Who's That Girl (21 page)

'the friend' a drink. 'And can you make it a large one?' I smile sweetly. He throws me a smile that's tighter than his leather trousers. 'And for you?' As he turns to Lottie, his smile transforms into one that Larry Goldstein would be proud of. She blushes bright red. 'Um… yeah, a cider, please.'

'Coming right up.' He smiles again and gets up.

As soon as he's gone, she turns to me excitedly. 'So what do you think?'

That he's going to sleep with you, promise you the world, then let you down
, I want to cry, but it's like it says in
How to Be a Good Friend
- it's important to be diplomatic when a friend asks for your opinion. Plus I don't want to look like a total fruit-loop.

So instead I go for a more tactful approach with an ambivalent 'Hmm.'

'What?' She frowns in consternation.

'Oh, nothing.' I shrug.

Which of course is the sure-fire way to make her insist I tell her.

'No, go on,' she cajoles.

'Well, I didn't want to say anything…'

'No, tell me,' she demands, pressing me for more. Just like I hoped she would.

'It's just he's got a really bad reputation.'

Lottie looks at me with both alarm and disbelief. 'That's probably just people being jealous,' she replies after a moment's pause.

I hesitate. I'm aware I'm treading a fine line here. I want to warn her off, but I don't want her thinking it's because I'm after him for myself.

'Believe me when I say I've known guys exactly like him, and trust me, he's no good.'

She looks crestfallen. 'But he seems really cool.'

'He
thinks
he's really cool,' I correct her. 'There's a difference. You need to go out with someone who's going to love you, not themselves. Who understands you, who really, truly
gets
you.' All at once my mind returns to Miles and our conversation about the fireplace. God, what is it about that stupid fireplace? It's not like it's super-important or anything. 'Someone you can trust not to let you down,' I add quickly. Because for all Miles's faults, I know I can always depend on him and, if there's one thing I've learned, that's really important.

Lottie nods, but I can see she's not thinking about loyalty and trustworthiness, she's thinking about attractiveness and coolness. Because when I was her age, that's all I thought about when it came to potential boyfriends. Speaking of which.

'And who doesn't want to be the next Liam Gallagher,' I say pointedly, remembering Rob, who slept with his Oasis records. I start running through a few of the horrors I dated later on in my twenties. 'You also need someone who isn't an alcoholic,' that was Archie the trainee lawyer. I broke it off with him, but he was so drunk at the time he didn't remember. 'Here's a tip: if a man gets so drunk he passes out on the pavement outside the pub, leave him the number of his local AA and lose him faster than you can say "Taxi!"'

Lottie laughs, oblivious to the fact she's got all this to come.

Though with any luck she'll listen to some of what I'm saying and learn by my mistakes, I think hopefully.

'Oh, and you need someone who has ambition,' I add, remembering Zac, who lived in a tent in someone's back garden. Zac was tortured and deep and angst-ridden, and talked a lot about the agony of life and having integrity and passion. I agreed with everything he said, while secretly wishing that I too could be deep and angst-ridden. Unfortunately I was too shallow and ended up paying for everything. 'Someone with prospects,' I finish emphatically.

'Billy's in a band,' she replies eagerly.

'Exactly. Never date musicians or men with skateboards.'

She throws me a puzzled look and laughs. 'Don't be silly.'

'He's going to hurt you, Lottie,' I warn, my face suddenly falling serious. Painful memories that I've buried deep inside of me begin rising to the surface, and I feel a sense of urgency. 'Please stay away from him.'

'Hey.'

We're interrupted by Billy, who has reappeared empty-handed. 'I thought we could get some booze and go back to a friend's house instead. Have a little after-party. There's a few of us going.'

He looks straight at Lottie as if I'm invisible. 'Fancy coming along and joining us?'

My heart thuds. This is it.

'Well?' He waits, hands on hips. 'What do you say?'

No! Say no!

'Erm…' Lottie glances at me uncertainly. I can feel her wavering. On one side there's me in her head telling her no, and on the other there's her groin telling her very much yes.

'Actually, I don't feel that well,' I blurt desperately.

Well, I can't risk leaving this up to my twenty-one-year-old groin to decide, now can I?

'In fact I feel really nauseous. I think I need to go to the ladies'.'

