Santa Baby (4 page)

Vera looked meaningfully at Tiffany. ‘Please go and get the wine glasses.’

She did as she was told and wondered when Vera would choose to give her the bollocking that she knew was bound to come her way.

Tiffany knew that Vera didn’t like her because she was younger and prettier. And she knew that Vera resented the way that she had stood up for the other waitresses and waiters, many of whom were from Eastern Europe, when Vera had tried to pull a fast one by claiming they were not entitled to sickness or holiday pay, which in fact they were. But because Tiffany’s dad knew the owner of Mamma Mia’s, Vera had to play nice. But not that nice.

Tiffany was just putting on her coat at the end of her very long shift when Vera called her in to the tiny office at the back of the restaurant. She sat down behind the desk while Tiffany had to perch on the small stool. The office was so small that Vera’s large breasts seemed to dominate the room, encased as they were in a purple, shiny wrap dress. Like two giant Quality Streets, Tiffany thought, trying to cheer herself up. It was quite a combination set against Vera’s aquamarine eyes – coloured contact lenses, Tiffany was sure, though the manageress claimed they were naturally that colour.

‘I know how you like everything to be official and above the board,’ said Vera in her strongly accented English.

‘You just say above board,’ Tiffany couldn’t stop herself from saying.

Vera smiled. ‘So clever, Tiffany. I wonder why you are still waitressing?’

Tiffany’s stomach lurched. Was she going to be fired? She owed rent and needed to pay her phone bill. Why hadn’t she been nicer to the irritating couple?

‘So, this is a formal warning.’ Vera drummed her
purple
acrylic nails against the desk for emphasis. ‘If we have any more instances of poor service from you, then I shall have no choice but to let you go.’

Tiffany opened her mouth, all set to defend herself, then closed it. She didn’t want to say anything she might regret, anything that might give Vera the chance to get rid of her on the spot.

‘Do you understand?’ the manageress demanded, fixing her with a beady unnaturally blue glare.

‘I understand, Vera.’

For a week, Tiffany managed to keep her head down and stayed out of Vera’s bad books. But on Friday night, at eight o’clock, the customer at table fifteen proved to be her undoing. She was taking over from one of the other waitresses whose shift had finished. As she walked over to table fifteen, she was so busy avoiding other waiters who were rushing to tables with orders of food that she didn’t see who was sitting there until she was right in front of him. To her dismay, she saw it was the tosser from the nightclub, Gavin. Of all the people she had hoped she would never have to see again, he was high on her list. Number one, in fact. But maybe he wouldn’t recognise her? Customers often only saw the black waitress uniform and didn’t notice the face at all. Unfortunately, not Gavin.

‘Hello, Tiffany.’ He did his gross-out thing of looking her up and down.

‘I’ve just signed another big deal and was in the area and fancied pizza. I’m slumming it a bit, to be honest. Usually I’d go to Nobu or J. Sheekey’s. But you know when you get that urge for something really cheap?’ He put extra emphasis on ‘cheap’.

‘Well, here’s your starter.’ Tiffany tried to sound casual, even though every inch of her was screaming: ‘Wanker alert!’ Was it pure chance that he had ended
up
in her restaurant or had the creep planned it?

She placed the garlic bread with melted mozzarella in front of him, trying to manoeuvre her body so as to put the maximum amount of distance between them. But all the time she was aware of Gavin’s arrogant gaze raking over her.

‘Black pepper?’ she asked, reaching for the tall pepper grinder.

He nodded. As she twisted the wooden grinder, he said, ‘I see you’re good with your hands. Is that how you supplement the pathetic wages you get here?’

She managed to put the grinder back on the table without decking him across the head with it. ‘Can I get you anything else?’

‘I’ll have a bottle of wine. The best one the restaurant does, even though I’m prepared for it to taste like shite.’ He gave a nasty little smile. ‘I don’t suppose you can tell the difference.’

What was he playing at? Had she really dented his ego that much that he wanted to seek her out and wind her up? He was a bully, she decided as she went to fetch his wine, as well as being a wanker.

Carlo was behind the bar. ‘Tough night?’ he asked sympathetically. Lovely Carlo, whose wife had just had a baby so he was having to work extra shifts. Vera was always especially mean to him as he showed no interest in her and she fancied him.

‘Tough customer,’ Tiffany muttered.

