‘Quite obviously a garden.’
He took out a huge bunch of keys, holding each one up to the light in turn before settling on one that was long and shiny and so big it might have been filled with chocolate.
‘We try to keep it as it would have been in the mid eighteenth century, but it isn’t easy,’ he said as he pushed open the heavy door. I ducked under his arm and gasped at what I saw. The inside of the house might have been musty and old and depressing, but the garden … the garden was something else.
‘I must have walked past this house a million times,’ I said, turning circles on the lawn, trying to get as much of the garden as possible into my eyes. Everything was so green and lush. ‘Sam, it’s gorgeous.’
‘Samuel,’ he said with a sigh. ‘It was important to those who could afford it to keep a beautiful outdoor space. Life indoors could get awfully stuffy, sweltering in the summer and sooty and unpleasant in the winter back then, I imagine.’
‘Back then, right now,’ I replied. ‘I can’t imagine having a garden of my own in London. I haven’t even got a settee.’
‘I haven’t even got my own bed,’ he reminded me, wandering over to a hydrangea bush, covered in soft purple and blue flowers. ‘These were introduced to Britain in the nineteenth century. Flower arranging was very popular at the time. Lots of people decorated their homes with greenery from their own gardens.’
‘Well, their homes were fairly disgusting,’ I reasoned, leaning in to sniff the flower but resisting the urge to pick one. I didn’t want Sam to faint. He was tall, I’d never be able to catch him. ‘And I guess there wasn’t much on the telly.’
‘Just the three channels,’ he said with a little laugh.
‘Imagine not having Sky,’ I commented with a sad cluck.
‘I’m joking, of course,’ he replied. ‘The television as we know it wasn’t invented until the 1920s and wasn’t popularized until the 1950s.’
Gazing up into his eyes, I sighed at the task ahead of me.
‘You’d be amazing on a pub quiz team,’ I told him. ‘Remind me to take you to the King’s Head next Thursday.’
My phone was in my hand before I even realized it. Opening up the camera app, I squared the hydrangea in frame.
‘Oh no,’ Sam said, holding his hand in front of the photos. ‘We don’t allow photographs in the gardens or the house, not without prior consent.’
No wonder I’d never heard of this place; it wasn’t just a museum about the nineteenth century, they thought it was still the nineteenth century.
‘And who do I need to get permission from?’ I asked, wiping my camera lens on my sleeve. I couldn’t touch his bloody books but he could put his mitts all over my new iPhone.
‘Me, I suppose,’ he replied.
‘Then can I take the photo please, Dr Page?’
He considered the request for far too long.
‘Yes,’ he said eventually. I was amazed to see the flower was even still in bloom by the time he answered. ‘But I’d rather you didn’t post it on the internet. We don’t want hordes of people running in here, traipsing around and breaking things.’
The man made no sense.
‘Then why bother having a museum?’ I asked. ‘If you’re not going to share it with people.’
‘To preserve something important,’ he replied, again talking to me as though it should have been obvious. ‘Not everyone is entitled to everything. Some things don’t exist solely to be exploited.’
‘Sharing isn’t exploiting,’ I argued, lowering my phone. Was there really any point in taking a photo if I couldn’t show it to anyone?
Yes, the devil on my shoulder answered. I quickly snapped a pic and saved it to my photo albums.
‘Thank you for the grand tour,’ I said, even though it had been far from grand and not really a tour. More like a sit-down, don’t-touch-anything and no-you-can’t-go-upstairs. It was Graceland all over again, only without the fried peanut-butter-and-banana sandwich at the end. Unless I went home and made one for myself.
‘Here.’
I couldn’t believe my eyes. Sam reached into the hydrangea bush and snapped off one of the pale, purple blooms.
‘Thank you,’ I said, cradling the flower in my hands. ‘It’s gorgeous.’
‘It’s only going to die anyway,’ he reasoned, giving his beard a good scratch. ‘You might as well have it die in your house.’
‘Thanks,’ I replied, not sure I wanted it any more. ‘Nice positive thinking.’
Sam replied with a sneeze.
‘My hay fever,’ he said, snuffling into a white cotton handkerchief retrieved from his pocket. ‘Might we go back inside?’