Lottie looks at me, alarmed. 'Do you want me to come with you?'

'If you don't mind.' I nod weakly.

OK, so I feel a bit mean fibbing, but like I said, it's for my own good.

'Sorry.' Putting her arm round me, Lottie turns to Billy. 'But no, thanks.'

'No worries. Some other time maybe.' He shrugs and, turning away, lopes out of the pub'. Watching him leave, I stifle a small yet victorious smile.

Chapter Twenty

Great. That's the first thing crossed off my list. Sitting at my desk the next morning, I unfold the crumpled piece of paper on which I've scribbled down my tips and advice and, taking a large black marker, draw a line through:

l. Do not sleep with Billy Romani.

I'm feeling really pleased with myself. Last night was a total success. After Billy Romani left, I made a remarkable recovery; in fact ten minutes later I was feeling well enough to drive and gave Lottie a lift home alone. Which partly explains my good mood. The other reason is because it's my—

'Happy birthday!'

I look up to see the door swing wide open with Beatrice attached to it, a bit like one of those magician's assistants on a knife-throwing board. In her hands is a large cardboard box with

'Sprinkles' written across it in large swirly writing.

'There's only two of us so I didn't buy a cake,' she trills, her cheeks pink with excitement. 'Instead I got the Red Velvet cupcakes with special frosting. Just wait, you're going to become addicted!'

What she really means is 'Help!
I'm
already addicted. My name's Beatrice Spencer and I'm a cupcake-a-holic.'

'You shouldn't have!' I smile with amusement.

'Nonsense,' she says, setting the box down on my desk. 'You missed pudding last night, so you deserve a treat.' Flicking open the lid, she takes a deep, languorous inhale.

'Four?'

'Well, one's never enough,' she says sagely, peeling off the paper case. Beatrice, it seems, has turned into a cupcake-pusher so she can, quite literally, feed her habit.

'Mmm,' she groans orgasmically, burying her mouth in the frosting. I look at the cupcakes, sitting there in all their red devilness, oozing dairy, wheat and refined sugars, and probably contaminated with nuts from being near peanut-butter-flavoured ones. With all my allergies, I can't possibly eat them. Plus I'm trying to be healthy. Then again, I don't want to offend Beatrice, and a little bit probably wouldn't hurt, I tell myself, taking a nibble. And it
is
my birthday.

It's like a sugar overload. Soft, sweet buttery frosting and a rich, moist, chocolatey cupcake. Wow, I can see how Beatrice got hooked. Not that I ever would, I tell myself quickly, thinking about my training session this morning and feeling a stab of guilt. Hastily I put the cupcake down.

'So what are you doing tonight to celebrate?' Surfacing, Beatrice looks at me. The tip of her nose is covered in butter frosting.

'Having dinner with Miles and some friends.' I take a swig of coffee. 'Remember Vanessa and Julian?'

'Golly, no, I don't think so.' She taps her finger on her nose to think, then, discovering the frosting, licks it off hungrily.

'Here, look…' Tapping my keyboard, I click on to the photos on my computer until I find one of them together.

'Oh, yes, I remember now.' She nods. 'He's a lawyer.'

'Yes, that's right.'

'Jolly sexy,' she adds.

'You think so?' I look back at the photo. I know Julian's attractive, but it's hard to see your bestfriend's husband as sexy. I just can't see him in that way. Especially when I know all about his personal habits, such as using a nose-hair-trimmer and leaving the bits around the sink.

'If he was single, that is,' she adds hastily, obviously remembering her confession about flirting with Patrick, the married guy, at the spa. 'I mean, I'd never find him sexy or anything
now
.' She blushes bright red and makes a start on her second cupcake. 'So where are you going?'

'Back to that gastropub I went to with Miles on Monday.'

'Oh, fabulous! What are you going to wear?'

Beatrice's interest in my wardrobe never ceases to baffle me. She has no interest in her own clothes and recently asked me the name of 'that girl that I always see pictures of. It was Kate Moss.

'My Chloe dress, the one with the little capped sleeves that Miles bought me for Christmas.'

Well, actually, that's not strictly true, Miles bought me a gift certificate for House of Fraser, but I never have time to shop these days, so instead I treated myself to a beautiful dress from Net-aPorter online. Miles will never know I bought it from there. Or how much it cost.