‘Do you want me to serve him? I saw him looking at you in a way I don’t like. If ever a man looks at my daughter like that, I will punch him.’

It was probably not a good idea if Carlo went anywhere near Gavin.

‘I’ll be OK, thanks, Carlo.’ And Tiffany picked up the bottle of Montepulciano which was actually a very good bottle of wine, not that Gavin would realise.

‘Is it worth me tasting it first?’ he asked sneeringly.

‘It’s entirely up to you.’

‘Oh, just pour it.’

Tiffany carefully poured out a glass. Gavin took a sip, wincing as he did so. ‘It’s rougher than I’m used to.’

‘I’ll go and get your pizza,’ Tiffany said, itching to get away from him.

She could feel her cheeks burning with suppressed anger as she walked away. She longed to go and let off steam with one of her fellow waiters but Vera was on the war-path. Instead she served another couple of tables, but all too soon Gavin’s American Hot was ready.

As she approached she could hear him talking to Zena, a young Polish waitress.

‘You ought to get yourself down a lap dancing club. Great figure like yours, you’d be raking it in. Lots of Poles there … pole dancing. Get it?’

Zena blushed and looked embarrassed. ‘I’m happy here, thank you very much,’ she said in her sweet broken English.

‘Seriously, what time do you finish here? I could take you to a club …’

‘Thank you, no, I cannot.’

Realising that he wasn’t going to get anywhere with Zena, Gavin turned nasty. ‘Expect you’ve got a cleaning job to go to. Good scrubber are you?’

Zena had tears in her eyes as she walked away from him.

He really was a piece of work. Racist, sexist and a total wanker! He was the gift that kept on giving.

‘Ah, here’s my pizza girl. Hey, pizza girl, why can’t you smile like that pretty waitress? Don’t you want to get a nice fat tip from me? I don’t suppose you earn anything here.’

Something snapped in Tiffany. She’d had more than enough of him. And she’d had enough of being treated
like
shit, not just by Gavin but by a long line of customers, so many of whom had been rude, talked to her as if she didn’t matter, as if she was nothing. Six months of pent-up rage boiled over in her. Before Gavin knew what had hit him, she dumped the piping hot pizza on to his lap. And, as he yelled in protest she picked up the bottle of wine. ‘Bit hot for you, sir, is it? Here … have this.’ And she poured half the contents over his head, the red wine running down his arrogant face like blood. ‘Enjoy your meal, sir. It’s been a pleasure serving you.’

She swung round in time to see Vera advancing towards her, breasts jutting like torpedoes, an almost gleeful expression on her face as if she was relishing the prospect of a scene.

‘You don’t need to say anything, Vera, I quit.’ And to the cheers of the other waiters and some of the customers, Tiffany took off her apron, flung it to the ground and marched off.

Vera was still fussing over Gavin as she passed them.

‘I’ll sue!’ Gavin shouted after her.

‘So will I … for harassment, you dickhead!’

Tiffany was buoyed up on a wave of anger and righteous indignation all the way to Leicester Square tube station. It was only when she realised that she had run out of credit on her Oyster card and had barely enough change for her tube ticket home that the enormity of what she’d just done hit her. She had quit her job! And, yes, she had hated it, but the people she’d worked with were nice, apart from evil Vera, and she didn’t have to think too hard about what she was doing. Now she was going to have to get another job … another shit job.

She scrabbled around in her jacket pocket, needing just ten pence more for her fare, and her fingers touched an envelope. She pulled it out. It was the letter
her
dad had given her the other week.
Oh, well
, she thought,
I may as well see the damage
. She ripped it open, and as she read the letter it was as if everything and everyone around her faded away into the distance. The people rushing to get their trains, the thwack of the ticket barriers opening and closing, the announcements, all vanished. The letter was from her real mum, Tanya, and she had sent it to the social worker first, asking her to pass it on to Tiffany. The writing was barely legible and the spelling pretty bad, but the meaning was clear enough.

I thought Tiffany should know that she has a half-sister. She’s Angel Summer – the famous model. I don’t know if Angel will want to know her. She came and saw me once but didn’t do nothing for me, and didn’t want to know me after. But maybe she could do something for Tiffany. And I wanted to say sorry to both of them, to Angel and Tiffany. Sorry I couldn’t be a mum to them.