‘We might,’ I agreed, taking one last look at his secret garden before going back into the mouldy manor. Stuffy and unwelcoming from the outside but surprisingly beautiful once you were allowed in.
I looked back at Sam, hurrying inside the house with long, loping steps.
Maybe there was hope after all.
CHAPTER TEN
Thursday, 12 July: Twenty-Two Days to Go
215 followers
‘I have learned so much from this bet already,’ Mir said, blankly scrolling through her Instagram feed and pausing on the latest post from Sam’s new account, @TheHipHistorian. ‘What kind of attention-seeker has a state funeral for their amputated leg?’
‘So extra,’ Brian agreed. ‘I kind of love it.’
The Hip Historian’s Instagram account was on fire. Well, it was smouldering around the edges at the very least. We’d been up for two days, posting pic after pic along with some truly fascinating facts from the epic list Sam had provided. There was nothing that man didn’t know about, as long as it occurred at least a century ago and the knowledge itself was utterly useless. I mean, who knew the Leaning Tower of Pisa was never straight to begin with? Sam. Sam knew. We already had over two hundred followers and it was growing every second. Zadie, my beloved new intern, had spent what seemed like every waking hour researching and following all the appropriate accounts, getting follow-backs, creating gifs and uploading our memes to every possible outlet. So far, so good.
‘Mexico is a beautiful country, it’s not like there was nothing to do there,’ I said as I put the finishing touches to Lily’s latest empties video. If it didn’t upload on time, her fans would riot. ‘General Santa Anna needed to get out more.’
‘You need to get out more,’ Bri commented, leaning back in his chair. ‘Look at those glowing, pink cheeks. You’re a girl in desperate need of a hangover.’
‘No thanks,’ I said, rubbing the life back into my dry eyes. ‘Have you ever tried editing a YouTube video hungover?’
He gave me a look. We both knew full well that he had.
‘He has a point,’ Mir said, siding with the enemy. ‘You’ve been killing yourself lately, between all your regular work, the bet, helping Sam, all the SetPics stuff. Why don’t you knock off early, I’ll finish Lily’s video.’
I shook my head and smiled. ‘As if you’re not doing exactly the same thing. It’s fine, this is temporary. Once we’re incredibly rich and insanely successful, I’ll be flat on my back on a superyacht in the south of France, Rihanna on one side, assorted celebrity Ryans on the other, I promise.’
‘As long as it is temporary,’ she replied, shaking three different Coke cans on her desk in an attempt to find a live one. ‘All work and no play makes Annie a sociopathic shut-in.’
‘Agreed,’ Bri said with a sage nod. ‘I hate to say it, buddy, but you’ve been on a dick-tox too long.’
Miranda spat out her Diet Coke.
‘I know I’m going to regret asking, but can you run that past me again?’
‘A dick-tox,’ Brian repeated the word, as though it was an explanation in itself. ‘Dick detox, like Dry January or Oct-Sober only it’s more like a No-Peen-November. Or in Annie’s case, a No-Dick-Decade.’
‘Thank god the interns have gone home already,’ Mir said, shaking her head sadly. ‘Also
, it’s July.’
‘It hasn’t been a decade,’ I argued, trying to remember just exactly how long it had been. ‘More like a year.’
Brian gasped. Miranda sighed. I shrugged.
‘What? It’s not a big deal.’
‘That’s the problem with a dick-tox, once it’s out of your system, you don’t know how to get it back in,’ Brian said. ‘So to speak.’
‘He’s right,’ Mir muttered into her can. ‘Because, no matter what people tell you, it is nothing like riding a bike.’
Brian clapped his hands loudly. ‘We’ve got to get you back on the horse. A Sandwich Man, a little snack to keep you going between meals.’
‘A man-wich?’ Miranda nodded approvingly. ‘Maybe a nice French baguette.’
‘I’m more likely to end up with a mouldy bit of Hovis and a floppy piece of plastic ham from Aldi,’ I replied, holding up a hand to silence Brian before he could start. ‘And don’t start on Aldi. I know, I know, it’s a perfectly good supermarket.’