Trust me, I've long since learned to tell Miles that everything costs a fraction of the actual price, thus saving him from a heart attack, and me from another financial lecture.

'Which reminds me, I've got to pick it up from the dry-cleaner's on the way home—' I'm interrupted by the phone ringing and glance at my watch. It's 9 a.m.

'That'll be the Cloud Nine people,' remarks Beatrice, polishing off the rest of her cupcake. As I go to pick up the phone, I catch her staring at the cupcake that's left with a look of such longing that any moment now she's going to start salivating. 'Go ahead, have it,' I tell her, reaching for the phone.

'Oh, no, I couldn't possibly,' she protests. Then, without even a missing beat, 'Oh, well, all right, if you insist.' And diving on it she gives a little hiccup of pure, unadulterated pleasure. When I was younger, my birthday was a huge deal. In 1997, the year I moved to London, I remember spending the whole day in constant celebration: taking phone calls from friends and family, opening presents from my co-workers, enjoying a boozy lunch at the pub with the rest of the office, before returning to work sometime late in the afternoon to eat cake and sober up ready for the evening's celebrations. God, I used to love my birthday!

Now of course it's business as usual.

After my conference call with Cloud Nine, I dash over to the tearooms at Liberty to meet Katie Proctor, which officially is a meeting about getting promotional features for our clients in the newspapers she writes for, but unofficially is a chance to catch up over iced lattes. Then I snatch five minutes to reply to emails on my BlackBerry - my inbox seems to fill up whenever I'm out of the office - before dashing for another appointment.

And another. And another. Until hours later I find myself sitting round a boardroom table with a lot of men in suits, discussing a campaign to raise awareness of a new range of hair masks by Johnny Bird, while surreptitiously glancing at the clock on the wall. It's my last meeting and it's running late. Like, really,
really
late.

Like the dry-cleaner's is shut late.

Screeching into the kerb half an hour later, I jump out of the car and dash across the road, but the shop's in total darkness.

Bollocks.

I stare in dismay at the 'closed' sign on the door.

What am I going to do now? My dress is in there. Along with everything else, I reflect, thinking about the huge pile of dry-cleaning that I finally got round to dropping off a couple of days ago. That's the problem with expensive designer clothes - they're all dry-clean only. You can't just chuck everything in the washer, like I used to do with my clothes when I was younger. But of course that's because they're better designed, better cut and made from much better fabrics, I remind myself.

Not that any of that is much good if I can't bloody wear them, I think, feeling a clench of irritation. Turning away from the shop, I climb back in my car. Saying that, even if I had something to wear, I don't have time to go home and change now anyway, I realise, glancing at the time on the dash board. The reservation's at 8 p.m. and it's ten to already. Hurriedly I pull out my make-up bag and after a quick onceover with some lip gloss, blusher and mascara, I turn the ignition and pull out into the traffic.

'Red or white?'

Entering the pub, I'm greeted by Vanessa, who jumps up from the table and energetically throws her arms round me. 'We can't decide and you're the birthday girl, so you get to choose!'

'Um…' Breaking free from her bear hug, I slide into the seat next to Miles, who stops munching on a breadstick to kiss me hello.

'Happy birthday, darling.' He smiles pleasantly, then frowns. 'I thought you were wearing the dress I bought you?'

'It's a long story.' I roll my eyes, then glance at the remaining empty seat. 'Where's Julian?'

'Working late,' says Vanessa, and we exchange looks. 'He says to start without him and he'll be here as soon as he can.' She smiles cheerfully. Anyone else would be fooled by her broad white smile, but I've known her too long: it doesn't reach her eyes. 'So what's it to be?' she enthuses, changing the subject and passing me the wine menu.

'Oh gosh.' I look at the dozens of wines. I don't know much about wine. As I've got older, I've progressed-from cider to Liebfraumilch to dry whites and learned that if you pay less than a fiver for a bottle, you're going to wake up with a very bad hangover, but that's about it. 'What about this Sauvignon Blanc from Australia…?'

'No, no, no.' Miles clicks his tongue. He likes to think of himself as something of a sommelier. 'If you're going to go for a Sauvignon Blanc, it has to be from the Marlborough region of New Zealand.'

'Oh, OK, then.' I shrug.