As if in a daze Tiffany looked up from the letter. Someone bashed into her in their haste to reach the ticket barrier, but she hardly noticed. Angel Summer, the former glamour model now turned TV presenter, famous for her beauty and for being married to the gorgeous England footballer, Cal Bailey … she was Tiffany’s half-sister! It seemed too incredible to be true, the plot of of a Hollywood movie. It couldn’t possibly be true, could it? And yet why would Tanya lie about such a thing?

Tiffany made her way to the platform, feeling as if her world had just been turned upside down and inside out. And in a twist of fate, staring right at her from across the track, on a massive billboard advertising her new TV show, was Angel.

TIFFANY CHEWED THE
end of her pen as she tried to come up with a letter to her sister that would make her sound sane and not like some loony-tune stalker. But it was proving so difficult. How should you break the news that out of the blue you have found out you are someone’s long-lost sister? You couldn’t exactly Google tips from the internet. For her fifth attempt – the last four had ended up in the bin – she got straight to the point:

Dear Angel,

You don’t know me but I am writing to let you know that I have just found out that you could be my half-sister. I know how mad that must sound but it’s true. I recently got in contact with Tanya, our ‘real’ mum, and afterwards she wrote and told me about our connection. I don’t want anything from you; the chance to see you is all I ask. My meeting with Tanya didn’t exactly go well …

So here’s some stuff about me: I’m twenty-two, I live in London. I’m Aquarius. My favourite colour is red. My favourite book is
Wuthering Heights
. My favourite film is
Little Miss Sunshine
– I always cry at the ending. I’ve got a tattoo of a dolphin on my ankle. My dad is a carpenter, but wants to be a chef,
my
step-mum is a classroom assistant, and I have a half-sister, Lily-Rose, who wants to be Lady Gaga. I studied Fashion and Textiles at college and I’m trying to get my career as a stylist off the ground – at the moment it’s a case of Tiffany Taylor, stylist to no one but herself. I love going to the cinema, clubbing and girlie nights in. And I’ll stop there in case you think I really am a stalker – I’m not.

Tiffany sighed after she’d read through her letter, having no idea whether she had got it right. It was probably the best she could come up with in the circumstances.

After some research she had tracked down Angel’s agent and planned to send the letter to them. Kara had been all for her writing to Angel; in fact, was wildly excited about it. However, Tiffany hadn’t yet told her dad and Marie, as she didn’t want to give them anything to worry about. She sealed the letter in the envelope and wrote Angel’s name on the front, c/o The Carrie Rose Agency, and stuck on a stamp. Then she quickly grabbed her jacket and ran out of the flat to post the letter, before she could change her mind. As she shoved the envelope into the letter-box she wondered if she would ever hear back from Angel.

That night she went round to Kara’s flat in Camden. Her dad had bought it as a rental investment, but Kara had begged him for it, and as she could pretty much twist her dad round her little finger he’d agreed. Harley had moved in as well but Kara’s mum and dad didn’t know that so every time they came over she had to remove all traces of her boyfriend. Harley had got used to living out of a suitcase.

‘Harley’s out playing football so we can have a total girlie time. We can watch Angel’s TV show, I recorded
it
this morning,’ Kara declared as she let Tiffany in. ‘I’ve got fizzy wine from M&S and a chicken Caesar salad.’

Even when she was relaxing at home Kara always looked as if she had made an effort, with perfect make-up and freshly washed and blow-dried hair. Tonight she was wearing a pink Juicy Couture tracksuit, coordinated with pink nail varnish and pink UGGs, and a necklace with a pink diamante K hanging from it. Tiffany couldn’t help wondering if it was in fact Kara who was related to Angel. Style-wise they were a perfect match, both sharing a passion for pink, trackies and UGGs, none of which Tiffany cared for one little bit. In fact, it was a running joke between her and Kara that she wouldn’t be seen dead in a pair of UGGs and Kara was always trying to persuade her to try some on, telling her that once she did there would be no going back. She too would be hooked on the ridiculously comfortable boots.

Tiffany slipped off her very un-UGG-like leopard-print high courts and followed Kara into the small but beautifully decorated flat. Everything was cream or white, except the bedroom which was a girlie girl’s paradise of pink. The curtains had love hearts on them, there were pink flower-shaped fairy lights decorating the mirror, a bright pink duvet cover, a pale pink sheepskin rug. Tiffany often wondered how Harley felt about sleeping in such a room, where even the sheets were pink. She figured he was man enough to cope.