‘If you’d rather pay over the odds for fancy packaging, you go ahead,’ he sniffed.
‘So that’s it, is it?’ Mir asked. ‘You’re retiring from dating altogether? Stitching it up and calling it quits?’
I considered the question and all the existing relationships in my life. Becks and Boring Alan, Miranda and Mess-Around Martin, my dad and his three identikit wives. And that was before you thought about poor Sam, sat in his office, ploughing through all three Fifty Shades books in an attempt to keep his relationship together.
‘Yes,’ I replied. ‘Do you know anyone who can do it for me?’
‘Positive attitude, that’s what I like to hear,’ Brian replied. ‘So, shall we kill ourselves now or later?’
‘Later,’ I said, going back to Lily’s video. ‘If this doesn’t upload by seven, there’ll be three million fourteen-year-olds on the street, screaming for my blood.’
‘It’s like working at Grey Gardens,’ Brian said, closing his laptop with a slap. ‘I’m off. I shall see you ladies tomorrow.’
Miranda rolled her eyes and grinned over her laptop as he kissed her on the top of the head, hit my high five and strolled out the door, whistling loudly.
‘What can I do to help?’ she asked, dumping all three empty cans in the recycling bin. ‘You need me to set up links or anything?’
Before I could answer, Mr Mess-Around himself appeared in the hall outside our office. Mir straightened up and tossed her head, the angles of her face sharpening into an arched brow and a half-smile.
‘Knew you’d still be here,’ he said, holding up a hand by way of a hello. ‘I’ve got two tickets to some rooftop film thing, starts in an hour or so. I wondered if you wanted them?’
‘You’re not going?’ I asked, watching Miranda, watching Martin.
‘Not on my own,’ he replied. ‘Should be fun though – there’s drinks included.’
‘Why don’t you go with Miranda?’ I suggested, a picture of innocence. ‘I’ve still got loads to do, no way I’ll be out of here in an hour and it’d be a crime to waste an open bar.’
The two of them looked at each other with wide eyes and blank expressions, neither wanting to seem too enthusiastic or too disinterested.
Martin spoke first.
‘I’m in,’ he said. ‘I mean, if you fancy it?’
‘What film is it?’ Miranda asked. It was very impressive, I could tell by the way her hands were balled up into tight little fists she was chomping at the bit.
‘Does it matter?’ Martin replied. ‘You can never concentrate on the film at these things anyway.’
Miranda swayed back and forth, deliberating.
‘You sure you don’t want to come?’ she asked, looking back at me over her shoulder. ‘Brian did have a point.’
‘I’ll go with you next time,’ I promised, imagining the look on her face if I suddenly changed my mind, decided I wanted to go and sent Martin off on his Jack Jones. ‘Have fun.’
She sighed at the pair of us, as though she was doing everyone a tremendous favour, then picked up her backpack and pushed Martin through the door with almost indecent haste.
‘Don’t do anything I wouldn’t do,’ I called as they vanished down the hallway, leaving me and my YouTube videos in peace.
I wasn’t sure how it happened but the sun was going down by the time I closed my computer. Another late night, another rumbling stomach, another inevitable visit from my good friends at Deliveroo. Whoever was in charge of my account at the credit card company had to be worried about me.
The building always emptied out earlier in the evenings when the weather was good and, luckily for Martin and Miranda, it was a beautiful evening, a British summertime unicorn; warm without being sticky and a gorgeous sky that had been painted with the broad strokes of a sunset by the time I found myself outside.
‘Pulling a late one?’
I looked to my left to see Charlie leaning against the building with his phone in his hand.
‘They’re all late ones at the moment,’ I replied with a stifled yawn. My voice sounded croaky in my ears and the words scratched my throat. I fumbled around in my bag for my ever-present refillable water bottle.
‘You look like you could use something stronger,’ he said, nodding at the flask as I sipped the dregs. ‘Fancy a drink?’
A drink? With a boy? On a Thursday? Spontaneity, thy name is Annie.
‘Why not?’ I said, smiling. A sudden fizziness replaced the rumbling in my stomach.
Charlie grinned, cancelled his Uber and put his phone back in his pocket.
