaded question. We're sitting in Henry Africa's Hothouse for a Friday drinks-after-work thing. The giant palms are annoying me as one particularly troublesome leaf keeps scratching my head, and the setting sun is streaming through the windows and causing me to squint unattractively. Funnily enough, I'm not in the best of moods.

'Oh. You know. A bit peculiar.' I take an almighty suck of vodka through my straw. I have wafted a little orange juice under its nose but that was only to show willing.

'How peculiar?' He leans closer to me so that we can hear each other better in the excited, humming atmosphere of a bar on Friday night.

I pause and rest my chin on top of my glass with the straw still in my mouth – no point in being too far away from it. I've never really seen the use of straws before tonight but suddenly I understand. Do you know you don't have to move your head at all? 'They've made me the new crime correspondent for the paper!' I say with my new straw friend to one side of my mouth, and try to smile brightly through my glass.

'Is that good? I mean, didn't you say it was an awful job? What happened to Percy or whatever his name was?'

'Pete.' The giant palm tickles the top of my head again.

'What happened to Pete?'

I sigh deeply, breathing in vodka fumes. 'Left for a job with the
Daily Mail
.'

'Oh well. It's a sort of promotion, isn't it, really?'

I look at him sideways. If he only knew. 'That's one way of looking at it.'

'Holly Colshannon, crime correspondent on the
Bristol Gazette
.' He sketches out my new job title in the air with his hand.

'I suppose it sounds all right,' I say, returning my gaze to the cross-eyed examination of my ice cubes.

'It sounds great!' Ben says boisterously. Normally a punch in the arm or a slap round the back would accompany this. This is his jollying-her-out-of-it tone. Not terribly jolly when you realise that the slap/punch in question comes from a six-foot-three rugby player.

'Joe said he gave it to me because I did a good job on the Stacey fraud story.' The giant palm is looking for trouble now and I swat it away, trying not to lose my temper. I don't want to be remembered in here for ever as 'that girl who got into a fight with a palm tree'.