‘Come on then,’ he said, leading the way. ‘You can tell me how close I am to winning our bet.’
When we first moved into The Ginnel, Miranda and I had found ourselves locked in the King’s Head after hours more times than I cared to remember. Actually, more times than I could remember. It was nice to have a work local to retire to after a long (or not so long) day in the office, it made Content feel more legit. If I told Mir I’d meet her in the pub, she’d know where I meant. But the last couple of months had been so non-stop, we’d barely crossed the threshold. Plus Brian was barred for standing on the bar and screaming at everyone for not supporting Taylor Swift enough when her last album came out. He was such a loyal soldier.
‘I love a proper pub,’ Charlie said, dumping his bag on a wooden bench outside the front door. ‘Manky carpet, dark wood, terrifying locals. Exactly what a pub should be.’
‘I’m surprised,’ I said, waving to Maria, the landlady, through the window. ‘I had you down as more of a private members’ club kind of a man.’
He rolled up his shirtsleeves as he laughed. ‘I am a member of Shoreditch House.’
‘Of course you are,’ I replied. ‘What are you drinking?’
‘I’ll get them,’ he insisted. ‘What’ll it be?’
‘Gin and tonic,’ I said with confidence. ‘I’ve tried both wines, the red and the white, and they do not come recommended.’
‘Noted.’
As he walked inside, I noticed a group of women at the next table give him the once-over before turning their attention to me. Two of them flicked their eyes away as soon as they realized I was watching while the other smiled, embarrassed, before they returning to their conversation. I wondered what it was that they saw. I knew exactly what they saw in Charlie. If you clicked on the hashtag ‘hottie’ on Insta, you’d eventually find a photo of him, but what did they think when they looked at me? What was my hashtag? Without time to craft a clever caption, it was difficult to explain why I was a boss, why my life was goals. All they saw was a tired brunette, badly in need of a filter.
‘So.’ Charlie sat back down with two glasses of gin in one hand and two bottles of tonic in the other. ‘What’s keeping you at work so late?’
‘The inability to do ten things at once,’ I told him. ‘You?’
‘We’re working with an American company on a campaign,’ he replied, pouring my tonic into the gin and
then passing it across the table. ‘They’re based in LA. It’s the strangest thing, everyone wants to work on the campaign but no one wants to stick around to do the late-night conference calls.’
‘How peculiar.’ I clinked my glass against his. ‘To being the boss?’
‘I should have got shots,’ he said with a grimace. ‘Some days I wonder if it’s worth it. Must be nice to have a business partner, to not be in it alone.’
‘It is,’ I agreed, sipping slowly. Why was gin so delicious? ‘When things get hard, it’s good to have someone around to keep you going, but it’s also a massive pain in the arse when you don’t agree on something. We’re usually on the same page but when we’re not, it’s tricky.’
He nodded, rubbing the two-day stubble on his chin.
‘When I started up, I was planning to do the partner thing,’ Charlie said. ‘But it didn’t work out. Probably for the best, I have enough trouble keeping relationships going.’
Something in my stomach dropped.
‘Not that I’ve got a girlfriend,’ he added quickly.
‘It’s hard to find a work–life balance,’ I said, refusing to let on how happy I was to discover he was single. Brian and Miranda were right: I’d been off the wagon for too long. Perhaps it was time to jump back up on the horse and ride Charlie like a bike. Or something.
‘Am I allowed to ask about the bet?’ He stretched his long legs out underneath the table, bumping my knee with his. Whether it was on purpose or not, he didn’t move it. ‘Or is that off the agenda?’
I flushed, choking on my answer before clearing my throat with gin.
‘God, imagine if you could actually agree to an agenda before a date,’ I said with a skittering laugh, tucking my legs underneath my seat. ‘Life would be so much easier.’
‘A date?’ Charlie leaned forwards across the table, backlight by the fading summer light. ‘I thought this was just a friendly drink. Ms Higgins, are you trying to take advantage of me?’
‘No!’ I spluttered. ‘You mentioned agendas and I thought it would be funny if you could have an agenda for a date, not that this is a date, and why are you laughing, you arse?’